So lambs, it’s a quiet week, a little too quiet if you ask me. Since there is some time to take a breather, this means I can get back in the kitchen and cook my little heart out. In fact, I’m sitting in our newly cleaned and organized kitchen right now. Sweet.
Below is what we are having this week and last night we had this Soba Noodle Salad with Salmon and Asparagus, or as I called it, “Health on a Plate.” Full of good for you salmon, avocado, spinach, ginger, asparagus and buckwheat noodles and it was still flavorful to boot. It was absolutely delicious and much needed after a wedding filled weekend full of gorging on fabulous food and beverages! Huge congrats toour gentle friends Justin and Carrie on a beautiful wedding and here’s to a lifetime of happiness together.
Monday Grilled Pork Chops with Cherry Peppers, Cipolline Onions, and Balsamic Vinegar (in the April Bon Appetit, I’ll post here if it’s gentle.), Olive Oil-Mashed Potatoes with Spinach and Basil
Yay! I cooked lambs! Our Tuesdays typically run pretty late in the kitchen assembling our little Crimps, but before I left for the evening I made the glaze and the hominy mixture for this meal from Bon Appétit,. I got home pretty tired but was so happy that I had to simply glaze the salmon and roast for 10 minutes in the oven. I reheated the hominy with a 1/3 cup of milk to give it a little bit more body and bam! dinner was served.
This took exactly 30 minutes to put together and was DELICIOUS. I served a little bit of fresh cilantro on top of the salmon to give the plate a little more pizazz. We loved this for its flavor, freshness and the unique blend of cumin, red wine vinegar, apricot jam, and chipotles on the glaze! Plus, according to the magazine, you get a good dose of Vitamin D through the salmon – winning. And with that, I might have just killing “winning”…good.
Roast Salmon with Sweet Chipotle Glaze and Hominy Puree
3 chipotle chiles (about) from canned chipotle chiles in adobo
2 tablespoons apricot jam or preserves
1 1/4 teaspoons red wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
Nonstick vegetable oil spray
2 6- to 7-ounce salmon fillets with skin (scant 1 inch thick)
1 15-ounce can hominy, drained, juice reserved
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon chopped fresh cilantro
Preparation
Preheat oven to 450°F. Using back of spoon, press enough chipotles through fine sieve into small bowl to measure 2 teaspoons puree. Mix puree, jam, vinegar, and cumin in bowl; season glaze to taste with salt.
Coat small rimmed baking sheet with nonstick spray. Arrange salmon on sheet; sprinkle with salt and black pepper. Spread half of glaze over each fillet. Roast until just opaque in center, about 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, puree hominy and 3 tablespoons reserved juice in mini processor until almost smooth. Transfer to small skillet. Add butter and cilantro. Stir over medium heat until warmed through, mixing in more reserved juice by teaspoonfuls if too thick. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
Divide hominy between 2 plates, top with salmon, and serve.
Here’s my pretend conversation with Gwyneth Paltrow about her dish, Hot Niçoise Salad.
Emily: So, let me get this straight. You are smart, funny, a great actress, gorgeous, married to Chris Martin from Coldplay, have two beautiful kids, an Oscar, a blog, travelled Spain with Mario Batali and Mark Bittman and now the most amazing thing you’ve accomplished (I kid, I kid) was the creation of this Hot Niçoise Salad. You’re an alien aren’t you?
Gwyneth: You’ll have to speak to my publicist.
Emily: Well, regardless this was absolutely incredible, something I’m going to add to my weekly diet, full of delicious flavors, simple to make, David and I might have snorted it in five seconds and it turned out to be a staff favorite at Food & Wine. I mean really, only an alien could create this amongst EVERYTHING ELSE you do. Hugs, sparkles and unicorn horns. XOXO.
Yesterday morning I was starving and needed sustenance ASAP. For anyone who knows me, I AM the Snickers commercial where I turn into a grouchy mcgroucherstein if I don’t eat. Since I needed to eat pretty quickly, I improvised and created a fun breakfast sandwich that I call the Sanity Saver so I could get food in my belly and David didn’t have to tolerate a hungry diva.
