re-thinking pesto

One of my scores at the Farmer's Market on Saturday morning was a big, inexpensive bunch of garlic scapes -- and after throwing a few, chopped, into my stir-fry on Saturday night, I was sill left with most of a big bunch of garlic scapes . . . what to do?

My friend Courtney suggested I turn the scapes into peso, so after a quick google search and glimpses at a few different recipes, I started chopping, blending, and devised this gorgeous sauce:

Yum! The light, lemony garlic flavor and gorgeous, pale-green color were definite winners in my book . . . but now, what to do with my scape pesto?

I wasn't really feeling like pasta, and wanted something healthier . . . (I only have refined-flour pasta on hand at the moment,) . . . and I glanced at my rows of grains and lentils lining my kitchen shelf. Maybe if I made a sort of bland bean-grain dish and topped it with the pesto, that would work?

Barley and Chickpeas with Garlic Scape Pesto was born:


INGREDIENTS:
For the Pesto:
1 cup garlic scapes, chopped (remove flowery tops first)
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
1/3 cup sunflower seeds
juice of one lemon
1/2 cup olive oil
water as needed to thin the sauce

For the Barley and Chickpeas:
1 tbsp olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
1 tsp salt
freshly-grated pepper to taste
1 cup pearled barley
2 cups cooked chickpeas, drained and rinsed if from a can
3 cups water
1/2 cup thinly-sliced dried tomatoes
5 cups fresh spinach

DIRECTIONS:
1. Make the pesto: add all of the ingredients to a blender or food processor and puree. Continue to thin with water until the sauce is well blended, still thick, but pourable.
2. In a 3 to 4 quart pot, saute the onion in the olive oil until soft. Add the salt, pepper, and barley, and continue to cook for a few minutes. Add the chickpeas and water, and bring to a boil.
3. Lower the heat, cover, and simmer the barley for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.
4. Stir in the dried tomatoes, cover, and simmer for 25 minutes.
5. Stir in the spinach, cover, and steam for 5 minutes. Serve the barley with the pesto

I'm glad I decided to choose a different avenue for my pesto than the traditional pasta, because this worked beautifully! The healthy, somewhat bland bean and grain dish was the perfect avenue for the flavorful, assertive sauce. Yum! A definite winner.

Now I just have to figure out what to do with the rest of my pesto . . . maybe I'll toss it with some pasta after all! :)

I heart weekends.

Really, who doesn't? I've had a good one so far -- plenty of time to catch up on errands and work around the apartment, hang out with Dan, and best of all, blog!

I was a busy girl again yesterday -- I went to the Farmer's Market, Asian grocery store, and co-op, washed and prepped two huge bunches of lettuce and FOUR huge bunches of kale, baked a couple of sweet potatoes, roasted a couple heads of garlic, baked up a batch of granola, cut a ton of corn off the cob and froze it for later enjoyment, baked a chocolate-zucchini cake (more on that later when we cut into it and I can get a decent photo,) went for a bike ride with Dan, did two huge loads of laundry, and enjoyed a long and leisurely dinner with Dan and his family -- belated birthday celebration for my sweetie. Whew! No wonder I was so tired last night!

Best of all, I was so busy last week, I have a huge blogging backlog. Let's get started!

Here's Dan's birthday dinner, way back from last Monday night:

When I asked Dan what he wanted for his birthday dinner, he said, "pasta and salad." I harassed him for something a LITTLE more exciting than that, and he came up with, "rigatoni with pesto." Okay! Nobody carries whole-wheat rigatoni, so we had to settle for white pasta (GASP! YUM!) with some sliced zucchini thrown in the pasta water for the last two minutes, all tossed with homemade pesto. (My pesto recipe is pretty basic, but I use almonds instead of pine nuts, since I always have almonds on hand, and pine nuts are ass expensive.) Tasty delicious! Truthfully, my favorite part of the meal might have been the little, local sungold tomatoes in the salad. Sungolds and "Kellog's Breakfast" tomatoes are a tie in my book for the best tomatoes ever. Mmmmmmmmm!

Tacos, how I love thee:

Whole-wheat tortillas from the Farmer's Market, topped with home-cooked black beans (with garlic, onion, and lime juice,) stir-fried peppers and onions, queso fresco, salsa, guacamole, sour cream, and shredded cabbage. Now I'm craving tacos again!

Anybody found anyone who doesn't like tacos yet?

"Bulgur, Arugula, and Cannellini Salad," from VCON:

We needed a dinner that would be ready immediately upon arriving home on Thursday night, and this fit the bill. Healthy, chilly, and delicious for a hot and busy weeknight. I might even try this with chickpeas next time! (I'm starting to realize that I really don't like white beans, except pureed into homemade hummus. Is that weird?)

