Tomato Gazpacho

Posted on September 22, 2016 by makehastenotwaste

What’s one of the recipes you can make using the abundance of summer tomatoes? Gazpacho!

So let’s make gazpacho! Everybody’s doing it recently, including Cooking with Kyler, which is hosted by my husband’s cousin and his daughter. It’s appealing because it is simple, refreshing, and customizable.

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not a huge fan of cold soups in general, but I’ve recently warmed to the idea of a good gazpacho (see what I did there?) Especially when you add crunchy toppings.

Gazpacho is simple because you can basically dump everything in a blender or food processor. However, it’s a bit messy – be forewarned. It’s likely you’ll have to transfer the mixture back and forth between different containers since it won’t completely fit in the blender. Then you strain it–unless you don’t mind a little texture. The resulting soup is a unique color (which will splatter all over your counters as part of the process) and fun to serve presented in clear drinking glasses.

I wish the 2 pounds of tomatoes made more of dent in my harvest. Here’s what I collect every couple of days!

Tomato and Cucumber Gazpacho
Adapted from Julia Moskin’s New York Times Cooking recipe

Approximately 2 lb ripe red tomatoes,
1 green pepper, such as bell pepper, Italian frying, or Anaheim pepper
1 cucumber, about 8 inches long
1 small onion (white or red)
1 garlic clove
2-4 teaspoons sherry vinegar, to taste
Salt to taste
½ Cup extra-virgin olive oil, plus more to taste and for drizzling

Optional and recommended toppings:
Hot sauce
Croutons-make your own with stale bread, butter, garlic and salt
Almonds, toasted and coarsely chopped
Avocado, cut into cubes

Prep your vegetables: seed and chop pepper, peel and chop cucumber and onion, and core and roughly chop tomatoes.

The onion in not shown because I had a leftover portion of a red onion in the fridge that I ended up incorporating.

Combine as much of the tomatoes, pepper, cucumber, onion and garlic you can in a blender. It’s highly likely you’ll need to work in batches, so have a large bowl handy for transferring portions back and forth.

Initial batch: I made it through the cucumber and most of the tomatoes before I was at the top!

Ingredients batch 2.

Blend at top speed until the mixture is very smooth. This may take a few minutes. A rubber spatula is great for scraping down the sides as needed.

Add the vinegar and 2 teaspoons of salt. If your appliance allows, do so while the motor is running.

You can add more vinegar later, but I will tell you now that 2 teaspoons was not enough for me!

Pour in the olive oil slowly. The smooth mixture will become an orange-pink color and look like a salad dressing.
Additional olive oil can make the texture more creamy if it is watery.

Press the mixture through a strainer or run through a food mill to extract all the liquids and discard the solids. I was less than enthused about the idea of discarding the nutritious solids, but using my food mill resulted in such minimal solids that I felt OK with sending it to compost.

It’s one of the few times year this gets used!

Transfer to a large pitcher, preferably glass, and refrigerate until very cold. This could be done overnight. In the meantime, prepare any toppings. I used some very old cubes of bread from the freezer, cooked in butter with garlic.

When you are ready to serve, taste to adjust the seasonings with salt and vinegar. Serve in glasses. You can serve over ice or even chill the glasses for the best effect.

Present with toppings: chopped almonds, garlic croutons, olive oil and Tabasco all worked great for me.

Why not enjoy outdoors?

Chickpeas and Greens with Bacon

Posted on August 20, 2016 by makehastenotwaste

I told you I was going to feature the pressure cooker again soon, didn’t I? The first time cooking dried chickpeas in the pressure cooker was such a success: 8-hours of soaking, about 10 minutes for the pressure cooker to warm up, and 6-7 minutes of steady cooking resulted in perfect beans, whereas regular stovetop simmering would have added more than an hour. Last time, I started with a little more than half bag of dried chickpeas and ended up with cooked beans that were delicious on their own, then added to a salad, and then transformed into hummus. For the rest of the bag, I wanted the chickpeas to be used in a recipe that used some of the broth and incorporated other ingredients I had on hand. It would also be useful if the leftovers of the dish could be easily reheated for lunch, as I hustled around the house while the wee one napped.

A search on The New York Times Cooking website brought up a “Garbanzos and Greens with Chorizo” recipe. I didn’t have chorizo, but I did have an open package of bacon. I didn’t have kale or chard, but in the freezer, I had a bag of collard greens that I had blanched and frozen weeks before (collards are sold in such HUGE bunches, aren’t they?). Since collards and bacon often go together anyway, it was meant to be!

Note: you could omit the bacon to make this vegetarian. Just amp up the smoked paprika (one of my favorite pantry spices).

