Dark Days Lunches (with a little cheating)

It wasn't easy to pick a meal this week to dedicate to the Dark Days Challenge.  For some reason I kept changing my plans at the last minute and adding in an ingredient that made the meal not quite qualify.  So in place of one fully local plate I give you my past two lunches, each with one glaringly not locally sourced ingredient but lots of local flavor.

First we have yesterday's Sunshine Chicken with roasted roots.  I used a whole chicken from Hubbell Farm, which I broke down, the wings are pictured.  I shared this recipe back when I first started blogging and my family and I still love it.  Of course it calls for lemons and my lemon tree croaked right after I got one batch of fruit from it but they are in season and organic.  The root vegetables I roasted this time were turnips, beets, parsnips and onion-- a very good combination.  They came from 9 Bean Rows and vendors of The Saturday Farmers Market at the Village.  I cooked the roots in Hubbell Farm's turkey shmaltz.

And today's lunch was lamb arm chops from Starlight Hill Farms served with a variation on this cherry tomato salad.  I used kale, turnip greens and red onion from my 9 Bean Rows winter CSA share but couldn't resist the totally out of season cherry tomatoes John brought home.  I dressed the salad with verjus from Black Star Farms, lots of dried spearmint from my garden (re-hydrated in the verjus), salt, pepper and Higher Grounds olive oil.  You can see the distinctive oil label glowing in today's fantastic sunshine in the background of the photograph.

*Both of these meals fit the requirements of my January Whole 30

Visit Not Dabbling In Normal on Sundays for the round up of Dark Days meals. You can also visit our coordinator at Unearthing this Life to see some of our Midwest group entres.  

Dark Days Lamb and Kraut Salad

My lamb from Starlight Hill Farms arrived this weekend so for this week's Dark Days meal I made some pan-fried blade chops with kraut and kale salad.  The kraut and kale salad was inspired by Mother's Kitchen's recipe this week. I also used her kraut recipe to make my homemade sauerkraut, made this fall with cabbage bought at the farmer's market.  For the salad, I used Red Russian Kale and the sweetest little white turnips both from Blackbird Gardens, bought at The Village at Grand Traverse Commons' Saturday market.  I skipped the onion and carrot, used organic flax seed oil and added some anise seeds because I have become very fond of them with sauerkraut.  Thanks Cynthia for your Kraut and Kale Salad and Homemade Sauerkraut Instructions.

Visit Not Dabbling In Normal on Sundays for the round up of Dark Days meals. You can also visit our coordinator at Unearthing this Life to see some of our Midwest group entries.  

I noticed today that the star is even more crooked than it was when I first put it up and that we have a Christmas spider in residence.

Fragrant Beef Salad

It's been awhile since I've put forth an entry for the Mother's Kitchen Spice Rack Challenge, but her entertaining post and my love for cumin were inspiration to get me moving.  This past winter I was trying to think up new ideas to use the ground beef from the steer share we purchased.  I remembered the spiced beef from a Middle Eastern bakery near one of our previous homes in Sterling Heights, MI.  This bakery served spicy beef on top of brick-oven fired pizza dough with slices of fresh tomato.  (They have to-die-for cheese breads as well but those are now merely daydreams from my previous life as a dairy eater.)  I used my memory to try and recreate the flavor of the meat and it became a favorite dish this past winter.   The main spice is cumin so this is a perfect dish for this month's challenge.

Fragrant Beef Salad
Inspired by the meat flat breads from Maatouk Bakery.  This is my taco salad use for the spiced meat, of course you could use the beef on top of pizza dough like they do or like taco meat in tortillas.
Makes 2-4 servings depending on your hunger

1 pound ground beef, ground lamb is also wonderful
1 large onion, chopped
~6 cups greens (spinach, arugula and kale all work well)
1 1/2 cups chopped fresh tomatoes
2 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin seed
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
good extra-virgin olive oil
freshly ground black pepper (or a pinch of cayenne)
salt

-Brown the meat, preferably in a cast iron skillet.
-When browned and mostly cooked add the onion, spices, salt and pepper.  Add a little olive oil if needed to lubricate the onions so they will cook well.   Stir and cook over medium high heat until the onion is soft and browned a little.  Taste for seasoning and add more salt, pepper and spice as desired.
-Wash, chop and dry your greens.  Top the greens with the beef mixture and then top with the tomatoes.
-Season the tomatoes with salt and pepper and drizzle over olive oil to dress the greens.  Enjoy!

