Waldorf Salad and Grilled Lamb with Eggplants

Continuing on our adventure in eating fewer carbs...not because we're feeling particularly health-driven, but because I'm running out of white rice.

Waldorf salad. I realized I had half a head of butter lettuce left from Friday as well as some really delicious apples and a few stalks of celery, so I diced everything and tossed in a handful of raisins and walnuts with a little mayonnaise. It's not much, but it's colorful.

We seared up the last $2 lamb steak, and I tried a Chow tip for egg plants. I sliced a small eggplant into pieces a quarter inch thick, dipped the slices in a beaten egg, and coated in pecorino cheese and pepper. Then I put a few slices on a hot waffle iron brushed with olive oil, and cooked them until brown and crispy. I thought they were kind of a nice carb replacement, but J is still anti-eggplant. Oh well, can't win them all.

I love my carbs, and high on the list is fresh bread. When I need a quick fix, I bake half a batch of flakey, fluffy, delicious biscuits. And when I'm baking them for myself, I like them to be misshapen. The reason is simple: the more you work biscuit dough, the tougher your biscuits become. So I don't shape these and cut them into rounds or squares, I just scoop out the dough with a large spoon and let them be whatever shape they want to be, and they always have an especially airy interior.

Biscuits are a treat, so they need to be balanced with a little self control. I present, the green salad. Simple, fresh greens with celery, cucumbers, and red onions.

Dessert was grapes and blueberries. I'm being healthy now in anticipation of Saturday's party, which is going to be a fat fest.

Just kidding. I still had bacon with dinner. How could I resist? Bacon is the perfect topping for salad.

Salmon Salad, Garlic Bread, and Blue Cheese

Fresh summer flavors are my favorite part of this time of year. We've been making some really great use of a few bulbs of ultra fresh, ultra spicy, ultra flavorful garlic a friend grew in his garden.

First up to bat: baked sockeye salmon filet on a bed of red lettuce with cucumbers and tomatoes. Topped with feta, black pepper, and a garlic mustard vinaigrette.

And to drink, Chandon Classic Brut. This was great with the fish--the bottle doesn't lie when it says it's great with seafood and caesar sald (read: garlicky).

More garlic! I can't ever have enough. This is a basic garlic bread. You take a stick of softened butter and mix in one entire bulb of pulped garlic. You can put the garlic through a press, grate it with a microplane, chop it by hand and smear it with the side of a knife, or use a food processor. Mix in a half teaspoon of salt and a handful of chopped parsley, then spread generously on a loaf of crusty bread. This is a sweet batard, but French bread of course works well.

For dessert, we had fruit and cheese. On the left is a slice of what is called a fig wheel. It's dried figs and roasted hazelnuts pressed into a wheel, and quite tasty. I'm already forgetting the name of the blue cheese, but any blue cheese is stellar with dried figs or fig puree. The fruit mellows out the metallic sharpness of the cheese without detracting from the flavor. Delightful!

Basic Vinaigrette Tutorial

A lot of how-tos this week. I got a lot of questions while on vacation about how I do this and that, which of course is incredibly flattering--but not as flattering as when people actually try it my way and let me know how it goes! (hint hint) Every avid cook likes to know if her directions actually work.

Anyhoo, this is tonight's basil vinaigrette. Most people buy salad dressing in a bottle, but it's so easy to make a small amount. Not only do I get to change up the flavors every time, it helps me use up the vinegars and olive oil that tend to just sit around in my cabinets. Call me crazy, but the fewer bottles lying around the better.

Vinaigrette is an emulsion, so creating a creamy vinaigrette requires two things: the right proportions, and agitation. Here are the basics you'll need:

• one part acid. This can be vinegar, lemon juice, citrus juice, or a combination of the three
• three parts oil. This is usually the olive oil of your choice. Use light oil if you want the flavor to be delicate, and extra virgin if you want the grassy olive oil flavor to shine. You can also use infused oils
• salt and sugar to taste
• optional: herbs, garlic, ginger, peppers, nuts, fruits, and/or other flavoring agents
  

If you whisk the acid and oil together very quickly, you'll soon have a creamy vinaigrette. The rest is bonus! But for those who want a real recipe, this is what I did for my basil vinaigrette:

• 2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
• 6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 6 leaves basil, chopped finely
• 1/4 tsp ground black pepper
• 1/4/tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp sugar

I combined the basil, pepper, salt, and sugar in a bowl and ground them together with the back of a spoon. Then I added the vinegar and mixed until the sugar and salt dissolved, Using a whisk, I drizzled in the olive oil and whisked furiously until the dressing was creamy. Then I poured it over some mixed greens and heirloom tomatoes.

