A Good Dish

making food simpler

What to Cook in Spring When Local Still Means Root Vegetables

Golden beets with dill vinaigrette
Plate by Mary Barringer

Local asparagus is coming. So are ramps, fiddleheads and green garlic. But until they get here, we still need vegetables to eat. I am cleaning out my fridge and freezer this spring, trying to use up the jarred, frozen and preserved fruits and vegetables I stocked it with last fall. And then there are the roots.

Carrots (and beets) are available in several colors

Beets, watermelon radishes, carrots, parsnips, rutabagas and celery root are still available at our local markets as are potatoes and sweet potatoes. While the weather is still cool enough, and before the local greens arrive, I will continue to roast, steam, mash and sauté them, as suitable, and add them to soups. Root vegetables are quite nutritious, if grown in good soil, and usually quite inexpensive. If you browse social media, shots of root vegetable roasts seem to be trending. Perhaps roots are the new kale. Don’t forget horseradish is a root, is available right now and preparing it couldn’t be much easier (see recipe). Remember that roots also make wonderful salads which even improve after sitting in the refrigerator overnight.

Horseradish roots

I have linked below to several past posts that included root recipes. I keep linking to them in the hope that they will help you use up the contents of your crisper or give you some inspiration when you go to the market. Local greens will be here soon. But until then, don’t forget your roots!

 

Plate by Margaret Bohls

Cooked Carrots

 

Oval bowl by Emily Schroeder Willis

Carrot Salad

 

(top) – oval bowl by Robbie Lobell
(below) – Shino glazed bowl by Malcolm Davis

Beet Salad Two Ways

 

Glazed Porcelain Dish by Andrew Martin

Roasted Parsnips

 

Squared Bowl by Silvie Granatelli

Sautéed Watermelon Radish

Don’t Hold Your Nose! Cabbage Can Be Your Go To For An Early Spring Salad

Purple Cabbage Salad with Umeboshi Dressing
Wood Fired Bowl by Perry Haas

Cabbage may not be the first thing you think of when planning a meal but it is your friend when it comes to making a winter salad. Especially at this time of year, when you are tired of shredded beets or carrots or kale but you still want some crunch, reach for cabbage instead. Cabbages last remarkably well in cold storage through the winter, providing vitamins C and K and a good amount of fiber when other green (or purple vegetables) are wilted and well past use.

Cabbage is delicious sautéed and fermented but can also make a remarkably fresh salad in these early spring months. Cole Slaw is a typical use but shredded cabbage with a vinaigrette is preferable, in my opinion, since it eliminates the use of mayonnaise. There are wonderful recipes for Indian and Thai cabbage salads with coconut and spices but my perennial favorite is made with orange juice and umeboshi paste, mashed pickled plums found at markets that carry Japanese products.

This salad is the decendant of a recipe I learned in one of the first cooking classes I ever took. It was created by Minx Boren, who taught at the Natural Gourmet Cookery School in it’s early years and is now a life coach in Palm Beach. Natural Gourmet is a cooking school with a chef-training program focused on healthy eating. It is where I learned basic knife skills, a focus on nutritional balance and how to prepare global specialties from tamales to nori rolls to dosas. When learning to cook, I thought umeboshi paste and avocado oil were such exotic ingredients and, at that time, you really did have to search them out. Now even Costco sells avocado oil and Whole Foods and Fairway carry Umeboshi plums. If you really don’t like cabbage or don’t want to use it for some reason, this salad would also be good made with kale (massage it first) or shaved brussel sprouts, fennel or even blanched broccoli, carrots and cauliflower.

I have adjusted the original recipe only slightly in proportions, deleted and added a few ingredients. You can adjust it to suit your tastes. If you don’t want to add parley or cilantro, don’t. If you prefer cucumbers or red peppers to carrots, please use them. If you want to add some toasted sesame seeds instead of pumpkin, go ahead. Combining some purple cabbage with the green, or going all purple, will make the salad even more appealing. One of the beauties of this salad is that it tastes even better the second day, after the flavors have melded in the refrigerator, and it holds up well in a lunch box. If you find your cabbage tasting too strong or a little sharp or wilted after a winter in the fridge, just soak the shredded cabbage in cold water (before dressing) and it will sweeten and plump up.