Even though I miss the ocean there are some pretty great consolation prizes here at home- the tomatoes, kale and onions in this salad are all fresh from my garden.

An older cumin recipe to share, Black Bean "Tacos" with Smoked Paprika Shiitake Mushrooms

Black Pepper Asparagus with Millet and Bacon

Michigan asparagus soon to be gone for the season and Michigan strawberries just in.  I love the farmer's market in the spring!  Penny was very good at the market and shopping this morning but just refuses to be out in the garden with me.  So I'm inside cooking and blogging instead, the tomato plants will have to wait.

I've been eating a lot of millet lately.  It was one of the grains I made and froze for post baby eating, along with brown rice and quinoa which also freeze well cooked.  I hadn't eaten millet much before but it turned out to be a pleasant surprise when I realized how much I loved the corn-like flavor and fluffy texture.  Now I'm craving it.  Don't they say that thin people eat "like birds"?  My chickadees love millet!  A perfect get off the baby weight food!  Regardless, here's a great combination I made today that also utilizes my new favorite way to make asparagus.

Basic Millet Pilaf
Makes ~3 cups of millet

1 cup whole millet
2 1/2 cups water
1/2 teaspoon salt

-Toast the millet in a dry saucepan until it smells nutty and turns a light golden brown.
-Add the water and salt and bring to a boil.  Turn down to a simmer, cover and cook 30 minutes or until tender.
-Fluff with a fork and serve.  Or...
To store in the freezer for later:  Spread out the cooked millet on a baking sheet, allow to cool to room temperature, freeze and then crumble and bag.  When needed, shake out and warm in the microwave covered with waxed paper or in the oven covered with parchment.

Black Pepper Asparagus with Millet and Bacon
Serves 4 as a side or 2 as a meal

1lb fresh asparagus spears, chopped into 1 inch sections
3 cups prepared millet pilaf
4 slices of bacon, sliced into lardons *or see meat-free variations at end
1 tablespoon lemon juice
salt and freshly ground black pepper

-Heat up a skillet, cast iron is best for this, and add the lardons.  Cook until crispy.
-Remove the crispy lardons to a serving bowl and pour off almost all of the bacon fat.
-Make sure the pan is hot and add the asparagus.  Salt the asparagus lightly and grind on a generous amount of black pepper.
-Cook the asparagus over high heat tossing occasionally until it starts to brown and is hot and cooked through but still slightly crunchy.
-If you are using pre-frozen millet heat it up.
-Toss the heated millet, crispy bacon lardons and asparagus with the lemon juice and more black pepper.  Taste for seasoning and add more lemon juice/salt/pepper to your own taste.
-Serve with a side of Michigan strawberries for the best effect.

Meat-free variations:
-Chop Fakin' Bacon (smoked tempeh) into lardons and fry in 1 tablespoon of oil until crispy. 
-Caramelize 1/2 cup of chopped onion in 1 tablespoon of oil and use in place of bacon.

Fritz our dachshund caught a tomato hornworm moth this week.  John and Alex decided I couldn't kill it to protect my garden and so they relocated it.  My sincere apologies to the tomato gardener this guy finds. 

Quinoa and Blood Orange Salad

I'm sick with my first cold in over a year and really ready for winter to be over. In the past months I've paid my dues eating lots of local rutabagas and turnips but now I need a break. So I'm indulging myself with blood oranges and herbs from points south. Have you seen the prices on blood oranges? Just a few years ago you'd have to pay a buck an orange and now they're less than $2 per pound. Of course the ones on sale are tiny but they're still a nice break from Midwest winter food.

