An Israeli-ish Salad

It was slightly cloudy and cool last Saturday -- perfect weather to go absolutely crazy at the Union Square Greenmarket -- and so that's exactly what I did. And then I came home and made caprese for lunch and this Israeli-ish salad for dinner.

Approximate quantities: 1 medium sized tomato, cubed; 10 black cherry tomatoes, quartered; 1 small cucumber, cubed; 6 medium sized carrots, sliced into thin disks; 100 grams of feta cheese, cubed; 4 French breakfast radishes, sliced into thin disks; 2 tablespoons parsley, finely chopped; drizzled with juice of one lemon, olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt and pepper to taste

When you are ready to eat, make a version of Bon Appetite's insanely easy and insanely delicious herbed chickpeas: Peel and crush 4 cloves of garlic, drain and rinse one can of chickpeas, place chickpeas in a large skillet or Dutch oven and add garlic and a few tablespoons of olive oil; season with salt and pepper. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until chickpeas are crisped and some have split open (these will be the most delicious ones), 10–15 minutes. Remove from heat; stir in a few additional tablespoons of parsley and then toss with salad.

Serves four as an appetizer or two as a main.

Tortilla-less Tortilla Salad

An all Trader Joe's middle-of-a-busy-week-tortilla salad minus the tortilla. But if you have chips around, toss them in!

Approximate quantities: 3-4 cups of chopped kale; 1 cup quick-cooking brown rice; 1 cup black beans; 3 carrots, sliced into thin disks; ½ of a cucumber, sliced into thin disks; 1 avocado, cubed; 1 cup sugar snap peas, strings removed, ends trimmed; 2 cups of grilled chicken breast, roughly chopped; drizzled with olive oil, Cholula's chili lime hot sauce, salt, pepper, and grated Tillamook cheddar cheese

Serves four as an appetizer or two as a main.

I Also ❤ Links

So things are finally a little bit back to normal for me, no Southampton, not getting two wisdom teeth out, not going to Ithaca. Just normal life in Brooklyn and visiting my family in central Connecticut on the weekend. Here's what I've been reading this blessedly normal week.

This really awesome looking: Grilled Watermelon, Feta & Tomato  on Epicurious

Martha's great tutorial on making Caesar salad including the the dressing -- it's shame how bastardized Caesar dressing has become

She's also got: A tomato and beet salad that looks interesting and is definitely not a combination I've had before and a grilled chicken cobb -- I've been thinking about cobb salads for a while now

When it gets cool, I'm definitely going to make this: tomato-basil risotto

Oh and I have peaches and rhubarb chopped and tossed with lemon juice and two tablespoons of brown sugar sitting in my fridge -- they were on the verge of softening and I didn't want to lose them -- it's not enough for a full pie so I'm think about adapting this blueberry hand pie recipe

And last but definitely not least: Zoe Francois' Chocolate Zucchini Cake looks incredible, it's totally a salad in cake form, right? 

Garlic Scape Pesto

I've had garlic scapes in my fridge for weeks now and I've been meaning to do something with them but time got away from me and the tips just started to wilt, so I blitzed them into scape pesto -- which I plan to use in all sort of things over the next few weeks.

Blend together: 15 garlic scapes, trimmed; 4 tablespoons olive oil; zest and juice of one lemon; salt to taste

Makes a lot of garlic scape pesto that will keep in the fridge for a few weeks.

Lemon-Basil Pesto

I also had basil from the Ithaca Farmers Market in the fridge that was wilting, so I went on a bit of a blending kick and made some lemon-basil pesto too. This is probably controversial but I don't like too much garlic in basil pesto, I think it can really overwhelm the basil.

Blend together: 60g of dry basil leaves; 20g of Parmesan cheese or soft goat cheese; 1 large garlic clove, 3 tablespoons of olive oil, zest of half of a lemon

Two notes, first, my favorite increment of measurement when cooking is weight, but I use volume intermittently but for something like basil, using weight is so, so much easier, I've read so many recipes over the years the include loosely packed or densely packed volume amounts for herbs and I find it incredibly difficult to decipher

And second, yes, Parmesan cheese or soft goat cheese, if you don’t like goat cheese, obviously don’t, but if you do, try it, it makes for a great soft consistency

Makes about 150g of pesto which is about how much you need for 6 servings of pasta.

I Also ❤ Links

Things didn't exactly go as planned this week as I ended up having two wisdom teeth out on Wednesday afternoon. Anyway, here are few things that I've been reading, or maybe I should say, a few things that I can remember reading this week:

If you are into making dressings: An excellent-looking green goddess recipe and Goop claims these 6 are easy and up your salad game

This beautiful shaved carrot tart that reminded me of: the heirloom tomato tart that I made last summer, I used a soft, herbed, goat cheese instead of ricotta and it was delicious

Food52 has a great guide to keeping berries fresh and also an interesting "magical" cold brew recipe that I might try

I'll be spending my weekend blending my way through Bon Appetite's: 17 Smoothie Recipes That Are Actually Good and dreaming of next week's salads

Fresh Herb Risotto

My usual salad eating has been a bit limited the past week because I had to have two wisdom teeth out. Yeah. Not particularly fun. So I did what any normal salad loving person would do: I made a risotto that's as salad-like as possible. Also, risotto is really the perfect thing to cook when you are stuck at home and slightly loopy because gentle, mindless stirring and slightly loopy go extremely well together.

I have made one small change to this recipe, it's an extremely minor one, once the risotto is almost done, when I'm at the point where I'm adding the minced herbs and the last ladleful of stock, I briefly add that last ladleful first to my blender and blitz it for 10-15 seconds as to unstick all of the bits of herbs that have stuck to the sides of the blender. It's a minor, minor change, it's probably just a symptom of me hating to waste fresh herbs and vegetables.

I Also ❤ Links

Have a wonderful weekend! I'm heading out to Long Island to visit friends who've rented a house. I'll be visiting farms stands, making salads, prepping fruits and vegetables for the grill, and making Joy's Roasted Strawberry Shortcakes with Basil Cream. Here's what I've been reading & eating this week:

Evidently, I wasn't the only one thinking about cobb salads this week ... 

Now that it's almost corn season in the north east, I'm thinking about two of my favorite corn recipes: Martha's Grilled Pizza with Cheesy Corn, Fresh Tomatoes, and Basil and Melissa Clark's Creamy Corn Pasta With Basil

Two cold soups that look interesting: Thai-Scented Asparagus Soup and Corn Soup with Tofu Larb

I've never made: Spaghetti All 'Ubriaco -- or any pasta all 'ubriaco, for that matter -- but after reading this, I'm wondering about how it would be fun to maybe mix a smaller pasta shape all 'ubriaco into a salad 

That's it, it was a short week!