Garlic Is For Heroes

Herbed Orzo with Pecans

2010-05-11T13:55:00.003-06:00

A pretty simple recipe. Cook up some orzo and toss with butter, fresh chopped herbs (we used basil, parsley, rosemary, and thyme.) Mix in a handful of rough broken toasted pecans.

Served with pilsner braised sirloin tips with a shiitake blue cheese sauce. That doesn't look as sparkling as the orzo by itself, but tastes every bit as good.

Swordfish with Herbs

2010-04-11T07:38:00.002-06:00

Looking for something lighter for the warm weather, we picked up some swordfish from Harmons, my new favorite grocery store. A quick mixture of basil, cilantro, coriander seeds, red pepper flakes, and salt and pepper were ground together in a mortar with a little olive oil and lemon. This was smeared on thick, and quickly cooked using a cast iron ridged griddle. Served with a warm red potato salad and the ever-present spring asparagus.

Spring Fruit Tart

2009-03-30T17:20:00.002-06:00

The crust on this tart was particularly tasty, and a new bottle of vanilla used in the custard really made it stand out. I used a lot less custard than you would normally use (only about a half inch) but I like it this way, it emphasizes the fruit, and it is not too gooey sticky sweet. Using fresh, ripe fruit helped; I'm looking at you, Market Street Grill.

Corned Beef Hash and Eggs

2009-03-10T15:03:00.005-06:00

Very tasty, and very filling. Even the small amount we typically eat was enough to fill our stomachs to the brim, but what do you expect from eggs and hash? It is pretty simple, all you need is some leftover corned beef and leftover mashed potatoes.

First, slice up an onion in thin lengths, and saute in a little peanut oil and about a quarter cup of water. As the water evaporates, the onions should sweeten and brown nicely. Mix the onions together with the leftover mashed potatoes and cubed cornedbeef, adjusting the ratio on your tastes. Season with a good amount of ground black pepper.

Form patties, and place in hot skillet with a little peanut oil. Fry on one side for 5-8 minutes or until the one side is crispy, then flip. As the second side cooks, make an indent on the top of each patty (fairly deep and wide) and crack one egg on each patty. Cover the skillet and cook until the egg whites are set, and the yolks still runny. Search immediately.

Bonus: We served this with green beans and a tarragon butter sauce. The tarragon sauce was excellent with the eggs and hash itself, but maybe a little obsessive if that's all you eat. Go with the green beans as well.

Halibut Wrapped in Potatoes

2009-02-16T15:02:00.005-07:00

A very simple recipe. We felt the need for halibut, but if that is not available or too pricey, try orange roughy or cod instead.

2 fillets of halibut
2-3 Yukon Gold potatoes

See? Simple. First, salt and pepper the fish lightly. Slice the potatoes as thin as possible, using a mandolin if available. The thinner and larger each slice, the better - thin enough to see through.

Arrange 5-6 potatoes in a row on a non-stick surface (like a baking mat), overlapping each potato slightly, so that they form a strip as long as a fish fillet. Arrange a second row of potatoes next to the first, overlapping them with each other and with the first row, to create a mat of potato slices. Salt and pepper the potatoes slightly.

Place the fish in the middle of the potato mat, and carefully wrap the potatoes up around the fish. Press firmly to adhere. This took some effort, but if the potatoes are thin enough, it should work after one or two attempts. If there is lots of overlap in the potatoes, it will help.

At that point, it is only a matter of frying the fish in some olive oil, about 4 minutes per side, until the potatoes are nice and crispy, and the fish is cooked. Serve with some sauteed spinach and slivered garlic.

Sweet Potato Gnocchi

2009-01-06T15:32:00.005-07:00

Gnocchi, from the Italian for a knot in wood-nocchio-as in Pinocchio is a tasty little dumpling of potato and flour. It is somewhat difficult to make, more than handmade pasta as it can easily taste too much of flour, or too thick and doughy. Ideally made, they are light and fluffy, with either the scratching of fork tines or a dimple to catch any sauce. Here is a sweet potato gnocchi, made soft with the inclusion of ricotta cheese. We made a simple browned butter, sage, and prosciutto sauce for a rich but simple meal.

