Pumpkin and Spicy Sausage Over Pasta

pumpkinpastaThis recipe is from my friend Jeanne. Like many recipes I get, it wasn’t written down. She said something like, “Cook up some spicy Italian sausage, add garlic, onions and pureed pumpkin and then toss it all with pasta.” If you want a few more details, keep reading.

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 pound hot Italian sausage
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
1 cup chopped kale (or other green)
1 1/2 cup puréed pumpkin (see Baking a Pumpkin Whole post)
Salt, pepper to taste
1 pound penne, cooked
Parmigiano, grated

Method:

  • In a large skillet, over medium-high heat, add sausage and olive oil and cook until well browned.
  • Transfer sausage to paper towel lined plate to drain. Drain most of the fat from skillet (leave a little to cook the garlic and onions). Add the garlic and onion. Sauté over medium heat for three to five minutes or until the onions are tender. Add kale.
  • Add sausage and pumpkin purée and stir to combine. If sauce is too thick, add a little water or stock. Salt and pepper to taste.
  • Once thoroughly heated, add sausage and pumpkin mix to cooked pasta and toss. Top with grated cheese.

Serves four.

Click here to read my About Pumpkin post.

Grilled Cubano & The Sandwich for Bleu Cheese Fans

New Column up at the Register Star and The Daily Mail:
While eating various types of food on bread has been around practically since the Stone Age, the term sandwich is more of a relatively recent appellation. Rumor has it that, in the 18th century, the fourth Earl of Sandwich liked to eat while playing cards. He didn’t like getting grease on the cards, so he started requesting that his meat, which he would normally eat with his fingers, be served between two pieces of bread. People, maybe other grease conscious card players, started to request the same, possibly saying, “I’ll have what Sandwich is having.” And a new term was born.

It wasn’t until the invention of sliced bread in 1928 that sandwiches comfortably took a seat at America’s dinner table and made their way into the country’s lunch pails. Since then, virtually everything has been tried on a sandwich, including Elvis’ infamous peanut butter, banana and bacon sandwich.

In a recent article in the New York Times Magazine, “Out of the Kitchen, Onto the Couch,” Michael Pollan laments that people are spending more time watching people cook on TV rather than actually cooking. He states, “The most popular meal in America, at both lunch and dinner, is a sandwich; the No. 1 accompanying beverage is a soda.”

While I am, of course, a big advocate of spending more time in the kitchen, I don’t see anything wrong with eating a sandwich for dinner, especially if it’s a good one and not just a piece of cheese thrown between two pieces of white bread (which I fear is what Pollan is referring to).

I bet you can whip out one of these sandwiches during the commercial breaks of Iron Chef. Be sure to trade in the soda for a seltzer with a splash of juice.

Go to the articles for recipes.>

Peaches

New column up at the Register Star.

While Georgia is known as the “Peach State,” I’ve tasted some darn good peaches here in New York. The local peach crop is now in full swing, so be sure to grab some.

The best place to get a peach is to pick one right from a tree. My friend Douglas said that he never buys supermarket peaches (unless they are local) because they go from being rock hard to mushy.

Peaches bound for the supermarket are cultivated for a long shelf life and a pretty red color. Flavor gets a back seat. They are also refrigerated, which can turn an unripe peach mealy.

Apparently we’ve been having that problem since the late 19th century. This from a New York Times editorial dated Aug. 23, 1895, written in response to an article claiming California peaches were of poor quality: A defense of California peaches – those sent to New York are poor because picked too soon, by Charles Vogelgesang:

The fruit is picked only half ripened, thus, in the first place, depriving it of the nourishment and sunshine necessary to give it its full flavor and sweetness. Consequently, it ripens without those essentials and, as I will admit, with very poor results as we usually find it in New York markets and thereby the fruit is placed at a sorry disadvantage when compared with that allowed to ripen on the trees and shipped comparatively few miles before reaching the consumer.

I always search out organic peaches. The Environmental Working Group, a not-for-profit research organization, has a list of the most pesticide contaminated fruits and vegetables, called the “Dirty Dozen.” Peaches top that list. They have the highest pesticide residue out of the 42 fruits and vegetables they tested. Pesticides easily migrate into the fruit through the soft skin of the peach. Since local peaches don’t have to travel far, farmers can get by with using less pesticide. Ask your peach farmer about his/her pesticide practices and/or shop for the organic variety.

