More soup for me! And you, if you’re up for it. This is a smooth and soothing soup I made with butternut squash and apples, two things I’ll be lugging home from the farmers’ market every week. It’s a little sweet and a little tart (depending on how sour you like your apples), and the sage leaves add that woodsy “ahhh… fall” finish.
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 small onion, chopped
1 small leek (white and light green parts) chopped
1 celery stalk, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
about 3 cups of cubed butternut squash
2 medium apples, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
about 2 cups vegetable broth
milk, cream, or creme fraiche if you wanna get fancy
salt and pepper
fried sage leaves
Add butter and oil to a medium-sized pot over medium-low heat. Add onion, leek, celery, and garlic. Sprinkle on some salt. Cook until onions are translucent and soft, about 10 minutes. Add butternut squash and apples, and cook for another 10 minutes or so. Add just enough broth to cover the vegetables, and bring to a boil. Lower heat and simmer for 30 minutes. The squash and apples should get really soft. Let it cool for a little bit, then puree with a blender (carefully! it’s hot!). Pour it all back in the pot and add more broth if you want a thinner soup. Season with salt and pepper (white pepper if you don’t feel like seeing little black flecks) to taste. Heat everything back up, then stir in as little or as much of your dairy product of choice.
Serve topped with fried sage leaves. To make them: heat a thin layer of oil in a small pan over medium heat, then fry fresh sage leaves until they turn dark green and get nice and crispy. Drain on a paper towel and season with a little salt. Use the leftover sage oil for dressing or bread-dipping or something.
I may be getting into homemade soup these days, now that autumn is in full swing and now that this recipe has won me over. It’s the most velvety smooth soup I’ve made in awhile. I think it looks fancy and tastes expensive (John’s palate puts a flattering but outrageous $10 price tag on it), but is good and unfussy enough for everyday dinners (using an immersion blender helps). You can make a big batch and save the rest for later. My favorite-smelling part of the whole process occurs at the beginning, when leeks, onions, and garlic cook in butter. I modified the recipe a bit by using milk instead of cream (and more of it) and adding a few squeezes of lemon juice.
Sunchokes, by the way, are also called Jerusalem artichokes. Guess what: they’re not from Jerusalem and they’re not even artichokes. The sunchoke is a sunflower tuber whose Italian name (Girasole) sounds like “Jerusalem” and whose taste resembles that of the artichoke. I found mine at the farmers’ market for a few bucks a pound.
And finally, a warning: sunchokes may give you (rather horrible smelling) intestinal gas. Plan accordingly.
I kicked off this blustery week with a new take on fennel, a vegetable I usually have raw and thinly shaved in salads. The difficulty-of-preparation-to-deliciousness ratio is very low. You cut up some fennel and while it’s roasting in the oven, you combine raisins, walnuts, parsley, lemon juice, and olive oil. When it’s all done, you get softened, licorice-y pieces of fennel coated in a bright lemony dressing, chewy raisins, and crunchy walnuts. It’s probably obvious by now, but this is a simple and worthwhile fall vegetable side dish to try out, in my opinion. The recipe is from The Meatball Shop, featured in New York Magazine.
I came home from a 2-week-long vacation to a freezer full of food. Before leaving, I cooked as much as possible to use up all our CSA stuff and froze the leftovers. We missed Hurricane/Tropical Storm/Potential All-Around Shitstorm Irene, but if we had been stuck in the apartment we would’ve eaten quite well (and probably would have cleaned out the liquor cabinet). Sadly, the storm caused horrendous flooding at many local farms, including the one that serves my CSA (Stoneledge Farm). I’m wishing them the best and looking forward to seeing them back up and running next season.
Anyway, this carrot soup is nice and simple, and it’s topped off with a pesto made from the carrots’ greens. It was my take on “root-to-stem” cooking, which I of course appreciate (previously: radishes sauteed with radish greens). I can also say from personal experience that the pesto is a good thing to smear on tomato and cheese sandwiches, stir into salad dressings, and mix into pasta or grain salads.
