French Potato Salad

Mary Ellen loved this last night, so I am posting the recipe for her.

Cube some red or Yukon Gold potatoes, cover with water, and boil for about 5 minutes or until tender yet firm. Eat a sample, don't just test with a fork!

Drain and let cool a little, then toss with a couple of tablespoons each olive oil and red wine vinegar. Gently fold in Dijon mustard--start with a tablespoon and add more if you like--and salt and pepper to taste. Potatoes are bland, so season generously. Add a couple of sliced green onions and some chopped fresh herbs. Parsley is okay, but fresh tarragon is best. Serve at room temperature. This is best made a couple of hours ahead.

Olive Update

Back in January I posted about curing the olives from our backyard tree. It took a long time, maybe about two months total, but they were delicious. I used this marinade featuring vinegar, garlic, and lemon:

1-1/2 cups white wine vinegar

1 Tablespoon salt dissolved in 2 cups water

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

3 lemon wedges

2 cloves garlic

Olive oil to cover

Next time I wouldn't cover them with olive oil. They tasted best after a whole month of marinating. I wish I had some left!

Pictures above is our herb garden. Mostly you can see parsley, sage, and rosemary, but maybe there's tarragon squeezed in there. The sage is blooming with purple flowers. Since most things are in their prime now, I plan to dry big batches of each. Sage and tarragon are especially fragrant and palatable when dried.

Corned Beef and Cabbage

I didn't do anything very fancy with this. I just boiled the corned beef, cooked the carrots and potatoes separately, and added the cabbage for the last 25 minutes--too long, but some people like soggy cabbage. It was flavorful and sort of homey and satisfying. I served horseradish and mustard with it. As usual, I mixed the horseradish with yogurt--it makes a perfect simple sauce.

I made Irish Soda Bread for the first time--I used the Joy of Cooking recipe--and we decided to have it for dessert because it was sweet. This version was a quick bread, sort of like banana bread with raisins instead of bananas. The traditional caraway seed made it interesting.

Bread No. 1 in a Convection Oven

This is my first loaf of bread in the new oven. It's a convection oven, which I've never used for bread before. I used a plain old pizza stone on the rack. I set it to 500 degrees, which the oven automatically adjusted down to 475 because the convection is faster and more efficient.

The crust got quite brown; I haven't decided if it's too brown yet. But the loaf is wonderfully light in weight and crinkly and evenly baked, so I think with some experimentation this will be positive.

I used my go-to recipe for basic, accessible (by which I mean a little softer) European white bread, which is based on Peter Reinhardt's Italian bread recipe and is almost identical to my pizza dough recipe. Really, it basically is my pizza dough recipe, except that I make a sponge the day before, pretty wet, with 1/2 t of the yeast and half the flour (2.5 cups) and over half the water. I use only 1 T of olive oil in the final recipe instead of 3, but otherwise it's about the same. Makes two lovely loaves or four home-sized pizzas. The second half of the dough is in the freezer awaiting its fate.

I am dreaming about your olives, by the way, Mom. They were so good. Wish we had an olive tree here.

Tomatoes Provencale

I got this recipe from the Arizona Daily Star. I usually make a bread crumb version of these, but this is better. I use a little less oil than called for.

Tomatoes Provencale

Serves: 6

• 6 hot-house, heirloom or your favorite tomatoes

• 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

• 2 tablespoons fresh chopped garlic

• 1/2 teaspoon fresh thyme; dry thyme can be substituted

• 1/4 cup fresh Parmesan cheese

• Sea salt

• Cracked pepper

Cut the tomatoes in half and cut a sliver off the ends so they will lie flat. Discard the ends.

Place the open or cut sides up, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil, rub the open halves with fresh chopped garlic, sprinkle with sea salt, fresh cracked pepper, thyme.

Bake for 20 minutes at 375. Remove from the oven and sprinkle fresh Parmesan cheese over top the tomatoes and place back into the oven for 5-7 minutes until the cheese has a golden color.

Advice About Vegetables

Here is some of Dad's beautiful pak choy. I cooked the first smaller heads whole, but these were a little larger so I cut them into slices, sauteed them in a little oil until seared, stir-fried in some garlic and minced ginger, and dressed them with this sauce from Jack Bishop. Searing the pak choy really adds to its character and flavor. Pour in this sauce at the end and let it boil up for a few seconds.

1 1/2 tablespoons rice vinegar

1 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce

2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil

1/2 teaspoon sugar

1 tablespoon toasted sesame seeds

And now to the matter of zucchini. It's really important to cut it into small pieces! I'm convinced that people who don't think they like zucchini are really just averse to large, wet chunks of it. I usually cut it in quarters lengthwise, then into small slices. In the dish above it is sauteed with garlic, then cherry tomatoes and black olives are added near the end. I believe I also added oregano, salt, and pepper.

Sugar-Free Granola

This is delicious and easy. Most granolas are too sweet, I think.

Granola

1/4 cup vegetable oil

3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats (not quick oats)

Pour the oil in a 9"x13" baking pan and put it in the oven while the oven preheats to 300 degrees. Stir in the oats and bake for about 15 minutes, stirring often, until slightly toasted.

