Engaging stories of love, joy, comfort and friendship with proven scrumptious, healthy recipes, we celebrate LOVE as the secret ingredient for wonderful food!

Frosty cocktails and dinner salads – summertime is here!

June 6, 2016 by Mary 8 Comments

Frosty cocktails and dinner salads, summertime is here, right? Easy cooking and meals that come together quickly, that’s what we all want when it’s time to open the windows wide, as we’d really rather be outside.

My mother-in-law passed early Tuesday morning. We had the funeral in Baltimore on Thursday. She had lived a good long 96+ years. So on Wednesday night, our oldest son and his fiancée came over for dinner and spent the night so we could all drive to Baltimore together. Obviously I had not planned for four for dinner this week but here’s what I threw together. It was great for a hot summer, late night meal.

Fortunately I had defrosted a package of 4 chicken thighs with bone and skin. I had some baby spinach and romaine lettuce, potatoes, mini sweet peppers, radishes and tomatoes. I threw in some caperberries and lemon halves to roast with the potatoes and chicken. Over the finished salad, I drizzled a tiny bit of olive oil and with a squeeze of the roasted lemons – DELISH!!

The caperberries got crunchy – a nice and interesting little bit of salt crunch every once in a while. The potatoes, baby Yukon Gold, were creamy dreamy. And roasting the lemons at the high heat of 425 degrees made them almost sweet! You can just salt and pepper your chicken on both sides but I was also trying out a new possible product for the summer box, delicious and high in garlic content, so I will tell you to just add some garlic powder and sesame seeds on the thighs, in order to not ruin the surprise of this product in the upcoming summer box.

Here’s what I did.

DINNER SALAD WITH ROASTED CHICKEN THIGHS, CAPERBERRIES AND ROASTED LEMONS – serves 4

4 chicken thighs with bone and skin
Salt
Pepper
Garlic powder
Sesame seeds
5.5 oz. baby spinach leaves
3 – 4 romaine lettuce leaves, washed, dried and torn into bite size pieces
1.75 lbs. baby Yukon Gold potatoes – scrubbed, dried and cut into 2“ chunks
2 Tbs. olive oil, plus more to drizzle on finished salads
1/3 cup caperberries, drained
2 whole lemons, washed, dried and cut in half
8 radishes, scrubbed clean and dried, trim if greens are not nice
½ cup sugar snap peas, washed, strings removed, and cut on a diagonal into slices
3 tomatoes, washed, dried and each cut into 8 wedges
4 small sweet peppers – yellow, orange or red, washed, dried, split in half lengthwise, seeds removed
3 scallions, cleaned and sliced, white, light green and some dark green parts
Maldon salt
Fresh ground pepper

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Toss potatoes with 2 Tbs. olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast potatoes in the oven for 15 minutes. Then add the caperberries to the potatoes and toss and return to the oven for 20 – 30 minutes more.

Meanwhile, wash and dry chicken thighs, removing all fat and extra skin on the edges. Season both sides with salt, pepper, garlic powder and sesame seeds, pressing them in to adhere. Place thighs on a rack on a rimmed baking sheet, add lemon halves in the corners of the baking sheet, cut side down and roast on the top shelf in the oven for 30 – 40 minutes.

Prepare all the other vegetables.

Distribute the spinach and romaine lettuce leaves evenly among four dinner plates. Place chicken thighs in the center and evenly distribute all the other vegetables around the chicken, putting one roasted lemon half on each plate and finishing with the scallions sprinkled all over. Drizzle olive oil on the vegetables in a circle around the chicken, and squeeze the lemon all around. Finish with some crushed Maldon salt and fresh ground pepper.

Serve with LOVE and enjoy!! We paired this with an Alsace Riesling – perfect! (Steve – what do you think?)

Last weekend, I was also playing around with cocktails and another box item. More on that to come later after the summer box is shipped on June 25th. Here’s a photo to whet your appetite.

Roasted Squash and Radicchio Salad With Buttermilk Dressing & Sweet Corn Arepas

January 17, 2016 by Mary 32 Comments

You know I love salads for dinner and since it is the season for squash, I wanted to share this recipe with you! It may sound a little bit time consuming, but it’s not. Perfect for a meatless weeknight meal, particularly after all the rich holiday food.

I love delicata squash because the skin is truly delicate enough so that you don’t have to go through the time consuming step of peeling it and you can eat it. It’s probably like potato skins and has more nutrients than the actual squash part. Don’t quote me on that, I’m just guessing.

