Monthly Archives: March 2011

Spring is in the Air – Vegetarian Fresh Spring Rolls with Mango

31 Thursday Mar 2011

Posted by in Appetizer, Cooking, Mango, Recipe, Vegetarian

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My good friend Valentina was having a get together with her friends to discover the different flavors of hot sauces.  It was to be a pot luck of sorts.  Since I didn’t have a hot sauce to contribute (other than a bottle of Frank’s) I decided to make something that would go well with hot sauces, or could be a palate cooler.

I’ve made Spring Rolls on many occasions (including once at the University Farmers Market with kids).
This time, I decided to add a secret ingredient – mango!  Why you might ask?  The sweetness of mango goes really well with bell peppers and cucumbers, plus it is cooling against the hot sauce.

There’s really no recipe for this.  All you need are a stack of spring roll papers (made from tapioca flour) and a collection of “suffers”.  If you look at the photo above, you will see my selection of English cucumber, carrots, red bell pepper, cilantro, bean sprouts, and mango.

Soak spring roll wrappers in hot water just until they become pliable and translucent (do this one wrapper at a time).  Carefully remove the wrapper and lay over a plate (try to discard as much water as possible).  Lay your toppings in the lower part of the wrapper, in a tight, small pile. 

Warning – try to resist temptation to pile up too many toppings, otherwise the wrapper will rip.

Now it’s time to roll! (Afterall, you are making Spring Rolls).  Pull up the wrapper above the pile of filler ingredients and tuck in the sides.  Do so gently enough not to rip the wrapper, but tightly enough so that the filling does not fall out.  Roll it up and place on a serving plate, seam side down.  

Continue to make Spring Rolls using up the wrappers and filler ingredients.  You might want to lightly drizzle the spring rolls with sesame oil to prevent them from sticking.  The sesame oil will also add a nice toasted rich nutty flavor.

Because the Spring Rolls went with hot sauces, I decided against making a dipping sauce.  If you are looking for a sauce, I would suggest making a mix of peanut butter, Sriracha, lime juice, touch of sugar/honey and sesame oil (you might need to thin out the sauce with water to reach desired consistency).
Give this a try and come up with your own combination of filler ingredients.  Be sure to let me know what you end up using.

Gyro Plate and Greek Fries from Mr. Gyro’s – Greenwood, Seattle

23 Wednesday Mar 2011

Posted by in Greek, Restaurant Review, Salad, Seattle

≈ 1 Comment

“Hungry? Grab a Snicker!” is not for me.  When the hunger hits, I tend to gravitate towards savory, salty, and the spicy.  Last Friday night, driving home after work, cooking was the last thing on my mind.  I was hungry and in need of nourishment.  My mind was racing from Indian, to sushi, to Thai.  For a second I considered making hummus and pita chips and that’s when I knew exactly what I was craving!

Lucky for me, I live close to Mr. Gyro’s.  Luck was on my side, the rain slowed down, there was a parking spot right in front of the restaurant, and it took me less than 2 minutes to decide what I wanted to order for my take out.  Combo plate please!  I selected lamb gyro and falafel balls ($9.49).  Traditionally, all plates come with hummus or baba ganoush, rice, Greek salad and pita.  I wasn’t in the mood for rice and asked for a substitution suggestion.  We decided on both hummus and baba ganoush.

