Red Lentil Soup

A few weeks ago, I spotted a recipe for red lentil soup in the Recipes for Health section of the NY Times. I've had an unopened bag of red lentils sitting in my pantry for as long as I can remember - I think I heard or read that they cook faster than green lentils, and the word "fast" was all the motivation I needed to pick some up. But when it came time to actually cook with them, I was at a loss, and they kept getting shoved farther and farther back in the cabinet. This soup recipe seemed like a great way to get them out and front and center.

Only problem is, I forgot to bookmark it, so I had to search for it again when I wanted to make it last night. I googled red lentil soup nytimes and the first result was this recipe, published in the regular food section of the Times almost a year ago. At first I thought it was the same recipe - it had the cumin I remembered, and the onions and garlic, and it was finished with some chopped cilantro (which always sticks in my mind because I know that I'll never make a cilantro-ified recipe the way it's meant to be, because I am one of them). But a few things seemed off. I could have sworn the recipe I originally read had curry powder and mentioned swirling in some yogurt.

After sitting there confused a while longer, I did a more thorough search and realized that there were in fact two different red lentil soup recipes in question, written by two different people, appearing in two different sections of the Times almost a year apart. However, there were some striking similarities. I took this as a good sign, because I imagine the chance of two people reaching the same conclusion (and deciding the conclusion was fit to print) when their soups are in fact kind of crappy has got to be slim. So... which recipe did I follow? Well, both, and neither. I mixed and matched from the two to fit my mood and what I had on hand. Instead of chopped cilantro and lemon or lime juice, I made a sort of gremolata/pesto thing from parsley, raw garlic, lemon zest, lemon juice, and a little olive oil, and I added it at the end with a dollop of Greek yogurt. The soup tasted a little flat before these additions, but the lemony yogurty tartness turned it into one of the best soups I've ever made. (I realize I haven't posted enough for you to know this, but: I have made some pretty awesome soups.) I got a brand-spankin'-new immersion blender over the holidays, so I blended my soup into oblivion, but it's probably good left chunky too. I was way too blender-happy to find out. My mish-mashed recipe is below.

Red Lentil Soup
serves 3; adapted from two NY Times recipes linked above

Ingredients:
1 tbs olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1 small carrot, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp hot curry powder
pinch of cayenne
salt and pepper
1 small (14-ounce) can whole tomatoes with juice
1 quart chicken or vegetable broth
1 cup red lentils

For the gremolata/pesto topping:
1/4 cup loosely-packed parsley leaves
1/2 lemon
1 garlic clove
1 tbs olive oil
salt

Equipment:
knife and cutting board
saucepan or soup pot
wooden spoon
blender (immersion or otherwise)

Method:
Heat the oil in pot over medium heat and add the onion and carrot. Saute until tender, about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and saute a minute longer, stirring so the garlic doesn't brown. Then add the tomatoes with their juice and all the spices, including a pinch each of salt and pepper. Let the tomatoes simmer until they begin to break down, 5-10 minutes.

Add the broth and lentils and bring to a boil, then cover and lower the heat. Let the soup simmer for 30-40 minutes, until all the vegetables are soft and the lentils begin to fall apart. Season with salt, pepper, and cayenne to taste.

While the soup simmers, make the gremolata/pesto topping by finely mincing the parsley and garlic. You could also do this in a food processor, but I didn't want to get mine dirty, and I actually liked the "rustic" (read: uneven) texture I got from chopping by hand. Add a pinch of salt to the parsley and garlic. Zest and juice the lemon half and add a bit of zest and juice to the other ingredients, then stir in 1 tbs of olive oil. It should come together in a paste at this point; if not, add a little more oil. Taste the mixture and add more salt, lemon zest, or lemon juice if you want. Keep in mind that this will get stirred into the soup, where the sharpness of the garlic and the tartness of the lemon will be subdued, so your mixture should have a lot of kick to it.