Chickpeas and Greens with Bacon
Adapted from The New York Times Cooking

For the chickpeas and broth:
About 1/2 bag or 1 Cup dried chickpeas (garbanzo beans)
½ small onion, plus 1 clove
1 small carrot, peeled and cut into chunks
1 bay leaf
A generous amount of salt
1 Tablespoon vegetable oil

For the beans and greens:
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 onion, diced (about 1 Cup)
Salt and pepper to taste
About 6 ounces bacon, chopped
2 teaspoons fresh garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika
1 teaspoon cumin seeds, toasted and coarsely ground
3 Tablespoons pine nuts, lightly toasted
1 bunch of collard greens – or kale, or chard, washed and cut into slices

Soak the chickpeas overnight or all day (I soaked mine about 6 hours.) Drain and put in the pressure cooker. Add the onion half and clove, chopped carrot, bay leaf, and vegetable oil and cover with 6 Cups of water. Reference the directions that come with the pressure cooker to make sure you are using it correctly and safely. I put mine over a high flame until the lid sealed and the pressure regulator began to rock. I them set the timer (for 7 minutes) and lowered the heat so the regulator was rocking steadily but not excessively throughout the cooking time.

In the meantime, chop your other ingredients, and toast and grind your cumin seeds.

When the chickpeas are done (and the pressure has lowered and the lid can be opened), season generously (and I mean generously) with salt.

In a wide, high-sided skillet, heat olive olive oil over medium-high. Add the onion and salt and pepper and cook until softened and turning slightly brown. Add the bacon and cook until browned.

When the chickpeas were done, I removed the onion, carrot and bay leaf from the pot and then strained the mixture, saving the broth and separating the chickpeas.

Into the bacon-onion mixture, stir the garlic, smoked paprika, and 1/2 teaspoon of the cumin. Then add the chickpeas and about 1/2 Cup of the chickpea cooking broth.

Turn the heat up until the liquid is at a simmer; add the greens and salt and pepper. If using fresh greens, stir until they wilt. Otherwise, put the lid on the pan and allow to cook for a few minutes.

Taste and add salt and pepper as needed. Then transfer a portion into each individual soup bowl for serving.

Ladle 1 Cup of broth into each bowl. Sprinkle with remaining cumin and pine nuts.

Serve with a toasted baguette slice or two to soak up the broth. Enjoy with a celebratory glass of sparkling wine!

Green Tomato Curry

Posted on December 30, 2015 by makehastenotwaste

Season’s Greetings!

I won’t dwell on the fact that there has been a significant lack of recent content here. The second half of 2016 has been exciting and eventful; the activity simply has not taken place in my kitchen.

At minimum, I wanted to share with you a recipe I had executed a few months back, during the transition from summer harvest into fall/winter hibernation.

When I had a job with a normal, local work week, I would frequently travel on the weekends. Now that I’m gone many weeks, I have tried to keep the weekend plans limited. Plus there was the 9 months I spent with class on Saturdays–the weekends finally started feeling solidly long (that is, when I wasn’t traveling for part of them). So on a Saturday in mid-October I gave in to the cooler weather and spend much of the day retiring the garden for the season. Does anyone experience some sense of relief when this happens? No more weeding. No more tomatoes rotting before I can use them. No more weird gross evidence of bugs.

The wintering over meant the last big batch of jalapeños and–yes–tomatoes, green ones. Lots. Of the options for cooking green tomatoes, I had already once made the requisite fried green tomatoes, and as for pickled tomato relish? Um, I still have some from last season. So I wanted to mix it up.

My husband is a fan of curries and spiced foods, served over rice, so I wondered if there was anyone who had documented an attempt to make a green tomato curry. Of course there was! Other than a few basic substitutions, I followed the version described by Kerry from Classic Cookery on the kitchn, and was mostly content with the result — it just needed more spice! Nothing a little chili-garlic sauce can’t help.

Looks seasonally appropriate to me!

Green Tomato Curry
Adapted from recipe on the kitchn

Tool needed: immersion blender

2 Tb clarified butter (ghee)
2 Tb shallot, minced
1 tsp curry powder
2 Cups green tomatoes, chopped
Salt and pepper, to taste
As many roasted peppers as desired, up to 5 Cups (I scrounged up less than 2 Cups)
2 cloves garlic, roasted and smashed
1 can of chickpeas, drained and rinsed
Cayenne pepper
Cumin
Coriander
1 Cup light coconut milk
1 Tablespoon Asian chili-garlic paste, to taste
Brown or white rice or naan, for serving

Preheat the oven and roast your garlic cloves and peppers, if starting from scratch. I usually cook these at around 375F.

These peppers could have gone a little longer.

Stem, core and chop your tomatoes.

There was some parts of the tomatoes I sliced and tossed because they didn’t really seem edible.

Taste the rainbow!

In a soup pot or high-sided saucepan, melt butter. Add shallots and cook on low heat until soft and fragrant.

Add curry powder, add tomatoes, and season with salt and pepper. Allow tomatoes to warm fully and start to soften.

Next add the roasted peppers, peeled and smashed garlic, and garbanzo beans.

