Vegetables From My Garden, Mostly, Hash

The one bad thing about going away for five days is that my garden did one of two things, one over produce giant zucchini or plants die all together. I have had years of trouble with tomato plants, they grow bear fruit and then wither and die after one round of tomatoes. Before I left for the boat the tomatoes were doing fine, except for the parts eaten by dear. I came home yesterday and the plants are about to expire with a load of fruit, some ripe, others still green. If I were not on such a strict diet I would make fried green tomatoes, but not now.

I am eating zucchini as fast as can, but I am getting a little sick of the quick sauté method. Tonight I decided to use some of everything I harvested in a hash, sans potatoes. My only refrigerator staple I added was mushrooms.

3 large Mushrooms sliced

1 medium Zucchini diced

2 handfuls of green beans, steamed and cut in thirds

20 cherry Tomatoes, halved

Sprinkling of Oregano

Dashes of garlic powder

Salt and Pepper

Heat a hot fry pan on high and spray with Pam. Throw the mushrooms in the pan. Cook for two minutes and then flip them over and cook another minute.

Add the zucchini and cook for three minutes, stirring once or twice. Add the garlic and oregano. Add the green beans and cherry tomatoes and cook another two minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Grown Too Big Zucchini Bread

For no other reason than plain laziness I did not harvest my garden everyday this week. I have no excuse. I was spending plenty of time watering it since we have had little to no rain, but I just did not look under the giant leaves of my many squash plants.

Yesterday I pulled four baseball bat zucchini out of the garden followed by two more today along with two bowling pin yellow squash. I’m not sure if I am going to be able salvage the yellow squash, but I was determined to use the zucchini, even if it meant making something I could not even take one bit of.

I made three loaves and begged Russ to taste it to let me know if it worked. I got two thumbs up so I made three more loaves. It was the perfect way to use the otherwise inedible vegetables.

Normally I would grate a zucchini with the skin on to make bread, but in this case I peeled them first so that I did not have any toughness. I also cut the peeled flesh in half and scooped out the seedy center before I ran the crescent shaped squash pieces in the Cuisinart with the grating blade.

3 cups flour

1 cup of sugar

1 ½ t. baking powder

1 ½ t. baking soda

2 t. cinnamon

½ t. freshly grated nutmeg

4 large eggs beaten

1 cup of oil

1 t. vanilla extract

4 cups of grated Zucchini

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

In a large mixing bowl mix together the dry ingredients. In a separate bowl mix the wet ingredients, minus the zucchini. Pour the wet into the dry and mix just until all the dry is moist. Add the zucchini and stir until it is well distributed.

Prepare two small bread pans with pam or other grease. Divide the batter between the two pans. Place in the oven and bake for 50-55 minutes.

I doubled the recipe and divided the batter between three larger bread pans and baked for 60 mins.

Remove from oven and let cool on a rack on the counter.

Dressing Doctoring

In my attempt to lose the weight I gained in the month of December, on our trip to Italy and during May, otherwise known as the month of me, I enrolled in a weight loss program that was different than my own self designed plan. I needed to hand my problem over to someone else who could just tell me what to do.

So far it is working great. I have lost all the weight I gained since returning from Italy and that is just on the pre-conditioning diet. Wednesday I start the real diet, which will be harder than the pre-conditioning. What I eat is not so different, except I don’t eat cheese or vinegar in unlimited amounts like I used to. I have been instructed to use Walden Farms zero calorie dressing and it is a basic affront to everything I am about.

I have not been a bottled dressing kind of gal for years and years so to ask me to eat this stuff has been hard on my palette. I would just use lemon juice, but that too has been limited to 1 teaspoon a day and I need every drop of it for my tea. I finally came up with the answer, I doctored the bottled dressing with some things I am allowed to have. I have to say I am fairly happy with the outcome.

Sesame Ginger Dressing Redone

In a blender put the following

¼ cup of Walden Farms 0 calorie Sesame Ginger Dressing

Ten fresh basil leaves

Handful of fresh cilantro including the stems

2 t. limejuice

1 clove of garlic

½ inch of grated fresh ginger

Whirl that mother up until the herbs are just tiny bits. If you like spicy add a few red pepper flakes.  It is infinitely better that the stuff right out of the bottle.

