I cheated on the crust, and used a frozen crust instead of making my own and substituted leeks for ramps, since that was what was idling in the fridge. I also supplemented my morels with shitakes (because $20.00/lb was a bit out of my price range). Overall though, this makes a damn fine quiche. The gruyere is a must. Don’t skimp on that.

DSCN0203.JPG, originally uploaded by CaitKP.

Asparagus Morel (or Shitake) and Ramp (or Leek) Quiche

(makes 6 servings)
Printable Recipe

Ingredients:
Crust:
2 cups cooked brown rice
1/4 cup gruyere (grated)
1 egg
-or-
1 frozen pie crust from the store

Quiche:
4 eggs
1 cup milk
1 cup gruyere (grated)
1/2 pound morel mushrooms
1/2 pound asparagus (cut into 1-inch long pieces and steamed)
3 ramps (chopped)
salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
To make the crust:
1. Mix the rice, cheese and egg in a bowl.
2. Press the rice mixture into a pie plate, about 1/4 inch thick.
3. Bake in a preheated 450F oven until the edges and bottom just start turning golden brown, about 5-7 minutes.

To make the quiche:
4. Mix the eggs, milk, cheese, mushrooms, asparagus and ramps in a bowl and season with salt and pepper.
5. Pour the egg mixture into the pie crust.
6. Bake in a preheated 375F oven until golden brown and set in the center, about 30-35 minutes.

The biggest hazard when it comes to grilling asparagus is that it has a terrible tendency to slip through the grate on the grill, at which point it is no longer edible, *and* you have to disassemble the BBQ to extract it. However, on this particular evening, I had a flash of brilliance of Fine-Cooking-Tips-and-Tricks proportions: I took the fish-grilling basket, and chucked the asparagus in there, closed it up and put it on the grill. It worked perfectly. There was no asparagus-spear herding with the tongs or the spatula, just flip it over a couple times while your other grillables are cooking and there you have it: grilled asparagus, no fuss, no bother, no grill pan.

A word of warning though (well, 2 actually). I failed to toss my spears with salt and olive oil before grilling (I was *that* lazy), which probably would have made for a tastier result (we were doing Asian style chicken thighs with the asparagus, so I drizzled it with a soy-and-hoisin sauce, which basically had the same effect. Also, I recommend not stuffing *too* much asparagus into the fish-basket. Ideally you want each spear to be expose to the flame on at least one side (so 2 layers of asparagus at most), otherwise the ones in the center don’t cook very well.

Grilled Asparagus Spears and Five-Spice Chicken Thighs with Soy-Vinegar Sauce & Cilantro

The chicken thighs are from The Wonder Issue of Fine Cooking. The ingredient list is nothing special, but somehow this is one of the most Asian-tasting recipes for Asian style chicken I’ve ever tried (and, its a mix, marinade and grill sort of thing, which makes it that much better).

DSCN0191.JPG, originally uploaded by CaitKP.

Servings: Serves four to six (and great as left-overs).

Ingredients
2 tablespoons Chinese five-spice powder
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon garlic powder
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 teaspoons rice vinegar
1 teaspoon Asian sesame oil
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
2-1/2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs (about 8 large, 10 medium, or 12 small), trimmed of excess fat
2 tablespoons vegetable oil; more for the grill
3 tablespoons chopped cilantro

Directions
1. Mix the five-spice powder, the 1 tablespoon sugar, the garlic powder, and the salt in a small bowl. In another bowl, mix the soy sauce, vinegar, sesame oil, red pepper flakes, and remaining 1 teaspoon sugar.
2. Put the chicken in a shallow pan, drizzle with the vegetable oil, and toss to coat evenly. Sprinkle the spice mixture over the chicken; toss and rub to coat thoroughly.
3. Prepare a hot charcoal fire or heat a gas grill with all burners on medium high for 10 minutes. Clean the hot grate with a wire brush and then lubricate it with an oil-soaked paper towel. Put the chicken on the grate and grill (covered on a gas grill or uncovered over a charcoal fire) until one side has dark grill marks, 5 to 6 minutes for large thighs or 4 to 5 minutes for medium and small thighs. Turn and continue to grill until well marked on the other sides and cooked through, 5 to 6 minutes longer for large thighs or 4 to 5 minutes for medium and small thighs.
4. Move the thighs to a serving dish. Drizzle with about half of the soy mixture, sprinkle with the cilantro, and toss to coat. Let rest 4 to 5 minutes, tossing once or twice. Serve hot, warm, or at room temperature, with the remaining soy mixture passed at the table.