Having one fresh herb or brightly flavored fruit really takes your vinaigrette to the next level. Last weekend, for example, I pureed a single perfect strawberry into a bowl of dressing for a group of 11. Not much of an investment, but suddenly we were dining on strawberry vinaigrette instead of just eating olive oil and vinegar.

Random Food Photos

We ate a lot of random food for dinner today. You know how it is; end of the week, gotta get rid of leftovers.

For what I suppose is called our entree, I pulled some aushak out of the freezer. Aushak are Afghan dumplings filled with a variety of herbs. For ours I used mint, cilantro, green onions, salt, pepper flakes, and an egg.

The finished product wasn't nearly as beautiful as my last version, but it was fine. One can't always care a lot about presentation.

For dessert, we were just going to have cherries, but N came over with cupcakes! I scarfed down the German chocolate, which was really moist and dense with a great nutty coconut frosting. I forgot all about my camera until it was 100% in my stomach. This is the red velvet, which N and her sister said was tasty. They are from That Takes the Cake in the Marina.

And, a preview of coming attractions. J's lunch tomorrow is a potato salad sandwich gussied up with red onions, cucumbers, and a few stray pieces of leftover salami. Like I said, at the end of the week anything goes together.

Broccoli and Bean Salad

Haha, chicken, I speared you! Yup, gotta check to make sure the meat's cooked before we dig in.

The broccoli salad was inspired by something I saw in the deli counter at a Middle Eastern restaurant. I'm not sure what exactly is in their version, but mine is as follows:

• 3 cups broccoli, crown broken into bite sized pieces and stem peeled and cubed
• 1 carrot, diced
• 2 cups whole wheat pasta (leftovers, in this case)
  
• 1/2 red onion, diced
• 1 cup cooked mixed beans
• 3 tablespoons (to taste) garlic balsamic vinaigrette (homemade)
• juice of 1/2 a lime
• salt and pepper to taste

Bring a pot of water to a boil and put in the carrots. After a minute, put in the broccoli. Boil for a minute to a minute and a half, depending how you like your vegetables. Drain and toss with the other ingredients. The beauty of this salad is that it's good warm, cold, or anywhere in between.

Celery Root Cucumber Salad

A perfectly balanced meal: four kinds of vegetables, red beans with rice (plain, no lard), and piece of grilled fish with a little salt and pepper.


I'm trying to take advantage of celery root while I can, since they don't always appear at the farmers market. This week I roasted them, then tossed them with cucumbers, romaine lettuce, and carrots in a mustard garlic vinaigrette. Next time I might try them raw in a slaw. I'm not sure they're worth the trouble, though. They do just kind of taste like celery. Where I really see them pulling their weight is in a puree or soup, where celery fibers are completely undesirable.

Calorie Break

I wouldn't say I overate this trip, and I even made it to the gym with C and J, my weightlifting role models. However, it's nice to be able to sit back and enjoy something like this instead of looking forward to restaurant food:

This is very improvised. I boiled a mix of beans and a half cup of Israeli cous cous in separate pans. When both were cooked, I drained them and mixed everything together with salt, pepper, paprika, parsley, chopped red onions, and some dijon mustard. Then I added some frozen peas and carrots for color and let everything mellow together in the fridge. When I was ready to eat I lightly tossed some chopped romaine with a storebought creamy garlic dressing, then topped with my grain salad. A squeeze of lime and a crack of pepper brighten this dish and bring it up to restaurant quality.

Crispy Ribs Salad

Someone complained to me this week that losing weight is too hard even with regular exercise because he/she loves red meat too too much. Sigh, don't I know it! I too love red meat more than many other foods. Still, there are many reasons to eat less meat: you'll save money, help the environment, and stave off the extra pounds. And when you do eat meat, make sure it's good!

Tonight we're having slow-cooked Prather Ranch ribs, but instead of each eating slab of meat with bread, rice, or potatoes we're balancing our meal with plenty of colorful vegetables. It's ideal for me because I get all the flavor of beef without that heavy feeling you get after eating too much greasy food. Like I keep telling people: if you take the effort to make sure you're actually eating 5 fruits and vegetables every day, you shouldn't have that much room left for the tasty but less healthy foods we all love.


First, I salt and peppered the ribs and stuck garlic slivers in several slits in the meat, then wrapped tightly in aluminum foil and baked for almost four hours in a 200 degree oven. When I was ready to eat I took off the foil and crisped the meat on the outside, then cut it into small pieces and set aside.


The salad is mixed greens tossed with a little garlic dressing, then topped with toasted flax seeds (or sesame seeds) and finely slivered carrots. Beets, corn, tomatoes, roasted asparagus, or roasted bell peppers would have made it even more delicious.