Sassy Radish

Honestly, if someone told me I had to go and live on a uninhabited island and could bring one vegetable with me, it would be an onion. My kitchen feels oddly empty when I run out, which is why I buy loads of them at once as if the great onion famine is going to set in any day. I always wonder about the folks in the check-out line with a singular onion – why just one? Can’t you just chop up a great deal of them and make caramelized onions, spread them on bread with a little fleur de sel and you have a meal fit for a king?

Consider the onion – it is a humble thing. It’s subterranean, for one, growing in the dirt. It isn’t all sweet and welcoming like a carrot is, for instance. It’s never been serenaded, unlike, say the plum. Songs have not been written about it unlike beans for example. It’s got a smell, a bite, and it makes you cry. It’s cheap, fairly pedestrian and socially maligned (just try ordering a salad for lunch with onions and see what happens). And yet, what sandwich would be complete without it? What soup wouldn’t get more depth if you took on onion out? Making stock? Better have an onion on hand.

And when I say I can be giddy with a piece of hearty bread, topped with slowly caramelized onions and fleur de sel, I’m not lying. As a child, it was one thing my mother could make at any time and I would eat it. All of it. Without leaving so much as a little onion piece behind. I would have turned down chocolate and cookies just to sit down with a bowl of caramelized onions. And I might be the only one out there who swoons at the word “allium” – I once name my goldfish that. Unfortunately the goldfish lived an additional three hours and then decided it was time to go belly up. Perhaps it was offended at the name, but I meant it in the highest of compliments.

So let me just warn you before I give you the recipe for this. If you’re an onion fan and if the thought of slow-cooking an onion gives you weak knees like it does to me, run to the grocery store and get the ingredients to make this. Go now, don’t wait. As a side dish this is perfection. Roasted in port, these are luxurious, earthy, fully developed flavors. While peeling them is time consuming and is a pain, the end result is so worth it. Besides, roasting the onions in port makes the dish anything but pedestrian.

Continue reading glazed pearl onions in port.

Sometimes, I operate under the delusion that I have excellent time management skills, that I can multi-task and that no goal is unattainable. Take this roasted cauliflower, for example. I wanted to share it with you before I left for my vacation to L.A., but I got a bit distracted and failed to do much of anything. And then I thought I might even write about this while on my vacation, but who was I kidding? Not that I didn’t have an opportunity – L.A. was rainy for the 4 out of the 6 days. So much for their eternal sunshine.

Continue reading roasted cauliflower with indian spices and yogurt dressing.

I must first apologize for the ugly picture above. No matter how hard I tried, these sprouts refused to look sexy for me, and instead you get this washed out, glib picture. I’m sorry for that, I really truly am. But as disgusting as this picture looks, that’s how good these sprouts are. Better even, they’re stunning, operatic, grand. Sure, they may not seem like a big deal, but trust me, braised in cream this is a royal dish. One that is perfect on its own, or as as side to some hearty roasted meat. Or maybe even, say turkey?

Everyone is probably counting the days down to Thanksgiving, I know I am. Menus have been planned, dishes have been discussed, shopping lists drawn. And yet, in my emails with friends from here and there, I keep hearing the same sentiment - I just need more sides. Well, if more sides is what you need, here, use this one. Because, let’s face it, the green beans have been overused to the point of delirium. They could use a break from all this pressure to perform on the foodiest of all the food holidays. Here, give Brussels sprouts a go.

Disliked by many a child, I am almost positive that he (or she) will gobble this up in minutes. And maybe even ask you for seconds. I think that the trick here is cream, which in my opinion, makes most things better and elevates them to a status fit for a feast and not just an everyday side. Lemon juice, too, makes it sparkle even more so. And seeing as this is really easy to make (I know, here I go with this easy stuff again!), you won’t even feel taxed adding one more side to your Thanksgiving menu. And it’ll look that much more impressive!

Honestly, whatever yield I give you below, I am lying through my teeth. This was devoured in one sitting by three people and quite honestly, we would all have gone for seconds. Or, in my case, I probably would have had three helpings if that were an option. This recipe, which was adapted from Molly, is a true stunner and one to be made over and over this cold wintry season.

In case this is not an appealing side dish for you – I’ve compiled a few Thanksgiving dishes that should be pleasing to the eye as well as the palate. And will post it tomorrow!

Continue reading cream braised brussels sprouts.

I know that in many people’s minds, soup is not the kind of thing you get overly excited about. It often gets overlooked on the menu in favor of a more exciting appetizer, and unless it has words like velouté in its title, it just doesn’t have much sex appeal to many. But not this girl. This girl loves soup, loves it unabashedly and wholly, placing it in the three top reasons to love fall and winter; the other two being squash season and thick wool sweaters. And red wine. And hot cider. Okay, so maybe more than three, but you get the gist.

I’ve been meaning to make soup for quite some time now this fall, but the weather’s been playing tricks on me. I’ll get ready to prepare a pot of a hot and hearty soup and sneaky fall will flirt with Indian summer, pushing the temperatures well into their 60s. And here I am, with beets and cabbage in tow, ready to make borscht. It’s been so unsettling – this lack of soup in my kitchen this fall, I was beginning to wonder when it might happen for me.

