Broccoli and Cauliflower Salad

2 cups fresh cauliflower cut in bite size florets

2 cups fresh broccoli cut in bite size florets*

1 carrot peeled and sliced julienne stye diagonally into 1/4 inch slices

1 small red,yellow or green bell pepper diced

1/2 cup prepared Italian salad dressing

In a large bowl mix the vegetables then add dressing and mix all ingredients well and refrigerate for 20 minutes or more.

Can be served immediately, but will have a better flavor if allowed some extra time to chill.

If giving it more than 30 minutes chill time it helps to stir it one more time to distribute the dressing that gravitates to the bottom.

Serves four.

Note: I like a jalapeño or some other hot pepper to spice this up.

I usually add some of the broccoli stems, but chop them first.

In late March, I attended the International Association of Culinary Professionals (IACP) meeting in Washington DC. While the theme was “Happy Birthday” to founding member Chef Jaques Pepin, the DC host team assembled a great list of local sponsors, tours, and three days of panels, seminars and workshops. Attendees went home with bags and minds full of goodies, information, and ideas.

Part of the eighty cake display.

The National Geographic presentation, derived from the National Geographic’s Food 2014 issue, gave me much food for thought. The image that sticks in my mind is an illustration of the amount of food an American family of four wastes each year. The piles of veggies behind the family and the meats in front forming a parade of waste is truly shocking, and disturbing. The article states that on average a typical American family of four tosses out 1,160 pounds of vegetables, dairy products, and meats in just a year!

Robert and Chef Tom at the Melissa’s table.

This has to stop.

Modern American refrigerators are large, and some of the food we buy gets lost and goes bad by the time we rediscover it deep in the bins and shelves. A quick twice a week survey of every bin and shelf in our fridges could cut out plenty of waste. Making a grocery list and sticking to it helps cut out overbuying, and waste as well.

Using leftovers efficiently and creatively helps eliminate waste. A common restaurant term is “cream of walk-in soup” – a soup made from scavenging the walk-in cooler for vegetables and other foods that need to be used before they go bad.

A website like recipekey.com can help the home cook use what they have on hand. You enter what you have and the site shows recipes using those ingredients by percentage. With tools like these you can use instead of lose foods to spoilage in your fridge and pantry.

As an example, the other day I had a few spears of asparagus, a nice bit of fresh cilantro, lemons, broccoli stems, celery, and some Melissa’s fire roasted red bell peppers in my fridge. There were some lentils in the pantry from Melissa’s Produce, so I decided a lentil vegetable salad was in the works. After a bit of chopping and mixing I had a great looking healthful salad for lunch. Without the lemon, and adding vegetable stock it could have been made as a soup. As for the amount of each ingredient you can vary the amount of broccoli, asparagus, bell pepper and celery significantly and still come up with a great tasting salad. This is a use-your-leftovers type of salad so feel free to experiment, and substitute ingredients as needed.

Lentil Asparagus Salad

1 1/2 to 2 Cups cooked lentils*

2-4 broccoli stems, peeled and sliced in 1/4 inch pieces

1 Cup chopped fresh cilantro*

1-2 stalks of celery, about ½ cup sliced thin

1/2 to 1 Cup chopped fresh red bell pepper, or fire roasted

½ pound fresh asparagus, cut into 1 inch lengths

1/4 Cup fresh squeezed lemon juice

3 Tablespoons olive oil

2 Tablespoons chopped green onions, optional

1 jalapeño chopped, optional

salt to taste

In a large mixing bowl, combine all ingredients except lemon and oil.

In a small bowl whisk oil and lemon juice together for ten-seconds or so, and pour over the salad.

Mix salad with spoon or toss with hands to incorporate the dressing. Ready to serve right away or refrigerate for 2-8 hours.

Serves 4 to 6.

*Red beans may be substituted for lentils

*Parsley may be substituted for cilantro.

Even though Melissa’s Produce gifted me some of their products to try my opinions are my own.

Last local broccoli of the year

Even though it is soup season there is still time to check out this Asian broccoli salad recipe. Since my Maryland gardening adventure began three years ago I’ve become much more knowledgeable about the growing seasons for vegetables. Before my gardening education  I didn’t realize how well broccoli grew in the fall. It thrives in the cooler weather and lack of bugs. If the weather is cool enough, broccoli planted in August and September grows fast and full. Big thick crowns of this healthy vegetable flourish in cold weather and can even withstand a bit a frost without damage.

