Green Beans Sauteed with Onions and Garlic-- or My Sister Loves Green Beans

It's my sister's birthday month.  She loves green beans!

Sides like green beans, carrots, spinach, asparagus--otherwise known as vegetables-- aren't something I usually blog on their own.  Today  I'm  changing all that in honor of my younger sister.   You just  get the words "green beans" off your tongue, and she nearly swoons.  "I just love green beans!" is her immediate comeback.  And it doesn't matter how you make them, she'll eat them and be glad.  In our childhood days, our southern parents would talk about "a mess of beans" for supper.  That could mean anything from butter beans to pole beans to wax beans, but it usually meant a big pot of green beans.  That, along with some bacon or ham thrown in, a pot of rice, a pan of corn bread, and a plate of sliced tomatoes was a typical summer meal.  And, oh, by the way, you wouldn't throw out the juice or "liquor" the beans were cooked in because you might want to dip your corn bread in it or add your rice to the bowl for an instant soup, though no one would ever call it that.

Tuna-Cannellini Bean Salad with Feta -- Pantry Dinner, Lunch or Both

In a perfect world, someone else would make your lunch.
Do your laundry.
Grocery shopping.
Make your iced tea.
Clean out your refrigerator.
Do your taxes.
Clean the leaves out of the flower beds.
Fill your car with gas.
Take your old books to the library book sale.
Mend your favorite jeans.

But since this isn't a perfect world, you might have to cook for yourself  AND do your laundry.  But.  If you "cook" this (and there's no cooking involved), you'll skip most of the above because this yummy ditty is made mostly from pantry ingredients.  No running out to the store for fresh fish or searching the shelves for a bag of dried beans.  Of course, you'll need to have kept a few fresh veggies, etc in your frig "pantry," but here's hoping you do.

Tomato-Carrot Soup for Easter or Passover--A Light and Easy First Course

Up next in the blog is a simple, yet incredibly tasty soup I made out of on-hand ingredients to preface a meal of steak with oven-browned potatoes accented with burnt onions and roasted asparagus. If your meal is easy and nearly instant, as was this, or is a holiday meal elsewhere,  what a good time to make a first-course soup. Get ready for, “Oh, you made SOUP?!” 

Canned Salmon Salad or Simple Pictures are Best

While I'm not hard-pressed for grocery money ... right now.. at this moment...I have been.  I spent years feeding six of us and, before that, had fifteen bucks a week to feed two hungry adults.  Really.  I know from cheap eats and, btw, canned salmon salad is cheap eats.

Lately, I find I'm just heart-sick over the cost of groceries.  And I only have to feed two people and two dogs.  Everyone I know complains about it.  One friend recently described a woman speaking on NPR about wanting to eat healthily--to eat vegetables.  Her words were something like this:

Help! I've Got Leftover Take-Out Rice and Don't Know What to Do with It

Leftover Take-Out Rice Salad

Do you leave all that extra rice at the Chinese place?  (What do they do with all that rice?  Make fried rice!)  When you pick up take-out and there's two of those "little" boxes stuffed to the gills with white rice, do you eat it all?  Do you soy sauce it up with a scrambled egg for breakfast? That's one idea.  Throw it in chicken broth with chopped green onions, a drop of soy sauce, and shredded deli chicken?  That's another.

Breakfast Reuben in a Cup for St. Patrick's Day

Here is it out of the cup.

Here it is in the cup.  You can eat it either way.

 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Spread 2 thin, trimmed slices of pumpernickel or rye with Dijon Mustard and place in buttered, oven-safe large cup or small bowl.  (For crispy toast, bake the mustard bread in oven for 5 min. before continuing.)  No oven-safe cup?  Use a Pyrex measuring cup.

 

Add 2 thin pieces of corned beef.

Top with 1/4 cup rinsed/drained/squeezed-dry sauerkraut, a piece of Swiss cheese, an egg, and a pat of butter.
Salt and pepper to taste.