Standing in line, waiting for my food to be prepared (right in front of my eyes, in a very small but efficient space) I suddenly realized – I wanted fries.  And in Mr. Gyro’s you don’t get just regular fries – you get Greek fries!  Fresh out of the oil the fries are sprinkled with oregano and feta cheese.  Piping hot and delicious, still crispy, yet perfectly cooked through, the fries were a perfect addition. You can’t imagine how delicious and tempting my car smelled!
Once at home, I decided not to bother with the formalities of a plate.  I did have a place mat though, if that counts for anything.  And I even squeezed a fresh lemon wedge into diet coke.
Let’s get to the food.  I will start with the “needs some work” and finish with “delicious, please don’t change.”
In the “needs some work” are the Greek Salad and the falafel balls.  I’m sorry to say, but the way the salad came, it might as well have been called “Onion salad with tomatoes and feta.”  The onion was overwhelming to say the least.  The falafel balls, I believe, were undercooked – while there was some nice crunch on the outside, the inside was obviously raw and chewy.  Lucky for me, there were only 2 falafel balls in this plate.
The rest of the plate was perfection.  The lamb gyro was by far the best I’ve had in a long time.  Traditionally, cut into very thin strips, these lamb gyro pieces were thick, tender, and juicy (it is taking everything in me not to say “moist”).  I’ve already discussed the fries, which leaves us with hummus and baba ganoush (I didn’t bother eating pita until the next day when I used it for a grilled ham & cheese quesadilla).  Both dips were precisely what I was hoping for.  The hummus was a well balanced combination of chickpeas, tahini, lemon and just enough of garlic.  The baba ganoush looked deceptively simple, but the smoke flavor from roasted eggplant spoke volumes and made me wish for more.
This being my second visit to Mr. Gyro’s, it’s safe to say that I will be back.  And perhaps I’ll give falafel balls one more try.  Thank you!

Fitness Magazine: Dinner in 20: Lemon-Thyme Chicken with Sauteed Vegetables

21 Monday Mar 2011

Posted by in Chicken, Dinner, Fitness, Lunch, recipe development, Writing/Publishing

≈ 6 Comments

Welcome Spring!  Salute! to lighter, healthier, and fresher eating.  Why not start with my recipe for Lemon-Thyme Chicken tenders with ribbons of sauteed zucchini, grape tomatoes and a sprinkle of crumbled feta!

I’m so excited to share my 3rd recipe developed for Fitness Magazine with you.  (To one of my biggest fans, you know who you are, please notice that there are no onions or cilantro for once in the recipe!).  I love developing this healthy and delicious recipes that take 20 minutes to make – no more excuses for not having enough time.  Feed your body, feed your soul – you are worth it!

Go get your copy on the newsstand.  Page 134, April 2011, Fitness Magazine.

I would love for you to try out the recipe and get your feedback!  I hope you enjoy it.

Green Olive and Eggplant Caponata Recipe

16 Wednesday Mar 2011

Posted by in Cooking, Dinner, Lunch, Recipe, Sides, Vegetarian

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Last week I was co-teaching a class at Whole Foods Market with Jordan Ashcraft (the head of the Specialty Department). The Olive Tasting class focused on marinated, brined, pitted and stuffed olives – a true culinary delight and wonder. Jordan shared many facts and stories about the history of olives, the difference in taste between varieties, etc. My role was to cook!

I decided to prepare two recipes, one of which was Green Olive and Eggplant Caponata. This traditional Italian dish is full of delicious vegetables – eggplant, onion, and tomatoes. I thought that adding briny green olives would elevate it to a higher taste bud experience.

Preparing this recipe, I used my usual cooking philosophy – taste as you go, pay attention to the ingredients and enjoy. During the class, the students asked about the recipe and wanted to have a recipe. Below, is my best attempt for the recipe – ingredient amounts and times are approximate.
Ingredients

2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
3 medium eggplants, cubed
1 large red onion, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
4 stalks celery, diced
2 cloves garlic, chopped
5 tomatoes, cored, diced
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 cup green olives, pitted and roughly chopped
1/4 c pine nuts, toasted
1/2 cup basil, roughly torn
salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. In a medium pot, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium heat, add eggplant and sauté for 5 minutes, stirring. Season with salt. Add 1/4 cup water and cover the pot. Cook eggplant until almost tender.
2. In a large sauté pan heat the remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium high heat. Add onion, pepper, celery and garlic. Cook for 7 minutes. Add tomatoes, cooked eggplant, lemon juice, pepper flakes, and sugar. Cook for 25-30 minutes.
3. Once the vegetables are tender, add olives and taste for seasoning. If needed, add more sugar and lemon juice. Cook until the olives are heated through.

