Pesto, Meat, and Asian

In the past week, we’ve had two very similar pesto dishes and two very similar Vietnamese-inspired dishes. Why mess with a good thing? Today, I am going to share my second versions of each (the firsts were previously listed).

Vietnamese-inspired Pork and Veggies over Rice Vermicelli:

Pork with Veggies Over Rice Vermicelli

Ingredients:

1 package of rice vermicelli, prepared

1 lb of pork tenderloin, chopped into small chunks’

1 red onion, diced

2 cloves of garlic, diced

1 yellow pepper, chopped

1 cup of mushrooms, sliced

salt/pepper to tast

3 tablespoons of fish sauce

Instructions:

1. With a little bit of olive oil, saute the onions and garlic over medium high heat, until the onions are soft.

2. Add the pork, along with the salt, pepper, and fish sauce. Mix well. Cook for about 2 minutes.

3. Add the yellow pepper and mushrooms. Continue cooking, stirring regularly, until the the pork is cooked thoroughly.

4. Serve the pork and veggies over prepared rice vermicelli. Garnish with Vietnamese hot sauce, cucumbers, and a little squeeze of lime juice.

We didn’t love this as much as the beef version, but it was still pretty fantastic. I actually adapted the direction from how I cooked it, and I think the new directions will make for a better meal. Originally, I threw the pork, veggies, and seasonings into the frying pan at the same time. I think the flavors overwhelmed each other, and the fish sauce was unable to saturate the pork. So, I am suggesting that the pork go in first, with a little time to take in the fish sauce flavor, and then add the veggies later.

I may have Vietnamese blood running in my veins. Fish sauce is pungent. It smells like wet dog. It’s delicious, but it smells like wet dog (the better the quality, the worse it smells, in my opinion). However, I no longer flinch when first smelling it….now when I smell fish sauce, my taste buds come alive. I know something delicious will come from my pan. It makes my mouth water.

A real wet dog does not elicit that reaction, thank goodness.

Cost:

Rice noodles ~$1.00

Pork ~ $3.00

Yellow pepper ~$1.00

Mushrooms ~ $1.50

Total: ~ $6.50

Pea Pesto: 

Pea Pesto Pasta

I think I’ve mentioned before that I have become obsessed with the blog Smitten Kitchen. The blogger creates the most beautiful and delicious food. Well, a couple days ago, she posted a recipe for a pesto made from fresh peas (the recipe is linked in the hyperlink above), which inspired me to make my arugula pesto the other day. However, I could not stop thinking about that pea pesto! I love peas. Split pea and ham soup reminds me of growing up in the cold, Ohio winters. If I were only able to survive on one canned food for the rest of my life, I’d choose canned peas (yes, I even liked the canned variety). I made a kick-butt pea soup a while back. Peas are delicious. While I didn’t have any fresh peas handy, I decided to try this pea pesto recipe with frozen peas.

I’m not going to retype the recipe, since I followed the one linked above. The only modifications I made were: I used pistachios instead of pine nuts, because I am the worst New Mexican ever and do not have pine nuts (or as we call it pinon) handy. Also, I had a beautifully ripe tomato sitting on my counter, so I chopped that up and mixed it with the pasta.

Pea Pesto Pasta

I LOVED this dish. It was so yummy. Pesto just screams summer to me, plus for a pregnant woman battling heartburn, it keeps the acid at a minimum, unlike tomato-based sauces. Also, it’s a pretty simple way to pack in the veggies. I think it’s particularly effective if you are using basil, spinach, or arugula….those wonderful leafy greens we should be eating all the time. Mark said it was good, but not his favorite….though he definitely had seconds! This dish was for me. He likes pasta with very light sauces (olive oil based). Actually, I don’t think he likes pasta much at all, but he doesn’t have the heart to tell his part-Italian wife the news. I’ll pretend I haven’t figured this out yet.