2-3 yams
12 oz ricotta cheese
parmesan cheese
2 T brown sugar
2 t salt
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 3/4 cups all purpose flour

Turn the yams into mashed yams by piercing, microwaving for 10 minutes or so, peeling, and mashing. Stir in the ricotta and parmesan cheese, sugar, salt, and nutmeg. This will be a fairly wet mess. Stir in flour until a light dough forms. Working in batches, roll the dough into snakes of about 1/2 inch in diameter, and cut into sections about 1 inch long. Roll each piece around a fork to dent.

You can either freeze the gnocchi, or boil them in salted water for 5 minutes or so. They make good leftovers for a snowy afternoon as well.

Christmas Turkey - Salted Herbs and Shallot Gravy

2008-12-25T22:09:00.000-07:00

Pretty tasty. As other who cooked this turkey have noted, the end result is very similar to a brined turkey, but without the brine effort and unusable carcass. The turkey is salted inside and out with an herb salt, left to sit in the fridge overnight, then rinsed clean and cooked with lemons and onions inside.

Herbed Salt

1/4 cup coarse kosher salt
2 teaspoons dried rosemary
2 teaspoons dried sage
2 teaspoons dried thyme
2 teaspoon crushed black peppercorns
3 torn bay leaves
1 teaspoon grated lemon peel

Mix all ingredients together. Wash the turkey well, but do not dry. Cover in salt, and place covered in the fridge for 12 hours or so (Christmas Eve). When ready to cook, remove and rise all the remaining salt off, and pat dry. Stuff the turkey with loosely cubed:

1 onion
1 celery stalk
1 whole lemon with peel
dried rosemary
dried rubbed sage
dried thyme
1 stick unsalted butter

Roast for 17 minutes per pound. We made a gravy out of sauteed shallots, white wine, and the amazing amount of drippings the bird put off. A very brown, juicy turkey, not too salty at all. Very good drumstick meat, will try this on drumsticks alone next time, or maybe a roasted chicken.

Thanksgiving Turkey - Apple and Smoked Bacon

2008-12-02T07:30:00.003-07:00

The 2008 Thanksgiving turkey, an adaptation of the Bon Appetit cover recipe. Prepared with the standard butter rubbed method. Butter mixture included fresh sage, salt and pepper, lemon juice, and 1-2 pieces raw diced applewood smoked bacon. The stuffing was a fennel apple bacon mixture, sauteed onions, celery, fresh fennel bulb, and about 6 pieces cooked and drained applewood smoked bacon, as well as fresh Italian parsley. The bacon gave the stuffing a pleasant smoked flavor, which carried over to the turkey. The end result (after cooking for about six and a half hours, was a very brown, tasty turkey that could be cut with a butter knife.

Sweet Potato and Sausage Soup

2008-11-07T08:38:00.004-07:00

What It Is: A very good soup, probably unlike most things you have ever had. Broth bursting with flavor to compete with the best Thai and Vietnamese soups, although this hails from Spain. There is one ingredient that makes this dish work, so it should not be done without it. Make something else if you don't have:

1 string Palacios Spanish Hot Chorizo sausage

Authentic Spanish chorizo is made from the same acorn fed (up to 30 pounds per day) Iberian pork that becomes jamón Ibérico. Ground pork is seasoned with paprika, garlic, salt and sherry and the sausage smoked over a period of months. The result is a sausage unlike you have tasted before, and an incredible improvement on the fresh chorizo available in the supermarket. Slice the sausage into thin rounds, and maybe eat one or two slices. Meanwhile, in a soup pot, saute

2 chopped onions
3 chopped garlic cloves

with a little olive oil. Add

1-2 peeled, cubed yams
1-2 small, peeled, cubed potatoes

And cook until starting to brown, about 10 minutes. Add

6 cups of decent chicken broth

And let simmer until potatoes are soft, about 20 minutes. At this point, taste the soup. It will be boring. Not to worry. In a small amount of olive oil, saute the sliced sausage until they brown, about 8 minutes. This will produce a good amount of seasoned oil, which you can use later, or save for some fried eggs in the morning. When the soup is ready, add the sausage and let that simmer for a little bit. We let the soup sit for a half hour, which helped to spread the sausage flavor around. At the last moment, add

Several large handfuls of fresh spinach

to the pot, and stir until wilted. Serve with crusty bread.