4. Remove the caponata off the heat and stir in pine nuts and basil. Serve hot or at room temperature. If serving cold, or the next day, add the pine nuts and basil right before serving.
This makes for a very flavorful and filling vegetarian dish or a side dish. Keep your eye out – soon I will share a recipe using this caponata as one of the main ingredients.

Sitting in the Kitchen – New Bar Stools

15 Tuesday Mar 2011

Posted by in Furniture, Kitchen, Seattle

≈ 2 Comments

Four months after acquiring a new kitchen, I’m happy to report that from now on, “Snacking in the Kitchen” will be happening sitting down, instead of standing up or sitting on the floor.  Thanks to my good friend Era, I am a happy and proud owner of 4 bar stools!

The search has been quite challenging to say the least.  The combination of style, price, availability was a tough one to find and I spent many mornings, days, and nights, standing up by the kitchen counter, eating.  My visitors have done the same, or settled for a more casual dining – on the floor.  I am happy to report that “on the floor” option will continue to be available.

I assembled all four chairs and did my best to tighten up the bolts and screws.  But just in case, every visitor will be signing a consent waiver, taking complete responsibility for a potential chair failure 🙂

In the near future, I plan to reupholster the chairs (as much I am a fan of fake black leather – ok, I’m really not, but that’s how they came).  I might wait for the couch (it will come eventually), or be brave and choose a fabric for the upholstery.  Feel free to send your recommendations.

For now, I look forward to sitting at the bar in my own kitchen and enjoying a meal with you!  Bon Appetit!

(Chairs are from Fred Meyer where they are buy 1 get 1 free this week with an additional 10% discount)

Sunchoke (Jerusalem Artichokes) & Potato Puree with Caramelized Onions

09 Wednesday Mar 2011

Posted by in Cooking, Dinner, Lunch, Potatoes, Recipe, Sides

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I consider myself to be quite an adventurous eater.  Over the years, my tastes have developed and I have grown to love and appreciate a number of new ingredients – olive oil, basil, balsamic vinegar, mangoes, celery, and fennel – just to name a few.  (For the most part, these ingredients were introduced to my daily eating after my family moved to the United States from Russia).

I’m a big fan of discovering the new flavors.  Last week, I discovered sunchokes – also known as Jerusalem artichokes.  What’s funny, is that this root vegetable has nothing to do with artichokes or Jerusalem.  The sunchoke is a root of a certain sunflower plant.  In its raw state it has a very crunchy, juicy texture, similar to that of a water chestnut.  When cooked, sunchokes develop a richer, earthier flavor, similar to an artichoke. This explains the “artichoke” reference in the name.  But why Jerusalem?  Apparently, the Latin name for the sunchoke sounds similar to Jerusalem.  I will let you be a judge of that.

How to deal with sunchokes?  Buy them!  Make sure they feel heavy for their size and are firm.  Instead of peeling them with a vegetable peeler or a knife, use a spoon!  That’s right – I said to use a spoon.  That’s the way I peel ginger – it’s easy and takes just the skin, leaving all of the flesh for you to enjoy.

For my first cooking experience, I decided to mix sunchokes and potatoes together and make mashed potatoes of sort.  To be honest, I wasn’t sure if the taste of the sunchokes would come through – but it did!  I’m quite a fan, and hope you will be one too.

Sunchoke and Potato Puree with Caramelized Onions

Ingredients

1 pound Yukon gold or Idaho potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
1 pound sunchokes, peeled and cut into chunks
4-6 garlic cloves
1 bay leaf
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 large sweet onions, thinly sliced
Pinch of sugar
1 cup whole milk or half-and-half, hot
2 tablespoons olive oil
Kosher salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped

Directions
1.  In a large saucepan, cover potatoes, sunchokes, garlic cloves, and bay leaf with water and bring to a boil. Turn the heat to medium and simmer until potatoes and sunchokes are fork-tender, about 20 minutes.

