Grilled Cabbage Slaw w/ Yogurt Miso Dressing

*sigh*....I LOVE summer. But wait...March has JUST begun! Summer?...March?...oh yes...one of the greatest reasons why I am so loyal to the golden state. On the last day of February 2010, the temperature was 68 and sunny, and I was wearing flip flops and a tank top, getting more than my daily required dose of Vitamin D au naturel on my friend's front porch. Are my friends in the north east and mid west jealous?... probably just a little. *sorry guys!*


Grilling party! So what to make? I will provide 100% transparency here and admit that it was a VERY slow Sunday morning due to a crazy Saturday night. That said, I was very limited on time, and the busy weekend didn't allow for any pre-planning or meat marinating, so I thought a basic coleslaw would be good - but no...too boring, and I wouldn't get to use the grill! So, I thought, what the heck, why not just throw the cabbage ON the grill? And thus, the grilled cabbage slaw was born. Caramelizing the cabbage on a hot grill would give it a rich nutty flavor. To brighten it up a bit, I had a barely used bunch of mint in the fridge that I could bring w/ me, peanuts would be great for crunch, and cilantro....just because I like cilantro.


As for the dressing, I needed to make do with what I had in the fridge which included miso paste and non-fat greek yogurt. In my rush to get to the party, I hopped out of the shower, wrapped myself in my bathrobe and ran to the kitchen. I literally just scooped a bunch of yogurt into a jar, spooned in some miso paste, and added in whatever other ingredients I thought would go well with it, then prayed. I slapped on the lid, shook it up, tasted it, adjusted and threw it in the fridge while I got ready. On the way out, I stopped by the closest grocery store, a little Korean market, to pick up the cabbage, cilantro, and peanuts. I had everything in hand, but couldn't for the life of me find peanuts! They carried bags of whole unshelled boiled peanuts...and unshelled roasted peanuts...raw shelled peanuts, but I just wanted a jar of ready to go roasted PEANUTS! Where's the peanut man with top hat and cane?! Why doesn't a Korean market have ready to go shelled peanuts!?!?! Even your average gas station has them! I almost wished I needed gas, but luckily I didn't, and found a fun substitute. Instead of a peanut man with top hat, I found little yellow circle man looking down on me with a big smile. He sat on a tall can full of crunchy sesame balls, each w/ a little peanut inside. Why not? The salad turned out great - a fun creation originating from lack of time....and lack of peanuts.



Ingredients

For the dressing (Note that the quantities should be viewed as 'more or less' due to the nature under which this dressing was created):
1 Cup Greek Yogurt
3 Tbs Miso Paste
3 Tbs Rice Wine Vinegar
2 Tbs Honey
2 Tbs Sesame Oil
1 tsp salt
1 tsp white pepper
1 tsp sriracha chili sauce
2 Tbs toasted sesame seeds

For the greens:
1 small green cabbage, quartered lengthwise, with the stem keeping each quarter in tact
1 small red cabbage, quartered the same way
Olive Oil
Salt & Pepper
1 bunch mint
1 bunch cilantro
1 can of sesame balls, lightly crunched up (or.....1.5 Cups of roasted salted peanuts)
1 lime, zest and juice

Throw all of the dressing ingredients into a jar and shake vigorously so that the honey and miso paste is dissolved and there are no clumps. Set aside in the refrigerator

Rub olive oil over each of the cabbage quarters, and season w/ salt and pepper. Place each quarter of cabbage on a hot grill cut side down for 2-3 minutes each or until there are grill marks. The grill should be covered. Remove from grill onto a cutting board and slice cabbage into thin strips

While the cabbage is grilling, chop cilantro and tear off the mint leaves in a large salad bowl. Add sliced cabbage and toss with all of the dressing. Add crunched up sesame balls (or peanuts), lime zest, lime juice and toss again until well combined.

'Deconstructed' Ginger & Garlic Fried Rice

Right now, I am eating while blogging. This is a first for me. Usually, I think, "Dood, there's no way I would interrupt quality time with my food. Writing comes after eating." But no, at this very moment, I'm practically licking dribbling creamy egg yolk from my bottom lip (and a little piece of rice) because I shoveled a bite in my mouth while the previous sentence was being created. I am so insanely excited about this recipe that I want to share it with the world ASAP.

