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Tag: salad

Playing with eggplant

So I liked the Imam Bayildi so much that I started making vows such as, “I shall never use any other method to prepare eggplant!”

And I immediately set out to bastardize the recipe. And since they are chinese eggplants I’ve got, I was thinking something vaguely chinese in flavor. Especially since I was reminded of the buttery texture of the stuffed and fried eggplant in black bean sauce at my current asian restaurant.

But I wasn’t about to start messing with pork mince and shrimp… actually, I could even be bothered to thaw a hamburger patty of (nothing but) ground turkey and repurpose it… but I did have a zucchini looking for a home.

So I actually ended up jumping out at bed at 2am after I made the Imam Bayildi to jot down notes for modifying it. But let me spoil the ending of the story and tell you that it just didn’t end up as perfect. I don’t know if it just needs tomatoes to have the perfect synergy of flavors or if it would have been perfect if I’d just added more sugar (or oil!), but I’m still liking the result enough that I will be tinkering with this recipe some more – even the disappointing version is entirely edible.

Tinkered Imam Bayildi

Peel 2 chinese eggplants in stripes, cut in half widthwise, and cut deep slits into each of the 4 pieces. Drop them into a pan with 1 Tablespoon hot oil (see, I’m still trying to minimize the oil, and maybe that’s just going in the face of the whole point of the original recipe), and turn them at intervals until the outside is evenly golden.

Meanwhile, fry cleaned leeks in 2 tsps oil until just starting to brown. (And this here is another place I might need to tinker. See – using all the way up the greens of the leeks was great when I was also capturing the chlorophyll taste of parsley, but it ended up being a bit too much damp green leek in this version. Then again, maybe it would have been better if the leeks had gone into the pan drier (or if there were more oil) – this experiment and reading about Orangette‘s perfectly cleaned and dried leeks has my pondering the purchase of a salad spinner.)

Once the leeks are soft, add minced garlic and ginger. A minute later, add zucchini diced a little smaller that 1cm (so it will stuff inside the eggplant nicely, but not so small that it loses justifiability). Cook just another minute or two longer – maybe with a splash of a stir fry sauce, if you have a good one. I had just finished a bottle, so I did without.

Turn the eggplants so they are slit side up, wiggle a spoon into the slit to open it up, and then stuff with the leek/zucchini. If there is any left, pile it on top.

Mix together – the juice of one lime, 1/2 tsp sugar (I ended up using a teaspoon of the lime simple syrup I had leftover), 2 tsp soy sauce (and I still ended up seasoning both versions with more plain salt while eating, but that might just be me), and 1/2 cup of water. Pour the mixture into the pot with the eggplant, put on the lid, and simmer on low for 45 minutes.

~*~

So, as I said, not perfect – nowhere near as exciting as the original – but still decently tasty.

And then I’ve been using the leftovers.

1 day I microwaved a whole stuffed eggplant piece and wrapped it in a piece of bread and ate it as a sandwich. 🙂

Another day, I made a salad of spring mix, 1 ounce sharp cheddar cheese pieces, a tomato, and a de-seeded and sliced serrano pepper. Topped that off with microwaved (and sliced into smaller pieces) Imam Bayildi. And dressed it with some balsamic vinegar stirred up with half a teaspoon of dijon mustard.

I think tonight I’ll make a salad with carrots and crispy noodles and top it with one of the modified versions (and dress it with black vinegar mixed with a 1/4 teaspoon chinese mustard).

food list

food I have
Produce
5oz package of lettuce
brussel sprouts
2 small/medium zucchini
4 limes
1 lemon
carrots
1 red and 1 orange aging bell peppers
fennel (fronds and half a roasted bulb)
hot peppers galore
4 chinese eggplant
1/2 pound snowpeas
chinese broccoli
coconut milk
6 Seckel pears
red and green tomatoes
1 onion
2 apples
2 butternut squash – still maturing

Meat
3 ounces chicken, cooked in green curry paste and coconut milk
jam jar of condensed chicken stock