2.  While potatoes are cooking, heat olive oil over medium high heat. Add onions, pinch of salt, pepper, and sugar. Cook slowly, stirring occasionally until onions are soft and tender.

3.  Drain potatoes thoroughly and return to pan, discarding bay leaf.

4.  Set the pan over medium heat and add milk or half-and-half and olive oil. Mash with an old-fashioned potato masher or large fork, adding additional milk if needed to reach desired consistency. Stir in onions, salt, pepper, and parsley.

Give this a try.  If you have a different way to enjoy sunchokes, please share!

Raw Kale Rainbow Slaw Salad Recipe

07 Monday Mar 2011

Posted by in Cooking, Kale, Lunch, Recipe, Salad, Vegetarian

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I was watching “Modern Family” the other day (it just happens to be one of my favorite shows and a laugh-out-loud highlight of the week).  In the middle of the show kale enters the picture!  That’s right, the green, leafy, vitamin-packed star of the produce department was featured on the sitcom.  Now, how often does that happen?  I think it’s pretty fantastic.

For a long time the only way I would eat kale would be cooked, steamed, or quickly sautéed.  It often would play a role in a soup or a stir fry.  Somehow I never thought of eating kale raw, at least not until I tried this healthy, colorful, and most important delicious and good-for-you Kale Slaw recipe from Whole Foods Market.  The recipe uses Lacinato kale, also know as Dinosaur kale – wouldn’t your kids love the fact that they are eating something called Dinosaur Kale?!  Give it a try.

Ingredients

1 bunch lacinato (a.k.a. dinosaur) kale, thick stems removed and leaves thinly sliced
4 cups shredded red cabbage (about 1 small head, quartered and cored)
2 navel oranges or Clementines, peeled and segmented
1 small red onion, thinly sliced
1 large red bell pepper, cored, seeded and thinly sliced
1/3 cup sunflower seeds
1/4 cup Dijon mustard
1/4 cup freshly squeezed orange juice (from about 1 small orange)
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

Method

In a large bowl, combine kale, cabbage, orange segments, onion, bell pepper and sunflower seeds.

In a small bowl, whisk together mustard, orange juice, vinegar and pepper. Pour over the kale mixture and toss to coat. Serve immediately or refrigerate for up to 2 days.

Chef Gabrielle Hamilton ~ Prune Restaurant, New York

04 Friday Mar 2011

Posted by in New York, Restaurant Review, Writing/Publishing

≈ 1 Comment

The latest in the culinary publishing circuit is the book by Chef Gabrielle Hamilton, a chef owner of Prune restaurant in New York City.  In Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef, Chef Hamilton shares her life stories in and out of the kitchen. I have read a few excerpts from New York Times and as I was reading, I could hear Gabrielle’s voice behind the words – strong, open, honest and passionate.  A few years ago, back when I was a student at The Culinary Institute of America, I had a great honor of meeting Gabrielle and dining at her restaurant.  I was so touched by our meeting that I wrote an article for the school’s newspaper.  Hope you enjoy the read!

***

Yet another sleepless night. If I don’t fall asleep right now, I might just die – everything is a little bit more dramatic at three o’clock in the morning. I toss around to the sounds of a high-pitch hyena laughter coming from the gazebo right outside of my window and the slamming of the doors in the hall. I should be asleep. The mental list of things-to-do runs through my mind in vicious circles. I panic and my heart races. Just then, a strong, calming voice pops into my head. “Simply because it’s night time doesn’t mean you must be sleeping. Get up, do your laundry, take care of the bills, do what you need to do. Make every moment count.”

The voice belongs to Gabrielle Hamilton, a chef and owner of Prune in New York City. I am fortunate to have met Chef Hamilton and dine at her East Village restaurant on a recent visit along with members of the Women Chefs and Restaurateurs group. Our early arrival pays off: we are whisked down the steep and narrow stairway of the restaurant to the prep area. We meet Chef Hamilton and spend over an hour asking her questions and listening, all the while trying not to get too much in the way of cooks and servers who are in the middle of finishing up brunch service.

