Tastes Like Food

I am a huge coleslaw fan. But I like my coleslaw light and fresh, not drowning with creamy mayo. I like to taste the vegetables. And I like colorful food, like pale green set off by bright orange carrots, and dark green parsley. Plus, coleslaw is great because it’s base is the anti-cancer cruciferous vegetable cabbage. (Seriously, look up cruciferous vegetables benefits on Google.) So here’s one coleslaw mainstay I like to make…

Ingredients (all measurements are approximate, use your intuition):

• 3-4 cups green cabbage (shredded)
• optional: 1 cup purple cabbage (Purple cabbage has a much stronger flavor than green.)
  
• 2 carrots
• 1/2 cup parsley
• scant 1/4 cup mayo (Hain’s safflower mayo is dairy-free)
• 1 tbs olive oil
• 1 tsp fresh lemon juice
• 1 tsp brown mustard
• 1/2 tsp honey
• salt

Very thinly slice the cabbage, then chop the thin slices. Do the same for the carrots. Finely chop the parsley. Put all the sauces & spices in the bowl with the veggies and mix thoroughly. This coleslaw will last for several days.

One of our favorite summer time entrees is this Ginger Tamari Salmon poached in a foil packet on the grill. The foil keeps all the flavors. We were lucky to learn about this recipe from our friend Earth in Boulder.

Preparation is very easy!

Ingredients:

• salmon (either fresh or previously frozen)
• tamari
• ginger root

Preparation:

1. Put your salmon filets on a large sheet of foil.
2. Make a few tiny slices in the salmon filets.
3. Fill slices with crushed ginger (a garlic press is the best for this, you’ll need some arm strength!) Use about a 1 inch x 1 inch chunk of fresh ginger root.
4. Splash liberally with tamari sauce (about 3-4 tablespoons) and let the tamari that rolls off the salmon stay in the bottom of the foil.
5. Fold up the foil, so it’s a small pocket around the salmon (not air tight).
6. Cook on a medium grill about 12-15 minutes.

Note: Fresh salmon is certainly the tastiest. But high quality frozen salmon is a very good option. We buy Orca Bay Wild Alaskan Salmon.

A couple of weeks ago, my man and I took a little trip to the Savory Spice Shop on Platte Street here in Denver. What a treat! So, in our trip we bought some fun flavors, including the “Family Style Fajita Mix” which we tested out tonight.

We marinated strips of steak in a bowl with 2 tbs of the spice mix dissolved in a cup of beef broth, juice from half of a lime and some olive oil. Then we pan seared the steak, with some red peppers and onions. This medley we combined with rice, mango salsa, and cilantro to make a tasty fajita. I’m calling these “Nouveau Fajitas” because we used brown rice, sirloin steak (I think you usually use lower-class meat for fajitas), and the mango salsa. We weren’t positive on why the spice is called Family Style – maybe because the portion in the mix bag is large to season lots of meat… or could be because it’s only mildly spicy and friendly for families (wink).

Today I picked the very first strawberries from the strawberry patch in our yard.

It’s incredible what an amazing taste you get from fruit ripened in the sun (and not in the fruit truck on it’s way to the store). These little beauties were juicy and sweet.

Strawberries grow well in Colorado. This is the first time I’m growing them, it’s easy so far — and I’m totally enthused to have fresh berries in the yard.

Tuscan white beans garnished with baby sage leaves.

Pressure cooker filled with white beans and water, with sage leaves and garlic on top. The sage is tri-colored sage from my herb garden.

Ingredients (all measurements are approximate):

• White beans (1 1/2 or 2 cups)
• Fresh Sage (12-15 leaves)
• Garlic (5 cloves)
• Parsley (1/4 cup)
• Olive Oil (3 tbs)
• Green Onions (2)
• Lemon (1 tsp)
• Honey (1/2 tsp)
• Vinegar (1 tsp)
• Brown Mustard (1 tsp)
• Salt & Pepper

Part One:

1. Rinse beans and remove any ugly beans or hard debris.
2. Add to pressure cooker and cover with water about 3 inches above the level of the beans.
3. Peel and coarsely chop 5 garlic cloves, add to pot.
4. Add sage leaves.
5. Add 1 tbs olive oil.
6. Seal pressure cooker and cook for 60 minutes.
7. When cooked, empty the excess water and discard the sage. (Leave the garlic.)

Part Two:

1. Add lemon juice, 2 tbs olive oil, lemon, honey, vinegar and mustard to large bowl.
2. Add a dash of pepper, and some salt (approx 1 tsp).
3. Finely chop green onions and parsley and add to bowl.
4. Mix well.
5. Add the beans and stir to coat.

The beans are especially tasty when served still warm, but can be enjoyed at any temperature. Rich and buttery (without butter!), great side for any season.

These muffins are a very tasty, healthy, dairy-free breakfast treat. Or snack anytime (grin). They’re tastiest when they’re still warm from the oven, but good for 2 or 3 days, or even longer if you store them in the fridge. This recipe is adapted from the Joy of Cooking.

The berry you see in the middle of the muffin is a mulberry (surrounded by chocolate chips. I picked several from a tree in our yard. Mulberries look similar to blackberries, with smaller corpuscles. Their flavor is a not as pronounced, but they’re just as juicy. You can use any berry in this recipe…

Mix Dry Ingredients Separately:

• 1 cup whole spelt flour
• 1 cup sifted spelt flour
• 1 tbs ground flax
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt

Mix Wet Ingredients Well:

• 1 large egg
• 3 tbs olive oil (or vegetable oil)
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 cup rice milk (or other low-fat milk)
• 1/2 cup applesauce

Optional:

• 1/2 or 3/4 cup fresh berries
• 1/2 cup mini chocolate chips (dairy-free)

Gently fold wet ingredients into dry with a spatula. When about 2/3 mixed, add berries and chips. Important: Do not over stir. Otherwise, the muffins will get hard and dense.