I may be able to survive being told exactly what to eat for a few weeks now.

Healthier Red Beans and Rice

I am in charge of bringing a vegetarian main dish to a church supper for new members tomorrow. I decided to go all out and even make it vegan just in case. I have a giant bag of rice that I can’t eat on my current diet so I wanted to use some of that, and then it hit me, Red Beans and rice, the perfect vegan dish that I can make ahead. Of course I usually would make red beans and rice with a smoked ham hock to add flavor and then fat too, but that was out of the question. The answer was to use smoked Paprika to bring that smoky flavor without the meat. The other oddity is I added light grape juice to bring sweetness and a little bit of, “Hmm, what is that?” So here is my vegan version

Spice Mix

2 T. kosher salt

1 t. garlic powder

2 t. onion powder

1 t. dried oregano

1 t. dried basil

1 t. cayenne pepper – less if you a spicy adverse

1 t. black pepper

2 t. smoked paprika

The rest

2 large sweet onions chopped

3 stalks of celery chopped

1 green bell pepper chopped

4 cans of dark red kidney beans drained and rinsed

32 Oz. of vegetable stock

1 cup of light grape juice

2 T. apple cider vinegar

Big pot of cooked rice- you can figure that out

Mix all the spices in a bowl, you can vary the amounts to make any flavor profile along the heat spectrum you like.

In a large Dutch oven on the stove top on high put the onions, celery and green pepper with half the spice mix and cook, stirring every so often for five minutes. Add a cup of stock and continue cooking for five more minutes.

Add the Beans and the rest of the stock and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat a little and cook for 30 mins at just under a boil and above a simmer. Add the grape juice and cook at least another 45 minutes stirring every five minutes to scrape anything off the bottom of the pot. You want it to reduce to a thick beanie gravy.

Add the vinegar right before serving. Put a scoop the beans in a bowl and top with a scoop of rice. YUM

Garden Club Picnic Salad

I could not remember if I was assigned a salad or a side dish for our annual Garden Club Picnic tonight so I made a vegetable salad that could be consider either.

I had bought a beautiful pound of green beans at the farmers market on Saturday so I just added some other veggies to those.

I made a lemon thyme dressing with our new Vitamix since I feel compelled to use it as often as possible to help amortize the cost of the crazy machine. If you don’t have a Vitamix you can make the dressing in a jar. You will just need to zest the lemon and squeeze the juice out to make it by hand.

Lemon Dressing

2 whole lemons – quartered

¼ c. olive oil

2 T. Champagne Vinegar

4 packets of Splenda

Handful of washed fresh Thyme

Salt and pepper

2 T. water

Put the lemons in the blender and on the lowest setting start chopping them up. Add the oil and water and increase the speed one notch every 10 seconds for three notches. Add the thyme, vinegar, Splenda, a pinch of salt and three turns of the pepper grinder. Run the blender for 30 more seconds.

Put a fine sieve strainer over a bowl and pour the contents of the blender in it. Using the back of a spoon push as much as you can through the sieve. You will have a lot of solids left in the sieve, which you will throw away. Taste the dressing in the bowl and add more salt and pepper if needed. Set the dressing aside.

Salad

1 Pound of green beans – cut in thirds

1 pound of cooked lentils – Traders Joes has them in the vegetable fridge

½ pounds of cooked and shelled edamame

10 small cooked beets diced

½ pound goat cheese

½ c. walnuts

Cook the green beans in pot of salted water for about four minutes and then drain them and run under cold water to stop the cooking. Chill the beans.

Add the lentils, beets and edamame to the chilled green beans and toss with the dressing. After everything is well-coated toss in the crumbled goat cheese and walnuts right before serving.

Coconut In This Salad Is The Bomb

I made a blanched green vegetable salad yesterday with some shaved coconut and fried onions in it. It was fine then, but today when I went to have the leftovers it was fantastic. The sweetness of the coconut and the tang of the lime had married beautifully with the chili in the salad.

I used broccolini because I found some at Trader Joes, but I have to say it was the disappointing part of the salad, at least the tough stalks. Next tie I might just use the tops of regular broccoli.

