Carrot, Date, Currant and Coconut Bread

It's been really hard for me to determine what to do with the carrots I have. I didn't want to just make some candied carrots as a side.

It hit me that I don't recall ever making carrot cake, though I love it. Instead of going for a full-on cake though, I thought I'd try a loaf. I added some Medjool dates that I had delivered to my house, along with some currants and coconut flakes. 

What you'll need:

1 cup of shredded carrots (about 1/3 pound, or 3 large carrots)

1/3 cup Medjool dates, pitted and chopped

1/3 cup Zante currants

1/3 cup shredded coconut

warm water

2 cups flour

3/4 cup sugar

3 eggs

1 tablespoon baking powder

1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon

3 tablespoons canola oil

canola spray

For gluten-free people, I found a similar recipe on Whole Foods' website for carrot and date muffins that uses a blend of almond and either amaranth or millet flour. I'd imagine that would work with this recipe too, 1/2 a cup of almond flour and 1/2 a cup of either amaranth or millet. 

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. 

First, pit and chop the dates. a cut down the middle with a knife should let you peel the date back from the pit. 

Add the chopped dates to a bowl with the currants. Cover them with warm water to help reconstitute the dried fruit. 

Then shred up your carrots. I did it using a plain old grater.

Crack your eggs in a bowl. Adding eggs first will help if you accidentally get a piece of shell in there. Then add the canola oil and carrots. 

In a larger bowl, add the flour, sugar, baking powder and cinnamon. Blend until all ingredients are thoroughly mixed. Then add the coconut and blend again. 

Then add the ingredients from the carrot bowl into the dry ingredient bowl. Drain the dates and currants and add them to the bowl as well. Blend all the ingredients until you can no longer see any white flour and everything is evenly incorporated.

Then I sprayed a 9-inch bread pan with canola oil and poured the very dense mixture into it. I baked it for and hour, when I could pull out a toothpick cleanly.

Turns out, the dates are actually the stars of this bread, not the carrots. They're so sweet and add a lot of texture to the dish too. It's pretty dense, like it was as a batter. Perhaps if I wanted to lighten it up next time I'd add more oil or some apple sauce.

But the great thing about this bread is it is the perfect amount of sweet to be either a breakfast toast with some butter on it or a dessert by icing it with cream cheese frosting.

Apple and Pear Tart

After eating a few of the gala apples and d'anjou pears in my latest grocery shipment, I decided that these crunchy but somewhat blander varieties of fruit might make better for baking than eating. I much prefer eating fuji apples and bosc pears, particularly when the pears get a touch overripe.

I've made plenty of pies in my life, but never a blend of fruits, and I figured this was a good chance to test this out. I also have never made a pie to look like a traditional French tart, with thin slices of fruit standing up throughout the baking dish.

I put all these concepts together, with a few twists, to make a rustic looking apple and pear tart. What you'll need:

flour
shortening
cold water
two gala apples
two d'anjou pears
sugar
cinnamon
nutmeg
butter

Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. I had an 8-inch pie tin, which I sprayed with canola oil and lightly coated in flour.

Peel both apples and pears and cut the fruit away from the core. Discard the peels and cores, and then cut both the apples and pears into long, thin slices. Place these slices in a bowl and add about 3 tablespoons of flour, 1/2 cup of sugar, 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon and 1/4 teaspoon of nutmeg.

It is important you do this step before making the dough, because the longer a dough sits, the more dried out it gets, and the more difficult it will be to work with.

Now for the dough: Typically, tarts are made with puff pastry, but I figured an old-fashioned, U.S.-style pie crust would do the trick. I used my mother's (and her mother's, and likely her mother's) recipe.

Mix 1 cup of flour with 1/3 cup of shortening. I like to blend the two with a fork. Small crumbles of dough should begin to form when they're fully incorporated. Then slowly add cold water, typically about 2-3 tablespoons, until a dough begins to form. Now, a lot of things can factor into how much water you need, like humidity, so if you think you need more, you probably do, and vice versa. The goal is to make one cohesive mound of dough, not a flaky bowl of flour. I add about a tablespoon at a time until I'm satisfied.

Generously flour your tabletop. There is practically no such thing as too much flour in this situation. If your tabletop looks like the final scene in "Scarface," only then have you gone too far. Also coat your rolling pin.

