Tag Archives: blue cheese

Chame’s Spinach, Figs and Blue Cheese Salad

12 Mar

This is my current favorite salad… hands down, I have been making it for 2-3 weeks straight almost every time I cook for myself at home.

Chame is my friend for 15+ years now.  And she has been inspired by our little blog here to follow a healthier lifestyle.  By reducing the animal products she and her family eat, they have been able to lose many pounds.  She tells me she feels with more energy, her cholesterol numbers are lower, she is trying new recipes each week … basically, she is in love with their new lifestyle.  The message here is that shifting your habits and lifestyle overall, does lead to improvements in weight and self-esteem.

When I was in Miami recently she invited me over to dinner.  She wanted to “brag” about the changes they’ve made in their diet and lifestyle and wanted to showcase one of their favorite meals – A mini pizza with a spinach salad with blue cheese and figs.  After my experience at Cocina Abierta recently, I am certainly a believer of figs in a salad.

Inspiration goes both ways… I am grateful to Chame for inspiring me to create this salad.  This is as easy as any salad is, and impressive enough to make for company.

CHAME’S SPINACH, FIGS AND BLUE CHEESE SALAD

Baby Spinach
Grape or Cherry Tomatoes, sliced or diced
Dried Mission Figs, diced
Pickled Onions
Sliced Almonds
Crumbled Gorgonzola Cheese
Extra-Virgin Olive Oil
Aged Balsamic Vinegar
Salt and Pepper to taste
  1. Assemble all salad ingredients in a salad bowl – from the spinach up to the cheese.
  2. In a measuring cup or bowl mix together 2 parts olive oil to 1 part balsamic vinegar with a dash of salt and pepper to season.  Mix well and drizzle over salad.  Toss to coat.

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Gorgonzola Stuffed Bell Peppers

9 Mar

Stuffed peppers are definitely one of my favorite clean-the-fridge meals. I tend to make these recipes a little bit different each time because I work with all the little bits and pieces I have in my fridge. I use mostly left-over rice as a filling, but orzo pasta, quinoa or even couscous work deliciously here. I have even used left-over butternut squash risotto from a large party, added a few extra veggies and made stuffed bell peppers for a crowd after my sister’s baby shower once.

 

However, the other day I purposely made a conscious effort to think of what I would put in. I am in a blue-cheese kick lately ,so I wondered how would my beloved stuffed bell peppers would taste using gorgonzola as the main cheese. I know I already loved them filled with goat cheese… so this would be a nice twist if successful. And successful it was.

 

BLUE CHEESE STUFFED BELL PEPPERS

1 large bell pepper – I prefer yellow, orange or red for this… but a green one will do also
1 cup cooked brown rice
½ medium onion, chopped
1 garlic clove, chopped finely
1 small carrot, chopped small
1 small tomato, chopped
3-4 white button mushrooms, chopped
3 large handfuls of baby spinach or any other hearty green lettuce
2 ounces cream cheese
1/2 cup gorgonzola crumbles
½ cup walnut pieces or almond slivers
¼ cup mozzarella cheese, shredded for topping
Olive Oil
Salt and pepper to taste
  1. In a large skillet over medium heat, add the olive oil, onions, garlic and carrots. Season with salt and pepper lightly and sauté for a few minutes for the onions and carrots to soften.
  2. While this cooks, cut the bell pepper in half and clean the insides of all ribs and seeds. Set aside.
  3. Add the mushroom pieces and cook for a few minutes. Add tomato pieces and cook for them to release their juices.
  4. Add the spinach and mix together so it wilts. Season with salt and pepper to help the spinach release its juices.
  5. Remove from heat. Add the cooked rice and mix well. Add the cream cheese and gorgonzola. If you feel the mixture is a bit stiff, add a drizzle of olive oil to soften it.
  6. Add the walnuts or other nut you might have handy.
  7. Fill generously each bell pepper half with rice/cheese mixture. Top with some shredded cheese to make a nice cheesy crust on top.
  8. Place the pepper halves in a baking dish and cook in a 425F oven for about 25-30 minutes. The filling is already cooked but this will cook and soften the pepper outside.

