Upon opening my weekly produce box this past Saturday I was very excited to see our first leeks of the season. We’ve been getting potatoes for a few weeks now so my first thought was to make vichyssoise, a simple leek and potato soup (usually with a heavy dose of cream added). I have to admit, it’s been awhile since I last made vichyssoise. It is a very rich soup and we don’t get into eating a whole lot of heavy cream in our household. I wasn’t sure how satisfying it would be if I left out that cream, but in an effort to lighten things up, I gave it a go. I must tell you, we did not miss the heavy cream one bit. As easy as it is to whip up a batch of this I will not let so much time pass before making it again.

As for the nutritional value of the two main ingredients of vichyssoise, I give them both a thumbs up.

Leeks are a good source of manganese and have many of the same health benefits associated with garlic and onions.

Potatoes have often been vilified and eschewed by many people for all kinds of reasons. In the spirit of eating a balanced diet, I think we can make room on the plate for potatoes and recognize the many benefits they do provide. Including the skin, potatoes are a very good source of vitamin C, fiber (almost 12% of the RDA in one medium potato!), vitamin B6, copper and potassium. Research published within the last year indicates potatoes have some health benefits that would give broccoli and brussels sprouts a run for their money.

Leek & Potato Soup

• 4 small leeks, white part only
• 2 T. olive oil
• 4-5 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
• 2 1/2 - 3 quarts chicken or vegetable stock
• salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• fresh snipped chives, optional garnish
• crispy potato skins, optional garnish (directions below)

Thoroughly clean leeks and slice. Add olive oil to a medium sized pot and heat over medium heat. Add sliced leeks and cook until translucent. Do not allow leeks to brown.

Add diced potatoes and about 2 1/2 quarts of stock to the leeks. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer and cook until potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes. (While the soup cooks, prepare the optional potato skin garnish.) When potatoes are tender puree soup in a blender or with an immersion blender. Addas much additional stock as is necessary if the soup is too thick. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve hot or cold garnished with potato skins and fresh snipped chives.

Crispy Potato Skins

Method:  Fill a medium sized bowl with boiling water. Peel scrubbed potatoes letting the peels fall directly into the hot water. (This will remove some of the starch from the potato peelings resulting in a crispy product.) Rinse the peels in cold water and wring out the excess water using a tea towel. Place the peels back into the bowl and toss with a small amount of olive oil and salt. Heat a skillet to medium-high, add the potato skins and cook until crispy stirring often enough to avoid burning.

Click here for a printer friendly version of this recipe.

In the last couple of weeks at Vegan Bits, Lane started a discussion about natto. Having multi-generational familiarity with natto, I thought I’d share some additional information to help uninitiated westeners navigate this unusual food.

Like so many other great foods out there, natto was invented quite by accident according to Hiroko Shimbo, in “The Japanese Kitchen”. This accidental invention involved a bacteria residing in rice straw. Before natto was packaged in styrofoam or plastic containers it was once sold in wrappers of rice straw. Shimbo also explains that until not that long ago there were some places in Japan where natto was not a popular food item!

Natto is made by inoculating cooked soybeans with the natto bacteria and allowing them to ferment. Fresh natto is best eaten within the first few days, but freezes very well. I buy my natto from the freezer section of the Japanese market. It usually comes packaged in sets of 3 small foam or plastic containers weighing about 1.75 oz. each.

Natto is a good source of calcium, iron and magnesium. It is a very easily digestible protein and the fermentation gives the added bonus of supplying vitamin B12 - an important nutrient for those adhering to a vegan diet.

Shimbo recommends trying natto with miso soup. I second that recommendation as it makes the acquired taste of natto completely disappear.

For using in miso soup, remove natto from one 1.75 oz. package and rinse in a colander. Roughly chop, add to the soup water and cook for a couple of minutes before continuing with the recipe. If desired you can use a bit of the mustard sauce included with the natto as a garnish for the soup.

One last note for vegans and vegetarians: When shopping for natto, you may notice on some packages the addition of bonito flakes or extract. Typically this is part of the soy sauce mixture contained in a tiny sealed plastic packet with the natto. If you have no qualms about buying this and simply throwing it away, it will make your search for a dietarily acceptable natto much easier.

Those of you looking to try new healthful foods or in search of a way to enjoy natto, I hope you try it in the soup. Let me know how it goes.

This past Saturday’s produce box included a nice quantity of the beautiful purple tomatillos pictured above. With sweet corn and tomatoes included in Saturday’s delivery, it was hard not to make some Mexican cuisine over the weekend. Along with the tomatillo salsa recipe I’ll share today, I made sweet corn pudding and chicken taco filling (to utilize some of the tomatoes). I’m working on fine tuning the sweet corn pudding recipe and promise to share it when I’ve got it just right.

Tomatillos are fantastic when you can get them fresh. In the past when trying to find enough at the grocery store to complete a recipe, it has been difficult as they are often past their peak. Store tomatillos in the refrigerator until you are ready to use them. Freshly picked tomatillos will keep for up to two weeks, though I always recommend using produce as quickly as possible because the longer it sits the less nutritional value it will have. Tomatillos are very low in calories and provide a decent amount of potassium.

My method for this salsa requires the ingredients to be broiled to mellow the flavors just a bit, but you can opt to make this completely raw which will shave about 12 minutes off the preparation time making this a super quick salsa. I really like to eat it on chicken enchiladas or chicken tacos.

