Summer Veggies and Soba Noodles

I heard a sad thing on the radio today.  A sad thing and a scary thing.  "It's warm out there folks, so enjoy it! Before you know it, it'll be November, December, January, February, and it's going to be a cold one this year!"

Please answer me this.  Who says that in the first week of August??  You don't spend your time thinking of the miserable, dreaded cold of a dark Midwest winter in the first week of August.  August should be a happy, snow-free time!

I'm sorry.  I talk about the weather a lot.  I try not to, but it's like the queen of small conversation.  But maybe you all should talk back to me.  Then I can stop this small convo stuff.  Ok, that was a plea for attention, I admit it.

Anyways, I'm stalling here.  That's the real reason.  Cause here I am loving summer and praising the sunshine and blue skies and I want to put off telling you that I didn't like this.  It could very well be my fault.  It started promising.  There are beautiful fresh veggies that are chopped and diced and coated in a tasty Asian vinaigrette.  That mysteriously get eaten by wandering fingers.  See, promising?

And well, then I think I screwed up the soba noodles.  And then I messed up more and tried to convince myself that if I just tossed them with the yummy veggie mixture, it'd be ok.  It wasn't.  I really wanted it to be, but it wasn't.  The sad thing is, I know I will never try it again.  It could totally work.  I see that.  If you are better than me and can cook noodles into something other than a gummy, gooey mess, go for this.  Enjoy it for me, please.  Cause unfortunately I've already filled it into that special, round filing cabinet.  But let me know.  Please?  And I swear the weather talk will stop...

Summer Veggies and Soba Noodles
Adapted from Bon Appetit's July 2012 issue

1 medium red bell pepper
4-5 large radishes
1-2 large carrots
1 large cucumber, halved and seeded
1/3 c. unseasoned rice wine vinegar
1/3 c. vegetable oil
1 Tbsp. Sriracha
1 Tbsp. sesame oil
8 lz soba noodles (Japanese buckwheat noodles)
Scallions, thinly sliced
Cilantro, slivered
Black sesame seeds

It all starts with some chopping.  Chopped all vegetables into matchsticks.  Be super happy if you have a mandolin and break it out.  Once all the dicing is done, you should have about 8 cups of little veggies.  It's a lot, I know.  Put in a large bowl.

Start the noodles going in a large pot of salted water.  Stir occasionally and cook until al dente.  Don't trust your package, use your judgement.  Overcook and you're going to have an unpleasant gooey gummy mess.  Trust me here.  Drain and run under water to cool noodles.  Keep running if you want cold, we went with lukewarm.

Meanwhile, whisk together vinegar, oils and Sriracha.  This is a wonderful sauce by the way.  Drizzle over cut veggies and toss to coat.  Season with salt and pepper.  It's ok to eat a lot of this right now, without the noodles even.  It's veggies and a vinaigrette.  Totally good for you.

Toss in noodles when they are done.  Season with salt and pepper if needed and top with scallions, cilantro and sesame seeds.  Eat with chopsticks if you are adventurous!

Spicy Bell Pepper Salad

My week of being a nomad is finally drawing to a close.  After driving through 5 states, as well as a quick visit home to Arizona, I finally arrived in Terre Haute, Indiana, a small college town in the midst of corn fields that I’m already kinda falling in love with.  I’m not sure what it is, but even now, it’s starting to feel like home.  Granted, having an apartment that already I am enamored with is probably making me bias.  It has new carpets!  And a room whose sole purpose will be to hold all my random junk!  And the kitchen has THREE usable counters!  One, two, Three!!  But we’ll get to that…

With one shopping trip under my belt and way too many boxes still hanging around to be unpacked, my cooking has been less than adventurous.  What it has been is centered around my new, most awesome kitchen toy.  The cheap mandolin that arrived from Amazon the day I left South Carolina.  My first day here, I made the cucumber salad I had been craving since the day I talked myself into ordering the mandolin.  Today, I ventured into the bell pepper salad world. 

