Snapshot I took of the Sierra/Nevada mountains (California) as I was driving.

Last year, my son and his wife Karen bought a condo in Big Sky, Montana. They’d vacationed there for several years, and decided they wanted to have their own place to ski and summer vacation. For the month of July Karen and grandson Vaughan are here, with Powell flitting in and out when he can get away from work. So, several months ago when they invited me to come visit during July, I said yes. And I’d make a road trip out of it. Having never been to Big Sky, I didn’t really know what to expect, other than photos I’d seen. Big Sky is located about 1 1/4 hour drive south of Bozeman, and about an hour north of the western gate to Yellowstone. Set nestled in between very tall peaks and valleys.

That picture was taken from the restaurant at the golf course near the Big Sky Resort. As you can see, there is smoke in the air, but we enjoyed a really nice lunch, sitting outside.

As I’m writing this, I AM in Big Sky, and have been for several days, enjoying the alpine location (7200 feet), the wonderful pine tree smell that pervades, the good food (both out and at home). And not enjoying the altitude sensitivity I have. I won’t be here long enough to acclimate to the altitude, so I’m just being careful by not exerting myself too much. I had a low grade headache for the first two days, but that finally went away. Walking much at all is out of the question as I get winded. But going in and out of various restaurants is certainly do-able!

That’s the view from their living room window. Ski slopes abound in every direction and that ramp you can see on the right is a ski-on, ski-off way to get down the hill to the ski lifts.

And again, as I write this, I’m having to re-adjust my itinerary as my next stop was going to be in Lolo National Forest (near Missoula, Montana), which is currently under fire evacuation orders. So, scratch that long day trip of driving in the Bitterroot Valley. In a few days I’ll head back to Coeur d’Alene, where I’m staying with my friend Ann (you’ve seen photos of her when she visited SoCal over several winters for a week in Palm Desert with me – we couldn’t do it that last Jan/Feb because of Covid, but hopefully this next winter she’ll be able to fly south).

My plan is to do some wine tasting in Walla Walla, Washington and if I find anything I really like I’ll have it shipped to home. I don’t want to cart cases of wine in my car trunk through hot summer weather. I have encountered lots of high temps on this trip (over 100 degrees, driving up the old 395 highway along the eastern edge of California). I had just driven through the area that was hit with a 5.9 earthquake that tumbled boulders down onto the highway. And yes, my car tipped left and right – I thought it was an uneven road . . . no, it was the earthquake! I stayed at a hotel nearby and was awakened several times during the night with aftershocks. Good thing I’m used to those kinds of tremors.

Once I arrived in Idaho it was about 100 degrees every day. Oh my goodness, is that ever hot! During my drive in California I encountered one day at 109 degrees, but I was comfortable in my air conditioned car, thankfully! I enjoyed the three days of driving to get from Southern California to northern Idaho, and I’ve been listening to a couple of books as I go. I’ve subscribed to Chirp, a discounted website for audio books. They don’t offer very many books at the lower prices, but I’ve found a few to keep me entertained. My car doesn’t have a CD/DVD slot anymore (my newest car that’s now 1 1/2 years old and still had less than 10,000 miles on it because of Covid) so I can’t use books on CD anymore from the library as I’d done in the past.

FYI, last night I made those vegetarian enchiladas that were posted about a week ago. Karen and Vaughan really enjoyed them, and me too. That recipe is a real keeper. I’ll post again in coming days if I have time.

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Utter deliciousness. Is that a word? Should be if it’s not.

A post from Carolyn. You will want to make these. They’re actually quite easy. My granddaughter Taylor has moved in with me because she’s in nursing school at Concordia University here in SoCal. When she finishes her 13-month accelerated nursing program she’ll have her second bachelor’s degree, this one a B.S.N. (nursing). Her first B.S. is in hospital administration. She drove down from NorCal with her good friend Quinn, to keep her company, and I wanted to have dinner for them before Quinn got on a plane to fly home.

