214: Indian Mustard Greens

You can Indian anything, apparently. I keep reading/making versions of Indian dishes that are (in my view at least) Baignan Bharta, but with another veggie. Not complaining, but eventually I'd like to try a vastly different preparation- one of those curries with coconut milk (oh wait I guess I tried that way back, but you know, better) or a samosa or something.

I used this recipe from food 52, adapted as I only had about 1/3 of the Mustard Greens the recipe called for. I waffled between using 1/4 to a 1/2 of the other ingredients, so my ratios are probably off. Oh! And I added hing, as I had it, and didn't add lemon juice. The latter was partially due to my general avoision of that flavor in savory dishes, and a little because acid would cut down on the bitterness of the greens, which is kind of my favorite part.

The result was a little harsh the night I made it- I think the turmeric was a little too prominent for my tastes, but after a night in the fridge everything had mellowed nicely. Would try again.

Delivery 21

I'm very much behind on this post, apologies. Many recipes are pulled from previous posts.

Potatoes - 2 pounds

Carrots - 1 pound 

Chiogga Beets - 1 pound

Garlic - 2 heads

Lacinato Kale - 1 bunch

Mustard Greens - 1 bunch

Radishes - 1 bunch

Thyme - 1 bunch

Romanesco Cauliflower - 1 head

Mustard Greens

Salads are tempting, but it's hard for me to turn down an Indian dish.

Chiogga Beets

Will take a picture of this pretties when I actually cook them, but in an effort to save plastic I didn't want to tear open the bag. They have bag of 15 lbs of beets for sale from my CSA. It's bad how tempted I am. Definitely want to preserve the color on these, so will likely use one of these recipes from the kitchn. Here are more raw beet recipes.

Rainbow Carrots

Raw salad to showcase the colors. Roasted with honey ginger butter. Salad with walnuts and radishes.

Potatoes

Roasted (bonus for rainbow carrots).

Radishes

Mango and radish salad. Radish curry. Oh man, maybe I'll actually make this crazy crazy bread.

Romanesco Cauliflower

Really want a recipe that keeps the cauliflower looking pretty, so a roast seems ideal.

Thyme

Roasting herb. Will throw it in where I can. Maybe I'll try drying it out? I can never use these things up in time.

Garlic

Used in other recipes, most likely. Can't afford to be precious.

Dinosaur Kale

All the salads, please. Here's one with balsamic vinegar and pine nuts. One with ricotta. Super simple with breadcrumbs and garlic.

175: Mustard Greens Salad

I warned you all, did I not? I've found my salad formula and will definitely stick with it. Today's iteration: finely sliced carrots, radishes and apples with mustard greens. The dressing is less complicated than previous versions- just oil, vinegar, mustard, salt and pepper. I figured the rest of my add-ins would make up for the sweetness lost from omitting the honey/maple syrup.

I like this salad better fresh, or more mustardy. It also seemed like the dressing drew water out of something in the salad, it was unfortunately thinned out a bit. Still good, just have to be mindful that while better than straight up mixing the salad, the mason jar salad transportation method isn't ideal. Maybe an excuse to buy this?

Delivery 17

Red Leaf Lettuce-2 heads Still having nightmares about the lettuce from the beginning of the season, so I switched out for more tomatillos

Mizuna-1 bunch

Mustard Greens-1 bunch

Radish-1 bunch

Potatoes-2 pounds

Cabbage-1 head

Tomatillos-10

Thyme-1 bunch

Rainbow Carrots-1 bunch

Hot Peppers - Habanero - take if you like

Ancho Peppers- 2

Sweet Peppers-2

Mustard Greens

The salad I made last week was just what I needed, so I'd like to do another raw preparation. Here are a few options.

Potatoes

A mix of red and white potatoes...and I still have some potatoes from last week that haven't found a recipe home. My time has been crazy limited lately, so I have a feeling that most things will probably be roasted/boiled. One of the mustard green recipes uses them. Here are some leftover recipes from other weeks: potato cake (with parsley), pancake, roasted (with cabbage), smashed (with cabbage).

Peppers

Rainbow of peppers! Bell, what they say is ancho (ancho is a dried poblano), cubanelle and habenero. Here's a frittata (bonus for potato). I may just roast them all and mix them with some kind of dressing.

Rainbow Carrots

Rainbow of carrots, too! I'm interested to see if the different colors taste different. Simple raw and roasted preparations are in order.

Cabbage

So...I still have that cabbage from two weeks ago. It's looking not-so-great. Can we just agree that I'll get to this when I get to this? But my perennial salad suggestion will hopefully not be the new pepper jelly (i.e. a recipe that I keep mentioning but never actually do)- it sounds lovely, but the "salt then let it sit for a few hours" gives me pause. When am I home for a few hours and then not on my way to bed?

It's a natural pairing with potatoes- here are some options: Ethiopian, Bolivian, more fried cakes, a few Indian preparations.

Broccoli

Makeshift "head" of broccoli...not sure it's worth making something dedicated out of this. I'm always in need of something simple (and healthy) to eat after interning on weekend, may just snack on these raw.

