Romano Bean Salad with Shallot Vinaigrette & Egg

I love this salad. It includes a just hard-boiled egg, which as you know, makes everything better.  It takes less than 20 minutes to prepare, a major win when on those nights when you just don't feel like putting a lot of time into dinner.  And even the little man in my life loves it.  He first sucks off all the dressing, then delicately pries open the pod to fish the inner bean out with his tongue.  It is a specific and sweetly enjoyable process.

Romano Bean Salad with Shallot Vinaigrette & Egg

Ingredients  

• 1 pound fresh Romano beans, washed and ends trimmed
• 1 just hard boiled egg 
• 1 tablespoon finely minced shallot
• 4 tablespoons of olive oil
• 1.5 tablespoons cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon dijon mustard
• Salt & Pepper

Directions 

• Steam the romano beans to your liking. I prefer them still crispy, just 3 - 4 minutes in a inch of boiling water
• Meanwhile,  hard boil an egg, keeping it in the water about 10 minutes post boil so the inner most yolk is still tender
• Make the dressing by whisking the finely minced shallot, olive oil, vinegar and mustard, then add salt and pepper to taste.  You want this dressing to be bright and bold to stand up to the thick beans, so add more vinegar if necessary
• Arrange the beans on a plate, crumbling the hard boiled egg over top, and then drizzling with dressing 
• This salad is best warm, or brought back to room temperature before serving 

Moroccan Carrot Salad

Blink, a month zoomed by.  The crazy fun intensity of a new gig and suddenly it's mid February.  We've been in a stew, left-over, omelet phase as we navigate new schedules, with nothing terribly inspiring to share. Until now. 

In the Northeast, winter really dug her teeth in and I am finding myself more than a little ready for the change of season.  This salad is the perfect antidote to these last long few weeks of winter.  Bright, zingy, citrusy... a refreshing alternative to all homey food of late. If you close your eyes, you can almost taste spring.

Moroccan Carrot Salad 
Ingredients 
Food52

• 2 - 2 1/2 cups of 1/2 inch thick carrot slices (4-6 carrots, depending on size)
• 1 tablespoon of Harrisa or Sriracha
• 2 tablespoons chopped preserved lemon (or 2 tablespoons, plus juice and rind of fresh lemon)
• 2 cloves of finely chopped garlic 
• 4 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
• 1.5 tablespoons white vinegar
• Salt & Pepper
• Optional: Fresh chopped cilantro  

Directions

• Boil the carrots for 10 minutes in salted water until soft but not mushy
• Drain, let dry and cool
• Mix the rest of the ingredients in a bowl, toss in the carrots and and refrigerate over night
• Serve at room temperature, taste checking to see if more salt or vinegar is needed

PS I promise not all my posts will be from Food52.  Indulge me a little as the high of working here bubbles on.

Tomatillo and Avocado Dressing

I have been patiently waiting for tomatillo's to arrive so I could share this recipe with you. Inspired by my favorite Midtown lunch spot, this dressing is so easy to make, so versatile and oh so yummy. Between this dressing, and last years tomatillo salsa I am obsessed. I couldn't stop taking pictures of these little treasures, as you will see below, and have used one batch of the dressing three ways this week already!

It has served as as:

1. A dip for crudites at work;
2. Water-downed as a dressing for a tomato, cucumber and mozzarella salad, and
3. As the sauce accompaniment to roasted shrimp over rice.  (Toss shrimp with salt, pepper, olive oil and lemon zest and roast for 8-12 minutes at 375.)

Scoop up the next tomatilos you see and enjoy this easy peasy recipe with me.

Tomatillo and Avocado Dressing
Ingredients

• 1 ripe avocado 
• 10 small to medium tomatillos 
• 3 spring onions
• Salt and pepper 
• Water

Directions

• Bring a small pot of water to boil, and drop in the peeled tomatillos. Cook for 6-7 minutes until they turn a nice mustardy yellow.
• Drain, reserving one cup of the cooking water, and let the tomatillos cool.
• Mince the onions in the food processor or blender until finely chopped. Add the tomatillos and avocado and then blend. One tablespoon at a time, add the reserve cooking water until you reach your desired consistency.

Black Bean, Shrimp & Quinoa Salad

While I knew I'd love the food memories this blog would help me create, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the memories its helped me recollect. Like one about the little nuggets below.  Beans.

My final winter CSA share delivery and my wonderful #FoodiePenPal package both included bags of black beans. It was a sign that it was finally time to move away from the canned alternative.  I've been meaning to cook beans from scratch forever, in that "I will clean out my closet and go to good will" kinda way.  You should, you know the end result will be good, but you keep putting it off.

Sifting through the beans, I flashed back to my dad and the family baked beans recipe. A recipe, I am now realizing, I have to get my hands on.  A recipe I can't tell you much about but a recipe I can vividly picture being prepared. I'd arrive in the kitchen in the morning, and there, in the sink, red beans would be soaking.  A signal that a BBQ or party was imminent.  

The single challenge of cooking beans is planning ahead to soak them. Otherwise, it's a really really easy process. 1) Soak the beans overnight covered in two inches of water.  2) Rinse the beans twice the next morning.  3) For every cup of beans, add two cups of water, a clove of garlic, a bay leaf and a half a teaspoon of ground cumin into a pot.  4) Simmer for 45 minutes to an hour until tender, adding more water if necessary.  Done! Easy!