Sanity Saver Breakfast Sandwich (Photo by Emily Ingle)
To ensure I get a few more vegetables in my diet, I’ve been grabbing these Green Giant Health Blends in the freezer section. I decided to serve their antioxidant blend (red peppers, carrots, broccoli) and a poached egg on top of toasted whole wheat bread all smothered with Everyday with Rachael Ray’s Good-For-You Hollandaise Sauce. A little salt and pepper on top and you’ve got breakfast in a flash. We both really, really liked this and more importantly the diva crisis was averted. There’s only room for one diva in this house and I think we all know who that is…
As I was thumbing through the new Cooking Light, I kept coming back to this Vegetarian Country Captainrecipe due to it’s unique combination of ingredients: curry, mango chutney, heavy cream, cauliflower, edamame, and a Granny Smith apple? My brain kept trying to figure out just how these would all taste together and finally intrigue got the best of me. Two cheers for intrigue. We LOVED this. It is an Emily and David favorite hands down.
OK back to what the heck a Country Captain is exactly. According to Cooking Light: Traditionally, Country Captain is a mild chicken stew seasoned with curry powder. Myth has it that a British sea captain working in the spice trade introduced this classic, comforting dish to the southern U.S. in the 19th century. Here, we’ve replaced chicken with edamame and cauliflower for a version loaded with vegetables to help you meet your daily produce goals. For a more in-depth history of this very popular Lowcountry dish (FDR adored it!), read more here. If anyone has favorite Country Captain recipes please share in the comments as I’m dying to make more versions of this.
This was so easy to put together and the layers of flavor were insanely delicious. I loved how all the ingredients played off each other and it is really filling to boot. For the love y’all, make this right now! One note, if you are working off of the magazine do not pay attention to the photo above the recipe. It’s the wrong image and I saw on their website that Cooking Light is aware of the error. As I was making this I kept scratching my head and worrying because mine was looking nothing like the beauty shot. Lo and behold I flipped to the page ahead and put two and two together. Whew, that photo DID look like this….
This month’s At the Market section of the January Bon Appetit focuses on Miso. To be honest, I only know miso from the traditional soup you get at Japanese restaurants, so I was very intrigued to learn more about the mysterious miso. First, what the heck is it exactly? According to Bon Appetit: Miso is fermented paste with a bold, salty flavor. Most of the miso sold in the U.S. is made from soybeans and rice or barley, but it can also be made from brown rice, millet, garbanzo beans, and other beans. It’s also a source of Umami or Savory, aka the fifth flavor, along with Sweet, Salty, Sour and Bitter. We tried naming the four last night and it was like listing the seven dwarfs, you always manage to forget one no matter how easy it is! If you want an in-depth look at what Umami is, check out the UMAMI Information Center (UIC). Hi yeah, UIC? If you ever need a taste-tester call me, mean it! Also, miso comes in three colors on a range of taste intensity from mellow white, a little bit stronger yellow and the kapow version, red. Naturally, I gravitated towards the red version.
Roast Pork Tenderloin with Apricot-Miso Glaze (Photo by Kenji Toma)
This Roast Pork Tenderloin with Apricot-Miso Glaze was well, just genius. You can find miso here in Austin at Whole Foods Market and I got mine for $8. A little pricey but considering the fact that it lasts up to a year in the fridge and now I would like to dollop it on my cereal, I consider it a good investment. I loved the flavors of the sauce: apricot preserves, red miso, Champagne vinegar, orange peel and garlic clove. You slather it on the tenderloin, roast, roast, roast, slather, slather, roast, roast and then let the tenderloin set. While the juices redistribute, you finish off the sauce with simple chicken broth to give it a silky texture and pour all over your pork. I took one bite and might have let out an expletive. This was heavenly and so simple to make. I served on the side with some garlic and soy sauce wok-seared baby bok choy. See, see, I’m still being healthy!
I realize purchasing miso might steer you clear of this dish but lambs, have I ever led you down the wrong path? Oy, I hope not. If you are up for something adventurous give this dish the chance it deserves. I for one know I’m going to experiment more with my red miso. Maybe next time, salmon!
Or as I like to call it, the kitchen sink salad. Lambs, this has a SERIOUS ingredient list- 22 to be exact. The only reason why I was even pondering giving it a try is because it comes from the kitchen of one of my chef super poodles, Susan Feniger!This little beaut of a salad graces the January cover of Bon Appetit and is the centerpiece for their healthy eating focus.
This salad requires a few unique ingredients so spots where you see Sparkled Unicorn Horns OR you can use light brown sugar or Fluffy Clouds from a 78 degree sky OR you can use red radishes, I always went with the latter. I’m being mean I know, but seriously who wants to go find palm sugar and keffir lime leaves? I sometimes don’t mind for a recipe, but typically if I’ve got cost-effective but still tasty alternative that doesn’t make me go all over Austin then I’m down.