This recipe is from Melissa Clark at The New York Times. I like a lot of her recipes as we seem to have the same likes. But at first when I read this recipe, I was not too keen on the buttermilk in the dressing as I’m usually just an oil and vinegar kind of gal. But, I went ahead and followed hers exactly (this is rare) and this was delicious!! Not at all creamy like a ranch dressing, which is what I was afraid of, just the right amount of creaminess to work oh so nicely with squash and greens.

Try this, this coming week. I served this with Delicias Andinas sweet corn arepas, toasted of course and gluten-free – so satisfying, different and delicious!!!

ROASTED SQUASH AND RADICCHIO SALAD WITH BUTTERMILK DRESSING – by Melissa Clark – serves 4

2 delicata squashes (10 ounces each), halved lengthwise, seeded and cut into 1/2-inch half-moons
1 Tbs. honey
1 ½ tsp. kosher salt
¼ tsp. smoky chile powder, such as New Mexico or chipotle
6 Tbs. extra-virgin olive oil
⅓ cup buttermilk
2 tsp. lemon juice
2 tsp. finely chopped tarragon
1 large garlic clove, grated
1 head radicchio, cored and shredded (4 cups)
4 cups arugula
⅔ cup chopped toasted pecans (see note)
⅓ cup thinly sliced scallions

Toast pecans first by heating oven to 350 degrees. Spread nuts on a rimmed baking sheet and toast until they deepen in color and turn fragrant, 7 to 10 minutes. Cool before chopping.

Raise heat in oven to 425 degrees. In a large bowl, toss squash with honey, 3/4 teaspoon salt, chile powder and 2 tablespoons olive oil. Transfer to a large rimmed baking sheet. Roast, tossing occasionally, until tender and golden brown, 35 to 40 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a small bowl, whisk together buttermilk, lemon juice, tarragon, remaining 3/4 teaspoon salt and the garlic. Whisk in remaining 4 tablespoons (1/4 cup) oil.

In a large bowl, combine radicchio, arugula, squash, pecans and scallions. Toss in buttermilk dressing; taste and adjust seasoning as necessary.

So I know I’ve told you about how our two boys cook. They actually do most of the cooking in their partnerships. Both girls are great bakers, fearless with yeast, all breads and desserts. This is such a great thing as a mom of boys because we are always in conversations about food!! They text me their dinner photos all the time. Here’s Zach from Warsaw showing me his farmer’s market roast leg of mutton, perfectly cooked, I might add!! I’ve never had mutton – have you? So cool that he can be so far away, yet we can still be a very big part of their daily lives. This is what happens when you make great home cooked food a central theme.

Vegetarian Delight

February 11, 2014 by Mary 11 Comments

Vegetarian delight finished dish - baby spinach, beans and roasted vegetables topped toasted pine nuts and goat cheese.

Once on week I make a meatless meal, much to the disconcertion of my husband. He hates them. He knows, intellectually, it’s a good idea but the complaints beforehand, egads, it drives me crazy!! But I soldier on, try to ignore him and cook up something, with LOVE. You probably know by now that I love salads, but salads are not very inviting with all this cold weather we’re having here on the East Coast. And raw foods are very good for you. So I made up this Vegetarian Delight with warm beans and roasted veggies, including the tomatoes, on a base of raw baby spinach leaves.

By golly, he loved it! He kept on talking about it – even the next morning! BINGO, I know something is really good if he’s still talking about the next morning AND it’s meatless too! This is packed full of nutrients, delicious with the contrasts of the cool baby spinach leaves and the warm roasted vegetables, even on a frigid winter night. The roasted shallots and crushed garlic cloves were a brilliant addition providing bursts of flavor, complementing the sweet parsnips while the warm, slightly roasted tomatoes provided the right acidity. The Midnight Moon goat cheese is a wonderful splurge, but not really necessary if you are a true vegetarian. We loved this dinner and it’s going to be repeated often in our household.

Truly, I just made this with the vegetables I had on hand. You can try your own combination but I will say that this blend was really yummy. I hope you’ll try it and it makes your recipe regulars too.

VEGETARIAN DELIGHT serves 2

2 large handfuls of baby spinach leaves – about 4 – 5 oz., washed and spun dry
1 – 15 oz. can cannellini beans, drained, rinsed and drained again
1 Italian eggplant, cut in 3/4” slices, roasted
1 parsnip, peeled and cut into julienned strips
1 zucchini, cut into 1/4” slices
2 shallots, peeled and quartered
1/2 of a poblano pepper, cut into 1/4” strips
4 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 tomato from the vine, cut into 6 or 8 wedges
3 grape tomatoes, cut in half
Sherry vinaigrette
Midnight Moon hard goat cheese, cut into small strips
Toasted pine nuts

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Slick a cookie sheet or flat roasting pan with peanut oil. Arrange eggplant slices on the sheet, salt with fine sea salt and fresh ground pepper.