Asparagus

Ingredients:
1 lb asparagus spears
Salt
Olive Oil

Optional:
1 tbsp hoisin sauce,
1 tsp soy sauce

Toss the spears with salt and olive oil, place in a fish grilling basket, and grill along side the chicken, if you want, you can drizzle it with the soy/hoisin mix afterwards.

Asparagus with Smoked Salmon Ravioli in a Rose Sauce

Really, the asparagus was just a side dish here, we didn’t do anything fancy to it, just popped it in salted water to boil for a couple minutes before draining it and serving alongside the ravioli. But thats part of the beauty of fresh asparagus: smetimes the best thing to do with it is absolutely nothing. Cook it in the simplest possible way, and serve it (don’t worry — we did more interesting things with it too).

DSCN0190.JPG, originally uploaded by CaitKP.

This recipe is adapted from here. We used smoked salmon ravioli, which we had bought at the market with the asparagus, however, if you can’t find that, probably penne with some chunks of smoked salmon thrown in would work well too.

This recipe made about twice as much sauce as

Ingredients

Pasta:
1/2 lb Smoked salmon ravioli
OR
1/2 lb penne and 1/2 cup smoked salmon

Sauce:
1 tablespoon butter
1 small finely diced onion
1/2 cup diced smoked salmon (if not using ravioli)
2 fluid ounces vodka (or any liquor: we had no vodka and instead used brandy)
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1 cup crushed tomatoes
salt to taste
ground black pepper to taste
1 pinch ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes

Asparagus:
1/2 lb fresh asparagus rinsed and stemmed

Directions

1. In a large saucepan saute butter and onion with smoked salmon (if using). Once the pan begins to lightly smoke, pull saucepan away from heat source and add the Vodka (or other liquor).
2. When the Vodka has burned off, return the sauce to heat source and mix in the crushed tomatoes and heavy cream (you can tweak the cream to tomato ratio here depending on personal preferences).
3. Season sauce with salt, pepper, nutmeg, and red pepper flakes. Reduce sauce to desired consistency; serve.

As for the asparagus, the prep is pretty easy, but the key is timing. It may seem difficult to mess up a simple side like boiled (or steamed) asparagus, but believe me, I’ve done it. Put the asparagus in to early, and it either ends up limp and overcooked (if you leave it in too long), or worse yet, cold (if you take it out to early). For this recipe, I put a pot of water up to boil for the asparagus at the same time I put up the water for the pasta. Since both ravioli and asparagus cook very quicky, I waited until the sauce was mostly done (in the reducing stage) and put the pasta and aspargus in then. I kept an eye on both, and as soon as the asparagus was done (usually no longer than 5 minutes if the water is boiling when you put it in), drained it, put it back in the pot, and covered it (to keep it warm). Then I drained the ravioli, assembled, and served.

So far we haven’t done much exciting with it, besides mussels with the fennel (I’ll post the recipe in a later post) and broccoli salad with the broccoli. Rumour has it there is rhubarb in next weeks box, which is very exciting!

The burritos didn’t actually use much from the box–it was mostly a clean out the freezer sort of recipe. Whenever I make burritos, I end up combining ideas from about 4 different recipes. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. This particular time, I thought things worked out pretty well, and so I give you “Patchwork Burritos”, needless to say, the recipe is quite versatile and substitutions are welcome.

Ingredients:
*2 chicken breasts cut into strips
*1 clove garlic chopped
*1 onion sliced
*1 poblano pepper, chopped
*1/2 a red pepper chopped
*1 jalepeno, seeded and chopped fine
*1 14oz. can chopped tomatoes with juice
*1 cup refried beans (I used refried black beans for extra flavor)
*2 tbsp oil
*1/2 cup uncooked rice (long grain is good)
*1 cup water
*2tbsp cumin
*1 tbsp mixed mexican spices (chili powder, cayenne, cumin etc.)
*1 tbsp chile powder
1/2 tsp cayenne/red pepper flakes (more if you like it hot)

Method:
In a large, deep frying pan (make sure you have a lid to fit it), heat the oil over med. heat, add garlic, onion and peppers and cook until they are fairly soft. Add the chicken, and saute stirring frquently, until it is no longer pink.

