Broccoli with Caramelized Onions and Pine Nuts

I don't know about you, but I get seriously tired of steamed broccoli. I'm dieting right now, and I know it's a really great vegetable, but after so many nights of it I just want something else. Don't get me wrong I eat other veggies, but steamed broccoli is an incredibly quick and easy thing to prepare so it get's thrown into the rotation with a little more regularity.

I think this recipe has a lot of potential. I think the next time I make it rather than steaming the broccoli I'm going to roast it, which, while taking more time, will bring out a nice nutty flavor that I think will mesh well with the additional nuttiness of the pine nuts and the sweetness of the vinegar. I also feel like it could do with a little heat, but I'm not sure what.

This recipe isn't perfect as far as diets go, onions have a lot of sugar (though they do prevent heart disease) and pine nuts have some added fat, but it's good fat, so I'm not going to worry too much. I think next time I'm going to do garlic, sun-dried tomato and red pepper flakes instead of the onion and vinegar.

3 tablespoon(s) pine nuts, or chopped slivered almonds
2 teaspoon(s) extra-virgin olive oil
1 cup(s) chopped onion (about 1 medium)
1/4 teaspoon(s) salt, or to taste
4 cup(s) broccoli florets
2 teaspoon(s) balsamic vinegar
Freshly ground pepper, to taste

1. Toast pine nuts (or almonds) in a medium dry skillet over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until lightly browned and fragrant, 2 to 3 minutes. Transfer to a small bowl to cool.
2. Add oil to the pan and heat over medium heat. Add onion and salt; cook, stirring occasionally, adjusting heat as necessary, until soft and golden brown, 15 to 20 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, steam broccoli until just tender, 4 to 6 minutes. Transfer to a large bowl. 

4. Once the onions are finished add vinegar (the original recipe didn't do this, but it will coat things more evenly and pick up some good pan flavors).

5. Add the nuts, onion mixture and pepper; toss to coat. Serve immediately.

No pictures today! Sorry

Roasted Romanesco

So my produce box came with one of the strangest veggies ever. Romanesco, also known as Roman Cauliflower, it is completely bizarre looking. It looks a little like a miniature alien city. Here's a picture!

See! Crazy right?

I'm pretty sure my Mom has made it for me before but I couldn't really remember, so I didn't want to do too much to it, because I wanted to get a good feel for the flavor. I decided to roast it, and then promptly made my boyfriend cook dinner, so he should probably be writing this post.

Overall I liked the flavor of it quite a bit. It was hard for me to eat cause Chris went a little nutso with the red pepper flakes, but what I could taste was pretty yum. Roasting brought out a really nice nutty flavor similar to what happens when you roast broccoli, but it overall it had a much more similar flavor to cauliflower. Anyway here's the recipe

Ingredients:
1 medium head fresh Romanesco, cleaned & chopped in to bite-size florets
5 medium cloves garlic, diced
1/8 cup olive oil
Salt & Pepper

Pinch Red Pepper Flakes

1/4 of a lemon (wedged)
1/4 (or less) cup grated fresh parmesan cheese

1. Preheat oven to 375F degrees. 

2. In a bowl toss romanesco, garlic, olive oil , red pepper flakes and salt 

3. Roast on a baking sheet for about 20-40 minutes or until just tender

4. Squeeze lemon over it

5. Sprinkle cheese over the top

Valentine's Day Menu:Sides

I am going to do things a little bit differently this week. I'm going to post the recipes I'm using for Valentine's Day Dinner today, that way if anybody wants to use them they can get their shopping and possibly some of the prep work done ahead, then I'll either post or just update the post with pictures (as long as I don't forget!) Friday. There will be a separate post for most items otherwise it would be stupid long, although I'm going to combine the two side dishes in this post, then just so that if people want to find them later on I'll do a master post with links to the individual items.