Take the dough out of the mixing bowl and place on your floured surface. With your hands coated in flour (and rings removed), press this dough gently into a mound. Then, I like to perform a move that looks a little like I'm giving my dough CPR. Place your palms one on top of the other, much like CPR, and press different parts of this mound of dough out into a circular shape. This is a little trick I do to ensure that when I roll out the dough, it forms into a circle.

Take the rolling pin and evenly roll out this dough in all directions. If you're not sure how big to make the circle or if parts aren't stretched out enough, simply turn your pie tin upside down over the layer to get a good idea.

Now the fun part: Picking up the dough, and putting it into the pie tin.

This is my mother's trick: Pick up one edge of the dough and roll it onto the rolling pin. Now continue to roll the pin, picking up dough as you go. Once you can lift the entire dough this way, unroll it into the pie tin. It's a scary thing the first time you do it, but you'll get the hang of it. We're making this dish look rustic, so if it breaks, just pick it up and press it back together in the tin, no apologies! Never scrap your dough and try to start over. This overworks the dough, and you will never get it back to its original elasticity. Make a few fork impressions in the bottom of the dough.

Fill the crust with the pear and apple filling, stacking the fruits so they stand upright in the tin.

Dot the top of the filled crust with butter. Why? Because it's delicious — that's why.

I wanted this to look a little rough around the edges, so I did exactly that. I took the overlapping pie crust and just folded it back toward the center, leaving about a 4-inch-diameter hole in the center of the pie. Feel free to cut the excess crust and use a fork or your fingers to make a fancier looking edge. Make sure if you opt to cover the entire top with crust to leave holes so the pie doesn't puff up much taller than the filling.

Fun fact: Apparently the only real difference between a pie and a tart is if there is only a bottom crust. This one has a big overarching bottom crust, so perhaps this is somewhere in between technically.

I baked this in the oven at 425 for 50 minutes. I kept an eye on it, and about 35 minutes in, I covered the center with aluminum foil, because it was starting to get too brown. Do the same to any part of your pie you feel is in danger of burning.

It turned out great. The slices of apple feel very familiar, but then a slice of pear will come out of nowhere and wake up your tongue. One of my pears was particularly juicy, and slices of it make the whole pie come alive. Another dessert success for this blog!

Cooling Down With Kiwi Sorbet

In my latest grocery shipment were three little kiwis, a fruit I've always liked. Despite its seed-filled texture, I like the kiwi's sweet but unique flavor. My little fruit lesson of the day: Kiwis are actually called kiwifruit, their full name. They're also known as Chinese gooseberry, but were named kiwis in the U.S. after their very cute avian counterpart.

After watching a recent episode of "Chopped" with one of my friends, I decided to copycat an idea and make kiwi sorbet. It was so easy, and I didn't need an ice cream maker.

What you'll need:

3 kiwis (they can be a few days away from ripe)
water
sugar
liquor
lemon juice
powdered ginger

This recipe made about a cup and a half of sorbet, so multiply it to make more.

In a saucepan, add 1/2 cup of water and 3/8 of a cup of sugar (I just put in 1/4 cup and then half of that size).

Simmer until the sugar dissolves and then lower the heat for about two minutes. You'll know you're doing the right thing by using a whisk to mix the simple syrup. If a bead or two forms on the whisk when you take it out, you're doing the right thing. Wait for the simple syrup to cool. I just put it in the fridge away from other items.

Then I halved the kiwis and spooned their contents into my little food processor and pulsed it around a few times. Then I added lemon juice and, the best part, liquor! It helps keep the sorbet from turning into a giant ice cube, since freezing liquor is basically impossible using standard kitchen freezers. I happened to have some, ridiculous I admit, blue raspberry vodka in my fridge. (As a Florida Gator, this vodka is key to doing orange- and blue-themed shots during football games.)

I added about a teaspoon of lemon juice and a tablespoon of vodka. I think a sweeter alcohol, like rum, would also work well. I'd advice against anything with a strong flavor, like gin. Just think of what alcohol you like in sweeter drinks and use it.

Then I added the cooled syrup to the mixture, about a teaspoon of ginger powder to add a more balance to the sweet treat, and pulsed it around a few more times. Place the mixture in a metal bowl, sealed tight with either a cover or a bunch of plastic wrap for a few hours.

