Kale and Mushroom Lasagna Roll-ups

When you support your local farmers though a CSA program you get veggies that you don't normally buy.  I think this a good thing, it gets me thinking outside of the box.  But sometimes those veggies are not a big hit with the family.  The first time we got kale, it flopped.  Steamed and sauteed with some olive oil and salt and pepper, it was too strong for everyone including me. Well anyone who gets a CSA box knows you're going to get some kale, in fact you are going to get a lot of it.  That means creativity needs to come into play.

I have found that kale goes over best in my house when it's pulverized to bits, such as in a winter pesto.  Another way is in these yummy lasagna roll-ups.  I found this recipe on Pinterest (of course) and it has become a regular in the rotation. As usual I adapted the recipe to fit my family's tastes and my cooking style.


Kale and Mushroom Lasagna Roll-ups
Adapted from Skinny Taste.com (Mushroom Kale Lasagna Rolls)

Sauce:
6 cloves garlic crushed
2 T olive oil
Several fresh basil leaves thinly sliced
2 -28 cans crushed tomatoes
¼ cup red wine
salt and pepper
2 T. Honey

15 lasagna noodles

Filling:
5 cups kale, thoroughly rinsed, stems removed, roughly chopped
8 oz mushrooms, roughly chopped
1 tsp olive oil
2 cloves garlic, chopped
15 oz part skim ricotta cheese
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1 egg
Kosher salt and black pepper
6 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese, shredded

Start with the sauce.  Heat oil in sauté pan over medium heat and add garlic, stir for a minute or two.  Add the remaining sauce ingredients and allow it to simmer

Cook the lasagna noodles according following the instructions on the package.

In a food processor, pulse kale a few times until chopped.

In large skillet, sauté the garlic in oil for about 1 minute.  Add the kale, salt and pepper and sauté 5 minutes more minutes. Then add the mushrooms, cooking and additional 5 minutes or so. Season to taste with salt and pepper

Place the kale in a medium bowl and add the mushrooms mixture, ricotta, Parmesan cheese, egg, salt and pepper. Stir to combine

Preheat oven to 350° and ladle about 1 cup sauce on the bottom of a 9 x 12 baking dish.

Working with about 3 noodles at time lay the noodles flat on cutting board or other surface. Spread out 1/3 cup of the filling across each noodle. Roll each noodle up and place in the pan, allowing a bit of space between each roll up. Continue this process until all the noodles are used.  Cover the roll ups with the desired amount of sauce, saving a bit for serving. Cover the pan with foil and bake for about 35 minutes.  Remove the foil and sprinkle the mozzarella on top. Return the pan to oven bake another 5 minutes.  Let rest 10 minutes before serving.

Short Ribs in the Crock Pot

With all this talk of vegetarian cooking, it might surprise you to see today's post of beef short ribs. I am not opposed to eating meat, it's good stuff.  The issues are how much of it we eat and how it is sourced.  I used to buy lots of meat on sale, put it in my freezer and then thaw it as I needed to use it.  I haven't completely stopped this practice, but I have severely cut back on it. More and more these days, as my budget allows, I buy less meat but much better quality meat.  Local, organic meat, like these short ribs.

Short ribs are rich, yes dare I say a bit fatty, so you don't need many per portion. Serve this dish with some rice to soak up the broth and add two green sides and you're done.  Some beef and lots of plant based foods to fill the plate.

These ribs are cooked in the Crock Pot. Don't let that fool you into thinking we just throw it all in and they come out looking so browned and beautiful.  Mistake number one with Crock Pot/slow cooker cooking is skipping the browning step with the meat. It's hard to do it when you are cooking a whole chicken, but with most pieces of meat the few minutes it takes to brown your meat on the stove (and yes one more pan to quickly wash) is more than worth it.

Short Ribs in the Crock Pot

Short ribs, enough for 3 per serving
olive oil
1/2 onion, chopped
2 teaspoons tomato paste
1/2 cup red wine
1 teaspoon flour
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
kosher salt and black pepper to taste

In a medium skillet over medium high heat, brown the short ribs in a scant amount of olive oil, using tongs to move the ribs to the crock pot. Discard half of drippings and in the remaining drippings saute the onion for about 2 minutes. Swirl in the tomato paste, red wine, flour, Worcestershire sauce and salt and pepper. Stir in 1 cup of water and then pour the mixture over the ribs in the crock pot. Cook on high 5-6 hours.

Pappardelle with Corn and Tomatoes

I am sure that I have shared my family's desire to change the balance of meat and veggies in our diet.  Turning the tables to make sure we eat a lot less meat and a lot more veggies. Last week I made the meal in the picture above and it was a big hit, claiming a spot in the rotation. I found this recipe on the Food Network, and made some small changes to fit our tastes.  The star of this dish is not the pasta, but the corn.  This is the time of year for this dish, fresh local corn is everywhere. In the winter we may have to try frozen corn (on the cob), but I am sure it won't be the same.

