Sunday: Tentacle tagine

Squid and chickpea tagine, served over couscous.

We modified this recipe from Paul Johnson's Fish Forever.  This was our first experience cooking squid at home, and we have deemed it a success.  Squid is tricky - it has a tendency to get too tough and chewy, because the proteins in the tissue can form tight bonds when it's cooked.  To compensate, Paul Johnson says you must either cook it extremely briefly over high heat (so that the tissue doesn't have enough time to toughen up) or for a very long time over low heat (so that it tightens, but then becomes soft again over a long period of cooking). 

This tagine, a North African stew, employs the second method, allowing the chopped squid to simmer until it is tender and has picked up the flavor of the spices in the tomato broth.

Monday: It's not delivery, it's D4SA!

Homemade pizza with mozzarella and sunflower sprouts.

Pizza made from scratch on a Monday night might have been a challenge, but Lizz whipped up the dough early in the morning so that it could rise in the fridge during the day. With the dough already made and a jar of tomato puree from Norwich Meadows Farm at the ready, this wasn't a difficult meal. The sunflower sprouts, which were new to us, really do taste a bit like sunflower seeds. They were pretty strong raw, but mellowed when baked.

Monday: Pale Green Things

Methi chole (fenugreek and green chickpea curry).

Lizz's parents visited us in New York this past weekend, and since they had a car, we took advantage of the opportunity to stock up on Indian groceries in Jackson Heights.  In addition to two gigantic ten-pound bags of Lal Qilla brand deradunhi basmati rice, tons of dal, and a block of jaggery (more on that later), we brought home a lovely harbinger of spring: fresh green chana in their shells! 

These little guys are only available in the springtime at Indian grocery stores, though the frozen and shelled version is widely available.  They are fresh, only partially mature chickpeas, and they grow in cute little pods that look like green peas:

Also like peas, they have a "green" note and a slightly sweet flavor, and cook very quickly - more like a fresh vegetable than like a dried legume. 

This recipe pairs the chana with fresh methi - fenugreek greens.  These are the greens of the same plant that gives us fenugreek seeds (the source of fake maple sugar flavor, and a frequent component in curry powders).  The flavor of methi is hard to describe, but the greens are noticeably fragrant and herbal - in fact, the dried version is used as a flavoring in some other Indian dishes.  We highly recommend trying them out if you've never had them: they're easy to wilt into vegetable or legume dishes of many kinds.

Thursday: Chipotle and adzukis

Adzuki butternut squash soup.

It's always a little bit of a fuss to cook dried beans, but if you want to use interesting varieties and get their full flavor, it's worth it. We pre-cooked these whole adzukis for a couple of hours (unattended) before adding them to frozen pureed butternut squash and frozen tomatoes to make this soup. The recipe called for canned chipotle peppers, which added a smoky flavor. Now we'll have to find some other applications for them, since we have a few left over.

Wednesday: I'm in yr childhud, relivin it

Cream of yellow tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwich.

Who doesn't like a little comfort food once in a while?

Thursday: Indian potato and green pea stew

Simple potato and green pea stew (aloo hari matar foogath)

We got this pleasant recipe from Yamuna Devi's book The Art of Indian Vegetarian Cooking. She says this dish is popular throughout north India, where the consistency can vary from relatively dry - as ours was - to thinner and more stew-like.

Wednesday: Less-than-photogenic zucchini soup

Zucchini soup.

This is a repeat of the Italian zucchini soup that we made (and loved) back in September. Here, we used frozen summer squash from Winter Sun Farms. The flavor was good, but somehow the photo did not quite do it justice. You'll just have to take our word for it.

Super Bowl Sunday (with Gumbo!)

Vegetarian gumbo with homemade crackers.

Gumbo is a thick soup, really more of a stew, which puts the natural sliminess of okra to good use. It comes to us from Louisiana, and so we felt it was appropriate to make as we cheered on the New Orleans Saints in Super Bowl XLIV.

