Weekend Appetizer: Trio of Zippy Summer Veggies for bread or lettuce cups

Although fall is beginning to creep in (though you could not tell with 103 degree weather) as evidenced by swim suits banished from store racks, temporary Halloween stores moving in, e-mails about Restaurant Week, and a sign at the farmer's market "we still have peaches", I am still delighting in the challenge of the seemingly never ending supply of peppers, cucumbers, squash and lettuce. That is the beauty of the CSA box-when you get the same things multiple weeks in a row it really gets your noggin going about different ways to try eating the vegetables. 

This week my challenge was lettuce-I do salads (today was tuna sashimi with bean sprouts, japanese seaweed salad and some mae ploy sauce to combat the warm weather), spring rolls, Vietnamese noodle salad (bun), Japanese somen noodle salad (using a rice noodle now of course), tacos and bedding for enchiladas. I even tried doing a baked lettuce dish once a few years ago (I pretty much took the whole thing home from the potluck I brought it to).  Even with this variety I get to the point where I do not want to order salad out at a restaurant.

So what to do with the dreaded iceberg-my least favorite as it tastes like nothing. My train of thought: What goes well with "nothing"?  Something really flavorful that needs a partner that lets it shine. Then the light bulb, ohhh-Eggplant tapenade that I made a couple years back! Buttery soft eggplant when cooked right, hob nobbing with Italian herbs and zesty tomato, could be lovingly plopped into lettuce cups. Or if you happen to have a fresh batch of bread (I really adore this bun recipe . You must use a scale, but has worked magically with whatever combo of gluten free flours I have in the pantry.)

Eggplant tapenade, roasted peppers and marinated mushrooms-made 3 light servings

This makes for a fine appetizer or light meal. Plan to make this on a weekend when you have lots of time or grab some helping hands for prepping and measuring ingredients.

 

 To start get your oven preheated to 400F OR You could probably try putting this on the grill if you want to avoid turning on the oven in the summer heat (not sure what the cooking times are like) but use foil on the eggplant to keep the sauce in and if you have one, a metal cooking basket on the peppers.

 Eggplant tapenade adapted from Vegetarian Times Complete Cookbook

1.5 tsp salt*

2 tsp olive oil

1 cup finely chopped onion

1 tbsp minced garlic

½ tsp dried basil

½ tsp dried oregano

1 tbsp tomato paste

     

      1.       Peel and dice the eggplant. I chopped up the skin and saved it to add in later.

           2.   Remove bitter juices from eggplant. *See options below if sodium is of concern to your diet.

Option 1: sprinkle with ½ tsp of salt and place on paper towels (or tea towel for lint free-no-paper-wasting) to drain.  This will help remove the bitterness from eggplant.

Option 2 (low sodium)  I researched online and BDL at cheftalk.com says you could try using less bitter eggplant such as Japanese variety   or younger, smaller Italian eggplant  

 

Option 3 (low sodium) BDL also says  you can cook twice to remove the bitterness. For this recipe you can sauté the eggplant a few minutes and drain on a towel/tea towel and then add into the tomato sauce in the next step. 

     3.        Heat the oil over medium high heat in a medium saucepan (oven proof it you have it), adding the onion (and eggplant skin chopped up if you like), stir often and cook about 1 minute.  Add remaining salt, basil and oregano. Continue stirring and cook 1 minute more. Add in the tomato paste and eggplant. Cook until eggplant begins to soften about 3 minutes.

    4.       Transfer into a baking dish if your sauce pan isn’t oven proof. Place in the oven to bake uncovered about 30-35 minutes. Stirring once or twice during this time, checking to see if eggplant is completely softened.

Roasted Peppers from Vegetarian Times Complete Cookbook

1 red and 1 yellow sweet pepper, cut into ¼” thick slices

½ tsp red wine vinegar

1-2 tsp olive oil

    1.        Mix the red wine vinegar and olive oil together. Drizzle over the peppers in a bowl and toss to coat evenly.

    2.       Spread out on foil atop a baking sheet. Keep in the oven about 25-30 minutes with the eggplant, until tender and some charring on the peppers occurs.

Marinated Mushrooms-from Vegetarian cookbook edited by Nicola Graimes.

8 ounces brown cremini or white button mushrooms, washed and quartered

2 tsp ketchup

2 tsp lemon juice

2 tbsp milk substitute (I used hemp milk)

While your eggplant and peppers are roasting in the oven.  Put mushrooms into a small saucepan with ketchup, lemon juice and milk. Simmer for 5 minutes until most of the liquid has evaporated and mushrooms are tender.