Now add tomatoes, water, spices, and rice, cover and cook for 20 min, or until the rice is thoroughly cooked, and most of the water absorbed. Once the rice is cooked, you can shred the chicken a bit with a fork to make it easier to eat.

Finally, stir in the beans, cook for another couple minutes until heated through, and serve on tortillas with lettuce, cheese, salse and sour cream (or yogurt in a pinch).

You can eat these like tacos (meaning put all the toppings *inside* the tortilla, wrap it and eat by hand) or like classic burritos (put only the filling inside the taco, wrap it, and then put the toppings on top, and eat with a fork and knife). The refried beans, as well as adding flavor, do a nice job of holding everything together so it doesn’t ooze or explode on you.

The best kind of leftovers: homemade ones.

Here’s what was in it:
*Leeks
*Yukon Gold Potatoes
*Bibb Lettuce
*Spinach
*Collard Greens
*Cameo Apples
*D’Anjou Pears
*Strawberries
*Asparagus
*Purple Carrots
*Red Peppers
*Tangelos (similar to tangerines)

What struck me right off the bat was how well balanced this array of produce was. By well-balanced I mean that some of it was stuff that I buy at the grocery store on a weekly basis anyways (citrus, carrots, and apples fall into this category), while other items were things that I had forgotten how much I liked (asparagus, leeks, lettuce). In particular, lettuce–it’s been *ages* since I made my salad from a head of lettuce rather than a bag of mixed salad, and with lettuce this fresh and crunchy, it was definitely a welcome change. And just to make things a bit more exciting, there was of course, the token item I had walked by a thousand times in the grocery store and never bought: collard greens. I’m sure Nige will have some suggestions as to what do do with them though.

The other concern I had had, when we signed up for the box was its size, I was worried that we were going to get enough veggies to feed a small army on our doorstep, without any guinea pigs nearby to help us get through them (Silky, my childhood pig used to go through at least one bunch of dandelion greens per week), be forced to spend the whole weekend cooking (which wouldn’t be that bad) or throw some of them out (which ould be very bad). Luckily though, this seemed not to be a problem, and the amount of food we got was very reasonable for both the price and our needs . To quote a famous movie: Produce Box, “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship”.

Speaking of things you see in the grocery store and never buy, I bought an artichoke last week. They are in season right now, and the shelves are packed with monsterous spiky prehistoric looking globe artichokes. I just *had* to buy one (well, that and there was a recipe in my favorite F&W Cookbook that I wanted to try).

It came out very well, all things considered, and the excess vinagrette has been excellent on the organic Bibb lettuce, however, it did refresh my memory as to why I didn’t buy artichokes very much. In the end, it all comes down to a princple which I have dubbed the Law-of-Lobsters (and crabs, and artichokes): They look very elegant in the store, and in the photos in the cookbook, however, when it comes down to it, an awful lot of hassle and hard work for not a lot of food.

That won’t stop me from posting the recipe though, just be warned: only a very small portion of that artichoke is edible:

Artichokes with Scallion Vinagrette

Serving info: The recipe calls for 4 artichokes. I only made one, as it was going to be a side dish with other food. I used the full portion of seasonings (onion, peppercorns, bayleaves, etc.) in the liquid for the artichoke, and it was not at all overpowering. I also made the whole portion of vinagrette thinking, (rightly) that it would come in handy for other things. However, if you don’t want left-overs, you could probably half the portions of the vinagrette. In general, you can be pretty flexible with ingredient ratios in this recipe (add more oil if you like your vinagrette milder, or less if you like it vinegarier–you can guess which side I was on). I would say count on 1 artichoke per person if its a main course, and 1/2 an artichoke per person if its a side/appetizer.

