Random Food Fridays - Butternut Squash and Kale Saute

Yum, oh YUM! Please pass me some!

I was inspired to make this dish by a cooking demo at the Auburn Farmers' Market a couple of weeks ago. Their FM Association uses produce from the vendors to show folks how easy and delicious veggies can be. Because I wanted to share this yummy dish with Mr. Dwayne, I made one adjustment and that was to leave out the wonderful curry spice mix they used. (Sold at the FM for $5 a jar!) Even without the curry flavor, it is savory, sweet and so good. I've made this twice in the weeks since the demo. It is also an awesome frittata filling. Yum!

Butternut and Kale Saute
1 tbsp. olive oil
2 cups of butternut squash that has been peeled and cubed
1 large shallot, sliced thin
1 cup of apple, peeled and cubed
4 cups of kale that has had the ribs removed and been cut into thin ribbons
About 1/2 cup water or broth
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Heat the oil in a large saute pan and add the butternut squash, shallot and apple. Over a medium flame, cook until the squash begins to become tender. Add the water a little at a time, if the squash begins to stick to the bottom of the pan. The steam will help the squash to cook and keep the dish from scorching. Once the squash becomes tender, add the kale ribbons and a little more water. Toss to combine and cover. Let the kale steam for a few minutes until it is tender. Adjust seasoning and serve.

Butternut and Kale Frittata
1/2 cup Butternut and Kale saute
2 eggs
1 tbsp. Greek yogurt
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
2 tbsp. grated Parmesan cheese

Add the veggies to an 8 inch omelet pan with an oven proof handle. If it is not non-stick, add a little butter first. While the veggies are heating, beat the eggs, yogurt, salt and pepper together in a bowl. Add the egg mixture to the pan. Place a rack on the top shelf of your oven and heat up the broiler. Gently lift the edges of the frittata and let the liquid egg run under the cooked part. When the eggs have barely set, but are still runny on top, sprinkle with the cheese and place under the broiler. Broil just until the cheese melts. Remove from the oven and gently tilt and scoot the frittata onto your plate and eat!

Rose Hip Syrup

I've been taking care of my great grandmother's and my grandmother's roses for years. I retired from caring for my grandma's roses when she sold her house. I still care for the roses that are left from my great grandmother as we've lived in her house for almost 30 years. I was taught to dead head roses right away. By doing this, you keep the roses' energy directed at blooming at not at completing the reproductive cycle. If I ever saw a rose hip developing, I thought, "Dang! I missed one." Not, "Yay! Rose hip syrup!" When I discovered a cache of rose hips in a parking lot I knew it was my big chance.

I keep my eyes open for foraging opportunities as I wander through my life. Turns out that there is a rose hedge, next to my Trader Joe's, that has been pretty much abandoned. For a forager, this is a good thing. I know it hasn't been sprayed or fertilized for some time. There was once an Italian food market on the other side of the rose hedge from TJ's, but now there is a pet supply store and they don't have any interest in the roses. The rose hips on these bushes are large and orangey yellow. You may see wild roses with little red hips. I've read that these are very good for syrup too.

My friend, Miss Pauline, who is a gardening genius, told me that rose hips are sweeter after a frost. I'd be awaiting a frost for long months in this climate. There are some winters where we don't have a frost at our elevation at all. I have now made two batches of rose hip syrup, from these same bushes. The first batch was made when the hips were larger and juicier. For the second batch, the hips were dryer and some had been a bit sunburned. My perception is that the first batch has less bitterness than the second. It may be that in cold climates, the rose hips would freeze while still moist. With our unseasonable heat, they've just been drying up. If these hips are available next year, I'll try to work with them in September, when they are still plump.

