Asian Pork Noodle Salad

I had lettuce, carrots and cucumbers from the CSA in my fridge. What should I make? Hum… it sounds like a salad or a Vietnamese dish. Since I have a pork tenderloin in the freezer, voila.

This is a great summer dish. I am combining the Vietnamese style with a Chinese dish called bifun. Instead of pork, tofu, shrimp, chicken, beef or just vegetables will taste great too!

Asian Pork Noodle Salad

4 servings

Ingredients

10 oz dried rice noodles

1 cups shredded red or green leaf lettuce

1 cup bean sprouts

1 cup julienne-cut carrots

1/2 cup English cucumber, seeded, cut into thin matchsticks

1/3 cup mint leaves, coarsely chopped (or green onions)

1/3 cup basil leaves, julienne-cut

2 tablespoon soy sauce

¼ cup rice vinegar

3 tablespoons mirin

2 tablespoons water

1 tablespoon sesame oil

1 teaspoon dry mustard

8 oz Asian Pork Tenderloin*, thinly sliced

4 tablespoons chopped peanuts

Cilantro springs for garnish

Directions

Cook the noodles according to package instructions. Drain and rinse under cold water.

Combine the soy sauce, rice vinegar, mirin, water, sesame oil in a large bowl. Add noodles to the bowl and toss well.

Arrange lettuce, basil and mint at the bottom of four serving noodle bowls. Top each bowl with ¼ of the seasoned noodles, carrots, cucumber, bean sprouts and pork. Garnish each bowl with 1 tablespoon peanuts, some cilantro springs. 

Asian Pork Tenderloin

8 servings

Ingredients

3 tablespoons  lite tamari

1 tablespoon canola oil

1/3  cup  packed light brown sugar

2  tablespoons  rice vinegar

3 garlic cloves, crushed

2" piece of fresh grated ginger

1  tablespoon  dry mustard

1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper

2 whole pork tenderloins

1 tablespoon canola oil

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Trim the pork tenderloin of any excess fat and silver skin.

Put the 10 first ingredients into a 1-gallon resealable bag, and move around to combine. Add the pork tenderloins to the bag and seal, removing as much air as possible and place the bag on a plate. Refrigerate for 6 to 12 hours.

Remove pork from marinade and pat pork dry with paper towels.

Heat 1 tablespoon of canola oil in a large sauté pan over high heat. Sear the pork tenderloins on all sides until golden brown. Transfer pork to a foil lined roasting pan. Make sure the foil is big enough to wrap the pork later.

Bake at for about 10-15 minutes or until meat thermometer reads 145 degrees at the thickest part.

Remove from the oven wrap tightly with the aluminum foil from the pan.

Meanwhile, place the marinade in a small saucepan over medium heat and bring to a simmer. Simmer for 10 minutes, or until slightly thickened.

Slice the pork into 1/4 inch-thick slices, spoon the hot marinade over the pork just before serving.

Forbidden Rice with Caramelized Spring Onions, Yukon Gold Potatoes with Fleur du Sel

August 27th, 2009 
I always make plans for next dinners but I never follow them. So today I was going to make Stuffed Patty Pan Squash, but after a friend sent me a Brazilian BBQ recipe book, I decided that we need to have steak. By the way, I am Brazilian. My husband is Irish, so we need to have potatoes too.  J

I am using Fleur du Sel for the potatoes as I inherited it from a restaurant that closed (miss you, nine75!). The jar of salt has been sitting there, in the cupboard, for maybe a month, and I keep looking at it, everyday. 

You shouldn't be cooking with it, just sprinkle it over yummy food. If you don't have this special salt, it's ok to use sea salt or kosher salt!

Yukon Gold Potatoes with Fleur du Sel 

8 servings for regular people; 2 servings for my husband

 Ingredients

2 lbs or 8 medium yurkon gold potatoes, well washed

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

Chopped fresh herbs (optional)

Fleur du sel

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Place potatoes in a roasting pan and bake for about 1 hour or until the potatoes are tender (depends on the size of the potatoes). Cut the potatoes into 2” pieces, arrange them in a serving casserole, top with little pieces of the unsalted butter and bake for about 10 to 20 minutes, mixing once or twice, until potatoes are golden brown. Remove from oven, top with fresh herbs and sprinkle with fleur du sel. Serve immediately.

Forbidden Rice with Caramelized Spring Onions

4 servings

Forbidden rice is a short-grained, heirloom rice. It is purple when raw and dark purple when cooked. It is high in fiber, iron and has a deep, nutty taste. Additionally, the deep color of black forbidden rice suggests the presence of phytonutrients.

Ingredients

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 medium spring onions, halved and cut into 1/4-inch thick slices

1 tablespoon coarsely chopped fresh rosemary

2 cups cooked forbidden (black) rice

1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

Freshly ground pepper

Directions

In a large skillet, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add onions and rosemary.

Toss the onions so that all are coated with oil. Toss the onions every 8 to 10 minutes. Don’t toss them too often. Cook until all the onion is golden brown, about 20 - 25 minutes.

Add 2 to 3 tablespoons of white wine to the pan to deglaze it, add the rice and heat through stirring gently. Add salt and pepper to taste. 

Peach Cobbler

I decided to go for it...

Peach Cobbler

(Adapted from epicurious.com, from Gourmet, September 1999)

4 servings

Ingredients

6 large peaches, cut into thin wedges

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon Nocello (walnut liqueur)

1 tablespoon cornstarch

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

3/4 stick cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

1/4 cup boiling water

Directions

Preheat oven to 425° degrees F.