Starch
cooked brown rice
loaf of spelt bread

so what am I going to do with that?
Meals
Wednesday, October 29
Salad. Because a) I had 2 croissants today, so I’ll want something filling that’s not too high on calories; and b) While the lettuce looks good on the outside still, it’s already old enough that the center is a mess of badness. I am only expecting to salvage 1 salad worth of greens. So what else? I should use the fennel… so that should go with fruit, I think. So pears. And fennel. And Almonds. And some slices of raw zucchini. Why not? Maybe the dressing should have lemon zest and/or juice… and pomegranate molasses… and that’ll be pretty tart, so honey and red wine, both. And then a vinegar… white wine balsamic. Any spices? little bit of nutmeg, probably a clove would be too strong… nor 5 spice because that already has a licorice flavor. Ummm… Cheese! It needs a gorgonzola. I only have cheddar in the house right now. So between now and when I go home, I’ll need to decide if it needs a cheese enough to stop at a store and buy some special. With spelt bread on the side.

ETA: So the salad turned out delightful, so I thought I’d revise with that I actually did. No fennel. No zucchini. No pomegranate molasses. No gorgonzola. So a little different from what I planned. On the other hand, the salad greens are in pristine condition, so I foresee another salad in my future.

So

Main body of the salad
spring mix (and I hate to admit it, but I’m liking the lettuce I get in the spring mix packs from my local supermarket more than I like the mix in the packs carried by whole foods – yay, canada)
snow peas (so crisp – I was walking by the produce vendors in chinatown and had to stop when I saw the pretty peas. It’s good to know that they actually are as good as they looked from a distance)
2 pears, cut into quarters, the core cut out, and then halved across
thin slices of my garlic and chive cheddar
toasted almond slivers
and slices of a red jalepeno pepper (no seeds)

Dressing
1 tsp red wine (Manischewitz, as always)
juice of half a lime
2-3 tsp white balsamic vinegar
…and then I didn’t want to use honey. It just didn’t feel right.
So I made a simple syrup from the lime-and-grapefruit-zest-infused sugar I had lying around the house. And I added that until the dressing tasted right – about 4-5 teaspoons

And the pears I don’t use, I could just trust that I’ll eat them all up – not a hardship. Or, I could try to pickle them out of curiosity.

Thursday, October 30 – I’m working 9-5 this day!
If I wake up early enough, there should be breakfast – stone ground oatmeal with brown sugar, apples, dates, and a splash of cream. I’ve been wanting it for about 4 days now, and I finally have the pot clean and the apples ready. In fact, all of the ingredients are already laid out together on my counter just waiting.

Dinner – Since I have pilates 5:45-6:45 and belly dancing 7:30-9pm, I think I’ll try to get out during the break and grab one of the famed vegetarian hoagies at Fu Wah.

Friday, October 31 – wear a costume to work?
8:30am pilates
do laundry!
breakfast – sweet sticky coconut rice (try making it with saffron!)

dinner – If the bell peppers are still good, they’ll need to be used up next. And I have snow peas. And eggplant. Maybe half of the snow peas and 2 of the eggplants… with thai green curry and coconut milk. Top with slices of red jalepeno.

Saturday, November 1
breakfast – bacon, onions, and brussel sprouts – seasoned with mustard, fennel, and nutmeg. Give it a taste, maybe add a tomato and/or poach an egg on top. And serve on slices of spelt toast.

Make stock.

dinner – using up the rest of the eggplant and the zucchini. Oh, and probably snow peas as well. I’d usually go asian with that… but I how about italian? Something primavera-ish? Huh – I might still have some homemade pesto in the freezer. OOooo! I know I have some ice cubes of cilantro. How about putting it on soba noodles and making it, still asian inspired, but not what I usually cook. I can think about this for a bit.

Herbed mayonnaise, Summer Garden Hoagie, Stir Fried Beef and Eggplant Salad

I made a couple delicious sandwiches last week because I claimed some bread when I visited my mother the weekend before.