Salad with Pink Peppercorns, Lemon and Thyme Vinaigrette:
Can be made 1 day ahead
1/2-1 Tsp pink peppercorn Lightly crushed (you can do this with a fork, bottle, rolling pin etc.)
1/2-3/4 Tsp Lemon Zest
1/2-1 Lemon Juiced
1/2 tsp minced thyme
1/2 tsp minced shallots
1/2 tsp honey
1/4 tsp dry mustard
1/8-1/4 tsp anchovy paste
1/3-1/2 cup good olive oil
Sea Salt and pepper to taste (I'm going to use gray fleur de sel for extra oomph, but any will do)

1. Whisk everything but salt and pepper together and then season to taste. You may not need the additional pepper.

You can obviously customize this based on whatever you want to put in the salad, croutons, cucumber, tomato etc. We're a little light on salad fixings this week, so for me it's probably just going to be red leaf lettuce, which is fine since it's not even the sub-sub-focal point of this meal.

Mashed Potatoes and Cauliflower with Caramelized Shallots
6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) butter**, divided
2 cups sliced shallots
3/4 cup whole milk
1 pounds large Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled, quartered

1 medium-large cauliflower*

1. Melt 2 tablespoons butter in heavy medium skillet over medium heat.

2. Add sliced shallots and cook until tender and brown, stirring often (20 minutes). 

3. Transfer shallots to small bowl. Add milk to skillet. Set aside.
4. lace quartered potatoes in large saucepan. Add enough cold water to pan to cover potatoes by 1 1/2 inches. Bring to boil, reduce heat to medium, and simmer until potatoes are tender (15 minutes). Drain. 

5. Return potatoes to pan and stir over medium heat until dry, about 1 minute. 

6. Add remaining 4 tablespoons butter**. 

7. Bring milk in skillet to simmer, scraping up any browned bits. 

8. Blend cauliflower and hot milk till smooth.

7. Add cauliflower puree to potatoes. Mash potatoes. 

8. Stir in caramelized shallots and season to taste with salt and pepper.

* Instead of using cauliflower you can just double the potatoes.
**Instead of using 4 Tbsp of butter I used the remaining Pink Peppercorn Butter from the steak recipe + 1 tbsp regular butter.


Post-Dinner Update:
Both of these items turned out really nicely. The vinaigrette was really bright and light as a nice counterpoint to the richness of the other dishes. Next time I make it I might add a little more honey than I did, the lemon and shallots made it really acidic and I think a little honey might ease that bite. Overall though it was really nice. As for the potatoes, I didn't have as much shallots as the recipe called for, but that wasn't really a problem since I was also using the pink peppercorn butter which added a lot of good flavor. If you are making this without the butter I would definitely make sure you have the full amount of shallots. I have a ton left over, which is going to be a pain, since Chris is on a diet that only allows simple carbs once a week...

Master Post

Main Course
Dessert

Delicata Squash with Rosemary, Sage, and Cider Glaze

I realized that I've not really been updating. I promise I will fix that.

Last night Chris and I were feeling a little lazy so while we were grocery shopping we picked up a rotisserie chicken. We had some left over mashed/pureed cauliflower and potatoes and a recipe for Delicata Squash that I'd been dying to try.

Chris and I were split on how this tasted. I really liked it, can't wait to make it again, Chris thought it was good but not amazing. The one thing that I didn't like about the recipe was the directions are not great, so I've fixed them just for you! In the original directions it said to cook over medium heat an an even boil, but 3 cups of cold liquid takes a LOOOOONG time to come to a boil in the first place and the directions don't indicate that you should increase the heat to bring it to a boil and THEN cook on medium. Anyway, I decided to follow the recipe exactly and about 20 minutes in decided to pull the squash and then reduce the sauce separately.

The only other change I made was that I used red wine vinegar instead of sherry vinegar. IF you do this, you need to add a little sugar. I used about 1.5 teaspoons of brown sugar. I also think a little heat wouldn't go amiss in this recipe, but choose something that won't muddy up the flavor. I suggest red pepper flakes, maybe 1/4 - 1/2 tsp.

Bottom Line: 4.3 Stars 

Roast Salmon with Green Beans and Black Bean Cakes

The unanaimous decision on these was: Good but not great, but they could be great.

They need cilantro in the cake, and a little more heat. I used the bell/jalapeno combo rather than the poblano because there weren't any when I went grocery shopping and I didn't want to make a special trip. Maybe next time I will...