When the soup is finished, blend it with an immersion blender or in a regular blender in batches (CAREFULLY - I speak as someone who has splattered hot soup all over the kitchen before and it is not fun). It should turn a really pretty orange color. Taste one more time for seasoning, then spoon it into bowls and top each with a dollop of yogurt and a few spoonfuls of the gremolata/pesto mixture. Make sure to swirl it all together before eating!

Lamb, Okra, and Tomato Stew

Whenever the question is asked, "how can I meet new people?" there seems to be one consistent answer: join a club. Personally, I've never taken this advice. Joining a club involves going somewhere on your own and meeting new people, and the thought of being surrounded by people I don't know kind of gives me panic attacks.

But last week I stepped outside of my comfort zone to go to a meeting of the Brooklyn Kitchen's Foodie Book Club, and I'm so glad I did! I guess the reason people are told to join clubs is to find other people with common interests (really now), and I'm definitely interested in food, so it was a perfect fit. (My friends, for the most part, are not interested in food at all. In fact, my closest guy friend either eats out or eats frozen tortellini - with no sauce - for every. single. meal.)

The book for last week's meeting was Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver which is about one family's attempt to produce as much of their own food as possible for a year, and supplement it almost exclusively with local products. Members of the book club are asked to bring a dish inspired by the book, so I picked up some extra ingredients during my most recent greenmarket trip. I would have loved to include something home-grown but the tiny basil plant on my fire escape is not too happy that the days are getting shorter. Apparently 5 minutes of direct sunlight a day isn't really enough to keep it growing. Anyway, at the market, I saw a giant pile of okra, and I remembered a dish I had at a Turkish restaurant a while back that had okra, lamb, and tomatoes. I thought I'd try to recreate it so I picked up some fresh lamb stew meat from another market vendor and this is the recipe I came up with. Sorry it's so vague - my camera died, so I don't have any pictures, so I wasn't really planning on blogging the dish. But it was well received at the event last night, and Taylor (one of the owners of Brooklyn Kitchen) asked me for the recipe, so here's what I remember!

Lamb, Okra, and Tomato Stew
serves 4-6ish

Ingredients:
3/4 lb lamb
1 lb fresh okra
vinegar
olive oil
1 onion
a few cloves of garlic
4 plum tomatoes
water
salt and pepper
honey (optional)

Equipment:
knife and cutting board
bowl
saucepan or dutch oven-type pot
wooden spoon

Method:
Prepare the okra by rinsing it and gently rubbing it try to remove some of the fuzz. Trim the tops leaving a little bit of the "cap" on. Put the okra in a bowl and drizzle some vinegar over them, then set it aside for half an hour (you can get everything else ready in the meantime).

Cut the lamb into bite-size pieces and season with salt and pepper. Heat some olive oil, maybe 1-2 tbs, in a Dutch oven or something similar, then add the lamb and brown it on all sides (~10 mins). While the lamb cooks, chop the onions and the garlic. Add to the pan and cook until the onions turn translucent.

For the tomatoes, I chopped two of them finely and two of them in larger pieces, but once everything cooked down together I'm not sure it made a difference, so cut the tomatoes to whatever size you want. You can also peel them beforehand if you are feeling fancy. I didn't bother. Either way, once the onions and garlic are cooked, add the chopped tomatoes, okra (drained), a splash of the vinegar the okra were sitting in, and water to almost cover everything. Stir it all up, season with more salt and pepper to taste, and if you added a little too much vinegar (*raises hand*) you can balance it out with a small spoonful of honey.

When the water starts to boil, cover the pot and lower the heat. Let it simmer for a while, however long it takes to shower and watch the Daily Show - probably an hour. Check to see if the okra are tender and the lamb is cooked through. If they are, remove the cover and turn the heat up a little until some more liquid boils off and it thickens up a little, maybe 15 minutes longer. And you're done! This also works ahead of time -- in fact I'm pretty sure it tasted better at the book club the next day than it did when I first made it, and the leftovers the following day were even better.