Toss peaches with sugar, lemon juice, and cornstarch in a 2-qt. nonreactive baking dish and bake in middle of oven 10 minutes.


Stir together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Blend in butter with your fingertips or a pastry blender until mixture resembles coarse meal. Stir in water until just combined.

Remove peaches from oven and drop spoonfuls of topping over them. Bake in middle of oven until topping is golden, about 25 minutes. (Topping will spread as it bakes.)

Spicy Black Bean Soup with Beet Greens, Balsamic Tomato and Basil

August 26th, 2009

After having the eggplant pasta last night, I asked my husband about tonight's dinner. He said, in a joke tone, "black bean soup". Well, that's what we are going to have then!  
My mom used to make this soup with watercress, and I sometimes like to use arugula. But today I have beet greens I need to use. They are delicious too!

Spicy Black Bean Soup with Beet Greens

4 Servings

Ingredients

1 large spring onion, chopped

1 spring onion stem, 3 – 4”, finely chopped

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 anaheim pepper, chopped

1 cherry pepper, chopped

4 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth

1 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

4 (15 1/2-ounce) cans black beans, drained but not rinsed or 15.5 oz of cooked beans

2 bay leaves

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Elbow macaroni, cooked, 2 cups

Beet greens, 4 cups (or arugula, or watercress)

Thinly sliced scallions, for garnish (optional)
Cilantro leaves for garnish (optional)


Directions
Put the olive oil into a large heavy pot and
place it over medium heat. Stir in the spring onions, chopped peppers, and cook, stirring, until they 
start to turn brown, about 10 minutes. 
Stir in the garlic and cook until you can smell it, 
about 1 minute.

Add the beans, bay leaves, broth, Worcestershire. Turn the heat to high and bring to a boil. Adjust the heat so the soup is bubbling gently and cook 10 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Remove the bay leaves and blend the soup with a hand blender. Add the elbow macaroni and the beet greens. Cook until heated through and greens are wilted.Serve with the garnishes. I served it with the Balsamic Tomato Basil, see recipe below.

Balsamic Tomato and Basil

2 servings (as soup garnish)

1 serving (as salad)

Ingredients

2 medium red tomatoes, cut in 4 or 6 pieces

1 cup yellow pear tomatoes, cut in half

¼ cup julienne cut
fresh basil

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

1/2 tablespoon balsamic vinegar

Kosher salt

Fresh ground pepper

Directions

Mix together the red and yellow tomatoes in a medium bowl. Sprinkle with the salt, pepper, add the vinegar and olive oil and mix well. Add ½ the basil and mix. Top with the remaining basil. Serve as a salad or as a soup garnish.

We've got these beautiful peaches in the CSA box. Should I make some peach cobbler?

Fresh Tomato and Japanese Eggplant Pasta, Baked Beets with Goat Cheese

August 25th, 2009

Today is the day of the week I get my CSA box. Although they send us an email the day before telling what they might send in the boxes, getting to them is like Christmas, as there is always something different than what they told you. So yesterday I have planned to make farro with kale for dinner. But oh, there was not kale in the box! but lots of tomatoes and eggplants instead! There you go, deal with the unexpected and surprise yourself with delicious food!

Fresh Tomato and Eggplant Pasta
Ingredients

2 Japanese eggplant, cut lengthwise into 1/4-inch slices

Coarse grained salt

Olive oil spray

3 cloves garlic, minced

10 medium tomatoes

1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

Salt and coarsely ground fresh black pepper

1/2 cup basil torn

8 ounces whole wheat farfalle, cooked al dente

Parmesan cheese to taste

Directions

Set oven to broil. Spray cookie sheet with olive oil spray. Place eggplant slices on cookie sheet. Sprinkle with coarse grained salt and spray with olive oil. Place in oven. When lightly brown on one side, about 5 to 6 min, flip. Broil on other side until lightly brown, about 5 to 6 additional minutes.

Place a saucepan 3/4 full of water over high heat and bring to a boil. Dip tomatoes that need to be peeled in the boiling water for 1 minute. Remove tomatoes and set aside to cool enough so that you can handle them. Gently pierce, just barely, the skin of the tomatoes with the tip of a sharp knife. Loosen the skin with the knife and peel away. Repeat with all the tomatoes. Cut peeled tomatoes in half lengthwise. Hold tomato half in your hand over a small bowl. Gently squeeze tomato half so that seeds drip into the bowl. Put the seeds and their juice through a strainer. Discard seeds, add the strained juice to the bowl of tomatoes. Crush the tomatoes with your hands leaving big pieces. Add the balsamic vinegar and a couple of basil leaves. Stir.

Place the olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add garlic, cook until it starts to brown, but do be careful not burn it. Add tomatoes and their juice to the pan. Simmer about 5 minutes to reduce sauce a bit. Add broiled eggplant. Taste and adjust seasonings. Add the basil and cook 1 minute more. Add the pasta and heat through. Serve with parmesan and more basil if desired.

Baked beets taste much better than boiled!

Baked Beets with Goat Cheese

Ingredients

3 medium beets, washed and cleaned

1 – 2 oz goat cheese, at room temperature

Extra virgin olive oil

Herbs

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Place beets in a roasting pan, cover with foil, and bake 1 hour until al dente. Cool until easy to handle, then peel. Slice, dice into 1” cubes. Place in a bowl. Top with crumbled goat cheese and parsley, or dill. Drizzle with a little bit of olive oil.