Daria Can Cook – and so can you!

…the Daria will play. With her veggies, that is. T is out of town for the weekend, and I just don’t feel like going to the trouble of defrosting and cooking meat for one. I’ve had this recipe for roasted brussels sprouts with cranberries saved for a few weeks and figured now was a good time to test it out.

As usual, I didn’t have all of the ingredients and so used the recipe as a guideline rather than a rulebook. I prepped my sprouts and steamed them for 5ish minutes as directed, then tossed them and a handful of cranberries with some Trader Joe’s aioli garlic mustard sauce and a few drops of liquid stevia (stevia courtesy of Nu Naturals, review to follow soon!). I then popped them in a 450 degree toaster oven for 20 minutes. As you can see, they got a wee bit crispy. Next time I’ll add the cranberries later. But they were still delicious!

I also made some kale chips, which I dunked in the TJ’s mustard sauce.

BFFs for life.

What are your favorite recipes for one? I have a few nights of solo dining left – I’d love some inspiration!

I’m finally back with this week’s veggie CSA haul. It’s one of the biggest ones yet, and it includes a fall treat I’m super excited about!

Nope, not those…

Not those either…

Getting closer…

Can you see it?

There it is! On the right! A BUTTERNUT SQUASH!

Plus a beautiful bunch of kale:

For lunch today I made use of a summer squash leftover from last week (so many veggies! so little time!), the new kale, and some of the cherry toms to get this snacky plate:

I definitely felt a little Snackface-y, especially because I sauteed the kale in a dry skillet so they crisped up into kale chips. I was kind of skeptical about kale chips, but WOW are they good! They explode into little crispy bites of heavenly greenness in your mouth. I will definitely be making these again.

For dinner tonight we did a pasta dish with CSA spicy Italian sausage, stir-fried eggplant, long beans (amazing texture!), more cherry toms, and hot pepper. It was so good I forgot to take a picture!

This was purportedly our last week of summer bounty. Our share continues through November, so we’re looking forward to hardier fare like root veggies and (thankfully) kale. I’m excited for the change of seasons! And I’m excited to be writing a blog post – I’ve missed doing this during my busy busy school days! Thanks to those of you who have still be visiting and commenting – you’re the best!

… make a bean dip and a frittata.

It was a British-isles-type of cool, grey, wet day yesterday, so I mostly hunkered down with tea and books. The little time I spent in the kitchen yielded this:

The green one is a bean dip similar to this one. One cup of white beans, a giant bunch of basil, the juice of one lemon, a few glugs of olive oil, a clove of garlic, and some s&p played in the food processor for a few minutes. The white one is a slice of lactose-free muenster, crumbly from being frozen and thawed. Mmmm.

Dinner was inspired by this post at Tea & Cookies. We had a whole lotta amaranth leaves and kale on their way to spoilage and some CSA bacon leftover from Friday’s dinner, which was these amazing BLTs minus the L because we ate our two heads in two days (woohoo huge salads!):

So we sauteed up our CSA potatoes, leeks, amaranth leaves, and kale along with our fabulous bacon, mixed them with 8 eggs and 2 slice of lactose-free muenster in a casserole dish, and baked them until we got this:

Frittata-tastic! This bacon is out of this world. It’s simply pork, maple syrup, and salt. No nitrates or nitrites, no frightening preservatives. Pure love. I was worried that our frittata would suffer from our failure to add any herbs, but the bacon and the cheese provided more than enough flavor.

It’s still cloudy, but I’m hoping the sun will pop out so I can enjoy it when I go running. Gotta get that natural vitamin D while I can! How is your weekend going?

And on a sidenote, is anyone else having trouble with google reader this morning? Nothing will load in mine, and it’s totally cramping my style.

We’ve been in leftover/scrounge mode lately. Last night we made a lovely dinner out of our CSA meat sauce, served over rice with a side of boiled kale. Boiling is the worst method for conserving vitamins in your food, but I really love the texture of slightly boiled kale, so we went with it. When served with lemon juice and s&p it’s delightfully chewy and just a little tart.

Check out that steam! We paired it with a Trader Joe’s find, which Kelsey recommended a while ago on Bites + Bowls.

This was really good! Fruity, juicy, and $5.99. There is nothing I dislike in that half-sentence.