As I researched recipes for rose hip syrup, I found many war time references. Check out this article that explains how rose hip syrup was used to prevent scurvy in the UK during WW II. Rose hips are very high in vitamin C. Because of the vitamin C content, I thought they would be very sour. I was thinking of a flavor something like hibiscus, but this rose hip syrup is nothing like that. I smells and tastes like apples, almonds and rose petals all in one. The flavor has a subtle bitterness that I balanced out with lemon juice. The lemon juice also brought up the acidity to a safe level for water bath canning. Some recipes for this type of syrup are thick with sugar. I didn't intend to end up with a syrup suitable for pancakes or a dessert topping. I wanted a syrup more analogous to fruit juice for flavoring soda water. I really like this flavor and it's like no soda I've ever had before. It is a great way to get a good dose of vitamin C in a tasty, sparkling form.

Rose Hip Syrup
2 pounds ripe rose hips
3 quarts water
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup lemon juice

Wash the rose hips and remove any extra stems or flower parts. Place in a large pot and add the water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer until tender - about 90 minutes. Mash the hips with a potato masher and simmer about 10 minutes more.

Place a colander over a smaller sauce pot and line the colander with at least 6 layers of cheese cloth. Pour the rose hip mash into the colander and let drain. If you want a clear liquid, as for jelly, let it drain slowly with no pressure. I squeezed every last bit of liquid out of mine! You can prepare everything up to this step, add the lemon juice and refrigerate until ready to bottle.

When ready to bottle, prepare 6 half-pint jars and lids and the boiling water bath. Bring the liquid to a boil and stir in the sugar. Simmer while waiting for the BWB come to a boil. It will reduce slightly. Carefully ladle the syrup into hot, sterilized jars. Wipe rims and top with lids and rings and close to a finger tightness. Process in the boiling water bath for 10 minutes. Carefully remove and allow to cool.

Makes 5 to 6 half pints.

For a refreshing soda, add 3 tbsp. syrup to a pint of sparkling water and ice.

Random Food Fridays - Apple Sauce

It's apple time! We've been waiting for the cool Fall breezes for a while now. Our temperatures were close to a hundred right up through the end of September. We've had overcast for a few days now and I am hoping for the rain. Nothing makes our air (which can be pretty exhaust filled) smell so clean as the first good rain of Fall.

You may recall that I made homemade pectin out of green apples from my father-in-law's MacIntosh tree. I can usually make the green apple pectin sometime in June. The ripe apple harvest happens in September. I had two big grocery bags of apples on my kitchen floor for a couple of weeks. I'm lucky. These apples have such great character (flavor and aroma) that they forgave me for allowing them to get a little overripe.

MacIntosh apples are one of the great cooking apples. They are tart and sweet and cook down nicely. I decided to make apple sauce out of these apples. I read the Ball Blue Book for basic instructions, such as acidity and timing for the boiling water bath, but I did not follow their recipe. Most apples are acidic enough that you need not add anything to them to bring them to a safe PH for the boiling water bath. Even so, I love some lemon to brighten things up. Unless you burn it or allow it to spoil, it's really hard to make apple sauce taste bad. I spent about an hour coring the apples and removing any bad spots. (There were a few worms, but hey, they are healthy organic worms!) I had enough to fill my three biggest pots! To each pot, I added 1/4 cup lemon juice, 1/2 cup sugar, two cups of water, a good sprinkling of cinnamon and a dash of salt. I didn't peel the apples because I just run the cooked apples through a food mill. I think I capture some of the color and nutrients of the peel that way. (And really, who wants to peel when you don't have to?)

 Here they are, cooking away. I smashed them with a potato masher to help them break down. 

After about 30 minutes of simmering, they were soft enough to put through the food mill. I ended up with my big stock pot FULL of apple sauce! At this point, I put the big pot in the fridge for the night and went to bed.

The next evening, after work, I sterilized my jars and lids, prepared the hot water bath and heated up the apple sauce. This is when I tasted and adjusted for flavor. It tasted just right to me. You can always add more lemon, sugar or spice. When everything was nice and hot, I ladled into wide mouth pint jars, used a bamboo skewer to release the bubbles and processed for 20 minutes. My two brown grocery bags full of apples turned into 12 pints of apple sauce. I must say, it's really good! To make yummy apple sauce, you don't need to tackle 12 pints' worth. Even if you buy a couple of pounds of good apples at the farmers' market, you can make apple sauce by this same method and just store it in the fridge for a week or so. I bet you eat it all before you find out how long it takes to go bad!

