Brussels Sprouts Salad with Tomato, Avocado, Almonds, Raisins and Mustard Vinagrette

Get ready, everyone! It's my first post with the new camera!

It never even occurred to me to eat Brussels Sprouts raw; I like them roasted so much that's it's hard to imagine them any other way, but leave it to my mom to plant this idea in my head.

It's best to use a mandolin to slice the sprouts. Careful not to cut your little fingers!

Serves 6 or 7.

You will need:

-1 stalk Brussels Sprouts
-2 Roma tomatoes, cut into wedges
-1 avocado, cubed
-1/3 cup raw unsalted almonds, chopped coarsely
-1/3 cup raisins
-1/4 cup Dijon mustard
-3 Tbsp. Olive Oil
-1 1/2 Tbsp. Balsamic vinegar
-Salt & Black pepper.

Pull sprouts off the stalk, shred them thinly with the mandolin.

In a large salad bowl, toss together shredded sprouts, tomatoes, avocado, almonds and raisins.

Whisk remaining dressing ingredients in a small bowl, add a little water if your dressing is too thick. Pour over salad and toss.

Corned Beef Hash with Poached Eggs

Before we get into this recipe, I just want to let you know it's a complete coincidence that I'm posting this on March 18th, the day after St. Patrick's day. Nope, nothing to do with it at all. Anyway...

Like many of my posts, the idea for this one comes from my mother and me growing up surrounded by her cooking genius. And I say this really nice, flattering thing about her both because it's true and because I'm about to say something that might sound like an attempt to discredit her, even though it's not:

Corned beef hash is easy as...well, you know.

It's another one of those things I saw my mom do when I was young and thought "wow, that's so complicated and hard! I bet I'll never be able to do that."

I mean, of course it will be a lot more labor-intensive and time consuming if you brine and spice your own corned beef, but that's not what I'm talking about here. Maybe future post, but not now, please, I'm tired. Zzzzz....

Recipe for 2 people

You will need:

Hash:

-1 large red potato, skin on, thinly sliced for quick boiling
-4 big strips cooked corn beef, preferably cold for easy slicing
-1/2 small onion, chopped
-pinch salt
-pinch lemon pepper
-1 Tbsp. olive oil for cooking

Poached Eggs:

-4 eggs
-2 Tbsp. Vinegar
-Medium-sized pot
-slotted spoon or frying basket with handle

Make the hash:

In a medium-sized pot, bring water to a boil and add potatoes, once it starts to boil again turn heat to low and simmer until fork-tender, 15-20 minutes. Meanwhile, dice cold corned beef.

When potatoes are done, drain water from pot, heat oil in a skillet and add onions until fragrant. Add potatoes and cook until they start to form that awesome brown crust that corned beef hash simply must have. Add corned beef, salt and pepper and stir to combine.

Once the beef is warmed and the hash is well-combined, turn off heat.

Meanwhile, boil water in medium pot, turn down to just barely boiling and add vinegar. Crack eggs, one at a time into a ladle or cup and add to pot. Once all 4 eggs are added, remove pot from heat, cover and let sit 4-6 minutes, depending on how runny you like your yolks.

Serve hash topped with eggs to let the yolks run down into it and make everything all yummy and awesome and stuff.

Polenta with Swiss Chard and Dinosaur Kale

If you get in your time machine and go back a couple years to some of my old posts (not something I recommend) you'll probably find some ever-so-witty musings over dinosaur kale and its silly name and how it looks like something from prehistoric times or how I wish to gobble it up like a ravenous Triceratops. Well, years later I'm much more familiar with the stuff so don't worry, I'll spare you the cheesy dino jokes.

Speaking of cheesy (sorry, I just can't help myself), what dish tastes even better with a big ol' smattering of parmesan cheese on top? Umm, duh! Every single one, especially polenta.

I recently started getting a bi-weekly CSA and it's been forcing me to cook again, and so I was like, okay, why not start blogging again? Because I'm lazy and useless? I guess that wasn't a good enough reason because here I am blogging again. *blogblogblog*

The chard, kale and green onions came in my first CSA pickup, and the tomato sauce is, oh my gosh, out of a jar because I have a life. So there.

You can't really see it in the picture because it's all covered by beautiful green veggies and tomato sauce but there's polenta under there, I promise.

Here's what you'll need:

Serves 2 people

-1 cup cooked soft polenta, still hot
-1/2 bunch Swiss chard
-1/2 bunch dinosaur kale
-2 green onions, chopped
-1/2 cup your favorite tomato pasta sauce
-Parmesan cheese
-olive oil for drizzling

Chop the kale and chard, steam them together for about 3 minutes.

Divide the polenta into two bowls, top with tomato sauce, then mixed kale and chard, then green onions, then parmesan. Drizzle with olive oil and that's it.