Big bunch of Broccoli- lightly steamed and shocked in cold water to stop the cooking

Big bunch of green beans lightly steamed and shocked

Cup of cooked and shelled Edamame

Cup of Cilantro leaves- chopped

¾ cup of chopped coconut – not the flaked sweet kind. I used Trader Joes Coconut sticks that I chopped

1 large sweet onion

1/3 cup of Wondra Flour or rice flour

¼ cup of olive oil –for dressing and more for frying

Juice of 2 limes and zest of one

2 small dried red chilies

1 t. mustard seeds

Make the fried onions first my very thinly slicing the onion and dredging it in the wondra or rice flour. Pour a bit of the oil in a frying pan just to coat the bottom of the pan and heat on medium heat. Use a fork to pick the onions up out of the flour so you shake any excess off the onions and put in the fry pan and cook quickly, turning to keep them from burning. Remove from the pan to a paper towel covered plate and salt while still hot. You make need to fry the onions in batches.

Make the dressing by putting ¼ cup of oil in a small pan with the mustard seeds and red chilies and heat it up on medium. Cook until the mustard seeds burst, about two or three minutes. Mash the chilies with a fork and break them into small bits. Set the oil aside to cool. Add the limejuice and zest when cool and mix well.

Put all the green vegetables in a big bowl and pour the dressing over it. Tossing everything to coat. Add the coconut – It tastes better if it can marinate overnight. Add the onions right before serving.

You can add cooked chicken or shrimp to make it a whole meal.

Spring Chicken Artichoke Lemon Salad

I had a meeting of some women friends at my house today so I used it as an excuse to try some new salads. True to form I could not decide on one salad I wanted to make so I made three. I’ll dole the recipes out over the next few days. Interestingly the simplest one was the tastiest, at least to me — Maybe because I love lemons so much.

I was inspired by a more complicated artichoke recipe that involved cleaning and cutting down fresh artichokes to just their hearts and then cooking them in a complex broth of herbs before dousing them in a candied lemon peal sauce. It seemed like a lot of work when I could just use canned artichoke bottoms, so that what I did. The candied lemon peel was really the star and very easy.

Candied Lemon Peel Sauce

3 whole Lemons

2 T. sugar

2 T. water

Cut the peel off the lemons trying to get just the yellow part, leaving the white pith on the fruit. Once you have cut it off in about ½ inch wide strips cut those pieces into thin slivers. It is easier to do it that way, than cutting it off the lemon in tiny thin strips. Once you have gotten all the skin off the lemon you can squeeze the fruit to remove all the juice and put it in a small saucepan.

Add the lemon peel strips, sugar and water and place on a medium flame on the stove and bring to a simmer and cook for fifteen minutes until half the liquid has disappeared.

Put in a plastic container in the refrigerator. This can be done in advance and kept for weeks.

Dressing

1 whole lemon cut in eights

2 garlic cloves

Big pinch of salt

Black Pepper

1/3 c. of olive oil

¼ cup of Champagne Vinegar

Put the whole lemons, garlic salt and a few grinds of the pepper mill in a heavy-duty blender, like a Vitamix. Starting on the lowest setting start grinding everything up and adding the oil while increasing the speed for one minute. Put a fine sieve over a bowl and pour the contents into the sieve catching the lemon solids and letting the lemony oil go into a bowl. Add the vinegar and whisk together. This dressing is good when used with the candied lemon peel and the liquid that is left with it. If you do not make the lemon peel add a tablespoon of honey to sweeten the dressing.

Salad

4 boneless skinless chicken thighs- cooked and shredded

3 heads of butter lettuce cut into small pieces

30 basil leaves torn up

20 mint leaves torn up

1 can of artichoke bottoms- drained and quartered

2 globes of Burrata- cut in half at serving time and put on each individual serving.

Mix the lettuce, and herbs together and divide onto four large plates.

In a separate bowl toss the artichoke bottoms with the candied lemon peel and the remaining sweet liquid. Spoon over the lettuce. Top with chicken. Drizzle a little dressing on top and lay half a globe of burrata on the side with the cut side up so the creamy center stays in.

Best Bang For Your Buck Black Bean Soup

My well documented hate of throwing away food drove me to create this recipe back in my catering days to use up the ham that was left on a bone of a Honey Baked Ham spiral cut ham. Later I learned that the Honey Baked store sells ham bones with a ton of meat still attached for something like $5. They keep them frozen so just go in and ask to buy the ham bone.