Cost:

Pasta ~ $.70

Peas ~ $1.00

Tomato ~ $.50

Total: ~ $2.20

Beans & Rice

Ingredients:

1 cup of chopped onion

1 green pepper, chopped

3 cloves of garlic, minced

cumin, to taste

cayenne pepper, to taste

1 ripe tomato, diced with juiced reserved

1 teaspoon of salt

1 1/4 cup of brown rice

1 can of kidney beans, liquid reserved

water

Instructions:

1. In a medium sized pot, heat up a little oil. Add the onions, green pepper, garlic, cayenne, and cumin. Cook over medium high heat until the onions are transparent.

2. Add the tomato and salt. Mix well.

3. Add the beans and rice, mix well. Add the liquid from the beans and water (totaling about 2.5 cups together). Turn heat to low and simmer with the lid on for 45-50 minutes, or until the rice is tender and the majority of the liquid is absorbed.

Beans & Rice

This turned out pretty phenomenal…the cumin gave it heat without being overwhelming, and I liked the texture of the brown rice. I was a bit worried, because brown rice can be quite a bear to cook just right, especially when I am not following the cooking brown rice in water method. However, I got it just where I wanted–not too mushy. I ended up allowing the pot to sit off heat for about 10 minutes, and I think that really allowed the rice to finish up nicely.

I wanted to use a fresh tomato partly because I did not have tomato paste, but also because I wanted to use the freshest ingredients possible…and keep for adding unnecessary salt. Thinking about it, I am not sure how much salt is in tomato paste, but I’d assume it would be added to prepare for the canning process. I think the fresh tomato worked out nicely. I could taste a little tomato, and it added to the overall texture of the meal.

Cost:

organic onion ~ $.35

organic green pepper ~$.80

organic tomato ~ $.50

organic brown rice ~ $.50

organic kidney beans $1.19

Total ~$3.34 (and totally organic!)

Beef over Rice Noodles

I looked at my shelf that holds my seasonings and various cooking vinegars and sauces, and my eyes paused on the bottle of fish sauce. Mmmmm, fish sauce, that salty, delicious Vietnamese condiment (that may or may not smell similar to a wet dog). Realizing I had a NY strip steak in the fridge, a meal was born. I ended up doing a beef modification of a traditional Vietnamese dish of fried pork over rice vermicelli.

Ingredients:

Rice vermicelli

8 shallots, sliced

2 garlic cloves, diced

8 oz of beef (I used a NY strip steak)

1/2 green pepper, chopped

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/2 teaspoon of pepper

1 tablespoon of fish sauce

1/4 of a lime

cucumber slices

Instructions:

1. Prepare the rice noodles according to the package instructions.

2. In a large skillet, add oil, the shallots, and garlic. Cook over medium heat until the shallots are soft.

3. Add the beef, green pepper, salt, pepper, and fish sauce. Mix well. Cook until the beef is cooked to desired temperature. Remove from heat and squeeze the lime juice over the mix.

4. Prepare the dish by putting noodles in a bowl, topping with the meat dish, garnish with cucumbers and Vietnamese hot sauce.

This dish was a perfect summer treat–substantive, but not heavy. I LOVE rice noodles. The combination of fish sauce with lime gave the meat a great flavor…it tasted as if it has marinated for hours, which it didn’t. Also, using a better cut of meat truly added to the dish. The beef was soft as butter.

Next time around, I think I’d add more veggies, perhaps some mushrooms, to fill out the meal a little more. It’s pretty heavy weighed with meat and a processed starch, so not exactly the healthiest meal on earth.

Arugula Pesto Pasta

I only discovered the deliciousness that is arugula recently. It’s sharp flavor really adds to a salad. I researched some arugula pesto recipes online, and I noticed that the great majority of them used some spinach or basil within the recipe. I am assuming it’s to cut the bite of the arugula a bit. I didn’t have any spinach or basil handy, so I decided to go ahead without. As a result, I added some extra veggies to my eventual pasta dish to try to balance the flavors.