I find that if I allow it, many of my vegetarian selections rely on a hearty amount of pasta.  I love pasta, but this is not what I want to fill up on instead of meat. The whole point of less meat is more veggies, so this meal cuts back the quantity pasta in the original recipe.  Instead of making this a one dish meal, I used wonderful fresh veggies from our CSA box to fill our plates. The fresh spinach was steamed and dressed with a drizzle of olive oil and salt and pepper, while the English peas were also steamed and dressed with a small amount of butter an salt. Just because you are serving a vegetarian main dish doesn't mean you should skip good sides!

Pappardelle with Corn and Tomatoes
(Adapted from Food Network's Pappardelle With Corn)

3 ears corn, shucked
5 tablespoons butter
3 vine ripe tomatoes, cut into cubes (use fresh local summer tomatoes when available)
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 small purple onion, thinly sliced
1/2 cup white wine
9 ounces pappardelle pasta
1/2 cup low-sodium vegetable broth
1/2 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons flat leaf parsley, chopped
kosher salt
black pepper

Cook the corn in boiling salted water for about 4 minutes.  Remove the corn the corn to cool and reserve the water, keeping it at a low boil.

Over medium heat, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in large skillet. Once melted, add the tomatoes, 1 teaspoon salt and 1/2 pepper, cook for 3-4 minutes.  Add the onion, cook for another minute and then add the garlic and cook for another minute.  Add the wine and and reduce for 5 minutes.

Once the corn is cool, cut the kernels off the cob.  Cook the pasta as the package directs in the same water used to cook the corn. Remove about 1 cup of the water and reserve before draining the pasta.

Add the corn and broth to the skillet and allow to simmer for 1 minute.  Add the pasta, parmesan 1/2 teaspoon salt and the remaining butter to the skillet.  Stir and add the reserved cooking water to help combine the ingredients. Season with salt and pepper and garnish with the parsley.

Frozen Hot Chocolate

I keep seeing commercials for frozen hot chocolate from various vendors and it sounds really good.  The problem is I know that these drinks have got to be calorie laden, with tons of sugar and fat.  I thought that making my own would help cut back some on both.  This is by no means a low calorie, low sugar drink, but I think it cuts enough while keeping that decadent taste.

I 'd been pondering this recipe for a while, what type of chocolate and what method to get it just right.  The chocolate part was easy, I knew I needed something more than chocolate syrup.  The solution of baking chocolate and Abuelita (used for Mexican style hot chocolate) turned out to be just the thing to give it a unique richness.  The method part was a bit trickier.  I knew I would need to melt the chocolate first to mix it with the milk, plus isn't this a play on hot chocolate? Yes, we need to start hot.  Fine, but how to get it slushy?  In the blender with ice? Freeze the hot chocolate in cubes then blend it?  I couldn't see it working out. Today it dawned on me, the ice cream maker!  The perfect solution to take my hot chocolate mixture to wonderful frozen slushiness!

Frozen Hot Chocolate
2-3 servings

1/2 tablet Abuelita
1 ounce square semi sweet baking chocolate
3 cups organic 2% milk
3-4 teaspoons chocolate syrup
1/4 vanilla extract
maraschino cherries

Chop the Abuelita and semisweet chocolate in small pieces.  Place the chocolate in a small mix bowl with about 1/4 cup of the milk.  Place the bowl in the microwave and heat for 15 seconds.  Pull it out and stir.  Repeat the process until all the chocolate is melted.  Let the chocolate sit and cool for about 5-10 minutes.

Meanwhile set up the ice cream maker.  Once the chocolate has cooled a bit, stir in the rest of the milk and then the vanilla extract.  Start the ice cream maker and pour in the hot chocolate mixture.  Blend for about 20 minutes. Spoon into tall glasses and garnish each with a cherry.

Herbed Salmon with Peruvian Inspired Lettuce Sauce

The more I cook, the more I realize that many times with a good dish it's all about the sauce.  Certainly the food needs to well seasoned and properly cooked, but an exquisite sauce really makes the dish extraordinary.  In fact, a fabulous sauce can save a mediocre dish.  It's all about the sauce.  That's how I feel about today's dish. It's not that the herbed salmon is mediocre, it can certainly stand on it's own, but it's the sauce turns this dish into something special.