Bake for approximately 30 minutes until egg is set to your liking.  (30 min was a runny  yolk for mine.)

While egg bakes, make a Horseradish-Yogurt Sauce, set the table, and make the coffee.

Sauce: Whisk together 2T plain yogurt or sour cream, 1/2 t Dijon mustard, 1/4 t horseradish sauce, 1 T milk, pinch  each salt/pepper.  (Optional:  a drop of hot sauce.)

Drizzle with sauce and eat in or out (like this!) of the cup. 

Happy St. Patrick's Day!
Love, Alyce

Vietnamese Chicken Salad

Ready?  Set?  Eat.  I'm about all written out this week, but I haven't forgotten Dinner Place.  And when I thought about you, all I could think about was this Vietnamese Chicken Salad.  I made it twice this week--once with chicken and once with tofu and shrimp.  If I had my druthers, I'd say do the chicken.  We just wanted to eat and eat this.  Which is ok.  It's light and healthful.  Good to pig out on.  If you like, you can use rotisserie chicken; I know a lot of solo cooks buy a chicken a week.  Or  roast one yourself; here's how.

 vietnamese chicken salad  (courtesy Nigella Lawson/Food Network)
                        2-3 generous servings

Ingredients

• 1 Thai chile, seeded and minced (I used 1/2 a jalapeno, minced)
• 1 large garlic clove, peeled, minced
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons rice vinegar
• 1 1/2 tablespoons lime juice
• 1 1/2 tablespoons Vietnamese or Thai fish sauce (nuoc nam or nam pla)
• 1 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1/2 medium onion, finely sliced
• Freshly grated black pepper
• 7 to 8 ounces white cabbage, shredded
• 1 medium carrot, shredded, julienned, or grated
• 7 ounces cooked chicken breast, shredded, or cut into fine strips (I used 3 boneless chicken breasts)
• 1 bunch mint, plus extra for garnish, leaves roughly chopped  (I used about 1/2 cup chopped mint.)
• Salt

Directions

In a medium bowl, stirring with spoon, combine the chile, garlic, sugar, vinegar, lime juice, fish sauce, oil, onion, and black pepper, set aside for 1/2 hour. In a large bowl combine cabbage, carrot, chicken breast, and mint, tossing with tongs. Pour cabbage mixture over the dressing, tossing with tongs, slowly and patiently so everything is coated. Add salt, to taste. Serve on a flat plate with mint for garnish. 

Solo Cook's Notes:

If you make this whole recipe (and why not), divide the undressed salad in half.  Dress and eat one half and store the other half separately from the dressing in the frig.  Otherwise, the salad is soggy the next day.  Unless you like soggy! 

Slice the cabbage thinly by hand.

Make the dressing and marinate the pepper and onions.

Avoid tough chicken:  Sear well-seasoned, oiled boneless breasts over high heat 1 minute on each side, turn down to low and cook partly covered  until done.

Toss with chicken and dressing.  Eat as long as it holds out.

If you liked this, you might like:

My Lenten Journey blog.  Lent 2012:  40 Thoughtful Days.

This week on More Time at the Table, I've blogged a bunch of desserts and Darina Allen's Irish Soda Bread.  Take a peek!

Have fun cooking and taking care of yourself,
Alyce

Tuxedo Chili

If you're tired of chili, skip this post.  I never get tired of chili; I make several different kinds.  For our neighborhood chili cook off, I decided to make a new one.  Why not?

Pancakes for One--The Solo Cook and her Breakfast for Dinner: It's a Beautiful Thing!

Fat Tuesday has a great ring to it.  I have memories of a lot of soggy or burnt pancakes made by legions of cook-once-a-year men in kitchen after church kitchen.  I've been in a lot of places. The very best pancakes I've ever eaten are those made by my own kitchen-man husband.  Those are made on a propane camp stove and stand out as some of the finest food in the world to me.  Either everything really does taste better outside, or my man just knows from pancakes.  He puts fresh butter on the griddle for every pour.  He heats the syrup before he starts.  He fries the bacon before he heats the syrup.  He makes the coffee before he fries the bacon.  Did I say he looks good while he does it?