In my ongoing pantry cleaning, I found the last box of quinoa left from 2008. Recently I found a more foolproof method for cooking quinoa. The key is to let the grains rest in the middle of the cooking process. If you look closely at the quinoa in the closeup shot nothing is sticking together, the little curly-cue husks are still attached, there is just a tiny dot of uncooked middle and overall the quinoa is fluffy with a nice bite. I paired the quinoa and blood oranges with fresh parsley and mint and a light dressing. For a short while it kept me from thinking about winter dragging on outside.

Quinoa and Blood Orange Salad
Makes enough for 2 as a side dish or one large serving

1/2 cup uncooked quinoa
1 cup water
1 tablespoon finely diced shallot
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
freshly ground black pepper
1/3 to 1/2 cup coarsely chopped flat-leaf parsley
1-2 tablespoon(s) sliced fresh spearmint
2 small blood oranges, supremed (see video at the end of this post for a demonstration)

-Place the quinoa and water in a microwave safe bowl and cover loosely with plastic wrap. Cook on high in the microwave for 8 minutes. After the 8 minutes stir the quinoa, mixing any grains that climbed the side of the container back into the water. Recover loosely and let sit for 8-10 minutes. After that time has passed, cook again on high for 2 minutes or until there is only the faintest dot of uncooked center in the quinoa, like the center of al dente pasta. Uncover and allow to rest while you prepare the rest of the salad.
-In your serving bowl, stir together the shallot, red wine vinegar, olive oil, salt and a few grinds of black pepper. Add the quinoa, parsley and mint and stir to coat everything evenly with the dressing.
-Top with the blood orange supremes and serve at room temperature.





This is my entry to Weekend Herb Blogging, a food blogging event created by Kalyn's Kitchen. The event is now run and documented by Haalo of Cook (Almost) Anything Once. Haalo is also hosting this week's roundup.

Beer Bread Experiments and some Bean Salad

I've been baking a lot of bread lately. There have been plenty of baguettes from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day, countless variations on banana bread, applesauce bread with nut milk pulp and quite a bit of beer bread. I was curious about how much the quality of the beer will effect the quality of the beer bread, so I started to play around. A recipe that simply calls for 12 ounces of beer leaves a lot of interpretation to the reader. Should I just go get a Bud Lite or is it worth it to use better beer? For the sake of experimentation, my latest beer breads have been made using some microbrews my parents brought back for me from Pittsburgh and the quality and flavor of the beer does make a big difference. I was particularly inspired by the microbrew called Stoudt's Fat Dog, an Imperial Oatmeal Stout. I love the dog on the label. It looks just like my father-in-law's black lab Max, who is quite the emperor of their house. ("Imperial" stout: "emperor"--get it?) I'm usually not a huge stout fan but I enjoyed my sampling--at 8am when I was making the bread, which felt naughty but I only had a taste! It had the more meal than drink appeal of good stout and a sweet molasses flavor that seemed perfect for bread.

I've been using a beer bread recipe I found on the site Zesty Cook. I like that it uses half whole wheat flour and the brown sugar in the dough adds just enough sweetness. The best part is the melted butter (Earth Balance margarine for us) that you pour over the top of the dough before baking. It makes the best tasting crunchy crust! I make my beer loaves in mini loaf pans and that gives you even more crust to savor. The day of my Fat Dog bread experiment I also made a bean salad. Inspired by a mock tuna salad recipe from The Daily Spud, I made some changes according to what was in my kitchen. I swapped cannellini beans for chickpeas, kale for parsley, home dried tomatoes for fresh, and some mashed avocado instead of mayonnaise. Though it deviated greatly from the original intent of mimicking tuna salad, it was a delicious, nutrient dense cross between bean dip and guacamole. And it was great on the beer bread! I think it would work equally well on other hearty breads, pita or just eaten with corn chips.

