Archive | 2008

Roasted Red Carrots

14 Jul

Every other Sunday morning, we have an organic market in San Juan… it’s at Placita de Roosevelt in Hato Rey.  Two Sundays ago I went for the first time.  I’ve never been there before because I always remember too late or I am usually at the yoga center on Sunday mornings.  I decided that after our 4th of July retreat I should go and buy organic fruits and veggies to start my eating rituals again. So off to the organic market we went…

I was a bit disappointed because I was expecting more stands with more variety of goods.  Maybe it was because of the long weekend… and organic farmers need their long weekend vacations too, who knows?!  But I was also pleasantly surprised by some of the things I saw, among them these beautiful red carrots.  These are very unusual, at least for regular Puerto Rican grocery shoppers.

 

 

I decided to buy a bunch and experiment… this was the result.

ROASTED RED CARROTS

2 red carrots, scrubbed well and cut into large chunks
Olive oil
Kosher salt and pepper to taste

 

  1. Pre-heat oven to 400° F.
  2. Place carrot pieces in a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.  Drizzle them with olive oil and sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper.
  3. Roast in oven for about 30-40 minutes, until the carrots are crispy and caramelized.

 

Serve them as a side dish with roasted potatoes mixed in as well.  Delicious.

 

Something curious was that when I peeled the carrots (I did because they were soooooo dirty with mud) I noticed they are orange inside.  Not exactly the same as regular carrots, because they have reddish speckles… but orange inside.  I thought they would be red, like a beet, inside.

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SS Smoothie

10 Jul

As you may have noticed, I’ve been making myself a lot of fruit shakes and smoothies lately, especially during the preparations for my yoga retreats.  I need to go thru days of preparations where I eat only salads, fruits and juices.  So when we have to prepare, fruit shakes are a great way to go.  Plus, it’s more appealing to me than eating one fruit at a time.

So the BB Shake does not feel too lonely with the quirky name… here comes the SS Smoothie.  This one has strawberries and spinach.  And again, the fruit flavors are sooooo awesome; you can’t taste nor see the spinach in the final product.   This shake is also very good friends of the Stealth Shake.  As you can see, after two attempts of incorporating spinach into my shakes, none of them have turned out green yet.  

 

 

THE SS SMOOTHIE

3 strawberries, quartered
A handful of fresh baby spinach
1 cup of pomegranate juice
A big squirt of agave nectar
3 cubes of ice
A bit of water , if the smoothie is too thick

 

  1. Mix everything in your blender…  and enjoy.

Here’s a picture of the spinach and strawberries before blending – trying to give you proof that indeed there’s spinach in the mix and that I did not make it up.  Another lesson… Madelyn, needs to get a glass jar for the blender so the blog pictures can look better.  Same goes for the plastic cup I used to drink it.

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Rex Cream @ Isabela

9 Jul

A few weekends ago,  I went on a weekend trip with my friend Rosani to the beautiful town of Isabela, located in the northwest side of Puerto Rico.   Isabela is where my grandfather’s family is from. 

We loved visiting Isabela when I was younger – to visit the family and to go to the beach.  Isabela is a surfer town so there are beaches for everyone.  We stayed at a nice resort, but we are locals and do not like to be confined to resort world.  When we went into town, it was sooooooo hot that my body only craved cold things instead of lunch.  That’s when we discovered this little ice cream shoppe called Rex Cream.  The place is called and it’s located in a side street off the Plaza.  Their ice creams looked like gelatos, but they are all done with milk, cream or water.  None of them include eggs.  These were sooooooo good that we went there 2 days in a row.

Rosani ordered Coconut the first day and Corn the second.  Here’s a picture of the Corn ice cream.  Can you see the pieces of yellow corn?  They can garnish them with cinnamon if you like.  They tasted creamy, sweet and made of real stuff… none of that crappy artificial fillers.  We have a place in Lares that supposedly was where the corn ice cream was invented… Rosani’s palette says the Isabela version is way better.

