you, too, can enjoy parsnips

This recipe comes from Faye Levy's International Vegetable Cookbook, which is a real workhorse where learning what to do with new and unfamiliar vegetables is concerned. This book not only taught me how to make parsnips palatable, it also taught me what to do with daikon, and red cabbage too. And I still have a ton of other recipes marked to try.

For this dish, you boil some parsnips, then swathe them in a creamy yogurt sauce spiked with garlic, sweet paprika, and dill. When I put it that way it sounds kind of busy, but it's a great combination. Somehow the other sharp flavors--dill, garlic, tangy yogurt--help balance out and tone down the sharpness of the parsnips.

Levy's notes say that this sauce is also good with potatoes or carrots. I imagine so, but I've never tried it--because, hey, how awesome is it to have something to do with parsnips! If there's a better vegetable out there to enrobe in this sauce, I kind of don't want to know about it.

Last time I made this recipe, I was trying to figure out how to simplify and streamline it. I thought I could cook the parsnips in a big pot of water, scoop them out (along with a bit of cooking liquid to make the sauce), and then cook the noodles in the same pot of water while I made the sauce. But I'm going to be honest with you: my parsnips--due to my own laziness, not any fault of their own--were kind of, well, marginal by the time I got around to cooking them. And that cooking water smelled really, really bitter. So I just tossed it and started over with fresh water--and the parsnips themselves were delicious, tender and sweet. Crisis averted, but the point is, if you're a better, less lazy person than I am and are therefore working with fresher parsnips you might be able to save a little water and a little time here.

The one quibble that I have with Levy's cookbook is that a lot of the dishes seem like sides, and it can be difficult to figure out how to turn them into a vegetarian main course. With this recipe, I had the idea to serve the parsnips over buttered egg noodles, which seemed consistent with the Central/Eastern European origins of the dish.

My mom's vintage salt and pepper shakers--a couple of guys who look like they know a thing or two about goulash and the like--seem to approve.

Parsnips with Bulgarian Yogurt-Dill Sauce

1/2 C plain yogurt (full-fat is best, I think)
1 pound parsnips
1 C water or vegetable stock (or cooking liquid from the parsnips)
8 oz. dried egg noodles
1 medium garlic clove
2 1/2 Tbsp butter, divided
2 Tbsp flour
1tsp sweet paprika
1 Tbsp chopped fresh dill or 1 tsp dried
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

First, get the yogurt out of the refrigerator and put it in a medium bowl (you want it to be at room temperature by the time you add it to the sauce); stir until smooth.

Put a large pot of water on to boil with a pinch of salt. Wash and peel the parsnips, and cut into 2-inch lengths. Quarter any thick pieces (larger than 3/4 inch in diameter) lengthwise. Trim any woody centers (I find this instruction kind of confusing--I'm never sure how to distinguish between a woody center and a not-woody one--so I tend to err on the side of trimming them out).

When the water boils, add the parsnips to the pan, cover, and simmer over medium-low heat until tender, about 15-20 minutes. If it seems like a good idea, remove the parsnips from the pan with a slotted spoon and scoop out 1 Cup of the cooking liquid, setting both of these aside. Otherwise, just drain the parsnips and put on a new pot of water for the noodles.

When the water for the noodles boils, add them to the pot. Peel the garlic.

Then, in a large skillet, melt 1 1/2 Tbsp butter. Add the flour and paprika to the melted butter, and cook over low heat, whisking, about 1 minute. Remove the pan from the heat and whisk in the water/stock/cooking liquid. Put the pan back on the heat and bring to a boil, whisking. Press the garlic into the pan and cook over low heat, whisking often, about 2 minutes.

Take the pan off the heat again and gradually stir the sauce into the bowl with the yogurt. Return to pan and whisk until smooth. Gently heat through; do not boil. Stir in dill. Add parsnips and heat through without boiling. Taste and adjust seasoning.

The noodles should be done now; drain them. Return them to the pan, add the remaining 1 Tbsp butter, and toss to coat the noodles with butter. Put the buttered noodles on a plate and the parsnips on top. Serve hot.