Tomatillo Salsa

• 2 pounds tomatillos
• 1 -2 serrano peppers (or more according to taste)
• 2 small onions
• 8 large cloves garlic
• 1 t. coarse salt
• 1/4 c. fresh cilantro

Preheat broiler. Have a large sheet pan at hand.

Remove husks from tomatillos and wash off sticky residue - fruit and vegetable wash makes quick and easy work of washing away the stickiness! Cut tomatillos in half and place on sheet pan.

Remove stems from peppers and cut in half. Add to pan with tomatillos.

Peel and slice onion and lightly smash garlic cloves without removing the skin. Add onions and garlic to pan. Place 4″ - 6″ under broiler and cook until everything begins to brown.

Remove skins from garlic cloves and place all broiled ingredients in food processor along with the salt and cilantro. Process until as smooth as you like. Adjust seasoning to taste and enjoy!

Click here for a printer friendly version of this recipe.

Tomato season is here, and I bet even some of you who don’t consider yourselves gardeners have a tomato plant or two so you can enjoy the amazing flavor of a fresh, home grown tomato.

For those of you who don’t grow your own during the summer you certainly won’t have any difficulty finding them at local farmers’ markets. If you’re new to your area, haven’t shopped local farmers’ markets recently or just plain don’t know where to find one near you, check out www.localharvest.org to search by zip code.

I am an avid gardener, but unfortunately do not have much space for vegetable gardening. This year I decided to get more inventive and find ways to grow a few things in pots. (If you recall, earlier this year I shared a picture of some small radish I grew in fine soil in a wide shallow pot.) One thing I was particularly enthusiastic about was a package of San Marzano seeds I’d had in the refrigerator for years. On March 29 this past spring my first San Marzano tomato journey began. 133 days later, I harvested my first nine tomatoes! (Not many, but San Marzanos are indeterminate meaning they produce fruit over a period of time.)

Clearly nine plum tomatoes is not nearly enough to merit getting out the canning supplies or even cooking down to paste. So what was I to do with my few precious tomatoes? For anyone who isn’t already familiar with San Marzanos, these tomatoes are not the kind of tomato to slice and eat raw on a sandwich or in a salad. These tomatoes best show off their merits when they’ve been cooked. Given my initial small yield, I devised a way to make do with so few of these little gems — roasted tomato sauce.

One more short discourse before I dive into sharing the recipe - I was about to call this quick & easy pasta sauce, but it really isn’t quick. Even though it doesn’t qualify as a quick sauce it more than qualifies as easy and the active preparation time is very little, about 10 minutes. The rest of the time the tomatoes are roasting away in the oven getting really sweet and saucy. Do you have a quick version of your own fresh tomato sauce? I’d love to hear about it.

easy pasta sauce

• San Marzano tomatoes, cut in half lengthwise
• olive oil
• coarse salt, to taste
• fresh basil (may substitute dried)
• fresh oregano (may substitute dried)
• fresh thyme (may substitute dried)
• garlic
• good quality balsamic vinegar

Heat oven to 400 degrees F. Lay tomatoes, cut side up in a baking dish large enough to hold them in a single layer. If using dried herbs instead of fresh, sprinkle tomatoes with dried herbs at this point. The amount of dried herbs to use is the same or a bit more than the appropriate amount of salt. Season with salt and drizzle somewhat generously with olive oil. Put in oven and roast until completely soft and edges begin to brown, about 45 - 60 minutes.

Just before taking the tomatoes out of the oven, mince the fresh herbs (if using) and garlic. Set aside. Remove tomatoes from oven. Flip tomatoes cut side down and pull the skin away with a fork. Discard the skin. Stir in the minced herbs and break up the tomatoes with a fork or a couple of dinner knives the same as you would cut butter into flour for biscuits or pie crust. Drizzle in balsamic vinegar and adjust seasonings to taste.  Serve over hot pasta.

Notes:

• If your balsamic vinegar is not well aged and has a bit of an edge on it, stir in a bit of brown sugar to tame it.
• For my nine tomatoes, I used about 1 1/2 T. balsamic vinegar, 1 1/2 T. fresh basil, 2 t. fresh oregano, 2 t. fresh thyme and 1 large clove garlic.
• My nine tomatoes made enough sauce for 2 adults with no leftovers!

Click here for a printer friendly version of this recipe.

Over the last month, I have been keeping busy developing new recipes inspired mainly from the produce I receive in my CSA box. In the process of having so much fun, I’ve neglected to share the ideas that would be helpful to everyone out there interested in keeping their cooking seasonal. Over the next few days, I’ll be getting caught up on sharing some of the recipes and ideas from the last few weeks, so stay posted. There is more to come!

Yesterday we received our first sweet corn and heirloom tomatoes of the season. Those two ingredients, along with the candy onions available now inspired my roasted corn and black bean salad. We’ve been getting huckleberry potatoes as well over the last few weeks, and I incorporated those into the meal. Fried until crisp on the outside and soft in the middle, they were a nice complement to the bright flavors in the salad. In addition to being suitable on its own as a light meal, this salad would make a nice side to a number of things including fish tacos or a good burger.

Roasted Corn & Black Bean Salad

• 2 cans black beans, drained or 3/4# dry black beans, cooked
• 6 ears corn, roasted or grilled, kernels removed from cobb
• 1 large tomato, diced
• 1 large green bell pepper, diced
• 1 small candy onion, very thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup cilantro, minced
• 1 lime, juiced
• 2 T cider vinegar
• 2 t chili powder
• 1 t ground coriander
• 1 t ground cumin
• 1 chipotle in adobo sauce, minced
• 4 T olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste

Click here for a printer friendly version of this recipe.