Ingredients:

6 garlic cloves with skins on

1/4 cup of pistachios

2 cups of arugula, packed

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/2 cup of olive oil

2 cups of pasta

1/2 onion diced

1 cup of peas

1 cup of mushrooms, sliced

Instructions:

1. In a frying pan, brown the garlic over medium high heat. Flip after about 5 minutes, allowing both sides to brown. Remove garlic from heat, allowing to cool. Remove the skin and cut into small chunks.

2. Add the arugula, pistachios, garlic, and salt to a blender or food processor. Slowly add the olive oil over medium-high setting. Allow a few moments to blend thoroughly. Scoop the pesto out of the blender. Set aside.

Blending arugula

3. Meanwhile, prepare the noodles as suggested on the package. When straining, run cold water over the noodles to prevent overcooking.

4. With a little olive oil, cook the onion over medium high heat, until translucent. Add the mushrooms and peas, cooking for a few minutes.

5. In a serving dish, mix the noodles and pesto well. Add the veggies and mix. Serve immediately.

Mixed Pesto

I think this dish turned out to be pretty good. I used brown rice pasta, which I think was a good move on my part. It’s a bit heavier than white pasta. I’m not really a fan of whole wheat pasta, it has a funny taste to me, but in the case of this pesto, I think it would work even better than the brown rice pasta. This pesto can compete with a heavier noodle.

Cost:

Arugula ~$1.00

Pasta ~ $.75

Onion ~ $.30

Peas ~ $.50

Mushrooms $.50

Total ~ $3.05

Guacamole is one of my favorite foods. I think it’s yummy as a dip, it’s yummy as a condiment, and it’s yummy when you open the fridge and stick your finger in the bowl. It’s actually incredibly easy to make. I used to make it with onions and something was always off…then I discovered that shallots were the key! A little less biting than onions, shallots perfect the guacamole.

Ingredients:

2 shallots

2 garlic cloves

2 avocados

1 jalapeno

1 large roma tomato

1 lime

salt to taste

Step 1: Finely dice up the shallots and garlic. Place them in a bowl big enough to hold about 2 cups of food.

Step 2: Cut the avocados in half. Remove the seed and the skin of the avocado. Cut the avocado into medium sized chunks. Add to the shallots and garlic. Smash with a fork and mix well.

Step 3: Dice the jalapeno. Add to the bowl and mix.

Step 4: Dice the tomato and add it to the bowl. Mix well.

Step 5: Squeeze the juice of one lime into the bowl. Add a little salt. Mix well. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed.

Guacamole is typically pretty pricy when you go out to eat, which strikes me as funny, because it’s not terribly expensive to make at home. And it is incredibly easy to make! This is a pretty traditional version, but I’ve modified, adding green peppers or green chile or anything else that might sound good mixed with smashed avocado. I wouldn’t let it sit in the fridge too long, but that’s never a problem at my house.

Green chile roaster

I truly feel sorry for any person who has not experienced authentic roasted green chile from New Mexico. That stuff that comes from a can in the “international foods” aisle at your grocery store? Blasphemy. The chopped stuff from Colorado or Texas? Delicious, but not nearly as delicious as true-blue roasted green chiles from New Mexico. We are serious about our green chile–I think our official state mantra is “red or green?” (referring to the type of sauce you want on top of your New Mexican food, red chile sauce or green chile sauce. I’m a die hard green girl). You know how you are not supposed to wash and scrub a cast iron pot, in order to preserve the seasonings collected over time? A pretty similar logic is used with the roasting barrels for green chile. A local restaurant had their roaster stolen, after decades of use, and it was a city-wide tragedy.

Roasted Green Chiles

A mean craving for green chile, memories of Hidden Chicken lunches, a blog post on vegetarian pot pie, and a sheet of puff pastry in the freezer drove me to making my adaptation of the beloved green chile chicken pot pie–replacing the chicken with chickpeas!