Cod with Stewed Eggplant

When I first saw this recipe posted at Anticiplate, it really appealed to me, though on the surface it's hard to say why. Couldn't be the cod, which I like, though it's not a type of fish I'd get excited about. Definitely not the cilantro, and I have a love-hate relationship with eggplant. I like the taste, but I hate when it's really mushy, and I hate how much oil is required to crisp it up. I think the reason why this jumped out at me is the combination of coconut milk and heat, which works wonderfully in Thai and Indian food. However, I've never seen coconut milk with Latin-type spices. Maybe it's really common and I've just missed it, which is very possible. Either way, the combination worked really well, and the eggplant didn't get too mushy, and this dish was delicious.

For the fish, I used scrod from the Greenmarket - the woman behind the counter described it to me as being very similar to cod, but milder and more delicate. I tend to think of cod as mild and delicate to begin with, so I worried the fish would have no flavor at all, but it was cheap so I got it anyway. And it was really good! I don't think I'd make a piece of scrod the highlight of a meal, like I would with salmon or tuna. Here, though, the mild flesh cut through the spicy stew in a similar way that rice would have. I think scrod would also be great deep-fried as the fish half of fish and chips. Yum.

Anyway, I followed the recipe pretty closely, with only a few modifications. I replaced the capers and cilantro used as garnishes with some chopped scallions, I used my slow-roasted tomatoes instead of sun-dried ones, and I cut the whole recipe in half. My modified version is below.

Cod with Stewed Eggplant
recipe by Daisy Martinez for Every Day with Rachel Ray

Ingredients:
4-5 small Japanese eggplants, diced
salt
1 plus 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
1 cup slow-roasted or sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
1/2 cubanelle pepper, thinly sliced
1/2 an 8-ounce can tomato sauce
1/2 cup coconut milk
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 cup water
Pepper
1/4 cup flour
2 6-ounce cod fillets
Handful chopped scallions

Equipment:
knife and cutting board
colander
large skillet
saucepan or dutch oven-type pot
wooden spoon
spatula

Method:
In a colander, salt the eggplant; let stand for 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, in saucepan, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the onion and garlic and cook until fragrant, about 3 minutes. Stir in the tomatoes and pepper and cook for 7 minutes.

Pat the eggplant dry. Add to the skillet with the tomato sauce, coconut milk, cumin and water; season with salt and pepper. Lower the heat, cover and simmer, stirring once, until the eggplant softens, 15 to 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, season the cod with salt and pepper; coat with the flour. In a large skillet, heat the remaining 2 tbs olive oil over high heat until hot. Add the cod and cook until golden, 2 to 3 minutes; flip and cook until opaque, about 1 minute more. Drain on paper towels.

Divide the stewed eggplant among 2 plates and top each serving with a cod fillet. Sprinkle with chopped scallions.

Apricot and Blackberry Flognarde

I am sure that the correct pronunciation of flognarde is rather elegant, like most French words. However, I have one of the worst French accents ever, so I've been calling this dish a flog-nard. It's kind of fun to say. FLOG-NARD! Also I am maybe 12.

Anyway, this dish came about after I went a little fruit-crazy at the Greenmarket this past weekend. I brought home a pint of apricots, 5 peaches, and a small yellow watermelon, and I'm just buying enough for myself here. Half the watermelon went into a salad with tomato and feta; the other half is still in my fridge. I ate one peach and turned the rest into peach sorbet (recipe coming soon, it was delicious). But the apricots required a little more work. I couldn't resist eating a few straight from the carton -- I loooove me some apricots -- but I really wanted to make something out of them, something like a clafoutis. I had never made a clafoutis before, and I'm not sure I'd ever eaten one before; I just knew that I had seen lots of recipes floating around the food blogosphere and it seemed like a fairly easy dessert that would work well with apricots. Then I discovered that once you take the cherries out of a traditional clafoutis, you don't even have a clafoutis anymore - you have a flognarde.

This recipe came together based on what I had on hand, using a few different recipes as inspiration. At the last minute I noticed a container of blackberries sitting in the fridge about to go bad; they were my roommate's, but I figured she wouldn't mind my using them. Better than throwing them away, right? The combination of apricot and blackberry was fabulous, and next time I might even try to use these fruits together on purpose. (She didn't mind at all, by the way, especially once I told her to eat as much of the finished flognarde as she wanted.)