So, dinner. My other granddaughter, Sabrina, got me onto a new (to me) blog called Half Baked Harvest. Tieghan is a very gifted and prolific food blogger – she puts together the most interesting combinations of food, and the photography definitely intrigues my taste buds. The impetus of my version was her post about these vegetarian enchiladas. I made some changes to her recipe, however. I added a sweet potato and a yellow squash to the roasted veggies. I didn’t add chipotle (I like chipotle, but thought the mixture had enough heat from the pepper jack, which was quite hot). I didn’t add honey, either. I also used more cheese. And I totally forgot to add all the garnishes (avocado, sour cream for instance). Tieghan is a wizard with garnishes.

The vegetables are roasted – I didn’t buy fresh corn – I used frozen, defrosted – so they aren’t showing up in the photo. I forgot to halve the poblanos. Next time I wouldn’t keep the onions intact as they needed to be separated once adding to the enchiladas, but you can do what you prefer. Really, these enchiladas could be called calabacitas enchiladas, but for sure some Southwestern cooking gurus would lambast me since calabacitas is a vegetable dish, not a Mexican enchilada . . . oh well. Do you ever have these kinds of conversations with yourself? Like my head was going . . . if these are made with flour tortillas, then they become a burrito, don’t they? instead of an enchilada. Corn tortillas = enchiladas; flour tortillas = burritos?? Or the one about calabacitas maybe I should call this calabacitas enchiladas. Or, no, calabacitas burritos. Oh dear, never mind. (telling my brain to be quiet!)

Prepping the veggies was easy – a bit of EVOO, salt and pepper and into a hot oven they went for about 30 minutes. I skinned the poblanos, chopped them up, grated the cheeses and I was in biz. I used a brand of thick salsa verde – a bit is poured into a baking pan/dish, then you make the enchiladas. Now, I used flour tortillas (I prefer them to corn) but you can use either. The veggie mixture with the cheese is put in the center of a tortilla and rolled up, seam side down in the pan. More salsa verde is spread on top (not a lot – just enough to moisten all of the top of the enchiladas), and a little more cheese and back into a hot oven they go. I baked them at 400°F for about 20 minutes (because the veggies were cooled to room temp when I constructed them). If the veggies are still hot from the roasting pan, you could probably bake them less time.

This version made 7 enchiladas. My guests ate two per person; I had one. I suppose it depends on what size tortillas you use. More hungry appetites will want two per person, so keep that in mind if you make this. If your family is sensitive to heat, use regular jack, not pepper jack.

As I said, utter deliciousness. Everybody’s plate was slicked clean.  I served it with a green side salad. I was a bit alarmed at the calorie count on this, AND the sodium. It appears it comes from the flour tortillas, as I had no choice on size. So I hope these really aren’t this high in both.

What’s GOOD: cheesy and veggie goodness. Quinn thought she might be able to fool her growing boys with eating more veggies. You could add some chicken to these if you wanted protein in them. I loved the flavors from the veggies – and the smoked paprika. And the poblano – I love the depth of flavor from that variety of chile pepper. This recipe is a keeper.

What’s NOT: nothing really – it does take a bit of time to roast the veggies, but it was a relatively simple dinner to prepare once that was done.

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Another biscotti variation, this one adapted from Giada . . .

A post from Carolyn. If you’ve been reading my blog of late, you’ve seen a bunch of biscotti recipes. I’ve been on a roll with biscotti. It’s something I can make for myself and since I use fake sugar in it – truly I can’t tell the difference (from fake sugar vs. real sugar). They are quite low in calorie and fat (although some do have quite a bit of butter).

I went searching around on the ‘net to read more about biscotti. Way back when, biscotti were developed by Italian nonnas as a little sweet something that had to be dipped/dunked into hot liquid (obviously, espresso) in order to make them edible. Probably it was at a time in history when fat was precious, whether it be butter or olive oil. Earlier versions of biscotti had no fat in them. None. And truly, they were little, rock-hard nuggets; hence they sliced them thinly and when you dunked them, you could eat just the part that had been dunked. It would break off where it has softened. And there was a trick to how long that little slice was dunked. Too long, and it would fall off into the coffee. Ever had that happen? I sure have! In fact it happened to me recently, with one of my biscotti I’d made (that did have butter in it). As I said, there’s a trick to how long to dunk. If it has little fat in it, maybe a second or two longer. With fat, less time.