Even if they weren’t from a farmer’s market, the three bell peppers I bought on the cheap this Tuesday were gorgeous; red, yellow and orange.  Seeing them sit in my near empty fridge, I thought I would see if I could find a bell pepper salad online.  You see, I hadn’t gotten enough briny goodness from my cucumber salad. 

As always, epicurious pulled through when it came to finding the right recipe, even if didn’t include that acid tang I was initially pining after.  It had stellar reviews and one of those strange but exciting combination of flavors: caraway, lemon and dill.  It seemed like a good, first adventurous try in my new kitchen.  And it was good, even if I didn’t use fresh dill.  It was summery.  And I ate it staring out my windows into the wide open field that is my view.  Terre Haute ain’t all that bad. 

Spicy Bell Pepper Salad
adapted from epicurious.com

1 1/2 tsp. caraway seeds

2 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil

1/2 tsp. dried crushed red pepper

1 red bell pepper, cut into 1/3-inch-thick rings

1 orange bell pepper, cut into 1/3-inch-thick rings

1 yellow bell pepper, cut into 1/3-inch-thick rings

1 medium onion, cut into 1/4-inch-thick rounds, separated into rings

6 3 x 1/2-inch strips lemon peel (yellow part only)

2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

1/4 c. chopped fresh dill

1 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice

Toast caraway seeds in large skillet over medium heat until fragrant, about one minute.  Add olive oil and crushed red pepper.  Increase heat to medium high and mix in sliced bell peppers, onion, lemon peel and garlic slices.  Saute for several minutes until vegetables are "crisp-tender".

Remove salad from heat and transfer to bowl.  Remove lemon peel pieces and toss salad with lemon and chopped dill.  Season with salt and pepper and serve.

Note:  Can be made up to two hours ahead.  Let stand at room temperature until served.  Refrigerate leftovers.

Summer Linguine

  

Yesterday morning I spent putzing around the Greenville Farmers Market.  It's only a little 3 block thing, but I'm still shocked by some of the stands they have there.  There's local honey, fresh pasta and ravioli, different kinds of meat and sausage, even seafood!  Somehow, someway, I managed to keep my purchases to a minimum yesterday.  Only 4.  It was a challenge.  And even more impressive, I managed to use 3 of them in dinner that night.  I made Summer Linguine, courtesy of the ever wonderful Heidi Swanson and her new cookbook Super Natural Every Day.

It starts with zucchini and I had gotten 3 ginormous and pretty green zucchini.  I only used one, but don't worry, the other two have big plans: zucchini bread...yum...  So you shred and shred the zucchini and put it in a colander with a few pinches of salt and let it sit.  The salt works to draw out the water in the zucchini, which is a surprising large amount.

 

      I also got a bunch of spring onions at the market.  I absolutely love that one of them is purple, even though I have no idea why.  It's just so pretty and bright.  The original summer linguine recipe doesn't call for onions, but these were fresh and bright and they were going in too.  So, a few of those got chopped up with two small cloves of garlic.  And with that, prep was completed.

My other market buy that made it into this dish was fresh pasta, fresh garlic chive fettuccine to be exact.  Not quite linguini, but it was fresh!  It was garlic chive flavored!  Plop, and that was in a pot of boiling water.  And once that was done cooking, everything gets a quick saute in a skillet, in stages and that is that.  Less than 5 minutes in a skillet and it goes on the plate, topped with a little bit of Parmesan.  It came out so pretty, with the green zucchini and bright little red pepper flakes, it did look summery.   I guess if I can't have summer vacation, I at least can have good summer food.

I shared with two friends from work, to rave reviews.  "You can make zucchini pasta for me anytime!"  But with all the fresh ingredients, how much credit am I allowed to take?    

Summer Linguini

Adapted from Super Natural Every Day

1 large or 2 medium zucchini, grated

8 oz of linguine, or other flat pasta

2 Tbs. oil

1-2 cloves of garlic

2-4 spring onions, chopped

2 tsp. red pepper flakes

Parmesan to top

Grate zucchini and put in colander.  Sprinkle well with coarse salt and let drain 10-15 minutes over the sink.  Remove and place in paper towels or clean dish towel; squeeze excess water out.  Set aside.