To make carrot top pesto:
Put carrot tops, whatever other fresh herbs you might have/like (I added parsley and thyme), garlic, toasted walnuts, and salt in a food processor. Press the button. Then drizzle in olive oil while the thing is still running. Add grated Parmigiano cheese (optional).
To make carrot soup:
Cook chopped onion, chopped celery, minced garlic, minced ginger, and a lot of carrots in a bit of oil in a pot until onions are translucent. Pour in enough vegetable or chicken broth to fully submerge the vegetables. Season with salt, pepper, and chopped herbs (I used savory, but sage, thyme, and/or rosemary would’ve been nice too). Cover and simmer until carrots are soft. Puree mixture, then return it to the pot. If it is too thick, add more broth. Add a splash of apple cider vinegar. Taste and adjust seasonings. Stir in carrot top pesto right before serving.
Bonus point: stick a piece of beer bread cheese toast in the bowl.
Here’s another salad for your viewing and eating pleasure. I pulled out whatever vegetables and herbs were left before my CSA pick-up day and put ‘em all together with a simple mustard vinaigrette.
1 small fennel bulb
1/2 pound green beans
1 small carrot
1 tablespoon finely minced red onion
1 teaspoon grainy Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon white wine vinegar
salt and pepper, to taste
olive oil
chopped herbs (I used dill and parsley)
Blanch or steam the green beans until they are crisp-tender. Dunk them in ice water, then dry them off and cut into bite-size segments.
Slice the fennel and carrots very thin using a mandoline or a very sharp knife (and crazy good knife skills if you want to compete with the mandoline).
Combine onion, mustard, lemon juice, vinegar, salt, and pepper. Stir until salt dissolves. Toss with vegetables. Finish with a good drizzle of olive oil and chopped herbs.
There is restaurant Indian food, and then there is homemade Indian food. The former typically features menus with deep fried things, tikka masala things, and a flavor that I can only describe as “Americanized sweetness” (you’ll find this at Thai and Chinese restaurants too). The latter is something I came to know a bit in the homes of childhood friends and more recently, their grown-up kitchens. As you might expect, the homemade stuff tastes like something you could eat everyday, not something heavy enough to mess up the rest of your night.
One of these aforementioned friends cooked up some baingan bharta (mashed eggplant with tomatoes and a whole lot of delicious seasonings) and I was a little jealous that this video of Rajen wasn’t taken in my kitchen. I had been saving a couple of eggplants to finally try it out, and this was more than enough inspiration to get me through being in a kitchen with all four burners (and the oven) blazing.
A brief overview of how I made it:
Roast, steam, microwave, or grill eggplant (the big purple globe kind) until soft. Set aside and let cool.
Heat oil in a pan. Add cumin seeds, which will sputter and pop. Add chopped onion, chopped bell pepper, minced hot pepper, minced garlic, and minced ginger. When everything has softened up, add chopped tomatoes, ground coriander, ground cumin, turmeric, cayenne pepper, garam masala, and salt. Cover and let it all simmer into a loose sauce (add a bit of water if things start to stick).
Remove skin from eggplant and roughly mash the flesh. Add to tomato sauce mixture and heat through. Garnish with fresh cilantro.
As much as I love Chinese-style scallion pancakes, I am taking a break from them. During my most recent practice session, I muttered obscenities at a batch of overly sticky, uncooperative dough and emerged from the kitchen soaked in sweat, defeat, and a greasy oniony smell.
I still have a whole lot of scallions left though, so thank goodness Korean cuisine gave us pajeon. These pancakes require no rolling of dough, and you can dump all kinds of seafood, meat, and vegetables into them. At their simplest, all you need is flour, water, salt, and an egg. Pajeon is so easy that I made it as a quick stay-at-home lunch before getting on with the rest of my day. I’m not so good at flipping these in one big piece, but that’s ok. The main drawback is that I hunger for a full Korean barbecue spread afterwards (some kind of associative craving… Korean BBQ has always been with a big fun group of friends).
Step-by-step instructions with photos are here. You could also add the beaten egg directly into the batter.
Previously: kimchi pancakes