What's funny is that I wasn't planning on making a sauce, but this time of year the CSA bombards us with greens, greens and more greens.  I'm pretty good with using up the tougher greens such as kale, collards, chard, spinach in various recipes, or in the case of use it before it spoils, my go to recipe is winter greens pesto.  Make it, freeze it, move on and use something else before next week's box comes.  The problem for me is lettuce.  I love salad, but not every night.  I had some romaine and the outside leaves were losing it, so I knew that I needed to act.  I went online and looked for lettuce sauces and found a nice variety of ideas.  One that caught my eye was a Peruvian sauce with mayo in it. I used that concept as my base and threw this sauce together with items that I had on hand, including some garlic scapes that I needed to use up.  As I get the hang of sauces like this, I realize it's not always in the exact ingredients, just use whatever you have. So as you read this and find that you have no garlic scapes use garlic (a little less) or scallions (a little more) to make the sauce.

Herbed Salmon with Peruvian Inspired Lettuce Sauce

Lettuce Sauce

1/2 head romaine lettuce, roughly chopped

1 teaspoon capers

1/3 cup mayonnaise

2 jalapenos, seeds removed and chopped

2 garlic scapes chopped

1 teaspoon salt, or to taste

1/4 teaspoon pepper, or to taste

1/2 cup cilantro, roughly chopped

Herbed Salmon

1 lb salmon fillet

2 garlic scapes, minced

1/8 cup garlic chives, chopped

1 1/2 tablespoons honey

juice of one lime

salt and pepper to taste

1/4 sup olive oil

romaine lettuce chopped

Puree the lettuce sauce ingredients in a food processor and then refrigerate until ready to serve.

Prepare a broiler pan with foil underneath the rack to protect the pan and preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Place the salmon on the rack.  Mix the remaining ingredients and pour on top of the salmon.  Roast in the oven for about 10 minutes and then turn up the heat up to broil to caramelize the honey during the last few minutes of cooking.  If the fish browns before it is cooked to the desired degree, turn the oven back to 450 degrees to complete cooking.

Serve the fish on a bed of lettuce with the lettuce sauce drizzled on top.

Zucchini Pancakes with Yogurt Sauce

Today’s recipe is one that I found on Pinterest a few months back,  Zucchini Fritters with Tzatziki. I love this recipe because it's a wonderful marriage between latkes and zucchini, plus the yogurt sauce although not what I think of as a tzatziki sauce since there are no cucumbers in it, is really nice.

I have to confess I got quite obsessed with these for a while, tweaking the recipe to fit my tastes and in the end to be baked instead of fried. The fried ones are still a bit better, but it's because they have more oil and and of course the butter.  The baked ones are a fine trade off though and at this point I am only making the baked ones.  The key is using the parchment paper, it helps crisp the bottom and also keeps them from sticking to the bottom of the pan.

A very important point made by alexandra, who originally penned this recipe, is that getting all the moisture out of the veggies is key.  I use a clean kitchen towel to squeeze out every bit that I can.  I have also noticed that sometimes after making the batter there is some liquid in the bottom the bowl.  To deal with this I will move the batter to one side and put in a few paper towels to soak up the liquid before moving on.

If you have extra yogurt sauce use it on chicken, veggies or whatever.  It's too good to let it go to waste.

Zucchini Pancakes with Yogurt Sauce
(Adapted from alexandra's kitchen's Zucchini Fritters with Tzatziki)

2 zucchinis, grated
1 potato, grated
kosher salt
2 tablespoons flour
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 tablespoon garlic chives, chopped
1 tablespoon parsley, chopped
2 teaspoons lemon juice
1/4 cup onion, diced
1 tablespoon butter (only if frying)
1 teaspoon olive oil

Yogurt Sauce:
1 cup Greek yogurt
1 tablespoon red onion, minced
1 tablespoon mint, chopped
kosher salt (to taste)
pepper (to taste)
1 tablespoon lemon juice

It is important to get as much liquid out of the veggies as possible. Use a colander to drain the grated potato and zucchini.  Sprinkle the veggies with kosher salt and let sit for 30-40 minutes.

While the veggies are draining, mix the yogurt sauce ingredients and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Spread the potato and zucchini onto a clean kitchen towel.  Roll it up and squeeze to get as much moisture out as possible. Carefully dump the veggies out of the towel and into a large bowl. Sprinkle in the flour and toss to coat, then add the egg, herbs, lemon juice, onion and salt and pepper to taste. Mix well.

Version 1 – Pan fry method
Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat.  Melt the butter and olive oil in the pan.  Add a about ¼ cup dollop of the veggie mix and gently flatten it to about 1/2 inch thick. Cook 3-5 minutes per side until browned.

Version 2 – Baked method
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Line a pan with parchment paper and spread a bit of olive oil on the paper.  Use about 1/4 cup of the batter to form each pancake. Place zucchini pancakes on the oiled paper.  Spray tops with cooking spray. Bake for 15 minutes, then turn the pancakes over and bake another 10 minutes or until crispy.

Serve with yogurt sauce.