Make pasta according to package directions.  Drain, but reserve about a cup of pasta water.

In medium skillet over medium high heat, heat oil.  Add garlic, onions and red pepper flakes.  Saute 1-2 minutes until the garlic and onions become fragrant.  Add zucchini to skillet and cook another minute or two more.  Add pasta and toss until zucchini is completely throughout and cook another minute, to heat pasta through.  If needed, add more oil or pasta water until desired consistency is reached.  

Top with fresh grated Parmesan and eat immediately! 

Mojito Cake-Tails

I have wanted to make this recipe for over two years.

I had a summer internship where I lived in Providence, Rhode Island.  It was here that I got my first taste of living, and eating, independently, in a country where my favorite spice was familiarly called cinnamon, and not “Zimt”.  Not that I didn’t love my summer living in Germany, because I did, and not that I didn’t cook there, because I did, it just wasn’t really the place to sit around in the kitchen and discover things, when I could be out in Germany, discovering things.  Like Biergartens, famous castles, and Weinwanderung--a wine hike.  So it was a lot of chicken breasts and cold cut sandwiches, with amazingly delicious, fresh bread.  And the occasional Ananas Eis from the ice cream cart in the park.

On the other hand, during the Providence Summer, I had a sufficiently stocked kitchen and I cooked often for me, my roommate and her ever present boyfriend.  I tried new things, some of which are already in my green cookbook, and my purple recipe file began to grow exponentially, with the help of a color printer at work. 

This is one of those recipes, Mojito Cake Tails. (Ha, get it?  Like a cocktail, but a cake!)  You start with a pretzel and butter crust, packed tightly into the bottoms of muffin tins and you top it with this creamy, dreamy, lime and mint flecked cream.  Then you freeze it.  No baking, no buttering or dusting tins, you could probably even cheat and just use CoolWhip instead of whipping some cream up yourself.   It is the perfect summer dish, served cold from the freezer; it’s refreshing.  It wasn’t overly minty, not too much lime, if I had to complain I would say that there wasn’t enough rum.

The recipe said it made up 12 servings.  With 3 cups of crushed pretzels, we easily filled the bottoms of 17 muffin tins, and most of those had thick bases.  You could likely stretch this to 18-20 with no harm, because our cream tops were overflowing as well.  And be sure to chop the mint super fine.  Can I say again, they were delicious?  Cold and dreamy, with the salt from the pretzel crust balancing out the sweet cream.  The mint and lime epitomized summer.  The perfect end to a grilled Memorial Day dinner. 

There were rave reviews from aunts and uncles alike, most of whom stuck their fork in the middle and ate it like a popsicle.  A delicious, summer, adult popsicle.  Happy Summer!

Mojito Cake-Tails

adapted from here

2 sticks butter
3 c. salted pretzels, finely crushed 
1 1/4 c. sugar, plus 2 Tbsp. sugar
Two 8 ounce packages, cream cheese, softened
Grated peel of 3 limes
1/2 c. lime juice
2 Tbsp. white rum
3 Tbsp. finely chopped fresh mint
2 c. heavy cream

Over medium-low heat, melt butter in a medium skillet.  Stir in pretzels and 2 tablespoons sugar and cook until lightly toasted, about 3 minutes.  Transfer to bowl and let cool slightly.  Press about 3 tablespoons into bottom of muffin pans.  Freeze for 30 minutes. 

Meanwhile, beat cream cheese on medium speed until fluffy.  Mix in remaining 1 1/4 cups sugar on low speed.  Gradually mix in lime peel, lime juice, rum and chopped mint.  In a separate bowl, beat the cream until stiff peaks form. Fold ito cream cheese mixture.

Divide cream cheese mixture evenly among muffin cups; swirl and smooth the tops.  Cover with plastic wrap and freeze 8 hours, or overnight.   To remove from muffin tins, dip a butter knife in warm water, then run around each cake.  Cake-tail should pop right out, but if it doesn't, invert pan.  Serve with a mint sprig or lime twist for garnish.