My mother's Gazpacho

If I talk to my father at the beginning of the weekend, he will inevitably remind me to go to Mass on Sunday. I always tell him I'll try, but the truth is I have my own religious-like activities on Sunday mornings to attend to. My Sunday is started with a free yoga class followed by my weekly trip to the farmer's market, and cooking later in the afternoon. After my two morning activities, I feel renewed and ready to start the week with a fresh mind and body and fresh produce.

On top of all the other delicious food at the market, there are also fresh crabs! Blue Crabs from Maryland (I hope...) are only a dollar a piece. The copious amount of old bay spice comes for free. This Sunday I bought 8 crabs for Sam and I to split and eat with gazpacho. I'm proud to say that my crab cracking skills have improved since last year, enough that I might buy crabs again this weekend. We had a wonderful Sunday meal, the kind of meal that makes Sunday special and reminds you how lucky you are to be eating crab in Washington, DC with a few worries but a bright future ahead...What can I say, the crabs, the bread, the wine, avocados, and the gazpacho made me sentimental!

My father, besides being a devoted Catholic, is also a voracious eater of gazpacho. My mother buys boxes of tomato seconds and makes about a gallon of this cold soup a week. Her gazpacho is a masterpiece; mine is still being perfected. However, here is her recipe, a bare bones recipe, and it's up to the chef to make it memorable.

Grace's (my mother's) gazpacho
4 or 5 large tomatoes, cored and blanched
1 cucumber, peeled and sliced
1 green bell pepper, washed, de-seeded, and sliced
2 cloves garlic, sliced
1/4-1/2 cup olive oil
a few splashes of red wine vinegar
salt, pepper
a small hunk of white bread, soaked in water for a few minutes

1. To blanch the tomatoes, bring a big pot of water to boil. When it boils, add the tomatoes and leave them submerged for 3-4 minutes. Don't leave them in much longer or they will start to cook and you'll be making tomato sauce.
2. Remove the tomatoes and place them into a big bowl of cold water. The skins should slide of easily. Remove the skins and place the tomatoes into the blender.
3. Add the cucumber, pepper, garlic, and olive oil into the blender and puree the mixture.
4. Blend until smooth, then add the bread soaked in water and blend again until smooth.
5. Add the red wine vinegar, salt and pepper to taste.
6. Blend until the mixture is very smooth. Decant into a bowl and let the gazpacho cool for at least an hour so the flavors can meld and it can be eaten cold.

Optional: You can chop up boiled eggs and prosciutto or ham, and croutons to serve on top of the cold soup, or you can just eat it with bread, or you can do both...

Curry Chicken Salad and Roasted Skinny Carrots Salad

Two of my favorite food personalities are honored in this post. The curried chicken salad comes from Giada, and it is an easy, tasty, and fast recipe good for sandwiches or on top of lettuce. The roasted carrot salad comes from Smitten Kitchen, who is a huge inspiration for me in the foodie blogosphere.

I stopped by my nearest bakery, Firehook, to get fresh rolls for the sandwiches. I made the mistake of getting brioche buns which were too bready and heavy for this surprisingly refreshing chicken salad. The recipe calls for ciabatta, so look for an airier bread than I bought.

Curried Chicken Salad (adapted from Giada's Kitchen)

8 slices of pancetta (optional)
1/4 cup half sour cream
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1 tablespoon curry powder
1 tablespoon lime juice plus more squeezing on top of the sandwich
2 teaspoons honey
1/2 teaspoon ginger powder
2 large chicken breasts, baked and diced
shredded radicchio
4 ciabatta rolls

1. Fry the pancetta slices in a large skillet until crispy. Drain on a paper towel and set aside for the sandwiches.
2. In a large bowl, mix together the mayo, sour cream, curry powder, lime juice, honey, and ginger.
3. Add the diced chicken and stir to coat with the dressing.
4. Slice the rolls in half and assemble a sandwich stacking the pancetta and radicchio along with a squeeze of lemon juice on top of a generous serving of curried chicken salad.

Though it's listed second, the roasted carrot salad is the star of this post. I love this recipe because of avocado and carrot combination, and I love it even more with the fresh, skinny, carrots I've bought from the farmer's market these last three weeks. The carrots are long and skinny and the flavor is concentrated and bright. These carrots are really pretty in this dish, and they also provide a satisfyingly salty and sweet taste from the curry powder and the carrots.

