Swordfish with Fennel and Mustard Sauce

Eric came home from 2 day road trip.  He needed something fresh, local, light but comforting.  I was pooped, had not gone shopping and needed to cook everything in one pan, so this was the result.  I have never cooked swordfish this way so felt fun and bold.  He was happy, so it was a success.

1. Slice some of Steve's smaller red potatoes (those small french red potatoes would be ideal for presentation) and fry in olive oil until crisp.  (Oven Roasting would render drier, crispier potatoes). Remove and allow to drain on some paper towels.

2. In same olive oil (adding more if necessary), add thinly sliced fennel. Stir until starting to soften, then push to sides to create room for 2 perfect pieces of swordfish from Alicia and Ric of Geewhatadeal.  (Wow!  I have never encountered such tender plump pieces of swordfish.)  Cover pan to cook first side.  When browned to your liking, turn fish over, add some white wine to pan and cover again.

3. Meanwhile, mix some green peppercorn dijon mustard with some lemon, soy sauce and olive oil.  Lift lid and pour mustard sauce over fish and cover again.  When fish is done, remove to a plate.  Stir fennel and mustard sauce and remove to a bowl.  Toss turnip greens into pan and stir fry until soft and bright green. 

4. Meanwhile, divide potatoes between plates.  Place turnip greens next to potatoes, slightly on top.  Place fish in middle between potatoes and greens, pour fennel mustard sauce on top.  Sprinkle with a little freshly chopped dill and freshly ground pepper.  Serve.

Wilted Spinich Salad with Feta and Figs

This is the perfect dish when Steve's Spinach starts to go off.  The most delicious gigantic spinach ever.

1. Wash Spinach.

2. 1/4 Slice half a medium red onion.  Put in bowl of cold water to reduce "onion-i-ness".

3.In the Salad Bowl, mash a clove of garlic and grind with a little salt

4. Mice some fresh mint and grind some Mexican oregano and mix with garlic.

5. Pit and tear Kalamata or other favorite black olives.  (At least 12 depending on how much you like olives.

6. Pour some favorite vinegar into bowl.  Lately I am addicted to the Ojai Olive Oil White Balsamic Vinegar.  But red wine vinegar is also delicious.

7. Meanwhile, heat some olive oil in a pan and pan toast a few slices of ciabatta or other favorite bread to make "croutons".

8. Toss Spinach into bowl with onions, halved fresh black mission figs, crumbled feta and freshly ground pepper.

9. Heat some olive oil to just before smoking and pour over salad to wilt spinach.  Toss.

10. To Serve, scoop into bowls and place croutons around sides.

Eating What You Usually Throw Away

I am being guided to cut all animal products out of my diet.  It has come about suddenly and is related to an unraveling which I have been writing about in Blog of Yogi but not yet posted. 

I am not new to the territory as I was, like most people I know, a vegetarian in college.  But I married a meat eater and love a meat eater, so I aligned.

Re becoming a vegan cook will be fun.  The key for me will be to find new ways of doing things and look in the direction of the abundance of possibilities as oppose to focusing on what is missing from my diet.  My first experiment was to start to cook the tops of the vegetables that I usually toss.

Larry Yee at B.D.'s stand is always telling me that he cooks his radish tops.  So tonight I sauteed them up in a little olive oil, added some lemon, salt and pepper and they were delicious.  I might try to toss them with some couscous and toasted almonds next time.

Then, those giant fennel tops!  So I sauteed the stalks up and sure enough, they are tasty!  Who knew!

Leftover Halibut Tacos

We had some fish left over from last night's Halibut cooked in Coconut meal.  So we made it into tacos.

1. In a blender, blend 1 inch or so of roughly chopped ginger, 1 clove garlic, 5 or so cashews, an entire bunch of cilantro, several sprigs of mint, a small container of plain Brown Cow yogurt, juice of 2 small limes and salt to create a green chutney.

2. Pull out Halibut from fridge and break up into pieces.

3. Fry up one side of those Delicious sprouted corn tortillas from Rainbow Bridge in a little olive oil.  (Fry on at a time to serve and eat).

4. To serve, break fish up onto tortilla scooping some remaining sauce on top and pour desired amount of cilantro chutney on top.

YUM! Thank you John and Shani for the Halibut!!!

Halibut Baked in Coconut Milk Curry

We defrosted the second piece of Halibut from Shani and John.  I came home thinking that a Lemon Grass Jalapeno Shallot kind of thing baked in coconut milk would be good, but after cruising around on line and looking up recipes,  ended up doing this:

1. Heat Oven 350 degrees.  Use a  Oven Proof Creuset flat bottomed saute pan for this.

2. 1/4 sliver and saute a yellow onion.  Once browned, add some minced garlic, 1/2 a seeded (or not) jalapeno, and minced ginger.  Saute for 2 more minutes.  Add Spice Mixture.

3. Spice Mixture

4tbl or so of coriander

1/2 tbl of cumin

ground together in spice grinder

mixed with:

1 tsp of smashed (loosely ground) fennel

1/4 tsp of Cayenne

1/4 tsp of tumeric

1/4 tsp of freshly ground pepper

1 tsp of salt

4. Stir and add a chopped perfectly rip heirloom and some halved orange cherry tomatoes from Tutti Frutti.  Allow to cook until tomatoes break down and sauce becomes "lumpy" as one recipe called it.