I took the mixture out for about 10 minutes before serving it to my friends, who all seemed to highly approve. It was definitely something I'll make again. So easy and so mouthwateringly good. This would make an excellent summer barbecue cool dessert, and your friends will think you're some kind of culinary genius for making your own sorbet.

Squished Squash

I may have just prepared butternut squash in the best way I've ever had it. Pretty exciting stuff.

I've never been a big fan of butternut squash soups. I think they're too much like the pureed pumpkin you get inside of pies. There's something about that sweetness, especially coupled with that monotonous texture, I just don't get.

I'm in general not a huge gourd fan. They're edible, but I don't spend all summer dreaming of pumpkin cookies in the fall. I ultimately decided to treat my butternut squash like my true favorite orange vegetable: sweet potato. I added a twist to the recipe by spicing it up a bit with some powdered ginger.

Much like sweet potatoes and pumpkins, butternut squash are extremely dense and, therefore, difficult to cut up raw. I've seen recipes where you can just grill butternut squash after cubing it, but that seemed like a task my knife set was not up for.

To soften up a butternut squash for use in a recipe, simply cut it in half and then take out the seeds and strands, just like a pumpkin.

Then I baked the squash, insides down, in a baking tray with some water to add some steam to the process. It took about an hour at 350 for the most center part of the halves to be soft to a fork's touch. Look for the same qualities you look for in a done baked potato.

For the recipe, you'll need:

butternut squash mash
butter (or butter substitute, I used SmartBalance with added Omega-3s)
salt
pepper
ginger
maple syrup

I took the cooked butternut squash halves and scooped out the innards into a bowl. Then I added the butter, or in this case a substitute. I did this all earlier in the day for preparation for dinner later on in the night.

When it came to reheating the mash, I put it in a pan sprayed with some canola oil just to ensure it didn't stick if it overheated. Then I added about a tablespoon of maple syrup, a teaspoon of ginger, and salt and pepper to taste.

The result was delicious, sweet but spicy because of the ginger. It would make a fantastic addition to any Thanksgiving or fall dinner. I'm glad to add another vegetable to my cooking repertoire.

My Next Delivery of Produce

Just a quick update to let you know what's coming in my next shipment from Washington's Green Grocer.  In this week's box, I encounter another long-term challenging vegetable of mine, butternut squash.

What's in my box:
butternut squash
green beans
spinach
zucchini
Bibb lettuce
carrots
seedless cucumbers
Ruby Red grapefruit
Gala apples
D'anjou pears
Kiwi

Butternut squash and I do not get along. I've tried butternut squash soup a million times and am always underwhelmed. I'll just have to get creative! If you have any ideas for how to cook this squash in a more savory fashion, let me know.

A Family Tradition With a Spin

I spent St. Patrick's Day this year with my friend who just moved from Philly to Nashville, so I didn't do any of the cooking I normally do.

It's been years since I did the full-on corned beef and cabbage dish that my family does to celebrate our Irish-American heritage, but I do typically make Irish soda bread. A very dry peasant food, the bread consists of flour (no yeast, so very easy), buttermilk, baking powder, salt, caraway seeds and raisins. The caraway seeds, of course, give the bread a flavor reminiscent of seeded rye bread, but this bread is very dense and texturally worlds apart from rye.

In truth, this bread is best toasted with some butter or jam to help get it down. The raisins help in this department ever so slightly, moistening it a big. I admit these two flavors are a bit of an acquired taste together, so while this might not be everyone's favorite dish, I decided to add some caraway seeds and currants to some leftover cabbage to make a side dish with a lot of personality. What you'll need:

green cabbage
canola oil
butter
caraway seeds
currants
water

I put some oil and butter in the pan and let them heat to the point where when you put the cabbage in the pan, it sizzles. When I washed the cabbage, I dried it off with a paper towel so when I added the cabbage to the oil it wasn't too wet crisp up.

Then I let the cabbage cook until fairly soft. I added about a teaspoon of caraway seeds and about a tablespoon of currants. Caraway seeds are very potent, so be careful not to dump away when adding them.

