Minestrone Soup

This flexible recipe is a lovely meal all on its own. It’s specially exciting if you have some pesto and croutons to top it.

Ingredients:

2 tbs olive oil

1 onion, chopped

3 or 4 carrots, sliced

2 celery sticks (optional, but add lots of good flavor)

4 to 6 cloves garlic

1/2 cup tomato paste, or 1 cup of tomato sauce, or 3 medium tomatoes, finely chopped

2 potatoes and/or 1 or 2 zucchini or other summer squash and/or green beans, or other seasonal veggies, chopped

2 cups spinach and/or kale and/or turnip greens and/or beet greens or other seasonal greens

1 tbs fresh oregano or 1 tsp dried oregano

1 tbs fresh thyme or 1 tsp dried thyme

2 or 3 bay leaves

8 to 10 cups water and 3 cubes vegetable bouillon or 8 cups liquid vegetable broth

1 tsp salt or more as desired

1 tsp pepper (optional, but cooks in to add wonderful flavor)

1 cup pasta (elbow, rotini or shell pasta works well)

2 to 3 cups cooked white beans (black eyed peas work well, too!)

Optional Toppings—

lemon juice

parmesan or nutritional yeast

parsley

basil

microgreens

INSTRUCTIONS

In a pan, saute onions with olive oil for a few minutes, when starting to become translucent, add chopped garlic, carrots and celery and saute for 3 more minutes. Add a splash of water if it’s looking too dry

In a pot, add the water and bouillon or vegetable broth, cooked beans, sauteed onion, carrots, celery and garlic, chopped potatoes/zucchini, summer squash/green beans, herbs and spices, cover and bring to a medium boil for 10 or 15 minutes, until the potato is cooked through

Add pasta and greens and boil for a few more minutes until the pasta is cooked.

Serve hot and serve with any or all of the optional toppings for your steamy enjoyment!

Vegetarian Quiche

As we look ahead to spring picnics with those we love, I finally took the leap into my first attempt at making quiche. I'm happy to report the kids cheerfully ate it (that’s the ultimate test these days) and I have lots of ideas for making it even yummier next time. It’s the perfect make-ahead-of-time dish to share outdoors. The chickens are happily laying eggs and the chard this week is beautiful, so I figure it is the season. Here’s my flexible recipe for future experimentation:

INGREDIENTS

For the Crust—

4 cups almond meal

1 tsp salt

4 heaping tbs coconut oil (melted)

2 eggs

As a Topping—

½ box (6 to 8) mushrooms, chopped in 1/4s, drizzled with olive oil and salted, baked at 400 until lightly crisped (about 10 minutes)

For the Filling—

Around 6 cups of greens, finely chopped (last time this was ½ bag of spinach and 3 large chard leaves, but kale, amaranth, dandelion, verdolagas --that is purslane, in English-- or even turnip greens would work!)

2 large leeks or 6 green onions or 1 medium onion, finely chopped 

3 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped

1 tbs coconut or olive oil

8 eggs (to make 1 pie pan plus 4 cupcake-sized mini quiches)-- reduce to 6 eggs if you only want the pie. 

1 tsp salt (drop this a bit if you use an herb mix that already has salt)

2 tsp dried herbs or 2 tbs fresh herbs (This first time, I went with the dried --1 tsp Trader Joe’s 21 season salute and 1 tsp thyme--because I was cooking this on a late, rainy night and didn’t want to go harvest the fresh stuff. Next time, though, I’ll be sure to use fresh herbs, I’m thinking marjoram and rosemary. Fresh makes a big difference!)

2 heaping tbs nutritional yeast or ¼ to 1/2 cup cheese, whatever type floats your boat! My boat skips the cheese (C:)

pepper to taste

1 cup sun dried tomato

INSTRUCTIONS

For the Crust—

Mix salt and almond meal in a large bowl. Add in the coconut oil, then the eggs. It’s recommended that you let it chill for a while, but I skipped this step and it came out just fine! In a greased (just rub it down with coconut oil) pie pan, and/or cupcake tin lined with baking cups, press and pinch the dough in to form the crust. Set it aside while you prepare the filling.

