Warm Quinoa Salad with Roasted Kabocha and Pomegranate

After the husband reintroduced me to kabocha squash by way of a brilliant farroto he invented last month (coming soon to a blog near you), I became obsessed. (I say reintroduced because in retrospect, I have eaten it—and always loved it—in Japanese tempura, but never knew what kind of squash it was.) Roasted, kabocha tastes of toasted pumpkin seeds and squashy wonderment. You might think the latter is more of a delirious rant than an actual taste. Roast some yourself and see.

This recipe calls for enough kabocha to make about 2 cups cooked, plus 3-5 extra wedges for snacking, because I am a realist, and realists believe in accurately predicting the amount of a given ingredient that will make it past one's mouth and into the pot. Also because it allows you to have the following conversation:

You: Would you like a slice of kabocha?
Other person: Kabocha?
You: KABOCHA.
Other person: Is it good?
You: KABOCHA.
Other person: What?
You (mouth full): Mmrmph.

Ingredients
1 kabocha squash (weighing about a pound; or sub butternut squash)
Olive oil
1/2 cup quinoa
3 inches of a medium leek, white and light green parts, halved lengthwise, rinsed well, sliced
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
5 oz veggie and/or chicken broth
2 oz. baby spinach or arugula
Seeds of 1/2 pomegranate
2 tbsp pine nuts, toasted in a pan until golden brown
Freshly ground white pepper

Preheat the oven to 425°F.

Rinse the kabocha squash and pat dry. Cut the top out as you would when carving a pumpkin, then slice in half from top to bottom. Scoop out the seeds, then slice both halves into even wedges (roughly 3/4" wide at the thickest part).

Drizzle a cookie sheet with olive oil, and arrange the squash wedges on the sheet, turning them over as you go so that both sides are lightly coated with olive oil. (Note that if you overcrowd, they won't brown well, so try to leave a little space between them.) Roast for 15 minutes, flip, and roast 12-15 minutes more or until lightly browned and tender without being squishy. Set aside to cool.

Meanwhile, rinse the quinoa and let soak in cold water for 15 minutes.

Heat a pot over medium heat. When hot, add a glug of olive oil. Saute the leek with a pinch of salt until it softens, then add the garlic. Saute a minute more, add the quinoa, and stir a few times. Pour in the broth, cover the pot, and bring to a boil. Turn the heat down to low and simmer for 15 minutes or until liquid is absorbed.

While the quinoa is cooking, slice about 3/4 of the kabocha squash wedges out of their skin and cut into 1 inch pieces. (You also have time to seed the pomegranate and toast the pine nuts here if you want.) The rest of the squash is yours for the snacking.

When the quinoa is done, fold in the squash very gently (to avoid smushing it) and let heat through, then turn off the heat and cover the pot. Toss the baby greens with a little bit of olive oil and a spoonful of sherry vinegar so that the leaves are very lightly coated. Pour the quinoa-squash mixture over the greens, and let sit for 2 minutes to slightly wilt the leaves. Toss gently, sprinkle with salt and freshly ground white pepper to taste, and serve topped with pine nuts and pomegranate seeds.

Serves 2 as a main dish or 4 as a side.

Pasta with Braised Broccolini and Bacon

This is an easy and delicious dinner for one, or double it for 2-3 people (keep in mind that the time it takes something to brown in a pan will increase when you double a recipe because the ingredients crowd together more...using a wider pan will help with this).

Ingredients (per person)

1 1/2 cups whole wheat fusilli

Olive oil

1 strip Niman Ranch applewood smoked bacon, diced

1 bunch broccolini, cut into bite-sized pieces (or sub broccoli)

2-3 cloves garlic, slivered

1/4 cup chicken or veggie broth

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 oz. Stilton, crumbled

Bring a pot of water to boil for the pasta. Salt the water, then follow package directions to cook the pasta. Drain when al dente, reserving a ladleful of pasta water in case it's needed.

Meanwhile (this part takes about 10-15 minutes), heat a wide pan over medium heat. Saute the bacon for 2-3 minutes and then pour off the excess grease. Add a glug of olive oil and the broccolini, and saute for 1-2 minutes more. Stir in the garlic and a pinch of salt, cover the pan, and cook for 1-2 minutes. Stir, add the broth, and replace the cover, turning the heat down to medium-low. Let simmer for 5 minutes or until the broccolini is tender, stirring once or twice.

Toss everything together, adjusting salt and olive oil to taste, and adding a little pasta water if the mixture is too dry. Sprinkle liberally with black pepper, crumble just a bit of blue cheese over the top, and serve immediately.

