Another Dreamy 'Dreaming of Spring' Salad ...

Funny thing happens when the Spring weather comes our way! We crave greens and look for new ways to wake up our tastebuds to what's coming soon from our gardens and the area Farmer's Markets! I don't know about you, but I am just 'champing at the bit' to buy fresh asparagus that has come from an area farmer's asparagus bed for a light and tasty Spring salad, go out to our garden and break off baby greens for a fresh walnut and feta salad, look for local watercress for a creamy soup ... come on, Spring!

Today, I have some beautiful little mandarin oranges that I found at the market when the produce manager balked at breaking up a box of clementines for smaller orders... shame on him! Oh well... I remembered this light salad that I found years ago and have made whenever I have a citrus salad urge... this recipe came out of Betty Crocker's Cookbook. Funny... When you look back at older cookbooks, you see just how silly we were as consumers way back in the day... this recipe calls for canned mandarin oranges ... horrors! Yuck, yuck, triple yuck! Those little white-spotted, limp, pieces of citrus can't hold a candle to a small bowl or fresh, juicy, mandarins. So... I have altered Betty's recipe to make it fresher and to do a fast-forward for today's (meaning mine) palates. I took out the iceberg lettuce and substituted baby spinach greens ... dark greens are tastier and better for you! I like raspberry vinegar  and walnut oil in dressings, so they're in there. I love almonds, so I doubled the amount. I've decreased the salt by half because, hey, we have WAY too much salt in our diets these days.You may want to take the salt out altogether and add it to taste after shaking up the salad dressing ingredients.

I have a little roaster chicken that I'm going to stuff with a stabbed lemon, rub with some herbs and bring to a golden brown crispy goodness in the oven. I also have a beautiful bottle of Brancott's Reserve Sauvignon Blanc getting cold, cold, cold in the fridge. I'm thinking dinner will be light, simple and delicious.

Acme Applesauce Cake with Guava Cream Topping

Cakes... I've been into easy cakes of late. After the last Tex-Mex feast, I served this easy little cake of humble origins. I dressed it up with a guava cream topping that had a hint of lime in it. Since we were having company for dinner, we put a good dent in it. That's a good thing, as Silent Bob and I love sweets, but ... a whole cake for the two of us? Ridiculous!

So... the history of this cake goes WAY back. When I was a little girl, living in the northern New York border town of Massena, my mother shopped at the Acme Supermarket. She bought store-brand cans of all the basics, applesauce being one of them. This cake recipe came from the label on the back of the can. It was one of the first recipes that Mom let me make unattended. I have three brothers and a sister ... together, we would mow through an entire 13" by 9" cake at the end of a family meal. It always satisfied the whole crowd!

Chiles Rellenos - Tex-Mex at Its Best

Here in the boondocks of New Hampshire, I have yet to find a restaurant that can serve a chiles rellenos dish that tastes and feels like the real thing. I have friends who spent their college years in Colorado, other friends who lived for years in Arizona, still others who spent their early married life in southern California. They all agree that a plate of good chiles rellenos is a wonderful thing, but as Deni says, "You just can't get a good chili east of the Mississippi." ... well, I'm trying here. If you're a chiles rellenos fan, I'd appreciate you trying this particular recipe and getting back to me, because I am on a quest to get it right!

I had my first 'real chiles' when I visited a friend in Phoenix. The soft roasted pepper was a revelation ... I had never roasted peppers before and thought they were only used from a jar or can to supplement taste and add color in a dish that had another 'star'. The crisp coating of flour and fried treatment was so wonderful! Add a cheesy filling and I became a fan for life. Of course, getting the authentic Mexican cheese back in New England would be a challenge, but there had to be a way to duplicate that wonderfully crispy, cheesy, soft flavorful pepper experience.

Salad Day ... Red Lettuces with Spiced Almonds, Green Olives, and Asagio Cheese

A simple salad for a sunny day when Silent Bob and I are dreaming of our own vegetable garden and what we will be growing this summer ...