Ingredients

1. 1 quart water
2. 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons olive oil
3. 5 1/2 tablespoons wine vinegar
4. 1 small onion, cut into thin slices
5. 12 peppercorns
6. 5 bay leaves
7. 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
8. 4 large artichokes
9. 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
10. 4 scallions including green tops, chopped
11. 6 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
12. 1 1/4 teaspoons lemon juice
13. 1/2 teaspoon fresh-ground black pepper

Directions

1. In a large wide stainless-steel pot, combine the water, the 2 tablespoons oil, 1 1/2 tablespoons of the vinegar, the onion, peppercorns, bay leaves, and 1/4 teaspoon of the salt. Bring to a boil.

2. Cut the stems off the artichokes and cut off the top third of the leaves. If you like, using scissors, cut off the tips from the remaining leaves to remove the thorns. Put the artichokes in the pot, stem ends down. Cover and bring back to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer until the bases of the artichokes are tender when pierced with a small knife, 30 to 40 minutes. Remove the artichokes.

3. In a small glass or stainless-steel bowl, whisk together the mustard, the remaining 4 tablespoons vinegar, the scallions, parsley, lemon juice, the remaining 1 1/4 teaspoons salt, and the ground pepper. Add the remaining 1 cup oil slowly, whisking. Serve each artichoke with a small bowl of vinaigrette alongside for dipping.

P.S. Last Sunday’s salad is still in the queue. I just haven’t got round to posting it yet.

I knew full-well what I was in for. Actually, its surprising that my movie choice wasn’t vetoed on account of the rants caused by my reading Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food, a couple years ago. Perhaps it would have been better that way.

Indeed, In Defense of Food basically scared me away from the interior of the grocery store. My shopping trips these days almost always take me around the perimeter of the grocery store: produce, dairy, fish, and occasionally meat. My rule about the rest of the store is, if it doesn’t come in a can (tomatoes and chickpeas), a jar (jam and pickles) or sack (flour, sugar, pasta etc.)–I’m not buying it. This seemed to work pretty well for weeding out the high-fructose corn-syrup masquerading as nutritive food…however, as Food Inc. explained, leaving little to the imagination, high-fructose corn-syrup was just the tip of the iceberg.

As I listened to the stories of more and more farmers being bought out/bullied/beat up by giant corporations trying to convince the world that we really only needed one genetic strain of soybean to feed everyone (coincidentally, it was the strain that they had patented) the guilt started to set in. Ok, so I wasn’t buying the Twinkies in aisle 3, but I was buying the bananas in aisle 1, which probably didn’t come from the local farmer down the way. Then I realized I didn’t even *know* what was in season anymore. Clearly, it was time to seek out some serious remedial vegetable education.

There are several local farms in the greater seattle area, but getting to one to buy ones weekly produce is no small task, and unlike Toronto, where they all congregate at the St. Lawrence Market once a week, there is no central market (well, there’s Pike Place, but Pike is mostly an overpriced tourist trap, and as much as I love organic produce and supporting local agriculture, I can’t afford Pike). Then I remembered the produce box.

I first heard of the concept of a “produce box” in Nige’s Kitchen Diaries. It sounded like a brilliant idea. Once a week, a box of fresh seasonal, locally grown produce shows up at your door, and you get to come up with creative ways to cook it, and the profits go direct to the farmers. Better still, it saves you wandering aimlessly around the grocery store trying to find culinary inspiration from an expanse of sterile, season-less plastic wrapped vegetables fruits imported from all over the world.

Now, if anywhere in the US was likely to have produce boxes, its the Pacific Northwest. In fact, a google search quickly revealed that there were 10+ CSAs (Community Supported Agricultures) which delivered weekly boxes in the Seattle area alone. As with most things on the internet, it was mind-numbing. Finally, after an evening of (not so) exhaustive research, we settled on New Roots organics, a CSA which bought produce from a couple local farms, and delivered boxes once a week. We liked it because it didn’t require a season-long commitment, like other farms did, but felt more farmers-markety than other places, in that the boxes were put together based on what was in season, rather than customer preference (great for those of us who have been known to spend an hour wandering around the produce section, trying to decide what they want).

And so I did it. I signed up. Either this thursday or next, a box of local green goodness should be appearing on my doorstep, which, in and of itself is very exciting. The fact that it saves me having to carry flavorless grocery store produce home on my bike at least once a week, is equally, if not more exciting.