Here's is a link to the Beer Bread recipe from Zesty Cook. For the Fat Dog stout bread, I replaced a half cup of the all-purpose flour with oat flour, in honor of the oatmeal that went into the stout. My flour measurements were 1 1/2 cup whole wheat, 1 cup all-purpose flour and 1/2 cup oat flour. It made the bread a little softer inside but didn't change the taste much. The real change in taste came from the beer. I plan to keep playing with other brews and maybe other beer bread recipes to see what I like best. I'd love to hear about your adventures in beer bread. What beers have you tried? Any favorite recipes for the beer bread? If you'd like to try it, here's my bastardized (but yummy) bean salad that I think is great on beer bread.

Bean Salad/Dip/Spread
Inspired by Mock Tuna Salad recipe on The Daily Spud who got the recipe idea from The Nomadic Gourmet, there is nothing like a viral recipe.
Makes ~2 cups

2 sundried tomatoes (I used home dried tomatoes from this summer)
2 large leaves of kale
1 (15 oz) can of cannellini beans (For canned beans I buy Eden Foods organic beans, they're a Michigan company)
1/4 cup diced onion
1 stalk celery, diced
juice from 1 lemon
1/2 small avocado, mashed
salt and cayenne pepper to taste

-Soak the dried tomatoes in just enough hot water to cover them for 5-10 minutes. Drain and dice.
-Wash the kale, remove and discard the stem and chop the leaves.
-Drain and rinse the beans. Place them in a bowl and mash a least half of them.
-Add the rest of the ingredients, stir and taste for seasoning. Add more salt and/or cayenne pepper to taste.
-Serve on bread or with chips.

Crunchy crusted beer bread made with Fat Dog StoutStoudt's Fat Dog Imperial Oatmeal Stout, so you can see the great label.

*I have one last site recommendation. If you are looking for a new banana bread recipe try this site. The number of different recipes seems endless and I'm addicted to watching the ingredient cloud on the side bar spin. It's like playing banana bread roulette!

I'm adding this to Bookmarked Recipes, an event started by Ruth of Ruth's Kitchen's Experiments. Visit the new Bookmarked Recipes site for the roundup of other bookmarked and tested recipes.

Heartnut and Wild Rice Salad and a Blogger Potluck

Ever unable to resist a new food, especially something local, I picked up two bags of heartnuts recently. Toted as "A delicious heart shaped walnut for every special occasion" they looked a lot like shag bark hickory nuts. That and the sketch of a hammer hitting a nut on the bag should have tipped me off to their impenetrability. I collected hickory nuts with my parents as a kid and we'd have to smash them between two bricks to get the darn things open. Unfortunately, I was too enthusiastic about bringing a new local ingredient to a Michigan foodblogger potluck I was attending this past Saturday. I had settled on making a wild rice salad.

My wild rice salad is inspired by the one they sell at Oryana, a co-op in Traverse City. I change the recipe to suit what's seasonal but always have nuts for richness and crunch. I had Romeo, Michigan peaches, sweet corn and onions from just down the street, mint from my garden and wild rice from Minnesota. I figured the heartnuts would be ideal to create a salad that was almost all Michigan-based, all Midwest at least. I got to cracking on Saturday morning while my rice simmered.

Now, no standard nut cracker is going to free these nuts. A hammer along with one of the granite counter top samples I just received was required. A concrete surface, flat stone or brick would have worked as well. It took a couple of well placed hits from the hammer right on the nut's seam to split them open. Inside the nut and cavity are a beautiful heart shape and the flavor is that of a mild walnut. Alas, very few of the nut meats come out as a intact heart but I can see how they wouldn't want to market them as "broken heart" nuts. More than half of the shells split perfectly and I'm saving them to see if I can't come up with a craft project for them. Perhaps everyone will get heartnut ornaments for Christmas?

