Fava Beans and Purple Cabbage from our back garden

Honey Kale and Cabbage Rolls

The kale, dill, carrots, celery, cabbage and shallots were all grown in our spring garden! Yum I love cabbage rolls. This is a good springtime dish because if you drizzle each serving with locally produced honey before serving, the honey helps fight against sneezing and seasonal allergies. And it also makes the whole dish taste fantastically sweet and delicious! 

You can make this vegan by eliminating the grass fed beef and cheese.

Make a sweet and sour tomato sauce by sauteeing 1 small chopped onion, 2 small chopped shallots and 3-4 smashed garlic in 1 tblsp butter and 2 tblsp olive oil. Cook until fragrant. Add 1 large can of chopped organic tomatoes, 1 cup of chicken or veggie stock, the juice of 1 lemon and 1 tsp turbinado sugar, (or any sugar you have) Season with celery salt and pepper, and a big sprinkle of fresh or dried dill. Simmer and set aside until you are ready to assemble. 

For the filling: Saute 1 small sweet onion in olive oil, add 1 lb. grass fed organic ground beef, salt and pepper, cook till browned and crumbly. Once the beef and onion is cooked, drain off the excess fat and add chopped celery, chopped carrots, chopped shallots, and cook until fragrant. Add 1 can of organic beans, rinsed and drained, I used black beans and pinto beans leftover from tacos the other night.. Season with 2-4 crushed garlic cloves, 1 teaspoon brown sugar, juice of 1/2 lemon, and 1 tsp Hungarian paprika, and a bit of dry dill. Taste and season with salt and pepper as needed. Meanwhile, cook some Jasmine or Basmati rice, and start another pot of water to cook and soften the cabbage leaves.

Remove core from the cabbage and place it in the boiling water,  let the outer layers soften for a minute or two and loosen the leaves one at a time with tongs, and reserve to a plate. You want them to cook more in the baking part of this recipe. This step is just to soften them so you can roll. Once cooled, cut away the big center part of the stem of each leaf about halfway up. Soften the kale leaves one at a time in the same pot for a few minutes each and cool on the plate.

In a casserole, add a few tblsp of the tomato sauce to the bottom layer.

Mix the cooked rice with the cooked, seasoned ground beef mixture in a bowl, and roll into the cabbage and kale leaves. I like to place 1 kale leaf on the bottom, add a cabbage leaf over it and roll it all together to have two colors of green on each roll. Place in the casserole , seam side down and continue until the pan is nicely packed together. This packing together assembly also helps the rolls hold together while baking. Top with the remaining tomato sauce. Top with grated cheese if desired.

Bake at 350 for 45 minutes until bubbly and a bit browned. Serve with plain yogurt or sour cream and drizzle each serving with honey. YUM!

Honey Tangerine Kale and Cabbage Slaw

I used to think kale was tough and a bit too "green" tasting. Not anymore. I recently discovered this lacy, organic Tuscan kale at my neighborhood farmers market and now I can't get enough.  

http://fairfieldgreenfoodguide.com/tag/lacinato-kale/

This kale slaw is super healthy and with a little bit of orange juice, honey and cayenne in the dressing, it's also very yummy! 

Wash and chop red cabbage, grate a carrot, and de-stem and finely chop some kale. 

For the dressing, the juice of 1 tangerine, 1 smashed open garlic clove, 2 tblsp cider vinegar, salt pepper, pinch of dried basil, small pinch of cayenne, 1 tsp honey, whisk in 2 tblsp olive oil till the dressing emulsifies. Pour it over your finely chopped veggies and toss to coat.

Yum!

Vegetarian Egg Rolls with Spicy Apricot Dipping Sauce

These are delicious! Chop the veggies as small as you can so they are in long skinny shreds and smallish pieces. You still want them recognizable, but the small pieces make the egg rolls easier to roll.

Using a food processor, box grater or a good old knife, chop 1/2 of a small head organic green cabbage, 1 large carrot, 1 cup sugar snap peas or snow peas, 10 shitake mushrooms, 1 can water chestnuts, half of a red jalapeno pepper, (seeds removed) and add them to a big mixing bowl.

  Slice 1/2 sweet onion very thinly, chop up the thin slices & add them to the bowl.  Add 1/2 bag or package bean sprouts, (the big white kind that you see in egg rolls.) and a big bunch of fresh cilantro , chopped.

In a small bowl combine 1 tsp peanut butter, 1/2 tsp sesame oil, 1 tsp soy sauce, 1 crushed garlic clove, 1 inch of fresh ginger, grated, 1/2 tsp oyster sauce, and 1 tsp fish sauce. Mix it all together till the peanut butter dissolves.

Add the peanut butter mixture to the chopped veggie mixture. Season the bowl of mixed veggies with some black pepper, you don't really need salt because of the soy sauce and fish sauce.

Roll up the egg rolls sealing the end with some scrambled egg wash. You can roll these as small appetizer using those little won ton wrappers, or as large egg rolls using the larger wrappers. Place each egg roll on a plate that's been dusted with flour till you are ready to fry them up.

Heat 1 inch of canola or vegetable oil in a cast iron skillet till it's pretty hot but not smoking. Your egg rolls should bubble tight away when you put them in. Fry for a minute and flip them over. Cook for about 1 1/2 mins till crispy and golden brown.

You can also do these in the oven. Spray the cookie sheet with canola spray, place all the egg rolls about an inch or so apart, sprits with canola spray & bake at 400 for 15 minutes or so till crispy. They come out much crispier in the cast iron skillet, but are healthier done in the oven.  

Serve with apricot dipping sauce:

Mix 2 tablespoons apricot jelly, the other half of the red jalapeno, minced, 1 tsp rice wine vinegar, 1 tsp brown sugar, 1 tsp (or 2) sesame oil, 1 crushed garlic clove, 1/4 tsp fresh grated ginger

Corned Beef and Cabbage Dinner

I borrowed this image from an Irish culture website.

It sorta looks like they borrowed it from a vintage cookbook. It's pretty interesting to read that a true Irish dinner wold be bacon and cabbage, not corned beef.

Click through the photo to get to the page.

Corned Beef and Cabbage

It's my favorite time of year! I'll be making this later today. It's easy! Place a corned beef in a pot of water. Add 6 or 7 raw garlic cloves, 1 cut up onion, a few carrots cut in large chuncks, 1 can of stout beer, some peppercorns, a few bay leaves, the spices in the little package that come with the corned beef, 1 or 2 tblsp brown sugar, and, if you have them, some extra coriander seeds. There's no need to add any salt, corned beef is very salty already because the meat is brined in salt.

Simmer on low for 4 hours until fork tender. Toward the end of cooking, add a few red potatoes and a couple more large carrots cut up.  Red potatoes are slightly waxy and won't crumble apart like a baking potato might. Once those veggies are cooked, cut a green cabbage in quarters and add that to the pot & cook for another 15 minutes or so. Serve with Irish Soda bread or rye bread, and beer.