I wanted to add a small amount of vanilla extract but I couldn't get the bottle cap off. If your bottle is less stubborn than mine, feel free to add some.

Also, I baked my flognarde in a springform pan, because it was the only round pan I had in a reasonable size. It mostly worked, except for a thin layer of custard that leaked out and settled between the bottom of the pan and the baking sheet it sat on. I ate that thin layer anyway -- it was nice and crispy -- but a regular round dish would probably work out a little better.

Apricot and Blackberry Flognarde
serves 6-8

Ingredients:
1 pint apricots
1 cup blackberries
3 eggs
1/3 cup heavy cream
2/3 cup milk
1/4 cup butter (half a stick)
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup almond flour
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup sugar
pinch salt

Equipment:
paring knife
two bowls, one large and one medium-ish
pastry brush
whisk
10-inch baking dish
baking sheet

Method:
Preheat oven to 375°F.

Cut apricots in half to remove pit. If you have larger apricots, cut them again into quarters or eighths.

Separate eggs, putting the whites in the larger bowl and setting the yolks aside.

Melt butter in the microwave on low power in smaller bowl and brush a little bit onto the bottom and sides of baking dish. Arrange apricots and blueberries in the dish, laying fruit in a single layer if possible. Whisk egg yolks in with remaining melted butter.

Add cream, milk, honey, sugar, and salt to bowl with egg whites and whisk until frothy. Whisk in yolk-butter mixture.

Add AP flour and almond flour to batter and mix until most lumps are gone.

Pour batter over fruit, then place the dish in the oven (on a baking sheet if you want, to catch any leaks or spills). Bake for 30 minutes or until the custard sets.

Cherry Picking / Recipe: Balsamic Black Cherry Gelato

When I was a little kid, my family made a tradition out of going fruit-picking. We'd drive 45 minutes upstate, watching the suburbs give way to farm land, until we started to see rows and rows of evenly-spaced trees. We picked peaches in July and apples in September and even tried berries a few times, but I think everyone preferred the shade provided by larger fruit trees to all the crouching in the hot sun that berry picking involved. While I do love peaches and apples and berries (and almost any fruit, really), my favorite was always cherries.

Maybe it's because cherry season started right around my birthday; maybe it's because cherry trees were the easiest to climb; maybe it's because you can eat a million cherries while you pick them (as opposed to larger fruits, where you really do have to pace yourself a bit). Whatever the reason, I just loved that day when we would all don matching red shirts (to hide cherry juice stains, of course) and drive up north. Last weekend, we decide to revive the tradition. It had been at least 10 years since we last went fruit picking and I'm not going to lie, I was THRILLED.

But I think me and my sister have gotten just a bit faster at picking cherries since the last time. When we dragged our fruit-filled buckets to the weighing station, we realized that the 5 of us (me, my parents, my sister, and one of her friends) had picked 25 POUNDS of cherries. We had about 20 pounds of deep red Bing cherries and 5 pounds of yellow-pink Ranier cherries. Far more cherries than any of us expected or knew what to do with.

That night, we made a cherry cobbler for dessert. (8 cups of cherries down.) In the morning, I made a sauce of cherries sauteed with a little butter and sugar to go over my dad's challah French toast. (2-3 more cups down.) We put a bowl of cherries out on the counter for snacking and kept refilling it. (Few more cups...) And then in the evening, we made gelato, and it was SO good. Four more cups down! Only... 23874235 remaining. But once we split the remaining cherries up 5 ways, the leftover amount seemed reasonable. I've been snacking on mine all week and just finished them today, and I only had to throw out a few bad ones on the way. You can't really get fruit any fresher (or cheaper) than when you pick it yourself, so at least our cherry excess lasted longer than supermarket cherries probably would have.

I had never made ice cream of any sort before, at least not in recent memory, so I really enjoyed seeing this come together. We made a few changes to the original recipe, which are reflected in the version below.