Then I raised the heat and added some water to the pan to help along the cabbage's wilting process. It also helps reconstitute dry fruit, like currants. Like a lot of my cooking seems to go, I just happened to have currants and not raisins in my house, so that's what I used. Zante currants are just a variety of grape, anyhow. They're just usually used in Middle Eastern foods. My mother made Irish soda bread one year with dried cranberries, so you can experiment with that too, if they are your preferred dried fruit.

I let the water cook off and had my side dish.

It's always hard to eat someone else's family's food, and equally it's hard to express the comfort when you taste those flavors you've eaten your whole life. For me, this dish was like remembering a dream. You're familiar with it, but you know you've never really experienced it before. Think of what those tried and true flavors are for you, turn them on their head, and you might surprise yourself with what you come up with. 

A Classic: French Onion Soup

I thought I'd build on the caramelized onion skills I developed making the topping for my portobello mushroom burger and make a serious classic: French onion soup.

This was easy, delicious and tasted like the million other times I've had it out at restaurants.

What you'll need:

an onion
olive oil
butter
salt (optional)
sugar (optional)
red wine
beef bouillon (enough to make two cups)
garlic powder
cracked pepper
dried sage
old bread
blue cheese (my little spin on things, since that's what I had around)

I did exactly what I did in my previous entry to make the onions brown. I put oil and butter in a pan at medium heat, added the onions and stirred occasionally for the next 30 minutes. I added salt and sugar to help along the caramelization, but that is optional, and I'm sure many people wouldn't feel the need to add salt to a soup.

When the onions were ready, I added some old red wine I had on hand. Sherry is the traditional wine for French onion soup, but my old shiraz did the trick to give the soup that depth of flavor. After the wine burned off a bit, I added two cups of water and my bouillon. If you have homemade or store-bought beef stock around, go ahead and use that. I was cooking a little on the fly today with whatever I had in my fridge. I'm anticipating another Washington's Green Grocer shipment Thursday and didn't want to go shopping.

Then I cracked in enough black pepper to balance the soup's sweetness from the onions, probably about six cracks. Then I added about three or four shakes of garlic powder and about a half a teaspoon of sage. The sage really gave it an earthiness and added to the pepper's balance. It's not my favorite spice, so play with adding more if it's one of your mainstays.

I took some pretty old bread I had and broke it up in the bottom of a soup bowl with some leftover blue cheese crumbles. If you have oven-safe bowls, you can put some cheese, like Swiss, on top and broil the cheese to a brown, but I actually really liked this lower calorie alternative.

It tasted amazing, and I guarantee you will make this again and again.

Fruit For Dinner

As a final side to the portobello mushroom burgers I made, I thought a slaw would be a good addition. The kale chips were already serving the role of the chips you'd normally eat alongside a burger. So I figured I could make a healthier than cole slaw option that went well with the meal and was healthier.

To play off the blue cheese I put on the burgers, I thought I'd take some of the Fuji apples I had on hand and blend them with the cabbage I also happened to have. I swapped out the traditional slaw ingredient of mayo with a scoop of Greek yogurt to add a little extra healthiness to the dish. What you'll need to complete this dinner triumvirate of lip-smacking healthiness:

green cabbage, cut into slices
Fuji apple, diced
lemon juice
Greek yogurt
apple cider vinegar
blue cheese crumbles

First I diced up one apple and tossed it in a bowl. I added a splash of lemon juice to make sure the apple kept its color and didn't brown.

Then I chopped up some cabbage into slaw-style pieced. This is pretty easy. Just slice the cabbage very thinly, working from the top toward the end. I probably ended up adding about a cup of cabbage.

Then I took about a tablespoon of greek yogurt and mixed it in with the cabbage and apples. I splashed the apple cider vinegar on, probably a total of a tablespoon.

I mixed the whole thing up and then added some crumbles of blue cheeses — the same blue cheese I put on the burgers. This side is actually excellent for something like those spicy kale chips, since it's very cooling and refreshing in your mouth. And there is no better pairing in the world than Fuji apples and blue cheese.

I put some plastic wrap on the slaw and let it sit in my fridge for at least 30 minutes before dinner time so all the flavors had time to blend. All in all, I think portobello mushroom burgers with kale chips and this cabbage apple slaw was probably the healthiest dinner I've ever had in my life. It was also one of the most amazing. If this is where this blog is leading me, then I like my new spin on dinner.