The Omnivore’s Hundred

2008-10-31T12:17:00.004-06:00

The idea: cross out everything you wouldn't eat, and bold everything you have eaten.

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
- Most recently, the borscht at the Bozeman Co-Op after a rainy night of camping. Served hot.
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
- aka 'Why cook aloo gobi, when you can Bend It Like Beckham'
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
- Only a tiny amount, shaved atop Michelangelo's Truffle Risotto in Salt Lake City
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
- Most recently, pear wine.
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
- Handmade gelato can't compete with Hagen Daaz
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
- Lots of options here, most notably fields of wild blackberries on the coast of California.
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
- From a road side stand in Costa Rica, served plain or with a side of chicken fillet.
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
- Most recently, from The Bakery in downtown Salt Lake, and from the Living Traditions Festival there before.
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
- Snowbird Resort's Octoberfest
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
- Abalone risotto in Monterey, California
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
- Again, Octoberfest
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
- And made it that way.
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill (no, but Ann has)
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
- Most recently, at a thriving Thai place in Lava Hot Springs, Idaho. Not the typical destination for authentic Thai food, but good nonetheless.
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
- Late season nasturtiums from the garden
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

A total of 51. Not too bad for living in the intermountain west for my entire life. Next to track down: Lapsang souchong

Pepper Crusted Ahi Tuna

2008-10-28T17:13:00.003-06:00

A pretty simple recipe. First, stick a skillet on the stove until it is super hot. Rub a small amount of salt and a large amount of cracked pepper all over a good chunk of fresh ahi tuna. Add several tablespoons of sesame oil to the hot skillet, and drop the fish steak. Cook until you can't stand the smoke and you get hungry, about 3-4 minutes per side depending on how thick the cut is, and how tasty (i.e. raw) you want your fish.

Remove from the heat, and cover tightly. Quickly add soy sauce and cooking sherry in a 1 to 3 ratio to the skillet, which will bubble tremendously. Toss in some chopped green onions and cook until the sauce is thickened (only a matter of minutes if the pan is hot). Drain the sauce on the fish and serve immediately with roasted yams, broccoli, and radicchio. Enjoy.

Fall Butternut Squash Soup

2008-10-19T19:28:00.003-06:00

A pretty simple soup, for a simple fall evening. Combine equal parts (about 3/4 cup each) of chopped onions, carrots, and celery in a pot with some butter, garlic, and olive oil. Saute until things start to smell good, and add 3 cups of chopped butternut squash (skin and seeds removed) and mix well. After the squash has sufficiently moistened, add about 2 cups of chicken or vegetable broth (we used some leftover turkey carcass broth) and cook for 15 minutes, until everything is soft.

Remove from the heat, and blend the soup in blender in batches, until everything is creamy. Return to the pot, reheat, and season with salt and pepper as needed, and maybe some fresh sage. Garnish with the last of the nasturtium blossoms.

Beets!

2008-10-12T17:44:00.004-06:00

The color of beets is due to betalain, a naturally occurring pigment most often found in flower petals. Prickly pear fruit (another ingredient in our refrigerator) also exhibits this pigment, and swiss chard (still hanging on in the garden outside) owes its color and taste to being a subspecies with beets. They make a good meal tossed with carrots, garlic, and montreal steak seasoning, and roasted in olive oil in the skillet.

Beef Short Ribs

2008-10-11T09:59:00.003-06:00

A pretty simple fall recipe for two people. Fill a slow cooker with approximately:

1 C red wine

1/2 C chopped onion

1/2 C dried mushroom chunks (we used foraged boletes from Wyoming and Montana)

6 whole garlic cloves

1/2 can tomato chunks

handfull of Italian parsley.