For the Filling—
Saute the leeks or onions for a few minutes, then add the garlic and stir for another minute, then add the greens and stir for another minute or two until slightly wilted but still bright green. Let cool.

In a large bowl, mix the eggs, with the salt, pepper, herbs and nutritional yeast or cheese. Then mix in your sauteed greens, leeks/onions and garlic from the pan.

Stir in the sun-dried tomato.

Scoop the filling into the crust.

As a Topping—

If you’re adding mushrooms, place them on top.

Bake at 375 or 400 for 35-45 minutes (25 for the mini quiches!)

Eat right away or refrigerate to save for later. You can put it back in the oven for 10 minutes if you’d like to serve warm at a later time. Enjoy!

Green Potato Leek Soup with Mushrooms

INGREDIENTS

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

2 to 3 large leeks, thinly sliced

3 to 4 cloves of garlic, sliced

3 to 4 cups greens, thinly sliced and then chopped up into small short pieces (Here, you can consider using up all the limp celery you didn’t get to in the last weeks, leaves and all! Kale, collards, spinach, turnip or beet greens, chard all will work. Mix and match. This is your chance to clear out the old greens to make space for the new!

2 to 3 potatoes, sliced into 1-inch slices and then cut into half moons (No, I don’t peel my potatoes! But I do make sure they’re organic. If you don’t have access to organic potatoes, maybe it is worth the trouble of peeling them. Potatoes are amongst the heaviest-pesticide-carrying crop in the industrialized agriculture fields.)

salt and pepper to taste

2 to 3 bay leaves

1 to 2 tsp thyme

8 to 10 cups veggie broth (or chicken broth if that’s your jam) If I’m using bouillon cubes, I will use 2 cubes Edward & Sons Not-Chick’n and 2 cubes Garden Veggie.

10 to 12 mushrooms (or more!), sliced in fourths (This is about what you’d find in an 8oz box at the grocery store)

fresh parsley leaves and/or microgreens for garnish

INSTRUCTIONS

Place mushrooms in a single layer on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper and bake in oven at 400 for about 10 minutes, or until beginning brown, sizzle and crisp a little bit.

Heat oil in pan and saute sliced leeks sprinkled with salt and pepper on medium-high heat for about 5 minutes. Add garlic (and celery, if you’re going with that!) and stir fry for a couple more minutes.

In a pot, add the veggie broth or water and bouillon cubes, bay leaves, thyme, potatoes, greens and your sauteed leek and garlic goodness. Bring to a boil, then cover with a lid and simmer until potatoes are cooked through. Turn off heat when ready.

Now, the quick and easy way to finish up is to get your potato masher (metal please! Don’t stick plastic into your boiling liquid!) and semi-mash your potatoes directly in the soup pot. This leaves you with a soupy/chunky mix that I love to serve topped with croutons and pan-fried veggie italian sausage. Although, doubling the mushrooms is healthier and often filling enough for me to skip the sausage.

Alternatively, and perhaps, more traditionally for a potato-leek soup, you can blend it smooth. An immersion blender works great and you can better control how smooth you want the soup to be. The last method I would suggest, if you love your soup smooth and creamy, is to let it cool a bit, then transfer into your blender. The big blender is faster than the immersion blender, gets it smoother, but takes more patience waiting for the soup to cool enough to transfer to the blender, and then, of course, there’s more clean up because you’re stuck washing the blender. Blend and return to your pot (reheat if necessary) and serve topped with your garnish and mushrooms. The upside of blending to me, is that the kids tend to eat more greens this way. Can’t pick them out if it’s all blended up!

Delicata Mushroom Pasta with Walnut Sage Pesto

Thanks to A Beautiful Plate for the original inspiration for this recipe. I (as usual!) have simplified the recipe (skipping the fried sage leaves), doubled the greens, use kale instead of parsley in the pesto and added the mushrooms.

Ok, I am one of those people that has a hard time calling anything pesto if it’s not made with basil. My efforts to eat more in tune with our local seasons means that basil isn’t abundant enough in my yard now to make batch after batch of pesto. So…I’m giving this sage-and-kale pesto a try. The walnuts are good for my brain, I hear. And I can see the sage growing in my backyard. The kale is abundant, now, too! My hope is that it will be distinct enough to not rival the ‘real’ pesto. It will be in a category of its own. And sage and delicata squash are delicious together. I know this from my favorite biscuit recipe. Maybe, it will be my new go-to winter pesto to help me get through the cold months and into spring! Let me know what you think.

