Beet Salad with Oranges

 Gran Fran knows her way around beets. She would make them for us on a regular basis. Her salad involves only some olive oil and vinegar. And, she also cooks her with the skin on, removing it after cooking. Her method involves roasting the beets in the oven individually wrapped in foil (Gran Fran, let me know if I'm wrong here). Skinning the hot beets made me stay away from beet cooking for a good long time. My hands not only turned red from the juice, but also were slightly burned each time I tried to de-skin one of the beets.

My sister Danielle taught me this method, which turns your fingers red immediately, but leaves you with fewer burn marks on your hands. I think I end up with more beets, too. Using a vegetable peeler allows you to remove just the brown skin and preserve more of the good stuff.

I cook the beets in what will become the dressing for the final product, too, which gives you a really flavorful dressing. And, you are able to eat these hot, if you want to, without having to waste any time peeling off the skin.

The addition of oranges and sunflower seeds to this salad make it the perfect Spring-is-Here dish. It's fruity and earthy with just a little bit of crunch.

Featured on The Fruit Guys website.

Beet Salad with Oranges

INGREDIENTS

• 3 beets, skins peeled off, greens removed, cut into eighths.
• 1 small shallot, cut into quarters
• 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 orange cut into small pieces
• 1/2 teaspoon sunflower seeds
• Salt and pepper to taste

PREPARATION

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
2. Place the beet and shallots onto a rimmed baking sheet, or into a baking pan large enough to allow space between the pieces.
3. Mix together the vinegar, oil, salt and pepper and pour the mixture over the beets, making sure to coat all sides of the beets.
4. Roast the beets in the oven for 40 minutes, or until fork tender, turning the beets every ten minutes or so.
5. In a large bowl, mix together the warm beets with the orange segments.

Pasta with Romanesco Cauliflower...A Reminder of the Past

While I was pulling together all of the ingredients for this dish, I made a very interesting discovery.

I've been preparing to shoot and write this blog for close to 30 years.

In tenth grade we had to present a how-to project, complete with step-by-step instructions.  You know what I chose as my subject? My mom's pasta broccoli dish.

I remember being in the kitchen with Gran Fran, taking pictures with my sister's camera of each and every step of the process. My sister was kind enough to develop and print the photos for me, as she was a big-time college art student at the time. Suffice it to say, I was the only kid in the class who chose a food project, and who bothered to bring a big bowl of the finished product for the class to share.

Fast-forward to this past weekend when I found myself in my local farmer's market and I came across the above specimen of romanesco cauliflower. It took me a long time to take a knife to it, for fear of totally hacking it all to bits and losing the great geometric shapes that make up the whole. I carefully cut into the bottom of the stem and began to take the pieces off the stem. They were firm enough to keep their shape.

I was immediately brought back to my mom's kitchen the moment I put the parboiled romanesco into the hot saute pan to brown. Gran Fran makes very simple food, but with complex flavors. I took some liberties with her original recipe, and added some tuna, spicy italian vinegar pickled peppers and capers. It wasn't exactly like hers, but it sure was close, and it tasted the same as it did 30 years ago.

Like home.

Gluten-Free Pasta with Romanesco Cauliflower

Ingredients:

• 1 head Romanesco Cauliflower, cut into florets
• 1 can Solid White Tuna, drained
• 1/2 cup Olive Oil
• 2 cups Pasta, cooked (I used gluten-free rice pasta like this one from Tinkyada)
• 3 Tbsps Capers, drained
• 4 Pickled Italian Cherry Peppers

Method:

• Boil a large pot of salted water.
• Chop the peppers into small pieces, removing the stems.
• Once the water has boiled, add the pasta and a steamer basket on top of the pasta to parboil the romanesco cauliflower.
• Cook the romanesco for 3 minutes with the lid on.
• While the pasta/romanesco is boiling, heat a large skillet over high heat.
• Put the olive oil and the tuna in the saute pan and cook for 1 minute on high heat.
• Add the parboiled romanesco to the saute pan and cook for five minutes, or until beginning to brown.
• Put the capers and peppers in with the romanesco and cook for three minutes.
• Drain the pasta, rinse in cool water and  put in a large bowl.
• Mix the pasta and the tuna/romaesco mixture together and enjoy!

Veggies in the Oven: Cauliflower Gratin and Roasted Asparagus

 These two vegetable dishes are super easy to make and can be used as either a side dish or with some small additions, as a main dish. The roasted asparagus can be served with pasta and a poached egg, as a main dish. If you like, you can add bacon to the cauliflower gratin to make it just that much heartier.