On another rimmed baking sheet, toss parsnips, zucchini, shallots, poblano pepper and garlic with 2 tbs. olive oil, salt and pepper.

Roast the eggplant on the bottom rack of your oven for 20 – 25 minutes, until nicely browned on the bottom while you roast the other vegetables on the top rack at the same time. Roast the top mixed vegetables for 20 minutes, then add the tomatoes and toss and roast for 5 – 10 minutes longer, until all the vegetables are fork tender. Toast the pine nuts in a separate pan for 5 – 10 minutes until lightly browned.

Meanwhile, make your dressing, prepare the cheese and warm the beans in the microwave for a minute on high.

Assemble your salads. Place the spinach leaves on the plate, top with the warm beans (you may not use all of them – save them for tomorrow’s lunch), remove the eggplant slices with a metal spatula so you don’t loose the lovely browned bottom.

Place 4 eggplant slices on each salad, browned side up. Toss the other vegetables and place a nice amount on top. (You probably won’t use all of these either). Drizzle dressing over all and top with cheese and pine nuts. Serve immediately and enjoy!

Vegetarian Delight, just before drizzling dressing and topping with toasted pine nuts.

Vegetarian Delight, just before drizzling the dressing and topping with toasted pine nuts

Provençal chicken and 2 dinners in 1!

July 20, 2013 by Mary Frances 21 Comments

While this heat wave we’ve been having here on the East coast has been trying, to say the least, I love this time of year, with the bounty from the garden, which will be ending soon. (The lettuce is about to bolt and this extreme heat is not helping.) Here’s the lettuce and nasturtiums I cut from my little garden last Sunday.
And here is our Tuesday night dinner.

This is how you can make a quick, easy and super delicious weeknight dinner. If you think a little bit ahead, it’s a breeze, you won’t heat up your kitchen, and it’s light and healthy. Perfect for this time of year and particularly during this heat wave.

On Sunday, before I went on an hour-long bike ride, I threw a bunch of golden beets in the oven to roast. Those guys cooked and I was out of the hot kitchen! Now you all probably know how to roast beets, but just in case, here a little recipe. Beets are a great vegetable because you get two in one!! You can roast the beets and then sauté the beet stems and greens in olive oil with garlic. I almost like the greens better than the beets, and you don’t have to cook them at the same time. Beets, refrigerated will keep a long time, the greens, not so much, so use those sooner rather than later and come back here soon to see how I used them in another layered vegetable dish that was loaded with fresh flavors. Some grocery stores are now even selling prepackaged beet greens. I prefer to get the real thing, attached to organically grown beets. Who knows what they put in those bags to make them last longer in the grocery stores.

ROASTED BEETS – serves 2 – 4

1 bunch of golden or red beets
1 Tbs. olive oil
Salt
Fresh ground pepper

Preheat your oven to 375 – 425 degrees. You can roast them anywhere in this range. I like to use 400 degrees. At the lower heat, they will just take longer to become tender.

Trim the beets from the greens, scrub with a vegetable brush and dry with a paper towel. Place in the center of a good-sized piece of aluminum foil, drizzle with the olive oil, season with salt and pepper and draw up the foil to seal and make a neat packet. Place the packet in an oven proof dish (because the beets may leak and make a mess in your oven) and roast for one hour. Remove, open packet and test. A skewer should pierce the beet easily and completely. If not, put back in for 10 more minutes or so.

Once done and cool enough to handle, peel the beets and use immediately or refrigerate in a covered container and use within four or five days. They rewarm easily in a microwave as well.
Here was our dinner on Sunday night, when I made Provençal chicken legs with oven roasted broccoli and mushrooms. This is easy too! I made four leg and thigh pieces for the two of us, so we could have the two dinners.

For the broccoli and mushrooms, toss those with two tablespoons of olive oil, salt and pepper and roast at 375 degrees for 35 – 40 minutes while you’re roasting the chicken.

PROVENÇAL CHICKEN LEGS – serves 4 or 2 for two dinners

4 chicken leg and thigh pieces, with skin and bones
1 Tbs. each of chopped fresh thyme, sage, rosemary, and mint leaves
1 Tbs. fresh lavender flowers (optional) or 1.5 tsp. dried
Salt
Pepper
2 – 3 Tbs. olive oil
4 dried bay leaves
4 lemon slices, seeded

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.

