Homemade Greek Salad with chutney dressing

I did not grow up in a mac & cheese and chicken nugget household. We didn't have "kid's food" and "grown up food" when I was a a kid. Our regular meals as kids included my dad's fantastic chicken teriyaki, my moms homemade soups, my grandma's breads, stinky cheese, cured meats, and great sauces of all kinds. One my favorite dishes back then, and still now, is the Greek spinach salad that my parents would make from a friend's recipe. My mom and dad made this for dinner last week and reminded me of how much I like it. It makes a great entree salad. 

Dressing: 

1/4 cup white wine vinegar

2 tablespoons white wine

1 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon dry mustard powder

2 tablespoons mango chutney (like Major Grey's)

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1 clove minced garlic

1/3 cup salad oil 

Salad

1 pound baby spinach leaves

1/4 pound thinly sliced white mushrooms

2 hard boiled eggs, peeled and sliced

1 cup crumbled feta cheese

1 cup kalamata olives 

The dressing will last in the fridge for at least a week. You will have a little leftover dressing if you make the salad with 1 pound of spinach, as instructed above. The salad will serve 4 or 5 people for dinner with a hunk of bread. You can use the leftover dressing for another salad, as a sauce for chicken breasts and rice, or drizzled over smoked salmon, rice and corn. 

Sweet Potato Fries

When my husband and I first started dating and he would come over to my parents house for dinner, my mom would sometimes, thoughtfully, cook a "yam" for him to eat with dinner, since she knew that yams are a staple food in his home country. He politely thanked her each time. He never bothered to mention to her that the yams that we have here in the United States are nothing like the yams that they have there! American yams are actually a variety of sweet potatoes. African yams are ten times as big, dryer, starchier, and much lower in sugar! Here is a picture of the African yam that we have at home and an American yam that I just bought.

I was thinking about my thoughtful mom and my polite husband and their yams while I was playing around with sweet potatoes last week. The North Carolina Sweet Potato Commission (yes, they have a commission on sweet potatoes) is hosting a recipe contest and I thought I would come up with something for them. First I made some muffins, but they are not worth mentioning. Then I remembered something I had done with potatoes a while ago and thought it would work very well with sweet potatoes too. This recipe was worth mentioning, so here it is:

Curried Sweet Potato Fries with Tahini Dip

2 sweet potatoes

2 potatoes

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 tablespoon curry powder

salt and pepper

1/2 cup plain yogurt

1/4 cup tahini (ground sesame seeds)

1 clove minced garlic

salt and pepper

Slice the potatoes and sweet potatoes into long wedges, about six "fries" per potato. Heat the oven to 400 degrees.

Toss the fries with the olive oil, curry powder, and salt and pepper. Place the regular potatoes on a baking sheet and place in the oven for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, turn the potatoes and add the sweet potatoes. Cook an additional 15 minutes. Turn again and check them for doneness. You will probably put them back in for an additional 5 to 10 minutes.

While the fries are roasting, make your dip. Simply whisk together the yogurt, tahini and minced garlic. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and taste. Add more salt and pepper if necessary. If the dip seems too thick (depending on the thickness of your yogurt and tahini), you can add a drizzle of olive oil to thin it out a bit.

To (re) Boil a Bagel

{If this post looks farmiliar, it is because you read it orignially on my retired wedding blog from last year. I am re-posting here as promised after the french breakfast post last week.}

The difference between a bagel, and a piece of bread with a whole in the middle, is the boiling of the bagel before baking. This gives the signature texture that is missing from grocery store "bagels" stacked in piles of six and sitting on grocery shelves for a week before you bring them home. That wonderful texture goes from dreamy to dry within a day or two. When you make your own, or buy good ones from a bakery, freeze whatever you dont eat within the first 24 hours. To freeze your bagels, cut them horizontaly and then place the two halves back together, and freeze in a plastic zip-lock bag. When you want to eat one, take it out of the freezer, use a fork to break it apart at the cut seam, and place them, still frozen, in the toaster. They will come out perfect and warm!

Boiling Bagels

Mix together 1 cup warm water with one packet of yeast. Stir in two tablespoons of olive oil, three tablespoons of sugar, two teaspoons of salt and four cups of flour.

Turn out on to the counter and knead for ten minutes. Set aside, cover, and allow to rise until double, about an hour.