Tomatillos

These were smelling a bit musty, so as soon as I got home I washed and pureed. Will pick up some cheesecloth on the way home to strain out the juice for a tart. Or if not a tart, at least the curd portion of that tart. Any leftovers & pulp will probably be frozen/used in some kind of meat braise.

Thyme

Roasting herbage. Or biscuits, or popovers.

Radishes

Cherrette and one breakfast. Simple toast, salad (bonus for carrots), sandwich with herb butter, slaw with broccoli and carrot (technically daikon but I'd try it with regular).

Mizuna

Oh heeyyy Mizuna, long time no see. This post mentions an easy prep with potatoes, here's an insanely easy salad (hot garlic dressing), and here's a post on serious eats about it.

160: Mustard Green Salad with Apples

So, shocker, when you follow recipes, things can taste good. Nice simple salad- mustard greens, carrots and apples. Complicated dressing- mustard, maple syrup, olive oil, vinegar- all this loveliness can be found here. Made it for a nice detox dinner. I'd say my only complaint is that I would've liked to taste the greens more. I dressed it on the light side, too, it's just that all the flavors in the dressing masked the bitterness of the greens.

Definitely in the make again pile though,

Delivery 16

Lactino Kale - 1 bunch

Tomatillos - 10
French Breakfast/Cherriette Radishes - 1 bunch
Parsley - 1 bunch
Mustard Greens - 1 bunch
Bok Choy - 1 head
Broccoli - 3 These were feeling rather limp, so I hit up the swap table for more tomatillos!
Shallots - 4
Red Cabbage - 1
Peppers - 2

Hot Peppers - Serranos take if you like

Lactino Kale 

Why are people calling this Lactino Kale when it's also known as DINOSAUR kale. Seriously, so much more awesome and totally apt. Here's a raw salad, and some stuffed sweet potatoes.

Bok Choy

Hash, super easy saute, and I'm still feeling in need of soup.

Tomatillo

You could buy 10 lb bags of these from the farm that supplies the CSA. It was tempting, but I somehow refrained. I want to do something vastly different with these guys. Here's a tart, or some curd, a drink, or braised chicken. Ok and a guac, just in case I feel like dipping.

Radishes

I've had this salad on the list for ages, but now I actually have share radishes to make it with, so it will definitely happen soon. Greens are also nice! If I want to go simple here's a sandwich, or roasted. A few salads: detox and with mangos. And out of the blue a bit: curry!

Red Cabbage

No red cabbage on the swap table today. This is a little guy, so this won't hit as many recipes as the usual cabbage. Simple sweet and sour, a salad with white beans, a few slaws, cooked with apples, and a plain ol sear.

 

Mustard Greens 

There was a surprising amount of mustard greenage on the swap table, maybe people aren't as enamored of it as I am? I keep cooking them, this time I have to keep it raw. Here's a salad with anchovies and one with apples.

Peppers

So the long guys are probably cubanelles- I've just been eating them as easy snacks and will probably continue to do so. This looks really good, though anything with eggs is a winner for me. They're also often stuffed. I have a blacklog of hot peppers, maybe I'll finally get around to pickling them.

Shallots

I'll be posting something amazing with shallots soon, but, again, will mostly just try to use in place of onions/garlic in a few standard recipes.

Parsley

A few recipes mention parsley (at least one of the slaws has it), but here it is wilted on toast (with an egg- scroll down!)...and even further down the page there's a simple salad with lentils and a mustardy vinaigrette. Tabbouleh, a roulade (not gonna happen but cool), eggplant dip, potato cake.

154: Stuffed Squash

Stuffin stuff again...just thought this would look really cute, and it does.

Cooking for myself can involve a bunch of moving pieces. I only had one little winter squash left from my share this week, and I had the idea of making a nice mustard green and bulgur stuffing. But not being sure I'd like it and not wanting to be stuck with a ton of this specific stuffing for the rest of the week, I made a batch, cooked up my greens mixture separately, and mixed about what I needed. Now I have some leftover greens and bulgur to use up in vastly different ways if I'd like. It's a good technique to use for other grains as well.

Ingredients:

Bulgur:

1.5 cups veggie stock

1 cup bulgur

Greens:

2 small onions, diced

3 cloves of garlic, minced

1 portobello cap, chopped

1 bunch of mustard greens, stemmy bits removed (and nommed while cooking), chopped

~ veggie stock

~ salt, pepper

And last (but not least) 1 winter squash, cap removed, seeded (like a jack-o-lantern)

I started my squash (and cap) in a 350 degree oven, turned upside down. Meanwhile I brought the stock to a boil then poured over the bulgur (which was hanging out in a heat proof bowl). Covered and let that sit while I prepped everything else.

Sweat my onions (in a dry pan with a little salt), then added garlic and portobello. Once those had cooked sufficiently I added my chopped greens and mixed until they wilted. Deglazed with a bit of veggie stock, seasoned as needed. Mixed a small amount of bulgur in and adjusted the seasoning again.