Random Food Fridays - White Bean Guacamole

I can't believe I haven't given you a RFF post since September 7th! Life has been pretty hectic. Family stuff, work stuff, harvest stuff, canning stuff, Fall garden installation stuff. Whew! Zip! Bang! Pow! Mother Nature requires attention to timing. Late Summer/early Fall are high intensity times in the garden. This is true, even for a tiny garden like mine. So far, tomatoes, green beans and chard have come out. Kale, peas, spinach, carrots, daikon and radishes have gone in. I still have more to plant, including some lovely fava beans to fix nitrogen in the soil. I don't know if I like fava beans, but they are very pretty bushes and do the soil a lot of good.

So, here I am on a Thursday night, creating my post for Friday. Tomorrow we have the pleasure of attending the opening of a sci-fi and fantasy inspired art show at Art Ark Gallery in San Jose. Our girl is showing her work! We did have plans to bring her back home with us for a visit with her grandmas, but she's had a bad cold. We just can't take germs around the oldsters. So, instead of a round of grandma visits, we will be viewing her show and coming back home to our empty nest.

When life gets crazy, I often end up eating on the fly. Even if I don't eat fast food, I often eat too fast! I really like to eat my own food. That's why I do all this stuff. I mean, it's GOOD! If  I plan ahead, I can avoid spending my lunch time obtaining food and just start eating. If I know things are ratcheting up, I have to plan work-day lunches on Sunday. That's the only way to do it. Beans are a favorite. They end up in salads, soups, spreads, and dips. To make cooking from dry beans easier, I measure, sort, wash and then place the beans in a jar in the fridge until I'm ready to cook them. They can wait for several days. You have to pick a jar that is a lot bigger than your beans because they grow so much. I usually put 1 cup of dried beans into a quart jar of filtered water. The next step is cooking. If you are home for a few hours, cooking on the stove stop only takes an hour or two, depending on the type of bean. One of my favorite ways to cook beans is in the crock pot. I drain and rinse the soaked beans and add them to the crock pot with fresh water. I've cooked them overnight or during the work day. Voila! Cooked beans with no effort.

This dip is super yummy. It's kind of a hybrid of bean dip, hummus and guacamole - all flavors I love! I've enjoyed this with soft corn tortillas, corn chips and fresh veggies. Gotta change it up somehow, right?

White Bean Guacamole
1 cup dry, small white beans
1/4 cup red bell pepper, diced small
2 tbsp. shallot, diced small
1 large clove garlic, crushed
big hand full of loosely chopped cilantro
2 tbsp. lemon juice
1 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
1/2 salt
1 tsp. Tapatio sauce
2 ripe avocados

Sort and rinse the beans. Place them in a quart jar and fill the jar with cold water. Place in the fridge until ready to cook. Soak at least 8 hours.

When ready to cook. Drain and rinse the beans. Place them in a crock pot and cover with cold water. Cook on low for 6-8 hours. (You will get to know your crock pot just like you get to know your oven.) When the beans are very soft, drain. Allow the beans to cool off a bit. They can be warm when you add the other ingredients, but don't add them when they are so hot that you risk wilting the cilantro. Mash the beans and stir in the remaining ingredients except for the avocados. If you are serving this at a party, you can mash the avocados in all at once. Because I took this for several lunches, I mashed in half an avocado for each lunch.

Makes about 3 cups

Dilly Long Beans

Well, hi there! It's been a while! I have been cooking and creating, but haven't had the brain power to sit down and post. The good news is, I have several yummy things to share in the next week or so.

If you have never been to a farmers' market, I so urge you to go asap. Produce at the farmers' market is good, fresh, local and not expensive at all. There is a persistent myth that healthy food has to be expensive. I think this is true only if you are buying specialty items. Regular old fruit and veg are cheapity-cheap. Because of the large variety available at the farmers' market, I can try new things and if I need some help, the farmer is right there to give me pointers. They want me to enjoy their produce!