I went for something tangier – Tamarind and Passion Fruit.  Mine were more like sorbets.  Super tangy, super refreshing…  I ordered Tamarind the first day but the second day I got a combo cup.

Every time we went, we walked over to the Plaza to sit on a shaded bench and eat our ice creams.  Unfortunately, the feeling was not too lasting because the heat would melt our ice creams really fast.  But they’re sooo good, it was all worth it.

If you’re ever in the Isabela area, stop by Rex Cream and have a delicious ice cream in my name…

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Veggie Tortilla Soup

8 Jul

When I used to travel frequently to San Antonio I learned about a specialty they have – Tortilla Soup.  I am usually cautious about Mexican dishes or maybe even Tex-Mex dishes (because I don’t know if this is something truly Mexican or an invention from north of the border) because I do not enjoy very spicy dishes or a lot of cilantro in my food.  Maybe this will change in time, but that was the way it was when I first tried this recipe.

Tortilla Soup originally is a basically a tomato-based chicken soup that is garnished with any taco fixings, particularly cheese, sour cream and avocado.   And fried tortillas would come to replace the noodles in the traditional chicken soup.  I loved the flavors and I would order this soup each and every time I would visit San Antonio.  The last time I was there, I was already a vegetarian so I decided I needed to come up with a veggie version of this new favorite.

The other day I bought 4 avocados – they were “green” as in not ripe yet, so I was not worried.  Then all of a sudden they all ripened at the same time and I had to scramble…  Because “llora ante los ojos de Dios” if you throw away an avocado because you just let it spoil rotten before you get to eat it…  so the light bulb in my head went off and said – Tortilla Soup with lots of avocado and a Guacamole.

I gathered some inspiration from the 101 Cookbooks recipe here.  I think Heidi is just awesome and I would love to learn from her how to take such beautiful food photos…  She’s an inspiration in many ways.   Heidi and her cookbook SuperNatural were recently nominated for a James Beard Award… big stuff!!!

VEGGIE TORTILLA SOUP

2 corn tortillas
Some olive oil
Garlic salt
10 grape or cherry tomatoes, halved
3 garlic cloves – no need to peel them, just smash them a bit with the side of your knife
1 tbs Olive oil
Salt and Pepper to taste
1 tbs olive oil
2 tbs sofrito
½ onion, chopped finely
½ sweet bell red pepper, chopped finely
1 cup of vegetable broth
½ cup water
10-12 grape tomatoes, quartered
Salt and freshly cracked pepper to taste
2-3 slices of ripe avocado, cut into pieces
Sour cream, optional
Shredded Monterrey Jack cheese, optional
½ cup pumpkin, in small cubes, optional
½ cup baby red skin potatoes, cubed, optional
Handful of fresh baby spinach, optional

 

This recipe is enough for 2 people or for one, allowing for left overs for the next day.

There are several steps to making this soup… none of them are neither difficult nor time-consuming and they all add a special layer of character to this soup.

  1. First, place the grape tomatoes and garlic cloves still on their paper shells in a small oven-proof dish. Toss with a bit of olive oil, salt and pepper and roast in a 350° oven for about 15-20 minutes.
  2. Take the tortillas and using a small kitchen brush, brush them with a bit of olive oil.  Quarter them first, then stack them on top of each other and slice them into strips.  Scatter them onto a baking sheet and bake in the same 350° oven where the tomatoes came out of.  Bake for about 10-12 minutes.  Tend to them as they can go from pale to burn in a second.  When they’re done, spread them onto a paper towel and sprinkle them immediately with some garlic salt.  Set aside.
  3. In the meantime, we build the soup…  In a medium saucepan over medium to high heat, we heat up some olive oil, sofrito, the chopped onion and peppers.  Add some salt and pepper to start layering the flavors.  Sweat it all together until softened.  
  4. Add the roasted garlic without their paper covering, the roasted tomatoes and the fresh tomatoes.  Sautee for a bit to combine the flavors with what was already in the pot.
  5. Add the vegetable stock and the water.  If adding the potatoes and pumpkin pieces, this is the time to do it.  Check the seasoning and add more salt or pepper as needed.  Simmer covered for about 20-25 minutes if you added the potatoes and pumpkins, if not, it may ready sooner, about 15-20 minutes.   If you’re adding the spinach, you can add it in the last 10 minutes of the simmering process.
  6. When the potatoes/pumpkins are fork-tender, turn off the stove and let it sit covered for a little while, about 10-15 minutes.  Nobody likes boiling soup burning their palates, no?
  7. Serve yourself a bowl of soup… now add the accoutrements – the pieces of avocado, the tortilla strips, a dollop of sour cream.