Makes 3 servings.

sunday morning breakfast links, 2/6/10

A couple of notes on that carrot soup I posted about the other day (which I made again for dinner tonight):

• A big fat onion instead of the leeks? Sour cream in place of the creme fraiche? Totally, totally fine.
• No really, simmer it for an hour and a half. I know it sounds over the top but the flavor just gets crazy rich that way.

I wanted to link to this month's Gourmet, unbound roundup of recipes. I think I mentioned before that this is a project in which people are cooking through the Gourmet magazine archives month by month (so recipes from February are posted in February, and so on) to keep the spirit of that magazine alive. The rap on Gourmet, after its demise, was that it had gotten--or maybe always was--too fancy and out of touch. That's one reason I decided to participate--I thought it would be an interesting challenge to see if I could find recipes relevant to my project of simple, seasonal cooking for a busy working parent. Could Gourmet keep it real? Well, in a word, yes--I've had a lot of trouble narrowing things down to just one (or two, in February's case) recipe for the month.

It's also interesting to see what the other cooks participating in the project come up with. Some folks go all out with, yes, fancy and complex creations--I love reading about them but when it comes to my own kitchen I have to admit I think: No way. Other participants though have found some simple and accessible stunners. Here are a few that stood out to me this month, all featuring seasonal produce:

• Butternut Squash Galette from Doable and Delicious
• Pasta with Parsley Sauce and Cauliflower from Hungry Bruno
• Ginger and Garlic Broccoli with Brown Rice from Taste as You Go

 More goodness from the Interwebs:

• A while back I was wishing that I had more recipes for simple legume dishes that I could use to round out our plates of vegetables. Mark Bittman, as always, has my back, with a roundup of easy dal recipes.
• From The Kitchn, more cookbooks for kids/books on cooking with kids.
• 10 tips for reducing food waste. Because I was raised Protestant by a woman who was raised Catholic, I love the "guilt list" idea. 

And finally:

• I really hate how bulleted lists look in this template. Sorry folks.

soup by-the-seat-of-the-pants

We ate this carrot soup on Christmas Eve. It was a big hit, which was especially gratifying because the cooking was totally fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants.

I had originally planned to make a roasted squash soup, and had gathered these two recipes from Melissa's Produce and a blog called Seed to Table. Then the Mr. (who also snapped the photo for this post--thanks hon!) reminded me that we had a bunch of carrots in the garden that needed to be used, so I switched gears a bit. Just a little bit--I basically combined the two recipes, and substituted carrots for the squash. To simplify things, I decided to just simmer the carrots on the stove rather than roasting them.

So the carrots for the soup were hyper-local, but the chestnuts, of course, were quite the opposite. Despite their hefty tally of food miles, I was curious to try cooking with chestnuts, which just seem like a quintessential luxurious winter ingredient to me. And indeed, they gave the soup a gorgeous velvety texture.  Hopefully soon, those of us in North America will have access to closer-to-local chestnuts again.

This soup is not particularly quick--it takes a long, slow simmer--but it is very easy. Just a few minutes at the beginning chopping vegetables and tossing them into the pot, and a quick whiz in the blender at the end.  Dinner practically makes itself.

The soup is garnished with a dollop of chipotle creme fraiche, which makes a nice contrast to the creamy, slightly sweet vegetable puree. You will probably end up with a little bit of extra chipotle creme fraiche. It would be good in an omelet, in a buckwheat crepe, spread thinly on a sandwich, or even just smeared on a cracker and topped with a bit of fresh chevre. Not that I have extensive personal experience with that last option or anything.

Carrot, Leek, and Chestnut Soup with Chipotle Cream

2 Tbsp. butter
2 leeks
2 lb. carrots
4-oz. package shelled chestnuts
1 tsp salt
freshly ground black pepper to taste
4 C vegetable broth or water

1/2 C creme fraiche
2 tsp tomato paste
1/4-1/2 tsp chipotle chili powder, or to taste

Heat the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Meanwhile, wash the leeks and cut them (white parts only--reserve the green parts for another use) into 1-inch chunks. Add the leeks to the pan and saute, stirring occasionally. Wash, peel, and roughly chop the carrots, and add them to the pan. Then add the chestnuts, salt, pepper, and liquid. Bring to a boil then turn the heat down and simmer, covered, until carrots and leeks are very, very tender--at least an hour, and an hour and a half doesn't hurt.

