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Steamed Veggies with Horseradish Vinaigrette

29 Jun

A few weeks ago I received a bunch of green beans in my CSA box…  but not the regular green beans, the haricot vert French-kind green beans…  thinner and crisper than the regular ones.

As you may have read here already, I am not a bean fan.  But green beans are a completely different thing.  I grew up eating French-style green beans from a can.  It was one of the choices of ready-to-eat veggies we were given – green beans, canned corn or sliced tomatoes…  and they had to be the thin french ones, because the fat, stubby regular ones were not the same… you could see the little beans inside and that would be a no-no for me.

But evolving into fresh green beans is something much more recent… as I was explaining to a friend the other day, canned and fresh greens beans are two completely different things.  And after you’ve tried the fresh kind, you’ll never go back to canned, ever.

To me the easiest way to prepare them is steaming them…  and I top them with some sort of olive oil-based dressing.  This time around was with prepared horseradish.  Check it out…

 

 Steamed Veggies w- Horseradish Vin

STEAMED VEGGIES WITH HORSERADISH VINAIGRETTE

About 4-5 baby red bliss potatoes, washed and cut in half
A small handful of haricots verts or french-style green beans, trimmed
The juice of 1 lemon
1 tbs of prepared horseradish
Salt and Pepper to taste
About 1/4 cup of extra virgin olive oil

 

  1. In a medium pot, I cook some potatoes in a little bit of salted water.  I boil/steam them over medium heat in the covered pot for about 15 minutes.
  2. Boiling potatoes
  3. When the potatoes are about to be done, I place the trimmed green beans on top of the potatoes, cover the pot again and let them steam  about 2-3 minutes.  After that,  I turn the stove off and leave them there for about 5 minutes more until the green color in the beans is super bright.  Super easy.   
  4. Steamed Green beans and Potatoes 1
  5. While the beans steam, prepare the dressing…
  6. In a measuring cup whisk together the lemon juice, horseradish, olive oil, salt and pepper.   Drizzle over veggie and enjoy.

     Horseradish Vinnaigrette 1               Horseradish Vinnaigrette 2

Watch out…  make sure the horseradish you use does not contain egg or egg yolks in it.  I bought mine at Whole Foods and as you can see by the labeling, it does not contain any egg.  Just be careful if you’re traveling with it, because airport security might consider it a liquid and might take it away.  I was LUCKY I got a nice security person and let it slide…

           Gold's Horseradish                 Gold's Horseradish - BACK

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Left –Over Salad Dressing

20 Jun

This is a concept I learned from Katy at the Yoga Center… 

When we cook at the yoga center, salad is a big part of each menu and we do a home-made salad dressing to go along with it.  The first time I was “in charge” of the salad dressing I did not know what to do.  I have never made salad dressings in such bug quantities or know how to season it.  One rule we have at the yoga center is that we do not taste food before it is finished and “offered” to the Supreme Being.

Here comes Katy to the rescue…  She told me to check if there was any salad left over from the lunch service and to start from there.  What!?!?!?  Well, this is how left-over dressing came about.  The SALAD in the name is two-fold – it’s a salad dressing and it’s made from left-over salad…  The concept is to take what you have in the fridge, particularly a little bit of lettuce or a little piece of onion to season the dressing.  You season it and voila – salad dressing that’s natural and free of preservatives…

Because this is a concept made to use up any leftovers you might have in your fridge before they go bad, this is more a method than it is a recipe… so bear with me in regards to the ingredients list.

 

 Leftover Dressing

LEFT-OVER SALAD DRESSING

A handful of whatever salad greens you might have… I have even used a bit if shredded cabbage for coleslaw, red cabbage, mesclun, arugula, icebrg lettuce, you name it…
½ carrot – if the salad already has carrots, you don’t need to add more
1 tomato – again, if the salad you have left over has tomatoes, no need to add more…
¼ onion
½ cubanelle pepper
1 tbs salt
1 tbs garlic and herbs seasoning
3 tbs vinegar or the juice of 2 lemons/limes
About ½ cup olive oil – I rarely measure this…
About ¼ cup water – to thin it out a bit… it may end up being too chunky
Optional add-ins:
1/3 cup yogurt
4 oz cream cheese
 ¼ cup egg-less mayonnaise

 

  1. In a blender add the salad, onion, carrot, pepper, tomato, vinegar or lemon juice and seasonings.  Add the olive oil and blend together well.  If you feel the mixture is too thick, add the water in little increments until it reaches your desired consistency. 