Cheating With Kale

Kale is kind of the new kid on the block for showing off just how snobbily healthy you can be with vegetables. That doesn't mean it's not delicious, but I have to admit there's something slightly pompous to me about proclaiming something a "superfood." Kale is like the new girl that comes to your high school that suddenly becomes super popular out of nowhere. You didn't even know she existed, but now everyone is talking about her.

Another big issue with kale that makes people shy away from it: They could not possibly package it in larger bags. The bag my friend Ebo brought over has 11 servings in it. Eleven! For a family of five, this is not a big deal, but when you live by yourself it's a struggle to eat that much of anything before it turns.

Turns out there is a quick way to solve both of these problems, and Ebo had the answer: kale chips. That's right, chips.

So it's not like eating a Lay's, so get that out of your head right now, but for a self-confessed crunchy food-aholic like me, eating these kale chips felt like cheating on a diet with a huge bag of pretzels or something. And with a "superfood," that feels pretty much like getting away with murder. What you'll need:

kale
olive oil
kosher salt
cayenne pepper (optional, think of what spices you like on chips and try them out!)

Ebo showed me how you lay out the kale on a baking tray and coat it very lightly with olive oil (too much and the kale will never crisp up).

I suppose you could also use olive oil spray. I'll have to try that next time. Then he sprinkled the kosher salt and cayenne pepper over the kale. We popped it into a 450-degree oven for probably 10 minutes. Then we let them sit for a minute and, tada! Kale chips.

Portobellos Conquered!

As I've mentioned, I'm not the biggest mushroom fan. So when two huge, meaty portobellos showed up at my doorstep, courtesy of Washington's Green Grocer, I have to admit I was a little terrified. But I didn't want to simply put it in a sauce or make it a side dish. I wanted it to be the star.

I opted for making a portobello burger. And oh my god, I'm having dreams now about eating another one. I get sad when it's time to eat a meal and it's not this delicious burger. Why have I not had one of these before?

The real trick was just making sure the other flavors involved were as delicious as possible. I went for a portobello burger on a whole wheat English muffin (they're what I had around), topped with caramelized onions and blue cheese. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. What you'll need:

Portobello mushroom, capped and washed
kosher salt
ground pepper
yellow onion, sliced
olive oil
butter
table salt
sugar (optional)
blue cheese
English muffin

First I started with the caramelized onions. It's simple to turn onions into the most deliciously sweet but acidic dish by adding some olive oil and butter to a pan. The butter should be about 1 tbsp. per whole onion. The olive oil will help keep the butter's burning temperature down so it can stay in the pan for the long haul.

I kept my pan on a solid medium and added the onion, chopped so it was in long strips. Then I just waited and occasionally stirred for the next 40 minutes or so. After they started looking good and brown, I added salt to taste and a little sugar, just to help along the caramelization process. This is optional, but I figured it'd help balance the flavor. If the onions start to stick to the pan, instead of turning down the heat, just splash on a little water. It'll evaporate and the onions will be fine.

Cooking the portobellos couldn't have been easier. I don't have any outdoor space, so I just used a grilltop pan for my gas stove. I coated both sides of the mushroom in olive oil and put kosher salt and cracked some pepper on the underside of the cap. It took about 5 minutes for these mushrooms to transform from their normal rubbery texture to juicy, tender portobello patties.

Here's the mushrooms at the beginning of cooking:

And here they are almost ready to go:

I toasted my English muffin for some added texture, and I'm really glad I did. Portobellos can be really soft, and I like having a little crunch to counterbalance that. I'd recommend using any kind of toasted, crispy bread. The other bonus of the English muffin (besides the fact that they're pretty darn healthy if you get the right kind) is that without a lot of inner bread to soak up the juices of the portobello, it and never turned mushy.

After that, I just piled the portobello and onions onto the bun and added some blue cheese I recently bought. I'm a huge stilton fan, and usually get it, but I was inspired to branch out recently. I was a little bummed out this weekend and decided there was a good way to self soothe. So I went to Safeway and got everything I needed: blue cheese, crackers, M&Ms and wine. Worked like a charm.

Anyhow, dinner turned out amazingly! In my next two entries, we'll look at the sides me and my friend created for our portobello feast.