Balsamic Black Cherry Gelato
makes 1 quart; adapted from a recipe from The Ontario Tender Fruit Producers

Ingredients:
4 egg yolks
2/3-1 cup granulated sugar [adjust the amount based on how sweet your cherries are]
2 cups milk [we used 1% but it's probably even better and richer with whole milk]
4 cups sweet black cherries
2 tbs good quality aged balsamic vinegar
1 tsp vanilla

Equipment:
large bowl
whisk
saucepan
wooden spoon
blender or food processor
ice cream maker

Method:
In bowl, whisk together yolks with sugar until thickened and pale. Set aside.

In medium saucepan over medium heat, bring milk to simmer, stirring often. Whisk about 1/2 cup (125 mL) of milk into egg mixture and then transfer back to the saucepan. Cook over low heat and stir constantly with a wooden spoon until mixture is thick enough to coat the back of the spoon, about 8 minutes. Pour back into bowl and let cool.

In the meantime, pit the cherries and remove their stems. Purée 3 cups of them and their juices in a food processor or blender until smooth. Stir cherry purée, cherries, balsamic and vanilla into milk mixture. Cover and refrigerate overnight and up to 1 day. [Or put in the freezer for an hour, if you are in a rush/impatient. Just make sure you take it out before it freezes!]

Transfer to an ice cream maker and freeze according to manufacturer's instructions. Alternatively, freeze mixer in a large stainless steel bowl. After 4 hours, transfer to food processor and blend again. Freeze completely.

Recipe: Asparagus and Polenta with Fried Capers

I might be a little late in posting this, since I didn't see any asparagus at the market on Saturday and there's a chance the season is over already, but in case you can still find fresh asparagus in your area, you should give this a try. (Also, know that I am a little jealous of you. Asparagus season never lasts long enough!)

This meal would have been fairly ordinary if not for the fried capers. I can't remember where I first read about them, but it's something I've kept in the back of my mind just waiting for the perfect dish to garnish with little crispy flowery capers. Well... here it is. The capers really brought this from a little boring to very, very good.

Asparagus and Polenta with Fried Capers
serves 2

Ingredients:
1 tbs brined capers
canola oil or other high-smoke-point oil for frying
1/2 lb asparagus
1/2 small yellow onion
1 large stalk green garlic, dark green parts removed (or 1-2 cloves of regular garlic)
1 tbs olive oil
1/4 cup basil leaves, loosely packed
1 2/3 cup chicken stock, vegetable stock, or water
1/3 cup instant polenta (or non-instant polenta, if you have it and don't mind lots of stirring)
1 tbs butter (optional)
3 tbs grated parmesean cheese

Equipment:
small skillet
large skillet
saucepan
slotted spoon
knife and cutting board
cheese grater

Method:
Measure out the capers and blot dry with paper towels, being careful not to squish them. Pour 1/4" of oil into a small skillet and heat over medium-high heat. When the surface of the oil shimmers, drop in the capers. The oil will start to bubble so don't stand too close! After about 2 minutes, the outer layers of the capers will peel back so they look like little flowers. (My camera batteries died right as I started to cook, so I don't have a picture, but I found a good one here -- just scroll halfway down the page.) Remove the capers from the oil with a slotted spoon and set them aside to drain on paper towels.

To prepare the asparagus, snap off the woody bottoms and slice into 1" pieces. If your asparagus is really fresh, the woody bottoms might be non-existent. Peel and dice the onion and green garlic.

Heat olive oil in larger skillet over medium heat. Add the asparagus, onion, and green garlic with a pinch of salt. Saute for about 5 minutes, until the onions are translucent and the asparagus is tender. In the meantime, roughly chop the basil. Add it to the cooked vegetables and remove from heat. Season with salt and pepper to taste, but be careful not to overdo it with the salt, because the capers are like little salt-bombs.