What are you going to be doing for Halloween? Have you ever been a food object?

Summer Sniffles-Remedies & Chipotle Vegetarian Chili

The dreaded summer cold has found me. Snuffling around, building sinus pressure and having my normal "Daria" voice drop to an even lower pitch makes me slow down and take care. Things that make me feel better:

1. Light exercise-Consider what kind of symptoms are present. With symptoms limited to the neck and above and without fever, I have the energy to still move about this time. Monday at the gym was wearing work out gloves, not coughing or sneezing so hopefully did not spread any germs (at the time I thought it could be allergies and wanted to motivate my friend to go this week).  I'll use sanitary spray now that symptoms have been lingering. Tuesday, I found some gentle yoga poses here that felt nice. Wednesday was resting. Thursday just breaking a sweat doing an easy jog in the cooler evening seemed to help my nasal congestion. No pressure to push it.

2. Wellness Formula-Shades swears by it. And so do I. He got it from a holistic minded practitioner. If you get take it early enough it can prevent. But otherwise, seems to reduce the severity. They have it on bodybuilding.com or if you need it right away, their website lists stores who carry it . In San Diego I have got it at Sprouts and Whole Foods before. A little pricey taking 3 tablets every 3 hours when sick but I think feeling 10x better is worth it. They are horse pills so get a big glass o' water!

3. Restful activities-an obvious treatment but I still know a lot of people who just plow on through pretending like their body isn't crying for rest. I like being propped up with pillows of all sizes on the couch for reading (a touch of practical, some for fun like Game of Thrones or Dead Beat about obituary readers and writers, some for inspiration like Food Truck cookbook/stories), cracking up over Project Runway, and going to bed early.

4. I know you want the edibles. My buddy Karin recommended a hot drink (ingredients pictured) to stave off a cold and/or its symptoms. I like to put it in my favorite pretty big mugs. Pretty things for when you're not feeling pretty inside.

5. Apparently heating foods like onion and garlic are good for when you are sick. I heard this taking a series of yoga weekend workshops this year. Supposed to be part of ayurvedic medicine. So the thought is to use less of them when you are healthy and use it to help your body fight. I would like to learn more about Ayurveda. I hear it often around yogis but embarrassingly don't know much except each person has a dominant element or type of energy..something like that. I bet the yoga studio I attend has a good book, but can anyone have experience or on the contrary does anyone poo-poo this?

6.  Spicy foods-I like making the Korean instant spicy soups (another recommendation from Karin back in the college days) to numb itchy or sore throats, but to be honest I cannot tell what is in the "kimchi powder"-it could be ingredients I am not supposed to have. So I made an adapted vegetarian version of Rachel Ray's turkey chipotle stoup (stew/soup) with bountiful summer peppers and canned chipotle. On my ALCAT results I am not supposed to have chili powder, chipotle or paprika...but I have not started yet. Getting used to dairy and soy. I think it's easier to let go/reduce of a few things at a time, while I finish off the perishable no-no items before starting the detox anyway.

Chipotle Vegetarian Chili

This recipe can turn into a weekend (aka time intensive) if you don't use short cuts. You may need to plan ahead. You could do chopping, the stock and beans on a leisurely day and make the rest on a busy though-it cooks together in under 20 minutes. It makes about 4 servings.

3 cups home-made or store bought veggie stock
1 cup dried kidney beans-soaked overnight, then cooked (~1 hour) or about 2 cups canned kidney beans rinsed
1/2 cup diced red onions
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tbsp chili powder
2 tsp olive oil
2 canned chipotles, chopped finely
2 cups chopped sweet peppers
1 cup chopped tomato
pinch of smoked (or regular) salt (to taste)-got mine at Little Italy's Saturday market. (my friend Jeff says it's easy to make, but my little test tube has lasted a couple years so I haven't got around to trying)

1. Heat a pot that can hold at least 5 cups of liquid on medium-high. Add the olive oil allowing to heat up for a couple minutes. Then add onion, garlic, chili powder and chipotles to cook about 5 minutes.

2. Add your stock, tomatoes and beans. Bring to boil and then  reduce heat. Simmer 10 minutes.

3. Slurp and sooth your throat with this fiery concoction.

What are your best activities or consumables for when you're under the weather?