Tomato, mozzarella, and basil salad:

Local heirlooms, local hand-rolled fresh mozzarella, local basil, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar. Mmmmmmmmmm! I bought a small loaf of rye bread at the Farmer's Market to accompany this salad, and it was VERY tasty. The bread came from the nice man who I discovered is also making soft pretzels every week . . . heaven! I can't resist the artisan soft pretzel! I must buy one every week. :)

Gorgeous, local, fresh berries:

This is why I spend so much money at the Farmer's Market -- I can't help but buy local berries when they are in season! They are so expensive, but SO worth it! This dessert prompted me to say yesterday, "I LOVE summer! Wait, no I don't -- I hate the weather, but I LOVE the food!" Dan just laughed at me. :)

What do you love about summer?

I have another busy day ahead of me today -- more errands, more cooking, and more laundry. PLUS, Christine and I are making the trek down to IKEA tonight! Yay IKEA! Later!

weekly haul, pt. deux, and tasty meals!

I spent $33 at the Farmer's Market this morning, and came home with the following:



TWO POUNDS of asparagus, rhubarb, tomatoes, mixed field greens, buckwheat honey, maple syrup, and basil! All local (MN or WI,) and all delicious!

When we arrived home, I made lunch:



I finally got around to making the "Chickpea Cutlets" from VCON, and also made the mustard sauce to accompany. Deeeeeeeeeeeelicious! (Especially that mustard sauce! Dan would have licked the saucepan had I allowed him to.) :) Sauteed chard and roasted sweet potatoes on the side.

And later, I made dinner:



I put many of our Farmer's Market finds to good use, tucked away in a fantastic pizza! Half-wholegrain crust as a base, with homemade peso, local mozzarella, parmesan, asparagus, sliced tomato, and sliced garlic to top. (I made a quick side salad of local spinach, local cherry tomatoes, and nonlocal cucumber to accompany.)

It has been one heck of a delicious day! Asparagus may be one of my new favorite pizza toppings.

