Lemon Pasta

Wanna really show off your homemade pasta? This is a fabulous recipe to take advantage, it's not too harsh to overpower the delicate pasta, but it also really good in it's own right. It's also super simple. Our strata meeting ended at 8, and we were eating by 8:30. Serve this with a light salad as it is very rich!


This recipe comes from one of my favorite ladies - Marcella Hazan and this book. I have actually posted one of her recipes on how to make pasta as well - though I used the kitchen aid recipe this time...

Lemon Pasta Sauce
-1C half and half
-zest of three lemons
-juice of 2 small lemons
-4T butter
-salt and pepper
-parmesan and flat leaf parsley for garnish

1. Put water on to boil for the pasta - as it is fresh it will only take a minute or so and so you can leave it until the sauce is done.
2. Put butter and cream in a skillet or saucepan that the pasta will fit in later. Turn the heat to medium-high and bring to a boil.
3. Once boiling add the lemon juice and stir in. Add zest and continue stirring until reduced in half.
4. Once sauce is ready cook and drain pasta. Toss pasta with sauce and grate parmesan over top and toss.
5. Serve garnished with salt, pepper, parmesan and chopped parsley.

Vietnamese Salad Rolls with Dipping Sauces

These look far more challenging then they actually are but the payoff is great. You can vary what you put in them but the basics start with vermicelli rice noodles and green onion, cilantro is also really nice. Also the larger sized rice paper makes it way easier to get them tightly rolled but the smaller ones will work as well.

I always make a few dipping sauces to go with them and I posted this weeks variety below as well. It's also nice to have an asian style hot sauce handy. Please note that I do it to taste and measuring is not one of my stronger points so tasting and adjusting is key.

Salad Rolls:
-large rice paper
-vermicelli rice noodles
-2 large carrots
-1/2 english cucumber
-handful of briefly cooked and blanched asparagus
-4 cooked prawns per roll
-2-3 green onions
-rice vinegar if you have it

1. Cook noodles according to package directions. Drain in cold water to cool and add a little bit of oil to keep from sticking. Set aside.
2. Prepare vegetables. What you want is long thin strips at most 6" long. The easiest way I have found to do this with the carrot and cucumber is a vegetable peeler. Then you can get really thin strips. For the green onion and asparagus just slice very thinly with a knife. Toss the carrot and cucumber in a dash of rice vinegar.
3. Remove the shells from the prawns and slice them in half lengthwise.
4. Prepare sauces if you want them as below.
5. Find a shallow dish that you can use to prepare the rice paper. I used a large cookie sheet. Fill with hot (not boiling water).
5. Immerse a sheet in the water - it should get limp quite quickly. It takes a while to get the feel for it, but it should be about 20 seconds depending on the temperature of the water. Lay wrap on a work surface. Working quickly place 4 halved prawns on wrap, add a layer of each of the vegetables then noodles. Follow with another layer of vegetables and finish with the prawns. Roll up like a wrap. The rice paper should seal itself. Repeat until you are out of filling.

Ginger Garlic Sauce:
-1t minced garlic
-1t minced ginger
-1t vietnamese fish sauce
-3T soy sauce


Peanut Sauce:
-2T peanut butter (if its natural add a dash of honey to sweeten)
-2-3T water
-1t vietnamese fish sauce
-1/2 lemon or 1 lime juiced
-1t hot sauce
-1t soy sauce
-1t rice vinegar

If you are missing something don't worry, it will still taste good. Adjust water to get the consistency you are looking for.

Brand Loyalty, a minor rant.

Perhaps this is an old fashioned thing, or maybe it is caused intentionally by big businesses - likely both - but I have trouble diverging myself from brand loyalties. This varies from everything to computer parts (ahh the love of apple products) to clothing and of course kitchen appliances.

This habit recently became apparent in our purchase of a blender and the destruction of our toaster oven. Firstly, it is worth stating that I have the classic cuisinart food processor and am extremely happy with it. I also own a cusinart kettle, hand mixer and until recently a toaster oven. The last three were gifts - very well received gifts mind you - we got in the last year.

At first we were thrilled, assuming that the products would be of the utmost quality based on our food processor experience. However after a few months our toaster oven broke. It still functioned, however it would not turn off unless unplugged and only broiled no matter what setting it was on. A true fire hazard. After googling this model I came across the page above and tons of people complaining - including some who had the model catch fire in the middle of the night. I was not prepared to have the unit fixed only to have it be a safety hazard so I actually chucked it.

In addition to the toaster oven, I was also not overly thrilled with either the kettle or the hand mixer. The kettle stopped turning off properly for awhile and the hand mixer doesn't seem to work as well as our old, much cheaper, braun mixmaster.

I think there are several things at work here - and I don't think it is just a cuisinart specific problem. There is the usual complaint that things aren't made as well as they once were and I think that's part of it. Another big problem is that some products might be made locally and be of a certain quality while others may be made elsewhere and have a lesser quality. Lastly, I think that lots of companies have a variety of lines and they count on consumers relying on repuation and not researching the exact model.

So, why kind of blender did we buy? I looked into cusinart and kitchenaid - I certainly love my mixer - but after some internet research and talking to a rep at my local cooking store I settled on a waring pro blender. It's a bar blender. So far so good. It crushes ice like no blender I have ever owned and was very good with the squash soup from earlier in the week. I would highly recommend it - it's actually on sale at amazon right now. However I have only had it for a short time and the lifetime really is a big part of the quality, so only time will tell.

So what have I learned - if you are making a big purchase - like a small appliance you should research exactly what you are looking for. And yes, duh I should've already known this.

Butternut Squash Soup

Funny thing about living on the west coast, all week long it was summer and then suddenly today it turned into fall. To go with the chill and the rain I thought I would make butternut squash soup. This is another easy meal effort wise though it does take about an hour from start to finish depending on how quickly you can prep the vegetables.