Serves 1.

Celeriac and Potatoes with Sauteed Leeks and Thyme

Celeriac. [suh-LAIR-ee-ak] n. An under-appreciated root vegetable in the carrot and parsnip family. Coming to dinner soon at a table near you.

Seriously, make this. It's dreamy. It's also easy—you can prepare most of the ingredients as you're cooking, and just toss them in the pot as you go.

Adapted from Jamie Oliver's recipe here. 

Ingredients
Olive oil
1 celery root (celeriac), peeled and cut into 1/2" cubes
2 small to medium yellow potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/2" cubes
1 medium leek, white and light green parts, halved lengthwise, washed carefully, and sliced
2 cloves garlic, chopped
2 tsp chopped fresh thyme
1/4 cup chicken broth
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat a nonstick, medium-large pot or dutch oven over medium heat. When hot, add a generous glug of olive oil. Toss in the celeriac, then add the potatoes, leek, garlic, and thyme as you prepare them, stirring occasionally and adding another drizzle of olive oil whenever it starts to dry out. You want the celeriac and potatoes to start to brown in places, which will take at least 10 minutes and not too much stirring.

When the mixture is golden in places, cover the pot and continue cooking for 3 minutes. Stir, add a slosh (about 2 tbsp) chicken broth, replace the cover, and simmer for 5-10 minutes more or until liquid is evaporated. Stir, add another slosh of broth, and simmer for 5-10 minutes again. Continue cooking until the celeriac and potatoes are very tender.

Turn off the heat. Sprinkle with a little olive oil and salt to taste, and stir while smashing the celeriac and potatoes a bit. (This improves the texture. Also, it's inordinately fun.)

Serve hot, topped with freshly ground black pepper.

Serves 2-3.

Sauteed Beet Greens

Beet greens are like chard, only denser in texture—a bit less watery, and delicately flavored. Cut the tops off the next time you indulge in these, and save the greens for this recipe.

Ingredients
Olive oil
1 small shallot, chopped
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 large bunch beet greens, sliced crosswise into strips, washed well, and dried in a salad spinner
Salt

Heat a glug of olive oil in a dutch oven over medium heat. Add the shallot and saute, stirring, for 2 minutes or until it softens slightly, then add the garlic and saute a minute more.

Stir in the beet greens and toss to coat with the shallot-garlic mixture. Saute, stirring occasionally, for about 4 minutes, then cover the pot and turn the heat down to medium low. Cook another 5-6 minutes, stirring once or twice.

Sprinkle with a pinch or two of salt, and serve.

Serves 2. Pairs perfectly with a wasabi salmon sandwich, or probably just about anything else.

Wasabi Salmon Sandwiches

The Scene: Saturday evening. Feet up. Encouched.

The Game: Scattergories. Three-minute version.

The Letter: W.

The Category in Question: Things You Bring on a Picnic.

The Conversation, Verbatim:
Husband: What did you put?

Me: Wasabi salmon sandwich. You could totally bring that on a picnic.

Him: Ooooh.

(thoughtful pause)

Me: In fact, I kind of want one.

Him: Yeah.

Me: Like, now.

Him: Yeah.

(thoughtful pause)

Him: What are we doing for dinner tomorrow? 

Me: Making wasabi salmon sandwiches?

Him: That is correct.

Ingredients
2 smallish salmon filets (5-6 oz each), carefully deboned
1/2 tsp grated or finely chopped fresh ginger
1 small clove garlic, finely chopped or pressed
Kosher salt
Black sesame seeds
Olive oil
1 tsp wasabi powder*
1 tbsp very good quality mayonnaise or aioli**
1/2 bunch watercress, leaves separated, washed, and dried
2 tsp rice wine vinegar
2 ciabatta rolls, sliced in half (or sub slices of ciabatta or a french boule if necessary)

Sprinkle both sides of the salmon lightly with salt, then place skin side down on a plate. Sprinkle the top of each piece with ginger and garlic, and press them lightly into the fish with your fingertips. Last, sprinkle the same side liberally with black sesame seeds.

Mix the wasabi powder with just enough water to form a thick paste. Add the mayonnaise, stir well to combine, and set in the fridge.

Toss the watercress with the rice wine vinegar and set aside.

Heat a nonstick pan over medium heat. When hot, lightly drizzle with a little bit of olive oil. Add the salmon, skin side down, and shake the pan back and forth to make sure it doesn't stick. Cook for several minutes until the skin is golden brown and the salmon looks cooked about a third of the way up the side.

