Peachy Quinoa Salad

Get it?

Peachy quin-oa.

As in "peachy keen" + "wa".

It's fun to be me! Really it is.

So, today's is another salad post. I know these are less interesting than desserts and cocktails. But, well, salad is an important and consistent part of my kitchen repertoire, especially throughout spring and summer. And salad can be enjoyable to eat if you put some effort into it and/or have wonderfully fresh ingredients on hand.

I wouldn't lie to you.

Salad can be amazing.

We had some friends over for dinner on Sunday. I did this thing I do quite a lot between May and October, which is serve several smaller-plate, fresh, herby foods rather than one hearty item. I made two kinds of salad (including Peachy Quinoa Salad) and two sandwiches. It was a light, summery meal that went great with the cocktails I decided to share with others after enjoying them solo the previous night.

It was a nice, casual meal. Plus the condo stayed cool because I didn't have to cook anything. And I don't have much else to say other than that everything was varying degrees of delicious and healthy and worth trying immediately. Quinoa, especially, is as good for you as it is mispronounced. It is full of protein and it's pretty. I used red quinoa here but any kind (or color, anyway) would work. Diced mangos or tangerine segments would be a good substitute for the peaches.

Peachy Quinoa

From me

Yield: about 4 cups; a side dish for 6-8

Dressing

1/4 cup olive oil

1/4 cup red wine vinegar, champagne vinegar, or apple cider vinegar

2 teaspoons honey or agave nectar or sugar

2 teaspoons lime or lemon or grapefruit juice

Quinoa

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 cup uncooked quinoa, rinsed and drained

1-1/2 cups water

1 15-ounce can (or 1-1/2 cups cooked) black beans

1 red bell pepper, chopped

1 jalapeño, seeds removed and finely chopped

1 shallot, finely chopped

2 peaches or nectarines, chopped (I used white peaches because I love them love them love them)

1/2 cup chopped cilantro

Whisk together all dressing ingredients and set aside.

In 1 or 2-quart saucepan, heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat. Add the quinoa and saute for about a minute in the oil, stirring so that all the quinoa is coated, then add 1.5 cups water. Bring to boil, then lower heat and simmer for about 20 minutes, or until water has completely dissolved. Remove from heat, stir a bit and let cool.

Meanwhile, chop your veggies if you haven't yet.

Drain the black beans if they're canned.

Gently fold all the ingredients together. Dress with about half the dressing. Put the remaining dressing on the table for those who may want more. Garnish with fresh cilantro or mint leaves. Serve as is or over bed of lettuce tossed with 1-2 tablespoons of the dressing.

Presto! Pesto times two!

I hate when I think I have come up with a brilliant idea only to find out that not only have other people come up with the idea but they've also already posted it on their food blogs or more reputable, commercial foody websites. (I also hate that my fingers and my computer seem to have a significant relationship that fails to include me. So, as I'm typing all this in an OpenOffice.org (free Word-like software) document to cut and paste into blogger once the website is back up, the text keeps getting bigger and smaller and I am not sure why or how and now it is officially “Large Print” and I have to scroll sidewise to see the whole thing and I'm at a loss as to how to make it normal sized. As in 12 point, can-see-whole-width-of-page-at-once. My Mac is too fancy for me. I am a simple girl. No, I'm not a simple girl at all actually, but I am extremely non-mechanical and non-technical. And frustrated.)

Anyway, recently my friend Alicia emailed me a list of CSA tips. I skimmed the first few and then thought, “these lists never talk about pesto! I'm going to blog about that!” So off I went, making pestos out of everything but the kitchen sink, all the while narrating in my head the clever post that would solve every CSA member's too-much-garlic-herbs-and-greens problem. And then, in preparation for the arrival of our first CSA share this week, I went back to the list randomly one day to see if maybe the last few items actually could provide me some novel tricks to have on hand come Thursday. And I saw that, naturally, pesto-making was mentioned.

I'm not the only genius, it seems.

This discovery did not preclude this pesto post, however, because I read The Pilgrimage and one part lists a sort of beatitudes-like prayer with a bit I will paraphrase like so: “Blessed are those who don't give up on a task because someone else could do it better.” Or, in this case, has already done it [maybe, possibly, arguably] better [or at least has gotten paid to do so]. I have defeatist tendencies, so that part of the book really struck me (sort of the way Free Range Kids gets to me (in a good, healthy way) over and over again because I have paranoid hypochondriac tendencies that could potentially lead to my daughter living a Rapunzel-like existence).

And that was a really long preface to pesto.

