Chard Stem Hummus

Posted on July 29, 2014 by makehastenotwaste

I made a cooked vegetable dish this weekend that I fully intended to share on the blog. It displayed a medley of farm-sourced ingredients and required quite a bit of time to stir and cook. When it finally finished, I sat down and ate it…and didn’t like the flavor. One of the vegetables I incorporated was kohlrabi, and I think it was too dominant in the dish. More importantly, the vegetables were supposed to soften after pan frying for so long, and the kohlrabi didn’t. It stood out. It may have even been burnt–I couldn’t tell. The dish was edible, but it needed a lot of tweaking before sharing. Fortunately, it wasn’t served to guests–only to my husband, who years ago would have run away if I tried serving him a dish with kohlrabi. He didn’t love it either, but he ate it. I’m so proud of how far he has come.

It got me thinking about the people, young and old, who won’t eat vegetables, and their noble partners who, out of concern for the health and well-being of loved ones, find ways of sneaking in nutrition. Do you know one of those people? Maybe YOU are a sneaker. You probably use up even more of the vegetables you buy than I do, because you plan to throw them into a food processor to make a secret sauce, or soup, or dressing. In my ongoing search for recipes that use the Swiss chard stems, I found this recipe for a chickpea, tahini, and yogurt dip with hidden Swiss chard stalks. Last summer I pickled some stems, which was great for preserving, but I rarely reached for them in the fridge. When I tried this grilled Swiss chard stem recipe, I didn’t seem to have enough stems to make it substantial…and then some of them even blew off of the grill while they were being cooked! When tasting the hummus recipe I made this Monday, one would never guess it has Swiss chard. What a difference from that weekend vegetable medley! Are there those with the opposite view of a stealthy vegetable cook, who insist that each vegetable be featured prominently and celebrated, who are less than impressed with this approach? Perhaps. But this dip is undeniably delicious, and I do give the Swiss chard stems some of the credit.

Chard Stem Hummus
From Martha Rose Shulman of The New York Times

4-5 ounces pound Swiss chard stalks, from about 1/2 pound bunch, sliced
Salt to taste
2 garlic cloves (to taste), peeled
heaping 3/4 Cup cooked chickpeas (about half a small can), drained and rinsed
2.5 Tablespoons stirred sesame tahini
4 Tablespoons plain Greek yogurt
2 Tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice, to taste
1/4 teaspoon cumin seeds, lightly toasted on the stovetop
1 Tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

Steam chard stalks over 1 inch water until tender when pierced with a fork, 15 to 20 minutes.

Collect the rest of your ingredients.

Drain the Swiss chard stems well, about 10 minutes. Add to a food processor along with your chickpeas.

Purée, stopping the machine from time to time to scrape down the sides.

Using a mortar and pestle, mash garlic with 1/2 teaspoon salt until you have a smooth paste. Add to chard stalks and chickpeas. Process until smooth.

After the first whirring…

Wipe out the same mortar to grind your toasted cumin seeds.

Add to processor along with tahini and yogurt and run the machine until smooth once again.

With machine running, add lemon juice, olive oil and a touch of salt to taste. Test the dip for seasoning, and then transfer to a bowl.

The final product!

Sprinkle with chopped fresh parsley, for garnish, and serve with crudités, along with some wonderful homemade whole wheat pitas.

Stay tuned for what I made with the leaves this time!

Salted-Chocolate Rye Cookies

Posted on July 21, 2014 by makehastenotwaste

“You don’t post much about sweets, do you?”

I contemplated Matt’s question. He was digging into a ramekin of bittersweet chocolate mousse I had made, and I had just told him I didn’t make it for the blog. You see, I took no particular twist on the recipe, and the heavy cream and eggs I used for it had been bought specifically for the mint chocolate cookie ice cream I made the previous week. Mousse and ice cream aren’t the kinds of dishes you make to use up leftovers, usually. He was right, I could expand on the number of dessert recipes on the site.

I opted to make a dessert for the first of many upcoming summer potlucks. I saved a recent Tasting Table recipe for Salted-Chocolate Rye Cookies. It was adapted from a recipe in a cookbook out of the reputable Tartine Bakery & Cafe series. It looked rich and delicious. So many times when I tell people that the recipe I plan to make for an event or dinner is one I’ve never tried before, I get reactions of shock and horror. But this recipe calls for one pound of bittersweet chocolate. How bad can it be? I figure as long as I don’t burn the chocolate, the cookies will be enjoyed by most party guests.

