Kitchen (Mis)Adventure: Spinach Pesto Pasta Salad

I took this photo of one of my favorite meals months ago, look at how beautiful it is! I was reminded to post a Kitchen (Mis)Adventure about it on Sunday when I was making a new batch. I generally get six servings out of any given batch of my spinach pesto pasta concoction and, though Jason will have it once and maybe repeat with leftovers the next day, I'll eat it every day (sometimes twice a day) until the bowl's empty. Because it's amazing, and filling, and wholesome, and rad.

It takes all of 15 minutes to prepare, it tastes better the second (third, fourth) day, and you can eat it straight out of the fridge. DECADENCE. 

Ingredients:
8 oz penne pasta
0.5 cup pesto
8 oz baby spinach
2 cups kidney beans
juice of 2 lemons
0.75 cup toasted almonds
handful of chopped up sun-dried tomatoes
a healthy dash of red pepper flakes

While the pasta's cooking, prep and then dump the fresh spinach, beans, and sun-dried tomatoes into a large bowl. When the pasta's done and drained, quickly dump it on top of the spinach, legumes, and tomatoes and let it sit and steam for a bit. Toast your almonds (or buy a bag of pre-toasted almond slivers at Trader Joe's like I do and avoid all that), slice up and juice your lemons, measure out your pesto, and then dump all that in, too. Super excelente, you're all done.

We generally eat it at room temperature or cold, with some broiled chicken, as seen above. It's perfectly great on its own, but adding the chicken helps Jason feel like he's eating a real meal (eye-roll). It doesn't even need any grated cheese sprinkled on top (though I do add some generally because I'm a glutton) -- making it a great vegan dish! OOPS, wait, pesto sauce has cheese, right? I'm sure somebody's figured out how to make vegan pesto, probably Sarah Britton at My New Roots. Have you seen this shit? Vegan food has never looked (so) attractive. HA! 

I originally adapted this recipe from theKitchn's Lemony Pesto Pasta with Edamame and Almonds (mouthful), and it changes slightly every time I make it. The "pasta, pesto, lemon, legumes, iron-rich dark greens" formula is super versatile. As long as it's light on the pasta/pesto and heavy on the greens/lemon juice/legumes,* I don't think it really matters what you use, it'll always come out perfect. Doodle around with it and let me know what you come up with!

Lastly, I want to mention that this stuff is super healthful. Don't be turned off by the pesto -- you're using a very small amount, so little that it isn't really "saucy" just "bindy" in a small-amount-of-salad-dressing kind of way. I calculated its caloric and nutritional information** on Sunday, and (with a light sprinkling of grated pecorino-romano and not including the broiled chicken) two heaping salad-tongs full is all of 450 calories and a swell balance of carbohydrates, proteins, fats, etc. AM I BORING YOU YET? 

* Do be sure to "steam" the greens with the hot pasta a bit before stirring in the pesto and lemon juice, though. Especially if you're working with some gnarly fresh dino-kale or something.
** Can you tell that I'm trying to lose weight? I wouldn't be able to without this dish, life would be too awful.

Kitchen (mis)Adventure: Octopus Toast

I had a truly decadent and wonderful dinner at home Sunday night, and it was made all the better -- because I'm a lazy person -- due to the fact that I basically didn't have to do any cooking whatsoever. 

I mean, toasting toast and puréeing vegetables don't actually count as cooking, do they?

I've been hoarding two cans of imported (Spanish) baby octopus, packed in olive oil, that I bought at the Westside New Leaf in Santa Cruz a couple of months ago. They cost me millions of dollars (not really, but you know what I mean), and I've been waiting for a special occasion to crack them open. Well, Sunday evening rolled around, Jason was out,* and I decided that that night was the night (I only opened one can though, I'm a hoarder after all).

I made myself a nice batch of basic gazpacho, and toasted two pieces of bread. I slathered one in hummus and left the other one plain for the bowl of baby octopus I prepared with magic parsley from the St. John's Eve herb garden and lots of lemon juice. EXQUISITE. 

Kitchen (mis)Adventure success! I enjoyed it all before a lovely Skype date with Sarah T, after which I instantaneously crashed out while watching the opening credits to an old episode of Bones on Hulu. JUST ANOTHER PERFECT SUNDAY EVENING.

