Artichoke Pesto

Due to some miscommunications and a kitchen cabinet that has the ability to hide dry goods within its depths, Tim and I found ourselves the proud owners of not one, not two, but three Costco-sized jars of marinated artichoke hearts recently.

In an effort to work our way through this ridonkulous overabundance of artichoke hearts, I did some Googling on ye olde interwebs and found this artichoke-centric recipe for lemony artichoke pesto.  I followed the recipe, a pretty standard pesto, for the most part, but substituted fresh basil leaves for the parsley, as flat leaf parsley is nowhere to be found in Jakarta.  My nut of choice (or convenience, really) was almonds, toasted, of course.  

Good stuff!  I put it on pizza, topped with mozzarella, halved cherry tomatoes and mushrooms.  It looks pretty good as a pasta sauce, too.  A fun, but not too crazy, adaptation of your typical pesto.

Pepitas Two Ways: Brittle and Pesto

So, this post may be a little too early, in the sense that pepitas, which are hulled pumpkin seeds, are not really in season yet, but I have an excuse.  I bought a bag of roasted, salted pepitas at Trader Joe's back in January when I was in the States, with no particular plan in mind for them.  I brought them back to Jakarta, set them on the counter, and there they sat for six months...  I felt like I needed to use them or lose them, so here we are.  I've got two fall recipes for you...

Pepita Brittle: sweety, salty, crunchy, awesome.  I was a little bit worried about candy making in a humid environment (see: weepy marshmallows, January 2012), but this recipe from Smitten Kitchen was pretty foolproof. 

A spicy pepita pesto, with basil and cilantro, pepitas in the place of pine nuts, lime instead of lemon juice and a chili for heat... served on pasta with roasted squash (I used kabocha squash, but you could do pumpkin, butternut, what have you...):

Lemon Basil Ice Cream

While looking for mint, basil and cilantro at our local grocery store (to use in my grilled veggie salad), Tim and I unknowingly stumbled upon a new (to us) herb: lemon basil. 

 

I saw a bundle of it it tucked in the greens section, which is a tangle of some familiar and some unknown greens marked haphazardly in English, Bahasa Indonesia and Japanese.  It looked basil-esque, so I picked it up and gave it a sniff, only to inhale an awesomely fragrant lemony scent.  Once the produce guy (who is my new BFF, as I ask him the name of a new veggie or herb every time I shop there and he obligingly informs me of the name in at least 4 different languages) rang it up, I saw that it was called "daun kemangi."  Apparently it's used pretty regularly in Indonesian cooking and, since it's local, it's dirt cheap: a massive bundle for 2590 rupiah, which is the equivalent of 27 U.S. cents.

Anywho, I dropped some of it in the salad,  and then had a ton left over.  David Lebovitz and "The Perfect Scoop" to the rescue, yet again.  He had a recipe for basil ice cream spiked with lemon zest, so I followed his recipe, substituting lemon basil for the traditional Genovese basil.  Awesome stuff- creamy, lemony (somewhat lemongrassy), herby, sweet.  A good accompaniment to spicy Asian dishes, I'd say.  Get thee to thy green grocer or farmer's market and find some lemon basil!

Grilled Veggie and Rice Salad with Fish Sauce Dressing

Omg.  This salad is so good.  Even Tim liked it, lamenting the lack of meat only somewhat, stating that, "maybe it would make a really good side... you know... to some meat."  I liked it on its own, but agree that it would also make a kick-ass side dish and/or bed for some Vietnamese-style grilled chicken (we made a recipe quite similar to this one at our Hoi An cooking class in June.)  

I had lots of fresh herbs left over from our Vietnamese pomelo salad last week and saw this herb-heavy, Vietnamese-esque recipe in my July 2012 Bon Appetit magazine... I am so glad I made it.  It's got a lot of ingredients, but don't be intimidated, as it's really quite easy once you light up the grill and is a great way to utilize all your summer veggies and herbs- corn, eggplant, zucchini, okra, mint, basil, cilantro.  Mmm.

I made only a couple small changes to the recipe- the dressing is supposed to have grilled Holland or Anaheim chilis, but here there are just cabe rawit (the little ones) and cabe besar (the big ones).  All are blow-your-face off hot and not really the equivalent of an Anaheim.  Thus, I decided to substitute with some Sriracha to taste.  Also, rather than plain white jasmine rice, I bought some whole-grain Javanese brownish/reddish rice and cooked it coconut milk substituting for 1/3 of the liquid.  I think the hearty, nutty rice and extra coconut flavor really put the finishing touch on the recipe.