Spoon batter into greased 12 cup muffin tin. (I rub olive oil in the muffin cups with a paper towel). Bake at 400° for 12 minutes. Take out of oven, and let the muffins sit for 2-3 minutes. Then remove to cool on a baking rack.

While the muffins are warm in the muffin tin, you can sprinkle the tops with sugar, or mix sugar plus melted dairy-free butter (like Earth Balance) and brush it on top.

Makes 12 muffins.

Last night we dined at the Izakaya Den (owned by and located across the street from Sushi Den). It was fabulous. You can order the exact same sushi as is served across the street, and they serve additional contemporary meal options as well.

Here’s what I recommend if you go there:

Drinks:
-Pink Blossom - Hangar mandarin blossom vodka, St Germaine Eldeflower Liquer, Cointreau & cranberry juice.

-Shoshu Smash (and you can really get smashed on these, so watch it) - muddled orange, lemon, lime, vodka, Iitomo Shochu, fresh yuzu juice & seven.

Food:

-Roasted Red & Yellow Beets - with green tea smoked mozarella in a baked lemon-basil vinagrette.

-Grilled Panzanella Salad - with jumbo lump crab, Colorado goat cheese, pistachio & plum wine vinagrette.

-Baked Spicy Roll
-California Roll
-Vegetable Tempura Roll
-Red Dragon Roll

(the above rolls all have cooked fish for those of you who are sushi wimps!)

Izakaya Den
1518 S. Pearl Street
Denver, Colorado 80210
303.777.0691

I spend countless hours in the kitchen quite frequently cooking up some pretty amazing dishes for my friends and family. I love to cook, try new recipes, but recently I discovered a little “short cut” in making a fantastic dish–homemade pizza made so easy, anyone can make this and it’s virtually impossible to screw up.

Starting off with the “short cut” part of this: BUY PRE-MADE FROZEN WHOLE FOODS BRAND PIZZA DOUGH FROM WHOLE FOODS. They make the most out-of-this-world dough and it’s only about $3. Set it out until it reaches room temperature and then divide the dough in half (makes 2 medium pizzas). Roll it super thin and place it onto a pizza pan (my pan has little holes on the bottom to make the dough crispy). Then drizzle about 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil onto the dough and add 2 crushed cloves of fresh garlic–now spread that around the dough, covering all of it. Next, top the dough with a layer of fresh baby spinach leaves. Then add slices of mozzarella fresca and top that with freshly grated parmesan cheese and fresh ground black pepper and salt to taste.

Preheat oven to 425°. Place pizza into your oven for about 10-12 minutes. Enjoy. I recommend pairing this pizza with Vinyard Block Estates’ 2005 “Block 312″ Cabernet Sauvignon.

Modified from the recipe in the Simply Colorado cookbook. I’ve made a few recipes from this cookbook–they tend to be healthy, easy to follow, quick and well explained.

Ingredients

• 2-3 T flour
• 1 lb eggplant
• 3 egg whites
• 3 T milk
• 6 pieces of dry bread
• butter
• 1 jar (26 oz) spaghetti sauce
• 1 1/2 c (6 oz) mozzarella cheese
• Parmesan cheese

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400.
2. Add flour to zip lock bag.
3. Slice eggplant in 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick slices.
4. Put slices in plastic bag with flour and shake to cover.
5. Mix the egg whites and milk in a bowl with a fork.
6. Break bread into small pieces.
7. Dip flour covered eggplant into egg mixture and then into bread crumbs.
8. Place slices on a cooking sheet covered with aluminum and slightly buttered.
9. Bake 13 minutes or until eggplant is tender.
10. Reduce oven temperature to 350.
11. Butter a 13×9x2 baking dish.
12. Place about half the eggplant on the bottom of the dish.
13. Cover with about half the spaghetti sauce (it doesn’t have to be perfectly distributed, as it will run) and half the mozarella cheese.
14. Place the rest of the eggplant on the dish.
15. Cover with the remainder of the sauce and mozzarella cheese. Sprinkle with as much parmesan as you like.
16. Bake uncovered for 20 minutes for a crispy top.

Serves 2 with leftovers, 4 with side dishes.

Well, it’s that time of year where the leaves are budding on the trees, the sun is up longer and we want to spend more time outside. Which means it’s a great time to fire up that grill. This year, you should seriously consider purchasing cedar planks to enhance the flavor of your grilled dishes. Pretty much anything tastes fantastic cooked on a cedar plank–fish, chicken, vegetables. You can easily find these planks at stores such as Costco and Whole Foods. 3-5 planks will run you about $8-$10, well worth the extra cost.

You need to soak your cedar plank in water, for about 20-40 minutes before you set it on the grill. Then, rest your grillables onto the plank and set atop low heat. Depending on what you’re grilling, it’ll take about 10-20 minutes to cook your food.

This evening I grilled 1lb of salmon and fresh asparagus and served it with some seasoned hash browns and a cool glass of Merlot. I covered the salmon with paper-thin slices of lemon to further enhance the flavor as well as prevent the salmon from drying out. This meal serves 4-6 people, and is absolutely perfect.