Green chile chickpea pot pie

Ingredients:

1 onion chopped

2 tablespoons of butter

3 tablespoons of flour

1.5 cups of water

1 cup of milk

thyme

rosemary

oregano

salt/pepper to taste

1 cup of chopped carrots

1 cup of chopped mushrooms

3/4 cup of frozen peas

3/4 cup of frozen corn

3/4 cup of frozen spinach (I had it handy…not sure why)

1/2 cup of roasted green chile–seeded and diced

1 can of chickpeas–rinsed

1 sheet of puff pastry

Instructions:

1. In a deep pan, add the butter and onion. Cook over medium high heat until the onion is translucent. Mix in the flour, one tablespoon at a time, creating an onion paste-ish type of mixture.

2. Turn the heat down to medium and slowly add the water, little by little, mixing thoroughly and allowing the mix to heat up before adding more water. After adding the water, slowly add the milk in the same fashion. Add desired amounts of the spices, around a teaspoon each seemed to work well for me.

3. Add the carrots, mushrooms, corn, peas, and spinach and allow to simmer until the carrots begin to get soft. Add the green chile and simmer for a couple minutes more. Off heat, add the chickpeas, and mix well.

Pie filling

4. Preheat the over to 375 degrees. Place 2 individual bowls on a cookie sheet (we have big bowls, you might need 3 bowls), and fill with the mixture.

5. Spread out the put pastry on a floured surface. Using an empty bowl, cut out a circle of dough. Be sure to give a tiny bit of excess, which will allow you to pinch it against the bowl’s edge.

6. Place the dough carefully over the bowls filled with pot pie filling. Pinch dough to the sides. Cut several vents in the top of the pie dough.

7. Bake for 45 minutes, or until the puff pastry dough is golden and puffed.

Prior to baking

We really liked this dish, however, my one pregnancy symptom (heartburn) decided to make an appearance. That coupled with the large amount of green chile used (I added a whole cup and it was too hot for us, it even gave my husband heartburn, but he still ate the whole thing!), prevented me from eating more than a couple bites.

Fresh out of the oven

I’ve never been able to master the gravy for pot pies, which is why I was really drawn to the recipe on the Oh Dear Drea blog. It looked so thick and creamy. I ended up adding a little extra milk, because I thought all my veggies sucked out the gravy, however, I’d suggest following the actual recipe above. Adding that last 1/4-1/2 cup of milk made my gravy a little thinner than I would have liked out of the oven.

I recently began reading the blog Smitten Kitchen, where I also got the recipe for the roasted red pepper salad I made a while back. Well, one of the writer’s recent posts was on homemade ricotta. I almost skipped over the recipe, because I figured it was terribly labor intensive and it’s hot in New Mexico–no extended standing and cooking for this lady lately. However, curiosity got the better of me, and I decided to check the recipe out. Easiest thing ever. My mind was made up; I was going to make my own ricotta.

3 cups of milk, 1 cup of cream, a little salt, and 3 tablespoons of lemon juice. That’s it. I brought the milk, cream, and salt up to 190 degrees (approximately, I was using a meat thermometer, as opposed to the more appropriate candy thermometer). Turn off the heat, add the lemon juice, stir and let sit for 5 minutes. Then you dump the mixture into a colander covered with cheesecloth, with a bowl underneath to gather the whey. I didn’t have cheesecloth, and at first attempted to use a paper towel, which was not porous enough, so I put the cheese directly into the mesh colander I have (this was after an hour of watching the whey trickle out drop by drop. I went to amazon and ordered cheesecloth right away…they are quick, but not quick enough for this first batch.

The cheese sat in the whey longer than I would have liked, so I am not sure how it impacted its overall quality. It tasted wonderful and was amazingly creamy. I’m never buying watery store-boought ricotta ever again.

I speared some on bread last night.

And today for lunch, I made lox bagels, substituting the ricotta for the traditional cream cheese. Yummy-ville.

