rice, squash, greens and leek bake. hello winter in CA.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups white rice

1 bunch kale, stems removed

4 slices prosciutto

1/2 butternut squash, peeled and thinly sliced

1 leek, thinly sliced

1/2 cup panko bread crumbs

2/3 lb parrano cheese, shredded and divided equally

2 cups milk

3 eggs

1 1/4 cups vegetable stock

2 Tbsp butter

2 Tbsp flour

1 1/2 tsp dried thyme

dash of nutmeg

salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 350. Layer the bottom of a large casserole dish with uncooked white rice. Next spread the kale leaves over the rice to cover completely. Then top with slices of prosciutto. Next up is the butternut squash, then pour the beschemel over the whole thing. OMG! We forgot the sauce! Make a light roux by melting 2 Tbsp butter in a small sauce pan. Stir in 2 Tbsp flour and whisk to incorporate. Whisk in the milk and veggie broth. Temper in the eggs, by beating them in a small bowl and pouring a small amount of the hot milk into that small bowl. This will ensure that the eggs do not scramble. Add the tempered eggs to the sauce. Right before the sauce comes to a boil, whisk in 1/2 of the Parrano cheese. Dump the sauce over the casserole. Next toast the breadcrumbs and leeks together for a few minutes. Layer the leek and breadcrumb mixture on top of the casserole then cover with the remaining cheese. Cover with foil and bake for 35 minutes, then remove the foil and bake for another 10 minutes. Wait 5 minutes before you slice into it!

P.S. CSA Delivery blog does not support the ehm... use of a sort-of-illegal-but-pretty-much-decriminalized-in-CA drug. But if we did, then we would eat this right out the dish with two forks and not call for shitty pizza or take out noodles. Well, we might get noodles AND eat this dish together. BLAM.

The rice in this dish gets all milky and cheesy. The layers stay intact. OMG, I wish I could eat this year round and still be sustainable. Actually, this would probably work with lots of different veggies. If you are looking to do it vegan: Sub- Earth Balance, Lightlife Tempeh Bacon, and unsweetened soy milk, egg replacer, or corn starch. The cheese? Well thats up to you and your proximity to "decent" vegan cheese.

mini quiches

I was going to make myself a whole tray of mushroom & onion mini quiches because I'm a glutton like that. But we had still had some peppers in the fridge, so I figured I'd be nice and make some quiches that Kenny would like as well. Last time we made quiche was awesome, but this time I wanted to make the dough from scratch and use our muffin tin to make these cutesy little mini quiches. They make great hors d'oeuvres and the possibilities for the filling are endless!

Ingredients:
Crust:
2 cups all purpose flour
8 Tbsp cold butter, sliced into small pieces
3-5 Tbsp water
1 tsp salt

Add the flour, salt and butter to a food processor and pulse for a minute. Transfer to a large bowl and add 3 Tbsp water and begin to knead the dough and form into a ball. If the dough is not sticking enough, add more water one Tbsp at a time until it becomes easier. Form into a ball then put in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 425 degrees. When your dough is set up, flour a cutting board and rolling pin, and roll out the dough. Use a cookie cutter or a glass to cut circles in the dough. Press a dough circle into each well of a 12 well non-stick muffin tin, pushing the dough down to conform to the tin. Use a fork to poke holes in each mini crust.

We are going to blind bake the crusts so that they hold their shape. Rip off some squares of tin foil and press a piece into each muffin well then fill with dry rice or beans which will act as weights. Bake in the oven for 10 minutes at 425. Remove the tin foil and weights and return to the oven for another 10 minutes at 350. The crust should be dry and cooked through.

Mushroom filling:
1 Tbsp olive oil
4 oz white button mushrooms, quartered
1/2 onion, diced
pinches of oregano thyme, salt & pepper

Pepper filling:
1 Tbsp olive oil
2 gypsy peppers, small matchstick slice
1/2 onion, diced
pinches of red pepper flakes, salt & pepper

You can take care of this while you are waiting for your dough to set up & blind bake. Heat the olive oil in a pan over medium high heat and simply cook the ingredients together until just before the onions start to caramelize. Remember they will cook again in the quiche, so don't over do it at this point. Set aside in two separate bowls.