Here is a dramatic price comparison for you:

Lemon grass:
Bel Air - A tiny clam shell with one stalk cut into thirds, $2.99
Safeway - $6.99 per pound (it looked horrible too!)
SF Market in Little Saigon - 99 Cents per bunch, which has about 4 stalks
Sunday farmers' market - A big handful for a buck! (plus the nice lady shoved mint in my bag because I had to wait a minute)

I make iced tea with lemon grass and fresh ginger several times a week and I go through it pretty fast. There is no way I will pay $6.99 a pound for an inferior product! Herbs are one of the things that are always freshest and cheapest at the farmers' market. Most herbs grow like weeds, so I don't really know why they are so expensive at the grocery store. In fact, planting herbs is really the cheapest option. Many herbs are perennial and you will enjoy one plant for many years. I'm not much of a gardener, but I've always had good luck with parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme. (I couldn't resist!)

This week, the family that grows my lemon grass and other herbs, had beautiful long beans. I've been wanting to make dilly beans for a while and I thought it would be fun to experiment with long beans. I figured I could cut them to the length of any jar and they are usually pretty straight. I bought two bunches of green long beans. I don't know how much they weighed. They are bound at the top by a rubber band and the bound bunch was probably about 4 inches in diameter. As I was making my way out of the market, I noticed another family had purple long beans. They were gorgeous! They had to join my green long beans! Now, not only do I have dilly long beans, I have multi-colored dilly long beans! How cool is that!

I used the same brine I use for my little cucumber dills. Because the beans are smaller than the cucumber dills, the brine penetrates them more fully than the cucumber dills. In flavor, they remind me a bit of capers. I think it would be awesome to decorate the top of deviled eggs with purple beans. Stylish!

Dilly Long Beans
3 big bunches of long beans (I used 2 green and 1 purple)
6 cloves of garlic
6 sprigs of fresh dill weed
3 tsp. dill seed (1/2 tsp. per jar)
2 cups distilled white vinegar
6 cups water
1/3 cup kosher salt
1 1/2 tsp. whole black pepper corns (1/4 tsp. per jar)

Prepare 6 wide mouth pint jars, lids and rings. Prepare the boiling water bath.

Wash and trim the ends from the beans. Use a ruler to cut the beans so that they fill the jar with 1/2 inch head space. Peel the garlic and split each one in half, lengthwise. Set aside.

Bring the vinegar and water to a boil and stir in the salt to dissolve. Place the hot, sterilized jars on a towel and place one garlic clove, 1/2 tsp. dill seed and 1/4 tsp. black pepper corns. Carefully fill the jars with the beans, keeping them as straight as possible. Add the purple beans last, around the outside of the jar. Stuff the dill weed down one side, making sure everything is clear of the 1/2 inch head space. Pack the beans as tightly as possible, because they will shrink when processed. After the jars are filled, carefully pour the hot brine over the beans, again being careful of the 1/2 inch head space. Carefully wipe the rim of the jars and top with the prepared lids and rings. Process in the boiling water bath for 10 minutes. Allow to cure for two weeks before opening.

Makes 6 pints

Random Food Fridays - Rockin' the Pizza!

I'm having a hard time coming up with superlatives for pizza. I mean, it's pizza! Everybody likes pizza. I've seen vegans eat pizza with no cheese. I've seen gluten-free pizza with veggie crust. I've seen pork sausage swimming in a puddle of grease, using bell pepper rings as life preservers. I've seen it all. And, there is that famous quote that I once heard in a movie, "Sex is like pizza. Even when it's bad, it's still pretty good." (Tootled around google and could not find a reliable source for this quote. If you can remember, let me know.)

I can honestly say that I've eaten some of the best pizza of my life out of my own oven. Remember Butternut Squash Pizza? I'm looking forward to that specialty this Fall. One of the reasons homemade pizza rocks so hard is that you can make it just how you like it best. Your thickness of crust. Your favorite toppings. Your favorite cheeses. It's all you baby!

Here are some tips to make your homemade pizza especially good:

1. Make your own crust and use good extra virgin olive oil - My crust recipe is a basic one that won't fail you. If you like a thin crust, it is essential to let the dough rise at least once and then reform it and let it rest before stretching. The resting period should be about 10 minutes. More details in the recipe below.