After I made the last batch of biscotti, I got to thinking. I had a bag of macadamia nuts. And I’d been thinking about buying some fresh dried apricots. As I thought, I conjured up a biscotti that had candied ginger (minced up finely), apricots (also very finely minced) and the macadamia nuts (also minced). But what spice to put in it? Vanilla? No. Anise? No, as I’ve done anise in all my recent biscotti. Cinnamon? No, that didn’t sound good. The more I thought, the more I thought I should use a savory herb – and bingo, rosemary. And goodness, I loved the flavor combo.

Using the Giada recipe I’d used most recently, I merely swapped out the add-ins for the apricots, macadamia nuts, crystallized ginger and a little pile of finely minced fresh rosemary. They baked up easily and I made a double batch.

During the two weekends I spent with Karen, teaching her how to post on the blog, we had some very intense sessions together, with her doing photos, staging some pictures here and there, and getting her acquainted with the back-end of posting. And I took a bag of the biscotti. The family seemed to enjoy it as much as I did. I’d definitely make this again. The only thing I might do differently is to use slivered almonds instead of macadamia nuts. The latter are so expensive, and their flavor is quite subtle. I think they were kind of lost as an ingredient in a flavorful biscotti. But if you love macadamia, by all means use them. I just felt you couldn’t really taste them as much as eating them out of hand.

What’s GOOD: loved the flavor combination. Loved the rosemary. Who knew that rosemary would add such a nice, gentle flavor in a cookie?

What’s NOT: nothing really – easy to make. Only caution – once they’re finished, with the really-firm dried apricots, it’s a “hard” cookie – – don’t break a tooth. I freeze all of my cookies, and when I grab one out of the freezer, those little nuggets are very hard. Advice: let them defrost 10-15 minutes before serving.

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These used to be called 7-layer salads? Remember them? I’ve seen several recipes recently, so I guess there’s been a renewed interest in them.

The layered salad is supposed to be made in a glass bowl so you can SEE the layers. Other than a trifle bowl I didn’t have a clear glass bowl so I needed to use my etched glass salad bowl. You can sort of see through the various vegetables silhouettes etched in the outside of the glass. I was making the salad to serve 5, so the various veggies didn’t exactly line up in layers because the bowl is quite wide. But, oh well, it was the idea that counted. The recipe I’d read recently was a Keto version, but I’d already decided I wasn’t going to make it a keto salad anyway.

Really, you can use ANY vegetables you want to in this kind of salad. Supposedly, it’s the colored layers that make it so pretty. Try to have some dark green (I used arugula on the very bottom), some light green (Romaine, sugar snap peas and green onions), some orange (carrots and yellow/orange baby peppers). Mine also had a layer of corn, just sliced off the fresh cobs. Red is another nice layer (tomatoes for mine but red bell peppers would be good too). You don’t want to put two green layers next to each other, so put in an orange layer or a red one in between. In the old-time salad there was always a layer of frozen peas put in as the last veggie layer. Instead I added 3 hard boiled eggs that had been chopped up. Then you spread the dressing (used to be just a big glob of mayo) on top and add a generous layer of shredded cheddar cheese to the top. Cover it with plastic wrap and refrigerate for up to 24 hours. See photo at left of the top view.

It’s great for taking to a picnic or a shared gathering or a backyard barbecue. The dressing I made was an equal quantity of sour cream and mayo, then I added about 1/2 teaspoon of dill weed (in the jar because I don’t have fresh) and just because . . . I added about 1/2 teaspoon of blackened seasoning. No real reason – just that the packet was already opened and you know that mixed seasonings don’t last. That was spread over the top layer and the grated cheddar was added last.

All I’ll tell you is that everyone at the dinner table went back for seconds on the salad. Me too.

What’s GOOD: that it can be made the day ahead. Just takes a bunch of chopping and layering. Loved the dressing mixture with the dill and blackened seasoning. Altogether refreshing salad, and yes, I’d make this again exactly as I made it this time. It was a good combination.

What’s NOT: only that it requires a bunch of chopping and mincing, layering, and it’s best if prepared the day before serving. I made it about 8 hours ahead, which was fine too.

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A vegetable-laden soup with chicken, plus croutons and a spicy sauce (it’s French).