Serve alongside a crisp green salad and dinner is served!!!

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Blue Cheese Dressing

8 May

In the past few years I’ve taken an appreciation for blue cheese.  This has not always been the case, as I always thought blue cheeses were too salty for my taste.  And on top of that, the blue veins did not appeal to me in the least…

But watching Food Network and being more exposed to “haute cuisine”, I have grown to appreciate more and more blue cheeses.  It all started with a visit to the restaurant Mark’s at the Meliá in Ponce.  There I tasted the most wonderful butter lettuce salad with walnuts and crumbled Point Reyes blue cheese.  It was salty but mild at the same time… delicious.

Now, I regularly have a wedge of Danish blue cheese in my fridge.  I use it in desserts, in white sauces for pasta, to flavor polentas… and the newest addition to my repertoire is in a salad dressing.  Check it out…

BLUE CHEESE DRESSING

2 ounces of blue cheese – I use Danish or gorgonzola cheese crumbles
2 tbs of plain low-fat yogurt
A squirt of lemon juice
About 1 tbs of olive oil

 

  1. Mix all the ingredients with a whisk in a small bowl. 

 

Drizzle over your favorite salad greens…  it’s creamy and salty delicious.  Don’t be discouraged by the grayish color, it’s just the blue veins dispersed in the dressing.


Blue Cheese Dressing

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Blue Cheese Mac with Walnuts

31 May

I am a cheese lover… I guess this has been established and proven by the posts on this blog already.  However, blue cheese is a relatively recent acquired taste for me. I always found it too salty and pungent for my taste.  However, I few years ago I went to a really nice restaurant in Ponce, Mark’s at the Meliá, that featured a Boston lettuce salad with crumbled Maytag blue cheese and vinaigrette.  I was a convert after that dish.

Now I do not shy away from blue cheeses anymore.  I love it in desserts, in salads, and lately, in pastas.  That’s how this Mac & Cheese came about.  Kind of like a grown-up version of a mac and cheese. 

I did this dish the first time improvising at my aunt’s house in Miami.  She wanted macaroni with a white sauce.  So I decided to give it a twist to make it interesting.  She loved it and my cousin, whose daughter is a chef, loved it too.  She had never tasted my cooking and she was nicely impressed.

I hope when you make this, you’ll also impress the ones you love and cook for.

 

 Blue Cheese Mac with Walnuts

BLUE CHEESE MAC WITH WALNUTS

1 tbs sofrito
1 tbs olive oil
½ cup milk
4 oz cream cheese
1 handful of grated Italian-blend cheeses
6 oz of blue cheese – your favorite blue cheese will do here
½ cup of walnuts, toasted
½ package of your favorite whole-grain tubular pasta – penne, macaroni or rigatoni will all do

 

  1. In a large pot, bring water to a boil. Salt the water and add the pasta.  Cook for about 10 minutes, until almost cooked thru.  Try not to cook them too long, so they do not break when you stir the sauce in.
  2. Meanwhile, in a medium sauce pan over medium heat add the olive oil and sofrito.  Cook for a few minutes and add the milk.  Let it warm through, but be careful it does not boil.
  3. When the milk has heated up add the cheeses.  I leave the blue cheese for the end.  Stir a few times to make sure all the cheeses melt well.  They melt faster and better if they’ve been out of the fridge for a few minutes.  Not necessarily room temp, but not out of the fridge either.
  4. When the pasta is done, drain it and return to the pot.  Pour the sauce over the pasta and stir to combine.  Add the walnuts.

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Pumpkin Risotto

21 Nov

Thanksgiving is my favorite time of the year.  It’s special to me because it marks the official start of the Holiday and Xmas season and because I was actually born on a Thanksgiving Day a few years ago. 