2. Use a VERY HOT oven. Preheat your oven to 500 degrees and let it remain at that heat for about 10 minutes before you start to bake. Get to know your oven. My oven has a convection setting, but I find that the traditional bake setting works best for pizza. In my oven, this means that the heat comes from the bottom rather than circulating with the convection fan. The bottom of the crust gets nice and crusty this way. I use well seasoned, thin cookie sheets to bake and place the pizza in the top third of my oven. If you are talented enough to use a peel and pizza stone, go for it!

3. Use very flavorful cheese - I like Trader Joe's Quattro Formaggi. This is a cheese blend that includes mozzarella, asiago, provolone and Parmesan. Using strong flavored cheeses makes a huge difference from using plain mozzarella. Now, if you want to use a good fresh moz, I approve. Fresh mozzarella is sweet and creamy and totally different from the mozzarella used by most pizza places. I'm just saying, your pizza will only be as good as your cheese. Use a cheese that you would eat by itself and one that will compliment your other toppings. Another tip - cheese is the glue for your pizza, so use some below and some above your toppings.

4. Use great toppings that are not too wet - I used fresh, sliced tomatoes on the pizza you see in these pictures. The tomatoes I used are an heirloom variety that are very meaty, plus a few sungold cherry tomatoes. If the tomatoes had been super juicy, I would have cut them in half and squeezed some of the juice and seeds out before slicing. I don't like my pizza to resemble a blow-up pool filled with grease or tomato juice.

5. Divide the dough so that each person get their own pizza - Mr. Dwayne's pizza was meat sauce (Mixmaster Bill's Special Sauce!) with lots of cooked sweet Italian sausage and lots of cheese. Mine had tomatoes, garlic, sliced green onions, fresh basil, some of that sweet Italian sausage and cheese. Vive la difference!

I know that pizza doesn't need a hard sell, but I hope that you will try making pizza with your family. It really is worth the effort.

Late Summer, Thursday Night Pizza, Susan Style

Basic Dough:
1 1/2 cups warm water
1 tsp. sugar
1 packet active dry yeast
4 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp. salt
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

Stir together the warm water, sugar and yeast. Set aside until bubbly. Place the flour and salt in a large bowl or in your Mixmaster with the dough hook attached. Add the water mixture and stir to combine. Knead until smooth and silky. (5 minutes by machine or 10 minutes by hand.) Add 2 tbsp. of the olive oil and work it into the dough. Pour the other 2 tbsp. olive oil in a large bowl. Remove the dough and form it into a ball so that the outside is smooth. Roll it around in the bowl of olive oil making sure you end up with the smooth side up. Cover with a lid, plate or plastic wrap and a towel. Allow to raise in a warm place until doubled in size.

(Alternately, you can place this bowl in the fridge and use the dough another night. If it gets too big, just press the air out gently and reform the ball until you are ready to use it. Bring it out of the fridge to come closer to room temp about an hour before you plan to bake.)

Divide the dough and form each segment into a ball. Cover and let rest for about 10 minutes before shaping the pizza.

This dough will make two medium pizzas with a medium crust. You can use the whole batch for a large pizza with a thicker dough. Each pizza will bake for about 15 minutes in the preheated 500 degree oven. You'll want to check sooner until you get to know your oven.

For my toppings:

2 handfuls flavorful cheese

1 handful cooked sweet Italian sausage

1 large tomato, cored and sliced thin
a few cherry tomatoes, cut in half
a handful of fresh basil leaves
a handful of sliced green onions
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
kosher salt
freshly cracked black pepper

Toss all together. Set aside for 5 minutes to allow the salt to draw out some of the moisture.

Oil your baking pan and gently stretch the dough to almost fill the pan. Sprinkle with some cooked sweet Italian sausage and a big handful of cheese. Remove the veggie mixture from the juices and place them on the pizza. Cover with another small handful of cheese.

Bake in the preheated oven for about 15 minutes, or until the bottom of the crust is brown and crusty. Carefully remove to a wrack and allow to cool for about 5 minutes. Transfer to a cutting board and slice.