A post from Carolyn. This soup recipe has been in my repertoire for a long time. Just now I looked at my MasterCook soup file and see that it contains 458 recipes. That’s both soup recipes I’ve tried and those I haven’t. This one came from a Phillis Carey cooking class many years ago – I’m guessing 15. And why I’ve not made it more often, I don’t know (maybe because of the extra steps to make the sauce?), because it’s full of good flavor.

Bouillabaisse (pronounced boo-ya-bess) traditionally is a fish and seafood soup. So why not adapt it to chicken, eh? What sets this one apart is the use of saffron and the spicy rouille (pronounced roo-eel). And it contains some bread to thicken the sauce (baguette, to be exact) and does involve that extra step to whiz up the rouille in a blender. I changed the recipe just a little bit – I like celery in soups, not only for flavor, but for texture. I had a whole red bell pepper and decided I wasn’t going to roast it (too much trouble) so I merely used some in the soup and some in the sauce. The recipe called for potatoes – I didn’t have any – and I’d usually leave them out anyway, but they are traditional. There’s also a strip of orange peel in the soup. That is unusual, too. Up top, in that picture, you can’t see the little baguette slices – they’re underneath the rouille that I dolloped on top. The rouille adds a TON of flavor to this – don’t even think about making this without doing the sauce. And you can drizzle the rouille all over the soup – not just on the little croutons – the soup is enhanced so much with the garlicky flavors from the sauce.

The sauce, the rouille, contains saffron too, along with lots of garlic, Dijon, mayo, oil, salt and a dash of cayenne. But you start with some of the broth from the soup – first you add that to a shallow bowl, add the saffron (so it will develop its unique flavors in the warm liquid) and the garlic, then the bread – so it soaks up the liquid. You let that sit for awhile and the garlic sort-of cooks a little (barely), then the batch goes into the blender container, along with Dijon, the red bell pepper, mayo, 1/2 cup of EVOO, and some salt and cayenne to taste. The bread gives the sauce a little bit of substance, a thickener, of sorts. Do blend awhile to make sure it purees the way it should and it emulsifies.

You can make the sauce while the soup is simmering. You’ll likely have more sauce than you need for the number of soup servings, and I recommend you use the leftovers as a drizzle on roasted or steamed vegetables – like broccoli, cauliflower, green beans – even potatoes! The sauce is SO good. The garlic predominates, obviously.

What’s GOOD: so many layers of flavor – the sweet from the onions, the nuance of the saffron, the texture from the celery and chicken. And then there’s the rouille – the star of the show, in my opinion, which is very garlicky.

What’s NOT: nothing, really. Maybe that it takes a little longer to make, because of the sauce, but you won’t regret it once you’ve whizzed it up in the blender. I have broccoli in the refrigerator now, which will be enhanced with some of that great leftover sauce.

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What? I’ve never posted this recipe on the blog? That needs to be rectified as of now!

A post from Carolyn. Where this recipe came from, I’m not sure. I thought it was from Evan Kleiman, but having gone on the ‘net to look, my recipe isn’t quite like hers. Similar, but not the same. I suppose ALL caponata recipes are similar – containing eggplant, onions, celery, capers, tomatoes and olives. I’ve been making this caponata for well over 40 years.

So, what makes a great caponata? It’s Italian. It’s a combination: chewy of some textures (eggplant, olives and celery), softness of others (onions), a meld of sweet (a tiny bit of sugar and the tomatoes) and sour (some red wine vinegar) and for sure, a burst of fresh flavors. I know caponata can be purchased ready-made, and I’ve done that from time to time. But I’m here to tell you, there is nothing quite like home made caponata.

Know from the get-go that you need a couple of hours to make this. There’s a goodly amount of chopping going on (eggplant, onions, celery) but first you have to peel most of the eggplant. You can peel all of them if you prefer, but the recipe I have suggested leaving the peel on some of them to give the finished caponata an additional layer of color. Japanese eggplant are called for here (they’re supposed to be sweeter), and it’s a bit tedious to peel 2 pounds of them, I’m just sayin’.