I'm going to post two recipes here but the point of this post is not to encourage anyone to go buy these ingredients and follow these recipes precisely. No, no. The point is to liberate you from your marriage to traditional basil-parmesan-pine nut pesto. Which, you know, before I was allergic to pine nuts, I really loved. It's good stuff. But it's not the only stuff, especially if you have an herb garden and/or oversized bags of farmer's market produce and/or CSA shares that you have to make use of. Pesto-making is so handy! And it's so good and versatile. I used the two below as a pizza topping, tossed in a pasta salad with garbanzo beans, spinach and tuna, spread on a veggie-burger sandwich for lunch and on hearty crackers as a side dish with dinner, and in a small bowl as a dip with crudité.

See? Good and versatile. That's probably why I'm not the only person that thought of it.

Cilantro Pesto

1/3 cup sunflower seeds, toasted

1/3 cup pepitas (green hulled pumpkin seeds – found in refrigerated bulk section at the co-op), toasted

2 cloves garlic

1 cup cilantro (big handful or half a bunch)

½ cup fresh parsley (or other herb or more cilantro)

½ teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon Sriracha

juice from ½ or whole lemon (about ¼ cup is what you want – my lemon wasn't v. juicy, so I used the whole thing)

2/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

Sun-dried Tomato Pesto

2 cloves garlic

1 cup oregano leaves, chives, basil, parsley and/or green part of green onions

½ cup sunflower seeds or pepitas, toasted

½ teaspoon salt

5 sun-dried tomatoes, soaked in boiling water for 10-15 minutes

2-3 dried apricots, soaked with the sun-dried tomatoes

¼ cup extra virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons lemon juice

In either recipe, the method is the same: place the garlic, herbs, seeds, salt (and sun-dried tomatoes and apricots, if using) in the food processor and pulse until it forms a thick, chunky paste. Add the lemon juice and/or hot sauce, pulse a couple more times. Finally, put the food processor on properly (not pulsing), and slowly drizzle in olive oil. Use more or less oil depending on what kind of consistency you like in your pesto and/or what you plan on using it for.

Some other pesto tips:

1. Other ingredients you might consider trying to add a little depth of flavor or nutrition to your pestos, depending on what kind of herbs you are using: capers, green olives, mustard, roasted garlic, lime juice, artichoke hearts, roasted red peppers, roasted or raw jalapeños or other hot peppers, ground flax seed, nutritional yeast, and freshly grated parmesan or asiago cheese.

2. If you get any of the following in your CSA shares, they are ideal for pestos (and soups, but that's another post): garlic scapes (whole thing, just trim ends a bit and cut into 1-2” pieces – especially good with oregano and parmesan), sorrel, lamb's quarters, stevia, watercress, arugula, mint, and the parts of scallions or herbs that you don't otherwise use.

3. If you have a lot of herbs or more intense greens that you'd like to use in pesto but that you find too strong to use raw, a small amount of cooking or roasting can go a long way to mellow the flavors. To do this the easy way, heat ¼ cup olive oil in a saucepan or, if you have larger greens, frying pan over a low flame. Once the oil is smoking, add watercress, oregano, arugula, peppers, garlic, et cetera. Cook for about five minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and let the oil and ingredients cool to lukewarm. Once cooled, add the produce to the food processor with your other ingredients, straining and reserving the olive oil for drizzling into the pesto at the end. If you're not up for heating, you could just let the flavors meld overnight. I made an arugula pesto a couple weeks ago, which was super bitter the first day. The arugula was v. overpowering and I regretted using it. But I never throw out food, so I kept it in the refrigerator and tried it the next day and it was much milder and quite nice. So, yeah, there's that.

4. Oh - and if you don't have a food processor, you should get one. It is the best kitchen appliance ever invented, and you only need a v. small one, and those guys aren't too expensive.

St. Germain-Pineapple Martini

(Warning: Posted under the influence.)

Well, what can I say? It's Saturday night. The sun is finally shining at a quarter to eight. The baby's sleeping. The husband is glued to his plants vs. zombies iPhone game. (He's going to murder me for publicly disclosing that.)

Sounds like happy hour to me!

So with the help of the google machine, my famous resourcefulness, some luck in terms of what I happened to have in my refrigerator, and a desire to finally make something remarkable with the bottle of St. Germain Elderflower Liqueur that my sister got me for my thirtieth birthday (note: I am no longer thirty), I made the concoction below.

In addition to its going straihgt to my head (wait - that's funny, right? - am leaving the typo for dramatic effect), it is taaaaaaaaaaaaaaasty. And, as a responsible nursing mother and notorious lightweight, I used only half the amount of alcohol that the foundational recipe called for. CAUTION: am nonetheless tipsy and only a quarter through my first cocktail.