Punch down, and knead for a couple minutes more.

Making one bagel at a time, break off a piece of dough, and roll into a ball. Then poke your thumb through the middle to make a bagel shape. Make each bagel about half of the size that you want it to be when done. Make sure they are not too flat or they will come out too hard after baking. Allow to rise, covered, for thirty minutes.


Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Boil each bagel for two minutes, turning half way through. They will become larger while boiling. To turn them, I use two wooden spoons: the handle of one goes through the hole to turn it over while the spoon of the other coaxes the bagel to turn over before hole gets stretched. You should be able to boil the bagels 3 or 4 at a time. As you finish boiling, lay them out on the counter to cool a bit.






Beat one egg in a bowl. Pour into a second bowl: 1 teaspoon garlic salt, 1 tablespoon fennel seeds, 2 tablespoons sesame seeds and 2 tablespoons poppy seeds. After boiling and cooling enough to handle, dip the top of each bagel in the egg and then the seeds. Line up your bagels on a baking sheet.





Bake until slighly golden in a 400 degree oven.

Breakfast for Dinner a la France

Among the most brilliant inventions in the history of the world is smoked salmon. My criteria for "most brilliant inventions" are:

1) a simple idea,

2) that produces something better than the sum of its parts,

3) doesn't harm people and other living things,

4) preferably, is edible.

Other brilliant ideas in the history of modern humans: adding bacteria to milk to make cheese and brining olives to make them edible.

I will admit to you that even though I live in the North West, home to the magnificent salmon, I don't really like the fish that much. Unless it is smoked. Cold smoked, hot smoked, barely smoked (for sushi) - I like it all.

I had been craving a good moist middle section of smoked red King Salmon for a while, so when I found myself on Greenwood the other day, I stopped at my favorite custom wholesale smokehouse and bought a piece. It played center stage in my French style breakfast for dinner later that night. The dinner was so good that within 5 minutes of clearing the table I was seriously tempted to go back into the kitchen and make it all over again. If I hadn't been late to meet up with someone, I just might have. My husband liked it too, despite the lack of meat or anything fried. He kept asking, "Is this healthy? This is really good."

Menu:

Smoked Salmon Omelet

Mixed Greens in a Dijon Vinaigrette

Toasted Fresh Bagels (preferably the "everything" variety that is topped with poppy and sesame seeds).

Note: If you do not have access to real boiled-then-baked bagels (not bread with holes in the middle) and you are not up to making your own, I would recommend you skip the bagel and go with a nice french baguette instead. Also, now that I have referenced making your own, I will post soon with directions on making your own bagels.

Another Note: Salmon is either hot-smoked or cold-smoked. Cold smoked salmon has the texture of raw salmon and is often labeled "lox." Hot smoked salmon looks more like cooked salmon. King salmon is a nice choice for a moist variety. By moist, I mean lots of flavor and Omega 3 fats, which are good for your heart. Also, for this recipe, I am referring to salmon that you would find vacuum packed, not canned.

Smoked Salmon Omelet (for 2 people)

4 ounces hot-smoked salmon

4 ounces cream cheese

6 eggs

2 teaspoons of butter

Discard the skin from the salmon and remove any bones if necessary. Either by hand or in a food processor, combine the smoked salmon and the cream cheese. In a food processor, simply pulse them together five or six times. By hand, dice the salmon then mash together with the cream cheese until it resembles a course paste.

You will be cooking one omelet at a time. Heat a small non-stick frying pan over medium-low heat. Allow it to warm up for a couple of minutes. Add a teaspoon of butter to melt in the pan. Whip three of the eggs together. Add to the pan and allow to begin to set around the edges. Using a rubber spatula, gently push the edge of the set egg toward the center of the pan. There should be plenty of runny uncooked egg in the pan at this point, and it will fill out again towards the edges.

Add half of the salmon-cheese mixture to the top of the eggs in a few dollops. Cover the pan with a lid and turn the temperature to low. When you see that the egg is all set (it might be wet still, but not runny anymore), Remove the lid and fold the omelet in half. Replace the lid and continue to cook on low, turning if necessary to prevent browning on one side, until the egg is cooked to your liking and the salmon-cheese mixture is hot.

If your eggs are getting brown and dry (dark golden is fine, brown is not), you are cooking your eggs too hot for the salmon to have time to warm through. On the next omelet, turn the heat down a little lower.

