Last weekend, I finished reading Matthew Amster-Burton's Pretty Good Number One, a travelogue slash memoir slash love letter to Japanese food. Funded by a Kickstarter campaign, it's a book I'm…
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Side Dishes
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The other night I decided what to make for dinner around 5 o’clock. For someone who likes having a plan, that was late. A bag of chickpeas was thawing the in the fridge, so I made half a batch of hummus and then had to do something with the rest. Flipping to the index in the Jerusalem cookbook there it was, Basmati and Wild Rice with Chickpeas, Currants and Herbs. I went to the cupboard. No wild rice. Just as well, I wasn’t gonna wait around for 45 minutes for it to cook anyway. Currants? Check. Herbs? Well, cilantro. Close enough. Time to riff.
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Ever get the feeling we’re all making the same 100 recipes in slightly different ways? I make a black bean salad periodically that’s just a thrown together mix of black beans, corn, red onion, tomato, sometimes cucumber and avocado with lime, cumin and olive oil, and a little salt and pepper. A few states over, it’s got black-eyed peas, jalapeno and cilantro and they call it Cowboy Caviar. Call it what you want, this salad doubles as a rustic salsa, and it’s spot on for those of us getting our vegetable on, for those watching football and for general New Year’s good luck.19
With just a few days to go until the Big Meal, we’re keeping things light around here (previous Twinkie post notwithstanding). I spent Sunday morning picking up a few last things, including the turkey, and then the spent most of the afternoon in the kitchen. It’s just not the holidays unless there’s Chex Mix. Last night's dinner was a relatively simply affair – Sriracha Sloppy Joes and this arugula, radicchio and honeycrisp apple salad.14
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If you need any proof that it's possible to eat fabulously as a vegan, you only need to visit Denver. We just spent the weekend with our friends Jed and Lara there and ate at Justin Cucci's restaurants, Linger and Root Down. Not only is Linger's menu focused on global street food, which would be a potential disaster in less capable hands, these restaurants serve both carnivores and vegans, satisfying all parties. And Root Down makes a mean blood orange mimosa at brunch. I came back from Denver thinking about vegetarian dishes, and while I made a beefy, warms-your-soul pot of chili earlier in the week, I also roasted up a butternut squash and made a little butternut and quinoa salad with the flavors of fall.
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September is about new beginnings, well, at least as far as the school year goes, so maybe that’s why OJ kicked off his new diet and exercise regimen now. Whatever it is, this new deal is already changing the way we eat (and I thought we were in a pretty good place to start with).
The main challenge? Everything is weighed separately – 100 g protein, 80 grams carbs, however many grams fat. But when I start to look at how I cook, how do you calculate vegetable soup or pot pie or a casserole of any kind? Everything is mixed in.
This first week there’s been a lot of grilling going on. Last night flank steak, over the weekend we grilled chicken. And it was that chicken that formed the basis for this chicken tikka pasta salad.
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Some long weekends I go into overdrive on cooking projects, but over this past Labor Day weekend, I felt compelled to do almost nothing. I hit the farmers market Saturday morning after having missed the two previous weeks and bought a ridiculous amount of Roma tomatoes and nectarines to stave off that nagging (read: desperate) feeling that summer is slipping away. But I didn’t have anything really in mind for them.
OJ is embarking on a new diet and exercise regimen, which puts some real food limitations on half our household, so a nectarine buckle was out of the question and I didn’t feel motivated enough to make tomato paste. So despite our larder being more than full, this weekend was about simplicity. It was also about baseball games, braving the crowds at Pike Place and stocking up on this and that at Cost Plus, but mostly, it was about simplicity.
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We’re in the dog days of summer, finally. Days so hot all you want to do is sit in front of an oscillating fan and sip a cool glass of iced tea. Days so hot nothing is getting cooked, except you in your car on the commute home. I’ve got something for you. It’s cool, crisp and refreshing. It’s….a sandwich. Well, a dip and a sandwich. Break out the food processor, we’re making edamame hummus, which you can do as dip for dinner with veg and pita chips, or as a great spread on sandwiches for the “Damn, could it get any hotter?” nights ahead.26
Pop quiz! What makes succotash, succotash?
A. Lima beans
B. Corn
C. Cooking the vegetables
D. Pork
E. Who knows? All of the above.
On a multiple choice test, they always say, pick C, but in this case, I’m going with E. Merriam Webster says succotash is corn and lima beans. The word comes from the Narragansett for boiled corn, “msíckquatash.” Some recipes add bacon or ham. Most recipes cook the vegetables. Others add tomatoes, or red or green bell peppers. Sufferin’ succotash!