Somehow, I managed to get through my two bags of nuts by the time my rice was finished cooking, only smashing my thumb twice. I can be a tad clumsy so that's not a bad record for me. The pound of nuts yielded a little over a cup of nut meats. I toasted them and tossed them into the salad. The blogger get together was a lot of fun. All of the food was excellent! Our host was Shayne from fruitcake or nuts. She and her husband had a grill set up with pizza fixings and her sauce was outstanding! The conversation was entertaining and I decided not to worry about taking pictures. You can visit the other blogger sites to see if any decent pictures came out. I'll have the attendee list at the end of the post. Here is my contribution:

Wild Rice Salad
I change the ingredients in this to suit what's seasonal. The basics are cooked wild rice with a nut, something sweet, something crunchy and a basic vinaigrette. I left out mustard for this peach version but see the end of the recipe for some of my other variations.
Makes ~6 cups

6oz (1 cup) uncooked wild rice (or 4 cups cooked)
2/3 cup nuts, toasted
1 cup sweet corn kernels (~1 cob)
1 peach, diced
1/3 cup diced red onion
4-5 tablespoons lemon juice (~1 1/2 lemons)
2 tablespoons of olive oil
1/3 cup chopped fresh mint
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
salt, black pepper and cayenne pepper to taste

-Bring 4 cups water to a boil. Add in the dry rice, 1/2 teaspoon salt and simmer, covered loosely, for 45-55 minutes. Drain, then cover for 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork. Allow to cool slightly.
-Add the red onion, 4 tablespoons of lemon juice, olive oil, mint and parsley to a large bowl with 1/2 teaspoon of salt, a couple of grinds of black pepper and a pinch of cayenne pepper. Stir together.
-Add the rice to the bowl and toss to coat.
-Fold in the nuts, corn and peaches and taste for seasoning. Add more lemon juice, oil, salt and pepper as desired.
-Serve cold or room temperature.

Variations:
-My version of Oryana's salad: dried cherries, pecans, smoked baked tofu, no mint and 1/2 teaspoon of mustard.
-Halved red grapes, apples, and walnuts with all parsley, red wine vinegar and a 1 teaspoon of mustard added to the dressing.
-Caramelized onions, cubes of roasted winter squash, fennel, basil and mustard.

A bag of heartnutsHeartnuts in the shell
A nut seam side up, ready to crack
A perfect heartnut nutmeat, in the shell, cracked in the shell and empty shell
The best part, heartnut shells make great cat toys! A bonus shot of Abbie

The foodbloggers I met, by their blognames:
fruitcake or nuts
Una Bouna Forchetta
Could you hum a few bars?
The Hungry Masses
Diana Dyer, MS, RD
Four Obessions
Mother's Kitchen
Teacher in the Hood
All the Michigan foodblogs I've found. I'd love to know about more!

More about Heartnuts:
Heartnuts.com
An image of a heartnut tree
Fennville, Michigan Heartnut Grower site (under construction)
Oikos Tree Crops* a Kalamazoo nursery that sells heartnut trees
*This post took so long to complete because I browsed at Oikos for over an hour. I'd like a Noah's ark special from them, two of everything please!

Biryani Inspired Quinoa Salad

I've struggled with cooking quinoa. Time after time it came out of the pot mushy, clumpy, soggy, or chalky. On my recent trip to Top Chef tour we were served a quinoa salad that was delightfully crunchy and I realized what I'd been missing. I could hardly wait to try and replicate it! With some new tips from Nikki of season 4 on how to prepare better quinoa, I felt inspired to make a new dish with this versatile seed to enter in this month's Royal Foodie Joust. This month's Joust ingredients picked by Kittie of Kittens in the Kitchen were: whole grains, ginger and citrus.