Chef Hamilton answers each question thoughtfully and honestly without any pretense or hidden agenda and at the same time manages to put the final assembly touches on the individual pear and dried cranberry crisps (which we enjoy later on). We ask how she feels about being a female in the kitchen and she shares her journey of transformation from “one of the guys” to “a girly girl” to finally being herself in the kitchen. After working in the industry for over 20 years and owning her restaurant for the last 9 years, she has plenty to say.

When someone asks Chef Hamilton how she balances her professional life and her personal life (she is married and has two young children), I expect to hear a typical answer: I do what I can, and try to balance it all out. Instead, the answer is different and surprising. There is no such a thing as a balance in this demanding field; dividing the hours of the day evenly between each aspect of your life, each responsibility, simply doesn’t work if one wants to have an accomplished career and successful family life. There are days when you need to devote yourself to work and find someone else to take care of your children and days when you need to trust your sous chefs and leave them in charge of dinner service so you can take your sick child to see a doctor. After all, it is impossible to be in more than one place at the same time just as it is impossible to do everything at once with the highest standard of quality. And while the concept of “having it all” is quite appealing, it is hardly achievable. The best you can do is set your priorities and utilize every opportunity to reach them.

By the end of our conversation with Chef Hamilton we are ready to eat and eagerly take the same steep and narrow stairway up to the cozy and packed dining area where the food is just as honest and straightforward as Chef Hamilton’s advice. We don’t find a menu that requires a dictionary to understand, listing every hyped up trendy item. The plates arrive unadulterated without unnecessary garnishes, and the food looks approachable, inviting, and unpretentious. We eat family-style, starting with appetizers, passing the plates of grilled head-on shrimp with anchovy butter, Parmesan omelet, and Spanish goat cheese with buttered brown bread. Each ingredient plays in harmony with one another, showcasing skillful cooking technique. The food is perfectly seasoned and leaves a very satisfying, but not stuffed feeling.

There’s plenty of room for the second course. We choose among stewed pork shoulder with salsa verde, whole grilled fish and grilled prime ribeye with maitre d’hotel butter. The choice of main entrée comes with baked garnet yams with brown butter, brussel sprouts, cauliflower and baby white turnips, and bitter greens with virgin oil and lemon juice. I often find that vegetable cookery is a true test of the kitchen. And these vegetables couldn’t have been prepared any better: I would’ve been just as happy had I eaten nothing other than the garnet sweet potatoes and the bitter greens.

The dessert is a sweet ending to our visit with Chef Hamilton at Prune. The pear and dried cranberry crisp that the Chef was prepping earlier on, arrives with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. There’s also a dark cocoa cake with truffle center and wafer crumbs and Breton butter cake. We take the last bite of the dessert, thank our gracious host and head out of the restaurant with a sense of encouragement and inspiration.

Global Pizza Edition: Greek Pita Pizza

02 Wednesday Mar 2011

Posted by in Cooking, Greek, Mediterranean, Pizza, Recipe

≈ 1 Comment

The Global Pizza edition is back this week.  Last week I’ve shared with you a recipe for the Mexican Taco Pizza on a Tortilla.  This week, let’s head out to beautiful Greece and devour the Greek Pita Pizza.

Makes 4 pita bread pizzas

(Pardon my technical difficulties.  The image will be rotated soon!)
Ingredients
4 pita bread
1 cup hummus
2 Roma tomatoes, sliced
1/2 cup pitted olives, chopped
4 bottled piquillo peppers, sliced
1/4 cup red onion, thinly sliced
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 cup feta cheese, crumbled
2 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
Method
1.  Preheat oven to 425°F. Evenly spread hummus on top of each pita. Layer tomatoes, olives, peppers, onion on top of hummus and sprinkle with oregano. Top the pitas with feta and lightly drizzle with olive oil. Bake for 10 to 20 minutes.