Patience is needed though - I need to preface this recipe by first giving credit where credit is due. I first saw this thumbnail of culinary magnificence on a blog that my blogger buddy Matt Litman reminded me of: Smitten Kitchen. I love this blog because her recipes are so approachable and her photography is absolutely beautiful. She could probably make my mouth water simply with an elegant photo of a green onion - my least favorite food ever. Anyway, I was flipping through her beautiful photography, and I came across one with a sunny side up egg over rice..........c'mon really? A fried egg. over white rice. with soy sauce? That was me and every asian kid's staple breakfast and dinner in college. So - naturally, I had to see what all the fuss was about and it led me to Mark Bittman's version of a Jean-Georges Vongerichten recipe. I watched Mark Bittman's video, and he referred to the final masterpiece as something like a "Deconstructed fried rice". Here's my second....."c'mon really?" Not everything needs to be deconstructed - this is chinese food, not a michelin star rated restaurant that also includes molecular gastronomy in their menu.

So tonight was the night that I would set my doubts aside and test greatness. My boyfriend is gone for a bachelor party weekend, and I'm cooking for one - perfect recipe for it. The verdict: Oh BOY do I stand corrected. This is a staple college dinner on steroids, and you can call it deconstructed or not.....it's FABULOUS. What makes it is the fried ginger and garlic crisps, along with the savory leeks and chewy sweet rice, mixed with creamy egg yolk. It's an amazing balance of flavors and textures - and it's SO easy to do. Before I go into the ingredients and everything else...I'm frying up another egg and going for seconds. Oh heaven.

Ingredients
1/2 cup peanut oil (Jean-Georges apparently uses chicken fat......ummm...next time?)
2 tablespoons minced garlic
2 tablespoons minced ginger
Salt
2 cups thinly sliced leeks, white and light green parts only
4 cups day-old cooked jasmine rice
4 large eggs
2 teaspoons sesame oil
4 teaspoons soy sauce

Add half of the oil into a medium pan over medium heat and add garlic and ginger. Swirl the pan around occassionally until the bits are crisp and brown. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the garlic and ginger onto a paper towel. Reserve the oil.


In another pan, add the remaining oil over low-medium heat, add leeks, a pinch of salt and cook until tender and lightly brown. Add the rice and stir until heated through. To add more flavor, drizzle a bit of the reserved oil from the ginger and garlic and stir well. Salt to taste.

In a nonstick skillet over low-medium heat, fry the eggs sunny side up. To serve, scoop 1/4 of the rice on a plate, top with one egg, drizzle sesame oil and soy sauce over the dish, and finish with a generous sprinkling of crisp ginger and garlic.

Three Aioli

I'm starting off this post by saying that I'm not a mayo person. I end up scraping it off sandwiches if there's too much of it, I'd rather use olive oil and vinegar in my tuna salads, potato salads, etc... But aioli (prounounced EYE-OH-LEE).....for some reason, it's a different story. Perhaps because it's got a fancy name - or when I have it, it's usually from a restaurant so I have this vision in my head of them whipping it up from scratch vs. squeezing off-white goop out of a bottle. Plus, it's flavored! - usually with garlic.....which....mmmm.....I'm speechless.

I've got a dinner party to go to tonight! It's BYOB - Build Your Own Burger. Everyone just brings their own fave burger building yummies - avocado, mushrooms, onions, cheese, etc - whatever the heck you want and we just make various different sliders. I'll probably go to the store to pick up a couple of avocados and onions for caramelizing but I wanted to make something special and different. So - I thought - AIOLI. Plus, we're having sweet potato fries, and it'd be perfect for dipping!

To increase variety, I ended up making a big batch of it, then flavored it three different ways: Smoked Paprika and Chipotle, Garlic, and Pesto. Yum yum yum yum yum....that, spread on a mini dinner roll, with a flat beefy meatball. HOORAH! How could you go wrong!?!?

Before I get into all the ingredients and such - note: if you're the one making the aioli, I guarantee that you'll burn the calories you'll end up consuming. It requires a good amount of elbow grease.