Meanwhile, stir together the creme fraiche, tomato paste, and chipotle powder. Refrigerate until needed.

When the vegetables are done, remove the soup from the heat. Puree in batches in a blender--be careful not to fill the blender too full, so that it does not spatter. Return the soup to the pan and heat gently.

For each serving, stir a dollop of the chipotle creme fraiche into the bowl.

Makes about 5 servings.

a contradictory combination

Here are two recipes I chose for my February Gourmet, Unbound submission. Both are from a menu of Algerian dishes put together by Farid Zadi for the February 2008 issue.

So the two recipes--Braised Turnips with Poppy Seed Bread Crumbs, and Fennel and Carrot Slaw with Olive Dressing--are meant to be eaten together, yet I'm calling them a contradictory combination. That's not because of the flavors or textures--the two dishes are a great balance to each other in that sense--but because of timing. The salad really needs to be made way ahead, but the turnips are best right away. (Actually, come to think of it, that makes them a convenient combination for busy parents, since you don't have to do all the cooking at once.)

The turnip recipe needs a little tweaking, I think. First, there is just no way you need a cup and a half of braising liquid (I'd say a scant half-cup should do it). Second, the turnips really don't need to cook for a full hour. Mine were done after half an hour--then I started trying to boil down the excess liquid, realized it would take forever and result in overcooked turnips, and finally just fished the turnips out of the broth, tragically leaving all that delicious butter behind. There's got to be a better way. So I'm just going to link to the original recipe for now; I'll post it in full once I've made it my own.

Ignoring my quibbles with the method, the result is fantastic. The turnips end up meltingly soft, but retain just enough of their mustard-y bite. Some of the bread crumbs fall down into the braising liquid on your serving platter and get pleasantly soggy, while others perch on top of the turnips and stay delicately crisp--the combination is just perfect. (And it's this combination that doesn't keep--the leftovers are tasty, but the contrast of textures is lost.) The poppy seeds are, surprisingly, a key element of the dish, adding a nice nutty flavor--but I recommend that you go out and buy some fresh ones; admit it, your current stash has been hanging around your spice cabinet since 2003.

On to the salad. I've been looking for winter salads--something crisp and astringent to pair with those soft, long-cooked winter main dishes. And this one is definitely a good option. With one caveat. The original recipe says to refrigerate for at least 30 minutes to let the flavors blend, but I found that even after an hour or so the fennel was overpowering and the rest of the salad was kind of blah. But after sitting overnight--oh my goodness. The dressing made things all briny and savory, and the fennel retreated to become a grace note rather than a bazooka (yeah, yeah, mixed metaphors--so sue me). I've made a couple modifications to the original recipe, so my version appears below.

Fennel and Carrot Slaw with Olive Dressing
Adapted from Gourmet, February 2008

If you can't find fennel, I think this recipe would also be great with cabbage or grated radishes in place of the fennel, or even carrots alone. 

Juice of half a lemon
1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
3 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
3/4 teaspoon dried Aleppo chile or Espelette pepper flakes
1/2 tsp salt
1 medium fennel bulb with fronds
5 carrots
1/4 cup Spanish green olives
2 Tbsp finely chopped sun-dried tomatoes packed in oil
2 Tbsp chopped flat-leaf parsley

Place the first five ingredients--lemon juice through salt--in a medium serving bowl.

Chop enough fennel fronds to measure 3 tablespoons and reserve. Discard remaining fronds and stalks. Quarter the fennel bulb and cut each quarter into very thin crosswise slices. Peel and grate the carrots. Remove the pits from the olives (if necessary) and finely chop.

In the bowl, whisk together the dressing. Add the fennel fronds, fennel, carrots, olives, tomatoes, and parsley. Fold together to combine thoroughly. Refrigerate 8 hours or overnight to let the flavors blend.

Makes 5 servings.

sunday morning breakfast links, 1/31/10

Happy weekend, friends! I'm hitting post a little early today as I'm headed out to celebrate a dear friend's birthday.