The main draw of the recipe was that it calls for whole grain rye flour, an ingredient I was having trouble getting through after buying from a King Arthur Flour sale.

On a side note, I am such a King Arthur Flour super-fan. I frequently look for excuses to shop their website. I have gone out of my way driving through Vermont to stop at its bakery and storefront. If one of their recipes told me to climb a cliff to bake the muffins, I would seriously consider it. (Guess what, today they announced another sale! I swear they aren’t paying me to say this.)

Salted Chocolate-Rye Cookies
From Tasting Table

2⅔ Cups (1 pound) bittersweet chocolate (63-72% cacao), chopped or in chip form
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
¾ Cup whole-grain rye flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon fine salt
4 large eggs, at room temperature
1½ Cups muscovado, natural cane sugar, or light brown sugar
1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
Sea salt, preferably flaky, for topping

Prepare a small saucepan filled with about 1 inch of water and heat over medium to bring water to a simmer. Add chocolate and butter to a heatproof bowl that can hover over the simmering water without touching. Place bowl over the water and melt the chocolate and butter together.

Stir occasionally with a heatproof spatula, taking care to check the bottom of the bowl. The chocolate and butter may take several minutes to melt.

Once melted, remove from the heat.

In a small bowl, add the rye flour, baking powder, and salt and whisk together.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, add the eggs.

There’s a little piece of advice cooks like to give about cracking eggs for baking: never crack the egg directly over your bowl of ingredients. Instead, crack eggs one at a time into a small bowl, and then pour from that bowl to the mixing bowl. This is to prevent you from getting shards of eggshell hopelessly buried in your dough or batter. When you are terrible at cracking eggs, like me, this is good advice. It’s advice I don’t always follow. This time, I made the right choice, and you can see why:

I used organic natural cane sugar from my pantry.

Using the whisk attachment on your stand mixer, begin to whip the eggs on medium high. Add the sugar gradually, and mix until incorporated. Turn up the mixer and whip until the eggs increased in volume nearly 3x (about 6 minutes).

Before whipping

After whipping

Lower the mixer speed and add the melted chocolate-butter mixture and the vanilla, stirring until fully combined. Add in the flour mixture and stir just until combined. A spatula attachment or manual stirring would be best at this point. The dough will be soft, almost like brownie batter.

Refrigerate dough until firm, at least 30 minutes. If you leave it in the fridge longer, it will have to warm up for a little bit before you can scoop it easily.

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper or Silpats.
Take dough from fridge and scoop rounded tablespoons onto the baking sheets, spacing the balls about 2 inches apart.

Top with a few flakes of sea salt.

Bake for 8 to 12 minutes, until the cookies have completely puffed up. They should have a smooth bottom and rounded tops.

Almost there!

Remove the cookies from the oven and let cool slightly on the baking sheets. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Enjoy within a few days.

Dense, fudgy, salty goodness.

Get Pot-lucky

Posted on July 16, 2013 by makehastenotwaste

Last weekend was a full weekend. On Saturday, we had a friend in town visiting so we went to a Yankees day game. On Sunday morning I was participating in the Color Run and then in the afternoon had a party to which I was expected to bring something. When we arrived home on Saturday evening, I still didn’t know what I was making.

A peek into my pantry revealed that I had some neglected sweet potatoes. I wondered about making potato salad with sweet potatoes, and with a little research I settled on this. From the time I started brainstorming to the time the salad was done was probably just 45 minutes. The parsley was in my garden and everything else was in my pantry or fridge. Score!

This salad has a lot going for it. There’s potential for substitutions, it develops flavors overnight, and it can safely sit out and be eaten at room (or outdoor) temperature. My vegetarian friends liked it, but I bet it would have been even tastier with bacon or prosciutto! (Check out this recipe for a fall or winter sweet potato dish, with prosciutto, that will knock your socks off).

Summer Sweet Potato Salad
Adapted from a recipe by “NINABSLOAN” on SparkRecipes
Serves 6-8 if it is a main side dish, and many more at a potluck

1.5 pounds sweet potatoes or yams (about 2 potatoes that are on the large size)
1/2 C dried cranberries
1 shallot, thinly sliced
1/3 C pecans, chopped
2 Tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped

Dressing:
4 Tablespoons olive oil
2 Tablespoons rice vinegar
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
salt and pepper to taste

Set a pot of water to boil. Peel and cube sweet potatoes.

Add potatoes to water and boil until tender but still firm. Meanwhile, prepare remaining ingredients:

Combine with drained sweet potatoes and then toss with dressing.

Chill and serve. Could it get much easier?