A way to eat a lot of vegetables........

One way to eat as many vegetables as the latest nutrition pyramids say are good for us is to cook a lot of different vegetables together. Last night I was inspired by what was still growing in the garden: one zucchini, two small green peppers, and a chili pepper. I got out a large frying pan and covered the bottom with about 3 tablespoons of olive oil. I roughly chopped one onion and 2 cloves of garlic and cooked them until soft. I sliced the zucchini and peppers and added them to the pan. I cooked this all together for a few minutes, until the vegetables were getting soft. Then I added a box of frozen sweet corn and a good pinch of salt. I covered the pan and let it all cook for about five minutes more. During that time I added about 4 tablespoons of water to keep things from drying out. I then served this with chicken cutlets, an old family favorite.

Pasta with Broccoli

Here is a super quick dinner idea---pasta with broccoli. We were introduced to
this recipe many years ago in an (southern) Italian restaurant in New Haven. We passed it on to my northern Italian mother who embraced it, despite regional differences. It’s agreat choice when all you have is a head of broccoli and the time it takes to boil waterand cook spaghetti. Fill your spaghetti-cooking pot about 2/3 with water. Cover and put over high heat. Take a large frying pan and add about 3 tablespoons of olive oil to cover the bottom of the pan. Smash 2 garlic cloves with the side of your chef’s knife, chop them, and add tothe oil. Turn heat to low. Cook until garlic is soft and golden, but not brown. Prepareone head of broccoli: I cut off the bottom of the stems and peel off the tough skin. (My daughter Kate says that peeling is totally unnecessary.) Then cut the stalk and the top into small pieces, add to the garlic in the pan with about ½ teaspoon salt. Cover and cook over medium heat until the broccoli is soft. Sprinkle with a pinch of red pepper flakes and turn off the heat. When the water boils, add one teaspoon salt and the spaghetti or other pasta shape to the pot. This time, I used ½ of ziti pound for two people. Just before the pasta is done, add a ladleful or two of the water in the pot to the broccoli to make it saucy and turn on the heat. Drain the pasta, add it to the frying pan, mix with the broccoli, and add more salt or pepper flakes if you like. Finish the dish with a dribble of extra virgin olive oil.

Antipasti for Dinner

One of my favorite dinners is to combine two or three “antipasti,” dishes my mother would have served to company as a first course, before plates of pasta and then meat. For a week-night dinner, we stop with course number one. The other night we had tuna and bean salad, asparagus, a peeled roasted red pepper, and a boiled potato served with a green sauce made of parsley. The tuna and bean salad is a great healthy substitute for the normal tuna salad--no mayonnaise—and it’s as easy as opening 3 cans! Open 2 cans of white or red kidney beans and drain the liquid in a strainer. I try to buy beans that have no added sugar. Put them in a serving bowl with ½ a medium onion, slice thin, sprinkle with about ½ teaspoon of salt, and toss together. Drain a can of tuna fish. I like it packed in oil, but it’s hard to find here. Add the tuna to the bowl and break it up with a fork. You can also add two tablespoons of chopped parsley, but it’s not required. Pour on enough olive oil to coat the salad well, about 3 tablespoons, and 1 or 2 tablespoons of red wine vinegar. Add about 4 twists of black pepper from a pepper mill and mix all the ingredients together. Feel free to add more salt, pepper, oil or vinegar to please your taste.