Mini Farfalle with Eggplant, Cherry Tomatos, Almond Pesto and Feta

Kate passed on this recipe for labor-inducing eggplant Parmesan so I could share it with Jamie, who was nearing her due-date... it made me hungry for eggplant, which I had conveniently bought from the CSA this week. I didn't have all the ingredients for the parm, but I did have the world's biggest bag of basil, also care of Star Hollow Farm, so I decided to merge the eggplant with some basil pesto and serve it over pasta.Using this recipe from Giada "Boobs and Teeth" De Laurentiis as a general guideline for cooking the eggplant, I chopped it up, sauteed it until brown, and threw it all together with fresh basil pesto (basil, parm, olive oil, almonds, garlic), cute mini farfalle, a pint of halved sweet orange cherry tomatoes, and salty feta. Awesome warm, and also delicious cold the next day.

PS: Yes, the eggplant parmesan apparently did work for Jamie- she went into labor the day after eating it! Introducing my beautiful brand-new baby niece, Zoe:

Pesto Pizza

Easy weeknight dinner:
pesto (basil, garlic, Parmesan, nuts, olive oil, salt, pepper)
mozzarella
fresh tomato slices
whole wheat pizza doughLoad up pizza dough with toppings, cook on super high heat for 10 minutes, devour, done.

Okra, Corn and Tomato Saute with Cajun Grilled Shrimp

The end of summer is nigh... but the summer veggies keep coming! The CSA is still rife with corn, tomatoes, okra, peppers, and other summery goodies, though. I threw a whole bunch of these veggies together in a quick stir-fry, supplemented with a dash of hot sauce. Topped with some Cajun-esque grilled shrimp. Simple and delicious!

Chicken Sausage Lasagna

For our most recent True Blood TV Club meeting, I decided lasagna would be a good option since it serves a crowd and is delicious. Plus, I had 10 pounds of Roma tomatoes from the CSA to use up, and lasagna uses lots of tomatoes.Ina's recipes are consistently good, so I thought I'd use her lasagna recipe as my jumping off point. I did make a couple changes, though. Rather than use canned crushed tomatoes, I roasted halved Romas at 425 for about an hour, then zipped them in the food processor to make my own crushed tomatoes. Also, I substituted chicken sausage for the turkey sausage Ina recommends, solely because that's what was available (and on sale!) at the Teet.

This recipe was soooo good. Good thing I made a double batch so we had leftovers!!

Panzanella

Made this panzanella salad with cukes and mini-tomatoes from the CSA- yum! Very summery and delicious. I used a combination of the ingredients in this recipe and Ina's methodology and vinaigrette.
Awesome- it was a hit.I plan to try other panzanellas in the future... maybe in the fall I'll try a winter panzanella with butternut squash and brussel sprouts.

Summery Cantaloupe Sangria

For an outing to listen to jazz in the National Gallery of Art's Sculpture Garden, I made this summery sangria I read about in Martha Stewart's Everyday Food magazine... I can't seem to find the recipe online, but the gist of it was thus:

• lots of chopped up summer fruit (I used cantaloupe and a little peach)
• lots of mint and basil
• white wine
• orange liqueur
• sliced ginger

Let it soak together for a couple hours, pour over ice and enjoy!

Later in the evening, after we'd run out of wine, but the fruit was still in the pitcher, we poured some sparkling wine over it and that worked well, too.

Grilled Pizza

Last year, I was making some great pizzas, but in the process I was testing the oven's ability to handle extreme temperatures, bumping it up to 500 or 550 degrees, smoking myself out of the house and cracking baking stones left and right.

This year I decided to try a new method in the hopes that it would be easier on my cooking equipment and my nostrils... grilled pizza! I used this dough recipe from the Other Martha, and grilled it inside on my cast iron grill pan. it was really easy and really tasty. I rolled it super thin and it crisped up quite nicely. Still some smoke, but no cracked cookware!

Topped it with sauteed sweet cherry tomatoes, garlic scapes, mushrooms (all from the CSA), as well as some Italian sausage, mozzarella and basil.