Go to the Register Star for Peach Cobbler and Grilled Shrimp with Peaches and Bok Choy in a Spicy Peanut Sauce recipes.

Ellen Cooks: Panzanella

Please welcome guest author Ellen Simpson of “Ellen Cooks.”
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I first learned of Panzanella, an Italian bread salad, from my Uncle Bob. My mother’s garden was overrun with tomatoes, and we had been devouring tomato and mayonnaise sandwiches for weeks.  Bob, having arrived from L.A. in time for the thickest, most sweltering days of August, could only manage enthusiasm for one thing: panzanella. He had read about it in one of his favorite Italian cookbooks and was determined to give it a try. I was in my early 20s, living at home with my parents for the summer, and the idea of a salad built around soggy bread sounded revolting. Of course, Bob would correct me by saying, “its not soggy bread, my dear niece, it is bread that has already absorbed all the juices that we would otherwise be sopping up anyway.”  I took one bite and fell in love. And he’s right.  The bread in a panzanella shouldn’t be soggy at all. The bread should still hold its form, but be so laden with tomato juice and olive oil that the juices burst in your mouth when you take a bite. It’s a rustic dish that has no rules. Just add what you like. My family tosses the bread with grilled peppers, eggplant, onions, and squash. Olives, basil, and anchovies round it out. 

The genius of a panzanella is that it is the ultimate Clean Out the Fridge meal. Day old bread, veggies left hanging around the bottom drawers, the last few olives and capers in a jar. If planned right, you can have a cleared out fridge and a delicious dinner. Okay, in reality, that’s never happened for me, but a girl can dream…

Cut day old bread (ciabatta, baguette, miche) into 1 inch cubes. If you don’t have day old bread you can cheat by cutting the bread into the cubes and sticking them in the oven at a low temperature until the cubes of bread start to dry out.

Squeeze out the juice of  5 large tomatoes into a mixing bowl, and then add extra virgin olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt and pepper, to taste. Add a tablespoon of minced garlic to the juice mixture.

Slice, oil, and grill your vegetables.

Take a handful of the bread cubes and dunk them into the tomato juice concoction. Make sure all the cubes have a chance to soak up some of the juice, but remove them from the juice before they get soggy. Place them into a salad bowl. Repeat this step until either all the bread is gone, or all the juice is gone. Top the tomato-soaked bread with the grilled vegetables, black olives, capers, anchovies, and fresh basil. Done!

Ellen lives in Brooklyn with her husband John, who will eat anything. She works at Buttermilk Channel Restaurant and recently received an advanced certificate from the Wine and Spirit Education Trust.

Tomatoes

As a kid, I had to do chores. If my siblings and I fought, we had to do extra chores. We often fought. I don’t know why my parents thought it would be a good idea to make fighting siblings do chores together, especially if one of the chores was gathering rotten tomatoes from the garden to feed to my brother’s pigs.

I don’t remember how it started, but my sweet little sister, Stacey, took aim and threw a tomato that hit my older brother, Rob, squarely in the face. There was a brief pause, all three of us were stunned, and then my sister took off running for the house, screaming.

This from my sister: “I remember Rob saying something that made me really mad. I’m not sure what it was, I just remember being really mad and hurling a rotten tomato at him. When it hit pay dirt, I remember fearing for my life. I distinctly remember that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. I don’t remember how it ended. I don’t think I got pummeled, so I think I must have run to the house — somehow beating Rob — and hid behind Mom.”

Our tomato patch this year would have been a good place for a tomato fight. Sadly, late blight wreaked havoc on our garden and the rotten tomatoes outnumbered the good ones. The survivors were prized indeed.

Most things taste better fresh from the garden, but some things are essential to have fresh. The tomatoes that you can get all year round in the grocery store, in my opinion, aren’t really tomatoes. Sure they look like them, but these impostors certainly don’t taste like them. Real tomatoes have to be picked locally and eaten in season. Period.

A sure way to ruin a good farm fresh tomato is to store it in the refrigerator. It changes both the flavor and texture. A refrigerated tomato is still good to use in a sauce, but I wouldn’t use it for anything that wasn’t cooked. No worries though, cooking tomatoes increases lycopene absorption.