This recipe is for a huge amount of soup because of how much ham is left on the bone. If you want to make less you can just add some chopped ham instead of using the bone, but it will cost you so much more and won’t have quite the same flavor.

This is not the lightest soup, but it is very filling and satisfying so a small cup will stay with you a long time.

1 half a ham bone with meat attached

5 big yellow onions chopped

10 cloves of garlic minced

3 T. olive oil

8 15 oz. cans of black beans drained and rinse

5 T. ground Cumin

1t. Cayenne pepper- more or less depending on how hot you like food

2T. Garlic powder

1T. Smoked Paprika

2T. Dried oregano

2 T. brown sugar

Juice of 2 Lemons

¼ Cup Sherry

Sweet Red Pepper Chopped

Bunch of flat leaf parsley Chopped

If you get a frozen ham bone you can start this soup by putting the ham in a big stockpot and adding a half-gallon of water and bringing it to a simmer to begin to thaw out the ham and develop the flavor of the water for the soup. If your ham is not frozen just start at the next step.

In a big stockpot put the olive oil and heat on medium high heat. Add the onions and garlic and cook for about ten minutes stirring often. When the onions are translucent add the spices and cook for another two minutes to wake them up.

Add the ham bone and half a gallon of water at this point. If you have already started heating the ham in water add the onions and spices to that pot because it is easier to pour the onions that the water.

Bring the whole thing to a boil and reduce to simmer. Add the beans and cook uncovered for at least an hour to two hours. You want the liquid to reduce and thicken.

When thick take the ham bone out of the pot and let it cool enough to be able to cut any meat off of it.

Add the red peppers, brown sugar, sherry, lemon juice and the cut up meat back to the pot and cook for ten minutes. Taste for spiciness and add any cayenne you want. Add the parsley and serve. Good with Sour Cream

The Red Part of Christmas

In the 80’s when I lived in Washington DC we used to go to a really fancy Italian Restaurant on King street in Alexandria when we wanted the best Italian food we could find outside of Italy. I can’t remember the name of the restaurant now, but I do remember everything about my favorite dish there, veal cannelloni. I have never experienced a lighter, but more flavorful triple ground veal, spinach and cheese filling wrapped in a thin crepe with both béchamel and marinara sauce.

When my dad requested pasta for his Christmas day lunch my mind went directly to that cannelloni and I began my quest to recreate that meal. I bought a new crepe pan, went to the new Fresh Market to see what the veal situation was and discuss my desire for triple grinding and I purchased six kinds of cheeses. All prep for all these parts of the dish has to wait until at least Christmas Eve, but I could make the marinara today.

Since pasta by itself does not usually make the holiday meal top ten list in our house I wanted to make sure that what I am going to make is Jesus worthy.   I studied the recipes of many fabulous Italian cooks and then went to work amalgamating all that I had in my head into my own recipe. I knew that if this version was not perfect I still had time to make other versions.

After cooking for half the day I tasted the product of my study and am writing the results down right now since it was the most superior sauce I have ever made. I did not try and lighten my version, but I must say that any evil ingredients are so small in amount that their inclusion is mandatory. I also used the right tools for the job. I knew there was a reason I owned a food mill.

If you are still searching for something to make over the holiday that will make everyone happy this sauce is a great place to start.

Christmas Marinara

¼ c. Olive Oil

½ pound minced Pancetta

3 large Yellow Onions – chopped

3 large Shallot- minced

8 cloves of garlic minced

5 – 28 oz. cans of San Marzano peeled tomatoes

Salt

In a large stockpot on medium high heat pour the olive oil and add the Pancetta. Cook stirring every so often for about five minutes. You are not browning the pork, just starting the rendering process.

Add the onions and shallots and stir them around and cook another 8 minutes. Add two big pinches of salt. You do not want to brown the onions, just soften. Then add the garlic, stir and cook three more minutes.

Open all the cans of tomatoes—spring for the Italian ones, Trader Joes sells them for $3.39 a can. Place a food mill over the pot and pour the cans, one at a time into the food mill and turn the crank until all the tomatoes have been pushed through the sieve. At the end of each can scrape the bottom part of the food mill into the pan since that is the really good part. Repeat until you have done all five cans.   The food mill will probably still have some seeds and the cores of some tomatoes in it that you will just throw away.