INGREDIENTS

For Roasting the Squash and Mushrooms—

1 or 2 delicata (winter) squash

1 or 2 portabello mushrooms OR lots of cremini or white button mushrooms—Did you know these three are the same variety of mushroom, just at different stages? Check it out.

extra virgin olive oil

salt & pepper to taste

For the Pesto—

2 packed cups kale leaves, finely chopped

1 cup toasted walnut halves or pieces (Here’s two ways to toast walnuts)

3 to 4 garlic cloves

8 to 10 large fresh sage leaves

1/2 cup (or more) extra virgin olive oil or roasted walnut oil

3/4 to 1 tsp salt

freshly ground pepper to taste

For the Pasta—

Your pasta of choice cooked according to the instructions on the package. Try a fusilli, farfalle, or pappardelle I think those shapes hold more pesto for maximum flavor in each bite.

INSTRUCTIONS

For Roasting the Squash and Mushrooms—

In a large pot, start the water for cooking the pasta.

Preheat oven to 425.

1. Slice the delicata, in half lengthwise. Scoop out the seeds. Then slice up each half into thin (about 1/2 inch) half-moon slices. No need to peel the squash at all! The skin is edible and it’s good fiber for your digestive system.

2. Lay out the slices on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

3. Leave your mushrooms whole and arrange them sparsely around the delicata slices. Drizzle with olive oil. Optional— Sprinkle with salt and pepper (go light or skip this step altogether, as the pesto will also be salty!).

4. Place in oven and roast for 20 to 30 minutes, until squash is soft and a bit caramelized.

For the Pesto—

There are a few ways to do this.

Method 1: To destress (if you’re not in a hurry!) get your molcajete out (your mortar and pestle for those of you not familiar with the Spanish term with Nahuatl roots) and put your strength into grinding. I recommend you do the garlic first, then the walnuts, and add the fresh leaves last, a little bit at a time. Your setting yourself up for frustration if you pile fresh leaves in—it’s just a lot harder to grind so many layers of leaves at a time. For me, it’s unsatisfying! But if you add two or three leaves at a time, you can really take pleasure in the meditative transformation of the beautiful leaves into a bright paste. As you need more room to grind, scrape out the ground paste into a dish. Finally, add the salt, pepper and olive oil. This is where you decide how thick to make your pesto. If you don’t want it so think, add more oil.

Method 2: Put all ingredients in a food processor or blender. Or, put it in a slightly oversized dish (like a 2-cup pyrex container, for example) and use an immersion blender directly in the dish. This is not the fastest, but by far, the easiest clean up if you can manage to keep the immersion blender immersed below the level of olive oil so that it doesn’t spray everywhere when you start to blend.

Final Pesto-Making Tip: It took me a long time to assimilate our italian roommate’s discovery that the way to mess up pesto is by adding too much garlic. I love garlic so that was hard to hear. I think he’s right though because the power of raw garlic can easily overwhelm. (This from a person who’s mouth waters at the thought of taking a bite of the fresh whole garlic clove!) So, the tip is—When in doubt, add less garlic.

Your pasta water should be at a rolling boil by now! Cook up the pasta, strain, and toss with the pesto sauce, roasted delicata squash and mushrooms.

This is a glass-of-wine-worthy dinner. Or sparkling water, at least! What I’m saying is, this is no common pasta dish. It’s fancy! You should dress up or something, before you sit down to eat. (C:)

Beet Soup

For the more authentic Classic Polish Borscht (a.k.a. Barszcz) recipe that inspired this post, click here! My version has simplified the process (I didn’t boil the beets whole, then remove half to dice them up, for example…) and includes more of our in-season veggies (gotta get the greens in when you can!).

Sometimes you just need soup on a cold winter day. Other times you just need soup to have a good excuse to eat more bread on a cold winter day. Once in a while, beet soup is just the right thing to nourish your body and brighten up your afternoon. Try it this week!