This was so darn good!

Food Literacy Sandwich - Ginger Turkey and Wasabi Slaw Sliders

This sandwich was created to help the nonprofit California Food Literacy Center celebrate Food Literacy Month. The ingredients are good for you, good for the planet. www.californiafoodliteracy.org.

For the ginger turkey burgers...

Amber Stott is the genius behind the California Food Literacy Center and Food Literacy Month. She's also the creator of Awake at the Whisk, a great blog with recipes that are as fun as they are delicious and thoughtful. She's invited several bloggers and local restaurants to invent food literacy sandwiches. Here's the definition:

Food Literacy [fu: d lit-er-uh-see]

noun: Understanding the impact of your food choices on your health, the environment, and our community.

What’s a “Food Literacy Sandwich?”

You decide! It should take the definition of food literacy (above) into consideration. Is it healthy? Is it sustainable for our planet and community? You may already have a great sandwich on your blog that fits this description. Why not change the name and re-post it to let your readers know you care about the health of our children and our planet?

For my Food Literacy Sandwich, I've called on the rich cultural resources of the Sacramento area. This is a fusion of Vietnamese and Japanese flavors, all held together with one of my weaknesses - King's Hawaiian Rolls. I made these up today and got a big thumbs up from my tester, our friend Marcus (aka Big Sexy). Dude knows food.

The slaw is full of fresh flavors, with a little fruit for sweetness. I think the creamy, lively slaw is the perfect foil for the rich flavors in the ground turkey mini-burgers. I recommend making up the meat mixture and the slaw at least a couple of hours in advance, then cooking them to order. Juicy!

Ginger Turkey and Wasabi Slaw Sliders

For the mini-burgers:
1 lb ground turkey
1 tbsp. fish sauce
2 tsp. soy sauce
1/2 tsp. toasted sesame oil
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 tsp. fresh grated ginger
1 tsp. fresh grated lemon grass
1 green onion, sliced

Add all the ingredients together in a medium sized bowl. (I used a micro plane grater to grate the ginger and lemon grass.) Stir with a carving fork until mixed, but do not compact the meat. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.

For the Wasabi Slaw:
1 tsp. wasabi powder plus 1 tsp. hot water
2 cups thinly sliced Napa cabbage
1 cup of pea shoots
1 green onion, sliced
1/2 avocado, peeled and diced
1 tsp. rice vinegar
1/2 cup red radishes, grated
1/2 of a pear, grated
1/3 cup sour cream
1 tsp. sugar
pinch of salt

Combine the wasabi powder and hot water and let stand to rehydrate. Add the rice vinegar to the avocado and toss to coat. Run a knife through the pea shoots to cut into lengths of about 1 inch. In a large bowl, toss the cabbage, pea shoots, green onion, avocado, radishes, and pear. Mix the wasabi, sour cream, sugar and salt. Gently toss the slaw with the wasabi dressing. Cover and refrigerate until ready to assemble the sliders.

To assemble:
8 King's Sweet Hawaiian Rolls (I used Honey Wheat)
Cilantro

Heat a large cast iron or heavy bottomed skillet over a medium-high heat. Brush with oil or use a spray.  Use a 4 oz. ice cream scoop to measure out the sliders. Lightly press down to flatten. When the pan is hot, place the sliders in the pan and cover loosely. When the bottom has browned nicely, turn the sliders. Continue to cook until the internal temperature comes up to 165 degrees. Remove from heat.

Split the Hawaiian Rolls. Top the bottom half with one of the turkey burgers. Top the turkey burger with about 2 tablespoons slaw. Top the slow with cilantro, if desired. Top with the rest of the bun and EAT!

Makes 8 sliders.

Roll Call!

Grocery Store - ground turkey, fish sauce, soy sauce, sesame oil, rice vinegar, wasabi powder, cabbage, pea shoots, ginger, sour cream, sugar, salt, King's Hawaiian Rolls

Farmer's Market - garlic, lemon grass, green onions, avocado, pear, radishes, cilantro