Ricotta

Right now, I have some fresh squeezed lemon-lime juice sitting in the fridge. I got to take my new electric juicer for a spin (bahahahaha!), and I am just waiting for the juice to get nice a cold. 4 lemons, 4 limes, 1/4 cup of raw sugar, and about 5 cups of water. It’s so simple, so delicious.

I thought going to a small grocery chain known for its organic produce would be a bit cheaper than buying all my produce at Trader Joe’s…but it wasn’t. Even though they have big weekly promotion, most of them are not on the organic produce. I ended up buying a couple things there–including a couple luxury buys (brie *on sale* and Mexican Pepsi *made with real sugar, not HFCS*), as well as some white peaches and organic tomatoes.

The rest of my shopping was at Trader Joe’s, as usual. I didn’t make a list or meal plan, which is probably part of the reason it cost what it did–roughly 74 dollars, plus the 13 dollars at Sunflower.

We are going to check out Albuquerque’s Downtown Farmer’s market this weekend, to see if that’s the most economical way to shop for produce (it’s certainly the more green option).

Shopping List:

Sunflower

Brie $3.84

Organic tomatoes $3.06

White peaches $1.19

Mexican Pepsi x 4 $5.00

Total: $13.09

Trader Joe’s 

Dijon mustard $1.69

TJ’s dish soap $2.99

Organic raw sugar $2.99

Toilet paper $4.49

Organic cucumbers $2.49

Organic Arugula $2.29

Organic Spinach $1.99

Organic Garbanzo beans $1.19

Smoked salmon $3.99

Organic mushrooms $2.29

Organic plum tomatoes $2.99

Organic eggs $3.79

Farm bread $2.99

Whole wheat bread $1.99

Plain bagels $2.49

Guacamole kit (fresh ingredients for guac packaged together) $3.69

2 bags of lemons $2.98

Limes $1.69

Sharp cheddar $2.95

Organic butter $4.79

Organic carrots $1.49

Organic plain yogurt $2.99

Organic green peppers $2.49

Cottage cheese $1.99

Canned tuna $1.49

Organic 1/2 & 1/2 $1.69

Organic milk $1.79

Total: $74.16

Overall Total: $87.15

While I didn’t meal plan for the week, I have some ideas in mind….I have some vodka sauce I’d like to use, we’ve been loving salads lately with lots of fresh veggies, and I am currently making a homemade ricotta!

Ingredients:

1.5 lbs of stewing beef

1 onion chopped

6 cups of water

1.5 cups of grain (I used a barley, spelt, and rice blend from Trader Joe’s)

1 cup of frozen peas

1 cup of chopped carrots

dried thyme

garlic powder

salt/pepper

Instructions:

1. In a soup pot, add the beef, and brown slightly.

2. Add the onion, and saute the beef and onion mix over medium high heat, until the onions are soft. Add garlic powder and thyme to your taste.

3. Add the water, grains, peas, and carrots. Cook over medium high heat until boiling. Drop the temperature to medium low and simmer until the gain is cooked. Add additional water if necessary. Adjust seasoning with salt and pepper.

I’d contend that this is the ideal summer soup. While seemingly wintery, with it heartiness, it is not labor intensive at all. Throw some stuff in a pot and let simmer. So easy. I think using my toaster oven gives off more heat in the kitchen. I’ve noticed my husband walking back and forth between his office and the kitchen several times already, so I guess he approves of the summer soup!

I was thinking as I made this, why do I use stock (when it’s handy)? This soup has a nice subtle flavored broth, combining the tastes of the beef, grains, and veggies. From a health-conscious perspective, it contains very little salt, just what I added at the end to bring together the flavor. Why use stock????? Flavor saturated broths bring back bad memories of my childhood, when my babysitter would make canned chicken noodle soup and serve it to us without diluting it with the requisite can of water. Yuck! Salty city (and I love salty).

I’ll close by saying, broaden your horizons; give soup in the summer a chance.

