Live Nude Veggies

This little number is one vegetarian dish that has enough POW to substitute for 4th of July fireworks. It is always a pleasure to discover something we may not have stumbled into on our own and this was the case with the raw kale salad you see here, sandwiched between the red and orange. 

We were doing some work with Northshore health guru, Dena Mendes, a cyclone of information, advice and energy, when she introduced us to raw kale gone wild. So let's break this one down, starting with the Kale:

We start with a bunch of curly or lacinato kale (aka tuscan or dino or cavalo nero), cleaned well, thick woody part of stems removed. The leaves are chopped into 1 to 2 inch pieces, tossed into the food processor and pulsed...not too much though, we don't want raw kale soup this time, although that sounds like something to investigate..... Next we add some grated parmesan, pecorino or grana padano cheese, dried cherries cut into smaller pieces...the little bits of cherries are a smattering of tart deliciousness in a sea of green. The third balancing agent is nuts--pine nuts, walnuts or pecans are great. Now we drizzle on some raw olive oil, lemon juice and zest and pulse another time or two and we have the raw kale salad. We love it on its own, but with its cohorts in this case, any dabbler in veggie love will be quite pleased.

Mashed roasted beets form the lovely red pillow the kale is resting upon. We peel and dice raw beets, toss them with olive oil, salt and pepper, mix in some sliced garlic, wrap it all up in a foil packet and pop it in the oven where it steam/roasts until sufficiently soft. Next the contents are emptied into a bowl for the mashing...a hand-held potato masher will do the trick.

On top the very stunning display is carrot, stripped with a veggie peeler and fried until golden in olive oil. It is crunchy, tasty, flashy and fun. You will love it like we love it, I have no doubt!

The final, but crucial ingredient  is the jalepeno vinaigrette dressing the perimeter of the plate. Trust me, this is not just for looks. It is a flavor enhancer that seems to work well with almost anything....It makes a dish POP! Jalepenos are minced...seeds and ribs can be left in or omitted depending on your spice tolerance. They go into the mixing bowl along with a clove of raw garlic also minced and a pinch of kosher or sea salt. Mash up a little, add some fresh lime juice, give it all a good stir and drizzle in some extra virgin olive oil while whisking.  This dressing becomes silky quite easily due to something in the jalepeno, which is part of the magic. If you make this, try drizzling it over any dish that needs a little waking up. When we first discovered it, we put it on everything but the breakfast cereal.

Earthy sweet beets, bitter-green kale, crunchy-sweet fried carrots and tart/spicy jalepeno vinaigrette. Its flavors keep pace with its fetching looks and it is win-win on the health front, too. I have yet to see someone levitate right after eating this, but we know it is possible, any day now! If you make this and find yourself floating, please tell us about your experience!

Did someone say TUNA?

The answer to the weekly question was TUNA: versatile, healthy, savory and satisfying, but most importantly, a protein we could all agree to love. The question? What should we have for the family dinner Sunday night.

At the suggestion of tuna I began to think hmm.... bland, as tuna is one of those ingredients in which my interest depends on what phase I am in. I have gone through times when it was the best thing going like in Kauai when it is being served up raw and delicious around every corner and at times it seems boring. So when the tuna ideas began to come forward in my mind and turn this potentially unexciting dinner into a clean, savory and punchy treat, I was tickled and increasingly excited about what was to come.

The crust: I can never really name the seasonings and will have a hell of a time if we ever decide to write a cookbook....but we can guess smoked paprika, toasted cumin, cinnamon...but a nice amount of flavor packed on to the raw tuna, which is then doused with some olive oil, seared on all sides and sliced.

The salad: edamame, radish, steamed carrot, orange, avocado, cilantro and mixed lettuces (you can see how I started to love this idea--it just screamed healthy good times).

The Dressing: Toasted sesame vinaigrette with lime and honey, balsamic vinegar, tamari, minced ginger and garlic, toasted sesame oil and olive oil and a little peach jam for a touch of extra viscosity.

On the top we made a glaze of reduced soy, orange juice, cabernet and balsamic vinegars. 