... Which reminds me, one time, on our honeymoon, in Martinique, where they speak French, we saw a sign that said something in French and then had an (ill-advised) English translation below that said, "Caution to the Step!" And another time, in Switzerland, at a restaurant, not on my honeymoon, a menu said "Guacamole" on the French part and then, in the English part, it said "avocado sauce". Poor translations are never not funny. (Unless they are of religious texts. That can get a little dangerous.) ...

I am not that good at shaking drinks. Or maybe I have a bad shaker - I wouldn't know because I never shake drinks.

So I spilled.

I bet you are excited about this.

Are you excited about this?

Are you like, "Man, she's having fun! I want to have tasty fun too! Where'd I put my Elderflower Liqueur?"

Well okay then.

Go dust those martini glasses and shaker of yours.

I'll stay here.

Oh.

You're back.

Yuo're way faster than me!

Here you go.

St. Germain-Pineapple Martini
Yield: 4 martinis

1/4 cup fresh lime juice
1/2 cup pineapple juice
1/2 cup St. Germain Elderflower Liqueur
2/3 cup vodka

Fill a shaker with ice. Add all the ingredients, plus the lime rinds because that sort of feels hard core, right? Shake shake shake. Shake your booty while you're at it. It's Saturday, y'all! Baby's sleepin! Strain (carefully) into martini glasses. Savor.

Mmmmmmmmmm.

Lemon Basil Shortbread

A while back I got a phone call from my aunt, who wanted my advice about how to fancify some cookies she planned on making for a party that week. I could not have been more flattered. Because, you see, I come from a family of culinistas and entertainers, and I am one of the less talented of the bunch (we really are a bunch; I have a giant family), but she called ME! Apparently my aunt confused my resourcefulness with creativity, and given that confidence boost I came up with lemon-basil cookies and chocolate-lavender cookies. (I abruptly dismissed her idea of lemon-lavender because I think lavender in food can sometimes taste like soap, so any lavender would have to be a subtle addition to something more intense (like chocolate) and decidedly non-soapy (so the lemon was out).) I always like the combination of lemon and basil, however, so that's why I suggested she try that in her cookies, and apparently they ended up great (as did the chocolate lavender ones). Months later, I finally experimented with the combination myself.

YUM.

These are heavenly. They are melt-in-your-mouth buttery. The dried basil gives them a peppery bite that's perfectly complimented by the lemony brightness. My husband and I can't stop eating them.

But dough continues to be a bit tricky for me, so I didn't end up with two perfect nine-inch rounds (see photos below), nor was I able to score sixteen perfect wedges (id.).

Also, as you can see in the oven picture, they didn't really brown evenly. But nothing browns in my oven evenly without some sort of intervention, e.g. rotating pans or switching to convection half-way through, and I didn't intervene during this particular baking experiment because I was multitasking and keeping a watchful eye sort of went out the window. So, if you have a similar issue with your oven, go ahead and intervene as you see fit. You know your oven better than I.

(Speaking of ovens, mine is haunted. Seriously.)

Lemon-Basil Shortbread

Yield: 16-24 cookies, depending on how good you are at rolling and scoring dough

Adapted from Gourmet, December 2002

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup spelt flour (or another cup of all-purpose)

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon dried basil

1 teaspoon lemon zest, finely chopped

3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened

2 tablespoons honey*

1/2 cup powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 300 degrees.

Whisk together flours, salt, baking powder, basil, and lemon zest.

Mix together butter, honey, and powdered sugar until slightly fluffy. On low speed, add the dry ingredients and mix until dough resembles coarse meal with some small, pea-sized lumps. Knead the dough on a lightly floured surface until it comes together. Form two evenly-sized disks with the dough.**

Between two sheets of parchment paper, roll the dough, one disk at a time, into (approximately) nine-inch rounds. Place the rounds on a silpat or parchment-lined baking sheet and score into eight wedges per round, or, you know, cut in random shapes. (If both rounds don't fit on your baking sheet, just bake one at a time.)

Bake shortbread until golden brown, about 20-25 minutes. Let cool for about 5 minutes and then cut along score-marks with a large, heavy knife.

*I actually didn't have honey, so I used one tablespoon of lime syrup (I am the queen of random ingredients!) and one tablespoon of corn syrup. I think honey would taste different but be just as good. I am going to make these again soon with one tablespoon of honey, one tablespoon of lime syrup, and 1/2 teaspoon cayenne in place of lemon and basil. They sell something similar at our local market and I love them.

** I might try making one or two logs of dough next time, refrigerating them for 20 minutes, and slicing them. The only other time I made shortbread that method seemed to work fine.