Meal planning for a couple weeks and then not for a week has definitely thrown me off track. There’s something simple and comforting about knowing what’s for lunch or dinner each day, and also knowing that I will have the ingredients necessary to make them. I am looking forward to getting back to that!

Today’s Breakfast:

Ode to Brother Juniper's....

A friend I used to work with in Memphis mentioned going to a great breakfast place this morning, Brother Juniper\’s. It’s a great breakfast place, and one of the many phenomenal restaurants in Memphis. After reading his FB check-in, I decided to make something inspired by Brother Juniper’s. We had some crusty rosemary bread leftover from last night, so I toasted a thick slice and topped it with 2 over easy eggs, some sliced grape tomatoes, crumbled goat cheese, and a little dill. It was yummy! And I am a bad pregnant woman–I live on over easy eggs these days (I am highly recommended, by pregnancy guide books not my midwife, to eat fully cooked eggs only).

Crusty bread with over easy eggs, tomatoes, goat cheese, and dill

Who could say no to this? Not this woman.

Last Night’s Dinner

Last Night's Dinner

We don’t normally eat a lot of meat. However, we are definitely not vegetarians. I had a killer craving for a steak last night (I blame it on whoever decided it was a good idea to grill out 2 evening in a row), so we ran to the grocery store to pick up some fixings. We found a 3 pack of New York Strip steaks on sale for 12 dollars. They weren’t organic…but that’s life. We bought some fixing for a nice salad (with the yummy lettuce from our friend’s back yard), and we got a loaf of crusty rosemary bread. Dinner.

When we got home, Mark took to making the salad. I asked him if he thought I should make 1 or 2 of the steaks. We decided to make 1 and split it, which turned out to be more than enough for us. Keeping the new nutritional plate guidelines in mind, we loaded our plates with salad (with an adaptation of Mark’s balsamic dijon dressing, made by me!), accompanied it with the steak, and enjoyed some bread with a garlic infused olive oil (with fresh rosemary from our yard added!). It was a really nice meal. Buster ended up enjoying some of the steak, as even half a piece was too much for me. He didn’t mind.

Friday Night's Dinner

Thursday Night’s Dinner

Part of my problem this week is that I do not have a clear plan mapped out. Without my plan, I end up doing crazy things, such as Thursday’s dinner. I started off making the fixing for some yummy, healthy burritos–brown rice, some mushrooms, onions, and zucchini stir fried together, and a can of refried beans I discovered in the pantry. Well, when I was grabbing the beans, I noticed a can of white queso, which was a major early pregnancy craving of mine. Then I realized we had some tortilla chips as well. I rationalized, “Well, my goal is to use up all the stuff in the pantry, and this would work towards using 2 more things.” And burritos became this weird hybrid of nachos.

Pantry Nachos

I ended up laying the tortilla chips, followed by some brown rice, then some refried beans, a layer of the mushroom/onion/zucchini mixture, and then some of the thick, gooey queso. It was actually pretty good! The rice made them especially filling.

Wednesday Night’s Dinner

Mark initiated this one. He found some Trader Joe’s Curry Chicken Tenders in the freezer and pulled them out to thaw. I simply used up the last of some  white basmati rice and pan fried the tenders.

Curry Chicken Tenders and Rice

He liked them; I did not. I tasted soap for some reason. Not doing weekly shopping = a lack of veggies in our house, which sucks. I miss veggies. This is a sad looking meal.

Wednesday’s Lunch

Pea Pasta Salad

Using plain yogurt to replace many other condiments has been my new favorite trick. A while back, I raved about blending it with some spices and making it taste like ranch dressing. I decided to replicate that for this pasta salad. Pretty simple, I had some frozen pasta with various veggies, so I threw that in a skillet and I added a couple cups of frozen green peas. I cut up 1/2 and onion and mixed it with the cooled pasta blend. Then, I added 2 cups of yogurt, some dried rosemary and oregano, and some salt and pepper. After refrigerating for an hour or so, it became a creamy, delicious pasta salad with the ranch-ish flavor.