INGREDIENTS

2 or 3 beets, chopped into small cubes

1 or 2 turnips, chopped into small cubes (optional)

1 large onion, finely chopped

2 or 3 celery stalks, chopped

a couple of handfuls of dried shitake mushroom (or other dried mushrooms)

3 vegetable bouillon cubes (I used Edward & Sons Not-Beef)

and/or (if you’re not going for a vegetarian meal) 1 lb beef bones

8 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped

3 bay leaves

2 tsp ground black pepper

1/2 tsp marjoram (optional)

1 to 3 cups greens, finely chopped (try using your turnip and beet greens here, and/or spinach and/or kale)

4 to 6 green onions, chopped

3 tbs fresh lemon juice

parsley, cilantro and/or microgreens (optional)

INSTRUCTIONS

Add all ingredients (except the greens, green onions,lemon juice, parsely, cilantro & microgreens) to a pot with around 12 cups water

Bring to a boil, then simmer for 20 minutes or so, until beets are cooked through.

Add greens and green onions and simmer for 3 to 5 more minutes

Turn off heat and stir in the lemon juice before serving.

Serve with crusty bread or croutons. Garnish with parsley, cilantro and/or microgreens!

Stir-Fried Greens with Apple

INGREDIENTS

1 bunch greens (this week, it could be collards, kale or arugula, but many other greens could work, too!)

3 tbs olive oil

1 cup vegetable or chicken broth

1 large apple or 2 small ones, sliced

4 tbs apple cider vinegar

salt and pepper to taste

almonds or other seed or nut of choice (optional!)

INSTRUCTIONS

Rinse slice your greens

Stir fry them in oil for a bit. Sturdier greens like collards, I would do for two full minutes, kale, for just one, spinach even less!

Add broth and apples and stir fry for a tiny bit more.

Add apple cider vinegar, salt and pepper to taste.

Sprinkle with almonds or other seed or nut of choice to give this dish a protein boost and some extra crunch!

Pad Thai-Inspired Yummy Noodles-With-What-We-Got

We’ve tried growing pea shoots year round, but it’s this in this change to the cool season that they are the happiest! Just look at how beautiful they grew this week.

The cool season is here, I have to admit it. Even with the current warmth brought by the latest Santa Ana winds (that my bones jump to absorb!), you can feel the change in the crisp cool of the evening air. I’ve been grappling with my ritual conflicting feelings with this yearly season change. I must fend off the blues that come with thinking that I won’t be running into the warm ocean waves for many moons. I counter those feelings by looking ahead at the beauty of the rains to come AND the yummy cool season veggies that remind me that even in the cold of winter, life flourishes. One of these cool season veggies that we grow and my kids love are pea shoots! And what better to do with pea shoots than a makeshift Pad Thai-inspired dish that uses lots of what we’ve got. I should mention, staples in our house are peanut butter, miso paste, rice noodles and tamarind paste. I use Aunt Patty’s Tamarind Paste, which I can usually find at Sprouts. I love it because I don’t have to spend a bunch of time picking seeds out. I should also mention that this is by no means meant to rival or replace the authentic pad thai dish that we all love so much! If you’re interested in some invaluable tips (including a few key ingredients to add to your shopping list) for making that at home, check out this Edible San Diego article by Chef Fern Tran on Master Thai Take Out Recipes at Home.

Ok here’s this week’s quick recipe—

Ingredients:

3 carrots, grated into long thin strips with a potato peeler

1 bunch green onions, chopped

4 cloves garlic, chopped

3 tbs tamarind sauce

1/2 cup soy sauce

1 tbs molasses or 4 tbs brown sugar and/or juice of 2 oranges (or some combination thereof depending on what’s around and the call of your sweet tooth…)

1 or 2 tbs peanut butter

1 heaping tbs miso paste

1 heaping tbs chile (again, use what you’ve got—dry or fresh, maybe chili paste or even Sriracha. I tend to grab the chiltepin for most chile-related matters)

1 or 2 boxes of tofu (depending on how many hungry mouths you’re feeding…my two kids are tofu-eating-monsters sometimes and could easily finish a whole box themselves)

1 package rice noodles (around 14 oz)

1 box pea shoots (or bean sprouts, of course, but I highly recommend the pea shoots here!)

cilantro (another cool season ‘weed’ once it’s established in your yard) if you’ve got it

1/2 bunch of kale (and/or cabbage), chopped into fine strips

1 cup peanuts (chopped or crushed)

lemon or lime to taste

Instructions:

Prepare rice noodles as directed on package, drain, toss with the tiniest bit of sesame oil and set aside.