Mixed Greens with Dijon Vinaigrette

one large handful of baby greens or baby spinach per person

1 tablespoon strongly flavored Dijon mustard

1or 2 tablespoons olive oil

a squeeze of lemon juice if you have on hand (otherwise you can do without)

dash of salt and pepper

Whisk together the mustard, oil, salt and pepper. Toss the greens in the dressing. Serve.

Serve your omelet with the mixed greens and a lightly toasted bagel, spread with a little butter. Now that I am writing this, I know that I will be making this for dinner again tonight!

Thawing out

A few days since the snow has melted and the sky has been beautifully blue. I was ambitious enough to ride my bike to the store today (uphill on the way back!) and enjoyed that odd feeling, recently forgotten, of the sun heating my cheeks.

These last few weeks of winter (Yes! Spring is actually coming in a few weeks!) are warm enough to inspire my trip to the nursery today to buy seeds and cold enough to justify chicken pot pie and biscuits for dinner. My long awaited new stove arrived this weekend, so I can finally start making up for lost baking time, as my oven had been out of commission for months. Biscuits are a good start, don't you think? I went trolling for recipes and couldn't bring myself to add a whole stick of butter to my dinner, so I did some experimenting and ended up with a good recipe that uses half of the butter other recipes call for.

Lara's Milk Biscuits

2 cups flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

Pulse these ingredients together in a food processor to blend. Then Add:

4 tablespoons of very cold butter, cut into cubes

Pulse about 10 times in the food processor until the butter is in little bits.

Turn out into a large bowl. Stir in:

3/4 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup whole milk

Flour a board generously. Turn the dough out onto the board and sprinkle liberally with more flour. Gently turn the dough over a few times so that it is coated with flour on all sides. It will settle a bit as you turn it (from a ball into a disk).

It should now look like a round disk, about 3/4 inches thick, and evenly coated in flour. Use a drinking glass to cut the dough into circles. You can either place the biscuits on top of the pot pie and bake together, or you can bake the biscuits on their own. To bake alone, place them on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. Bake at 425 degrees for about 18 minutes or until slightly golden in color.


Lara's Chicken Pot Pie

You know, this would be perfectly tasty without chicken if you want a vegetarian dish. Speaking of the veggies, you don't have to use what I used. You can substitute what you have in the fridge. For example, you probably don't have Jerusalem artichokes and fennel laying around like this wierdo does. You could use parsnips or turnips instead. Or just use more of the other vegetables. It will be good any which way really. Just don't use anything that will get mushy (like zucchini), or change the appearance drastically (like beets), or will make it smell gassy (like broccoli).


1 onion
1 carrot
2 red potatoes
2 stalk of celery
2 Jerusalem artichokes
1/2 of a bulb of fennel
1 tablespoon of butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
3 cloves garlic
3 raw, boneless, skinless, chicken thighs
1 teaspoon of dried herbs (your choice. I suggest that it include thyme or sage)
1/2 cup chopped flat leaf parsley
1/4 cup flour
1/4 cup white wine
1 cup chicken broth
1/2 cup whole milk


Chop the vegetables into 1/2 inch pieces. Heat 1 tablespoon of butter with 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil in a medium sized pot over medium heat. Add the veggies to the oil along with the garlic. Cover and cook for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Add the button mushrooms, salt (I used smoked salt), black pepper and herbs. Cook uncovered for about 4 more minutes. Remove all of the vegetables from the pot and place in a bowl. Return the pot to the heat and add a little oil. Add the chicken thighs to the pot. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and more herbs if you'd like.

When almost cooked through, add the vegetables back in to the pot. Add the parsley. Turn the heat up a little and sprinkle everything with the flour. Turn to coat evenly. Pour in the white wine and cook for about 2 minutes. Add the broth and the milk and bring to a simmer. If it looks too thick, add more milk. Taste it now and adjust seasoning if necessary.

Pour everything into a deep baking dish.

Now you have four choices:

1) put your biscuits on top of the hot filling, with a little space between them, and put in the oven.
2) cover with pie crust and put in the oven.
3) cover with foil and put it in the oven.
4) just eat it.

If you put it in the oven, in will be ready when your biscuits or crust look golden.

I hope you enjoy your last few weeks of winter and comfort food!