1 cup chopped walnuts, hazelnuts, or almonds, or a combination of these

1/3 cup raw sunflower seeds

2 tablespoons sesame seeds

Add the nuts and needs and toast for 10 minutes longer. Remove from oven and stir in:

1 cup raisin, dried cranberries, or mixed dried fruit

Our Olives

We have an olive tree behind our house and this year for the first time since we moved in, it had abundant olives. Dad picked a couple of quarts and I looked on the internet for instructions. This article seemed reasonable.

I slit the olives and am brining them now. We are into the 5th week and they are still bitter, but there's progress: after the first week I had to spit out the one I tasted. Now they are tasting rather olive-like. I'll give them one more week and then marinate them.

I used a jar to weight down the olives in the brine, and I stored them in our laundry room, which is cooler than the rest of the house.

Ono with Beurre Noir

We brought Bev a two-pound fillet of ono from Suisan Fish Company in Hilo. It is the most excellent and prized of Hawaiian fishes, and she made a wonderful dish with it. I believe she learned this in France.

Put a stick of butter in a hot skillet and cook until quite brown. Add the fish (cut in smallish serving pieces) and cook, turning once or twice, until done just halfway through. Set fish aside to keep warm. Add a cup or so of white wine to the pan and boil until somewhat reduced. Add capers to taste and season with salt and pepper. Return fish to pan and coat with sauce. Serve at once.

That pale orange side dish in the photo is green papaya salad.

Don't Try This at Home

I have read that one can make tamales using canola oil instead of lard or Crisco, so I bravely tried it. They tasted okay, but didn't have that lovely, rich, mealy texture. I tried this so you will never have to.

Rocky Point Shrimp Cocktail

This was an excellent recipe--I picked it up at the fish counter at Sprouts. I bet it would make perfect tostadas, too.

Pretty Salad

Look how pretty this lunch was! The salad is from City Roots, and contained nasturtium flowers and leaves, pea shoots and arugula shoots, I think.

I made blue cheese dressing, which I have been making lately because Lawson announced he is sick of vinaigrettes with greens. I'm using no particular recipe, just an ad hoc, sample-as-you-go mixture of a minced garlic clove, some blue cheese, black pepper, salt, mayo, yogurt and milk.

Old/New Thanksgiving Food

We had many of the usual dishes on Thanksgiving: Portuguese-style turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, applesauce, pumpkin pie, etc. I did manage to insert two new twists on cranberries and sweet potatoes, which we all enjoyed.

Sprouts sells these sweet potato chips, which are delicious. I often serve them with raw tomatillo salsa, but this time found a cranberry salsa recipe in the local paper. It was a satisfying and colorful appetizer.

Spicy Cranberry Salsa

1/2 small red onion

1 tablespoon canned jalapeno slices

2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

8 ounces fresh cranberries

1/2 cup dried cranberries

2 tablespoons lime juice

2 tablespoons honey, or to taste

1/2 teaspoon or more salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

In food processor, pulse onion, jalapeno, and cilantro to chop finely. Add cranberries and pulse until coarsely chopped. Add remaining ingredients and mix lightly. Serve with chips.

Instead of the usual sweet potatoes, I made baked wedges with a yogurt dipping sauce, which we had at Zinburger recently. I got the recipe from the Bon Appetit website.

Tagines

I'm in love again--this time with my new cookbook Tagine: Spicy Stews from Morocco, by Ghillie Basan. Dad noticed it in a cooking store in Tubac, and I've become very involved with it.

First I made a chicken and dried apricot tagine, quite delicious. Next I made one with lamb, prunes, apricots, and honey (top picture). With that meal I made sides from the cookbook, including an orange olive salad and a sort of Moroccan pico de gallo. And Moroccan bread.

Now I am turning to the vegetable tagines, and we loved this one made with carrots and chickpeas. It was very quick and flavorful.

Spicy Carrot and Chickpea Tagine with Turmeric and Cilantro

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 onion, chopped

4 garlic cloves, chopped

Heat the oil in a tagine or heavy casserole and saute onion and garlic until soft.

2 teaspoons ground turmeric

2 teaspoons cumin seeds

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon cayenne

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Salt

3-4 medium carrots, sliced on the diagonal

Add spices and carrots. Add water to barely cover. Cover and cook 10 or 15 minutes, until carrots are just tender.

1 one-pound can chickpeas, drained

Add chickpeas and simmer for 10 minutes until flavors are blended and liquid is somewhat reduced.

Cilantro, chopped

Lemon wedges

Garnish with chopped cilantro and serve with lemon wedges.

Greek Chicken with Sage

We have two varieties of sage in the herb garden at present. I don't know their names but I certainly admire the way they hung in there over our record-hot summer. I don't use sage very much except at Thanksgiving, so I was happy to find this vinegary, flavorful recipe in Susanna Hoffman's The Olive and the Caper. A bonus: it's very easy.

Chicken with Onions, Tomatoes, Capers and Sage

2-4 tablespoons olive oil

3-4 large boneless, skinless chicken thighs, halved

1 sliced onion

1/3 cup dry red wine

1/3 cup balsamic vinegar

1 cup canned diced tomatoes

3 tablespoons capers, drained

1 teaspoon or more fresh chopped sage leaves

Salt and pepper

Heat the oil and brown the chicken and onion for about 10 minutes. Add all the remaining ingredients and stir to mix. Simmer, partially covered, until chicken is tender, perhaps about 45 minutes. Reduce the sauce at the end if it's too liquid.