Lycopene is the darling of the phytonutrient world and tomatoes are an excellent source of it. It’s found in vegetables with red pigment such as tomatoes, apricots, pink grapefruit, watermelon, papaya and guava. Lycopene is purported to be protective against a number of cancers. It may also provide cardiovascular and anti-inflammatory benefits. Tomatoes are also an excellent source of vitamin C and vitamin A and a good source of fiber. So, eat up!

I had the good fortune to go south this weekend. I gladly lugged an extra bag on the train to carry my tomato haul. I treasured the tomatoes and fretted over just what to do with them. There weren’t enough to make all of my favorite dishes, so I had to be choosy. Just throwing them on top of a green salad wouldn’t do. I wanted to celebrate the pure tomatoness of the tomatoes.

There are three tomato dishes that I would be very sad if I didn’t get at least a taste of in the summer: BLTs, caprese salad and panzonela. All three dishes say “summer” to me. The recipes are sort of non-recipes — the amounts don’t matter so much and the ingredients are either self-evident or flexible.
Read more…

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Grilled Pizza

Anyone who has come to our house for a summer dinner in the last couple years has had grilled pizza. It’s easy, everyone loves it and it’s as close as you can get to a wood-fired/coal-fired pizza at home. Pizza is also one of those easy, go-to dinners. The toppings are endless so you won’t likely get bored. Plus you can custom tailor each pie (or even each slice) to every diner’s taste. Read More…

The Wedding Singer’s Guide to Zucchini

Please welcome guest author SingerAimNYC of “The Wedding Singer’s Guide to Life”, an honest, encouraging and at times anecdotal look at event planning, the art of the party and more (that’s where the “life” comes in) from an unusual and humorous perspective inside the industry.

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Two summers ago I planted my first garden. It was at my father-in-law’s house in the country, at which I was spending half of every week. The space had been dormant for a few years, so my husband and I decided to revive it. We planted the usual suspects, as we had been instructed by my husband’s dad. It was a great summer for growing that year and yields were high. (I still have jars of canned peppers). Perhaps the most prolific of the garden plants was the zucchini. Before I grew my own veggies, I liked zucchini. Occasionally… in a stir fry or as an accompaniment to grilled salmon, but since that summer the thought of going without homegrown sweet delicious zucchini is horrifying.

The first giant zucchini was really an accident. One day I looked in the garden and saw some lovely little babies sprouting from the plant. I decided to let them get a little bit bigger, and a day or two later… I had raised behemoth squash.

I couldn’t have been more proud of my accomplishment, although I think the cat had some issues with it! Then came the advice, and inevitably the criticism. Some people said my giant zucchini wouldn’t taste as sweet as it’s normal sized counterparts. They said the skin would be too tough, they said I had gone too far! I wouldn’t listen.

Keep reading …

Grilled Meat Loaf, Mashed Potatoes & Green Beans

Growing up I went through a phase of requesting meat loaf for my birthday dinner. My Grandmother’s recipe with a tangy tomato sauce was the perfect accompaniment for a chilly winter evening. We always had it with mashed potatoes and home-canned green beans. I’ll admit the green beans were not my favorite part. As we were a clean-plate family, I begrudgingly ate the five or so that were put on my plate.

I usually don’t make meat loaf in the summer, mainly because we don’t have air conditioning in our kitchen. Happily I stumbled on a recipe for grilled meatloaf in a magazine (it was a “special advertising section” for a grill). It sparked my imagination to try a family favorite—meat loaf, mash potatoes and green beans—all on the grill.

As luck would have it, my husband and I were in Virginia last weekend visiting family. Who better to try a redux of a family standard?

I believe the first response to my proposed meal was, “That sounds interesting” with “interesting” stretched out and the last syllable raised like a question. Then it was “That will take FOR-EVER” followed by “Have you USED Mom’s grill lately?”

“Pish-posh,” I replied as I mixed the meat with my hands. My sister then began busying herself making her kids a separate meal. I’m not sure if it was taste preference or time concerns. To be fair, the later is legitimate. I’ve been known, to my Mom’s chagrin, to sit down for dinner at 9 or 10 at night.

Mom has a gas grill. The ignition switch has long been broken, but with a quick strike of a match we were off and grilling. I set the heat to medium and carefully set the loafs on the grates and closed the grill. In no time, the bottom of one was chard pitch black. Oops. My sister was right about the grill; apparently it has quite a hot spot. She was also right about the time. Aside from the uber-well-done bottom, the meatloaf was coming along nicely but the potatoes were rock hard. My quick-thinking husband popped them into the microwave then returned them to the grates for a grilled finish.