And then there was last week, when the weather was downright abysmal – pouring rain, nearly black skies and me staring longingly outside the office window wishing I was home on my couch with a pillow and a blanket and a good book. But seeing as I wasn’t anywhere near these comforts, I had to find solace elsewhere – in the form of tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich – perfect rainy day meal, if you ask me. The grilled cheese sandwich hit the spot, but the tomato soup, watery and bland, left me wanting.

I wanted something hearty and thick, something hearty with intense flavors. And so I set out to find a recipe that might deliver those qualities. After much searching I found a recipe at Martha Stewart, but never content with first good find, continued to peruse the web. Which is when I happened upon Molly’s write up on the very soup I bookmarked at Martha Stewart.

It sounded delicious, it used cilantro (which is one of my favorite herbs ever), and with some jalapeno chopped up finely, the soup offered a little bit more heat than its mere elevated temperature. It sounded delicious and simple – and given how demanding work has been this fall, simple is a concept very much embrace.

Besides, Molly’s praises of the soup were so glowing, that I was instantly convinced. Besides, she recommends passing the time, while you wait for the soup to cook, with a glass of wine. Which, when you’re hosting a small dinner for your friends, might be precisely what you need to get you in a festive dinner-party mood. And since it’s red wine season again – go ahead, put the soup on, and pour yourself a glass. You earned it.

Continue reading tomato soup with cilantro stems.

I think baby-anything is cuter than its adult version. Puppies, kittens, baby seals, baby pandas, regular people babies. Baby vegetables, especially turnips, are cuter than their adult counterparts too – just look at these baby turnips – aren’t they just adorable?

Just look at them – aren’t they adorable? So little and white and perfectly-rounded – bursting with spring freshness! As soon as I saw them at the market, I knew exactly what I wanted to do with them and it wasn’t anything complicated. Why mess with perfection?

So what I did was a simple braise – in olive oil and lemon juice with a few garlic cloves thrown in for flavor. Some herbes de Provence a little salt and white pepper – and that’s it. And then I had the turnips with a little white wine, closing my eyes in bliss. They didn’t taste of the earth like mature turnips do, but of the sun and rain, filled with juice, bursting with a sweet flavor – unhardened by the seasons and the temperature. Babies they were – so unpolluted and pure – and so darn cute on my plate, I almost paused to eat them. Almost, of course. And then a few minutes later, they were gone, with a lemony taste lingering in my mouth for a few more moments.

Continue reading braised baby turnips.

Oh hi, it’s me, it’s seems that I’ve yet again fallen into crazy days at work, days that are interminable. My last push towards getting better from the endless cold involved getting a second course of antibiotics and last week was all but a blur, with 15 hour work days and general chaos notwithstanding. The antibiotics are also making me very tired as a result, but one of the side-effects is that of having trouble sleeping. Lovely, lovely stuff, I tell ya.

However, I have to, however briefly, tell you about this soup I made a few weeks back that was just beyond heaven. I was quite inspired by Molly’s dreamy write-up on it and ever since I read her post on this soup, it’s been on the foreground of my mind.

And so when I spied the green garlic at our Saturday local greenmarket, I was quite overcome with joy because this soup was now well within my reach! My enthusiasm scared KS a bit because once I set my mind on something food-related, I am very ebullient about it. He is more of a subdued force and acts as a very good foil to my otherwise irrational exuberance. But I think this time my glee was well-founded – we loved the soup so much, we finished all, but a single bowl of it in one hungry sitting.

I added some seductively fragrant extra-virgin olive oil to our bowls as we try to go as much dairy-free as possible. I highly recommend a dollop of the finest olive oil you have in the house to enhance it.

Continue reading green garlic and spinach soup.

When I think of the phrase “spectacular disaster” I think of an implied double meaning. Is it a disaster so notable that it will be long remembered? Or was it as disaster that turned out rather well, unexpectedly? In my case, this Sunday, it was the latter.

I tried to make meringues and failed. Failed miserably as they were the flattest, saddest looking things you’ve ever laid eyes on. Fluffy and cloud-like they were not. Instead, they were crispy, flat, thin, two-dimensional. They were so deflated and when I took them out of the oven, they deflated even more, thus crushing my already-fragile cooking ego to a paper-thin level.

Growing up, my mother would make meringues that dreams are made of. They were impossibly airy, beautifully crumbly and dissolved on your tongue like a fairy-tale dessert. In fact, my favorite way to eat them would while reading Grimm Brothers’ Fairytales – stories, I am still fond of to this day. All she used were egg whites and sugar. And they were perfect every time.

I decided to give my meringues a little edge and added vanilla and lemon zest. I’m not sure whether it was the timing of adding sugar to the egg whites or the lemon zest itself, but I never wound up with stiff airy peaks like you’re supposed to. And perhaps I should have stopped right there, but I decided not to trust my gut and bake these guys anyway.

After I pulled the out of the oven, they were a pathetic bunch. I might have heard a sad sigh from one of them, or it could have been all in my head. Still, I refused to throw them in the garbage and when I bit into one, I was pleasantly surprised. They weren’t bad.

Now, I’m the first to admit failure when I am faced with one. If I took a class on meringues, and this was going to be my final product, I would expect an F. And yet, these egg white crisps were not bad, they were quite tasty, but in a completely different way. I might even try to make them again because they were quite intriguing, these crisps.

And so I wonder, as I bite into another crisp – a spectacular disaster? Perhaps not spectacular per se, but certainly a palatable one.

Continue reading meringues, sort of.