Published by mel on August 26, 2009 in entree, recipe and sides & bites.
What happens when you take everything that’s fresh and colorful about summer and stuff it in a tomato? This amazingly light and flavorful dish – baked tomatoes stuffed with fresh corn, black beans, zucchini and cilantro. I also added a little coriander and cumin for flavor and some lemon juice to brighten it all up. Finally, no baked dish is complete without breadcrumbs and a dusting of cheese, Cotija cheese in this case.
They’re as comforting as a casserole, but still fresh and healthy. They’re also really pretty, all red and green and yellow with a crusty top.
Continue reading ‘Summery Baked Tomatoes’
Published by mel on August 21, 2009 in entree, recipe and sides & bites.
I wonder how many variations of the meatball exist. Of course, there’s the traditional meatball with marinara that’s ladled over spaghetti – a classic. There are meatballs made of beef, pork, veal, lamb, chicken and turkey. Even meatballs made without any meat at all. You can have them fried, braised, steamed, baked, poached and probably confit-ed and sous-vided too, though I’ve yet to see that.
I found a recipe for baked Chicken meatballs in last month’s Gourmet that promised to be super moist and delicious. Thinking they’d make a great weeknight meal, I immediately bookmarked it. I started out with the best intentions of following the recipe to a T. I swear I did. But of course I didn’t. Anyhow, these meatballs are really quite tasty – moist and flavorful and they hold their shape well. Everything I want out of a meatball and everything you should want too.
Continue reading ‘Baked Turkey and Chorizo Meatballs’
Published by mel on August 7, 2009 in entree, recipe and sides & bites.
I don’t want to get into a whole thing about girly foods versus manly foods. As a woman, I do love my salads, dainty cheese tarts and chocolate. But not any more than I love big, beefy burgers, buffalo wings and nachos. Food is delicious and I will not take sides!
Even after all that, I have to say, this pasta salad is a manly salad. It’s hearty and bold and full of freshly grilled steak. It is not a side dish. It’s an aggressive, filling entree. The first time I made this, I tossed everything with a little vinaigrette and topped it with diced avocado and crumbled blue cheese. It was good, but it was missing something to tie it together.
I tried again, this time making a creamy dressing with the avocado and blue cheese and … success! The dressing pulled everything together like mayonnaise usually does. The rest of the ingredients – pasta, tomatoes, red onion and steak – completed the salad.
I loved it, Tom loved it. This is a salad for all the sexes.
Continue reading ‘Pasta Salad w/Steak & Blue Cheese Avocado Dressing’
Published by mel on July 24, 2009 in recipe and sides & bites.
Right around this time every year, people start scouring around for new zucchini recipes to get through what is usually an abundance of summer squash. Zucchini muffins, zucchini bread, ratatouille and zucchini pasta abound. Fortunately for me, I love the stuff and can’t get enough.
One of my favorite preparations is on the grill. Marinated and grilled summer vegetables are so good in pasta, salad or as a simple side. This time, I sliced some zucchini and yellow squash very thin, sprinkled with salt and pepper and quick-grilled them. Stacked with fat tomato slices and topped with a thick hunk of fresh mozzarella cheese, they made a very delicious and very pretty caprese salad.
But what really made it special was the good olive oil and and balsamic reduction I drizzled over the top. I’d never made a balsamic reduction and was pleasantly pleased by how utterly delicious and simple it was. I just simmered some aged balsamic vinegar in a little pot for awhile and it became an intense, slightly sweet syrup that’s insanely good with vegetables and creamy mozzarella.
A beautiful appetizer and an even better sandwich squished into a fresh baguette. Yum, yum and yum!
Continue reading ‘Grilled Summer Squash Caprese’
Published by mel on June 18, 2009 in recipe and sides & bites.
Ah, summer! Let me tell you, it’s hot down here. Really hot. Humidly, stiflingly, ridiculously hot. Still, despite the absurd heat, I love the summer because it means all-day stints at the beach. We get there early and set up tents, chairs and umbrellas. We haul out coolers full of beer and soda. Everyone brings tons of food, which we load up on plates and float in the ocean. In the afternoon, I usually nap under the shade of the umbrella. Beach days are perfect days.
And this grilled red pepper salsa is perfect beach food. It’s bright and sunny, a little spicy and very refreshing. I also love that subtle char flavor that the grilled peppers give it. Though it’s great with the standard corn tortillas chips, it’s also makes a delicious condiment for grilled chicken or pork chops. This time, my salsa made brightened up some melty bean quesadillas with sliced avocado.
Summer officially begins on Sunday. Welcome it with open arms, chips and salsa and a chilly bottle of beer.
Continue reading ‘Grilled Red Pepper Salsa’
Published by mel on June 23, 2008 in entree, recipe and sides & bites.
Wikipedia says that “The arepa is a corn-based bread from the northern Andes in South America …” In reality, an arepa is more similar to a savory corn pancake, and depending on who’s making it, it’s sometimes filled with gooey cheese. Down here, every street festival has an arepa cart which sells very greasy, very cheesy Colombian-style arepas. There’s even a semi-permanent arepa stand at Hobie Beach on Virginia Key that I’m sure gets lots of business from the multitude of hungry cyclists, runners and beach-goers that crowd the area during the summer.
Anyway, there are infinite recipes out there, all using different amounts of butter, cheese, milk and oil. I opted for a lighter version of the original, omitting the butter and cheese and keeping it as simple as possible to let the corn-ness (is that a word?) really shine. The result was just as flavorful, but way less greasy than the arepa cart.
Since I was trying to keep this meal light — it was lunchtime after all — I served my warm arepas with a refreshing crab and avocado salad. I loved the crab salad as an alternative to tuna and egg salads for the summer months. It would make a perfect lunch with some whole grain toast and leafy greens. It also elevates the arepas from small and snack-like to a full-blown meal, perfect for hot and humid evenings.
Continue reading ‘arepas w/crab & avocado salad’
Published by mel on February 28, 2008 in entree and recipe.
Two bulgur soup recipes in a week is a little much, but I haven’t cooked anything else this week aside from some uninspiring noodles last night. Monday’s recipe was decidedly Asian, so I tried to get as far from that as possible for today’s soup.
And so, I went Spanish. I made a nice broth from fire-roasted tomatoes and smoked paprika and added bulgur for weight and texture and a little kale for color and vitamins. I think this soup would be really lovely with some giant Lima, fava or butter beans, but I only had dark red kidneys in the pantry so those went in instead. Finally, I topped the soup off with a hearty drizzle of good olive oil and some slivered almonds.
It’s actually “cold” in Miami — a low of 58° today (!) — and the slightly spicy, smoky flavors of the soup will warm me right up. (Stop rolling your eyes northerners.)
I just noticed that 3 of my last 5 recipes have been for soup! That’s just crazy. Tomorrow’s will break the soup-y routine I’ve been on. Promise.
Continue reading ‘tomato almond soup’
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