I found those seasonal produce calendars that I mentioned in a previous link roundup. All via Apartment Therapy/The Kitchn:

• PDF download from The Cottage Industrialist
• From Claudia Pearson, available in poster or tea towel (swoon!!) format
• My favorite, a perpetual gardening calendar from Krank Press 

More links that caught my eye:

• The Breakaway Cook had an interesting post about how to become a good home cook. He argues that it's easier than ever to become a great cook, and also easier than ever to outsource your dinner preparations with prepackaged convenience food, which struck me as an interesting paradox. His post also dovetailed with some thoughts that have been swirling around in my head about the difference, and sometimes tension, between cooking local and cooking seasonal. I'm hoping to write more about that in this space soon.
• From a while ago, but I had no idea that Teriyaki was Seattle's culinary "thing." "Only in Seattle, however, are teriyaki restaurants so ubiquitous that they’re virtually invisible, said Knute Berger, the author of 'Pugetopolis,' a book of essays on modern Seattle mores"--I guess that's true because I hardly notice the joints. I rarely eat in them, either--though this article made me want to play around with the teriyaki concept at home. I do remember having some surprisingly tasty cabbage at a teriyaki restaurant way back in my U. District days.
• A kid's version of the Italian culinary bible Silver Spoon.  The reviewer, again from AT's The Kitchn, writes, "Why do we think it's so exceptional? First, it uses language that appeals to kids and teens ('squash the garlic,' 'bash the pesto') without talking down to the reader or getting too cutesy." Actually, why aren't more cookbooks for adults written like that?

the easiest soup in the world

Here's another dish for which Nigel Slater deserves the credit. (Oh, and looking through my previous posts on this blog I just realized that my braised carrot recipe is probably from him as well. I hope I'm not going to turn into some weird kind of stalker, clutching a handful of recipe cards like a goth pre-teen with the latest by Neil Gaiman.) It's a revisiting of the red lentil and sweet potato soup from The Kitchen Diaries that I made last year, except I've simplified it even further. Instead of pureeing the soup I just left it chunky (a certain member of our household does NOT approve of the blender these days, and can make her displeasure known at high decibels). And in place of the garnish of sauteed onions, I added a bit of coconut milk--otherwise the soup would be fat-free, and I'm sorry, I just can't do fat-free, especially in winter. The result is creamy and spicy--but gently so, since the heat the comes mostly from the generous dose of ground ginger.

And the method, basically, amounts to throwing a few ingredients in a pot and letting them simmer. It's almost as easy as ordering a pizza. It's definitely easier than ordering Thai food (and takes roughly the same amount of time to get on the table). You can do this.

Simplest Red Lentil and Sweet Potato Soup

1 small onion
2 cloves garlic
1 C + 2 Tbsp red lentils
2 medium sweet potatoes
1 1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 1/4 tsp turmeric
1 1/4 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp salt or to taste
1 C coconut milk

Chop the onion and place it in a medium saucepan. Peel the garlic and press the cloves into the saucepan. Add the lentils and 6 cups water, and bring to a boil.

Meanwhile, peel the sweet potatoes and cut them into one-inch chunks. When the water in the saucepan boils, turn down the heat to a simmer and add the sweet potatoes, spices, and salt.

Simmer covered, stirring occasionally, until the lentils and sweet potatoes are very tender, about 25-30 minutes. Add the coconut milk and heat gently. Serve.

Makes 4-6 servings.

sneaky me

This recipe is another small tastes original. My husband asked me what inspired it and I replied, "Monkey."

The idea started brewing a couple of weeks ago, when Monkey ate half a log of goat cheese for her mid-morning snack. For real. I'd give her another few chunks and she'd gobble it up--just unadorned goat cheese--and ask for more. So I started thinking about what I could make that would capitalize on this new enthusiasm of hers but also be something we would all enjoy. I figured I'd combine goat cheese and pasta--something not too different from her beloved "cheesy noodles" (a.k.a. Kraft dinner), because we wouldn't want to push our luck too far, would we?