Add about a teaspoon each of cumin and coriander, and then start adding cayenne pepper to taste–this can get very hot. The amount of spice you will need depends on the amount of peppers you end up using.
Cook for a few minutes until hot, and add coconut milk. Bring to a simmer and add seasoning.

Use an immersion blender to blend the “soup” until mostly smooth but leaving some chunks of tomato, pepper, and whole beans. Taste again and add spice as needed.

Serve in a bowl over rice. Be sure to transfer desired amount to freezer containers for later meals!

Summer Soups – Roasted Corn and Chilled Zucchini

Posted on September 5, 2015 by makehastenotwaste

Wasn’t August delightful? For those of us with access to fresh vegetables like corn, zucchini, tomatoes, peppers and more, this late summer time feels special.

New recipes, of course, can take some time to explore. And of course, the past few weeks of August were a bit packed for me. Let’s just say there were a fair number of tomato sandwiches. When I did some cooking prep for the first time in awhile, I was so rusty I even sliced my finger while chopping onions!

I was faced with the reality that if I wanted to do my work, complete my final class assignment with any degree of quality, fulfill other obligations, AND prepare myself healthy meals, they were going to have to be fairly simple. The corn soup I made with leftover roasted corn? Not so simple. The chilled zucchini soup I made the following week was more reasonable. Though you might guess which was more delicious in this case. I’ll describe both here, in case they appeal to you.

Starting with the zucchini soup: the recipe has wonderfully few ingredients, all of which I could get my hands on at home. I had almost forgotten about the garden zucchini in my fridge, which I acquired in a trade with my mom; she snagged some of my own garden tomatoes.

Chilled Zuchinni Soup
Adapted from the James Beard Foundation’s Isabela Wojcik

2 large zucchini
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 small onion, sliced thinly
1 teaspoon fresh oregano, minced and divided
scant 1/4 teaspoon red chili pepper flakes
1 Cup stock, chicken or vegetable
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1/2 Cup plain greek yogurt (or other dairy such as sour cream or milk)

Mise en place! Prep onion and oregano. To prepare the zucchini, trim, split in half lengthwise and thinly slice into half-moons.

While slicing the zucchini, a couple of things dawned on me: my food processor could probably do this even faster, and the slices would be great for ratatouille. Next time.

In a medium sauce or sauté pan, heat the olive oil over medium. Add the sliced onion, half of the oregano (about 1/2 teaspoon), and red pepper flakes.

Careful with the red pepper flakes.

Cook until the onion softens and becomes translucent.

Drop in the zucchini and cook through for several minutes, on lower heat. As soon as it starts to look dry, pour in the the stock.

Let the mixture cook until the zucchini is tender and the stock is boiling. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Take off the stove and transfer to a blender or food processor. Purée.

Add yogurt and blend. Taste and add more salt.

Chill, and then serve with other seasonal foods and a hunk of bread. You could also eat it warm. I won’t judge.

Roasted Corn Soup with Guacamole and Bacon
Adapted from Epicurious, Lourdes Castro

Soup
3 Cups of corn kernels, I used 2 Cups from 3 ears of leftover roasted corn and 1 Cup frozen, divided
1.5 Cups chicken or vegetable broth
1/2 to 1 Cup water, as needed, for extra liquid
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 onion, chopped
1 jalapeno, stemmed and chopped
Salt and pepper to taste

Topping
1 slice of bacon, cooked until crisp (separate)
1/2 Cup roasted corn kernels (from above)
1/2 jalapeno, stemmed, seeded and chopped
1/2 avocado
1 Tablespoon shallot or red onion, minced
zest and juice from 1/2 lime
Cilantro, if you have it!

If using whole corn, remove kernels from cob.
This is one of those recipes that uses the leftover corn cob to infuse a soup with more corn flavor. Everybody’s doing it! The corn itself was leftover from a picnic, and I removed the kernels for the soup. So while prepping other ingredients, get your corn cobs simmering low in your broth plus some extra water.

This is how I keep broth on hand!

If using fresh corn, roast at least half of it in the oven at 450°F, on a lined baking sheet. Reserve some of the roasted corn for the topping, and put the rest in a blender.

Cook the bacon and prepare the avocado, onion, pepper, and lime for the remaining topping.

In a saucepan, heat the olive oil and add the garlic, onion, and jalapeno.

Season with salt and pepper, cook until soft, at least 5 minutes.
Transfer to a blender with the corn.

Pulse to combine.

Remove the cobs from the stock and if possible, squeeze any liquid out of them. Transfer the corn mixture into the liquid and combine.

Bring up the temperature to a boil while stirring frequently, and then lower heat. Simmer for about 10 minutes. You may need to add additional water at this point. Don’t worry–the flavor’s still there.

Ladle into bowls, garnish, and serve!

See how dark it is? This took awhile to make.

See how dark it is? This took so long to make.