I guess that means that watching Food Inc, depressing as it was, wasn’t such a bad idea after all. However, the search for a decent, local, organic butcher continues–any suggestions are welcome.

Unlike Fine Cooking’sbrussels sprouts with hazelnut butter or brussels sprouts with brown butter, there is no roasting or butter-making or anything fancy in this one. It is *dead easy*:

This one comes courtesy of Edible Vancouver (whose cover is responsible for my brussels sprout cravings BTW):

Brussels Sprouts Saute

1 1/2 lb brussels sprouts trimmed and sliced in half lenthwise (I only had 1 lb, so I 2/3’ed the butter, but kept the lemon and shallots and garlic the same)

5 tbsp butter, divided (I used 4: 3 at the beginning, one at the end)

6 shallots or 1 medium sized onion (I used 3 monster sized shallots), finely sliced

4 cloves of garlic, minced

1 1/2 tbsp fresh lemon juice

2 tsp lemon zest

1/4 cup pine nuts, toasted

1/4 cup parmesean cheese, finely grated

Heat 4 tbsp of butter in a large pan on medium high. When butter starts to bubble, add shallots, cook until shallots just start to brown. Add garlic and cook for 30 sec. longer. Add brussels sprouts. Turn heat up a little and saute until sprouts are tender (they suggest 6 minutes, I’d say closer to 10). Stir in lemon juice, zest, and remaining 1 tbsp of butter, and half of pine nuts. Transfer to a large bowl and garnish with remaining pine nuts and parmesean. And voila! That’s all there is to it.

We served ours with grilled Mahi-Mahi ala Trader Joe’s frozen section, and some left-over herb baguette from the bakery (and of course, red wine). Not to bad for a thown together at the last minute meal, if I do say so myself.

The veritable veggies, clockwise from top-left: Brussels sprouts with hazelnut butter, maple-cardamom roast turnips, sauteed kale, Swiss chard and feta pie.

I have been trying to write this post for about 2 weeks. In fact, I think I have been trying to write it for so long that I think most of the veggies I intended to write about are no longer in season…well, ok maybe it hasn’t been *quite* that long.

So, at the time of year when it’s starting to get wet and cold and dismal, what on earth could have caused a vegetable extravaganza? Let me explain: the start of the veritable vegetable extravaganza was coincided with the arrival of the Thanksgiving special of Fine Cooking magazine. Now, your average Thanksgiving special contains about 2 turkey recipes, and 6+ vegetable sides, and Fine Cooking was no exception. If one were to *actually* make every side dish for Thanksgiving dinner, there’d be no need for a turkey! Now to be sure, the vegetables have always been my favorite part of Thanksgiving dinner, and I personally think the idea of a vegetable medley for Thanksgiving sounds kind of cool, but I know others tend to be partial to the bird.

And so, rather than making all 6+ veggie dishes for one meal, I figured I’d start early and work my way through them gradually. And thus began the veritable vegetable extravaganza (hereafter referred to as VVE).

One vegetable that shows up around this time of year is the infamous Brussels sprout. I say infamous, because like spinach and broccoli and other unfortunate victims of poor preparation, Brussels sprouts can indeed be fairly vile if they aren’t done right. This is really too bad, because if you do them right, Brussels sprouts can be quite tasty.

This year, Fine Cooking has cornered the market on creative ways to dress up Brussels sprouts:
Brussels sprouts with Dijon walnut crumbs
Brussels sprouts with toasted hazelnut butter
Brussels sprouts with brown butter and lemon
Brussels sprouts with herbs and shallots
Brussels sprouts with pancetta and lemon

So far, I’ve only made the first two–but as long as the sprouts are in season, I plan to keep working my way down the list.

The next two vegetables on the roster for the VVE are repeat offenders: kale and Swiss chard. I know, I know, everyone’s tired of hearing about my adventures with kale, but this really a delicious (and straightforward) recipe.