In a sauce pan, stir fry green onions and garlic in a spoonful or two of sesame oil.

Add tofu and stir fry a bit more (the aim here is just to warm the tofu up)

Add tamarind paste, sweetener (this your choice blend of orange juice, molasses and/or brown sugar), soy sauce, peanut butter and chile (optional, if you want it all spicy—with kids, I keep the chile on the side so people can spice up their plate individually) and mix over heat for a couple of minutes. You probably want to add a little water here to make a nice thin sauce and get everything blended up, especially if you didn’t add the orange juice.

Turn off heat and add miso (this keeps the probiotic goodness of the miso alive)

Add rice noodles, pea shoots, kale, carrots and toss to coat

Top with chopped cilantro and peanuts and chile (if you didn’t add it in before) and a squeeze of lemon or lime

Enjoy!

Spaghetti Squash and Kale Veggie Balls

Here’s a simplified and slightly modified version of this Savory Almond Flour Veggie Ball recipe that uses this week’s spaghetti squash and kale. The kids and I love spaghetti squash in our veggie balls, so I thought this variation is worth sharing. Here is a super simple version that is great for little ones.

INGREDIENTS:

1/2 spaghetti squash (cooked—You can slice it in half lengthwise and cook it face-down with a little olive oil on a cast iron pan, or place in the oven at about 400 degrees face up on a baking sheet with a little olive oil rubbed on the open face and cover with foil for faster cook time, around 30 minutes)

3 kale leaves, finely chopped

3/4 cup almond flour (You can get creative here and experiment with equal parts almond, quinoa flour and/or cassava flour)

1 cube veggie bouillon

1 tsp salt

1 tbs italian herb mix (or simply oregano and thyme)

1 tbs paprika

1 egg

about 1 cup dry oatmeal

INSTRUCTIONS:

1. Mix and mash all ingredients except the dry oatmeal. 

2. Work in dry oatmeal until consistency of dough is firm. 

3. Form 1 ½ inch balls.

4. Drop them into boiling water or your favorite soup (ours is tomato!) and boil for 10 minutes. 

Makes about 12-16 veggie balls.

Enjoy!

Brainstorming Kale--A Summary for Many Moods

Check out this Types of Kale art print by Marcella Kriebel.

Not counting, but it’s been many days of staying in and as much as I enjoy my home life and the freedom to create daily rhythms with my two kids as I see fit—I might be feeling a little stir crazy. I am confident this is the worst of it since the cold weather is on its way out and today’s sunshine, alone, has done wonders for my spirit. Anyway, this is the backdrop to my approach to this week’s recipe. I feel disconnected from the outside world and, as such, I’m not sure what type of recipe to share with all of you, given you may be going through any assortment of situations and feelings amidst this moment in history. So, I’ve decided to share my brainstorm and a summary of my findings rather than a single recipe. Here goes:

COMFORT Sweet Tooth and Chocolate-Fixes-Everything KALE

If you’re also feeling in a pit when it comes time to approach your kale of the week, maybe it’s time to make Kale Brownies. Based on my research, I think you can pretty much add 1 to 3 cups kale to your favorite brownie recipe. Raw and finely chopped is the way I’d go, but a more refined approach could also be to steam the kale until bright green and just wilted, then blend it up before adding it to your brownie batter. If you’ve got any floppy carrots that you didn’t get around to eating last week, you can steam one or two and mash it in, as well.

GREEN JUICE Keeps the Blues Away KALE

If you’re feeling good and want to eat light and clean (no added sugar, please), then maybe juice is the way to go. Slow juicers are fancy and nice, but you can also just use a blender and add kale, lettuce, any other veggies you want to consume—last week’s chard, and/or a stick or two of celery which gives it a yummy saltiness, a dash of lemon or orange juice. After a glass of green juice, I always feel more grounded and ready to make the best of my day.