Nothing too exciting happened in our kitchen today until this evening, when I made the most delicious healthy dessert EVER. No lie. It was so good that it deserves its own post, so you’re going to have to wait. Don’t worry, it’s worth it.

Have you done anything exciting in the kitchen (or elsewhere) this weekend?

We’re almost done with last week’s veggie CSA box, and not a moment too soon. Tonight we sauteed up the last of the kale and the two summer squashes we got.

This looks greasy, but it's just the camera flash reflecting moisture

This squash was one of those CSA revelations that I adore, much like our first truly free-range, hormone- and antibiotic-free chicken was. I usually don’t really like summer squash. It’s bland and watery and mushy and generally pretty blah. But this squash was sweet and nutty and toothsome; it almost tasted like an acorn squash. The time it spent sauteing in butter made it just a little carmel-y. Basically I want to eat this for every meal. Here’s hoping there’s more in next week’s box!

Yet another reason I occasionally rant and rave about conventional agricultural practices. Not only are they toxic, but they make our food taste like bland, watery crap.

In other news, Curly Top is starting up a new site for bloggers to review recipes and products. It’s called Chew Review and I think it’s a great idea. I can’t wait to see it get on its feet!

T and I rarely do lunch together, but we both happened to be home at the same time today. Our veggie CSA partners are out of town, so we have a whole box of produce to polish off by ourselves. A daunting task, but I think we’re up to it.

We did our level best to make a dent by having Hugh Jass salads.

Mine had beautiful purple kale, spring mix, lettuce, and grated white carrot (!) from our CSA share, plus half an avocado and a big ol dollop of my garlicky bean spread.

These white carrots are crazy! They look like this:

but they taste like orange carrots. Intriguing.

Actually, I don’t remember where I acquired this knowledge, but I remember hearing that the orange strain of carrots was popularized to honor a Dutch king and it’s been the dominant variety ever since. History: it’s crazy! (I heart you, Kate Beaton.)

Yesterday I threw some bananas in the freezer in preparation to test out the famous banana soft serve. In a moment of insanity, I thought “why peel the bananas first? I’ll just peel them right before I blend them.”

Folks, this does not work. Of course, you’re probably much smarter than I am and hence you could have told me that, but I had to learn for myself. I left them out for a bit to thaw enough so that I could peel them. T was intrigued by the weird, frosty, brownish lumps on our kitchen table, so he had to watch while I peeled them.

Let’s just say that they did not look appetizing oozing out of their skins. In T’s words, “Ew ew ew, they move exactly like feces!”

And they did.

So if you need a laugh (and have the sense of humor of a 5 year old), I recommend including the “banana poop” stage in your raw soft serve making adventure. If not, skip straight to the “blend and enjoy” stage.

I added cocoa powder to mine, because, as Katie knows, everything is better with chocolate.

T also added some of the Pacharan we picked up in Madrid to his:

Both versions were out of this world. The texture really is identical to soft serve – heaven!

Supper was burgers and warm German potato salad (the recipe’s from the trusty Joy of Cooking). CSA potatoes, scrubbed with the help of a blue man and ready to be boiled:

Hastily snapped photo of unphotogenic but delicious food: it was getting cold fast! This potato salad recipe is one of our favs because it includes bacon. This gave us a chance to use up the last of our CSA bacon, and also an excuse to top our burgers with it. Nothing like an all veggie lunch followed by an all meat dinner.

We made a heroic effort to finish off our peas, bok choy, and kale with tonight’s dinner.

bok choy and beautiful purple kale

sesame oil, sambal oelek (chili paste), garlic, bok choy stems, and peas, getting along famously

T stopped by our closest Asian market since we were out of sesame oil, and he also picked up some beef to add to the mix. We marinated it in a little soy sauce first and then sauteed it up.

all together now!

I went pretty light on the beef since we just had red meat last night. I like to keep the red meat consumption to a minimum, especially when it isn’t grass-fed.

We also polished off our final vegan baked donut. I find it very satisfying to use up food stores – it gives me an odd sense of accomplishment.

Almost time to polish off all that Paris has to offer….whee!!!

Question of the day: Any tips for dealing with jet lag? This is a short trip, so we won’t have much time to adjust to the time change. We’ll need all the help we can get!