The combination of ginger and citrus immediately steered me towards Asian flavors. That brought to mind some comments made on my Gingered Sweet Pickled Cauliflower post. A comment from Salt & Turmeric was that the pickles would be good with biryani. I decided to try making a cold quinoa salad with the flavors and ingredients found in vegetable biryani. Here's my recipe:

Biryani Inspired Quinoa Salad
Makes 6 servings

1 cup uncooked quinoa
1/2 cup dry lentils
1 tablespoon neutral oil
1 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 cup diced onion
juice from 1 1/2 limes
1/2 teaspoon lime zest
1 teaspoon agave nectar or honey
1/2 teaspoon grated fresh ginger
1 teaspoon kosher salt
pinch of cayenne pepper, optional
1 cup raisins
1 medium zucchini, julienned
1/2 cup shredded carrots
1/2 cup sliced almonds

-Cook the quinoa: Add the quinoa to 4 cups of water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and then simmer 10-15 minutes. You want to taste the quinoa periodically and stop the cooking when the chalky inside has disappeared. Immediately rinse in cool water, drain and refrigerate.
-Cook the lentils: Add the lentils to a saucepan and cover with water (an inch above the lentils is good). Bring to a boil and then simmer 15-30 minutes until completely cooked through. Drain and allow to cool.
-Add the oil and curry powder to a pan to toast the spices. Carefully fry the spices ~1 minute over medium heat. Add the onion and a pinch of salt and cook until the onions soften.
-Add the lime juice, zest, agave nectar, salt, cayenne pepper and raisins to a bowl and mix together. Add the quinoa, zucchini, and carrots and toss gently. Taste for seasoning and add more lime juice, cayenne or salt as needed.
-Top with almonds and serve. Good with my Gingered Sweet Pickled Cauliflower on the side.

My quinoa was much, much better with Nikki's tips. I think it could have been cooked a tiny smidge longer but it had the desired crunch and wasn't mushy. I'll need a little more practice to get it perfect. I loved the curry spice on the quinoa and the raisins and nuts for sweetness and crunch. I think I'd like to try chickpeas instead of lentils the next time I make this. The size of the lentils was too similar to the size of the quinoa. In all, this was a tasty dish worth making again to perfect my quinoa skills. It'll be interesting to try different vegetable combinations depending on what's available.

Links:
Top Chef: The Tour in Detroit
Gingered Sweet Pickled Cauliflower recipe
The Royal Foodie Joust
The Leftover Queen
Kittens in the Kitchen (Awesome blog name!)
Salt & Turmeric (Thanks for the inspiration!)

Cherry Tomato and Mint Salad on Lamb Steaks

There needs to be a saying for vegetable gardens along the lines of "a watched pot never boils." A watched plant never produces. A watched plant never grows. The watched tomato never ripens. Never turn your back on a zucchini plant. Ok, it needs some work.

We've been scouting the cherry tomato plants every day for the one or two ripe tomatoes to fight over and then I turn my back and BOOM! I have a load of cherry tomatoes needing to be picked. Ripe tomatoes are falling off of the vine and I'm feeling guilty. Looking around, I see that the mint has begun to flower and needs to trimmed as well. I know I have a lamb steak waiting in the fridge. Thus was this salad and my lunch born.



Cherry Tomato and Mint Salad
Makes enough for 2

3 cups cherry tomatoes
1/2 medium onion, thinly sliced
juice from 1/2 a lemon
1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
1/2 cup of fresh mint chiffonade
1/2 small red chili, chopped into fine dice
salt and pepper

-Slice tomatoes in half (quarter any large ones). Place in a bowl.
-Add chopped mint, lemon juice, olive oil and chili (or sub 1/8 t cayenne pepper). Add small amount of salt and pepper, toss together gently and taste for seasoning. Add more salt and/or lemon juice as needed.
-Serve with lamb steaks or good bread.

This little yellow pear tomato was almost too cute to eat.

I'm sending this post Weekend Herb Blogging, a food blogging event created by Kalyn's Kitchen to help everyone explore new uses for herbs.

This week's host is Srivalli from Cooking 4 All Seasons. Visit her site at the beginning of next week to see the other herb-inspired recipes.