Pork Tenderloin Salad with Blueberries, Oranges, and Sherry-Honey Vinaigrette

 I could look in my mom's frig and think there was nothing at all to eat in there.  I might even be found staring blindly into the freezer, hoping something would come to me.  Usually it was ice cream.  But let my mom loose in that kitchen and in record time, there was a full meal on the table.  Practice makes perfect.  The early bird gets the worm.  Hunger makes the best sauce.  Desperation is the mother of invention.  Whatever.  She knew how to bring it, as they say.  It seemed miraculous.

Valentine's Day- Make Your Own Chocolate Bark

Chocolate, chocolate everywhere and lots of drops to drink.

Chocolate. Chocolate. Chocolate.  Valentine's Day IS chocolate.  Sounds like a good song.  

This chocolate is a semi or bitter-sweet bark that Dave had made for me for Valentine's Day a couple of years ago.  Truth to be told, his bark is better than mine.  Candy maker, I'm not, though my toffee was to die for this year.  (pat pat)

Pot of Pinto Beans-Simple Pictures are Best

Pintos garnished with plain Greek yogurt and Frontera salsa

When I was a kid, a pot of beans sounded nasty to me.  It smacked of nothing to do out in the country (except make a pot of beans) and I didn't particularly like the taste of beans--particularly pintos.  My parents grew all kinds of vegetables and they were fond of many sorts of beans and peas; our neighbors were of a similar ilk.  Married during the depression, but first raised on or near the farm, they all knew every trick for saving money on food.  Moving to the big city, they searched for a piece of land out a ways in order to plant that garden every year.  (Weed, can, water, repeat.)

Pan-Roasted Brussels Sprouts and New Potatoes with Parmesan and Onions

When folks began oven-roasting Brussels sprouts and bringing them back into vogue, I began pan roasting them.  Either the oven was full the first time I tried it or I just wanted to see what would happen.  Whichever way, we loved them and I kept making the sprouts stove top.  I blogged them cooked with pumpkin seeds one Thanksgiving, and later made them with shredded, crispy ham or prosciutto, or just on their own with whole, quite soft garlic cloves and lots of black pepper.  Once I threw in a few slices of  hot Capicola, an Italian ham that sometimes comes rolled in ground red pepper.  Whew.

Split Pea Soup for One

Ham hock optional, but being at home you can pick it up with your hands!

Cooking at home, I've discovered, has the distinct advantage of being at home.  While things simmer and perk or bake, hard-working you can play the radio (or the piano.)  Relaxing you can bring home the NYT to read while lazing on the couch with the cat.  Your laundry, if you're blessed with the ability to do it at home, can be lazily floating through its warm dryer as you put your nose down in a pot or wine glass.  There's no waiting for the server to bring you another glass of water or waving her away from the bar so you can have your check.  No walking or driving through cold, rain, sleet, and snow only to wait ad nauseum for a parking spot or the bus that's 20 minutes late.  That's if you live in the city as do I.

 

Freezable, microwavable REAL Tupperware ordered from amazon.com

Rosemary Chicken Thighs with Butternut Squash and Fennel

 I've made this roasted chicken thigh and vegetable supper a few different ways....but the luscious, really luscious thing about it (besides being light on the wallet) is that you just throw a bunch of great food on a rimmed sheet pan, toss it with oil, salt, peppers, and rosemary, and shove it in the oven for 30-40 minutes.  Meantime--kiss your love, listen to NPR, iron your work blouse, or call your Mom.  Make double for leftovers or if you've invited a friend.   Wine?  Côtes du Rhône would definitely drink.

Chicken Chili for One

I once heard a woman say, "You can't make chili for two people."  As I began to write today, thinking about that conversation did make me do just a little bit of research...because I often make chili for one or two!