To me the rituals of Thanksgiving are most precious – the sharing with family, the cooking and wanting to please your loved ones and the action of giving thanks for all that we have today.  To give thanks without asking anything in return is one of the principles of YOGA and maybe, my connection to Thanksgiving and how much I enjoy this holiday are signs of me possibly practicing yoga before this life.

I always give thanks to the Supreme Being for everything I do have – my life, my family, my health, my ability to see, hear, speak, walk, communicate, my roof, my family, those who love me and those who I love.  But I also give thanks for all those things I do not have…  those things we might think we need in our lives, and the very fact we do not have them might very well be a blessing.  I always thank God for keeping those wishes away from me… because I must learn to appreciate that life is perfect just as it is and that we do not need anything else but the moment we are living.  The present is the only thing we need to continue evolving and growing as spiritual beings in this physical existence.

Ever since I became vegetarian, Thanksgiving has been a challenge in the sense that I was truly attached to the flavors and smells of the traditional omnivore menu.  But in recent years I’ve taken it upon myself to search and create recipes that are in tune with the season, but completely vegetarian and satisfying at the same time.  And when I say in tune with the season, I mean the seasons in the US, because in Puerto Rico, it’s hot and humid on Thanksgiving, just like any other summer day.

This year I decided to try a Pumpkin Risotto.  Something easy, yet delicious that I could make at my grandma’s house.  This year Thanksgiving will be only her, my mom and I, and I don’t want to carry stuff from my home to hers.   I did a test run of  this recipe first and here are the results…  Something you can make any time of the year, but resonates really well in Fall and Winter.  Here’s how I did it…

 pumpkin-risotto

 

PUMPKIN RISOTTO

1 box of Archer Farms’ 4 cheese risotto mix
1 cup pumpkin, peeled and cut into 1 inch cubes
½ tbs olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste
2 ounces Fontina cheese, cubed small
1 ounce Blue cheese, I use Danish blue, grated or in crumbles
¼ cup Pecorino Romano, grated
¼ cup pumpkin seeds (pepitas)

 

  1. First, we need to roast the pumpkin.  Place the cleaned pumpkin on a baking sheet, drizzle the olive oil, sprinkle salt and pepper and roast in a 350 F oven for about 20-30 minutes.  I do this in my toaster oven.
  2. When the pumpkin is about to be done, start preparing the risotto mixture according to the directions on the package.   I place 2 ½ cups of water to boil.  When the water starts to boil, mix contents of rice and season packets.  Mix together well and leave uncovered. 
  3. After the pumpkin is done, place in the pumpkin seeds another baking sheet and roast dry for about 10-12 minutes.  Watch them closely so they do not burn.  They’ll change color from green to brownish.
  4. When the rice is halfway done, add the pumpkin pieces, the Fontina cheese and the Blue cheese.  Mix well so the cheese pieces melt well.  If the pumpkin stays in big pieces, kind of crush them against the side of the saucepan.  The idea is for the pumpkin pieces to mix well with the rice sauce and make it kind of orangey.
  5. When the rice is done, about 17-20 minutes, turn off the stove, add the Pecorino Romano cheese and cover.  The sauce will thicken upon standing.  Leave it covered for about 15-20 minutes so the sauce thickens and the temperature lowers so you won’t burn the roof of your mouth and can taste the cheeses and pumpkin.  Do not skip the waiting step, no matter how hungry you might be… I speak from experience, and burning the roof of your mouth is not fun.
  6. When serving, sprinkle some roasted pumpkin seeds on top for a nice look and great crunchy bite.

 

I enjoyed this risotto with my sweet plantains and a side salad.

It’s super easy to make.  It’s great if you’re only cooking for a small group, but if you want to feed more than 2-3 with this, just double the recipe – no problem.  Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.  I hope my mom and grandma like it too.

 

Thanks to you for always touching base with me here at KarmaFree Cooking.  I definitely count you as part of my blessings.

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