Asparagus and Potato Salad

We had family over on Sunday to celebrate my son Alex's birthday. I was thinking about side dishes and how I love little boiled potatoes dressed with herbs and olive oil. I wanted something different and saw local asparagus at our Whole Foods. These were beautiful, thin stemmed asparagus and I knew they would look and taste great with the potatoes. I kept the seasoning very simple: olive oil, lemon juice, chives, salt and pepper with the tiniest pinch of cayenne. The key to keeping the asparagus bright and green is to watch it carefully so you do not overcook them and then shock them in ice water immediately after you remove them from the cooking water. The salad's flavors are at their best at room temperature or just a little warm.

Asparagus and Potato Salad
This is a fresh and simple potato salad. If it has been refrigerated make sure you bring it to room temperature before serving for the best flavor.
Serves 8-10


2 lbs small potatoes
1 lb asparagus
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup finely chopped chives
2 tablespoons lemon juice
a tiny pinch of cayenne pepper
salt and pepper, to taste

• Rinse the potatoes and place them in a large pot, covered with lightly salted cold water.
• Bring to a boil and boil until cooked through. Poke a test potato with the tip of knife to check for doneness. The potatoes are done when the knife point slides all the way to the center easily.
• With a wire strainer or slotted spoon, remove the potatoes to a plate or bowl. Leave the cooking water in the pot.
• Bring the cooking water back to a boil. Rinse the asparagus and trim off the woody ends. Chop the asparagus into 1 inch pieces. Keep the tips separate. Make up a large bowl of ice water.
• Place the asparagus (except the tips) into the boiling water. Cook for 1 minute and then add the tips. Cook for another minute and check to see that the asparagus is mostly tender but retains a little crunch. Remove the asparagus pieces from the boiling water and immediately plunge them into the ice water.
• In a large bowl mix together the olive oil, chives, lemon juice, cayenne, and a little salt and pepper.
• The potatoes should be still quite warm but cool enough to handle now. Quarter the potatoes and add them to the dressing.
• Stir gently to coat the potatoes. Add the asparagus and gently toss again. Check for seasoning and add more lemon juice, salt and pepper if needed.
• Serve warm or at room temperature.

Kale and White Bean Salad

I'm a huge fan of greens. Kale and collards are my favorites but I like mustard greens, turnip greens, spinach, and Swiss chard as well. For awhile I was making kale and white bean soup constantly. Then I had a bumper crop of kale one summer and since I figured no one wanted hot soup on an eighty degree day I needed a new recipe. This salad was born. The beans are creamy, the kale is just barely wilted and still bright and green. The sweetness of the roasted peppers and garlic balance with the brightness of the lemon and richness of the olive oil. I just love this salad!

I'm adding this to a food blog event hosted by Food Blogga called Beautiful Bones. This recipe is perfect since kale and beans are rich in calcium and the vitamin C in the peppers and lemon juice can help you better absorb that calcium. Learn more about National Osteoporosis Awareness Month.

Kale and White Bean Salad
Good as a meal with crusty bread or as a side dish with grilled vegetables or sausage.

Makes ~6 cups

1 head of garlic
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
juice of 2 large lemons (~1/3 cup)
2 (15 oz) cans of white beans (great northern beans or cannellini)
2 large sweet red bell peppers
2 bunches of kale (~1 1/2 lbs)
1/4 teaspoon of hot pepper flakes
salt and pepper to taste

-First, roast the garlic. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Cut a head of garlic in half and drizzle with 1 teaspoon of olive oil, and a little sprinkle of salt and pepper. Wrap the garlic in a double layer of aluminum foil and roll down the edges to form a tight pouch. Place in the oven for ~1 1/2 hours. You can peek and remove it when you see that the garlic is golden brown and soft. Allow the garlic to cool until you can handle it. Squeeze the garlic cloves out of their skin into a large bowl. Smash the roasted cloves with a fork. Add the remaining tablespoon of olive oil, a pinch of salt and pepper and the lemon juice to the garlic.
-Drain and rinse the beans. Add them to garlic mixture and toss. Set aside to marinade while you cook the other ingredients.
-Now, roast the sweet peppers. (You can just buy the canned ones but they don't taste as good.) Wash and dry the peppers. Place the peppers on foil or cookie sheet under a hot broiler. Turn when the skin turns mostly black. Remove the peppers from the broiler when blackened on all sides. Cool until you can handle them and remove the peel and seeds. Slice into thin strips. Add to bowl with garlic sauce and beans.
-Remove stems from kale and discard. Roughly chop or tear the leaves into ~2 inch pieces. Then dunk and swirl the kale leaves in a large bowl of clean water. If the kale is sandy or dirty repeat with clean water until clean. Remove the kale but don't dry it. Place the damp kale in a large pot or pan over medium heat with the red pepper flakes and a little salt and pepper. Turn the kale several times while it lightly steams in the water left from washing. Remove when all the kale has brighten in color and wilted down a little.
-Add the kale to garlic mixture and toss together. Check the seasoning and add more lemon juice, salt, pepper or olive oil as needed.
-Best served at room temperature.