While the asparagus cooks, you can start the polenta by heating stock or water in a saucepan. When it boils, add the polenta in a steady stream, stirring constantly. Lower the heat and continue to stir until the mixture thickens. With the instant polenta that I used, this took a minute or two, but there's a wide range of cooking times with non-instant polenta, so follow the directions for whatever type you're using. Honestly, I think the non-instant stuff tastes noticeably better, but it was about 90 degrees in my apartment and I didn't want to stand over the stove any longer than absolutely necessary.

Once the polenta is cooked, add the cheese and butter if you're using it. Scoop the polenta into bowls, top with the asparagus mixture, and sprinkle some fried capers on top.

[and pretend there is a tasty looking bowl of food pictured right here!]

Recipe: Radish Risotto

I bought a lovely bunch of these ruby-red bulbs at the Greenmarket last weekend with no real plan in mind. A few of them got sliced up for salads, but I'd have had to eat a whole lot of salad to use the entire bunch that way. So I started researching ways to use a lot of radishes in one go, and I discovered that you can cook them. Really! Cooked radishes! The idea had never occurred to me before - radishes are one of the few foods I'd only eaten raw. Thing is, as vegetables go, radishes are horribly under-utilized. Other than an occasional appearance in salads, they're usually relegated to garnish status. And it's a shame, because according to Wikipedia, a full cup of sliced radish bulbs is only 20 calories. Twenty calories! That's the same number of calories in an equivalent serving of cucumbers. In other words, basically nothing. You can also cook the green tops, which have a little bit of a kick to them that's reminiscent of mustard greens. A bunch of radishes really gets you two vegetables for the price of one.

If you're considering cooking radishes, you should know that a cooked radish is an entirely different beast than a raw one. The bulbs lose their bite, growing milder and sweeter, with a taste similar to parsnips. The color also bleeds and fades. Someone who finds raw radishes too strong might like cooked radishes, but if you like that bitter, peppery, crisp taste, you might be disappointed by the cooked version. I had no idea what to expect when I cooked radishes for the first time, but I figured that just about anything can be turned into a tasty risotto, so I used the bulbs and the greens together for this dish. It turned out really well, and I'm seeing other attempts at cooked radishes in my future.

I'm sending this to Gay of A Scientist in the Kitchen, this week's host of Weekend Herb Blogging. I hope I'm doing this right, since it's my first time trying to submit an entry anywhere, and only my second entry ever!

Radish Risotto
serves 2-3 as a main course

Ingredients:
4 cups chicken stock
1 tbs + 2 tsp butter
1 tbs olive oil
2 small shallots (or 1 large one)
1 cup risotto rice (Arborio, Vialone Nano, or Carnaroli)
1/3 cup dry white wine
1 bunch radishes with tops (my bunch weighed ~10 oz)
1/2 cup grated Pecorino Romano cheese
1 tbs fresh mint
1 tsp grated lemon zest
salt and pepper

Equipment:
skillet
2 saucepans (a small one for the stock and a larger, shallower one for the rice)
wooden spoon
knife and cutting board
grater

Method:
Heat stock in small saucepan. When it starts to boil, lower the heat to the lowest simmer so it will stay hot throughout the cooking process.

To prepare the radishes, first break off the bulbs. Rinse them well and scrub any parts that look dirty. (Well, you should probably scrub all the bulbs, but it can get fiddly, so... your call.) Cut small radishes in half, medium-sized radishes in quarters, and jumbo radishes in eighths so all pieces are similarly sized. Rinse the radish greens in a few changes of cold water, then cut off any long or thick stems. The greens can be really dirty and gritty so make sure they are clean before you trim them.

Put the radishes aside, then peel and chop the shallots. Heat 1 tbs butter and 1 tbs olive oil over medium-high heat in the larger sauce pan. When butter melts, add shallots and cook for 2 minutes until they turn translucent. Add rice and stir so rice gets coated in oil.

Add wine to the pan and stir until the alcohol burns off and the rice absorbs the remaining liquid. When the liquid is almost all gone, add a ladle-full of hot stock to the rice and stir. Watch the risotto closely; as soon as the stock is absorbed, add another ladle-full and stir again. Continue adding stock a little at a time and stirring until the rice is cooked through and creamy, with just a little firmness in the center when you bite into a grain. It should take about 20 minutes.