Then for the veggies. Here I was inspired by two of Monkey's favorite entertainments: The Little Engine That Could, which features "fresh spinach for [the good boys' and girls'] dinners" (but which, I have to tell you, is also a totally, totally insipid piece of literature. I mean, the little blue engine just chugs over the mountain! Where is the trying and trying and the almost failing and the trying again and finally overcoming adversity? It is not the story I thought it was, at all.) And an episode of the delightful animated series Harold and the Purple Crayon (which is narrated by, believe it or not, Sharon Stone), in which Harold is sent to his room for refusing to eat squash but turns out to think squash is quite yummy in the end. Sneaky me, I thought this all might function as peer pressure to encourage her to at least try what I came up with.

The first time I made this I even used tiny alphabet-shaped pasta, which Monkey's grandparents had sent in her Christmas package. But that first batch needed work. I'd tried to keep the method really simple by just stirring melted goat cheese into the pasta. The result was okay, but not great. I really wanted this to be smooth and creamy, almost like a risotto. I would have to actually make a white sauce.

The good news, though, was that this gave me the opportunity to add some garlic to the dish. Have I mentioned that I've been craving garlic recently?

And in truth, making a quick white sauce isn't all that burdensome. The method is just like making boxed macaroni and cheese, really (I know this sounds sacrilegious, but stick with me here) and it doesn't take much more time.

Anyway, I loved the result--I actually think it's company-worthy, a rich, creamy dish that's also pretty gorgeous on the plate. And Monkey? Well, the fad for goat cheese seems to have passed, I'm sorry to say. But try it she did. She might have even eaten two bites, though I'm sure completely by accident.

Orzo "Risotto" with Spinach, Goat Cheese, and Butternut Squash

4 Tbs butter
1 3-pound butternut squash
salt
pepper
whole nutmeg

8 oz orzo
6 oz frozen chopped spinach*

1 Tbs butter
1 or 2 cloves garlic, to taste (I used 2 and it was pretty dang garlicky)
1/8 tsp salt
1 Tbs flour
3/4 C milk
4 oz chevre (fresh goat cheese)

Put 2 Tbs butter in each of two large baking dishes. Set them in the oven and turn it on to 400 F. Peel and seed the squash, and chunk it into one-inch pieces.

By the time you finish with that, the butter in the baking dishes should be melted. Take the dishes out of the oven and add the squash, dividing it evenly between the two dishes. Sprinkle a little salt (no more than 1/4 tsp total) over the squash, grind on some black pepper, and then grate a little nutmeg over it all. Put the baking dishes back in the oven and roast the squash, stirring once or twice, for about 35 minutes, or until very tender.

Once the squash is in the oven, put a pan of water on to boil for the pasta. When the water boils, add the orzo and cook until it is al dente--the label on the bulk bin at the store said 5 to 8 minutes, but really it took me about 10. Add the spinach to the pasta pot in the last couple of minutes of cooking*. Drain the pasta and the spinach--a fine-mesh strainer works better than a standard colander in this case.

Now, in the pan you used to cook the pasta, melt the remaining 1 Tbs butter over medium heat. Peel the garlic and press it into the pan. Add the salt, and stir the butter and garlic for a minute or two, until the garlic begins to soften and becomes fragrant. Then add the flour and stir until the butter and flour form a paste. Add the milk, 1/4 cup at a time, stirring to incorporate each addition. Now add the goat cheese and stir until you have a smooth sauce. Then add the pasta and spinach back to the pan, and stir to combine and heat through.

Right about now, your squash should be done, so remove it from the oven. To serve, place a big spoonful of the orzo on each plate and top with a generous heap of squash.

*I used frozen chopped spinach because this was what I had on hand. There are a couple of ways to do this, I think. Instead of adding frozen spinach to the pasta water, you could defrost it separately, squeeze out the water, and then add it to the cheese sauce when you add the cooked orzo. Or, you could use fresh greens--I think that would make for an even better and prettier finished dish, actually. If you use baby spinach or something similarly delicate, I think you could again add it to the cheese sauce along with the orzo. If you use something more substantial, like grownup spinach or chard, I would recommend chopping the greens and adding them to the pasta water in the last few minutes of cooking. The key, in any case, is to make sure you are not adding a lot of extra water to the cheese sauce.

Makes 4-5 servings