It was as good as it looked. It was luscious with the avocado and bright with the orange segments, and the tuna really stole the show. We did have to make plain tuna with caramelized onions and mashed potatoes for the least adventurous family member, but we all swooned.

Scrumptious Health Bomb

Once upon a time in Montpelier, Vermont we spent many a lazy morning leafing through our friend Sandra's cookbooks over coffee.  There was something magical about that kitchen space with its long wooden table, windows to the endlessly green world of Vermont, dogs underfoot and John's impeccable music selections piped in from mysterious locations.  

We learned things there like how to cook tofu in such a way that anyone, really anyone would love it.  We also discovered these black bean and oat cakes. They jumped off the page of Mollie Katzen's Moosewood low-fat favorites book, which is a dream for any one interested in internationally inspired, healthy, light food that is not weak on the flavor front.  

On this particular day we had a craving for something clean for dinner after eating only focaccia and chocolate croissants all day in the city and that craving led us right back to this well tested favorite. So in this picture we have the cakes made up mostly of black beans and raw rolled oats--no kidding, it works-- with carrot, onion, garlic and some mexican seasonings.  They are seated atop a pile of spicy green goodness....swiss chard, onion, garlic and some of those gorgeous red carrots.  Normally we cook and puree golden beets for the sauce on this dish...but in this case we had some Mole Amarillo from the Red Iguana restaurant in Salt Lake City.  You just can't say no when you have mole looking you in the eyes. We seared some asparagus and rested them on top, then enjoyed the whole healthy experience....which was exactly what we were in the mood for!

Rescuing The Rutabaga

It has always seemed tragic to us that the sweet and earthy rutabaga has been relegated to the dustbin of modern American cookery.  It is one of those cheap, humble, durable vegetables that doesn't glitter on the shelves at the market but shines for the patient cook, honest and unpretentious like your oldest friend.

In this dish: Farro with Spice-Roasted Rutabagas, Bean Broth, and Smokey Arugula Salad, the rutabagas get a good dose of rosemary, aleppo pepper, and garlic powder and after a short while in a hot oven, they're crispy on the outside with a spice-crust and like butter on the inside.  The foundation, the anchor is farro - one of our favorite grains - both chewy and toothsome, and it was cooked with lots of garlic.   Carrots roasted whole along with arugula and radish all tossed with a smoked paprika and honey vinaigrette form the crown.   

And about that unassuming broth you see ringing the bowl: one of the most beautiful things in the culinary universe is the liquid you get after cooking a big pot of beans.  You could throw the beans away - not that we would ever do that - and it would still have been worth cooking them. This broth, or bean liquor, is hauntingly sweet and redolent of garlic and herbs and the slight starchiness thrown from the cannellini  beans makes it taste rich somehow, though it's essentially fatless and vegetarian.  So we spiked this lucky leftover with fresh lemon juice, drizzled on a little olive oil, and poof: the dish was tied together. 

A healthy study in textures and so darn satisfying to eat, this is what we mean when we tell people our style is "vegetable-driven".

  

Bread and Sweet Music

Luckily for all who know him, Jeff slowly, over the course of his life, developed a healthy obsession with all things bread.  In a way that must be somewhat unusual, he studied all the bread making books, made his own sourdough starter, and before you could say "sour raisin rye" he was making things that look like this!  Often this is shocking to people because producing true artisan style bread in the home kitchen seems to be a difficult task indeed.  This is why obsession can be a good thing......just look at those results.

We both worked in a bread bakery in Vermont, which really helped us nail down the tricky "shaping" aspect of making beautiful bread.  It was a pretty awesome experience, with lovely almost ritualistic rhythms in the day.  Mixing the dough, shaping the loaves, firing the wood ovens, and the most exciting....loading and unloading the cavernous brick hearth.  The final step?  Standing over the bread, fully baked and piping hot, and listening to them crackle.  Seriously, they snap and crackle as the interior air bubbles cool and contract pulling the harder crunchy crust inwardly enough to actually fissure.  Sweet, sweet music.