Beet Salad with Oranges

 Gran Fran knows her way around beets. She would make them for us on a regular basis. Her salad involves only some olive oil and vinegar. And, she also cooks her with the skin on, removing it after cooking. Her method involves roasting the beets in the oven individually wrapped in foil (Gran Fran, let me know if I'm wrong here). Skinning the hot beets made me stay away from beet cooking for a good long time. My hands not only turned red from the juice, but also were slightly burned each time I tried to de-skin one of the beets.

My sister Danielle taught me this method, which turns your fingers red immediately, but leaves you with fewer burn marks on your hands. I think I end up with more beets, too. Using a vegetable peeler allows you to remove just the brown skin and preserve more of the good stuff.

I cook the beets in what will become the dressing for the final product, too, which gives you a really flavorful dressing. And, you are able to eat these hot, if you want to, without having to waste any time peeling off the skin.

The addition of oranges and sunflower seeds to this salad make it the perfect Spring-is-Here dish. It's fruity and earthy with just a little bit of crunch.

Featured on The Fruit Guys website.

Beet Salad with Oranges

INGREDIENTS

• 3 beets, skins peeled off, greens removed, cut into eighths.
• 1 small shallot, cut into quarters
• 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 orange cut into small pieces
• 1/2 teaspoon sunflower seeds
• Salt and pepper to taste

PREPARATION

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
2. Place the beet and shallots onto a rimmed baking sheet, or into a baking pan large enough to allow space between the pieces.
3. Mix together the vinegar, oil, salt and pepper and pour the mixture over the beets, making sure to coat all sides of the beets.
4. Roast the beets in the oven for 40 minutes, or until fork tender, turning the beets every ten minutes or so.
5. In a large bowl, mix together the warm beets with the orange segments.

Veggies in the Oven: Cauliflower Gratin and Roasted Asparagus

 These two vegetable dishes are super easy to make and can be used as either a side dish or with some small additions, as a main dish. The roasted asparagus can be served with pasta and a poached egg, as a main dish. If you like, you can add bacon to the cauliflower gratin to make it just that much heartier.

Featured on The Fruit Guys website, here and here.

Cauliflower Gratin

Ingredients

• 1 head cauliflower, cut into florets, steamed for five minutes
• ¼ cup breadcrumbs (regular or Glutino gluten-free)
• ¼ cup grated Parmesan
• Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
2. Put the cauliflower into a casserole dish. Cover with breadcrumbs, grated Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper.
3. Bake for 20 minutes, until the breadcrumbs are browned and cheese is melted.

Roasted Asparagus

Ingredients

• 1 bunch asparagus stalks, bottoms trimmed off
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 450.
2. Place asparagus on a rimmed baking sheet and pour olive oil evenly over the top. Turn the asparagus over a few times to coat all sides in the olive oil.
3. Roast in the oven for 20 minutes, until the stalks become browned and wilted.

Shredded Brussels Sprouts and Potato Salad

A version of this recipe is featured on The Fruit Guys website.

Please meet my new favorite way to prepare Brussels sprouts: shredded. What a delightfully easy way to make a very healthy salad, using something other than your standard issue salad greens.

I first came across this method in the Bi-Rite Market's Eat Good Food cookbook. Their version (which I made and wrote about here) includes bacon. Which, in so many ways, makes me so happy. But, I've found that I need to cut back on the pork products (oh wait, I have a rack of pork ribs in the oven right now....). Therefore, I've created a new recipe using the shredded Brussels sprouts in not only a vegetarian recipe, but also a vegan one. A girl's got to keep her sleek physique and all of the lovely recipes I've been writing have begun to add up on the I-think-my-pants-shrunk-in-the-dryer meter.

The potatoes are the only cooked item in the whole shebang. You can either roast them, dice them or fry them, just do whatever you prefer. And, I didn't include how many this recipe feeds. Seems that the shredded sprouts really go on for days. I've taken to shredding a while bunch of them and storing them in a zipper bag in the fridge. That way I can make any kind of salad I want whenever I want to.

Please do make this or the other recipe referenced above. It really tastes great and is a nice change in your salad repertoire.

Brussels Sprouts and Potato Salad

INGREDIENTS

• 1 to 2 cups shredded Brussels sprouts
• 2 cups potatoes in 3/4 inch dice, steamed, roasted, sautéed, or boiled until tender but not mushy
• 1 /2 cup fresh chopped carrots
• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons red wine or sherry vinegar
• 1 clove garlic, minced finely
• ½ teaspoon minced tarragon
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• Salt and pepper to taste

PREPARATION

• Shred the Brussels sprouts.  You can use either a mandolin slicer or the slicer blade on your food processor. And, cutting them by hand is perfectly fine, just make them as thin as possible.
• Place the shredded Brussels sprouts, diced and cooked potatoes and carrots in a large bowl.
• Mix together the olive oil, vinegar, garlic, sage, red pepper flakes and salt and pepper.
• Add the dressing to the vegetables and mix well.

Leek and Cremini Mushroom Soup

A version of this recipe is featured on The Fruit Guys website.

I decided to give leeks another try this week. I've not always been a huge fan, as you can see from this post. But, I'm growing up (about time) and decided I needed to give the mighty leek another chance.

My chance came when I walked through my local farmer's market this weekend and spied a pile of leeks. Now was as good a time as any to give this a go. Right next to the leeks, I spotted some lovely cremini mushrooms for sale. I thought for a moment and knew that I could make a good soup out of these, with some little additions from my kitchen.

I chose to enhance the cremini mushroom flavor with mushroom broth. And, I used bread to thicken the soup, as I've done many times in other soups. I figured this way, the flavor of the leeks and mushrooms would really take center stage.

The soup, I must say, came out pretty tasty. It's very simple to make, since all you're really doing is cooking the cut up leeks in broth while you saute the mushrooms in oil. Not much too it, but the flavors are really nice and earthy. Very Spring-is-in-the-air type of dish.

This recipe has proven to me that I need to not be so stubborn about my likes and dislikes and at least get creative with an ingredient I had long-ago written off.

Long live the might leek.

Leek Soup

Cook’s note:  The recipe can be easily double or tripled, dependent on the amount of people you are feeding. 1 cup of leeks was the equivalent of two medium sized leeks cut into rounds.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup of leeks, cut into rounds
• 1 cup vegetable stock
• 1 cup mushroom broth
• ½ tablespoon minced basil leaves, or ¼ tablespoon dried basil
• 1 slice gluten-free sandwich bread, cubed (I like Udi's)
• 1/3 cup cremini mushrooms, thinly sliced
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

PREPARATION

• Place the vegetable stock over high heat in a large saucepan.
• Add the leeks and boil until soft, about 20 minutes.
• After 10 minutes, add the sandwich bread to the soup. It should thicken the soup right up.
• While the leeks are cooking, sautee the cremini mushrooms in the olive oil with some salt, over medium heat until crispy.
• Remove the mushrooms from the pan and set aside.
• Put the soup, basil and oil from the mushroom pan into a blender and blend until smooth.
• Serve the soup in bowls with the crispy mushrooms on top.