10-Minute Tomato Sauce

Holy moly have I had some good dinners lately. These vegetable boxes really reshape the way you eat, and I highly recommend this method to anyone looking to shake up their eating habits.

A had half a pint of grape tomatoes left, so I decided to make my own quick, dumbed down tomato sauce for pasta, and it was delicious! Here's a good 10 minute seafood marinara.

The ingredients and equipment you'll need:
1/2 pint of grape tomatoes
diced onions
minced garlic
dry white wine
basil
oregano
salt
red pepper flakes (optional, but far and away one of my favorite spices)

1 pan
food processor

First I put the tomatoes in a pan on medium to medium high heat, depending on the quality of your pan. Get a good sear on the outside of the tomatoes, and every so often shake them around in the pan so another side sears.

Then I added them to my handy Cuisinart mixer. It is such a great kitchen addition: small enough that you can fit it anywhere and, if I recall, only 30 bucks or so. I pulsed the mixture and then added it back to the pan.

Have your wine ready to go, because the tomatoes will stick a bit when you reintroduce them to the pan. A splash or two of wine helps make sure it doesn't stick and burn, and also makes you look like a kitchen badass when a puff of steam explodes from the pan.

From there, I added the onion, since I knew I was going to cook down a lot of vegetables. If I didn't add broccoli and zucchini to the pan, I'd get a new pan and put some olive oil in it to sweat down the onions and then the garlic.

Then add garlic, about a teaspoon. The rest of the seasonings are really to taste. I put a LOAD of basil and about half a load of oregano. This recipe certainly needs a good salting, so add that to taste. The red pepper flakes add great heat to the dish. I added them to the shrimp that I eventually cooked in the sauce.

I have to say, for not being roasted for hours, these tomatoes tasted delicious! A good step one toward my summer dream of canning my own tomatoes.

Here's the final product:

Also, just a blogkeeping note for anyone keeping up: I'm going to label every entry with the vegetable or fruit used, so you can search a produce item and get results for it!

First Washington's Green Grocery Delivery

Exciting news! I've received my first delivery from Washington's Green Grocer, and the box looks beautiful.

As advertised, the box contains a head of romaine, two HUGE zucchini, three portobellos, two heads of broccoli, a bunch of carrots, a pint of grape tomatoes, three potatoes, six oranges, three pears and five apples. I also got a bonus mango that I didn't order, and I added some eggs in since, at about $3.50, they're the same price as the Eggland's Best free-range dozen I usually get from Safeway.

Sidenote: You know what weird thing made me go free range? Napoleon Dynamite. Seriously. You know that scene where the chickens are all in tiny cages and those hick farm guys eat raw eggs for lunch? I just looked at that scene and thought the chickens deserved a little better that that.

I'm not sure how factual this is, but my grandmother said she had chickens when she was a kid in New Jersey (yes, New Jersey), and chickens will lay one egg a day. But with the lights constantly on in a chicken coup facility, chickens make two eggs a day instead, basically halving the nutritional deliciousness of eggs. Just a little food for thought there.

Anyhow, I also got another amazing delivery yesterday. I've always been intrigued by canning, but have always been a little afraid to do it. I hear botulism is just no fun. So I bought a starter canning kit from Ball, the company probably everyone knows through their glass jars. My goal this summer, once we get in full-on tomato season, is to jar my own tomato sauce once Romas are in season. I've heard they're the best to use. Some knowledge for us all: Italian plum and Roma tomatoes are the same.

Doesn't this lady look like she's having a blast?

I had absolutely the best tomato sauce, or "gravy" as my family calls it, in my life recently at Filomena in Washington, D.C. Seriously, if you love Italian food, you must go here. The entrees are pretty pricey, but they are completely massive. I think I had three servings of leftovers from their misto di mare alla Filomena, which means mix of the sea, I think. And with shrimp, mussels, clams, calamari and scallops, they're not joking. Also, bonus: They give you free anisette or amaretto after your meal.

I tried my hand last night at a little fresh tomato sauce with the grape tomatoes, and it actually turned out pretty well. I might take a few photos next time and make that my first real recipe since it was so easy!

Then I will tackle these portobellos. Also, if anyone has an idea that's not soup for killing all these carrots, let me know! They are intimidating me with their abundance. Really, the whole box is. Guess my quest to eat more fruits and veggies is officially on.