Potato, Kale and White Bean Soup

I adapted some Spanish/Portuguese Kale Soup recipes found on the internet, to make the soup just a little lighter, without skipping the meat altogether. So, instead of chorizo I used smoked turkey legs. A few weeks back, when I made this soup for the first time, I actually used turkey bacon, which made it even lighter. This picture was taken then, and as you can see, the vegetables overpowered the kale a little - so at Peter's suggestion (who wanted a kale soup more similar to my Lettuce and White Bean Soup, recipe to follow), I increased the amount of kale from 1 bunch to 2.

Ingredients (makes 8 servings):

1 large onion, finely chopped

2 bunches of kale, cleaned, thick stems removed, and cut in 1-1.5 cm strips

3 medium potatoes, diced

4 medium carrots, sliced

1 (14 oz) can white beans (or any beans of your choice, really), rinsed

1 smoked turkey leg, diced
5 cloves garlic, minced

64 oz chicken broth

2 Tbs olive/sunflower/vegetable oil

Preparation:

Heat the oil on medium in a large soup pot, saute the onions for 5 minutes, add the turkey, and cook for 2 minutes. Stir in the carrots and the potatoes, add a little water (about half a cup) and cook covered for ten minutes, stirring occasionally to avoid burning. In the meantime, in a large skillet wilt the kale, until almost done  - just add a little water (about 3/4 cup), and cook covered for 5-7 minutes. After ten minutes of sauteing, add the broth to the vegetables and turkey, cook for 15 minutes, then add the wilted kale, the minced garlic and the rinsed beans, and cook for another 5 minutes. It's best served with freshly grated Parmesan (we skipped it now, but maybe we won't next time). Enjoy!

Asparagus and Chicken with Whole Wheat Orzo

It's asparagus season! And as a fairly newly converted fan I can't resist the temptation, and on every Saturday, when we do our weekly grocery shopping I pick up a bunch from the store.

I've been quite busy lately, so dinner has to be quick and easy... Last night I threw together this light asparagus-orzo pasta (as you can see, I'm now a fan of orzo, too): it's much the same as the mushroom-asparagus orzo I made a few weeks ago, it just uses chicken instead of the portobello mushrooms. I omitted the shallots (truth be told, I completely forgot about them), and added some cherry tomatoes in the mix. Let me tell you, it was delicious!

I'm writing down the recipe quickly before I forget.

Ingredients (3 servings):

0.5 lb chicken breast fillets, cubed
1 lb fresh asparagus spears, trimmed and cut in 1 inch pieces
5 garlic cloves (yes, I know, we love garlic. Amount can be adjusted to taste)
8-10 pieces sun dried tomatoes, sliced
10 cherry tomatoes, halved
1 cup whole wheat orzo pasta
2.5 cups water or chicken broth
0.5 cups dry white wine
1 tablespoon Herbes de Provence
1 cube chicken bouillon (optional)
3 tbs olive oil

Note made on June 29th: last time I made it I used 1 lb chicken and 1 lb asparagus, and 1.5 cups orzo for 4 servings. I left out the cherry tomatoes as I didn't have any, and they turned out perfect that way too, it was a really nice variation.

Preparation:

In a large skillet heat 1 tbs olive oil, add chicken, season with salt and pepper and cook on medium until chicken pieces are no longer pink in the inside (5-7 minutes). Add the wine, bring to a boil, and cook the chicken one minute longer before adding the orzo pasta. Add 2-2.5 cups water or chicken broth, bring to a boil, add chicken bouillon if using, 1/3 of the garlic (optional - I only added them to the pasta because I realized I chopped up too much garlic for the asparagus, but eventually it turned out to be a good idea), and half of the Herbes de Provence. Cook uncovered until pasta is ready, 8-10 minutes, stirring frequently. Meanwhile, in a separate frying pan heat the remaining olive oil, add the rest of the garlic and the sun dried tomato strips, and cook for 2-3 minutes, being careful not to brown the garlic. Add the asparagus spears, season with salt, pepper and the remaining Herbes de Provence, and saute on medium to high until asparagus is softened but still firm and bright green (5-7 minutes, at the most). For the last 2 minutes of cooking, add the halved cherry tomatoes to the asparagus. When then pasta is ready, mix in the asparagus and tomatoes, and serve with freshly grated Parmesan and a green salad. Enjoy your quick dinner!

Portobello Mushrooms and Asparagus with Orzo

We bought some beautiful Portobello mushrooms last Saturday for grilling (broiling) with goat cheese, but my oven is still out of service, so I decided to use it up in a pasta dish together with the asparagus left over from Saturday's salmon. I almost felt proud for coming up with this recipe, but after a quick Google search I realized there's already a plethora of wonderful asparagus-mushroom pasta/risotto recipes out there, and there's virtually nothing I could possibly add to them.

Anyway, this is how I made it... I didn't follow any particular recipe, but I won't vouch for its originality. I'm posting it because we liked it so much, we plan to include it in our regular diet.