Bring the sauce up to a simmer and add a little more salt. Once the pot is bubbling a little turn the heat down just a bit so that the sauce is just bubbling. You are going to cook this for about three hours, stirring the pot every 15 mins or so.

Taste to see if it needs more salt.

You can keep this sauce in the fridge for about 4 days or freeze it if you are keeping it longer.

Your family will think you have an Italian grandmother tied up in the basement. This is worth the time and effort.

Ribollita – Tuscan Bread and Vegetable Soup

Some people accuse me of posting recipes on the blog when I have nothing to say. Anyone who has ever met me knows that I rarely have nothing to say. Sometimes I have too much to say and posting a recipe is keeping me quite, thoughtful and reflective for another 24 hours.

Today is the perfect soup day. It is cold, dark and a good time to be reflective. The best part about Ribollita is that it too is reflective, changing from one day to the next.

2 cups lima beans

2 cups of fresh Dixie peas (or field peas, or black eyed peas) – You can use any white beans to make up the Lima and field peas.

5 slices of thick cut bacon cut into ¼ inch pieces

2 c. chopped onions

5 chopped carrots

3 stalks of celery chopped

6 cloves of garlic – grated on the micro plane

1 quart of chicken stock

5 big handfuls of chopped kale

30 basil leaves chopped- I use a ¼ cup of my frozen basil

Pinch of red pepper flakes

Black pepper

An old baguette cubed into bite-sized pieces

Parmesan Cheese

Put Lima beans in a sauce pan with 3 cups of water and cook them until they are tender, about 15 mins. Do the same for the Dixie or field peas in a separate pan, but they may take a little longer. When those beans and peas are finished cooking take them off the heat but do not discard the water add a big pinch of salt to both pans now.

In a big stockpot put the bacon and cook for five minutes until the fat starts to render. Add the onions, carrots, and celery and continue cooking for five more minutes. Grate the garlic over the pot and cook for one more minute. Add the Chicken stock and the kale and cook for ten more minutes after the whole thing had come to a boil.

Add the basil and lots of black pepper and a few red pepper flakes.

Take half the cooked beans and peas out of the water and puree them with a hand blender. Add the puree to the pot and then add the remaining whole beans and peas. The mixture will be very thick. Thin it out using the bean and pea cooking water. Add as much bread as you like knowing that it will soak up the liquid so you may need to add more bean/pea liquid. Cook for ten more minutes.

Serve with a big heaping spoonful of Parmesan Cheese over the top.

Cranberry Ginger Trifle

From my post yesterday I had quite a few requests for this recipe. Since I spent the day cooking and throwing a party and the last hour washing dishes I figured it was OK to post a non-healthy dessert recipe just this once.

Cranberry Ginger Trifle

2 12 oz. bags of fresh cranberries

1 cup orange juice

1 ½ cups white sugar- this makes it very tart and not sweet . Add more sugar if you don’t like things too sour.

2-inch piece of fresh ginger grated on a micro plane

2 8 oz. pkg. cream cheese

¼ cup of brown sugar

1 t. vanilla

2 cups of heavy cream

2-pound cakes – cut into ½ –store bought is fine, I used homemade lemon cake I had left over from a coffee I threw last week and put in the freezer just for this purpose inch layers

In a big soup pan put cranberries, 1 ¼ cups white sugar, ginger, orange juice and ½ cup of water. Bring to a boil and reduce to simmer until the cranberries have popped, about ten minutes. Remove from heat and let cool completely

Using a mixer beat the cream cheese with the brown sugar and remaining white sugar and vanilla. After it is well mixed start pouring in the cream and keep beating on high until soft peaks form.

Using a large trifle bowl layer one third of the cake, cover with cranberry and then cream and repeat with another layer two more times.

Chill at least three hours, but it is better done the day ahead.

Pineapple Ice Dream

There is nothing as disappointing than a not ripe fresh pineapple. After all the work of cutting away the kin and coring the yellow fruit to find that it is still too tart and not that tropical sweet juicy flesh you were craving is a let down.

So what to do with the tart useless chunks, but turn them into a Pineapple whipped dessert.