Saigon Chicken Salad (Photo by Jose Picayo)
Let’s get to the marinade shall we? AMAZING. Amazing. Amazing. That is all. I will use this for marinating chicken whenever I can. Wow. Granted there is lemongrass in it which can sometimes be hard to find but hey, it’s worth it.
Second, the salad. It was good. The dressing was spicy, sweet and easy to make. And this dish had a flotilla of vegetables. I swear lambs I felt my whole body getting healthier while eating this, just look you’ve got: cabbage, radishes, carrots, tomatoes, green onions, garlic, green beans, cucumbers etc, etc. You know what my inner Emily said when I read this recipe? “I seriously should think about purchasing a Slap Chop before I do this.” To be honest it wasn’t that bad and the chicken didn’t take too long. My goodness, I’m still thinking about how amazing that chicken was.
Overall, I would definitely make the chicken (you are saying “no crap Emily, really?” aren’t you?) and then pile on top of whatever salad vegetable goodies you have floating around the kitchen!
After whirlwind Christmas and New Year’s celebrations, my brain was fried, my body was tired and my ability to cook was kaput. But I did want to start 2011 off right with a healthy dish…so of course I chose one with bacon in it. To be fair it’s center cut bacon which is a healthier alternative, but the delicious pork product in the Garbanzo Beans and Greens recipe from Cooking Light wasn’t the only thing it had going for it. The dish is a part of their Budget Cooking section that averages out to $1.75 per serving that yields four total. This recipe also looked super easy plus it fits into Cooking Light’s new Healthy Habits initiative that ensures you get a load of veggies. For the total win right?
Garbanzo Beans and Greens (Photo by John Autry)
Thank goodness for this recipe. It was everything I wanted/needed and was quite delicious. I’ve proclaimed my obsession with kale before and this has loads of it…YAY! What I truly loved was the Greek yogurt you place in the soup at the end. It gave it just the right silky and creamy texture that balanced out the soup perfectly. Plus, there’s bacon in it. Bacon.
Soup and bread – two food soul mates. I for one know I don’t like a yummy bowl of soup without some delicious crusty bread. Now kick that up a notch with this Tuscan version of soup known as Ribollita or in Italian Reboiled that has delicious crusty bread in it. Yep…IN IT. I’ve never heard of this soup but when I saw it in the Cooking LightNovember issue I thought I would save it for a cold, blustery day. Well, it’s here, right now actually, swishing the trees outside our windows and is very brisk indeed. A Ribollita is nothing fancy, just vegetable scraps and day-old bread but it does take time to make – three days from what I could find in my research. This one only took a few hours for chopping, baking, and of course building the soup so eh, that’s not so bad.
Ribollita (Photo by John Autry)
Y’all, this soup was super gentle. The flavors of the kale, tomatoes, beans, carrots, potatoes, yadda, yadda, yadda and yes, my delicious bread made this SUPER hearty. This bad boy is packed with good-for-youness and it’s vegetarian. We loved this for a gentle lunch on such a cold, windy day. Tonight, it’s Scallops with Green Tea Cream if I actually get around to making them this time. I swear, aliens are going to abduct me to ensure I don’t. More on this issue later and oh! if you haven’t yet, be sure to become a fan of Cooking Inside the Lines onFacebook today. Warm reboiled hugs.
A flavorful salad that’s done in about 20 minutes max? Sold to the Thai Beef Salad from Cooking Light! In a section all about shortcuts and fast recipes this one stood out to me. One, I heart fish sauce. Lambs, I know that’s a crazy thing to swoon over but I love the salty bite and unique flavor it lends to dishes. Maybe I should produce an “I Heart Fish Sauce” t-shirt? Anyone with me?
Thai Beef Salad (Photo by John Autry)
Two, the flavor combinations looked to die for with cilantro, cabbage, soy sauce, lime juice, honey, orange zest, serrano chile and mandarin oranges. Three, it’s a simple, hardly no-cook recipe that worked around our current kitchen status. We simply broiled the steaks in our Wolf microwave/convection oven to medium rare and made the rest of the salad while it cooked. The one thing that really stood out to me was the dressing. After making it in the food processor I gave it a taste and then did a little jig in our kitchen. Emily jig = really, really good.
Give this one a try for a super fast, delicious and healthy salad, and don’t skimp on the fish sauce.