I sometimes add all the ingredients except the olive oil and drizzle it slowly through the chute on the blender cover to make sure the oil emulsifies and that it does not separate afterwards.

 

You can use this as a sald dressing over greens or sometimes I also like to drizzle on top of steamed/boiled veggies, like potatoes, sweet potatoes, cauliflower, broccoli, etc.

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Arugula Pesto

6 Jun

My mom is a pesto lover… she sees pesto on a menu and she zones out anything else.

When we started getting bagfuls and bagfuls of fresh organic arugula in our CSA box, I decided to use some in a pesto for her.  There’s so much arugula salad one person can take in a given week. 

I loved the taste of this pesto because it’s much milder and fresher tasting than if you use only basil leaves. 

 

 Arugula Pesto 2

ARUGULA PESTO

About 4 cups of arugula leaves, well washed and dried
1 handful of basil leaves
1/3 cup parmesan cheese
3 garlic cloves, chopped a bit
2 handfuls of walnuts
Sea salt and freshly cracked Pepper
About ½ cup of olive oil

  

  1. Fill the bowl of a food processor with all the ingredients except the olive oil.  Turn on the food processor and drizzle the olive oil thru the cover chute.
  2. Process until a chunky paste forms.

Arugula Pesto 1

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Chunky Tomato Sauce

1 May

I started making this sauce because I wanted to try some techniques I learned from one of my favorite chefs, Jamie Oliver.  When I was at London’s Heathrow Airport doing a stop over a few years ago, I bought this cooking magazine with a small booklet inside with various Jamie Oliver recipes. 

Jamie talked about frying the basil and adding balsamic vinegar to the sauce to give it a special kick…  I have always seen chefs add wine to sauces and it was very welcoming to me to know I could also do it with vinegar and get a similar result.   BTW – This was the same magazine where my favorite whisk came with…

This is also one of the recipes made with basil from my CSA box…

 

 chunky-tomato-sauce1

CHUNKY TOMATO SAUCE

1 jar of whole peeled tomatoes
1 jar of fire-roasted tomatoes
1 tbs olive oil
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced thin
1 handful of basil, washed well and leaves removed from the stems
¼ cup balsamic vinegar
Salt and Freshly cracked pepper

 

  1. In a tall skillet, heat olive oil over medium-high heat.  Add the garlic slices and the basil stems.  Sauté for a few minutes to infuse the oil with garlic and basil taste.  Add the basil leaves and sauté a bit.
  2. Add the tomatoes to the skillet.  Stir to combine well.  Season with salt and pepper, and add the balsamic vinegar. 
  3. When the sauce starts to boil, lower the heat to medium low and cook uncovered for about 25-30 minutes, until the sauce reaches your desired consistency.  I like it chunky…  If you prefer it more liquidy, cook for less time.
  4. Remove the basil stems before serving.

 

Toss with your favorite noodle pasta or use it in a Pita Pizza Margherita.

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Fresh Strawberry Sauce

30 Apr

This is another of the recipes related to my Foodbuzz’s 24,24,24 April event…  A Very Veggie Experiment.

 

Recently, my goddaughter Kamila told me she loved strawberry ice cream. So when this idea of making dinner for her and her siblings started, I decided to make strawberry ice cream from scratch for her.  Unfortunately, I live this crazy life that I did not have time to fix it.  So I decided to do the next best thing I knew… prepare a fresh strawberry sauce to top vanilla ice cream.

This is great with any berry, in fact, the original recipe I learned from Ina Garten in her Barefoot in Paris book.  I had made it with raspberries, but strawberries are cheaper and more readily available.

 

 strawberry-sauce

 

VANILLA ICE CREAM WITH FRESH STRAWBERRY SAUCE

1 pint of fresh strawberries, hulled and cut in quarters  
½ cup brown sugar
¼ cup water
½ cup strawberry preserves
  1.  In a small saucepan over medium heat, place strawberries, sugar and water and cook them for about 5 minutes, until the sugar dissolves and the fruit starts to breakdown a bit.
  2. When the fruit has cooled down a bit, add them to the bowl of a food processor.  Add the preserves and pulse a few times to combine.
  3. salsa-strawberry-prep1
  4. Transfer to a small bowl and refrigerate for a few hours until ready to serve.

 

Surprisingly, the little ones loved this strawberry sauce, not so much the older ones.  Kamila even wanted hers with a fresh strawberry as a garnish.  Her older brothers exchanged theirs for plain ice cream.

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