Ingredients
1 Egg Yolk
1 pinch salt
2 Cups Olive Oil
2 Tbs Lemon Juice
Salt and Pepper to taste

2 tsp Smoked Paprika
1 tsp Chipotle

1 clove garlic - mashed

3 tsp pesto

In a medium bowl, whisk together egg yolk and salt until well combined. SLOWLY - starting with one or two drops at a time, add the olive oil. Whisk consistently. Once you've started the emulsion, it should look a little thicker and a bit more opaque than the egg yolk you started out with, you can start drizzling the olive oil in a thin steady stream, while whisking the whole time. Alternate drizzling the olive oil and lemon juice depending on the consistency you want. Once all the olive oil incorporated, separate the aioli base into three different containers. Mix the Smoked Paprika/Chipotle, Garlic Clove and Pesto in each separate bowl. Keep refrigerated until serving.

Masoor Daal

Happy 2010!!! ("Twenty Ten"....NOT "Two Thousand Ten"....for those who are still trying to figure out what to call it). So the holiday season of 2009 has officially come to an end..and over the time frame of approximately 2+ months, I've been busy eating, and eating, and eating...oh and eating. I ate A LOT. No exaggeration here. Between work and my birthday and my family and my boyfriend's family, and friends, there was constant consumption of a whole lotta food - eaten with joy and happiness, of course. But between the holiday dinners, lunches, parties, and unsuccessfully trying to eat light when meals were eaten at home (of course due to all the holiday cookies and treats that were shared), it's definitely time to change up the diet a little bit....at least for the time being. That said, week one of 2010 will be all healthy vegetarian. This will be hard because every time I open the freezer, a big tupperware of leftover ginormous juicy meatballs in homemade marinara sauce that had simmered over night (courtesy of my boyfriend's aunt) will be staring straight at me. Also - I need to add "healthy" in the first week of vegetarianism...because frankly, I could define vegetarian as gorging on cheese and chocolate all day.


Kicking off healthy vegetarian week, I decided to go the Indian food route. Daal - lentils - are such a great source of both carbs and protein. They're easy to make and you can make a big pot of it and eat it throughout the week. I LOVE making indian food because the spices add so much flavor, it's ultra satisfying without needing to add a lot of fat. I need to take some time here to caveat though - I didn't follow a recipe of any sort, I just kind of know a general process for making it, and added various spices that I personally like in indian cooking. I used red lentils - masoor daal - and added various spices to it.

Here's the combination of flavors I used starting from the upper left going clockwise: Mustard seeds, Cumin Seeds, Coriander Seeds, Garam Masala, Turmeric, Ginger (didn't have fresh ginger on hand so I used ground), Chili Powder



Ingredients
2 Cups of Masoor Daal
1 tsp Turmeric
6 Cups of water, plus more
4 Tbs Vegetable Oil or Ghee
1 onion, thinly sliced (clarified butter)
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp mustard seeds
2 tsp whole cumin seeds
1 tsp whole coriander seeds
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp ginger (ground...but fresh ginger is preferred: ~1 inch piece, grated)
1 tsp chili powder
2 Tbs salt (more or less to taste)
1 Tbs pepper
1 bunch fresh cilantro, chopped

Rinse the lentils well and pick out any little rocks, etc...that might be hiding in the lentils. Cook the lentils w/ water and Turmeric in a big pot over medium high heat. Stir occasionally so the lentils don't stick to the bottom and continue to add water to desired consistency.

Meanwhile, use a pestle and mortar to grind up all the spices together. Sautee the onion in a pan with the oil or ghee (make sure not to burn the onions!!!) - add the ground spices and garlic and cook over a medium heat until the the mixture is fragrant. The onions and garlic should be soft and the spices lightly toasted.

Once the lentils are soft and cooked through, add the onion, garlic and spice mixture into the pot and stir. Simmer for another 5-10 minutes, stirring occasionally until all the flavors are blended together. Add salt and pepper to taste. Before serving, stir in the cilantro. Serve over rice or with naan.

Fried Goat Cheese

The first time I've ever had fried goat cheese was at Chaya Brasserie in San Francisco. Ummmm...what can I say about it? Everything and nothing all at the same time. That was about 5 years ago. I've had it multiple times since then, and it just occured to me recently that I could make it myself - and boy was it easy...and WAY less expensive than ordering it at Chaya. My boyfriend calls it "fancy mozzarella sticks". Yeah, pretty much....same concept, but much MUCH more delectible.

In this salad, I paired the warm creamy goat cheese with sweet roasted beets and toasted walnuts. I also had some homemade bagel croutons that I threw in to give it extra crunch, and served it with a drizzle of homemade citrus vinaigrette.