Lemon & Raspberry Mini-Tarts

I am a dirty rotten cheater for posting this. Lemon curd from a jar? Pssshaw, clearly I am a terrible mad scientist. Go ahead and tell me how bad I am for posting this. What's that you say? Sorry, I can't understand you, because you just stuffed five of these delicious little tarts I made into your mouth. Why don't I get you a coffee to wash those down with, and then we can sit down and I'll tell you how to make them.

Preheat oven to 425.

You will need a mini muffin tin, as well as:

-1 ready-made pie crust (box usually contains 2 crusts for the top & bottom of the pie)
-1 jar lemon curd
-24 delicious raspberries.

Using a cookie cutter slightly bigger than the muffin holes in your mini muffin tin, cut out 24 circles.  Press pie crust circles into muffin tin, and bake for 10 minutes or until done (golden).

When cool, spoon in lemon curd, and top each mini-tart with a raspberry.

See what I mean? Too easy to post. But aren't they pretty?

Panettone French Toast

Mmmm....I always loved Panettone as a kid. We ate it at breakfast, toasted with cream cheese on top. I remember one Christmas I gave a box to my teacher and she said "Is this from your Italian grandma?" I made sure to tell her it was actually my grandpa who is Italian.

I didn't know until I bought this particular loaf at a small shop here in Madrid that they also eat it in Perú. It's exactly the same, except that it's spelled "Panetón" and it's normally eaten dipped in hot chocolate.

This was an eye-opening and amazing discovery, but with it came an even more delicious discovery: Panetón makes excellent French Toast.

-6 thick slices of Panettone (or Panetón, depending on where you buy it from)
-3 eggs
-3/4 cup milk
-Cinnamon
-Butter
-Pinch salt

Beat eggs, milk, cinnamon and salt in a wide, shallow bowl. Melt butter in a frying pan. Let the Panettone slices soak in the egg mixture longer than you normally would for french toast, especially if the slices are very thick. You don't want them dry inside, or do you? It's best to let some slices soak while others are cooking, first coating on both sides and then flipping them as you flip the slices in the pan.
Cook until golden brown on each side, and then serve with maple syrup (hard to find here...boo!) and strawberries.

Carrot Ginger Soup

A recipe from my mom! The best thing about this creamy, delicious soup is its deliciousness. The second best thing about it is a secret: sssshhhhh! The problem with most cream soups is that they call for cream, and cream=tunz of fatz. I hate writing stuff like this because I don't want my blog to turn from curious girl screwing around in the kitchen to crazy calorie-counting monster woman, but this really is an amazing thing so I'm going to go ahead and flaunt it: my mom's secret is to use cauliflower instead of heavy cream. Sounds weird but I give you my word and my photo of said soup, and we all know how many words a picture is worth. Go ahead and call me a liar.

3 cups broth
2 pounds carrots, chopped up small
1 head cauliflower cut into florets
2 sticks celery, chopped
1 onion, diced
2-3 cloves chopped garlic, depending on how garlicky you like things to be
2 Tbsp. fresh grated ginger
1 Tbsp. curry powder
1 Tbsp. Olive oil
freshly ground black pepper and salt to taste
nutmeg, olive oil or creme fraiche to go on top

In a large pot, combine broth, carrots, and cauliflower. Bring to a boil, then turn down and simmer for about 15 minutes. Meanwhile, heat the oil and sautee the onions and celery until translucent, add garlic during last minute of cooking. Add to the pot along with the grated ginger. Remove pot from heat and puree with a handheld blender. If you don't have one, wait for the soup to cool a bit and use a regular blender. Stir in the curry power, add the salt and pepper to taste. Serve with a float of olive oil or creme fraiche and a dash of nutmeg.

Popovers!

If you don't think you've ever had popovers, you're probably wrong.

Now that we've gotten that initial harshness of reality out of the way, I'll let you know you've probably had popovers except they were called Yorkshire Pudding. It's seriously exactly the same thing except popovers are more commonly associated with breakfast, at least for me. MAKE SURE ALL THE INGREDIENTS ARE ROOM TEMPERATURE BEFORE BLENDING!

Preheat oven to 400. You will need:

6 eggs
2 cups milk
3/4 tsp. salt
6 Tbsp. butter
2 cups flour

beat eggs and milk until blended.
combine flour and salt, cut in butter.
add flour to egg mixture and gradually blend.
fill well-greased custard cups or popover pan (looks like a really deep muffin tin) a little more than halfway full.
Bake for 1 hour. serve with strawberry jam or whatever you want because once again they're your creation! MUHAHAHHA!

TIP: Place cups or popover pan on top of a baking sheet before putting it in the oven to protect against the inevitable spillage.