Step one: Herbed Mayonnaise
Cut up into itsy bitsy pieces (if using a food processor, I would still cut them up a bit first so you don’t end up with stringy chunks) the leaves of:
Rosemary
Thyme
Marjoram
Summer Savory
Chives

And then if you also want to use more distinct herbs, pick one of the following and label the jar with that one – and be careful with your amount (the others, not so careful):
fennel
sage
dill
basil

And then mix with your favorite mayonnaise in a jar and let sit in the fridge for a couple days. Also good as gifts.

Step two: Sandwiches

I really love these steak rolls I claimed from my mother (claimed means that she bought them so my father could make cheesesteaks one night and then they didn’t have any use for the rest of the package).

So one of those. Spread with a teaspoon or less per half of the herbed mayonnaise.

Thinly slice:
1 slightly larger than fist-sized home-grown fresh off the vine already ripened tomato (and cut the slices in half)
1 home-grown salmonella-free sexy serrano pepper also from my mother’s garden
1 super small and cute yellow summer squash from the farmers’ market
1 ounce (well, maybe 2) of Jack cheese made by random amish farmers and sold at the farmers’ market (which is surprisingly tastier than their cheddar)

Step three: Pile only roll. Nom nom nom.

~*~

Stir fried beef & eggplant salad

Well, I promised you more salad recipes

Cold bit
spring mix
a few leaves of kale torn up, too.
a small yellow squash, sliced up (why, yes, I thought they were adorable and bought several of them)
scallions
serrano pepper (was actually too hot – leave this off)

Hot bit
I had pulled some beef I had sliced thinly for stir fry out of the freezer, so add about 1 oz of that, maybe less.
1 long, thin chinese eggplant, sliced into 2mm thick rounds
stir fried in 1 tsp of oil (mixed olive and sesame oils)
with 1 Tbsp of black pepper sauce
And then I tossed in 3 small apples, quartered and sliced crosswise, but not peeled because their skins weren’t particularly thick.

Dressing
1 1/2 tsp chinese mustard (which I had thought was supposed to lose potency over time, but it could have knocked me over when I opened the jar)
1 tsp real soy sauce
2 tsp black vinegar
3 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
juice of half a lime

Aside from being too spicy, this was a very successful salad.

Poached Egg over Tomato and Spinach, Salad with Za’tar salad dressing

I made an amazing breakfast.

The initial plan was to cook down some spinach and tomato and then scramble an egg in it – pretty standard.

And it started out simple enough with about as much fresh spinach by volume as the tomato (so there ended up being a lot more tomato once everything cooked down).

But this was a big, luscious tomato from my mother’s garden, so it released a lot of liquid. So I poured off some of the liquid (into a jar to keep since I could put it in rice or soup or something – and it’d be wasteful otherwise – and don’t judge me because just wait until the depression or the apocalypse hits because then you’ll all want me to be managing your foodstuffs so you won’t get scurvy), and then I poured off some more. And then I realized that it was just willing to cook down into sauce.

I added a bit of 5 spice powder for fun.

So instead of scrambling the egg, I just cracked it in and gave it a lot of channels into the goody and poached it right there, covering the pan occasionally so that the top would steam cook, too.

And I ground some pepper and sprinkled kosher salt on top.

And oh my, it was like pudding – tasty savoury egg, tomato, and spinach pudding. Only sexier.

I have enough spinach to try it again and see if the results are repeatable.

~*~

And there was a salad with za’tar

I went home last weekend, and I ended up cleaning out and organizing my mother’s space cabinet. A while back, she had purchased a tiny container of zatar from Penzey’s because it sounded unlike any of the other stuff in her cabinet (we’ve never cooked with sumac much). A few years later, it still hadn’t been used, and it wasn’t sounding like anything my father would enjoy, so it came home with me.

My initial plan was to soak it in lime juice and then taste it and build a salad dressing from there. Luckily, however, I looked it up online before I started, since apparently it has a sour taste that can replace lime/lemon/tamarind in recipes. So once I knew that was how it slotted in, it became easy and I’ll be able to use it regularly.