Ingredients for 4:

3 large Portobello mushrooms, cut in half an inch cubes
2 shallots, finely chopped
1 lb asparagus (I cooked with leftovers, so I used only half this time),  broken in 1-2 inch pieces
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
8-10 sun-dried tomatoes cut in thin strips (I'll use cherry tomatoes next time)
1.5 cups orzo pasta
2-2.5 cups water
0.5 cups fine dry white wine
1 small bunch parsley
1 tablespoon Herbes de of Provence
1 chicken bouillon (optional)
freshly grated Parmesan to taste (1/2 cups)
2 tablespoons olive oil

Preparation:
Saute the shallots with the garlic on medium until shallots become translucent (1-2 min.). Add Herbes de Provence and mushrooms and cook until browned (approx. 10 min). Meanwhile, in another frying pan heat 1 tbsp olive oil and stir fry the asparagus for about 5 minutes. It shouldn't be fully cooked, you want it crunchy and bright green. Add the sun-dried tomatoes tomatoes and pasta to the mushrooms and cook stirring constantly for 1-2 minutes, then pour in water and wine, bring to a boil, add chicken bouillon if using, and cook until al dente (7-8 minutes), adding more water if necessary. When ready, add the asparagus and the Parmesan, adjust the seasoning for salt and pepper, and sprinkle with fresh parsley. Serve with a nice leaf salad for a a main course, or with grilled chicken for a great side dish.
Enjoy!

Asparagus and Tomato au Gratin, with seafood

This is one of the very first dishes we were introduced to here in the US, more than seven years ago. And we have to thank Martine for it. Back in the day, she was a French graduate student at Peter's department at Caltech, and we shared an apartment with her for our first month in Pasadena. We also shared our love for garlic, cheese and wine (though understandably her knowledge of cheese and probably wine, too, far exceeded ours).

For this wonderfully simple asparagus-tomato au gratin you only need a bunch (approx. 1 lb.) of asparagus spears, cleaned, trimmed, and broken in 2 inches pieces, 3 Roma tomatoes, thinly sliced, a lot of minced garlic (as many as you like) - for this dinner I used 7 cloves, 2 tbs olive oil,  freshly ground pepper and sea salt, and 1 tablespoon Herbes de Provence. In a greased 8 inch baking dish simply layer the asparagus spears, half the garlic and seasoning, then the tomatoes, remaining seasoning and garlic, drizzle withe some more olive oil, and bake at 400 degrees for 15 minutes, or until tomatoes are softened. Serve with baked fish, or pan fried shellfish and rice. We usually serve it with mixed shellfish (or just scallops), but today I've decided to try it with baked salmon.

However, as simple as the recipe sounds, my life got a little bit complicated this evening, when my oven died on me just as I was about to pop in the prepared vegetables and fish... "What am I gonna do, what am I gonna do?" Here I was, on the verge of a panic attack, when I suddenly realized I could after all cook everything on the stove top... So I quickly heated some olive oil in two skillets, threw all the vegetables in one, placed the salmon in the other one, and everything was ready in 10 minutes (5 minutes for the vegetables, 10 for the fish). So what you see in the picture is not asparagus au gratin, but stir fried. It was still very good, and in the future, when I'm pressed for time, or it's too hot outside for baking, this is how I'll prepare it for a quick dinner.

Added July 15th:

It's July already and we still can't get enough asparagus... Today, after getting some great Gulf shrimps at a reasonable price at HEB, we decided to serve it with sauteed asparagus and tomatoes.

Shrimp is fairly easy and unbelievably quick to prepare, it takes (much) longer to peel and devein it than to cook it. I usually just sautee 3-4 cloves minced garlic in a little olive oil, add some pepper flakes and the shrimps, season with salt and some black pepper, and cook them turning once for 2-3 minutes, then add the juice of half a lemon, cook 1-2 minutes longer  and it's done (you can season it with chopped parsley, I just didn't have any today). 

Garlic Lovers' Salmon

Some years ago now, Peter got me an idea for a garlicky tomato sauce to serve with fish, after one of his December visits to San Francisco and its garlic restaurant, the Stinking Rose. As I've never served the original sauce myself, I had to reconstruct it from Peter's memory, which enterprise probably resulted in a fairly different sauce than the original must have been.

So I think I can safely call this recipe our very own creation: from Peter's input and my creative approach to seasoning a wonderful, yet very simple dish was born, which is on the menu in our home almost every week.

For real garlic lovers only!

Ingredients:
For the sauce:
1 (14 oz) can chopped tomatoes. Lately I've been using garlic and oregano seasoned tomatoes, but you can use any kind you like
1 tablespoon olive oil
 4-5 cloves garlic, finely chopped
10-12 large black olives, cut off their pits lengthwise
1 teaspoon Herbes de Provence
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
pepper flakes (to tastes, just to add a little heat to the sauce)
salt and pepper to taste

For the fish:
Two 4 oz fillets of salmon (your choice of salmon, we like Sockeye most)
Prepacked salmon and trout rub OR use the following mixture: Italian seasoning (basil, oregano, rosemary and thyme), 1 clove crushed garlic 1 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice, 1 teaspoon olive oil, salt and pepper
Olive oil for baking

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Add 1 tablespoon olive oil to a glass baking dish, season the salmon fillets with the salmon rub, if using. If not make a paste from the lemon juice, olive oil, Italian seasoning and garlic, season the fish with salt and pepper, then rub the prepared paste over it. Bake in the preheated oven for about 20 minutes.


In the meantime, prepare the sauce: In a saucepan, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil on medium, add chopped garlic, olives and crushed pepper flakes to the pan, and saute for 1-2 minutes. Add the canned tomato, season with salt, pepper, Herbes de Provence, sugar and balsamic vinegar, and cook until reduced, about 5 minutes.

Serve with rice and a glass of crisp Sauvignon Blanc!