Warm Miso, Maple and Bacon Dressing

This weekend I ventured out to the farmer's market despite knowing that April in Michigan doesn't offer a lot in the way of local produce. I was relieved to find that among the expected eggs, apples and frozen meat there were some fresh greens to be had. Alex and John were thrilled that the kettle corn guy was there :) The new maple syrup kettle corn was awesome!

I brought home some hunter's sausages, eggs, bread, bacon and some deliciously spicy organic Asian salad greens. When it came time to dress the greens, I was inspired by the traditional wilted spinach salad with egg and bacon and the recent Top Chef recipe for miso glazed bacon. I had my greens, local double smoked bacon, and Sleeping Bear Farms maple syrup to work with. The resulting take on a warm vinaigrette worked wonderfully with the spicy greens. Here is the recipe:

Warm Miso, Maple and Bacon Dressing with Asian Salad Greens
A new take on a warm salad dressing. Perfect on spicy or bitter salad greens.
Serves 1 as a lunch or dinner, 2 as a side

1 tablespoon shiro (white) miso
2 tablespoons brown rice vinegar (or any other rice vinegar)
1 tablespoon mirin
1 teaspoon maple syrup
a pinch of cayenne pepper
1 slice of thick cut smoked bacon
flavorful salad greens (2-3 cups)

-Wash and dry the salad greens.
-In a small bowl, mix together the miso, vinegar, mirin, maple syrup and cayenne pepper. Set aside.
-Chop the bacon into 1/2 inch lardons (I like to use kitchen shears). Cook the lardons in a small frying pan until crispy. Remove the lardons leaving the bacon grease behind.
-Add the miso mixture to the bacon grease and cook until thickened slightly (less than a minute).
-Drizzle the dressing over the greens and toss to coat. Top with the lardons and eat.
http://www.grouprecipes.com/50561/warm-miso-maple-and-bacon-dressing.html

Super Red Slaw

Though I loved buttered hot beets as a kid, I've had an aversion to cooked beets ever since my trip to France in 1995. I was a vegetarian at the time and stayed with a family in a house in the country. They had no idea what to feed a vegetarian. My main meal ended up being a salad of cooked beets, eggs, and potato. The first few times this tangy, vinaigrette-covered salad was unexpectedly good but after 2 weeks I couldn't even look at cooked beets.
Well today I was scrounging through the fridge looking for something for lunch and found that there was a single beet leftover from our Easter egg dyeing. Among the few other ingredients in my nearly bare larder were some red cabbage and a lone red onion. I decided to try my taste buds out on raw beets and see how they fared. The resulting slaw was tremendously good and satisfyingly fresh and crunchy.

Super Red Slaw
Serves 2-4

Ingredients
1/2 small head of red cabbage
1 large red beet
1/2 medium red onion
2 teaspoons grape seed oil (or other neutral oil)
2 tablespoons brown rice vinegar
1 tablespoon ume plum vinegar
salt to taste
pinch of cayenne pepper
Directions
-Grate the beets, cabbage and onion on a course grater, a food processor is best for this.
-Toss the grated vegetables with the oil, vinegars, salt and cayenne pepper.
-Serve.
Super Red Slaw on Group Recipes