Bok Choy, Bean, and Tomato Stew

Posted on March 16, 2015 by makehastenotwaste

I keep meaning to make soup. It’s so simple and productive for using up leftovers. For some reason, I continue to be intimidated. I wish I could be more like my Mom, who, hours after I had left her with a bunch of green tops from leeks, produced a lovely puréed leek green soup.

In my defense, I recall bad experiences cooking soup. I added a variety of ingredients, mixed things in at different times, seasoned initially, and what was I rewarded with? Bland taste. I’m also a big texture person–I love some crunch and chew to most of my meals. So I’m not necessarily drawn to the idea of cooking down my pantry to mush. Don’t get me wrong, I know there are ways to achieve texture in a soup. And if you don’t incorporate crunch in the soup itself, you can always get satisfaction from the toast you serve alongside!

Speaking of soup, check out this Edible Manhattan article about the ladies of the Soup Club. “Formalized food-sharing,” how great is that? If I started a soup club, I’d probably get pretty comfortable with making soup.

Last week I had my eye on some CSA bok choy that I had blanched and frozen in the fall. I was also scraping the bottom of a bag of dried Great Northern beans I wanted to use. Time to get creative! Except I couldn’t resist the urge to scan the internet for recipes using bok choy with beans. The selected recipe inspiration happened to help me use up some green onions, tortillas, and cheese too!

Bok Choy, Bean, and Tomato Stew with Homemade Tortilla Chips and Gruyere
Adapted from The Kitchen Paper

1 tsp olive oil
2/3 sweet onion, chopped
2 small carrots, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced

Diced heirloom carrots I had to use up.

2 Cups stock, (I used chicken)
1/2 Cup dried Great Northern beans , cooked and then incorporated with the bean broth(about 2 Cups cooked beans)
1 14oz can diced tomatoes
¾ tsp ground coriander
⅛ tsp ground cloves
2 corn or flour tortillas, or prepared restaurant-style tortilla chips
3 Tbsp olive oil
¼ tsp white pepper
salt to taste
about a handful of sliced bok choy, fresh or previously blanched
2 green onions, sliced
Gruyère, gouda or sharp cheddar cheese for topping (at least 1/2 Cup shredded)

If you’re starting with dried beans, you’ll need to start well in advance to have them cooked. I did both my soaking and cooking the day before, and had the cooked beans in their broth ready to go.

In a Dutch oven or large soup pot set over medium heat, add the olive oil. Add the onion and carrots and cook for about 2 minutes.

I didn’t realize that the purple in the carrots would be so dominant!

Stir in the garlic. Saute for a few more minutes to soften the vegetables. Pour in your stock.

Add the beans, tomatoes, ground coriander, and cloves.

Raise the temperature to bring the soup to simmer. Taste for seasoning and add a little salt. At this point, I also added a little dried basil and oregano.

This would be an excellent time to toss in one of the Parmesan rinds you have in your freezer. Of course I forgot. I might need to resort to the old post-it-note-reminder-stuck-to-the-stove-hood trick!

While the soup simmers, cut up your tortillas in to wedges to cook.

Turn the oven to 350 degrees F. Spray or coat the tortillas with a little olive oil and put on a baking sheet. Bake until lightly browned, checking frequently and turning once, halfway through.

Remove and sprinkle with salt.

Taste the stew and add more salt and pepper. Add the bok choy and bring up to temperature to finish.

Yep, that’s an interesting color.

Top with some shredded cheese and a few tortilla chips.

Leek and Squash Soup

Posted on October 4, 2014 by makehastenotwaste

I’m still here! It’s been a busy time. Shall I fill you in? For starters, after two years in a job that didn’t inspire me, I made the switch. The old job happened to come with a short commute and hours that afforded me a generous amount of free time to cook and clean and socialize. Now, I’m commuting from the suburbs to the city, a hub of activity and excitement. It requires a bit more time and energy, but I was ready for it. While I’m still young, I’m going to go where things are happening!

September is a special month, filled with birthdays and wedding anniversaries (such as my own, for both), including a new anniversary established by one of my sisters, who married at a lovely ceremony on September 6. September also has the unique feature of containing two of the most pleasant seasons, summer and fall.

Along with all the events and occasions and changes, it’s harvest time. Tomatoes and zucchini and peppers continue to stream in from the farm share, plus new crops of potatoes and squash. It’s a good time to stay home and cook!

Yet Matt and I also took an overdue trip to visit some of my family in Vermont. We enjoyed a lovely September weekend that included exploring a number of farms in the region by bicycle. (Almost 30 miles of biking…I was almost too exhausted to fully appreciate the agricultural wonders!) During the visit, I made a casual comment about how much I like leeks. I noted that because my farm share so rarely includes them in the weekly offering, and I never buy them because I have plenty of vegetables, I don’t enjoy them at home as much as I think I would. My sister proceeded to pull a bunch out of her garden and send them home with us. So exciting! First I grilled a couple along with zucchini and added walnuts and a lemon dressing with parsley as per this recipe. I knew I wanted to use a bunch of them in a soup. Then the acorn squashes on the counter called my name.