Salt and pepper 4-5 beef short ribs, and add to the pot. Cook on low for 8 hours, and serve with toasted acorn squash, seasoned with a homemade 5-spice mixture.

Pan Fried Duck with Parsnips

2008-10-05T20:11:00.004-06:00

What you are going to do is pan fry the duck in its own fat. Only wonderful animals can fry themselves: duck, pig, bear, and whale. Mmm, that could one up the turducken... the Wheariguck™, a duck stuffed in a pig stuffed in a bear stuffed in a whale. Maybe next Thanksgiving.

Cut some of the excess fat from the duck parts into thin strips, and add to a deep dutch oven to start rendering the fat. Salt and pepper the duck, and place in the pot skin side down. Cook until the skin is nicely brown and there are a fair amount of dripping in the pot (about 15 minutes), then add some chopped parsnips, shallots, garlic, and fresh rosemary. Cover with a tight fitting lid, and steam everything on medium heat until done. You may want to take out the duck at the last few minutes and broil to crisp the skin back up. Garnish with italian parsley.

Pear Poached in Wine Sauce

2008-10-05T16:05:00.004-06:00

Pick out some of the best looking pears you can find, favoring ripe pears with still a hint of firmness. We used Bosc pears, ideal for their slightly spicy, luscious flavor and firm texture. For each pear, add about

1 cup water

1/3 cup dry white wine

1/3 cup sugar

1/4 fresh lemon juice and zest

to a saucepot, and bring to a boil to dissolve the sugar. Remove from heat. Slice off the bottom of each pear-so they stand upright-and scoop out the seeds and pit from the bottom. Peal the pears, drawing fancy patterns in the pear peals if you so choose, and add them to the sauce. Each entire pear must be fully submerged, so add more water and wine if necessary. Fold several paper towels in half, and place over the pears (drawing liquid over the pear) and then weigh the pears down in the sauce with a plate.

Return the sauce to a boil, and then reduce the heat and simmer for about 20 minutes, or until the pears are soft throughout. Put the entire pot-pears, sauce, paper towels, and lid-in the refrigerator, and eat dinner.

When everything has sufficiently cooled off, remove the pears from the sauce, and re-heat at a fast boil until thickened into a syrup. Remove from heat, and add several drops of Angostura Bitters, or failing that, a dash of vanilla Arrange the pears, and pour the syrup over, and garnish with more lemon zest and some mint sprigs.

Homebrew Spreadsheet

2008-01-03T21:46:00.000-07:00

For the past several years I have been doing some homebrewing as a hobby, and to supplement the Boca Noir wine and grappa we make at Casa di Lamberti. The beer making has taken off once I moved to Salt Lake City, UT. The Puritanical Mormons and their alcohol laws and post hoc revelations (Post hoc ergo propter hoc - trans "after this, therefore because of this") do not for tasty beer make. The last several batches have turned out nicely, especially the Christmas Ale, a slightly spiced light-brown ale with hints of chai, banana esters, and cloves.

Thanks to Google Docs I have put a spreadsheet in an iframe (very simple, just publish the Google doc to share it with everyone, and wrap it in an iframe). I'll try and keep this updated as the brewing process continues. Homebrew is much more ephemeral than commercial beer, and undergoes a dramatic transformation in taste over a period of a few months; therefore the beer you make is not the same as you finish your last drop, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. Enjoy.

The Burger

2007-11-03T15:49:00.000-06:00

Gotta love the burger. I have developed a decent consistency in my burgers, with a little variation of the available ingredients.

Ground hamburger (about 0.5 - 0.75 lb per person)
Garlic, chopped
Salt and Pepper, or better yet, Montreal Steak Seasoning
1 egg per every 2-3 burgers

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl, and mix until blended with a spoon or your hands. Don't press the meat too much - the idea is to keep everything fluffy. Add whatever additional ingredients you want to flavor the burger with. Some of the things I toss in include chorizo or andouille sausage, good mushrooms (shitake, porchini, or morel), roasted garlic, or in this case, lots of chunked feta.