***

* Jason loathes, loathes, loathes seafood, which I find disappointing and am trying to slowly remedy. We're still working on tuna and (small) shrimp, so I knew that octopus would be way too much way too soon. ALL THE MORE FOR MEEEE. 

Kitchen (mis)Adventure: Magical Basil Gazpacho

Here it is, my first batch of magical basil gazpacho. OH YEAH. I decided to err on the side of caution this go around, and only made half the quantity of gazpacho as last time. It took me over a week to drink the whole pitcher, after all.  You may or may not be able to tell that I puréed the crap out of it in hopes that the smoother texture would be more pleasing to Jason, but alas, I just don't think he's much of a fan of the idea of cold soups.*

Apart from the magical midsummer basil (both Genovese and spicy Cuban), I gazpacho'd with what I had on hand: sweet baby bell peppers, jarred fire-roasted red pepper, a yellow onion (if I could, I would have used a red onion, a la Sarah T), garlic, Roma tomatoes, and an enormous cucumber (I only used half). I threw in a generous handful of toasted almonds for a little protein, something my mother does because she's a genius, and blended away with slightly less sherry vinegar and olive oil than last time and double the water. Tasty.

I think the gazpacho turned out great. But as I drank it, I suddenly had a craving for cheese. Fresh mozzarella cheese. IT TASTED JUST A LITTLE TOO MUCH LIKE CAPRESE SALAD WHAT HAVE I DONE.


Summer: caprese salads, gazpacho, soda water (yes, I made some after finally potting my magical herbs and feeding the citrus trees this morning), postcards, and the list goes on.

* Speaking of cold soups, TheKitchn highlighted a Mark Bittman New York Times article on cold soup recipes and they look really, really super. Check out the recipes here. 

Kitchen (mis)Adventure: Spicy Gazpacho

It's really hot here. Like, so hot that I'm completely useless. Yesterday was up in the 90's, today should be too, and we should be seeing high 80's/low 90's through the rest of the week. Looks like it's going to be a long, hot, and dry summer.

Here's a nice photo of my current laptop workspace in the living room, taken from my seat.
Observe piles of books and papers and knittings. 

In a fit of rage, I made 5 million gallons of gazpacho this morning. I just went whole hog with the Osterizer, making one batch and then two, using up as many veggies as I could. As you can see in the photo above, I pulled out my copy of Teresa Barrenechea's The Cuisines of Spain: Exploring Regional Home Cooking when I started, but only used it to cross reference Sarah T's* tried-and-true gazpacho recipe. Barrenechea tends to over-do it with the olive oil in my opinion, so I generally use her recipes as a starting reference. Here's something interesting: neither Sarah T. nor Barrenechea had any onion in their gazpacho recipes! I know! They only included garlic. Correction: Barrenechea doesn't have any onion in her recipe, only garlic, but Sarah T does include a whole red onion in hers! I've set the record straight! (6/25/2012) I put both into mine (and plenty of it). Because I'm a crazy person, apparently. I like my gazpacho spicy! (I may have also added too liberal a splash [SLOSH] of vinegar... burp.)

I'm drinking a tall glassful of it right now. Jason is so repulsed by the gazpacho that he can't even watch me drink it. I poured him a tiny amount in our little Garfield mug, but I don't think he'll be able to drink it all... Nope, he just gagged trying to get the first mouthful down. MORE FOR MEEEE!!!

* Check out Sarah T's super travel blog, Someday on the Avenue, here. I especially love her latest post on the old operating theater she visited recently. Creepy, gothic, Victoriana, yessss. 

Kitchen (mis)Adventure: Fresh Hummus, Sad Carrots

There's nothing easier than whipping together a plate of hummus. Well, sure there is, but so it seems. I made the latest batch below late last week with my trusty Osterizer blender (it's older than I am!) and my also trusty copy of How To Cook Everything. I followed Mark Bittman's basic recipe and then added to it as I blended. I ended up using twice the prescribed amount of lemon juice, lots of pepper, and smoked paprika. It still turned out a little on the bland side (sad), but I prefer even bland hummus made fresh to the store-bought kind*. Next time I'll cut back on the tahini, which ended up being too overpowering, and try a couple other things to pack in the flavor -- pine nuts blended in as well? Vinegar? Can you add vinegar to hummus? Something was missing, but what I cannot say. 