By that time my squash had been in about a half hour, so I took it out, flipped it over, poked a bunch of fork holes in the flesh of the squash, then added my stuffing, popped the cap on, then threw it in the oven.

About a half hour later (a little longer, probably) I took my adorable squash out and nommed. It was good, though I have some reservations. There's something texturally a little meh to me about this kind of squash. I love how smooth butternut gets when roasted, this just felt a little...mealy? Though maybe it needed longer.

It also needed more seasoning, and I realized that while adorable, this style of containerizing the squash is very difficult to eat (though obviously easier once I'd cut it in half). I also would've liked more stuffing- the ratio was a little off. Next time I'd cut it half pole to pole, then mound it in. Actually (per my experimenting), I'd probably just harvest the squash and mix in with the stuffing, but yeah, this was totally adorable and worth it for the one.

Delivery 15

Bright Lights Swiss Chard - 1 bunch

Winter Squash - 2

Orient Express Eggplant - 2

Sage-1 bunch

Mustard Greens - 1 bunch

Bok Choy - 1 bunch

Shallots - 4

Cabbage - 1

Potatoes - 2 pounds

Peppers - 2

Hot Peppers - take if you like

Bok Choy

Not my favorite, but happy to have greens again. May give this away (I know one of my roommates is a fan) or will do something simple. Like a stir fry or roast. Here's a little roundup.

Chard

Have a dinner, so may remake that dip I forgot to take pics of. Also this comic is lovely and has a few ways of cooking the veg (and I'm starting to get a little obsessed with Dirt Candy). It'd also be a good mix with the squash and sage. Here it is creamed from smitten kitchen- a preparation I haven't tried yet.

Sage

Excited, as it means I get to buy chicken liver again. Liking the looks of this recipe, especially that it includes a recipe for shallot jam! I may have a little thyme in the fridge as well. Beyond that: a huuge roundup of recipe ideas. Also: biscuits.

Shallots

The aforementioned shallot jam, but otherwise using in everything, as shallots are so tasty.

Orient Express Eggplant

I'm considering something beyond Baynan Bharta. I think it's time for a longer break until I can taste the original. I have a cool recipe for jam from the Dirt Candy cookbook, or maybe babaganoush. Here's a stir fry, and a few from Macheesmo. More roasty from Bon Appetit.

Cabbage

Peanut Slaw from Cook's Illustrated (via Martha). I'm continuing to run low on ideas haha. Also the swap table was ENTIRELY cabbage, which was fairly hilarious. Here's a roundup (these are my favs, skimming). Also: fritters.

Potatoes

I have a ton of recipes from potato's earlier appearances in deliveries. Here's some bread (tired Kelly is a carb-craving Kelly)

Squash

Roasty toasty. These are most likely carnival squash. These would be good stuffed. Oh hey here's a pinterest board of recipes! Fav, skimmin: stuffed with spaghetti (sucker for an egg yolk!). Here's a preparation for acorn that I'd totally try out with this.

Peppers

Happy I remembered spicy peppers this time- not 100% sure what the big peppers are, but will probably just dice them and throw them into something.

Mustard Greens

Yay! So happy to see this guy again. I love this spicy green, may just do a raw salad. Here are a few from Martha. Here's an Indian dish! Salad with bulgur, another with garlic mayo, and another Indian preparation to round out the ideas.

Dish 17: Spring Rolls

What happens when I wander places: I find projects. 

I was running errands in Brooklyn with no easy subway connection. There were busses between all these places but I don't trust them, so I walked. I love walking in the city- at the very least I get to connect up neighborhoods in my mental map. Usually I happen upon something I've heard or read about. This time it was an Asian market. It was small but decently stocked.

They had spring roll wrappers and vermicelli. So of course I needed to make spring rolls. 

Granted, I'd also seen this post on Macheesmo (one of my favorite blogs) and it seemed like a good way to use up some of my share.

The wrappers (a term I prefer to skins) were odd. Well so was the vermicelli- they looked more like plastic than anything. But it's always good to try something new. This was my first time making vermicelli- the internet told me to cook it like spaghetti so I did. 

It was a little weird. The noodles got lost in the water (they kind of turned invisible), and when I pulled them out my first thought was "jellyfish," which isn't exactly appetizing. Still, I tried them periodically and removed them from the water when they seemed about cooked. They got tossed in a little sesame oil to keep them from sticking together.

I also chopped/grated up a bunch of share and non-share veggies: carrots and daikon leftover from kimchi and mustard greens, mizuna, and red sails lettuce. In the future I would have prepped more of the grated veg.

To assemble just soak the sheets til they're pliant (not terribly long, 10-15 seconds) then put you veggies in and roll em up. No pics of the process, but there are tons of wrappers in the package so just dive in.

I ended up mixing and matching ingredients. The most delicious had the most variety- and that sesame vermicelli. Next time I'd like to wrap them a little tighter- or make sure the greens are more compact. A few wanted to fall out as I ate them.

I also need to plan more about what to put inside. They were fine, but with a considered flavor combination they could be awesome. 

Was worried leftovers wouldn't hold up but they were fine. Its a great dish for summer too- very little cooking required.