Archive for the ‘Quick and Easy’ tag
Cold Avocado Soup with Lobster and Scallions
Last weekend I got together with a number of the New York Food52 members for a potluck picnic in Central Park. Elina (a.k.a. The Naked Beet) organized a wonderful get together on Sheep’s Meadow, with great turnout and amazing food. My contribution was a cold avocado soup with lobster and scallions.
Bok Choy with Miso Butter
This recipe is another great reason to have miso in your refrigerator, in addition to the miso soup recipe I just put up. Miso keeps forever in your fridge, and this recipe is so easy that it’s even tough to say that it’s a “recipe”. This dish takes five minutes from start to finish, and it will become one of your favorites immediately. The miso butter idea is David Chang’s (of Momofuku, if you haven’t ever read this blog before or don’t live in New York) that I’ve appropriated and applied to every steamed vegetable I can get my hands on. I first tasted it three years ago at Momofuku Noodle Bar, where it was served over asparagus with a poached egg. Heaven. Give it a try; you won’t regret it. Trust me.
Miso Soup from Scratch
I don’t know about you, but one of my favorite parts of eating sushi is the miso soup. For years I ate the thin, watery soup that you get from every sushi delivery joint, and loved it, not knowing that there was something else beyond takeout miso soup. Then I bought miso for the first time to make a miso butter (more on that here) and I made my own miso soup. Guess what? It blows that takeout stuff right out of the water.
Whiting Croquettes with Truffled Tartar Sauce
Yesterday at the store I came across an ugly, often overlooked fish: the whiting. When I say “often overlooked” I say this because I never even give them a second glance at the fish counter. They’re small and ugly. They don’t have enough meat to be able to fillet them and cook them as a meal. I decided that I should give this fish a chance, and I picked one out to try as an experiment. This is one of those recipes that goes under the “just crazy enough to work” category.
Quick Key Lime Pie
Last night we went to a friend’s place for a little dinner party, and I was tasked with bringing dessert. I decided to make a quick key lime pie, which is an excellent springtime dessert that will take you about 10 minutes to put together and 10 minutes to cook. No one will ever know how easy it was when they taste it, believe me:
Stuffed Baby Eggplants with Goat Cheese and Pine Nuts
Tina over at Choosy Beggars summed up my feelings on baby eggplants quite nicely in this post. I feel compelled to buy them, though I don’t always have a recipe in mind. You could fry them in strips and make a miniature eggplant parmesan starter, or chop them and add it to stir fry. But that takes away the appeal of the miniature eggplant. I prefer to keep them intact, and stuff them with cheese. What could be better?
Modified Carpaccio: Steak with Arugula, Lemon, and Parmesan
Yesterday for dinner I decided to give Merrill’s recipe for steak, arugula, lemon and parmesan from Food52 a try. Merrill is one of the founders of Food52, and this recipe looked like exactly what I wanted: something easy, fresh, and tasty. I love carpaccio, and the wine bar down the street serves it pretty much like this, over a bed of arugula with olive oil, lemon, parmesan, and a bit of balsamic. Merrill’s use of steak made it more attractive as a full meal, while still maintaining those fresh flavors. I was sold. Her pictures are prettier than mine, but here’s the dish:
The Season Is Here: Soft Shell Crab with Sweet Corn Salad and Chipotle Aioli
Despite the recent “chill” in the air, today I stumbled across a sure sign of spring: the first batch of fresh, live, soft shell crabs at Citarella. Nothing makes me happier than a nice fried soft shell crab, and now I’ve got three months of crab season to look forward to. The fact that it coincides with my favorite season of the year has a *little* to do with it, but either way, I’m psyched:
Orecchiette with Snap Peas, Prosciutto, Cream and Mint
The second Food52 contest this week was for spring peas. I decided to put together a little spring pasta with a cream sauce, just because that’s my favorite way to eat pasta. Peas always go well in cream sauces (I have made one with smoked salmon and peas before that is great) and diced prosciutto is another favorite. Put all this together, and you get this:
Mark Bittman’s Expedited Tagine
Mark Bittman’s Minimalist Column in the New York Times is frequent stop on my internet food travels, but I have to give Kate credit for pointing this recipe out to me yesterday. It seems that anything he makes with chickpeas is worth our time, so I decided to give this recipe a try. I don’t own a tagine, as most people don’t, but a dutch oven worked just fine. You can’t serve it at the table like they do with a real tagine, but we obviously weren’t going for authenticity here. The beauty of a true one-pot meal is often overlooked (and in my case, rarely achieved…usually I wind up using every pot I own in the course of making a meal). This dish is a winner for its simplicity and the use of a flavor profile that most of us don’t experience every day.