Green Cabbage Salad with shredded carrots and toasted pumpkin seeds
Whiskey cups by Perry Haas

CABBAGE SALAD with UMEBOSHI DRESSING

Toss together in a large bowl:

  • 1 head cabbage, shredded
  • 2 carrots, shredded
  • 1 cup parsley or cilantro, chopped
  • 1/4 cup toasted pumpkin seeds (add when serving)

     Optional alternatives or add-ins: red or green pepper pieces, sliced red radish, orange segments (cara cara or blood oranges look great), chopped apple, chopped cucumber, toasted sesame seeds, walnuts, thinly sliced celery 

Dressing:

  • 1 TBs minced red onion
  • 2 TBs umeboshi plum paste
  • 2 TBs Dijon mustard
  • 2 TBs avocado oil
  • 1 cup freshly squeezed orange juice

Toss vegetables with dressing and let marinate in the refrigerator at least 2 hours or overnight. Top with seeds before serving.

Purple Cabbage with Cara Cara orange segments, parsley and walnuts

When Autumn Gives You Apples, Make Applesauce!

Homemade applesauce in a Maiolica bowl
by Stanley Mace Andersen

Fall is apple season and right now bins of fresh crisp red, green and yellow apples are ours to buy – the markets are full of them. When you have more than you can eat out of hand, cooking apples is a way to intensify and diversify their flavor. Making applesauce is the simplest means by which to transform apples to another level and doing so will generate wonderfully sweet aromas in your kitchen. Homemade applesauce tastes great served with pork, chicken, potato pancakes, with walnuts, pumpkin and chia seeds or on its own. It can be tailored to your own preferences for spice and consistency and is much more flavorful than the generally bland jarred varieties. You can substitute some applesauce for part of the butter in a muffin or cake recipe and it supplies a healthy amount of fiber, always a positive. I make it because I love to eat it and it is one of the easiest things I know how to cook.

A potful of cut apples with cinnamon ready to be cooked

There is almost nothing to it except cutting up the apples. We like to eat applesauce made with the skins (which also adds lovely color) but if you don’t, all you have to do is put it through a food mill after cooking or peel the apples before cutting (although the peels add color and flavor). I usually buy the 2 bags for $5 of sometimes bruised and sometimes perfect apples that one of the farmers at our market offers but any variety you like will work. Just cut up an assortment of apples (composting the cores), add 1/2 cup of water to get things cooking, toss in a cinnamon stick, sprinkle liberally with cinnamon, cover and simmer until mushy (about 20-30 minutes), stirring occasionally. Really – that is it!

Mason jars of applesauce can stay in your refrigerator for weeks

If you like ginger or cardamom or nutmeg, add some. If you like the consistency thinner, add more water or a little apple juice or cider. If you have a ripe pear, plum or a handful of cranberries or raspberries, toss them in to cook along with the apples. Apples and cinnamon together are sweet enough that I never add sugar of any kind. The finished applesauce keeps for weeks in a covered glass jar in the refrigerator or you can process it in a water bath like jam and keep it on a shelf until summer. If you make it now, I’ll bet it will be gone long before we even get to winter!

Homemade applesauce in a maiolica bowl by Stanley Mace Andersen

Salad for President Gets My Vote!

Salad for President
by Julia Sherman

Julia Sherman is more than a good writer and her cookbook, Salad for President, is more than a collection of recipes. She is an artist, interviewer, gardener and cook and her book is an eclectic mix of artist biographies and interviews, charming illustrations, appealing recipes and, by the way, some pretty nice handmade plates and bowls. The recipes are from both Sherman and the artists with whom she talks. Included are the well known like William Wegman and Laurie Anderson but so are many others who I didn’t know but with whom I was happy to become familiar.