Form the burgers into nice big patties, and again don't squeeze the meat too much, just enough to hold everything together. Push the center of the buger in with your finger, this will keep the meat from ballooning when cooking. Toss on a hot grill, and (and this is the secret ingredient) douse liberally with Worcestershire sauce. Cook until nicely crisp on one side, then flip, add more Worcestershire sauce, and cook until done. Add some sliced blue cheese towards the end if you like, but with the feta-burger it's not necessary. Top with carmelized onions or sauteed spinach or watercress, and all the other toppings.

Yogurt & Nut Crusted Lamb Chop

2007-09-05T14:47:00.000-06:00

Oh man this was good. Hopefully I can remember what I did. Normally when we cook lamb chops we only have one per person, which is not very much meat. This looked so tasty before it went on the grill I made twice as much, which was a Very Good Thing.

For the lamb
4 smallish lamb chops, with the thicker fat trimmed away
1 6oz container yogurt - we only had Yoplait peach, which worked fine
Diced garlic
Ground cumin
Ground coriander seed
Salt and pepper
Probably other similar spices - if you get it confused with cumin, it's good to go

Add the spices, garlic, salt, and pepper to the yogurt, and mix well. Evenly and generously cover all sides of the lamb chops with the spiced yogurt mixture, and set aside at roomish temperature.

For the crust
1/2 C almonds
1/2 C peanuts

As these were the types of nuts available, they got used. Others would have been just as fun. Using whatever your kitchen comes equipped with, roughly chop up the nuts into smallish chunks. Coat the lamb chops evenly with the nuts, pressing them into the yogurt so they stick. Cook by any fashion until lamb is done to taste. I used a grill, which presented several problems. The nut and yogurt crust was very good, but did not necessarily stick to the chops. I did not turn the meat, and only cooked on one side to avoid missing out on the sweet nut on yogurt on lamb action. Perhaps there's a better way? Probably more heat and a smooth surface. I guess I could heat a skillet over my propane burner next time...

Baked Crusty Ratatouille

2007-09-01T14:30:00.000-06:00

Recipe Coming Soon. I'll have to ask Ann on this one. It's been something we've had a lot, as it uses tomatoes and zucchini, which we have baskets full of currently.

Five Spice Swordfish

2007-08-21T20:47:00.000-06:00

With Sweet Potato - Orzo Mash

For the Fish
1-2 good quality fish steaks, such as swordfish
1 T Chinese Five Spice Powder
Black and white sesame seeds
Salt and pepper

Lightly dust both sides of the fish with salt and pepper, followed by the 5 spice powder, and finally evenly with sesame seeds. Set aside at room temperature, and prepare grill to high heat. When grill is hot, drip sesame oil on grill grate, and cook on high for only 1-3 minutes per side, or cooked until the mercury in the swordfish boils off (674.11 °F if you're paying attention).

The orzo and sweet potato mash was made up on the spot, and contained, among other things certainly, orzo, orange sweet potatoes (yams), garlic, onions, five spice powder, and lemonaide. It worked well with the fish, but not necessarily alone - more of a reminder that I have not yet made sweet potato gnocci yet.

Marinated Zucchini Appetizer

2007-08-19T10:40:00.000-06:00

Olive Oil
2-3 garlic cloves, chopped
2-3 medium zucchini, sliced
1 lemon
Capers
Italian parsley

Cover the bottom of a skillet with a fair amount of olive oil. Heat, and sauté the garlic until soft and brown. Remove skillet from heat, and scoop out garlic and set aside. After oil cools down slightly, add the slices of zucchini to the pan, laying flat and allowing the zucchini slices to soak up as much oil as each slice can hold. Flip slices to use up oil, then remove zucchini from skillet and reserve. Return skillet to heat, and after bottom becomes hot, place saturated zucchini slices in pan and dry fry on each side until evenly brown. Transfer zucchini to bowl, and add 1/2 cup lemon juice, several spoonfuls of capers, and 1/4 cup Italian parsley. Season with ground pepper. Chill for several hours and serve with crackers and cheese.

Jungle Fish (Cooked in Banana Leaves)

2007-08-15T07:37:00.000-06:00

Although any freshwater fish can stand in for jungle fish, I used tilapia.