Roasted carrot and avocado salad (adapted from Smitten Kitchen)

1 pound carrots (I used my lovely skinny carrots)
salt, pepper, curry powder or cumin

olive oil
lemon juice
1/2 or a whole avocado, depends on your love of the fruit

1. Pre-heat oven to 400 °F
2. Scrub the carrots or peel them if they're a bit bigger. Cut them into segments.
3. Toss the carrots with olive oil, salt, pepper, and the spice of your choice.
4. Spread the carrots in a roasting pan, and roast the carrots for 20-30 minutes, or until tender.
5. Once the carrots are roasted, arrange them on a serving platter and top them with the avocados, a bit of olive oil, lemon juice, and salt and pepper if necessary.

Inside Insides: MRIs of Fruit

I came across Inside Insides on Serious Eats. The author of Inside Insides uses an MRI to take cross-sectional images of fruits and vegetables and edits together the images into a video. While the images on the blog are really cool, you just have to wonder WHY? and HOW?


Where and how did this blogger get access to an MRI and a staff who allowed them to use it to take MRIs of fruit? The why is not so hard to see, these images are really cool, visit the site to check out these psychedelic videos. My main worry is that this blogger works at the NIH, somewhere near me, and is using precious, government research funds to take these images. Actually I'm not that worried about the money, I'm blogging work, so worrying about wasting government money is like the pot calling the kettle black...

Giada's Kitchen: Zucchini Crudi

It's squash and zucchini season out there at the farmer's market. Thankfully more stalls have tomatoes at the market, but melons are scarce, the peaches are sweet, sweet, sweet, and there are still no peppers, but lots and lots of zucchini and summer squash. Apparently these are all signs of a dry season. Not that I'm complaining. As a resident of the great state of Texas, I've witnessed my fair share of droughts. It is so sad when July rolls around and there are no blackberries because it was too dry and hot, and most large tomatoes have a big crack across the top from trying to grow too big with too little water.

I've never eaten raw zucchini. I've come across zucchini carpaccio recipes in the past, but they've never been appealing enough for me to try. I already eat my squash grilled, sauteed, or broiled, and I'm far too lazy to grate zucchini to make zucchini fritters or zucchini bread. However, I'm suffering from a glut of zucchini because I bought too much of it last week, and I came across this zucchini crudi recipe in New Italian Kitchen. The original recipe makes an asparagus and zucchini crudi, but for me the main objective was to use zucchini in an easy and fast way that didn't involve sauteing. Below are my adapted directions for the salad, but Giada's version can be found here.

Zucchini Crudi

Zucchini (half a zucchini per person)
lemon
kosher salt
fresh ground pepper
olive oil
Romano, Parmesan, or manchego cheese (any type of hard, dry, white cheese)

1. Peel the zucchini with a vegetable peeler. Once the skin is removed, use the vegetable peeler to create thin strips of zucchini. You can use a mandolin to make thin circles if you have one.
2. In a separate bowl whisk together a dressing of lemon juice, olive oil, and salt.
3. Pour the dressing on the zucchini and toss. Allow it to sit for at least fifteen minutes.
4. Using the vegetable peeler to shave flakes or strips of cheese on top of the zucchini.

I really enjoyed this salad. Plain raw zucchini tastes like nothing. But once the vegetable absorbs some of the lemon juice and salt it tastes like a subtle pickle, which was well complimented by the nutty, saltiness of the shaved cheese. This salad reminded me of the vinegary, almost pickled salads that I ate when I was in Egypt. Part of my family's trip included a 4 day cruise down the Nile. Aside from the views of the Nile with temples dotting the banks, the best part of the cruise was the food. Each day breakfast, lunch, teatime, and dinner were extravagant affairs. The food that really stuck with me were the myriad of salads of pickled vegetables, from radishes, beets, carrots, tomatoes, cucumber, green beans, other types of dry beans and cabbage. The vegetables absorb the vinegar or lemon juice and produce a cool and crunchy salad that is wonderful before the usual hot, heavy Egyptian meal. I highly recommended this salad in place of a traditional green salad. I think with the addition of tomatoes, cucumbers, or asparagus it could become a more substantial horderve.

Giada's Kitchen: Fresh tomato and goat cheese strata and grilled eggplant salad

Today's post is a two-for-one recipe deal. As a reaction to my white, empty fridge, I bought too much produce to feed one or two people. I couldn't resist the colors. I will need to cook two meals a night this week to avoid wasting food. Luckily, I'm still procrastinating my medical school application and personal statement writing AND the New Italian Kitchen has a trove of
summer vegetable recipes. So I celebrated the arrival of tomatoes with a tomato and goat cheese strata accompanied with an eggplant salad and pork chops.