As usual, I sought out a recipe for validation. Like many soups, however, this is one that you could totally wing. I realized well after the fact that it was especially appropriate to make a squash soup at the end of September around my anniversary, because we served little cups of butternut squash soup for one of the courses at our wedding four(!) years ago!

Acorn Squash and Leek Soup
Adapted from Food & Wine

3 1/2 pounds acorn squash (about two small) or similar, halved
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
3 large leeks, white and tender green parts, roughly chopped
5 fresh thyme sprigs or 1 teaspoon dried
4 Cups chicken stock or low sodium broth
1 teaspoons salt
1/3 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Optional toppings:
About 5 Tablespoons sour cream
About 2 Tablespoons chives, chopped
2-4 slices of bacon (to taste), cooked and crumbled

Set the oven to 350°. Prepare the squash by slicing in half.

The recipe I followed said to scrape out seeds AFTER the halves are cooked, but I would recommend scraping them out at this point. Place the squash, cut side down, on a baking sheet.

Roast until tender, checking at 30 minutes. Allow to cool so that you can handle the squash.

In the meantime, prep your leeks by washing thoroughly in a few changes of water. I took my green parts and tossed them in my freezer bag of vegetable scraps; I recently read that they contribute nicely to well-flavored vegetable stock.

Chop up the white and light green parts.

Set your large heavy saucepan or Dutch Oven over low heat. Add the butter and melt. Toss in the leeks and thyme and cook gently, stirring occasionally, until soft and browned, about 40 minutes.

Before…

After!

Discard the thyme sprigs.

When your squash is ready to handle, separate the flesh from the skin. If you waited until this point to scoop out and discard the seeds, do this now, taking care not to toss out too much of the delicious roasted flesh.

Then scrape the squash from the skin. Get all the good stuff!

Stir the stock and squash into the leek butter mixture.

Simmer for about 20 minutes. Using an immersion blender, or in a blender or food processor, puree the soup until smooth.

Season with the salt and pepper.

Spoon the soup into bowls and top each with 1 Tablespoon sour cream, a sprinkling of the bacon, and 1 teaspoon fresh chives if you have them, for garnish. Serve with toast to round out the dish.

Spring Vegetable Ramen

Posted on June 27, 2014 by makehastenotwaste

It’s no big secret that I’m a big fan of vegetables in the garlic and onion family, also known as Allium vegetables. I haven’t yet gone to the trouble of calculating, but Allium species ingredients may be in 95% of my recipes on this blog! Onions, garlic, scallions, shallots, chives–I love ’em all. One of my favorite bulbs that blooms in spring happens to be named Allium as well! Those flowers peaked weeks ago. The time for ramps has passed. Summer officially began last Saturday, and what do we have now? Garlic scapes. Those are the antennae in the goofy photo above.

I found an exciting way to use my scapes among Blue Apron’s weekly meal offerings. I like that they publish recipes on their website without requiring you to purchase the boxes, like I did recently. I’ll be honest, the recipe probably caught my eye because of the prominence of a slightly soft egg yolk in the picture. Also, it’s about time I join in on the country’s enthusiasm for ramen (though I refuse to make it with American cheese).

As a soup, you can really design this dish however you want. I chose to shop for a few items (mushrooms, peas, nori, and ramen noodles), and I had the rest ready to go.

Spring Vegetable Ramen
with Garlic Scapes, Shiitake Mushrooms and Egg
Adapted from Blue Apron

5 ounces fresh english peas, shelled
4 ounces sliced shiitake mushroom caps
2 eggs
2 garlic scapes, thinly sliced
2 scallion, white and green parts thinly sliced separately
1 1-Inch piece ginger, peeled and minced
1 lemon
1 sheet nori (dried seaweed)
4 Cups vegetable broth or stock
2 Tablespoons soy sauce
12 ounces ramen noodles
2 ounces arugula
Plenty of salt and pepper to taste, which will depend greatly on the seasoning in your broth

I thawed a chunk of homemade (chicken) broth I had stowed away in the freezer for something like this. You really can use any broth, but you'll need vegetable if you're keeping it vegetarian, of course.

I thawed a chunk of homemade [chicken] broth I had stowed away in the freezer for something like this. You really can use any broth, but obviously you’ll need vegetable if you’re keeping it vegetarian.

Take out all your ingredients for preparation, including the eggs. The eggs should come to room temperature before cooking. I was particularly nervous about this step because when I attempted to make hard-boiled eggs last week, I followed Martha Stewart’s instructions here, and it was a major failure.

Set a pot of salted water over high heat and bring to a boil while you prep all of the vegetables.

Tip: you can use one prep bowl for your sliced garlic scapes, the whites of your scallions, and the minced ginger. The green parts of the scallions should have their own bowl. The shelled peas have their own bowl.

Remove some of the yellow rind of the lemon with a peeler. Avoid the white pith. Mince the rind finely. Measure 2 teaspoons and set aside. Quarter the lemon, remove its seeds, and set aside.