                                        Pre-soak                             In the morning

Even if you don't find the time to prepare your own black beans, the salad below is a bright, healthy and perfectly summery meal.  It serves four quite happily.

Black Bean, Shrimp & Quinoa Salad

Modified courtesy of Pressing On 

Ingredients  

• 1 cup uncooked white quinoa
• 2 cups of vegetable broth 
• 2 cups of rinsed, chopped kale 
• 4 cups of cooked black beans
• 1 cup chopped, fresh cilantro
• 2 ripe avocados, pealed and diced
• 1 lb medium shrimp, cleaned
• Juice of three - four limes  
• Zest of one lime
• 2 tablespoons of olive oil 
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• Salt & pepper

Directions

• Rinse your quinoa, and place it in a pot with the two cups of stock.  Bring to a simmer, cooking for 20 - 25 minutes until the stock is absorbed. 
• Meanwhile, melt the butter over medium heat in a saute pan, add the shrimp and saute 3-4 minutes a side.  Chop in half once cooled. 
• Steam the kale for 2-3 minutes until tender.
• Once the quinoa is cooked, fluff with a fork and then add the beans, kale, cilantro, avocado, shrimp salt, pepper, lime juice and zest and toss delicately to mix**.

** In a moment of total local gluttony, I snapped up a few soft shell crabs, simply sauteed them for two minutes a side in butter and served them on top of this salad. Totally d.i.v.i.n.e. but totally unnecessary.

About Quinoa

Quinoa is a super food.  High in protein, gluten free and rich in 8 essential amino acids like lysine, Quinoa is the ultimate grain.

Carrot Ginger Salad Dressing

As part of Operation July (a.k.a. feel good about my body 6 months after birth), I am on a vegetable-based lunch mission. It has taken a bit of discipline to have enough creative and quick to make options on hand, but I'm getting better at it.

I'm washing and bagging my own lettuce mix (radicchio, endive and red leaf), storing chopped vegetables to easily scoop on salads, hard-boiling a dozen eggs on the weekend, and always making sure I have ripe avocado and good steaming vegetables on hand.

The real breakthrough has come by stocking up on homemade dressing. Prep on Sunday is leading to saved time mid-week AND a good variety making the vegetable lunch mission sustainable. Sesame vinaigrette, shallot lime... and today's flavor, Carrot Ginger.

As you know from this post, I'm a Japanese food fanatic. The winter CSA is carrot and garlic heavy, so the timing is perfect for my take on the staple Japanese dressing. I've made a lot of carrot ginger dressings, (this, that and the other one) and now have my personal perfect recipe down. The key is 10 minutes of extra work, boiling the carrots to soften them. It makes all the difference. Enjoy!

Carrot and Ginger Salad Dressing 
Ingredients

• Juice of 1 lemon
• Juice of 1 orange
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 1.5 inches of fresh ginger, peeled*
• 1.5 tablespoons tahini
• 1 tablespoon sesame oil
• 3-4 medium to large carrots 
• 1/3 cup reserve cooking water

Directions

• Clean the carrots, roughly chop them, place them in a small pot and cover with water
• Bring to a boil and cook over medium low heat for 10 minutes
• Drain, reserving 1/3 cup of cooking water
• Add all the ingredients to a food processor, and blend until smooth

*Love this trick: The easiest way to peel ginger is with a teaspoon.... the skin slides off!

The latest batch of dressings, Carrot Ginger on top!

Kale Caesar Salad

As you know, I...love...kale.  So imagine my delight at opening my first Winter CSA box to find it blanketed in kale. Literally, the whole top of the box was kale-covered.  After a chard-heavy summer share, I quite literally squealed in delight, "ooooohhhhhhhhhhhheeeeee!"

Since then, I've enjoyed poached eggs over sauteed kale, kale chips, and the simple recipe below:  Kale "Caesar Salad."  What I love about this preparation is that you don't have to actually cook the kale.  And as a farm share loving neighbor** pointed out when I had him taste this the other night, this actually ups the nutritional value as you do not lose any nutrients to the cooking process. 

**Yes, during a rocking holiday party I pulled a fellow CSA lover from the living room into the kitchen to talk CSA, vegetable storage, and to taste this kale salad -- it was a nerdy vegetable convention in my kitchen and I loved it!

Kale Caesar Salad

Ingredients

• 3 cups of washed, de-stemmed kale cut into bite-size ribbons
• One lemon
• 2-3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
• 5-8 tablespoons of freshly grated Parmesan cheese
• 1/2 tablespoon of kosher salt
• Pepper
• Olive oil

Directions

• Mash the garlic with the kosher salt, add to the bottom of your serving bowl
• Juice the lemon on top of the garlic paste, removing any seeds
• Add a couple of cracks of freshly ground pepper
• Add 1/3 cup of olive oil and 5 tablespoons of Parmesan cheese, mixing until until the ingrediants form a dressing 
• Toss in the kale to coat.  Sample your salad, and add more olive oil or Parmesan cheese to taste (i always end up with more of both!)
• Let stand 15 minutes before serving

Dressing

Kale Caesar Salad