The green beans were the least trouble, if you don’t count losing a few through the grill grates. The whole meal was on the table in about an hour. The kids still preferred the cheese quesadillas but the adults were all quite happy with the grilled feast, burnt meat and all.

Keep reading for recipes…

Aussie Burger


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Excerpt from my July 3, 2009 column in the Register Star and Daily Mail:
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After visiting Australia, my cousin Leslie asked me if I had a good recipe for beets because she wanted to put them on a burger. Apparently, if you are Down Under, it is customary to add a beet slice to your grilled burger…and a fried egg, pineapple or whatever else you fancy.

Get both hands and plenty of napkins ready for this one.

Ingredients:
1 1/4 lb ground beef chuck
4 large Kaiser rolls
4 eggs, fried
4 sliced roasted beets (see below)
1 teaspoon Salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
The usual burger toppings, lettuce, tomato, onion, ketchup, mayo, mustard

Method
- Prepare grill for direct-heat cooking over medium-hot charcoal (medium heat for gas)
- Mix beef with 1 teaspoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Form into 4 (4 1/4-inch-diameter) patties.
- Oil grill rack, place burgers on grill. Cook for about 4-8 minutes total, (cooking time depends on how you like your burgers) turning once.
-Lightly toast buns.

Place burger on bottom half of roll and top with beet slice, egg and then whatever condiments or toppings you like.

Eat with elbows out, napkin tucked, leaning over a plate.

Sugar Snap Pesto

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Excerpt from my June 26, 2009 column in the Register Star and Daily Mail:
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Pesto means “to pound.” Traditionally it is made with a mortar and pestle…and basil. I will occasionally make regular pesto that way. For this recipe I’m substituting sugar snap peas for the basil and am using a food processor to make quick work of “pounding” the pea pods. The result is a beautifully green, bright tasting pesto. Perfect for tossing in pasta or serving with grilled fish or chicken.


Ingredients
2 cups young sugar snap peas (Whole, not shelled. Taste a whole pea. If it is not sweet, shell the peas first.)
1-2 garlic cloves
1 cup shelled pistachio nuts
1/4 grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoon olive oil
1-2 tablespoon rice vinegar or lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
Dash of cayenne pepper

Method
-Remove the stems and strings from pea pods. Wash and pat dry.
-Place all ingredients in a food processor and blend. Add more olive oil if pesto is too dry.
-Taste; add more salt, pepper, and lemon juice if needed

Sesame Ginger Chicken with Roasted Radishes on Radish Greens

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Excerpts from my column in the Register Star and Daily Mail:
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I love a good spicy raw radish, but I only think of them as just nice crunchy additions to my salad. Turns out, I had a very myopic view of radishes. Not only are there endless salad variations for the brightly colored globes, but you can also cook them. To be frank, cooking a radish never crossed my mind. I just didn’t think it was done. Thank goodness for the Internet to broaden my culinary horizons.

Radishes are a member of the cruciferous family, which includes health-star siblings like cabbage, kale, broccoli and Brussels sprouts. Radishes are a good source of vitamin C, they are high in antioxidants, high in dietary fiber, and low in calories. Radish greens pack even more vitamin C than the globes. Radishes are purported to be beneficial for respiratory problems, digestive disorders, asthma, bronchitis and liver and gallbladder troubles. All of that in a pretty pink little package.

Our radishes are still growing. I have pulled a few very tasty gumball-sized ones. The radishes at the farmer’s market give ours something to which to aspire. They are beautiful indeed. So I grabbed several bunches and decided to experiment.

Sesame Ginger Chicken with Roasted Radishes on Radish Greens
I like this recipe because it satisfies my frugal nature by using all the parts of the radish. In fact, the radish greens in this dish are my favorite part.