Flip the salmon, and cook for 2-3 minutes more until the top of the fish is very lightly golden (but not long enough for the garlic to brown).

Flip back skin side down, and check for doneness (we recommend medium-rare). If it's not done yet, cover the pan, lower the heat to medium-low, and cook for a minute or two more. Remove from the heat just before it's cooked enough (it will cook more as you serve it and carry it to the table).

To assemble the sandwich, spread each piece of bread lightly with wasabi mayonnaise, then sandwich the salmon topped with watercress in between. Cut in half, and serve immediately.

Serves 2. Pairs extremely well with sauteed beet greens, St. Supery's 2011 Virtu (available right now at Costco), and Nina Simone.

*Whole Foods has Sushi Sonic, a freeze-dried version made with real wasabi that tastes entirely different from the horseradish-mustard concoction often used as a substitute.
**Also found at Whole Foods: Sir Kensington gourmet scooping mayonnaise; also well worth seeking out.

Roasted Rosemary Potatoes with Goat Cheese and Sage

Autumn has arrived, with crisp mornings and reddening leaves. Let the roasting begin.

Ingredients

Purple or yellow potatoes, cut in half (if small, you can leave them whole; if large, you can cut into thirds or fourths if you want to reduce cooking time)

Olive oil

Fresh rosemary and/or sage

A little goat cheese or feta, for crumbling over the top

Preheat the oven to 425°F.

Toss the potatoes with a generous glug of olive oil and stir to coat evenly. Set a piece of tinfoil, shiny side up, on a baking sheet and brush the foil lightly with olive oil. Pour the potatoes onto the foil, scatter liberally with rosemary and sage leaves, and then pull the edges of the foil inward to form a partially-closed container. (You can adjust the openness of the foil as you roast them—if they start to dry out, close the foil more to retain more moisture. If liquid starts to collect at the bottom, pull the edges outward to let it evaporate.)

Roast the potatoes until browned on the outside and soft on the inside, stirring every 15 minutes or so to prevent them from sticking (as a point of reference, purple potatoes cut into approximately 1" chunks take around 45-60 minutes). You want these a little softer than you'd want a baking potato to bring out the creaminess—the potato should smoosh a bit when you pinch it gently.

Serve hot, topped with crumbled feta or goat cheese. Pairs well with braised broccolini and roasted carrots.

Goat Cheese and Quinoa Stuffed Poblano Peppers

Apparently, the husband is the real cook of the household(s), because while I've been stuck in a repeat loop on old (and newer) favorites, he's been making up recipes left and right. Here's one that I've been promised upon my return to Kansas. (I asked for delivery, but apparently I'm outside the delivery radius. Hmph.)

Ingredients
4-6 Poblano peppers (use 4 if you want leftover stuffing to top with a fried egg the next day)
Olive oil
1 cup quinoa
1 large shallot, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 red bell pepper, diced
1 jalapeno pepper, diced
10 oz canned black beans, drained
4 oz mild, soft goat cheese
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Cook the quinoa per package instructions.

Create a 1-2" opening in the top of each pepper and remove the seeds. Brush peppers lightly with olive oil, then broil for 7 minutes on each side. Let cool.*

In a nonstick pan, sauté the shallot for about a minute, then add the jalapeno, bell pepper, and garlic and sauté, stirring, until the peppers soften. Add the black beans and allow to warm through. Stir in the cooked quinoa, let warm, then mix in the goat cheese in small pieces to allow it to melt evenly. Turn off the heat. Sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste.

Stuff the peppers with the quinoa-black bean mixture. Return to oven and broil an additional 8-10 minutes until heated through.

Serve warm. Pairs well with a Caprese salad.

 
The peppers reheat well in the microwave the next day. Or, reheat the leftover quinoa stuffing and top with a fried egg.

Serves 3-6.

*Helpful hint! If you store a rubber-handled saute pan in the oven because it's too big for the Kansas kitchen cupboards, you should remove the pan before you turn on the broiler. Even if you've been storing it there all summer and haven't turned on the oven yet and so you were thinking of it more as a cupboard than an oven. This PSA brought to you by Concerned Citizens for Oven Awareness.

Smoked Salmon Benedictless

Few things make me happier than the blissful combination of smoked salmon and poached egg.

I feel obliged to note that these lack Hollandaise, because while I want to believe in principle that there is some context in which I would appreciate Hollaindaise sauce, I have not yet found it. Here, the molten egg yolk makes its own sauce, and blends perfectly and richly with the smoked salmon. Tomatoes can provide the slight tang that you'd usually get from lemon in the Hollaindaise, and the tastes end up balancing perfectly.