Make thin strips of nori with a knife or scissors (one of my favorite kitchen tools!).

Carefully add the room-temperature eggs to the boiling water and set a timer for exactly 7 minutes. Then drain and rinse under cold water for about a minute to prevent them from cooking further.

In the same pot in which you boiled the eggs, set some more salted water to boil (yay less dishes!).

In a second, larger pot, add about 2 teaspoons of olive oil and heat over medium heat.

Pour in the ingredients in your one bowl of scapes, green onion, and minced ginger. Season with salt and pepper. Sauté for a minute or two until slightly softened.

Add the mushrooms and cook for about a minute more. Then pour in the vegetable broth, soy sauce, and lemon zest. Squeeze in the juice from two of the lemon wedges, to start.

Increase the heat to bring the broth to a boil. Then lower the heat so the mixture simmers; let it go for 8-10 minutes.

Moment of truth: while the broth simmers, peel the eggs and cut them in half lengthwise. (SUCCESS! Solid whites and slightly gooey yolk.)

Squeeze lemon juice over the arugula and toss. Add salt and pepper.

When the broth is about ready, stir in the peas, season with more salt and pepper, and remove from heat. Leave lid on to keep warm while you cook the noodles.

Add the noodles to your pot of boiling water, stirring to separate. Cook according to package directions. Drain rinse with warm water.

In two large bowls, divide the noodles.

Pour broth in bowls. Garnish with the dressed arugula, scallions greens, nori strips, and eggs. Add a bit more lemon juice if needed.

That’s what I’m talking about.

Tuscan Soup

Posted on May 1, 2014 by makehastenotwaste

It has been two weeks since we returned from our vacation to Italy and France, and I haven’t yet recovered from withdrawal. I long to return to days of wandering through historic cities in the spring sunshine. The jet lag lasted about five days before dissipating, but these cravings have lingered.

Italy was a feast. My main impression of the food is that people love meat, based on the abundance of meats we tried and encountered. Cured meats and sausage and porchetta. Yes, there was some excellent pasta (mostly enjoyed in a meat sauce), one excellent roasted shrimp “secondi” and two times I ordered a market-fresh (but not necessarily stellar) Mediterranean fish. I should have sought out vegetables more often. In Florence, I enjoyed one outstanding, flavorful chickpea soup, where some of the chickpeas had been blended to create a thickened, creamy base. Sadly, it was served at a restaurant where there service was so poor that I left fuming–we were treated almost as if we were invisible. Later that week, I had a lentil soup as part of a no-nonsense, prixe-fixe lunch at a restaurant frequented by locals, and it was terribly bland and uninteresting–clearly reflecting its place as part of a “value” lunch.

I don’t want to sound unimpressed with the trip; we loved the vibe of Italy, and savored numerous inspiring dishes. Here’s a small sample of our photos. Hover your mouse over each picture and click to view full captions.

Treats from the family-run bakery that uses no butter and has a giant oven that cookies run through on a conveyor belt.

Fresh Italian cheese at the Travesterre neighborhood food tour’s first stop.

An oven run on hazelnuts shells.

100% authentic gelato, we were told. We even tried one that was beer-flavored–pretty good!

We never knew porchetta could be so good.

Wine and fresh pasta sampled at lunch in Rome.

Truffles and a runny yolk made this a fantastic appetizer at a French-Italian restaurant in Florence.

Enjoying a taste on our Chianti wine tour, in Tuscany.

Lunch appetizers at a famous butcher on our Tuscany tour. Yes, that’s lard in the forefront.

It was rather timely to come across this Tuscan vegetable-based soup recipe last week, on the website Blue Apron, a grocery subscription service. The less fortunate part was that I couldn’t find toscano (also known as lacinato) kale! Tuscan kale is darker green and flatter, without the curly edges, and I really wanted to use it. After trying four stores, I resigned myself to a fact I already knew, that toscano kale is woefully out of season here right now, so I shouldn’t be using it anyway! Regular kale it is.

I will admit that a big part of the recipe’s draw for me was the soft-boiled egg on top–I am such a sucker for a runny egg. Drool. On a side note, is there anything more disappointing in life than when you expect the egg yolk you are being served at a restaurant will be runny and it’s not?

I have made poached eggs many times (they don’t always turn out great) but for some reason, I never made soft-boiled an egg. What an epiphany! It’s a much less messy-and still healthy-way to enjoy the liquid yolk.