I was a little unsure about what creamy beans look like, but other than that this recipe is not super difficult but it is time consuming. Make sure you start these EARLY. Chris and I ended up giving up on night one and saving the pureed beans for the next day.

The only tricky thing about these is actually cooking them. If you've ever made fried mashed potato pancakes you know how tricky it is. It requires a lot of patience, needless to say Chris got a little frustrated. :p Make sure when you're cooking these you cook them on true medium and ROTATE them before you flip them to ensure they are cooked evenly. The only thing that holds this guys together is the crust that forms from frying so unless you want just a gooshy mess, take your time, rotate, flip, rotate and then finish them in the oven.

What I am really excited about for this recipe is making Huevos Rancheros without a tortilla. I think some eggs, shrimp cheese and salmon would be FANTASTIC on these with or without heat. If you try it let me know how it goes, I might do it this weekend. If you have any questions about roasting salmon or cooking green beans leave a comment.

Bottom line: 3.7 Stars with Potential for a solid 4.5

Turnip and Onion Au Gratin

This is a pretty good approximation of potatoes au gratin, without the potato. If you have somebody who doesn't eat potato (freaks), make this for them. It's tasty! Not much else to say on it. Going to be a little of a recipe hiatus, since we're starting the cleanse Monday. I've started a separate journal geared toward that. Comment with your email address if you would like access. I'll continue to post on this journal as well, just in a limited way.

Bottom Line 4.3 Stars (Turnips just aren't potatoes)

Roasted Radishes and Greens w/ Brown Butter

I served this with leftovers from my roast chicken.

I used to hate radishes, they always tasted bitter and spicy, but not in a good way. So when I saw them in the box I was a little bummed, but I decided to look at it as a challenge rather than certain defeat.

I've only ever had radishes in salads, so I thought why not try them hot? Other spicy veggies tend to mellow when cooked, makes sense right? Yes it does.

These turned out really well! The radish itself was sweeter and kind of juicy. I wasn't super happy with the way the greens tasted. Chris and I agreed, it was sort of like eating grass. So either try cooking them as well or nix them all together. We'll see next time.

Bottom Line: 3.2 stars

Broccoli in Oyster sauce

Last night seemed like the first night this week that Chris and I had a normal schedule. So nice. He's been stressed out with work, which stresses me out, on top of that my uncle is in the hospital so I'm all freaked out about that.

Last night we had pan fried steak and broccoli stir fried in oyster sauce. I really like broccoli, but I usually just steam it so I've been on the look out for something new to do to it. I found this recipe and thought I'd give it a try. I really enjoyed the flavor, I just wish that the sauce was a bit thicker. Still it was pretty good and all that sauce soaked into the rice nicely. Any suggestions on how to thicken Asian sauces? I don't like the aftertaste that cornstarch leaves... 

The only other thing I'd want to do is maybe sprinkle toasted sesame seeds on the top. Bring out the flavor of the oil a bit. No pictures this time. Sorry!

Skillet Greens with Apple Cider Vinegar Gastrique

These were delicious and SPICY! I use really hot red pepper flakes though, so it may just be me. 

I sort of wanted breakfast for dinner. So I had these with fried eggs. Grits or potatoes would have been great but I was lazy and didn't want to go to the store. I used collard greens and kale raab, which I didn't have any experience with. Major tip for both, but especially the kale: make sure you get every little bit of stem off, it is SUPER tough.

Everybody who lives in the Northwest knows that right now it's really hard to find a vegetable that's actually in season, luckily greens are and they are delicious. It's miraculous to me that my boyfriend grew up in the south and managed never to have them. If I was going to pair this with meat for a more traditional dinner it would be pork. Either slow cooked or chops would be fine. I actually really enjoyed the eggs with them though... I used 4 pieces of bacon to make the drippings, and I'm a little sorry I ate them on the side instead of adding them to the greens. Knowledge for next time. My gastrique was a little on the thin side, but still tasted wonderful. To be truthful though bacon, apple and shallots is a winning combo no matter what else goes in there!

The Bottom Line: 4.8 Stars