Featured on The Fruit Guys website, here and here.

Cauliflower Gratin

Ingredients

• 1 head cauliflower, cut into florets, steamed for five minutes
• ¼ cup breadcrumbs (regular or Glutino gluten-free)
• ¼ cup grated Parmesan
• Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
2. Put the cauliflower into a casserole dish. Cover with breadcrumbs, grated Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper.
3. Bake for 20 minutes, until the breadcrumbs are browned and cheese is melted.

Roasted Asparagus

Ingredients

• 1 bunch asparagus stalks, bottoms trimmed off
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 450.
2. Place asparagus on a rimmed baking sheet and pour olive oil evenly over the top. Turn the asparagus over a few times to coat all sides in the olive oil.
3. Roast in the oven for 20 minutes, until the stalks become browned and wilted.

Avocados: Egg Smash-up, Smoothie and Guacamole

Years ago, when my parents were visiting from New York, I decided to serve them some avocados. Joe, my dad, was less than enthusiastic having only had unripe, unflavorful avocados up until this point.  He remarked upon how he stayed away from avocados at all cost because they were tasteless and held no appeal for him. His opinion was forever changed after I served him a California Haas avocado.

Once it was served up simply diced drizzled with some olive oil, pepper and salt, I thought his head was going to explode. I think he thought I was a magician of some sort because I had picked a perfect avocado.  The teacher in him asked me a million questions about why our avocados were so much tastier than any he had eaten before. And, how did I get that pit out so perfectly?

I figured it was because they are grown here and we are lucky enough to have a year-round variety, the Haas avocado, available at all times. The avocados we've had in New York are a harder, taller variety than the Haas. According to this website, I'm thinking Joe is getting something like a Zutano avocado. The taste is much lighter and not quite as creamy as the Haas.

I eat a lot of avocados. I'm also lucky enough to have a group of friends and co-workers who love food as much as I do. We don't work in the food industry, but we all love it. Whenever I'm trying to come up with a recipe for a particular ingredient, I tend to take input from everyone at work. I spend an equal amount of time working with them as I do working on this site, so it makes perfect sense that if I can make something they'll love to eat, we all win.

The egg smash-up is an Israeli dish, I think, that my friend Anastasia started making for us. It's really a simple mix of equal parts hard-boiled egg and avocado, with some salt and pepper. It's great on everything from toasted baguette to rice cakes. It'll keep you going for hours, too, so no need to worry about getting hungry anytime soon!

My friend Robby suggested the smoothie recipe. I was not always a fan of smoothies, but something about the combination of banana and avocado sounded good to me. You can use either regular milk or almond milk here. The almond milk gives it a nice nutty flavor. I don't recommend using rice milk, though, because it's almost too sweet next to the banana and honey. And, the combination of the almond milk, avocado and banana makes the smoothie smell like the beach.

Lastly, my other friend Ari makes a wonderful guacamole. I don't think mine even comes close. But, it does have a great fresh flavor and nice piquant onions to offset the smooth and tangy avocado.

I know when I'm in New York this summer, if I can find some avocados I'm going to break out these recipes and blow Joe's mind.

Avocado Smoothie

INGREDIENTS

• 1 avocado, sliced in half and removed from the skin
• 1 banana, sliced
• ½ cup milk
• ½ teaspoon honey
• Ice cubes

PREPARATION

• Put all the ingredients in a blender and blend until the ice cubes have been completely crushed.

Serves 2. Prep time, 5 minutes; cook time, 0 minutes.

Cook’s note:  You can use almond milk or rice milk instead of regular milk.

Avocado Guacamole

INGREDIENTS

• 1 avocado, sliced into cubes and removed from the skin
• 1 small onion finely chopped
• 1 small tomato, cubed
• ½ teaspoon cumin
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon olive oil

PREPARATION

• In a large bowl, mash the avocado until creamy.
• Stir in the onions, tomato pieces, spices and oil.
• Give the mixture one more run through with the masher.

Serves 4. Prep time, 5 minutes; cook time, 0 minutes.

Avocado and Egg Spread

INGREDIENTS

• 1 avocado, sliced in half and removed from the skin
• 2 hard-boiled eggs
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

PREPARATION

• Place all the ingredients in a bowl and mash well with a fork.
• Serve on toasted bread.

Serves 2. Prep time, 5 minutes; cook time, 0 minutes.