Tuscan Ribollita Soup with Soft Boiled Egg
From Blue Apron
2-4 servings

Part 1 ingredients:
1 onion, diced
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1 carrot, peeled and diced
salt and pepper to taste

Part 2 ingredients:
about 8 ounces kale (any type)
1 14.5 ounce can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
1 14.5 ounce can diced tomatoes
1/8 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
3.5 Cups vegetable broth
salt and pepper to taste

Part 3 ingredients:
2 slices sourdough bread, or 1 large sourdough roll, cut into bite sized pieces
1/2 Cup parsley, coarsely chopped
1/2 Cup Parmesan cheese, grated
2 eggs (or more for additional servings)
salt and pepper to taste

The reason I divided the ingredients into three parts is that you can use your time more efficiently by prepping the ingredients for each part while the previous set of ingredients are cooking. I did all my mise en place at first, which took quite some time, and then I was less occupied during the cooking stages. One could do dishes during those down times, of course.

Firstly, take your eggs out of the refrigerator to come to room temperature. Perhaps you are one of those lucky ones who has such fresh eggs you don’t need to refrigerate them in the first place? I envy you. Fill a small saucepan with some water and a pinch of salt and set aside for later.

In a large pot, heat 2 teaspoons of olive oil on medium. Add the onion and garlic and cook 2 to 3 minutes, until softened. Add carrots and a little bit of salt and pepper. Cook the mixture for a few minutes, until the carrots have softened.

Put the small saucepan over heat so it comes to a boil.

To your large pot, add all of the Part 2 ingredients (beans, diced tomatoes, kale, vegetable broth, and crushed red pepper flakes).

See why you need a large pot?

Season with salt and pepper. Increase the heat to bring the soup to a boil, and then reduce the heat to medium and simmer 6 to 8 minutes, smelling and tasting to see if the flavors have come together enough for your liking.

Add the bread cubes, half the parsley, and half of the Parmesan cheese to the soup and stir.

If you feel there is not enough liquid, it is fine to add a little water (especially if you are using a rich vegetable stock). Let the soup cook, without stirring, for 5 to 7 minutes, or until thickened. Add even more salt and pepper to taste!

While the soup is simmering, gently place the eggs in the saucepan of boiling water. Cook for exactly 5 minutes. Have a small bowl of cold water ready, and transfer the eggs into the bowl with a slotted spoon. Then run the eggs under more cold water for 30 seconds. Gently peel the eggs (be careful) and set aside.

Fill two bowls with soup and place one soft-boiled egg in each. Garnish with Parmesan cheese and parsley.

That’s what I’m talking about!

Italian-American Wedding Soup

Posted on November 2, 2013 by makehastenotwaste

This recipe is brought to you by the letter E…for escarole. Escarole, that vegetable that makes me groan, because it tastes so bitter raw. Which means I have to make an E for effort to cook it, and when I do, I always feel the need to do something complicated instead of simply sautéing it. Yes, I know this is MY problem.

I was surprised to discover that escarole is a fairly normal ingredient to add to Italian Wedding Soup. The Italian-Style Wedding Soup flavor of Campbell’s used to be one of my favorites as a kid. Yet I’m not sure I have had soup by the same name since then, and I had never made it at home. Of course, it is just a name, and there’s a good chance I have had a chicken-broth-based-vegetable-soup-with-meat-and-sometimes-pasta. Did you know that “wedding soup” was a mistranslation, and the original Italian phrase actually meant “married soup,” because of how well meats and green vegetables marry together? Now you know.

I really enjoyed how this came out using the slow cooker. The meatballs were so tender. Each vegetable added something interesting to the overall flavor. And with the chicken broth base, it definitely came out tasting like comfort food.

Italian Wedding Soup with Escarole
Adapted from Better Homes and Gardens

Because I only had 1 pound of ground beef instead of 1.5, I scaled most of the entire recipe down by 25%–including using 3/4 of my 2 beaten eggs. I’ll spare you that silly instruction on the ingredient list (I probably could have gotten by with just 1 egg).

Besides keeping close to recommended ratios for keeping meatballs together, the recipe is, of course, flexible. If you increase the greens, like I did, be sure to compensate with added broth.

2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup finely chopped onion
1/3 cup fine dry bread crumbs (I used panko run through the food processor, but it would have probably worked in its original form)
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons fresh Italian (flat-leaf) parsley, coarsely chopped
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef (I used 1 pound, as mentioned earlier)
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
8 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth (I used 6)
3 large carrots, chopped (I used 3/4 Cup)
2 pieces of celery, chopped (I used 1/2 Cup)
1/2 onion, chopped (I used 1/4 Cup)
2 tablespoons snipped fresh oregano or 1-1/2 teaspoons dried oregano, crushed (I used 1 tsp dried)
3/4 teaspoon dried basil (I used 1/2 tsp)
3/4 teaspoon garlic powder (I used 1/2 tsp)
2 bay leaves (I used 2 small Long Island bay leaves collected during a foraging tour with Wildman Steve Brill)
1 small head escarole (8 ounces), trimmed and cut into 1/2-inch strips (I used 6 ounces sliced escarole and 3.5 ounces of a mysterious green from my CSA I believe was mustard greens)
1 cup small pasta (I used whole wheat orzo because I had it – 3/4 Cup)
Fresh oregano sprigs (optional)

Escarole

Mustard greens?

