Sunday dinner: Pollock frolic

Pan-fried pollock on quinoa with kale.

Here's a D4SA take on fish-and-chips quinoa.  The pollock was dredged in flour before shallow-frying, and since pollock is related to cod, it had that familiar firm but flaky texture.

Monday: Match made in heaven

Sweet potatoes in curried coconut sauce over kale, served with quinoa.

In this very unique recipe from Elizabeth Schneider's Vegetables from Amaranth to Zucchini, the sweet potatoes are chopped and then simmered in water with some ginger, garlic, and curry powder. Coconut milk is added toward the end of the cooking time. Sweet potato and coconut milk actually make a lot of sense together flavor-wise, but you don't see many recipes containing both, since they're a geographically strange combination.

Tuesday: Black-eyed pea and kale soup

Black-eyed pea and kale soup.

The earthiness of kale and black-eyed peas make them a natural match, and indeed they are often found together in Southern cooking. Here we pieced together a soup loosely following the recipes here and here. This was basically a dump and stir, but we did use our new dried thyme, in addition to a pinch of smoky paprika, as the seasoning.

Saturday Dinner: Frittata for Two

Red Russian kale-sweet pepper frittata.

Frittatas are less exotic than they sound - they're sort of like baked omelet/quiche hybrids. They don't require many ingredients, and can be filled with cheese and/or vegetables. (Most veggies should be sauteed or blanched before being added.)

For this frittata, we blanched the kale for a couple minutes and sauteed the peppers until soft. Then we mixed the veggies with six beaten eggs. Next, on the stove we heated a little oil in a skillet that can be put into the oven. Then we poured in the egg-vegetable mixture. We let it cook undisturbed on the stove for about ten minutes on medium-low heat. Finally, we transferred the entire skillet to an oven preheated to 350F. A frittata should bake for 10-20 minutes, until the top is no longer runny.

Wednesday: Summer kale

Arctic char, brown rice and curly kale.

We tend to semi-consciously avoid kale in the summertime - like collards, they're one of the few leafy greens available deep into wintertime, and both actually are better in the colder months. But rules are made to be broken, right?

Thursday fish night

Arctic char, Kennebec potatoes roasted with rosemary, and red Russian kale.

Wednesday: Double-mustard potato salad

Double-mustard potato salad with tuscan kale.

We've both always had an irrational fear of potato salads. (Perhaps this had its origins in seeing the mayonnaise-drenched mush that appeared at midwestern picnics.) We recently decided to conquer our fears by finding a potato salad recipe we could respect. This one is easy: the potatoes are chopped and boiled for fifteen minutes, and then tossed with dijon mustard, grainy mustard, balsamic vinegar, olive oil, and basil. Weird, but it really works.