Baby Kale and Spinach with a Roasted Chicken Breast or...

When someone says "greens," I guess I usually think of turnip or collard greens.  Southern parents, I guess.   And while I like those on a  cold day with a big pan of crispy cornbread, that big mess of greens isn't my style all the time.  Give me a sauté pan full of teensy baby spinach just barely heated or even cooked way down with garlic as a base for fish.  Lately I've been adding kale to that mix and having that for lunch. (January, you know.)  A few grape tomatoes and a pinch of crushed red pepper and I'm that happy.  For the solo cook, both baby spinach and baby kale come in those not-so-green (tell me if  you know how to recycle them other than at Whole Foods) plastic boxes.  They keep a long time in your frig, which is useful for anyone who doesn't cook two pounds of vegetables every day.

Here's full-grown kale.  Chop it and saute it if you can't find baby kale.

Stollen--Stolen from More Time

Taken at our Colorado house a couple of years ago...

 

As a sweet (but not too) Merry Christmas, Happy New Year,  Happy Chanukah, or whatever, I repeat a recipe for stollen from More Time at the Table.  If you're afraid of making bread, this is for you.  If you don't like the typical dry, crumbly stollen, this is for you.  If you need to take something great to a neighbor, a holiday get-together, or simply want to make a super Christmas breakfast, this is for you.

So put on some music, wash your hands, and get ready to feel terribly accomplished.  Merry December, friends.  And if it's not December where you are, make it anyway.

STOLLEN

2 loaves. Each serves 8-10.

-

Great to make ahead and freeze. This recipe makes two. Keep one for later or take one to a friend. This is an easy stollen... not to worry about a thing. If you can make banana bread, this is just a T-tiny step above. No yeast. The original recipe that I've changed over a couple of years and bakings at sea level and at altitude came from Susan Westmoreland @ GOOD HOUSEKEEPING, linked here.

.

Porridged Eggs after a Long Winter's Night

 I've never heard of porridged eggs, though my experience is that very little is truly new.  We've just lived too long.  For a few weeks, off and on, they kept coming to me.  I love the idea of oatmeal because I know my body, my heart, needs whole grains and oatmeal's tops.  But I also find that I operate better (and eat less) during the day with a protein for breakfast.  Especially in cold Minnesota. Hence oats and eggs.  But how?

I grew up with the occasional bowl of take-no-prisoners buttered, salt and peppered grits with my eggs fried to a crispy lace in bacon grease.  Along with biscuits slathered with sour cream and honey.  And the very best fried fish in the world.   Lest you think things were always that wonderful, there was the occasional pot of squirrel gumbo, as well.  And often there was dove that required careful chewing lest you bite into buckshot.  While I seldom indulge these days, my displaced southerner living-in-Chicago parents provided me with a culinary heritage upon which I still draw.  (Phew.  That grammar's a killer.)

Tomatoed Cod on Fennel with Sautéed Spinach

Mostly people don't realize it, but when you're out for Friday Night Fish-Fry in St. Paul (or anywhere), you're probably having cod.  It could be haddock or pollack, and we can almost be sure it won't be halibut, though that would be so tasty.  Served up with boatloads of tartar sauce and a tower of fries with cole slaw, it's nothing if not very, very beckoning.   Add to that the number of people who've traveled to the UK and are now hooked on "Fish and Chips" and you have a ton of folks walking around thinking this is one of their favorite meals. And way too often here, the fish is "all you can eat."

But get us in the grocery store or at the fish monger, and cod doesn't stand out.  Darker, sexier catches like salmon and tuna prevail and cod hasn't much to say.  I mean, what do you do with cod?  (What do you do with a lot of fish, in fact.  Whenever I'm in line to buy fish, the other customers are always asking the clerk how to fix this fish.  I've nothing against the clerks, but they are not often great or accomplished cooks.  If I can gently and gracefully chime in, I do.  Of course, if you know me, you know I'm neither gentle nor graceful.