Quiche filling:
2 cups heavy cream
4 eggs
1 cup parmesan cheese
salt & pepper

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Whisk the eggs in a large bowl then, add the remaining ingredients and whisk until uniformly combined. Separate into equal portions using a measuring cup and add the mushroom filling to one portion and the pepper filling to the other. Pour the mushroom and quiche filling mixture into the first 6 mini pie crusts. Pour the pepper and quiche filling mixture in to the last 6 crusts. Bake for 40 minutes, turning the tin around halfway through if your oven doesn't bake evenly. At the end of 40 minutes, the mini quiches should be puffed up and beautifully golden on top. Allow to cool 10 minutes before removing the mini quiches from the muffin tin. Use a small spoon to run along the edge and pop them out.

orange thyme fruit salad

Ingredients:
2 apples, 1/2" dice
1 cup grapes (The grapes we had were small. If you have large ones, cut them in half.)
juice of 1 orange
3 sprigs thyme, leaves taken off, no woody stems. roughly chopped.
1 lemon
2 tsp olive oil
pinch of salt

I was stoked to make breakfast on Saturday morning, I even set my alarm because I couldn't wait for fruit salad and poached eggs. Then the thunder happened! It was awesome. I kind of thought that there was going to be a giant earthquake, but with one look out the window I saw the pouring rain and heard some more claps of thunder and knew that my roof had no chance of falling on my head anytime soon. I was pumped. I love thunderstorms, and I love breakfast, what better way to spend the morning. Then another BANG from the sky, and the power went out. It only lasted an hour, which in my experience with other public utility fixings in SF, was super fast. So we got down to business. I won't go into detail about the eggs, because we do them so often, but let's get into this salad.

Juice half of your lemon into a bowl. Add 2 cups of cold water, and start cutting your apples. Toss the apples into the lemon water, and they won't get all brown and mushy, even if you have to walk away for 10 or 15 minutes or more. Once they are done and your grapes are free of pesky little vine tips, it's time to make the dressing. Juice the orange and the other half of lemon into a small container or bowl, be careful not to get any seeds in there! Add a pinch of salt, the thyme and olive oil, and stir or shake until the oil is incorporated into the dressing. Drain the apples, add the grapes, toss with the dressing and nom it up! It's sweet, it's savory, and good for breakfast, lunch, dinner, brunch, dunch, linner, or a light late night snack.

roasted red pepper, tomato and chard soup

Ingredients:
1.5 lbs heirloom tomatoes (or other ripe tomatoes), roughly chopped and seeded (or 2 28 oz cans of canned tomatoes, drained)
3 roasted red peppers, seeded and roughly chopped
1/2 bunch chard, thick stems discarded and cut in a chiffonade
4 cups vegetable stock
1 onion, 1/2" dice
3 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped
1 sprig rosemary
4 sprigs thyme
2 Tbsp olive oil
2 Tbsp double concentrate tomato paste
salt & pepper of course!

In an effort not to get off topic later in this post, I am going to start, well- off topic. I have read on some message boards that people really like to save their veggie scraps (stems of greens/beets, broccoli, pepper ends, etc.) for later use in making stocks. Please don't torture yourself or your loved ones by doing such a silly thing. These can be used in so many other ways; broccoli stems can be peeled and shredded in slaws, pepper ends can merely be trimmed and used in the recipe you are making or a later one, and stems of greens while good in longer cooked dishes, can and should just be composted if you aren't going to use them. Putting these things into stocks, especially cruciferous veggies and green trimmings, will only do one thing- make your stock bitter. Not to mention the discoloration that would make it less appetizing. (If you really like bitter, dark stock then please, by all means, go ahead and continue.) Traditional vegetable stock has been made the same way for ages, and I am sure that many before us had ventured to add some extras into it, only to return to the simplicity that is as the French would say the "mirepoix". Two parts of one of the members of the Allium family (onions, leeks, etc.), one part carrot, and one part celery. It just makes perfect stock, and I would like to think that if it isn't broken, we shouldn't try to fix it. In this case, the case of taste, it's good to let history and past mistakes tell us what to do.

On to the soup!

In a large soup pot over medium heat, saute the onions until translucent, about 6-7 minutes. Add the garlic and tomato paste and continue to cook an additional 3 minutes. Toss in the tomatoes, red peppers, and herbs (Whoa Kenny! Toss them in whole, and don't remove the tomato skin? Totes, we want to make this soup fast, so we will strain it all out later.) and cook, stirring until the tomatoes soften, about 12-14 minutes. Add the stock, pop on a lid, and go read a book for 15 minutes. When the soup starts to boil, adjust the heat to low and allow to simmer, covered for an additional 20 minutes.

Now it's time to get down to business. Remove the sprigs of herbs and use your immersion blender to blend the soup until all the chunks are removed. You will notice that it's a little thick, and if you are really hungry, or like the soup just like that- go ahead and skip this next step. Turn off the heat and using a fine mesh strainer or a chinois (I hate those things, sorry, one tried to kill me once) strain the soup into another bowl, using a spoon to help you along. Compost the leftover chunky bits that are clouding your strainer and continue until all the soup has been strained. Place the soup back into the pot, and return the heat to low. The soup will still be pretty hot, so getting it back to a simmer won't take to long. When it reaches a simmer, add the chard and cook for 3-4 minutes, until the chard is just cooked through, but still has a little bite to it. Spoon into a big bowl, grab some bread, get in your Slanket, and turn on the tube; it's time to get comfy and relax.