In a large bowl, combine eggs, onion, bread crumbs, cheese, parsley, 1/2 teaspoon of the salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of the pepper.

Add ground beef; mix well.

Shape mixture into about forty 1-1/4-inch meatballs.

Now it is time to choose your method for browning the meatballs. One possibility is to use a large skillet, heat 1 tablespoon oil, and brown meatballs, half at a time, draining on paper towels. I tried this for the first half, and turning the meatballs was a challenge. It was much easier to bake them in oven at 350, turning once, for 10-15 min total.

In a 5- to 6-quart slow cooker, combine broth, carrots, dried herbs and spices, if using (oregano, basil, garlic powder etc.) the remaining 1/2 teaspoon salt, and the remaining 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Gently add meatballs.

Cover and cook on low-heat setting for 6 hours, or on high-heat setting for 3 hours, stirring in fresh oregano (if using), pasta, and greens during the last 20 minutes of cooking.

Ladle into bowls. Garnish if desired. Sit back and enjoy.

Soup’s On

Posted on September 30, 2013 by makehastenotwaste

Something tragic happened earlier this month. My oven stopped working.

It was the day after my birthday, and I had plans to make pizza. I wanted to top it with barbecue chicken, because not long ago someone (who may or may not have been my husband) opened a second jar of barbecue sauce when we already had an open one in the fridge…but there’s no need to get into that.

The oven was failing to heat up on multiple settings, so as I grieved, I improvised by using the outdoor grill as an oven.

The oven failure comes at a time when we are starting to feel the chill outdoors. That means it is time to start baking, right? I read a lot of summer seasonal recipes in which people reference the fact that “you may not want to turn on your oven!” because of the heat. Honestly, I think I use the oven almost equally in summer and winter! I don’t think I’ve consciously decided not to use my oven because of the weather…perhaps I’m not discouraged because we have central air conditioning and cool tile floors. But how quickly I forget! Now I’m flashing back to the apartment I lived in right out of college, the top floor of a converted house, and how I survived one Long Island summer without air conditioning. I’m pretty sure I avoided the oven then.

Anyway, the point is, I don’t necessarily gravitate to the oven in fall. The thing I start thinking about when it comes to fall is SOUP.

Of course, soup is a great way to incorporate miscellaneous vegetables. So later that week, I found a recipe that utilized CSA peppers and eggplant, along with leeks. With the help of the immersion blender, Matt was persuaded to eat and ENJOY something with eggplant! Pretty much any roasting vegetable could be incorporated in a soup like this.

Roasted Red Pepper and Eggplant Soup
Adapted from Bon Appétit via epicurious
Makes 4 servings

1 eggplant (about 1 pound), halved
~12 ounces red bell peppers
3 Tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
~1 Cup/1 leek, halved lengthwise, dunked in cool water to remove grime, and thinly sliced crosswise (white and pale green parts only)
3 large garlic cloves, minced
4 1/4 Cups chicken stock or canned low-salt chicken broth
2 Tablespoons tomato paste
4 Tablespoons fresh basil, chopped
1 Tablespoon fresh thyme, chopped
1.5 Tablespoons unsalted butter
1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice
Parmesan cheese shavings

As you can see, Matt pulled out his tools and made a fair attempt to diagnose and potentially repair the oven. Now a week and a half later, the repairman came, only to say he has to order a part and come NEXT week to see if that fixes it.

This is where an oven WOULD have come in handy–the original recipe called for roasting the vegetables on a parchment-lined baking sheet at 450°F. I once again turned to the grill, cranked up high to try to keep it over 400.

Pierce eggplants all over with fork. Transfer, cut side down, to baking sheet. Roast until tender, about 45 minutes.

In the last 15 minutes of the eggplant’s cooking time, char bell peppers over a flame or in a broiler until blackened on all sides.

The blacker they get, the easier they are to peel. These were a challenge.

Carefully add to a ziplock bag, sealed, and set aside for about 10 minutes.

Allow eggplant to cool slightly, then remove and discard peel. Chop eggplant into large pieces. Rinse pieces under running water. Drain well and set aside.

Take out peppers, and peel, seed and coarsely chop.

Heat oil in large pot over medium-high heat. Add onions and leek and sauté until tender, about 5 minutes. Add garlic; sauté 1 minute.

Stir in eggplant, peppers, chicken stock, and tomato paste. Bring to boil. Reduce heat to medium and simmer uncovered until vegetables are tender, about 45 minutes.

Stir in basil and thyme.

Either cool slightly before using a blender to puree the soup in batches, or turn off heat and use an immersion blender to blend in the pot. Once blended, season with salt and pepper, and add butter and lemon juice (general side note: if you are making soup and upon tasting think it is missing something, try lemon juice). Warm over low heat if soup has cooled too much.

Transfer to bowls, and garnish with shaved Parmesan cheese.

An effort to make efficient use of every last drop, stem, crumb, and moment.

Category Archives: Soup