3 tilapia fillets, cut into tidy triangle shapes
Banana leaves (If you don't have any, cut them fresh off you nearest neighborhood banana tree)

2 shallots
2 T ground tumeric
4 green onions, 2 finely chopped, and 2 in 1 inch sections
3 garlic cloves, smashed and chopped
2 seeded Thai chillies, finely chopped
1-2 T fish sauce
1ish T sugar
Salt and pepper

Grate the shallots into a bowl, and mix in the remaining ingredients except the green onion sections. Season with salt, pepper, sugar, and fish sauce to taste. Stir fish into marinade, and refregerate until needed. I had my fish marinate for about 2 hours, which worked nicely.

Start grill or oven. Lay out one notebook sized banana leaf, and brush with sesame oil. Mound half the fish in the center of the leaf, and cover with half the green onion sections. Wrap banana leaf up like a package, and wrap in a similar process (brushing with oil) until everything is nicely covered. Secure with toothpicks. Repeat on remaining fish, and place on grill. Cook until done, about 10 - 15 minutes, turning occasionally if your package will not fall apart. Serve over jasmine rice.

Pork Chops with Tomatillo Sauce

2007-08-11T14:25:00.000-06:00

Pork chops
Nice thick pork chops
2 T gound coriander
2 T ground cumin
2 T kosher salt
2 T black pepper
2 T olive oil

Mix together dry ingredients. Add olive oil to dry ingredients and mix well. Rub mixture over pork chops, and let sit at room temperature while making sauce.

Tomatillo and Apple Sauce
Basically you combine the most sour-green fruits, and try and balance it out with spice and sweetness.

4-5 fresh tomatillos, husks removed, cleaned, and chopped
2-3 green apples, depending on size, diced
1 garlic clove
1 t ground cumin
1 T lime juice
2 T honey
1 jalapeno

In a saucepan, add enough water to tomatillos to cover completely, and simmer for 10 minutes or until soft. Cool, and in blender purée tomatillos with garlic, cumin, lime juice, honey, and jalapeno. You may want to add half the jalapeno and taste before adding the rest. Taste sauce and balance sour, spicy-hot, and sweet flavors.

Transfer the sauce and stir in the diced apples.

Meanwhile prepare grill and when hot, turn heat down substantialy and cook pork chops on coolest part of grill until done. The Man used to say to cook your pork until 160° but now says 144° will kill trichinosis. The change in recommendation is similar to how engineers use to over-build buildings (more material than necessary, thicker walls, etc.) but now they have a theoretically better idea of material strenght. I usually take pork chops (boneless) off the grill at around 130°, which is fine for everyone except those with comprimised immune systems. Also, the pork chops were frozen at one point, which is just as effective for all but the thicker pork cuts.

Serve with sauce, and veggies. I rubbed some fresh zucchini with olive oil, salt and pepper, and sun-dried tomato flakes.

Quick Garden Sausage Medley

2007-08-07T20:59:00.000-06:00

Olive Oil
2 Italian Sausages
Garlic, smashed and finely chopped
1/2 Onion, julienned
1 Yellow Sweet Pepper, julienned
Can o’ Tomatoes, diced ideally
1 cube chicken bullion, crushed
2 smallish zucchinis
4 T Pesto
Fennel Seed
S&P
Red Pepper flakes

Pasta of your choice, cooking simultaneously

Cook the Italian sausages using the method of your choice, as long as you choice is pan frying with a little olive oil. Remove, and keep warm. In the same skillet, sauté several cloves of garlic and the onion. Add the sweet pepper and cook until slightly soft over medium high heat. Stir in a can of tomatoes and the chicken bullion. When well mixed add the zucchini and pesto, and season with fennel seed to make everything more sausage-y, salt and pepper to make it taste like food, and red pepper flakes for a kick. Serve over pasta – we used homemade spinach linguini, dried from a separate pasta-making excursion. The spinach and zucchini were from the garden, the sweet pepper from Costco. . Let’s hear it for Costco produce. Three weeks in the fridge and not a single blemish. How do you like them [overpackaged and unorganic] apples?