The weather forecasters are really loving this big winter storm coming down on the bulk of the US earlier than usual. Almost everyone has heard of winter storm Astro by now. It has dumped up to sixteen inches of snow in parts of Minnesota and is just getting started. While us lucky folks in Maryland won’t get that type of winter weather, it is going to bring a hard freeze. Therefore it is time to get out to your local veggie farms and buy the last of the fresh broccoli, cauliflower, kale and other fall vegetables before it turns into frozen veggies!

I went off to Wilbur’s Farm yesterday in Kingsville, MD, just up the road from my home to buy what was left of their fresh veggies. I bought great looking broccoli that was just cut, and a sack full of various peppers. Knowing that it will be many months before I can buy fresh locally grown vegetables I made it a priority to get what I could before the big freeze comes on Thursday and Friday nights.

Mix it up

With the broccoli and peppers safely  back home in my kitchen I knew what I wanted to do with them. If you have not made a home made broccoli and bell pepper salad with an Asian vinaigrette you are missing out on one tasty salad. I usually make my own dressing but I had a bottle of Annie’s shitake vinaigrette salad dressing and put it to work. This is one of the easiest and healthiest salads out there. It shouldn’t take more than ten minutes to make, and can be eaten right away or chilled for 1-4 hours for optimum flavor. So before we get all the way into soup and hot foods season I hope you try this simple and delicious recipe. Don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter if you haven’t already, and please share this with friends and family.

Asian Broccoli and Bell Pepper Salad

2 cups of broccoli florets, cut into bite size pieces

1 1/2 cups red bell pepper diced large, about the size of a nickel

1/3-1/2 cup Annies shitake vinaigrette salad dressing, see note

1/4 to 1/2 cup thin sliced red onion

1-3 jalapeños sliced thin, optional

Mix all ingredients in a large mixing bowl.

Serve right away or chill up to four hours for best flavor. Roasted seaweed goes well with this as an edible garnish. Try the wasabi flavored seaweed for some added spice!

Serves six to eight

Note:

Try an Italian vinaigrette salad dressing for a nice variation and grate some parmesan cheese into it if you like.

Cauliflower goes well with this too. Try adding a cup of bite sized florets and reduce the broccoli to one cup.

As a chef I love the explosion of specialty food shops over the last twenty years. Within that explosion are oil and vinegar  shops scattered throughout the US. Back in 1999 my wife and I went to Austria on vacation and visited Vienna for a couple of days. At an open air market we had a good conversation with a local who was working the vinegar shop at the market and educated us on the old world’s vinegars. She related that she had lived in the US for a few years and most Americans don’t have a clue about quality vinegar. She sold me two different types of high quality vinegars that I experimented with for happily over a year.

Now days us foodies are so lucky to be able to find oil and vinegar shops in abundance. My wife and I took a day trip to Bethesda last week and discovered Secolari Atrisan oils and vinegars. The big difference between them and others is they are not a franchise. The owner and his wife take trips to California where all of their olive oils come from. They hand pick anything that goes in their store, but before it goes on the shelf they both have to agree it is worthy. If one of them doesn’t like the selection, out it goes. Tasting is free and encouraged in their shop and I tasted many vinegars and a few oils.

I came home with a Blackberry Vinegar and an Ancho Pepper Vinegar to play with. Since I had just gone to my favorite local farm in Kingsville yesterday and bought five pounds of green beans and six ears of bi-colored corn I knew what I was going to do. I cooked up the corn and ate three for dinner reserving the rest for a salad the next day. I steamed the green beans the next morning and chilled them in ice water. Now the stage was set for a perfect summer salad. I picked basil and jalapeño peppers from my garden and put it all together in the recipe below.

Here’s the important point I want to make. If you plan ahead and cook extra items you are already cooking for dinner then the next day’s food preparation can be a breeze. By cooking the corn and beans the night before you have part of the makings of this salad for the next day and it will take less than ten minutes to make the salad. This is a fast, easy, and healthy salad that just about anyone can make so give it a try and see what you think. Please share with friends and family and leave a comment on this recipe.

time to eat

Two Bean Salad with fresh Corn and Tomato

1 cup green beans, see note

1 1/2 cup cooked corn cut from the cob

1 can kidney beans, see note

3 sliced jalapeños, about 1/3 cup, or use diced green bell peppers

1 medium sized fresh tomato diced

1/2 cup sliced fresh basil, about 1/2 package

2-3 tablespoons olive oil

2-3 tablespoons white wine vinegar, see note

salt to taste, about 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon

To make this easy plan ahead and have steamed green beans the night before and cook extra, but take the beans for your salad out of the pot and chill in ice water then drain and refrigerate over night.

For the corn it’s pretty much the same thing. You cook an extra two ears and chill it in ice water. Cut it off the cob and refrigerate over night.

Rinse and drain kidney beans and put in a medium-large bowl.