BED OF KALE—A Foundation for Balance

If you’re wanting to keep a balance in your life through healthy, hearty and complete foods, you might feel good starting with a bed of kale as the foundation for your meal. What to put on your kale bed? Root veggies (try roasting the radish along with sweet potato with olive oil, salt & pepper), your protein (roasted garbanzos! eggs…or glazed walnuts or any other nut or seed, think pecans or pepitas), pasta or quinoa…Just chop and steam the kale, salt and season to taste, and top your bed of kale with whatever you like. Here’s a simple recipe for tilapia on a bed of kale you might want to try.

KALE SALAD—Keeping it Fresh for the Sunny Days Ahead

Some of us love salads. I must confess, this isn’t always me! But, with the promise of sunshine ahead (my kids were so excited about today’s sunshine, they took to running around the backyard naked for the better part of the afternoon) does make me feel better about eating cold food. A kale salad is quick, nutrient-dense, long-lasting and oh so flexible. My favorite version involves, at its simplest, chopped kale, orange and/or lemon juice, salt and a splash of balsamic or apple cider vinegar. Other ingredients might include nuts, seeds, avocado, carrots, apple, radish, and any kind of microgreens you’ve got around. Here’s a more specific Kale Salad recipe that runs along these lines.

I Need Food Now! KALE QUESADILLAS

This keeps happening, especially on days the kids and I get lost in the backyard working on projects. We hit a wall and need food NOW. Corn tortillas, cheese that melts and chopped kale (very finely chopped for the picky little ones, fat strips for me). Somehow, the kale helps me see this quick dish as more of a complete and healthy meal versus a hold-you-over junky snack. Sometimes, it’s cilantro, chard, or other leafy green instead of kale, but kale is my go-to favorite for this meal. Cholula hot sauce is my in-a-pinch salsa. I’ve switched to that over other hot sauce brands because it’s the only one I’ve found that doesn’t have a bunch of weird preservatives.

Receta de Quelites de mi Nanaita (My Great-Aunt's Quelite Greens Recipe)

Quelites in Mexico

What exactly are “quelites” is a contentious issue amongst some because the plant most commonly known as “quelite” varies from region to region in Mexico. So, my grandmother’s quelites might not be your grandmother’s quelites.

On my quest to find clarity over the years, I came across this poster and this great article. Quelites are a pre-columbian dish indigenous to the americas. The name comes from the Nahuatl word Quilitl which translates roughly to
”tender and edible green”. Another key characteristic is that they are wild-harvested, a weed, not something you plant in your garden. At least that’s how it used to be. The one my father excitedly found growing as a weed in our yard, that his mother called quelite de monte, was green amaranth. The plant my Nanaita used the day I was introduced to this quelites recipe was spinach (not a traditional quelite, but available and delicious nonetheless). I felt nourished and was in love with the simple magic of her recipe. Since then, I make it with whatever I have around, including amaranth, spinach, chard, collards, chaya, beet greens, turnip greens, arugula, kale, and the list goes on. So here it is—-

Ingredients:

1 bunch of greens (try chard, kale, amaranth, chaya, spinach, collards, beet greens, turnip greens, arugula…)

olive oil

1 tsp coriander (ground)

1 tsp sea salt

black pepper (to taste)

2 cloves garlic (sliced)

1 handful of organic corn masa

1 cup water

lemon or lime

Instructions:

1. Thinly slice your greens

2. In a pan (I prefer to use cast iron), drizzle a little bit of olive oil (maybe a tablespoon) and saute the garlic, coriander, salt and pepper for a minute.

3. add water to the pan, then sprinkle the masa into the pan immediately (before water gets too hot) while stirring so the masa dissolves and doesn’t clump up too much.

4. Bring to a low boil, add greens and cover to simmer for just a couple of minutes (unless you’re using some of the tougher greens like collards or chaya, which you’d want to cook for a few minutes longer).

5. Remove from heat, add a little squeeze of lime (or the juice of a whole lemon or lime, like me, depending your preferences!) and serve.