This recipe was loosely adapted from this book. Soups are great because they are so forgiving, so feel free to modify the vegetable ratios. If you want an extra rich flavour add some cream at the end - personally I don't think it needs it.

Ingredients:
-1 small onion
-2 small or 1 large butternut squash
-2 large baking potatoes
-1t paprika
-6C chicken stock (enough to cover)
-salt and pepper
-1T olive oil
-1/2C cream if desired
-a few fresh chives

1. Prep the vegetables - dice onion, peel, seed and evenly chop squash and peel and largely dice potatoes.
2. Saute onion in oil until translucent.
3. Add potatoes, squash, paprika and chicken stock. Bring to a gentle boil, cover and simmer on low for 35 minutes.
4. In batches transfer to a blender or food processor and puree. I like to leave some chunks for texture.
5. Season with salt and pepper and reheat. Stir in cream if desired.
6. Stir in chopped chives reserving some for garnish.
7. Serve garnished with chives.

Asparagus and Goat Cheese Pasta

I am sure every food blogger out there is also a food blogger reader. One of the blogs I read is Elise's Simply Recipes. The other day it led me too discover Beyond Salmon. It was from this recipe that I was inspired to make this pasta. Asparagus is in season right now and it is wonderful. I grilled mine on an indoor cast iron grill as I live in a balcony-free apartment.

Asparagus and Goat Cheese Pasta
-1 package mild goat cheese or fresh buffalo mozzarella
-2 portobello mushrooms
-4 fresh greenhouse tomatoes or equivalent cherry tomatoes if in season
-1 large handful asparagus.
-handful of fresh basil.
-package of penne or farfalle

1. Wash and trim asparagus. The trick with asparagus is to hold it at the bottom and at the middle and snap, it will naturally snap in the right place so as to leave you without woody ends.
2. Brush and trim mushrooms. Remove stems.
3. Drizzle both asparagus and mushrooms with oil.
4. If you have a barbecue put the mushrooms on and grill about 8 minutes each side, then grill asparagus until done about 1-3 minutes, rotating while cooking. If you don't have a bbq (like me) Put the mushrooms in the oven and bake for 20 minutes at 350. meanwhile cook the asparagus in batches. You can always give the mushrooms a quick grill when they are done.
5. Slice asparagus into 1" chunks, mushrooms, into small strips and then again in half. Chop tomatoes into a large dice.
6. Toss vegetables with hot pasta and add cheese and chopped basil.

Tapenade

Another thing I discovered an addiction to while working in restaurants - tapenade. I am a fan of both the green and black olive tapenade. Basically just a rich salty spread to have on bread or crackers or even sandwiches.


For my Mum's birthday, struck with indecision I made both. You can used canned olives, but the flavour will reflect the quality of the olives.

Basically the instructions for both are the same. Put all the ingredients except oil in the food processor and pulse until combined, then slowly add the oil. The consistency is up to you, I like it quite smooth but my Mum likes it chunky.

Black Olive Tapenade:
-1 1/2C black pitted olives, I used Kalamata
-3T drained capers
-2 cloves garlic
-1/4C fresh parsley leaves
-1/2t salt
-fresh ground pepper
-1/4C olive oil

Green Olive Oil
-2C green olives
-2T capers
-2t anchovy paste or 7 fresh anchovies
-1t fresh lemon juice
-1t parsley
-1/2 olive oil
-salt and pepper to taste

Classic French Lemon Tart

I am afraid I have had a very busy couple of weeks and gotten behind on my posting. One of the causes of this was my Mum's birthday last weekend. We had a large not-birthday party for her and I helped make a few treats. The first was my all-time favorite dessert – lemon tart.

This is the traditional class French tarte au citron. After my first year of university I worked in a Mediteranean restarunt bussing and hostessing. It was a husband and wife team who made excellent food – he was French she was Italian. This was where I had my first exposure to lemon tart. Perfect. I even got to plate them - I loved making designs on the plates with the raspberry coulis.

Since then I have tried a few recipes but this one was by far the best, it is based on a recipe from this site. The only thing to mention is that I used organic eggs and their super bright yolks made for a slightly more cheese then lemon colour, so I would recommend finding a more medicated bird for your yolks. I served it with rasberries.

Pastry:
2 C flour
1/4 t salt
1/4C sugar
1/2C not soft butter
1 egg yolk
5 to 6 tablespoons of cold water
(pie weights or dried beans)

Lemon Curd:
8 fresh lemons (1 for zesting, 8 worth of juice)
12 egg yolks
1 cup sugar
2/3C butter

Pastry:
1. Put flour, salt, sugar and butter in a food processor, combine until butter is smooth. Add cold water and yolk. Stop processing as soon as the dough becomes a ball. Do not overwork. Remove the dough and form it into a disc. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for an hour.

2. Melt 1T butter and use it to grease a 12" tart pan. Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface and line the tart pan. Cover with aluminum foil and pie weights or beans, make sure weights are spread all the way to the edges.

3. Bake for 25 minutes in a 400º F oven, checking after 15 minutes (make sure edges aren't too brown). Remove foil and weights and bake an additional 8 to 10 minutes. Set a side to cool. It should be completely cooled before you add lemon curd.

Lemon Curd:
1. Grate the zest of 1 lemon and set zest aside. Squeeze the lemons and strain the juice.

2. In a saucepan over low heat melt butter and whisk in sugar. Once combined whisk in lemon zest, lemon juice and egg yolks.

3. Cook over medium heat whisking continuously until custard becomes thick – about 5-8 minutes. It should be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.

4. Pour into made tart and refrigerate until firm, at least 3 hours.