Dice tomato and add to mixing bowl.

Slice jalapeños or dice bell peppers and add to bowl.

Dice tomato and add to bowl.

Add oil, vinegar and salt and mix gently.

If serving soon add basil otherwise wait until just before serving to add basil. They helps basil retain its green color instead of turning black.

Note:

Fresh or frozen green beans will work.

Chill your can of kidney beans the night before.

I used Secolari’s, (an oil and vinegar shop in Bethesda, MD) Ancho Pepper vinegar, but white wine or champagne vinegar will work also.

Summer provides us with so many lasting memories, and as a kid I couldn’t wait for school to be over and blissful summer to arrive. I loved many things about summer growing up in Lakewood,Colorado. It was a time for games like “kick-the-can, hide-n-seek, kickball in the street, and baseball at the nearby school yard. We also loved the pool four blocks from home and my brother and I went there often to beat the heat.

today’s harvest

The family camping trips into the majestic Rocky Mountains were a highlight each year. We would usually camp out and eat fresh caught trout cooked in a cast iron skillet over a campfire for dinner with pork and beans. When It got dark my brother and I would lay out on a picnic table or the ground if no picnic table was available and stare at the billions of stars one could see back in the 1960’s way up in the Colorado mountains. It was paradise on earth.

Back in Lakewood in a corner of our yard was a plot about ten feet wide by fifteen feet long for a veggie patch. I was the unofficial veggie gardener of the family taught by my grandfather and my dad on the art of growing one’s own food. I started young, about at tens years of age if memory serves me right, and I loved it! I grew radishes, carrots, green beans, corn, and beets. I would eat it all but not the beets.

eleven ounces of beets

It took another two decades before I would willingly eat the red monsters of the dirt. They were grown for my parents to enjoy, not us kids. Better late than never though as I have learned to not only like them, I love beets. I cook the beets greens in garlic infused olive oil with or without sliced mushrooms. I cook and eat the beets hot or make a variety of summer salads with them all through the season. Plain cooked, chilled and sliced beets are a colorful accompaniment to a green salad, or just by themselves with a drizzle of balsamic vinegar as a side dish.

salad time

Today I share with you a recipe using the first Chioggia Beets of the year from my garden. This heirloom beet named after a fishing village in Italy has a lovely candy striped inside and a soft red outside color pattern. They are more like a golden beet in taste then a typical Detroit Red Beet. This recipe can be used with whatever beets you have available, but best with golden beets if you can find them. So give it a try and have a great summer and a safe Fourth of July!

Golden Beet Salad with Champagne Vinaigrette

12 ounces fresh beets
3 tablespoons thin sliced fresh basil leaves (chiffonade sliced)
1 tablespoon champagne vinegar, or white wine vinegar
1 tablespoon olive oil, or walnut oil

Wash and trim beets and remove green tops.
Put beets in a pot with enough water to cover and bring to a boil. If your beets are global size it will take about 10-12 minutes to cook after they come to a boil. If bigger they will take 15-17 minutes to cook.
Cool beets in cold running water for 3 minutes.
Drain and trim any hair like roots, or peel if you wish.
Cut into bite sized pieces and tops with oil, basil and vinegar .
Chill for a half and hour or more and enjoy.
Serves four.

Note:
I like to start by putting my mixing bowl in the fridge to expedite the chilling process.
Cut up grapefruit sections are a nice addition to this salad.
I usually don’t peel organic beets.

Avocado and Salsa Salad

3 simple ingredients

In the world of fast, and healthy recipes this original salad I made up is one of my favorites. It takes no more than five minutes to prepare and it tastes great. You can use almost any store bought tomato salsa or home made like I do to make this salad. I think a salsa that has a fair amount of tomato juice in it works best, but if you are using something like Pace picante that is a bit thicker just squeeze some fresh lime on the greens before topping them with the avocado tomato mix.

It can be a meal or just a salad starter for lunch or dinner. Add jalapeños for a kick, or even olives. Let your imagination play around with this one. You could snap peas, broccoli, or shredded cabbage in it also.

The recipe is a simple as it gets:

one ripe avocado, cut into one inch cubes

1/3 cup salsa

about two cups of your favorite greens

ready to mix

Mix the cut up avocado with the salsa in a mixing bowl and spoon it over your greens.

I love avocados so much I’m always looking for new ways to incorporate them in my diet.

This weeks giveaway is a beautiful solid cherry cutting/serving board that I bought in Fairhope, Alabama while there visiting my Aunt. It’s so nice I’m having a hard time parting with it, but someone will win it just for taking the time to comment on this post. Could it be you?

cherry wood cutting board up for grabs