1 cup frozen pineapple chunks

2 T. fat free half and half

¼ c. non-fat milk

Splash of almond extract

1 Splenda packet

Put everything in an ice-cold container and using a stick blender whirl until a smooth frothy liquid. Place in the freezer and chill until not quite frozen through, at least an hour. Enjoy as if it is pineapple ice cream and curse the pineapple purveyors who sell such unripe fruit.

Fennel, Orange and Grape Salad

In the use-up-what’s-in-the-fridge mentality today we all ended up eating different things for dinner. Russ is always the best sport about taking the oldest leftovers for himself. Carter opts of Asian as is her constant preference and I look around at what I have to chose from the ready made dishes and decide to make something new.

Staring me in the face are two fennel bulbs that are in the use them or lose them category. So fennel it is. As a child I hated all things that had to do with anise or black licorice, but my grown up palette now loves fennel.

2 fennel bulbs sliced very thinly

2 oranges cut into segments

1 red onion thinly sliced

25 black seedless grapes – halved

2 T. red wine vinegar

1 T. limejuice

1 T. olive oil

4 packets of Splenda or 1 T. honey

Salt and pepper

Blue cheese crumbles to sprinkle on top

Mix the fennel, onion, grapes and oranges in a big bowl. Mix all the other ingredients, except the blue cheese, together and pour over the salad. Toss it up. Sprinkle the blue cheese on the individual servings just before eating.

First Day of Summer Layered Salad

Finally one of my many cucumber vines produced a life size fruit this morning. Since it is Carter’s last night at home before five weeks of Camp Cheerio she is requesting Asian Food. I am trying to stay away from Asian since the sodium seems to stick with me for days. So I made this summer layered salad with the fruits of my garden and what I had on hand.

Starting at the bottom and working my way up to the top this is what it is.

1 Peeled and chopped cucumber

1 chopped tomato

10 Fresh Basil leaves – cut into strips

¼ cup of feta cheese cubes

1 avocado- cubed

¼ cup of marinated onions – I used the leftovers from the onion slaw

Pour some white balsamic vinegar (I used a honey ginger one from Blue Sky), in and chill.

It will need salt and pepper when you eat it, but I did not want to add the salt until right before serving.

As far as I am concerned this will make a meal.

Enjoy the longest day of the year.

Cantaloupe Soup

I let a cantaloupe sit a little too long on the counter. When I cut it open it smelled wonderful, but was just a little too mushy to eat solid. So I made soup with it and I might like this better than plain fruit.

1 whole cantaloupe seeded and cut from the rind

2 T. lemon juice

1 jalapeño pepper- seeded

1 inch of fresh ginger root- peeled

Salt

In a food processor place the ginger and the jalapeño and pulse until minced. Add the cantaloupe and lemon juice and run until pureed. Add a little salt to taste. If your cantaloupe was not sweet enough you may want to add a little honey.

Chill and serve.

You could also substitute fresh mint leaves for the jalapeno for a variation.

Spring Vegetable Hash with a Poached Egg

Normally this would not be a dinner that my child would like, but she seemed to think it was OK. You can make it with any vegetables and it is a great way to use up small amounts of leftovers. I just used what was fresh from the farmer’s market.

3 Small Red potatoes – cut into a ½ inch dice

10 asparagus – cut into 1-inch pieces

1 cup of fresh peas

2 leeks – cut into ¼ inch pieces

4 poached eggs

Put the potatoes in a pot of cold water and cook until fork tender- about 10 mins. Drain and set aside. In a separate pan with boiling water cook the asparagus until slightly under cooked. How long depends on how fat your asparagus is my pencil thick stalks took about 2 mins. Pull the asparagus out of the water and add the peas and cook them for two minutes and then drain them and set aside with the asparagus.

Spray a fry pan with Pam and put on a medium heat, add the leeks. Stirring often cook them for three mins and add potatoes and cook another four minutes so the potatoes start to get crispy. Add the green veggies and salt and pepper and cook until everything is hot.

Scoop a quarter of the mixture into a bowl and top with a warm poached egg.