The tomatoes need to be peeled and seeded, too, which of and by itself isn’t that much trouble, but it takes time to heat a pot of water, dunk the tomatoes in there, then remove the peel, cut them just so to remove all the seeds, then to chop up finely. The eggplant likes to sit awhile – with salt – to extract a little bit of the liquid. I have to say, maybe I got a tablespoon of discolored liquid underneath the colander after sitting for about an hour. Not much. The onion (both a yellow and a red), celery and garlic were simmered for awhile with some olive oil, until tender. All that was removed to a big bowl and then the drained and blotted-dry eggplant was added to several successive batches to be briefly browned. Finally, everything is added into the pot – along with some parsley, tomato paste, the red wine vinegar plus some water, and the little bit of sugar. That whole mixture was simmered for about 10 minutes. You do NOT want the vegetables to break down to mush – the flavor would be fine, but you want the texture of all those various ingredients to be seen and sensed on your tongue.

Taste it for salt (I ended up adding just a little) and pepper. A tablespoon of sugar was all the batch needed, and it makes about 3-4 cups when you’re all finished.

As I mentioned in my last post, I had a wine tasting event at my home (a fund-raiser), with two other friends co-hosting with me, and we served several appetizers to go along with the variety of wines. I made a special trip to go buy Cloudy Bay’s sauvignon blanc, which is a favorite of mine – if I’m going to drink white wine. Mostly I drink red. When my DH Dave and I visited New Zealand, we fell in love with Cloudy Bay wines, but particularly the sauvignon blanc. I asked the guests to taste the wine with the various appetizers, though the caponata goes better with red wine. I still have about 200 bottles of wine in the wine cellar – nearly all of them ones Dave bought – and he’s been gone for 7 years now. I gift them to friends when they invite me over, and I’ve done several wine tastings. The reds, mostly, keep for  years, although I have had to pour out a few bottles of reds that didn’t cellar well. Pinot Noir and Cabs keep well. Italian reds not so much.

My friend Lois made shrimp cocktail which went well with the whites. Linda made my Crostini with Pea Puree and Yogurt & Mint. I served some cheeses, some lighter, some heavier, and the caponata will be served with pita crackers (Trader Joe’s are great). With a can of smoked albacore on hand, I also made a favorite EASY appetizer, Smoked Albacore with Red Onion. And I’ve already posted the recipe for the Outrageous Brownies which were served with the last of the darker reds. I offered to open a bottle of after-dinner wine if our guests wanted some, but everyone was topped up. The cellar has about 10 after-dinner bottles and I just don’t open those. Except for a party, I guess!

So, once you’ve made the caponata, do chill it for a day if you can spare the time. Caponata improves with a day or two of chilling – letting those flavors meld. Caponata keeps well – I’d guess it’ll keep in the refrigerator for at least 2 weeks. You could freeze it, but my guess is once thawed, the veggies would turn to mush.

What’s GOOD: the flavors are just so special. Nothing unusual in this – but the combo? Oh gosh, yes it’s good. Keeps for a couple of weeks, though eating it within 3-5 days would be best. Good to make it ahead. In fact, it’s better made a day or two ahead.

What’s NOT: only the time spent – there’s a lot of chopping and prepping of vegetables. You’ll be at or near the range for about 1 1/2 hours for sure.

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A short post from Carolyn. No food in this post . . . just a little catch-up regarding the blog. Finally the blog platform is working the way it should, and those of you who have been long-time subscribers have been added to the new website that does subscription forwarding. It’s called follow.it, and they – of course –  are an online marketing website and offer a variety of tools to a user (like you) to “follow” various websites – news, or whatever. It’s up to you whether you utilize any of their other services besides the one you’ll get from the blog. You should receive an email in your inbox whenever there is a new post from tastingspoons. If you don’t get them, please email me – go to the contact page for how to reach me directly, or you can leave a comment on this post. I’m hoping they won’t be loading you up with more emails about their services – hopefully you can opt out of various notifications if it becomes a nuisance.

Chart above from flowingdata.com. If you want to see more charts describing changing food habits, click on See How Much We Ate Over the Years. It’s a fascinating article with multiple charts similar to the above. The one for vegetables was also very interesting. Are we surprised (the chart above) to note that chicken has taken over top spot for protein? Look where chicken was (on the left) back in the 70s and how it’s leaped up and up and up. Beef has moved into 2nd place, and pork into 3rd.

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In cooking terms, what does “outrageous” mean to you?