We had always thought of okra as the defining constituent of gumbo, but Wikipedia informs us that either okra or filé powder can be used as the thickener. (Filé powder is dried, ground sassafras leaves - we have yet to add it to our spice collection.) The recipe that we (loosely) followed actually called for both. Apparently this is not very authentic, nor is the addition of tofu. Gumbo would typically include shellfish, pork, or poultry.

In addition to the okra and/or filé powder, a roux base is used to make gumbo just a little bit thicker. To make a roux, flour is cooked in butter or oil over medium-low heat until it reaches the desired color, which can range from golden (a light roux) to copper-brown (a dark roux). Here, we started the gumbo with a dark roux.

To go with the gumbo, Giselle made crackers following Mark Bittman's recipe from How to Cook Everything. These made use of our half-white flour from Cayuga Pure Organics, and they were topped with salt and nigella seeds.

Saturday: Vegetarian Chili

Vegetarian chili with smoky paprika.

Lizz is down with flu-like symptoms, so dinner tonight was this very simple chili.

Saturday lunch: Sunshine soup

Cream of yellow tomato soup.

Faithful readers have seen this dish several times already - we can't stay away because it is so comforting and simple. The only difference here is that we used frozen yellow tomatoes from our winter CSA, so the soup has a sunshiney color.

Monday: Pasta e fagioli

Pasta e fagioli - Italian tomato-based pasta and bean soup.

We improvised this particular variation on the classic Italian dish. First we sauteed one chopped onion and a couple minced garlic cloves in hot olive oil, then added about 24oz of frozen tomatoes from our CSA along with a can each of white and kidney beans, a cup or so of mezzi canneroni pasta (the type that look like small smooth tubes), and three or four cups of broth. For seasoning we added two bay leaves and a little dried oregano, although we'd have added more herbs if we'd had them. We let everything simmer until the pasta was cooked and the beans were heated through, then served with grated Parmesan.

Monday: Cod Stew

Cod stew with olives and capers, and Pecorino cheese melted on baguette.

Although we cook fish a few times a month, we don't typically incorporate it into more complicated dishes. Usually we just bake or broil a fillet and then put it on a plate with two neatly separated piles of starch and vegetable matter. But it was high time to branch out, so we decided to make this tomato-based cod stew. We both love dried salt cold, known as bacalao (or baccalà, bacalhau, etc), which is also wonderful in stews, but here we used fresh fish.

This stew combines cod, tomato, olive, and capers with lightly floured and fried zucchini/yellow summer squash. (We used the summer squash from our CSA!) The recipe comes from The Silver Spoon, a classic Italian cookbook.

Friday: 15 Minute Biscuits (Plus Soup)

Cream of heirloom tomato soup with homemade biscuits.

We made this comforting cream of tomato soup with special out-of-town guest chef Tom. The soup was pretty straightforward, although it benefited from the delicious heirloom tomatoes provided by our CSAs.

We follow Mark Bittman's standard recipe for biscuits; they're surprisingly quick and easy:

Biscuits

2 c all-purpose or cake flour
1 scant tsp salt
4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
2 - 5 tbsp cold butter
7/8 c milk

1. Preheat the oven to 450 F.

2. Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl. Cut the butter into small pieces and then use your hands to rub them into the dry mixture until the butter is thoroughly blended in. (It might look a little like bread crumbs.)

3. Stir in the milk just until the mixture forms a ball. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead it 10 times - no more!

4. Press the dough into a 3/4 inch thick slab and cut into circles using the rim of a drinking glass. Place the rounds on an ungreased baking sheet.

5. Bake 7 - 9 minutes or until the biscuits are a beautiful golden brown.

Note: if you have yogurt, substitute it for the milk and reduce to 3 tsp baking powder.

Wednesday: Home again home again

Simple pasta with tomato and bell pepper sauce, topped with grated parmesan.