An introduction to two of the artists who are interviewed and contribute a recipe to the book
From Salad for President

The biographic essays, interviews and ingredient discussions are good reading. But more than a good read, Salad for President (from the blog of the same name) is a cookbook full of interesting but not too complicated recipes. When there are exotic ingredients involved, like labneh, like thick yogurt, or myoga, a wild ginger flower, she tells you where to find it or how to make it or if you can do without it. Sherman explains ingredients (like pomegranate molasses), discusses technique (like shredding cabbage finely enough so it fluffs) and offers helpful indices   (grouping recipes by season, ingredients, dressings and one on types of greens). Rather than a small index of artisans without any information, just pagination, I wish she had captions with her photographs of bowls and plates, but that is a minor quibble.

One of the charming drawings from Salad for President

There are other wonderful artist-centric cookbooks out there (The Artists’ and Writers’ Cookbook, Cooking for Artists, Artists’ Recipes, etc.) but Salad for President is both fun to read and to browse and full of recipes I actually want to try. Here salad is art, metaphor, practical technique and a source of inspiration for conversation, creativity and connection as well as, at its core, some delicious looking meals. Whether you buy it or take it out of the library, I am sure you will enjoy many dimensions of this artful book.

Chimichurri – The Verdant Argentinean Sauce that Brightens Almost Any Meal

Freshly made Chimichurri
Porcelain Bowl by Rob Sutherland

When it’s too hot to do much cooking, Chimichurri, the deep green Argentinean sauce will brighten even the most boring rotisserie chicken. Typically served as an accompaniment to grilled steaks, Chimichurri can enliven not only beef and chicken but also fish, pork, eggs and vegetables. It is quick and easy to make and so delicious that in our home we consider it more of a side dish than a condiment. My husband, usually quite moderate in his eating habits, has been known to empty entire jars in restaurants spoonful by spoonful! I secretly fear it was this consumption that caused the demise of our beloved local Argentinean cafe some years ago.

Chimichurri even moistens and flavors a bland rotisserie chicken

Chimichurri recipes vary by type and amount of greens but the constant ingredients in all of them are parsley, oregano, garlic, olive oil and salt. Some call for cilantro while others prefer mint. Most list red wine or white vinegar but you might see lemon or lime juice or zest in others. I’ve read recipes that call for red onion, crushed red pepper, regular or smoked paprika, roasted garlic, scallions or onion powder. They are probably all delicious.

The simple recipe I follow most often is based on the one in Seven Fires: Grilling the Argentine Way by the grill master Francis Mallmann. He doesn’t use cilantro but I add some because we love it. Use a flavorful green olive oil and you will notice the difference. If you like it spicy, add 1-2 teaspoons of red chili flakes. Mallmann’s recipe calls for an entire head of garlic so if you find that shocking, try using less. If you don’t have fresh oregano (it is plentiful in farmers’ markets right now), you can use a smaller amount of dried. The amounts are flexible and the Chimichurri lasts a few weeks in the refrigerator. You can use a blender or food processor but I like to chop the herbs with a knife to keep them from getting mushy. It is best made a day or so ahead for the flavors to merge but it will be delicious on the day you make it, as well. Just make sure to prepare a large enough batch so you have some left to refrigerate!

Chimichurri
Bowl by Rob Sutherland

CHIMICHURRI

1 cup boiling water
1 T kosher or sea salt
6-8 cloves garlic, peeled and finely minced
1 heaping cup fresh flat leaf parsley, mostly leaves with some tender stems included
1 cup fresh oregano, leaves only (or 1/4 cup dried), or substitute half with fresh cilantro, leaves and fine stems
Big pinch of black pepper or 1-2 t crushed red chili flakes
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

Dissolve the salt in the boiling water and let cool.
Put the minced garlic in a quart jar.
Chop finely the green herbs and add to the garlic.
Add black pepper or red pepper flakes.
Pour in the vinegar, oil and cooled salted water.
Screw on the lid tightly and shake well.
Let sit at least a couple of hours, preferably overnight, before using.
Store in the refrigerator.