A post from Carolyn.  So, outrageous . . . the word? Out of the box? Rich? Decadent? Probably all of the above. And this recipe qualifies on all counts. Maybe not so much on “out of the box” except that it’s an outrageous amount of chocolate in them. You can see on the right all the various packages of chocolate I unwrapped – unsweetened, semi-sweet plus the dark chocolate chips too.

Of course, the batch, baked in a half sheet pan, makes 20 (or more) servings, so to tell you that it calls for a pound of butter and nearly 3 pounds of chocolate . . . it does make a lot. I cut them into smaller pieces, so I got about 30+ squares from the pan. Not counting the two small one-inch square pieces I ate while the pan was cooling. . .

The recipe comes from Ina Garten. I think I saw her make these on her TV show awhile back – that’s probably why I already had it in my recipe collection. And perhaps it’s in one of her cookbooks as well? I haven’t checked. As I write this I’m having a wine tasting event here at my house. To serve a variety of wines with appropriate appetizers to go with them. Some white, some red. I’ve made home made caponata (I’ll post it soon – couldn’t believe that recipe wasn’t already here on the blog). I’m going to open a bottle of red after-dinner wine, which will go with the brownies. I still have a couple hundred bottles of wine in the wine cellar – 99% of them from when my DH Dave was still alive (and he’s been gone for 7 years now). And 95% of them are reds. A few of the bottles got poured out as they didn’t cellar well, but mostly the wine has been fabulous.  I did go out and purchase a couple bottles of Cloudy Bay sauvignon blanc, one of my favorites if I’m drinking a white. Many years ago Dave and I spent time in New Zealand, and I fell in love with Cloudy Bay wines.

Know from the beginning, that there are several steps:

Melt the semisweet and unsweetened chocolate and butter

Mix the 7 eggs, sugar and vanilla together

Mix the dry ingredients in a separate bowl

Mix the add-ins (chocolate chips and walnuts) separately, and coat with flour.

If you know all of the above when you start, you’ll get it all in the right order. First thing is to melt the chocolate and butter (either in the microwave – see the instructions – or over the stove in a double boiler or on top of a flame-tamer – the latter is what I did) and let it cool some. While you’re doing that, get all the rest of the ingredients together in their proper bowls. Heat the oven, then start mixing. The chocolate mixture does need to cool to room temp before you can proceed. Hot chocolate + raw eggs = scrambled eggs, maybe. So be careful.

The only unusual thing – after 20 minutes in the oven, open the door, pull out the rack, pick up the sheet pan a bit and rap the pan on the baking rack, to pump out any air trapped in between the pan and the parchment. After they finish baking, the brownies are cooled to room temp, refrigerated (yes) for an hour – THEN you can cut them. Makes for easier slicing. They’ll store in the frig (in an airtight container) for a week. Otherwise, freeze them, tightly wrapped in foil.

What’s GOOD: oh my gosh, are these wonderful. If you’re a chocoholic, you’ll be over the moon. I used dark chocolate chips so these were pure decadence for me. Wonderful. Marvelous. A keeper. Rich. Buttery. Yessss.

What’s NOT: don’t be on a diet when you make these.

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EASY! Have salmon? Asparagus? Cream? Yogurt, cilantro, ginger and curry powder? Plus some red curry paste (Thai)? You can make this in a jiffy. 

A post from Carolyn. What I had on hand was a nice, big piece of salmon. And I had asparagus. But no recipe. I decided to “wing it,” and I’m so glad I did. I was in the mood for curry, and this was so very easy to make. Of late, I’ve wanted to simmer fish over very low heat on the stovetop rather than baking or grilling it – mainly because I love the smooth silkiness of salmon that’s been poached. And I overcook fish too often when it’s oven baked or grilled. It’s a turn-off to me to eat a piece of overcooked (aka: dry) fish. This way, it’s moist, tender, and just so easy to eat that way.

First I dug out my jar of ghee, and slowly warmed a dollop of it in the pan while I chopped up half an onion and added it. Then I grated some fresh ginger and added that into the mix. Then I minced up some fresh garlic, sprinkled in a bit of salt and pepper. Curry powder and red curry paste were added, along with Greek yogurt (don’t use nonfat) and some cream. I let that simmer for about 5 minutes over very low heat.