If you can't picture yourself poaching an egg without calamity striking, go here for a lovely and reassuring tutorial (I do mine slightly differently, but the basics are the same and she has great pictures).

Ingredients, per toast
1 pastured egg
1/2 english muffin or slice of good bread, lightly toasted
Olive oil
1-2 slices smoked salmon
A few leaves baby arugula or spinach (optional)
A few cherry tomatoes, halved (optional)
Kosher salt & freshly ground black pepper

Heat 2-3 inches of water in a pan (a wide saute pan is best—it lets you lower the egg from just above the water). Meanwhile, break the first egg into a small dish.

As soon as little bubbles coat the inner surface of the pan (before the water starts to simmer—go here for a picture), make a gentle whirlpool in the water by stirring in a circle with a spoon or rubber spatula. Lower the egg dish above the water and slide the egg into the center of the whirlpool. Adjust the heat down a bit to maintain the water at just below a simmer, and let the egg cook for 3 to 3 1/2 minutes (you can very gently prod it away from the bottom of the pan with your spatula if it starts to stick after the first 30 seconds or so).

Remove the egg with a slotted spoon and let drain. Repeat with additional eggs as desired.

Meanwhile, toast the bread, then cut each slice into bite-sized squares while keeping the overall shape of the slice (this gives the lovely illusion of a bread slice without the annoyance of sawing your way through a piece of toast for every bite). Top with a layer of smoked salmon, a few greens and/or tomatoes if desired, and then the egg. Sprinkle with salt and freshly ground black pepper, and serve hot.

Fried Chickpeas

Protein in a pinch. These are fast, and easy, delectable, and the perfect way to satisfy a wayward fried street food craving without any of that post-fried-street-food guilt.

You can make this without measuring anything, but I've put suggested measurements in parentheses for those of you with a penchant for teaspoons. You can toss the chickpeas in the flour and spices on a plate first, or (easier still) just add everything to the pan, tossing to coat, in the order listed.

Ingredients
Generous glug or two olive oil (1-2 tbsp)
1 can chickpeas, rinsed well and patted dry
2 generous sprinkles stone ground whole wheat flour (1 tsp)
1 generous sprinkle coarse-ground cornmeal (1/2 tsp)
6 dashes cumin (1/2 tsp)
3 dashes paprika (1/4 tsp)
Aleppo pepper to taste (1/4 tsp, or sub a pinch of cayenne)
Sprinkling of kosher salt (1/4 tsp)

Heat the olive oil in a nonstick pan over medium heat. When hot, add the chickpeas, then sprinkle in the rest of the ingredients, tossing to coat. Fry for 6-7 min until golden brown in places, shaking the pan from time to time.

Serve hot.

Serves 2-3 (but note that if you make them by yourself, you're unlikely to have any leftovers).

Bacon-Infused Beluga Lentils with Zucchini

Don't be fooled by its lentil-like appearance. This dish is like a bowl full of bacon. Only, you know, healthy. And easy. Neither of which you'd ever suspect from the taste.

Adapted from here, and reheats well the next day...if you manage to have any left. 

Ingredients
1 strip Niman Ranch applewood smoked bacon, diced
Olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1 large or 2 small carrots, diced
2 medium cloves garlic, coarsely chopped
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1 cup beluga lentils, rinsed and carefully picked through for any stones
1 3/4 cups chicken and/or veggie broth
Salt & freshly ground black pepper
2 zucchini, halved and sliced crosswise into semicircles

Heat a smallish pot over medium heat. Add the bacon and cook, stirring occasionally, until it just starts to brown. Add a glug of olive oil and the onion and saute, stirring from time to time, until the onion turns translucent, then stir in the carrot and garlic and continue to cook for 2-3 minutes more.

Add the thyme and then the lentils. Saute for a minute more, then add the broth. Cover and bring to a boil, then turn the heat to low and simmer for 20-25 minutes until lentils are tender but not soft, stirring every 5-10 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat a wide pan over medium heat. When hot, add a glug of olive oil, then toss in the zucchini (you want them in a single layer—if they won't all fit in your pan, do them in batches). Fry until golden brown on both sides and tender (if they are browning without cooking through fully, you can cover the pan for a few minutes and turn the heat down to low). When the zucchini are soft but not soggy, salt to taste and turn off the heat.

Serve the lentils in soup plates, topped with the zucchini and freshly ground black pepper.

Serves 2 (or 4 as a side dish).