Contrary to popular belief, you don't need to stir risotto constantly. You need to keep an eye on it so it never dries out and starts to burn, but I think that one or two good stirs after every bit of added stock is just fine. Plus that gives you some free time to prepare the rest of your ingredients.

After the rice has been cooking for 10 minutes, melt the remaining 2 tsp butter in a skillet over medium heat. As soon as it melts, add the chopped radish bulbs and a pinch of salt. Saute the radishes for about 5 minutes. The bright red color of the skin will start to leech into the white center, turning the whole thing a translucent, pale shade of pink. When this happens, add the radish greens and a little bit of hot stock, then cover and cook for another 2 minutes. At this point the greens should have wilted. Remove pan from heat.

When the rice is finished, remove it from heat. Add the cheese, radish bulbs with radish greens, mint, lemon zest, and salt and pepper to taste. If the addition of the cheese thickens up the risotto too much, add a little more stock to thin it out.

Scoop risotto into bowls and serve immediately.

Recipe: Mint Vinaigrette

I had a bit of a revelation last week: Mint is an herb.

Did you know that? You probably did. You're probably thinking that I'm crazy, that I might as well jump up and down proclaiming, "The sky is blue! The sky is blue! Seriously, have you guys seen it? The SKY is BLUE!!!!" Which might be a valid comment after 32802384 days of rain, but at any other time... just a bit obvious.

So I guess I should clarify my revelation: mint is an herb that can be used without sugar.

I've always thought of mint as a dessert flavoring. Mint chocolate chip ice cream, Andes mints, Thin Mint cookies -- all are minty, all are deeeelicious, and all are sweet. The only times I've bought fresh mint in the past have been when I wanted to make mojitos, which are also sweet. Toothpaste, mint gum, and Tic-tacs prove the point even farther.

Mint has long been one of my favorite flavors. I remember walking around grocery stores as a child, and my mom would direct me to the mint bunches. We'd each pull off a leaf and rub it between our thumb and forefinger, and then our hands would smell like mint for the rest of the shopping trip. And yet... until last week, I never thought of using mint in a savory dish, using it alongside or instead of basil or parsley or sage. I bought a bunch of fresh mint yesterday for just this purpose: I want to experiment, to test the versatility of this herb. (Because that's what mint is: an herb. For reals!)

Experiment #1 came in the form of a salad dressing. Deb of Smitten Kitchen posted a green bean and cherry tomato salad recently that really called out to me, what with the freshness and the bright colors and all. The basic salad dressing in that recipe (olive oil, red wine vinegar, shallot, salt, and pepper) seemed like a good place to start minting it up. I prepped my green beans and tomatoes as described in the recipe, except that I halved the quantities, and here's the dressing I made to go along with it.

Mint Vinaigrette
makes enough to dress 2 salads

Ingredients:
2 tbs seasoned rice wine vinegar
2 tbs olive oil
1 small shallot
1/2 tbs fresh mint leaves
salt and pepper

Tools and Equipment:
small bowl
whisk

Method:
Pour vinegar into bowl, then slowly drizzle the olive oil in, whisking to emulsify.

Finely chop shallot and mint, then add to bowl. Add salt and pepper to taste. [Note that seasoned rice wine vinegar contains salt, so you probably won't need to add much more.]

Let dressing sit for a few minutes while you prep the salad.

-----------------------------

The results? Well, I'd say this experiment was a resounding success. The vinegar I used contains some sugar, so I didn't completely break away from the minty+sweet=tasty formula, but then again, this is a salad dressing and not a dessert... so I think that's progress. Either way, the dressing was great, the mint was subtle yet noticeable, and it really highlighted the fresh veggies in the salad. I served it with a piece of Scottish trout, rubbed with olive oil, salt and pepper, a dill-y spice mix, and a squish of lemon juice, then broiled for 10 minutes. Together, they made my favorite kind of meal - quick, easy, and delicious!