The slab of salmon was added, and I spooned the sauce over the top of the salmon, put on a lid and let it heat up, allowing it simmer for about 6 minutes. I checked how it was doing, and when I could still see that the salmon wasn’t quite cooked through, I took it out. I knew the salmon would continue to cook as I continued with the dish.

The asparagus I prepped differently – I left a few spears whole (but trimmed), and the rest of them I cut up into little pieces. Both were added to the sauce still in the pan. Once the pan came up to a simmer again, I put the lid back on and let it bubble away, slowly for about 4 minutes. I tested the asparagus and when a knife would slip easily into the asparagus, it was done. I removed the asparagus to the serving plate(s), then poured the sauce over the salmon and added a few sprigs of cilantro. Done. The whole meal took about 20 minutes. Yeah! Serve with rice on the side too – I didn’t – but it would be great to sop up all the rest of the sauce on the plate.

What’s GOOD: how easy this was – start to finish, about 20 minutes. Really lovely, subtle curry heat and lots of flavor. Asparagus was crisp-tender and went well with the fish. I have leftovers and will do nothing but reheat in the microwave. Because the fish was just slightly under-done, I think the fish will reheat without overcooking it. This recipe is a keeper.

What’s NOT: nothing, unless you don’t have all the ingredients.

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Refreshing spring side-dish salad with Asian flavors

This is a post from Karen.  Back in 1976 when I was 9 our family and a number of others on our block hosted high school students from Japan.  Some of the students were game to host a potluck with dishes from their hometown.   Minoru was staying with our neighbor and he put together a dish his mother would make.  He enjoyed its simplicity and fresh spring flavors.  We enjoyed it so much, my mom made a  point to get the recipe from him.

It would be over a decade before we ventured into sushi, but our family has fully embraced that as well.  My dad and I even took a class on making sushi.  My son was 3 when I took him for his first taste.  He was starving after his Tae Kwon Do “Tiny Tigers” class and right across the street was what would become his favorite sushi bar, so I walked him in and let him order off of the picture menu.  He picked Ikura, which is the sushi topped with Salmon roe.  I had not ordered that personally because it was a texture I wasn’t into, and fishier than I chose to venture. I didn’t think I should be ordering something I grew up putting on the end of my fishing hook to catch trout!  I was about to stop my son from ordering it, but then told myself that I shouldn’t censor or bias his food choices just because they might not be mine.  Who knows, he might like it.  And guess what, he did!  I asked him what he liked about it and he told me, “It tastes good and I like the way the balls pop in my teeth!” For the next two years that was always the first thing he ordered.  The owner and the sushi chef were so delighted to see this American kid enjoying their sushi instead of asking for buttered pasta that they made a point to spoil him rotten and ensure that his parents brought him back, which we happily did for many years before we moved.  But I digress, back to the Harusame Salad and 1976:

Back then we didn’t have rice vinegar as an option, so mom used apple cider vinegar.  We used regular white sugar at the time, but now I’ve tried alternatives and settled on palm sugar.  Whichever one you use, I make the sauce first so the sugar has time to dissolve. I have listed one tablespoon of sugar, but the original recipe said 1-2 TBS.  One works fine for me.  If you only have access to thick-skinned and waxed cucumbers I would go ahead and peel those.

I have experimented over the years with different vegetables and proteins.  I was out of ham but had chicken.  And when I was out of cucumbers I used red bell pepper or carrots.  But I always stuck to Minoru’s premise that everything should be uniform in size, roughly 3″ lengths for the noodles, vegetable, and protein.  Once it is done, it’s all I can do to wait and give the flavors a chance to meld for at least 30 minutes.  It doesn’t last long after that because we all love it so much.  I do make a point to use chopsticks when I eat this.  They hold onto the noodles better than a fork can. I also use it up within 1-2 days.  Otherwise, the cucumbers get soft, releasing more of their liquid and ultimately diluting the flavor.

What’s good:  Very easy, fresh flavors, great texture between the crunch of the cucumbers and the chew of the noodles and ham.

What’s not:  It disappears too fast.  Will get watery and dull if not eaten within a couple days.

printer-friendly PDF and Master Cook file (click link to open recipe)

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