Ingredients
4-6 pieces of chicken, skin on (plan on 3 ounces per person)
2 tablespoons soy sauce
3 tablespoons toasted sesame oil
3 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons grated fresh ginger root
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup sake (optional)
1/4 sesame seeds
1 tablespoon lime juice
1/4 cup rice vinegar
1/4 cup water
2 bunches of radishes (with greens)
Dash of Cayenne pepper

(Serves 2-4)

Method
-Rinse chicken pieces in water and pat dry.
-Mix soy sauce, toasted sesame oil, sesame seeds, honey, ginger, garlic, sake, lime, rice vinegar and water. Set aside 1/4 cup and pour the rest over the chicken. Let marinate for 20 minutes (or longer if you have the time).
-Preheat oven to 400°F.
-Wash radishes and radish greens well. Remove greens and set aside.
-Cut radish globes into fourths and toss in the reserved 1/4 cup of marinade until coated.
-Brush the bottom of a roasting pan with olive oil.
- Arrange chicken pieces skin-side up in roasting pan. Pour marinade over chicken.
- Add radishes around the chicken.
-Cook for 30 minutes at 400°F. Then lower the heat to 350°F and cook for 15-20 minutes more until juices run clear or until the internal temperature reads 170° F.
-Remove and chicken and radishes from the roasting pan and set aside leaving the liquid in the pan.
-Toss the washed radish greens in the pan.
-Return pan to oven for 3-4 more minutes or until the greens are wilted.

To serve, place the greens on a plate, top with the chicken and radishes. Drizzle the pan drippings over everything. Coconut rice from last week’s column will go nicely with this dish.

Grilled Blue Cheese Portobello Burgers

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This first appeared in the Register Star and Daily Mail.
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Last Saturday I was doing yard work in our backyard when I noticed a mushroom that looked suspiciously like a morel. Let me say that I know nothing about foraging for wild mushrooms. The real potential of picking a poisonous one has, to my Mom’s relief, scared me off. But THIS one, was too tempting to ignore. I did some research and determined that it was indeed a true morel…so we cooked and ate it (apparently it is wise to thoroughly cook wild mushrooms).

Eating wild mushrooms isn’t something to do wily-nily. If you want to go mushroom-hunting, do lots of research, find a guide and/or join a mycological club.

Luckily, you can get a variety of interesting mushrooms in the grocery store, no guide book or bug spray needed.

Mushrooms are an excellent source of B and D vitamins and a good source of many minerals including selenium, copper, potassium, phosphorus, and zinc. They are low in calories and are purported to have cancer prevention properties, so eat up!

Now I love a good burger, but I’ve been reading Mark Bittman’s “Food Matters” and want to incorporate less meat into my diet. Bittman encourages people to be “Lessmeatarians.” Bittman notes that global livestock production is responsible for more greenhouse gasses than transportation. He believes that small changes in people’s diet can help decrease global warming while improving your health. Eating less meat is one of the changes he recommends (cutting junk food out of your diet is another one). Bittman states “simple lifestyle choices (can) help you loose weight, reduce your risk of many long-term or chronic diseases, save you real money, and help stop global warming.” Sounds good to me.

A large portabella mushroom has about 30 calories. A 6-ounce hamburger patty weighs in at around 350 calories (more or less depending on how lean the ground beef is). Easy to see how the mushroom burger is a healthier choice. I won’t be swapping fungi for meat all summer, but once in a while it’s an inexpensive, flavorful, healthy substitute. Save the planet, slim your waist, and get a delicious meal all at the same time. That’s hard to pass up.

Ingredients

4 large Portobello mushroom caps, 4-5 inches in diameter
4 whole-wheat buns
4 thick slices of onion
1 cup Blue cheese (substitute your preferred cheese)
Few handfuls of arugula (or other greens)

Marinade:
2 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoon olive oil
1/4 cup water
1 tablespoon honey
1-2 garlic clove, minced
Dash cayenne pepper

Method

-Select burger-sized, plump, firm mushrooms. Avoid limp, dried or slimy looking ones (if not using right away, store in the refrigerator wrapped in a paper towel).
-Clean mushrooms with a mushroom brush or damp cloth and remove their stems (I save the stems in a freezer bag for stock).
-Place in a dish, stem/gill side up.
-For the marinade, whisk together the vinegar, water, honey, garlic, cayenne pepper and olive oil and drizzle the marinade over the mushrooms.
-Cover and marinate for 30 minutes or more, turning mushrooms once.
-Prepare a charcoal grill or heat a gas grill to medium high heat.
-Brush the grill with oil.
-Grill the mushrooms on medium heat for about 5 minutes on each side. The longer you cook the mushrooms, the meatier they get, just be sure not to burn them.
-With the gill side up, place blue cheese on the mushroom and cook until melted
-Place each mushroom on a bun and top with an onion slice, arugula, a tomato slice (if in season) and whatever condiments you prefer (like homemade mayo, ketchup, and mustard).