Ingredients
One small log of goat cheese, slicked into 1/2 inch discs
1/3 C Flour
1 Egg, whisked
2 tsp water
1/3 C cornmeal (Can also substitute bread crumbs, but the crunch of cornmeal is fun)
1 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
3 Tbs toasted sesame seeds
Salt & Pepper
Olive Oil

Put the Flour, egg and cornmeal in 3 separate dishes. Add the water to the egg, and whisk together. Add the garlic powder, cayenne, sesame seeds, and a generous pinch of salt and freshly ground pepper into the cornmeal and mix.

In a small saute pan, heat up enough oil so that it's deep enough to reach at least 1/4 of the way up the side of the disk - about 1/4 inch deep. Make sure the oil is hot enough by sprinkling some flour in the oil. If it sizzles, it's hot enough, but make sure the oil doesn't smoke.

Working with one or two goat cheese discs at a time, first cover each disc with flour and pat of the extra flour. Next, dip it in the egg, making sure that the whole disc is covered, then toss it around in the cornmeal. Gently place breaded goat cheese in the hot oil and cook for one to two minutes each side, taking care when flipping so the crust doesn't puncture. Once the goat cheese is golden brown, set aside on a paper towel and serve warm on top of the already prepared salad.

Horchata

I was browsing Food Network magazine the other day and came across a recipe for horchata. I don't know why it never occurred to me that I could make my own horchata. I LOVE the stuff! Sweet, cinnamon-y rice milk. Yum yum yum! The perfect balance for any spicy Mexican meal. After reading through the recipe, I didn't think it could possibly be that easy, so I went online to see if there were other variations. I found a recipe from Emeril Lagasse that included blanched almonds in it - which I think would add the creaminess that the other recipe may have lacked, so I decided to go with that one.


In the process of making the horchata, I realized that I had run out of sugar - so I used some powdered sugar instead. I think that added to the texture a bit to make it even more silky, since creamy sweet frosting is just powdered sugar and a tiny bit of liquid. In any case, it came out DELICIOUS. It's an easy recipe to follow, but a little time consuding since it has to sit over night. It definitely tested my patience - I couldn't wait to take a giant gulp of it.

Ingredients
8 Tbs long grain rice
1 Cup blanched almonds
zest of 1/2 lime
1 tsp cinnamon (I ended up adding more)
3 Cups hot water, 4 cups cold water, divided
1 to 1 1/2 C of sugar (depending on taste)
Vanilla extract to taste (~ 1tsp)

In a blender or food processor, finely grind up the rice - as fine as you can possibly get it. The finer the rice, the better the horchata. Put it in a large pitcher and add in the almonds, lime, and cinnamon. Add three cups of boiling water, stir, and let sit over night.

The next day, blend the mixure until it's as smooth as possible. Add 2 Cups of cold water and blend until combined. Using a fine strainer or strainer and cheese cloth, allow the liquid to strain through. (I strained it 3 times because I didn't have cheese cloth). Add a 2 more cups of cold water and mix thoroughly. Add Sugar and vanilla, and a little bit more cinnamon if you'd like. Stir well until the sugar has completely dissolved. I had to let the horchata sit in the fridge for a little while in order for the sugar to fully dissolve and all the flavors to meld together. Serve cold, over ice.

Corn and Zucchini Salad with a Latin Twist

Love, love, LOVE summer time!I mean, kale and chard in the winter is great and all, but nothing beats the bright colorful flavors of summer. The combination of the warm weather with sweet, in season corn, and cool tender zucchini screams summer time to me. It’s probably one of my favorite salads to make, and it’s so versatile! You can add anything you want to it. My first corn & zucchini salad had thyme and lemon zest with a simple lemon juice and olive oil dressing. In this version, I served it as a light and fresh side to grilled fajitas, so a Latin twist was in the stars for this recipe


Ingredients:
2 ears of corn, boiled and kernels cut off
2-3 small zucchini, diced to the size of corn kernels (more tender than the big ones)
1 red bell pepper, diced to the size of corn kernels
1 jalapeno, seeds removed, finely diced
½ Cup cilantro, chopped
Zest of one lime
Juice of one lime
5 Tbs Olive oil
Salt & Pepper to taste

Toss all of the ingredients together, and season with salt and pepper to taste. Yes, it’s THAT easy.

Side note: Feel free to play around with the amount of each ingredient to your taste!