Cold bits
spring mix
spinach
sliced tomato
serrano pepper

Hot bits
roasted zucchini, yellow squash, eggplant, and bell pepper (rewarmed in the microwave)

Dressing
3/4 tsp za’tar
1/2 tsp crushed mustard
2 Tbsp white balsamic
2 tsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp honey
2 Tbsp red wine
3 small scallions, sliced

I like salads

Okay, so I haven’t been giving you all recipes for salads, but let me tell you that I am loving them. I am a salad god. Or something like that. But I’ve been making a lot of salads lately, and they’ve all been pretty awesome… so now I’ll try to reconstruct them from (dubious) memory and my sketchy notes:

8/8/08
Cold Bit
spring mix
small bits of broccoli tops
1 Tbsp pickled ginger, patted dry
(would have also been good with some napa cabbage shreds here)

Hot Bit
thinly sliced baby carrots
thinly sliced purple onion
thinly slices garlic
thinly sliced broccoli stem
stir fried in 1/2 tsp olive oil, 1/4 tsp sesame oil, and San-J Szechuan sauce

Dressing
1/2 tsp chinese mustard (mixed up according to the directions on the bottle)
1 tsp black pepper sauce
juice of half a lime
1 tsp buckwheat honey
1/2 tsp soy sauce
2 tsp black vinegar

~*~

8/1/08
Hot Bit (part 1)
cooked up one slice of bacon on the stove, set it in a paper towel, and drained the fat from the pan

Cold Bit
spring mix
1 diced jalepeno pepper
2 Tbsp blue cheese crumbles (oddly, this was a bit too much cheese – just 1 Tbsp for a more balanced flavor)
sun dried tomatoes
broccoli
grind of pepper

Hot Bit (part 2)
in same pan, cook:
sliced red onion
3 ounces of sliced leftover chicken breast

Dressing
juice of half a lime
2/3 tsp black pepper sauce
1/4 tsp buckwheat honey
5 Tbsp apple cider vinegar
1 tsp Grey Poupon mustard
1 tsp Manischewitz concord grape

~*~

7/26/08
Cold Bit
spring mix
baby carrots, sliced thinly on an angle
1 tomato, quartered and then sliced thinly
3 oz extra sharp cheddar cheese, sliced

Dressing
salvaged bits from very, very ripe apricots
1 diced jalepeno pepper
2 finely sliced shallots
3 Tbsp white balsamic vinegar
lime zest
(let the above sit a while, thinking they might become salsa… then realise the apricots have completely liquefied and should be salad dressing)
2 tsp Grey Poupon mustard
juice of 1 lime (already missing some zest)

~*~

7/7/08
Cold Bits
spring mix
salmon jerky (from Alaska)
thinly sliced red onion
1/2 avocado, sliced (and the rest eaten with a spoon and some more of the dressing – it was perfect)

Hot Bits
slight handful of slivered almonds, toasted

Dressing
juice of 1/2 lime
2 Tbsp rice vinegar
1 tsp lime brown sugar (brown sugar with lime zest in it – lime bit optional)
1 tsp Grey Poupon mustard
1 Tbsp soy sauce
grate of nutmeg
pinch of chipotle

~*~

7/4/08
Cold Bits
spring mix!
a few baby carrots, sliced in half and then thinly lengthwise
2 scallions, sliced thinly into rounds
1/4 cup roasted red pepper, sliced roughly against the grain
1/4 cup sliced dried tomatoes

Hot Bits
2 Tbsp fried leeks
3 oz thinly sliced beef

Dressing
1 tsp tamarind-lime-honey sauce
1 tsp Grey Poupon mustard
4 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
dash of 5 spice powder

~*~

6/26/08
Cold Bits
spring mix
several baby carrots, sliced thinly on an angle
1 very ripe banana, cut in half lengthwise, and then sliced
sections cut out from 1 orange

Hot Bits
4 oz leftover pork (having been cubed braised in taco seasoning and orange juice)

Dressing
5 tsp balsamic vinegar
2 tsp tamarind-lime-honey sauce
2 tsp wildflower honey
1 tsp Grey Poupon mustard

Topping
1/4 cup roasted salted cashews
2 scallions, cut in rounds, but on a slight angle