Kitchen Chick

Cado Verde

I had some kale as a part of my CSA farm share from Tantre Farms. In fact, I have more greens stuffed in my refrigerator than I know what to do with, and I need to use them by Saturday, when I pick up my next share of the harvest. But back to the kale — I knew I needed to use it soon or lose it.

Since I'm splitting the share with a friend, I didn't have a lot of kale, so I was worried that any recipe would require more than I had. I turned to Madhur Jaffrey's Madhur Jaffrey's World of the East Vegetarian Cooking, which has never let me down, and found one kale recipe: Cado Verde. I had just enough kale to make a half-portion, which easily serves three people as a soup course and can be stretched to serve four.

This is a Portuguese recipe by way of Goa. Kale, potatoes, onion, and garlic simmered and pureed into a lovely creamy green soup and garnished with a swirl of olive oil and black pepper. Even Joe liked it, and he's not much of a fan of soup. It's an easy recipe that can be simmering on the stove while the main course is prepared.

Cado Verde
Madhur Jaffrey's World of the East Vegetarian Cooking

4 medium-sized potatoes, peeled and chopped into 3/4 inch dice
1 medium-sized onion, peeled and coarsely chopped
2 cups coarsely chopped kale leaves, firmly packed
12 garlic cloves
1 1/4 tsp salt
1 Tbs fruity olive oil
ground black pepper

In a large pot, combine the potatoes, kale, garlic, onion, and salt. Add 6 cups of water and bring to a boil. Cover and lower heat to a simmer. Let cook for about 1 hour 15 minutes or until the kale is quite tender.

Puree the soup. In as many batches as necessary, pour the soup into a blender or food processor and blend until smooth. (I used a hand-held blender.) Pour soup back in the pot (if necessary) and taste for salt. Add more water if the soup seems too thick. Just before serving, add the olive oil and black pepper.

As an extra "garnish", I added a very light sprinkling of Portuguese sea salt. We really enjoyed the small bursts of flavor as the grains of sea salt melted on our tongues.

Name That Food

Guess away. The answer will be posted in a week.

Garam Masala

From the top: cinnamon sticks, star anise, nutmeg, black peppercorns, green cardamon, black cumin. Not pictured: whole cloves

I was making my favorite lamb keema when I used up the last of our garam masala. This is considered a tragedy in our household that must be remedied at once.

This Pakistani-style garam masala comes from 100 Best Balti Curries, and is very different from the cumin- and corriander-based garam masalas commonly sold in the States.

I love the flavor and scent, especially the star anise and nutmeg and cloves. It's easy to make, and there's nothing quite like fresh garam masala that hasn't spent months sitting on a store shelf before making its way to your kitchen.

This recipe uses black cumin seeds, which have an earthy, almost smoky scent to them. Black cumin seeds are Bunium persicum, more commonly known as kala jeera, and have a thin curved shape similar to cumin or caraway seeds. "Black cumin" is often also incorrectly used as a name for Nigella sativa (aka kalonji or "black caraway" or "charnushka"), which is a small black triangular shaped seed similar to onion seeds. They are not the same thing. (But just to make things more confusing, in Bengali kalo jeera means black cumin and refers to the Nigella seed.)

Bunium persicum is harder to find in the States, and you'll more often see Nigella sold as "black cumin". You can get both kala jeera (black cumin) and charnushka (nigella) from Penzeys Spices.

Brown caradamon has a smoky flavor that's quite different than green caradamon. If you don't have black caradamon, substitute green pods. You'll still get a tasty garam masala. In fact, if you don't have black cumin, try the recipe with regular cumin. It'll still be good. Garam Masala is a highly individual thing -- every chef has their own recipe. Use the spices you like, and you really can't go wrong. The basic preparation method is the same: lightly dry-roast the spices then grind to a powder.

A really good garam masala
Makes 2 Tbsp.

1.5 Tbs black peppercorns
3/4 Tbs black cumin seeds (kala jeera)
1.5 tsp whole cloves
4 large brown caradmon pods (substitute some green pods if you don't have brown)
2 inch stick of cinnamon
1/2 a whole nutmeg
2 star anise

Gently roast all spices and grind everything to a fine powder in a coffee or spice grinder. Store in a tightly lidded small jar.

I usually make a double-batch, which will last me a bit. My coffee grinder is small enough that I have to process the spices in batches. It has no trouble with the whole nutmeg. The cinnamon sticks have been the hardest to grind well. I like to break them into smaller pieces before putting them in the grinder. If your coffee grinder does double-duty as both a coffee and a spice grinder, you will need to clean it really well afterward (see below) — unless you want garam masala flavored coffee.

Coffee/spice grinder after grinding the spices for garam masala

Fast & Easy Chilaquiles

When I'm feeling ambitious I make huevos motuleños*, but when I want my breakfast fast I make chilaquiles. This is one of my favorite breakfasts. It's easy, and the variations are endless.