Fresh tomato and goat cheese strata with herb oil
(makes 3-4 servings depending on the tomatoes)

6 oz goat cheese at room temperature (see note)
1/4 cup heavy cream
kosher salt and ground black pepper to taste
1/2 cup walnuts (I used almonds, it tasted great)
2 ripe tomatoes, sliced 1/2 inch thick

Herb oil:
3/4 cup parsley leaves
3/4 cup basil
1/2 cup oil
kosher salt and pepper

1. To make filling, combine the goat cheese with the heavy cream. Whip the two together with a fork until the filling is smooth and light. Season with salt and pepper.
2. To make the herb oil, combine the herbs in the food processor and pulse them together until they are coarsely chopped. With the machine running, stream in the oil and process the herbs until the mixtures appears smooth yet flecks of herbs are still visible. Set the herb oil aside.
3. Toast the nuts in a small dry frying pan over medium heat. Remove the nuts when they have darkened slightly.
4. To make the strata, use two slices of tomato per strata. Place a slice of tomato on a small plate. Top the tomato with some goat cheese filling and a few generous drops of herb oil. Cover the goat cheese with another tomato slice and cover the second slice with more goat cheese filling and then generously drizzle the goat cheese with herb oil and toasted almonds.
5. Repeat the steps until you run out of tomato slices.
Note: each tomato slice requires about 1 tablespoon of goat cheese

Grilled Eggplant and goat cheese salad

5 baby eggplants, ends trimmed and sliced into 3/4 inch circles
lots of olive oil
3 tablespoons goat cheese crumbled
1/4 cup herb oil from above recipe or
1/4 cup thinly sliced basil and
1/4 cup chopped parsley
3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
kosher salt and fresh ground pepper

1. Toss the raw eggplant slices in olive oil
2. Heat a large frying pan over medium high heat. Place the eggplant slices in the pan and fry each side until brown, about three minutes.
3. Decant the fried eggplant into a large flat dish. Gently toss the eggplant with the goat cheese, herbs/ herb oil, vinegar, salt and pepper. If you use dry herbs, add olive oil.
4. Rearrange the eggplant on the dish so it lies flat.

Giada's Kitchen: Broiled Zuccinini and potatoes with parmesean crust

This zucchini concoction is one of those recipes that I'm surprised to see in a cookbook. It's so commonsense and summery, and the premise of the flavors and technique is basic and oh-so-tasty. I think any person who has access to the mounds of summer squash and zucchini that appears in July and stays until September at farmers markets everywhere has probably thrown it on the grill with a bit of Parmesan. But with Giada everything is more sophisticated, so the sprinkled Parmesan becomes a Parmesan crust and with that modification the recipe is fit to be re-posted on my blog.



Broiled Zucchini and potatoes with Parmesan Crust (adapted from Giada's Kitchen)

4 small new potatoes, quartered
1/4 cup olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 cup parsley, rinsed and coarsely chopped
2 zucchini (at least), cut in half length-wise, then in one inch pieces
kosher salt and fresh ground pepper to sprinkle on top
1/2 cup of grated Parmesan

1. Bring a small pot of water to boil. Add the potatoes and cook them until tender, about 10 minutes.
2. Heat the olive oil in a frying pan and add the minced garlic and about a quarter of the fresh parsley to the oil. Saute the zucchini, garlic and parsley together until the zucchini is soft, about 10 to 12 minutes.
3. Once the zucchini is cooked, arrange the zucchini and potatoes on a baking sheet with the flesh side of the vegetables facing upward.
4. Sprinkle the vegetables with kosher salt and ground pepper. Then top the vegetables with the rest of the parsley and all of the Parmesan. The Parmesan will create a better crust on the zucchini than the potatoes, so focus the Parmesan on the zucchini for the most pleasing results.
5. If you're working with a grill, place the vegetables over high heat for 10 minutes to allow the cheese to melt. If you're using an oven broiler, move the oven rack close the broiler and broil the vegetables until the cheese is golden brown, about 4 minutes.

The beauty of this recipe is there is no way to mess it up. The amount of vegetables, parsley, and Parmesan really don't matter as long as the final product is delicious. The same technique can be employed with a variety of summer vegetables.