Baked Stuffed Squash Blossoms with Red Pepper Sauce

Springtime at the farmers market makes me so happy. I was downtown bright and early at 8:00 this morning buying food for the week. Of course I had to make one trip back to the car to drop off my bags half way through shopping because I could not carry my basket of strawberries, bunches of asparagus, stalks of rhubarb, green beans and leeks and still have any hands free to get the rest of the items I was buying.

I ran into my friend Mary Lee who is a regular at the market and she alerted me to the squash blossoms that were for sale. You have to be a very early shopper to be able to get the precious squash blossoms. Most farmers hate to pick the blossoms and thus forgo having squash to sell. I understand this because I too hardly ever take the blossoms off my plants, but I may get over that affliction this year.

So tonight for dinner we had a farmer’s market extravaganza. I will save my spring vegetable hash with poached egg for a blog later in the week. Today you get the Baked Stuffed Squash Blossoms with red pepper sauce. Carter had eaten squash blossoms in Paris so I felt certain she would not turn her nose up at this first course of dinner.

6 squash blossoms – ours were about four inches long which is on the small side

1 oz. of goat cheese – crumbled

¼ cup of Parmesan Cheese- grated

½ cup of ricotta- used fat free

2 Eggs beaten

½ c. Panko Bread crumbs- in a shallow bowl

Salt and Pepper

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees

In a bowl mix all the cheeses and add 3 T. of the beaten egg mixture and salt and pepper. Put the cheese mixture in a Ziploc bag and cut of the tip of one corner to make a pastry bag. Hold the squash blossom in one hand and squeeze the cheese mixture into it packing in as much as possible. It is all right if it comes out the top.

Dip the filled blossom into the egg and then then in the panko coating it on all sides.

Place the flower on a cookie sheet that is covered with foil and sprayed with Pam. Repeat until all the flowers are done.

Place the pan in the oven and bake for about 15 mins until the flowers are golden brown and the cheese is bubbling.

To serve place a large spoonful of red pepper sauce on the plate and place the flowers on top.

Red Pepper Sauce

2 Sweet Red Peppers

1 large Onion- chopped

2 T. half and half

Red pepper flakes

Wash you peppers and then turn a burner on your stove on high. Set the peppers on the grates of the stove and using tongs turn them every so often until most of the skin had blackened. When that has happened place the peppers in a brown paper bag and seal it and let them sweat in the bag until they are cool enough to handle.

Put the onions in a pot sprayed with Pam and cook then on medium heat until they are soft- about 10 mins.

Take the cooled peppers and scrape off the skin and cut them open and discard the seeds and the stem. Add them to the onions with salt and pepper and a couple of red pepper flakes. Add 3 T. of water and the half and half and using a stick blender puree the mixture until smooth. Taste for seasoning.

Paris Revisited Jicama and Green Apple Slaw

When we were in Paris last month we visited a tiny Bistro called Chez Adrienne twice. It was the only place we loved so much to revisit. It was a tiny four-table place with a chef and one server. The menu was four or five starters and mains written on a chalkboard. On my second visit I had a Jicama and Apple salad as my starter. As is often the case in really good food it was very simple and memorable at the same time.

I have been dreaming of recreating it in a slightly more healthy way since it had mayonnaise in it. The mayo is important so I kept it in this version, but cut down considerably on the amount. After one bite I was immediately transported back.

1 softball sized Jicama- peeled

2 granny smith apples

Juice of one lime

½ cup light Mayo

3 packets of Splenda

Salt and Pepper

It is quick and easy to make this if you have a shredding attachment for a food processor. Grate the peeled Jicama and then grate the granny smith apple with the skin on. Place it all in a bowl and mix in the other ingredients. It is too dry add a little more limejuice before adding more mayo.

Mango Mint Slushy

The mint has started to come up in my garden and the only way to keep it from taking over is to find ways to use it.

I bought a boatload of mangos the other day because they are my favorite cheep fruit right now. I decided to make a mango drink. I did not want to make a smoothie with any dairy just because I did not want the added calories. So I made a slushy—it would be a great base for a libationous drink too, so if you feel inclined add some tequila, rum or vodka.

Flesh of one mango

8 big mint leaves

2 T. limejuice

1 cup of soda water and 1 cup of crushed ice

Depending on how sweet your mango is you might want to add a few drops of honey

Put all the ingredients in a blender- drink. You think you can follow that recipe?