For quite a while, now, I’ve been trying to find a way to make the kale taste the way it does in the roasted chicken and kale dish, without having to make enough chicken to feed a small army. Not that there’s anything wrong with the chicken…but sometimes I just crave the kale. Anyways, this seems to be just the ticket. I’ve made it a couple times now and really enjoyed it. This particular time, I decided to skip the pasta altogether and just make a big pot of sauteed kale (it makes a delicious lunch).

There’s a stand at the farmer’s market in my neighborhood every Saturday that has absolutely delicious (and enormous) kale. The same stand also has delicious Swiss chard, and so, whenever I stop by there to buy kale, I almost always come out with a giant bunch of Swiss chard as well. The Swiss chard became part of a delicious phyllo pastry pie, along with some onions and feta cheese. If you’ve never had Swiss chard and feta, I highly recommend it. It’s like spinach and feta (think spanikopita) but even better. My only objection to this recipe is that I think the phyllo pastry is more fuss than its worth. Maybe next time (and rest assured there will be a next time) I’ll try using pizza dough.

This brings us to the last veggie of the VVE: Turnips. The recipe was another FC special: Roasted turnips with maple and cardamom–how could I pass that up? I couldn’t. Next time, though, I’ll be sure to buy the right kind of turnips. The tangy red ones–the type you often get in falafel sandwiches or shish taouk–do not lend themselves very well to the subtle flavors of maple and cardamom…oops.

And so we conclude the first installment of the VVE. However, I’m barely halfway through the veggie dishes from Fine Cooking, and the X-mas issue of Food and Drink just arrived in the mail, so I expect the extravaganza is far from over.

This is where I have been for the past week, although lucky for me, my cycle has involved more diverse (and nutritious) fare than cheese and chips.

It all began with a butternut squash soup that I made before I started my new job last week (figuring it would be the last chance I’d have to cook for a while). I bought a fairly massive squash, and ended up using only half of it in the soup. Now, given how long it took me to peel, cut and clean that squash, there was no way I was only using half of it. And so the cycle began.

The answer to the squash dilemma lay in the latest issue of Fine Cooking. A recipe for a quick and simple autumn soup that involving tomatoes, squash, chick peas, onion, carrots and kale (although I think one could substitute just about any autumn veggies in here and it would work just as well). This particular combination makes for a very festive colorful soup though.

The more I cook, the better I am getting about judging weights and quantities of things that don’t easily fit in measuring cups (herbs, veggies, etc.), or maybe its just that I can’t be bothered to measure out exact quantities anymore, and am content just to ballpark it. However, there is one area that still illudes me entirely: Leafy greens. I once took a guess at how many bunches of spinach it took to make 1lb, and was off by a factor of 3. Pathetic. It’s no surprise then, that I ended up with excess kale after making the autumn soup. And so the cycle continued.

There are a *ton* of cool things you can do with kale (although I’m not big on the kale smoothie), but since the last few culinary projects had been predominantly vegerarian, I decided to change it up a little and revert to an old favorite:

Roasted chicken legs with potatoes and kale is one of my standbys because it’s just so *simple*. Tear up some kale, chop up an onion and some potatoes, and toss the whole lot in a roasting pan with 1/4c of EVOO and some salt and pepper. Then, season chicken legs with salt, pepper, and paprika and nestle them on top of the veggies. Pop the whole thing in the oven and roast it 450 for 20 min covered, and 30 min uncovered. The result is that the chicken gets nice and crispy, but still moist inside, the potatoes get infused with onion, kale and chicken-ness, and the kale becomes nice and tender. Its a full meal (meat, veggies, and potatoes) all in one pot. True comfort food.

Of course now we have leftover chicken legs and potatoes, which can only mean one thing: curry. The cycle continues…actually come to think of it, maybe cycle isn’t the correct term, maybe it’s more of a “sprint”.

So what does one do with asparagus, zucchini, and summer squash? Grill it, of course! In fact, the asparagus is so fine and so fresh, that I have been munching on it raw, dipped in hummus, but for the zucchini and summer squash, I decided to attempt a variation on this recipe.

Lacking fresh mozzarella and flat-leaf parsley (and not planning on eating 2lbs of grilled squash in one night), I only went as far as the grilling and tossing with garlic and wine vinegar…But not I have a whole container of garlicy, grilled zucchini in the fridge, waiting to be employed to dress up a pizza or a panini.