Salad: A Very Fast Dinner

Last night I had no time to shop and only fifteen minutes to get dinner ready. Having just heard a lecture on nutrition, I wanted to combine speed, good flavor, and healthy food. I decided on a large salad. I hard-boiled one egg and opened a can of tuna fish. I put the tuna in the bottom of my largest salad bowl and broke it up with a fork. Then I searched the refrigerator and retrieved a red pepper, a quarter of an onion, about 6 black Greek olives, and found 2 tomatoes on the counter (some of the last ones from the garden. If I had to buy tomatoes, I’d get the little grape tomatoes sold in a small container). I cut-up the pepper and tomatoes, sliced the onion thin, and pitted the olives. I’d also consider scallions, avocado, fennel, cucumber, and carrots as possible additions. I had a head of romaine lettuce in the fridge, so I washed, dried and tore the leaves into pieces. I like a variety of greens, so I added some basil and arugula leaves. Those pre-washed bags of salad would make this even faster. Although I buy them occasionally, I think the lettuce that you wash yourself tastes fresher and lasts longer. Finally I added the sliced egg, sprinkled on a good pinch of salt and ground some black pepper over it all. For the dressing, I poured on 1 tablespoon of vinegar and about 3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil and tossed everything together. Along with one shared pita bread, the salad had everything we needed for dinner.

For home-grown tomatoes only

This recipe for spaghetti with uncooked tomato sauce is directed toward those lucky people who have access to home-grown tomatoes. Making it with tomatoes that you buy at the supermarket is not an option. For two people, I used four medium size tomatoes from my garden (about a pound). I peeled the skin off, cut them into small cubes and put them in my pasta bowl. I added one small clove of garlic finely chopped (actually I grated it) and about ½ cup of fresh basil leaves torn into pieces. The only other ingredients are about 1 t. salt, ½ t. red pepper flakes, and about 4 T. of extra virgin olive oil. I cooked ½ pound of spaghetti while making the sauce. (I always use Italian spaghetti, De Cecco or Barilla brands) When it was cooked, but before it was mushy, I drained it well, added it to the bowl and tossed it with the sauce. Serve it right away because it will cool off quickly!

Very healthy soup for dinner

Green Posole

I was moved to make this because I have a huge tomatillo plant in my garden. I had picked about 8 tomatillos, not enough for salsa, but still crying to be used. I found this recipe in World Vegetarian by Madhur Jaffrey, a very good book. I took some shortcuts and used chicken broth, but stayed fairly close to the recipe.

I had one can of hominy, about 15 ounces, and one can of cannellini beans. I broiled, peeled and chopped about 6 long green chiles. In my large pot, I sauteed 3 cloves of chopped garlic until soft and then added about 8 chopped tomatillos, 1 jalapeno and a bunch of chopped scallions. (I chopped them in my food processor). I cooked them for about 5 minutes and then added 1 t. of ground cumin and about 8-12 medium mushrooms, brown or white. They cooked for 2 minutes and then I added the chopped chiles, 1 T. dried oregano and ¼ cup chopped cilantro and the drained and rinsed hominy and beans. I covered it all with 1 quart of chicken broth. Of course you could use vegetable broth or water. To finish, add about 1 T. salt and bring to a boil. Cover and turn the heat to low. Cook for about an hour. I served it with chopped cilantro, diced avocado and lots of lime. It tasted great and felt very healthy.

Potatoes with Lemon

Potatoes with Lemon

I recently got a very nice gift certificate for Amazon.com and have used it to buy several great new cookbooks. I’m quite excited to have some new inspiration. Last night I made potatoes using a recipe in Easy Italian. For the two of us, I used 3 Yukon gold potatoes, cutting them in half lengthwise and into wedges—about six from each half. I put them in a bowl with 2 chopped cloves of garlic. Then I cut a lemon in half lengthwise, cut each half into thirds, and each third in half. I put the lemon pieces in the bowl with the potatoes, squeezing out the juice with my hands. I added about 2 T. of fresh oregano leaves, but any herb you like would be fine. Last, I sprinkled in salt, pepper and enough olive oil to moisten all the potatoes. I put them into a baking dish and put them in a 425 degree oven for about 30 minutes or until they were cooked and brown, turning them with a spatula halfway through. Since we were having fish for dinner, I seasoned the piece with salt, pepper, lemon juice and olive oil and then placed it in the center of the potatoes for the last 10 minutes they were cooking. Of course, you could leave out the fish all together. It was the first time we ate baked lemon pieces—very good!