Thai-Style Stir-Fried Chicken and Green Beans with Basil

I got the first of the season's green beans from the CSA this week and needed a simple but exciting way to prepare them that didn't involve going to the grocery store... couldn't deal with the crowds after a long weekend of Chicago-style drinking and an extra long day of workin' hard for the money.

A little Googling was all it took: Thai-style stir-fried chicken and green beans with basil. The recipe I used is a simplified (only about 7 ingredients!) version of this Thai staple: gai pad krapow. Mine was heavier on the green beans (1 lb) relative to the chicken (also 1 lb). And it was spicy and delicious. Try it.

Fettuccine with Peas, Asparagus, and Bacon

This pasta dish with peas, asparagus and bacon was the May Bon Appetit front cover... it looked great and tasted pretty good. Quite fast to make, light and springy. Mmm.

Baked Tortellini with Tomato Spinach Cream Sauce

Casserole week continues!!

Threw this semi-homemade dish together really quickly, but it was pretty good. I used tomato sauce that I made last summer during tomato season and threw in a bunch of frozen chopped spinach for some veggies.

Pretty good!

Banh Mi: Vietnamese Pork Meatball Subs

I saw this pork meatball banh mi recipe in Bon Appetit's January issue and knew I had to make it... banh mi are (is?) basically Vietnamese grinders/hoagies/subs/what have you.

Conveniently, the CSA had the carrots and daikon radishes (which look eerily like my nemesis, the parsnip) that make up the slaw that the recipe uses to compliment the meatballs. Also, it calls for plenty of everybody's favorite spicy sauce, Sriracha.

If you dig on swine, I highly recommend you give this recipe a try... the recipe really made only enough meatballs for 4 sandwiches, but it made a ton of the carrot/daikon slaw, more than necessary.

Spaghetti in Meatballs

Tony made spaghetti-in-meatballs with a basil tomato dipping sauce tonight after watching what must have been a particularly riveting episode of Rachael Ray's 30 Minute Meals. They were quite tasty, care of the pesto that's mixed into the meatballs and the dipping sauce. The meatballs are also kinda fun- they could be a good meal to make for kids since they're so funny looking. They kinda remind me of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Homemade Tomato Sauce for Freezing

This week my CSA offered 10 lb boxes of Roma tomatoes at a fairly steep discount... most likely because it's the end of the summer and they're swimming in tomatoes. I took the bait, and now I am similarly treading in deep tomato waters.

I decided to make a whole bunch of simple tomato-basil sauce to freeze so we could have the fresh tomato taste in a couple months when the grocery store tomatoes are pale and anemic.

I used the basic tomato sauce recipe from this pasta cookbook Mom gave me several years ago... here's the general gist, although feel free to amp up whatever aspect of it you like:

4 lb peeled/seeded/diced Roma tomatoes

2 TBS olive oil

2 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp pepper

1/3 cup chopped fresh basil (and/or parsley)

- throw everything but the herbs into a large pot over medium heat

- bring to a boil

- turn heat down, simmer for 20 minutes

- add chopped herbs

- process the sauce (or part of the sauce) to get the consistency you want

- cook 5 minutes more

Eggplant, Tomato and Goat Cheese Sandwiches

I got some eggplants, Roma tomatoes, garlic, and goat cheese at the farmers market this week. Along with some basil from the Aerogarden, we threw together these easy grilled veggie sandwiches. They were pretty good- not the most amazing sandwich ever, but easy and good enough for government work!

Please excuse the terrible photo- it's a camera phone shot. I was too lazy and hungry to go upstairs to retrieve my camera.

Grilled Summer Succotash Pasta with Roasted Garlic Sauce

This week's Washington Post food section included a recipe for a grilled vegetable pasta with roasted garlic and lemon sauce. This recipe was good- very fresh. The veggies the recipe called for were exactly what came in my CSA share this week, including sweet corn on the cob, zucchini, garlic, and one that I was nervous about: lima beans.

Turns out that fresh lima beans aren't half bad! They're kinda a pain to shell (see the photo below for an idea of what they look like in and out of the shell), but tasty.

Salt and Pepper Crusted Shrimp with Lemon-Basil Dipping Sauce

Jennifer made these tasty shrimp and their associated dipping sauce as a pre-burger appetizer. Used some basil from the all-basil Aerogarden I've got going right now.

Mmmm.