Quick Chilaquiles
All amounts are approximate. Adjust to your tastes.

4-5 corn tortillas, cut into wedges
2 Tbs of butter, maybe a bit of vegetable oil
2 Tbs of finely diced onion, or more if you like
2 lg peeled and diced tomato (or a cup scoop of canned, diced tomato). Add more if you like.
3 eggs or so, beaten
salt and pepper
meat or beans of choice (optional)
garnish of choice (chives, cilantro, whatever you like)

Saute tortillas in butter/vegetable oil until mostly crisp. Add onion and saute a bit to soften. Add tomatoes and simmer 1-2 minutes. Add eggs. Season with salt and pepper. Scramble slowly until eggs are finished to your liking. (I like mine a bit wet.) You can add cheese, if you like. Garnish with chopped chives, or chopped cilantro.

I often add diced bacon. I chop the bacon before cooking and fry it up in a separate pan to minimize the bacon fat in the final dish. I don't like my bacon fat to overpower the flavors of the tomato and tortillas. Or sometimes I add black beans or chorizo.

-----

*You see, with huevos motuleños there's the fried eggs, and the fried tortillas, and the sauce, and the beans, and ham and peas... And I make two-layer motulenos, so there's food stacking involved. Well, as you can see, it's a bit of work and my stovetop is a mess when I'm done. But they sure are delicious. I'll have to post them sometime.

Tantré Farms - Local CSA

Tantré Farm's stand at the Ann Arbor Farmers' Market. In the background a couple picks up their boxed up CSA share.

I haven't talked about it much here, but I feel strongly about using "organic" foods where possible and in supporting local businesses, especially food producers and sellers. I shop at a variety of locally owned grocery stores ranging from the upscale Kerrytown Market to the local People's Food Co-op to a variety of small ethnic grocery stores.

This year, in an attempt to both reduce our food costs and increase our vegetable consumption I joined a CSA -- Tantré Farm.

"Community Supported Agriculture" (aka CSA) is a member supported farm. You pay a membership (or shareholder) fee, and in return the farm supplies you with seasonal vegetables. In some cases, members also help work the farm. Shares usually supply enough vegetables to feed at least a four person family, though many Americans discover that they can't eat all the vegetables they receive. (A humbling reminder of how few vegetables most Americans actually eat.) Even if Joe and I did eat enough vegetables, we wouldn't be able to eat a full share, so we're splitting our share with friends. I'm looking forward to the challenge of both eating more vegetables and using more seasonal foods.

We received our first share this past weekend. This early in the season, we're a bit heavy on the greens and the winter roots. I now have a fridge stuffed with spicy mixed greens, asparagus, carrots (and carrot greens), buttercrunch lettuce, parsnips, radishes and radish greens, scallions, spinach, and baby turnips and greens. I have never eaten a parsnip before in my life. Or turnips, either! This is going to be an educational summer.

To help me with all these "new" vegetables I picked up From Asparagus to Zucchini. It's a definite departure from the kinds of cookbooks I normally search out. The contents are literally organized alphabetically from Asparagus to Zucchini, making it easy to find recipes that feature specific vegetables. Each vegetable or herb gets a page with a short culinary history, plus storage and usage tips, and then a page or two (or more) or simple recipes featuring that vegetable. As I discover recipes that I really like, I will share them here.

Local Harvest can help you find a CSA in your area.

Peanut Butter Ice Cream!

We've been putting our ice cream maker to good use.  (I'm not sure it was a "wise" purchase, but it's been fun.)  We recently cranked out five flavors for a BBQ: rum ice cream, mango sorbet, chocolate, cinnamon-cayenne chocolate, and peanut butter.  That was a lot of ice cream.  Good thing we have a stand alone freezer.

I would say that Peanut Butter ice cream is our current favorite, though Joe is enjoying playing around with rum. This recipe is slightly modified from the one in the recipe booklet that came with the maker.  I like it topped with Sanders Swiss Dark Fudge topping, but it's yummy all on its own.

Peanut Butter Ice Cream

1 cup peanut butter (after experimenting with several, including really high-quality gourmet ones, Jif Extra Crunchy gives the best results)

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1 cup whole milk

1 - 1/3 cups heavy cream

2 tsp vanilla extract (we use a generous teaspoon of Penzey's double-strength version, and by "generous" I mean that Joe kind of sloshes it in, so don't worry if you get a bit extra)

Combine the peanut butter and sugar until smooth. Add the milk. Blend on low speed until smooth and the sugar is dissolved. Stir in the heavy cream and the vanilla (don't stir too much, just a few strokes until it's well mixed).

Place in your ice cream maker and let it run until it's as thick as it's going to get, then scrape it into a container. If you let it sit in a freezer overnight, it'll harden up and have the standard ice cream consistency you've come to know and love.