Wash and dry your chicken legs. Mix together chopped fresh herbs with the lavender, salt and pepper to taste, and mix in 1 – 2 Tbs. of olive oil to moisten and make a paste. Carefully loosen the skin on the chicken on one side and place one bay leaf and one-quarter (about 1 Tbs.) of the herb mixture under the skin and spread around underneath. Make sure the skin is still attached in one or two places. Salt and pepper both sides of the chicken.

Heat the remaining tbs. of olive oil in an ovenproof skillet on medium high heat. Place in chicken legs, skin side down, and brown for 5 minutes. When nicely browned, turn legs over and place one lemon slice on each leg. Place the skillet in the oven and roast for 30 – 35 minutes, or until the meat registers 160 degrees with an instant read thermometer. Let rest for 5 – 10 minutes before serving.

So we ate 2 of these on Sunday night and saved 2 for the weeknight dinner salad. The bay leaf is not edible so remove while eating.

DINNER SALAD FOR A WEEKNIGHT HEAT WAVE – serves 2

Tender lettuce – Bibb or mesclun or homegrown
4 golden beets, roasted
2 Tbs. toasted pine nuts – oven toast at 350 degrees for 6 – 8 minutes
Greek feta cheese
2 Provençal roasted chicken legs and thighs
2 nasturtiums (optional)
Sherry vinaigrette

Warm the chicken legs in a microwave for 1 -2 minutes, depending on how powerful your microwave is. Warm beets in the microwave for 1 minute. Cut each beet into 4 or 6 wedges, depending on the size of the beets. Place lettuce on a dinner plate. Place the chicken leg on top in the middle, pour any juices on top. Arrange the cut beets around the leg, as well some crumbled feta cheese and the toasted pine nuts. Drizzle on the sherry vinaigrette and serve right away. Enjoy!!! You will LOVE this!!

My favorite kind of dinner

October 27, 2012 by Mary Frances 2 Comments

I’ve been wanting to share this healthy supper with you. It is quick to do as well, taking 45 minutes or so, from start to finish.

On debate night, this past Monday, I made the following dinner. One plate, eaten in front of the TV.
This really is my kind of dinner. I love salads. I eat one every day for lunch and I really think there is something to eating raw foods. I think they provide a very different kind of healthy eating. Heat must surely transform the vitamins and minerals and eating anything that you can in its purist form, raw, must be healthier for you.

We once met with a prospective client who was trying to introduce a raw health bar into the marketplace and wanted our help in packaging and marketing it. Carol Alt, the famous fashion model, was a big devotee of this. So maybe, if I eat enough raw food, I’ll look like her???
I hope you enjoy this. And don’t forget to add LOVE while you’re making it. After a day like Thursday, the world certainly needs a lot more love and you can add to it by making and serving nourishing, healthy meals, filled with love.

SIRLOIN STEAK SALAD
– serves 2

1/2 – 3/4 of a head of Boston lettuce, washed and spun dry, or use as much lettuce as you like
1 handful of snow peas, cleaned and blanched in boiling water for 1 minute, drained and cooled in ice water and then drained and patted dry
3/4 – 1 lb. boneless sirloin steak
1 sweet potato, peeled, cut into 1/2″ cubes, tossed with 1 tbs. olive oil, salt and pepper, and roasted in a 400 degree oven for 35 minutes
1-1/2” piece of daikon radish, peeled and thinly sliced on a mandoline
1/2 of a yellow pepper, cut in thin strips
10 cherry or grape heirloom tomatoes, washed and sliced in half
2 scallions, cleaned and thinly sliced

SALAD DRESSING
1 tsp. Dijon mustard
2 tbs. Sherry vinegar
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

Prepare your sweet potatoes and get them in the oven. Meanwhile, clean the snow peas and blanch, drain, put in an ice bath to stop the cooking, drain again and pat dry. Wash and dry the lettuce and chill in the refrigerator. Prepare all the other vegetables. Now your potatoes should be tender and done. Keep them warm.

Wash and dry your steak and season with salt, pepper and garlic powder to taste. Turn broiler on high and broil 4-5 minutes per side to your liking of doneness.

While the steak is cooking, make the salad dressing. Whisk together the mustard, salt, pepper and vinegar. Slowly whisk in the olive oil in droplets until all is emulsified and combined.

When the steak is done, remove it to a platter and let it rest for 5 – 10 minutes.

Lay out the lettuce leaves on the bottom of two plates. In a circular fashion around the edge of the lettuce, distribute the snow peas, sweet potatoes, yellow pepper and tomatoes. Tuck the daikon radish slices underneath the lettuce on the outer edge of the plate. Thinly slice the steak and lay out in the center of all the beautiful vegetables. Drizzle the salad dressing on top. Finish with a sprinkling of sliced scallions.