We've been opening the doors and letting a cool Spring breeze into the house this morning. Everything looks horrible in the yard, all brown and mucky, woodchips all over the path from woodpile to porch door, deadfall branches littering the grass, empty seed shells under the birdfeeders, last season's grass tufts, matted and splayed. Sounds depressing, huh? But no ... because if you stand quietly and wait for the breeze to die down, you hear the water percolating in the soil, the branches with buds just beginning to take on that reddish blush clicking together, the Spring songs of the chickadees and titmice, and a subtle crunching sound of the grasses and plants drying out and loosening up as they get ready to send up new growth. Really ... go out in your world and listen to Spring. It's there!

Coming in for lunch, I'm eager to have an easy 'throw together', so this salad is perfect. I made those spiced almonds last week and still have a cup set aside. I've been eager for fresh greens of late, so I have the ingredients for a wonderfully fresh and crunchy salad with a tangy shallot dressing. I made this salad last week for a luncheon with three of my pals. Unfortunately, Silent Bob missed out on lunch that day, so I'm making it up to him today, by making this salad for the two of us... and it's meatless so I'm staying with my pledge to the Meatless Monday movement. I hope you enjoy this bit of green!

Mud Season! Looks Like Chocolate To Me!

Up here in the New England boondocks we have mixed feelings about 'mud season'. For a few weeks in March and April, any Yankee living on a dirt road knows they better have a well-stocked larder, propane or oil in the tank, and a stack of books from the library or bookstore to keep them occupied for that time when the frost goes out of the gound, the snow melts fast, and the mire of mud on the roads quickly becomes a thing of mucky, sucky, yucky wonder. Yup, 'mud season' can be a real pain in the neck, but... it heralds Spring, and that means bringing gardens back from the dead, the first crocuses and daffodils, forsythia and pussywillows!

Infused Oils and Spicy Nuts ...

I've been on a Mediterranean kick for the past week or so. It all started with a new 'old' cookbook that I found in a used bookstore a while ago. Matthew Kenney's mediterranean cooking is a pretty little book that has some nice 'nice and easy' recipes. To boot, he tends to use ingredients that I have readily available in my pantry. That's a good sign when you're looking at cookbooks, I think. Kinda like seeing a cute guy in the same aisle of the bookstore you frequent and just knowing that you'd be compatible ... but I digress.

I got said book home and have found several recipes that I'm eager to try. However, before I do, I must prepare some of the specialty ingredients. Pepper-infused olive oil and spiced almonds are a good beginning. Today's project came out wonderfully! Now, I just have to wait a few days for the oil to cure. Then, I can dive into some of those new recipes.

Flatbreads ... What a Cinch!

Bread and I have a checkered past. There have been times when I have been wildly successful making herb and anadama breads, pizza doughs, cinnamon raisin bread, and oatmeal bread and then... there have been dismal failures. I just won't go there with you.

Last evening, I tried making a new type of bread that has been around for millenia - flatbread. I found a basic dough recipe in a cookbook on Mediterranean cuisine and then cross-referenced with a couple bread cookbooks that I have. Then, I looked at my rosemary topiary that needed a bit of a trim and thought I'd kill two birds with one stone. The result was a bread board with four flatbreads topped with kosher salt, black pepper, fresh snipped rosemary, olive oil, and freshly grated Parmesan.

Spice Garden Poetry - This Evening Slicing Lemons

This Evening Slicing Lemons

My sharp knife halves these orbs.

Oily fragrance coats my fingertips.

I twist juice from their yellow cups,

and in their mist I squint and see a yellow sun,

a bright green awning, the gnarled hands of

that Spanish elder presenting me a

burst of lemon coolness in the searing heat

of old Granada.

My fingers remember the slippery

chill of the red clay cup.

I can tilt my head back and feel the ache
from the sudden cold swallow.
I squint and see the distant Sierra Nevada
through the icy fumes rising
from that citrus nectar – all this,
all this before my kitchen counter.

- Susan Miller-Lindquist
  
 

I am intrigued by the idea that scents induce such strong memories that one can be completely transported sensually back across time and space to a particular point in one's experience.