This was our first meal this winter made with ingredients from our frozen CSA, Winter Sun Farms. Both the tomato puree and chopped bell peppers came to us in cute little frozen packages. Otherwise, this is a pretty typical pasta sauce for us and a good way to ease back into the post-holiday routine.

Wednesday: Pasta with parmesan

Pasta with anchovy-tomato sauce and grated parmesan.

This typical red pasta sauce with canned tomato was definitely enlivened by the Parmaggiano reggiano we realized we still had in the fridge.

Wednesday: Om gnom gnom

Whole-wheat purple potato gnocchi with heirloom tomato sauce and sauteed squash blossoms.

This was a bit of a fuss for a weeknight meal, but the results were worth it. We haven't made gnocchi from scratch for probably four years now, so it was about time. They aren't actually technically difficult to make: you just steam potatoes to soft, then mix with flour and one egg and knead till you have a dough. You then roll out the dough and cut into small lengths; finally you drop each piece (gnoccho?...) into boiling water and let it cook until it floats to the top, at which point you fish it out. So, as you may guess from the above, the real problem with them is that they're a bit time-consuming. (Plus you still need to make a sauce to go with them, after all that!)

This is also the first time we've used squash blossoms in anything but our standard fried blossom recipe. They were tasty this way - soft and zucchini-like in flavor.

Tuesday: Mahanandi's "hoppin' john"

"Indian hoppin' john" from Mahanandi.

We both love mustard greens and are always tempted by them at the market, but sometimes have trouble finding dishes that can handle their potency. Although we've never made the Southern recipe this is based on, we really liked Mahanandi's take on it.

This meal incorporated a tomato that had many an admirer during its time on our kitchen table. We wanted to share it with the rest of you, our faithful readers:


Most amazing tomato ever

Monday: Simple Pasta

Penne with anchovy-tomato sauce.

Well, tomato season is winding down...which means that this is probably the first dish we've posted in which we used canned tomatoes.

Our modern conventional food production system does allow grocery stores to stock "fresh" red field tomatoes year-round, but after you've had real local heirloom tomatoes it is just impossible to go back. Canned tomatoes make a more acceptable substitute for many types of dishes, including pasta sauces. We usually buy canned whole tomatoes as opposed to the chopped-up or pureed ones. In the wintertime, we occasionally get canned or frozen heirloom tomatoes in our CSA share, which is even better.

This dish is one of those easy weeknight dinners that takes under half an hour, start to finish, and we tend to make it as a fallback meal when we don't have a lot of time or energy. Frankly it takes about the same amount of time to do an easy pasta as it does to order a pizza...

Saturday lunch: Salad days

Tasty salad of sucrine lettuce, baby swiss chard, Kirby cucumbers, green heirloom tomato, chopped walnuts, sliced Bosc pear, and chevre. (Pictured in front of a little bit of fall bounty.)

We dressed this salad with a drizzle each of olive oil and champagne vinaigrette, and served it with some multigrain bread and a glass of apple cider.

Monday: Dal, with special guest chef

Toor dal with tomato and green beans.

As the seasons change, the menu here at D4SA changes in turn: here we have the first dal of the fall. In brief, dal refers to any of a number of split lentils in Indian cuisine. As anyone who has seen the dal shelf at our apartment surely knows, that number is rather large. We typically make a lot of dal in the wintertime, as it's a bit too heavy for the heat of summer, and green veggies aren't as easy to come by in the colder months. Stay tuned to learn more about the universe of dal...

This particular dish is toor (sometimes called toovar/tuvar/arhar) dal - which is actually dried, split yellow pigeon peas. It's flavored with mustard seed, lemon juice, brown sugar (jaggery if you have it), cayenne, fenugreek, cumin, turmeric, ginger, and cilantro.

Our enthusiastic guest sous chef Laura chopped the green beans precisely to specifications.


Laura, with the fruits of her labor