5. Meanwhile, Cut the giant fillet that Shani's husband John caught into four 2"+ pieces. Rub with oil and squeeze a little lemon on it.  Place on a baking sheet and bake in oven from 8 to 10 minutes.

6. Once tomatoes sauce has gotten "lumpy", add 1/2 can of coconut milk and simmer for another 5 minutes or so.

7. When fish is 1/2 baked, remove and add to pan with sauce.  Cover and put in oven for 10 minutes.  (Longer if fish is not cooked when you check).

8. Serve with Lemongrass Rice.  Cilantro would be the obvious herb to sprinkle on top, but we have a lot of Steve's amazing basil, so we used that and it was Delicious.

Fennel and Sausage Pasta

We have made this 100 times but tonight it came out really good.

1. Start a large pot of heavily salted water to boil.

2. Pull Mild Fennel Turkey Sausage into chunks and brown in some olive oil.  Remove with slotted spoon to a bowl when done.

3. Add more olive oil to pan if necessary.  Add 2 to 4 thinly sliced heads of fennel to pot. (Amount depends on size of fennel.  B.D. grows this delicate full flavored fennel that is very small.  Steve grows massive bursting extra crisp fennel).  Saute for 3 to 5 minutes depending on your slice sizes, then add a cooking alcohol of choice to pan to deglaze.  Last night we used Madeira.  Saute briefly, then add a mashed head of garlic, red pepper flakes to taste and a least a cup of beef broth.  Partially cover to allow fennel to steam.

4. Eric's new favorite pasta is strangled priests.  Add to pot when water is boiling.  Takes about 13 minutes for this noodle to cook.

5. Meanwhile, add the sausage back into the pot with the fennel and a lot of slivered fresh basil from Steve's farm.  (This is the best basil I have ever had).  Partially cover and turn heat way down to keep warm.  (Usually I throw fresh herbs in at the end, so this was an experiment to allow the herbs to cook a bit).

6. When Pasta is done, drain and toss with fennel, adding salt and freshly ground pepper.  (In the past I have added a hit of creme here but did not tonight).

7. Scoop into bowls and add some fresh mozzarella.

Mindful eating

Turns out that keeping a food diary is critical to weight loss.  Becoming MINDFUL and ACCOUNTABLE for what you eat.

Article here.

the white and green meal

i was in FnC yesterday thinking about getting fish and Shani and I got into a conversation about Pismo Beach and the Crab Shack.  She mentioned that her husband John had just come back from a fishing trip and she had too much halibut.  Score!  

So tonight we cooked it.

1. Set Oven to 400 degrees.

2. Mush mashed Garlic from Steve;s Farm and Good Salt with smashed cardamon pods, dried curry leaves, Mexican oregano,  freshly ground pepper and olive oil.  

3. Slather fish in mixture.

4. Place fish on shallow cookie sheet and cover with foil.

5. Place in oven. Set timer for 8 minutes.

6. Meanwhile, grind cardamon seeds with some allspice seeds and a few dashes of ground canela (Mexican Cinnamon).

7. Heat Olive Oil in a saute pan.  When Hot, throw in Romano Beans fresh from Steve's Farm.  Cover.  Pay attention to beans, turning as necessary.  When Browned, sprinkle and toss with Spice mixture and pour a liquid of choice into pan and cover to steam.  Tonight all I had was beef broth.  But water, fish broth, veg broth, chicken broth all would have worked.

8. Meanwhile, dice up Cucumber and half of a jalapeno (seed removed if you like) from Steve's Farm, Radishes from B.D, an onion from Dennis. Squeeze lemon or lime on it.  Add some rice wine vinegar.  Add some olive oil, salt and freshly ground peeper and toss.  This is the "condiment or "relish" or "salsa" for the fish.  This was hot and peppery and strong.  Only for a particular palate.

9. Check fish when buzzer goes and put back in or let rest accordingly.

10. Beans are probably done about now.

(thinly sliced fried potatoes would have been good right about now too, but lately i have not been in the mood to give much more than 15 minutes to cooking, so no potatoes)

To serve:

Place Romono Beans on plate.

Place fish kind of on top.

Place a scoop of radish cucumber salsa to side.

Slice of lemon or lime.

A sprinkle of good salt and grind of pepper

This was amazing.  Eric doesn' t like the beans, so those were rejected...but this dish is going to be iterated upon an refined for sure.

Everything expect the spices was LOCAL, organic and spontaneously found.

xo

k

Salmon and Green Beans for 2

This took 10 minutes to make.  Got everything at the Farmer's Market this morning.

1.Turn on Broiler and bring water to boil in a pot for which you have a steamer top.

2. Rub perfect piece of Salmon from GeeWhataDeal Seafood with some olive oil.  Salt and Pepper.

3. Put Salmon under broiler. (set timer for 8 minutes...at this point you will check it and most likely put in for another 2 minutes or so).

4. Meanwhile, mince up a shallot.  Mix with lemon juice, grainy mustard, worsheteshire, dill, minced green peppercorns, salt and pepper, olive oil to make a vinaigrette.

5. When fish has about 4 minutes to go, put green beans in steamer over boiling water and cover. 

7. Chop tarragon.

8. When Beans are done, drain and divide between two shallow bowls.  Toss with a little butter (optional) and fresh tarragon.

9. When fish is done, divide between the two bowls.

10. Serve with Vinaigrette and sour creme (optional, but if Eric is your husband, a point winner).

11. As a side, sliced fresh peaches is good.