 

This Tortilla Soup is easy, tasty, comforting and super easy to make – for one, two or a crowd.

I tried this recipe in its original version first.  Then to the left-overs, I wanted to revive it with fresh additions and that’s when I added the potato, pumpkin and spinach.  It worked great.  So you can make it like that from the start or use your imagination to revive your left-over soup with new things…  the potatoes and the pumpkins are not traditional, but who cares???

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Stuffed Chayotes

7 Jul

I like to stuff foods… I love to fill delicious things with other delicious ingredients and make them all even better.  I love to stuff crepes, mushrooms, manicotti, sweet bell peppers, tortillas, potatoes and now, I give you chayotes.

Chayotes are a fruit, but are mostly eaten very similar to the potato preparations.  What I like about them is they have very watery flesh after it’s been cooked, so it tends to be refreshing and light.  They’re perfect to eat during the hot summer days… or any other day if you happen to live in a Caribbean island like me.  They’re sometimes prickly, so be careful if the ones you get have the needles… just grab them using kitchen gloves or a kitchen towel.  After they’re cooked the needles kind of loose they’re potency.

I treat these stuffed chayotes the same way you would treat a twice-baked potato, only that we will only bake this once… the first phase of the preparation is boiling.  Check them out…

 

 

STUFFED CHAYOTES

1 chayote, washed very well and cut in half
1 tbs olive oil
½ onion or shallot, finely chopped
½ bell pepper, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
2 piquillo peppers, chopped
1 tbs capers
4-5 grape tomatoes, chopped
1 tbs goat cheese
2 tbs parmesan cheese
1 tbs almonds, lightly toasted
Salt and Freshly Cracked black pepper

 

  1. In a medium sized pot filled with salted water, place the chayote halfs and boil until the flesh is fork-tender just like a potato.  This should take about 20 minutes.  When you check for doneness, do not prick on the side of the skin, only thru the side of the flesh.  When they’re done, take them out of the water using a slotted spoon or a “spider” and allow them to cool.
  2. Meanwhile, in a medium skillet over medium high heat add the oil, onion/shallot, garlic and bell pepper and sauté until they’ve softened.   Add the piquillo peppers, capers and grape tomatoes and mix together and cook lightly so they release some of their juices until they become one with the onions/peppers mix.   Season with salt and pepper.  Turn off the heat and set aside.
  3. Carefully take the chayote halves and scoop out as much flesh as you can using a spoon.  I guess a grapefruit spoon would work great, but I do not have one.  Try not to disturb the shell/skin.   Set the shells aside while we work with the flesh.
  4. In a bowl mix together the flesh we just took out, the mix in the skillet, goat cheese and almonds.   Mix together by mashing everything with a fork or a potato masher. 
  5. Pre-heat toaster oven to 350° F.
  6. Refill the chayote skin shells with the mixture and sprinkle the Parmesan cheese on top.
  7. Bake for about 20 minutes or until the top is crusty and golden brown.

I made these a few weeks ago when I invited a dear friend to dinner…  I asked him to come over after he invited me to go out but I was already preparing dinner.  So I did not tailor the meal to his taste at all.  He actually had chayote for the first time that night and I must say he thoroughly enjoyed them.  I wish I had done more so he would have seconds…  Jesús, I promise that’ll make more the next time.

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