So here's a question . . . what are some of your favorite pizza toppings?

~~~~~~~~~~

P.S. Attention all Twin Cities vegans and dairy-intolerant folks -- I noticed this week that the Wedge co-op has started carrying Teese. I've never tried it myself, (since I do enjoy dairy cheese on occasion,) but I've heard fabulous things. I may pick some up for a pizza sometime soon, though, just to see what all the fuss is about!

Farmers Market finds, turned into dinner

Dan and I started our Saturday at the Farmer's Market. We had planned on picking up whatever looked good, and then meeting up with his family for brunch afterwards. However, Dan's brother, Ryan, ended up meeting us at the Farmer's Market, so the boys could pick out some plants for their mom for Mother's Day! They chose raspberries, chocolate mint, orange thyme, nasturtiums, and alpine strawberries. In-between the careful plant selecting, I managed to score the following:

Local, whole-wheat egg pasta, and BASIL!!

After brunch, we stopped at the Franklin Street Bakery, and I picked up a lemon vanilla bean cupcake to be enjoyed later:


Much later on, I made dinner:

Greek salad, artichokes, and pesto covered pasta! I practically licked my plate clean.

Dan and I shared the cupcake for dessert:

And we each added a scoop of mango-banana sorbet on the side. :) Yum.

Off to watch a movie . . . enjoy the rest of the weekend!

Fastest Meal in the (mid)West!

Dinner tonight took less than ten minutes to prepare, if you don't count the time it took to boil water:

Gnocchetti tossed with pesto, pan-fried baby zucchini, and cherry tomatoes. And that's all.

And it was damn tasty. But I promise I'll make my own gnocchi next time, instead of relying on the prepackaged kind. :)

P.S. I cooked over two pounds of black beans last night. Look at my little army o' beans! (12 cups total!)

After cooling, they all marched to the freezer for later use.

cramming

I managed to cram in a few more cooking projects before the end of the weekend, and I'm so glad I did! It's supposed to be awfully hot again this week, and I'm so glad I have a fridge full of food and won't need to turn on the oven or stove AT ALL.

Breakfast Sunday morning:

Homemade bread, toasted, with homemade jam. :)

Snack Sunday late morning:

I tried a green smoothie with kale, instead of my usual spinach. I think my stick blender is not powerful enough to handle the kale leaves. I'll have to stick to spinach from now on, until I get a new blender, that is! (This was still really good, even though it had some chewy bits in it!)

Sunday lunch:

Pesto pasta with white beans, broccoli, and a few leftover artichokes. Mmm.

Baking project:

Scones! I made the chocolate chip scone recipe from Joy of Vegan Baking, with only a few minor modifications: half whole-wheat pastry flour, (I find that sometimes all whole-wheat pastry flour makes scones too dense and dry,) and instead of the 1 cup of chocolate chips, I used 1/3 cup chips, 1/3 cup dried cranberries, and 1/3 cup sliced almonds. I had one of these at work for snack this afternoon, and they are FANTASTIC! Scones can often be too try and/or too dense -- this one was neither! Fluffy, "buttery," and perfect! Hooray!

Roasted chickpeas! These are SO, SO, SO amazing. Thank you, Courtney, for turning me on to the wonderful world of roasted chickpeas!

I had to quickly stuff these into a container and hide them Sunday night, or I think Dan (and I!) would have eaten the entire batch!

Remember my watermelon sorbet? It became unnecessarily hard in the freezer after a day or two, so I decided to thaw it out and refreeze it in popsicle form:

Just as refreshingly satisfying, but easier to get out of the popsicle mold than scraping the sorbet out of the container!

Part of dinner last night:

Dan and I were deep in conversation last night at dinner time, so I totally forgot to take a picture of our meal. We enjoyed a variation on this potato salad recipe. Since I had only two pounds of potatoes, instead of the three pounds called for in the recipe, and don't cook with alcohol, I made the following modifications to the dressing:
3 tablespoons white wine vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar
4 teaspoons olive oil
2 teaspoons grainy mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 large clove garlic, minced
1/3 cup minced fresh chives
4 teaspoons minced fresh parsley
2/3 teaspoon minced fresh tarragon
Although not as pretty the next day, since the herbs had wilted and were no longer a vibrant green, the salad definitely had better flavor. I'd HIGHLY recommend this recipe -- a nice, basic, picnic-worthy, flavorful potato salad! We enjoyed this for dinner with a green salad with beets, and some curried tofu.

Brekafast this morning:

I made the most wonderful, all-in-one smoothie this morning. Mmmmm . . . plain yogurt, cold-press coffee concentrate, a frozen banana, some frozen raspberries, a couple tablespoons of Ghiradelli sweetened ground chocolate and cocoa, and a splash of almond milk. I might have to make this exact same concoction for breakfast tomorrow!! Delicious!

And last, my goofy, sleepy cat:


Off to eat some leftovers!

Farmer's Market Extravaganza!

I made a deal with myself at the Farmer's Market yesterday -- I knew that I had a couple of things in mind that I wanted to pick up, but I took out plenty of cash and told myself I was allowed to buy whatever looked good, and I'd deal with the (positive) "consequences" later. :) I only ended up spending $23, but I don't think I could have carried more home if I had tried! Look at what I got:

Two big bunches of basil, "candy-stripe" beets, baby zucchini and summer squash, kale, bananas, lemons, broccoli, baby new potatoes, and two cartons of strawberries! Everything was local, except for the bananas and lemons, of course. :)

When I arrived back home from the farmer's market, I got busy.

Pesto:

I have big plans for this all week long!

Homemade pizza for lunch:

I made a crust from some unbleached all-purpose flour, some spelt flour, and a touch of gluten, topped it all with homemade marinara, smoked mozzarella, zucchini, red onion, kalamata olives, artichokes, mushrooms, and dabs of homemade pesto!! YUUUUUUUMMMMM. A very satisfying lunch yesterday, with watermelon on the side. (Dan and I laughed about how triangular our lunch was!)

Strawberry Galette:

I had planned on making a strawberry pie, but decided I didn't want to fuss around with pastry quite so much, so I made a free-form, rustic galette. Next time, I won't brush the top of the pastry with lemon juice and sprinkle it with sugar, since it browned WAY too much. But this was so damn tasty, I'll give you the recipe -- I based it loosely on the pastry and blueberry pie recipes from Betty Crocker.

PASTRY:
2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
13 tablespoons Earth Balance buttery sticks, chilled and cut into small pieces
4 to 6 tablespoons cold water
Combine the flour and salt, and cut in the Earth Balance, leaving some larger pieces of the marg still in tact. Toss in the water with a fork until the dough comes together. Form the dough into a disc, wrap in plastic wrap, and chill.
FILLING:
6 cups fresh strawberries, hulled and sliced
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup unbleached, all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon lemon juice
Toss the above together. Roll out the pastry into a large circle, and transfer the circle to a large baking sheet or pizza pan. Pile the filling into the middle of the circle, spreading evenly. Dot the top of the filling with an additional 1 tablespoon of margarine. Fold up the edges of the pastry, overlapping around the filling. Bake the galette at 425 degrees Farenheight for 30 to 40 minutes, or until the filling is bubbling and the pastry is golden brown!

I also made a jar of strawberry jam with the strawberries that were left after making the galette:

(I only made a half-recipe, since I had just over two cups of strawberries left.) So easy, and so delicious! I've made this jam with raspberries and blackberries before, and I think it would work well with blueberries, also. I can't wait to experiment more! I see strawberry-rhubarb jam in my future, I think. :)

I didn't actually make this yesterday, but I did thaw and bake it!

I had made a double-batch of homemade bread a while ago, and had parked most of it in the freezer for later consumption. After taking almost all day to thaw and rise, this loaf baked beautifully, and make excellent toast for breakfast this morning. :)

Dinner last night:

Brown rice, cucumber, avocado, and sesame seed nori rolls with a side of steamed edamame. 1 1/2 rolls each seems to be just the right amount for both Dan and I!

And lastly, Dan had to work yesterday morning for only a couple of hours, and after the farm tour he gave, he decided to walk through the woods and gather a surprise for me:

Black raspberries! These were SO good, and a very fun treat. We ate them as is over the course of the afternoon yesterday.

Less cooking planned for today, but I still have a few recipes up my sleeve. Until then . . .