We were super busy gallivanting around and adventuring last week, so I didn't get a chance to enjoy my hummus until yesterday afternoon. I pulled out a bag of carrots and started munching away as I worked at the computer. 

Something was off. I knew that the hummus wasn't the most exciting I'd ever made, but there was something... wrong. I chewed and chewed and chewed and frowned and started to feel something sinister and strange as I looked down at the bit of carrot in my hand. It was weathered and shriveled and unhappy. The carrots were stale. I couldn't even remember buying the bag, they'd been sitting in the back of the veggie crisper in the fridge for so long. They tasted like sad, little desiccated pieces of cardboard. There was no life left in those pale and dry roots. I threw them away. SO SAD. 

Speaking of gallivanting, here's a photo from last week. Carlos and Claudia came to visit, and we ended up putting over 150 miles on my car and over 450 miles on a friend's car with all our adventuring, seeing about a quarter of the California coast in the process. Super fun, super exhausting, and super sunburnt and happy. 

Savannah-Chanelle Vineyards, Santa Cruz Mountains, photo by Claudia

* Jason begs to differ. Next time, he can make the hummus.

Kitchen (mis)Adventure: Fracas de quiche

Oh man, it started out as such a good idea and ended up being such a goat-cheesy no-no. I made my first quiche this morning. Consulting Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything (my favorite cooking "reference" and not "recipe book", this is relevant, just wait), I pulled out everything in my refrigerator that Mark Bittman told me would likely go well together in a quiche and got to it: steaming broccoli florets, "gently warming" milk on the stove-top, adding dried marjoram to my beaten and room-temperature eggs, chopping up a couple rounds of herbed goat cheese that had been hiding in the back of the fridge, bla bla bla. I was so proud of myself. And the quiche turned out looking pretty good, have a see for yourself down below: 

Pulling it out of the oven, it smelled good, too. Well, at first. And then, just as I put my nose to its surface to better savor the aroma, I was immediately overcome by the most horrendously vivid olfactory memory: 

I loathe foods cooked with goat cheese. Like, the smell/taste/texture of cooked goat cheese kind of makes me gag. Fresh goat cheese -- in a salad, on a cracker, by itself, whatever -- is fine and great and I love it. But all warmed up and cooked with other things and I just think it's really, really gross. 

The problem is, just like this morning, I forget this all the time. I have made the mistake of cooking with goat cheese -- of finding a recipe and being honestly, earnestly, excited about cooking with goat cheese -- more than once. It probably happens every 12-18 months.* Just enough time goes by for me to completely forget about how revolting I find cooked goat cheese, and I don't remember how awful it is until I've used up all the ingredients and the food's been cooked. 6 local, free-range eggs; half a bag of organic broccoli florets; and the last of the also organic milk gone. Not to mention perfectly good goat cheese I would have enjoyed fresh and cold and un-cooked. 

Part of the horror is that I won't let it go to waste. I'll hate it -- and Jason, too, by the way, will hate it -- but we'll eat it all in the end. We'll smother it in hot sauce and hold our noses and agonize and torture ourselves, but I'll make sure we don't throw any of it away.**

Looks like we have just enough for two more servings each. 

In better news, I'm taking the rest of the afternoon to enjoy a couple new books I just bought. WHY NOT: Stephen T. Asma's On Monsters: An Unnatural History of Our Worst Fears was on sale, as was Judith Halberstam's Skin Shows: Gothic Horror and the Technology of Monsters. Some texts that you refer to again and again really are worth just investing in. The Halberstam I've had checked out and repeatedly renewed from the library for YEARS. I'm sure there must be some person part of the campus community who would like to stumble across it at the library again. The Asma I've been reading online through Amazon.com's "Look Inside!" (don't judge me) for quite some time as well. I'm looking forward to having them both to enjoy and reference at leisure, without feeling guilty. The final book is the latest Oxford edition of Robert Louis Stevenson's Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, collected with "Other Tales", which I purchased in order to read a collected short story in particular: "Olalla" (1885). The story was recommended by Carlos, and I aim to read it, contemplate it, and write on it soon. More on that to come. 

* Now that I think of it, the last instance was the "Summer Squash with Baked Eggs" fracas of summer '11. 

** Jason says, by the way, that he would have remembered. Not very helpful unless he's cooking, though.