Eat Boutique

My husband loves potatoes. It’s a true love that began when he was a wee one fed piles of the mashed kind by his grandmother and mother at every meal. Every. Single. Meal.

I’ve always been wary of attempting his family’s mashed recipe. I’m equally shy of his family’s potato salad recipe, a dish his aunt always brought to my home for special summer events, sweetly covering for my fear of the notorious creamy potato goodness. I’m not scared of potatoes or mayonnaise. I’m more scared of not getting it right in front of his gigantic Irish-American family.

Today, with his family no where in sight, I wanted potato salad, damn it, so I decided to make up my own recipe. As I boiled and chopped and mixed, my husband inquired as to the whereabouts of the mayonnaise. I reassured him, “No mayo. No problem. You’ll love it.” He buried his head in his coffee mug and muttered something about his grandmother, but I simply said, “I can’t hear any mumbling right now!” He shuffled out to the barn and left me to my mission.

I created this recipe on the fly and really adore it. I can actually taste potato, two kinds, red and purple. I lick my lips to the lemony flavor absorbed into the salad due to loads of lemon zest and juice. The chopped vidalia onions are soft and sweet, while the chopped garlic scapes provide a snappy crunch. After much internal debate about basil or cilantro, I decided my tomato bruschetta would swim in basil, so these potatoes deserved some of that fresh cilantro.

You can really mix these ingredients together to your taste. I’ve provided some guidelines and what I did, but it’s fun to add and taste as you go along.

My husband enjoyed this side dish very much. He easily got past the no-mayo thing. Alas, he couldn’t get past why I wouldn’t think to add crumbled bacon to the dish. He’s right; I bet that would taste great. But while bacon is pleasing even to many vegetarians I know, the sort coming to dinner today were “real” vegetarians who couldn’t be bothered with pork products. He feels there’s something intrinsically wrong with anyone who won’t eat bacon, but that’s another post for another day.

Try this dish; it’s delicious.

Lemon Cilantro Potato Salad

• 3-4 lbs potatoes, both purple and red
• 4 garlic scapes, chopped
• 1 large vidalia onion, finely chopped
• 1 small bunch cilantro, roughly chopped
• Lemon zest, from 2 lemons
• 4 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon, dijon mustard
• 6 pours, olive oil (about 6 tablespoons)
• Salt and pepper to taste

Place the potatoes in a pot of cold water. Bring to a boil and cook until tender to a fork. These took different times as the purple potatoes were much smaller. In general, the potatoes were fork-tender within 15-25 minutes. Drain the potatoes in a colander. As they cool, make the vinagrette.

Put the lemon juice, dijon mustard, olive oil, salt and pepper in a little jar that has a lid. I used about 1 teaspoon of salt and 1/2 teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper. Put the lid on the jar and shake until well combined.

Chop or slice the potatoes into your desired shape. I cut them into quarters. In a large bowl, place the potatoes, scapes, onion, cilantro and lemon zest. Pour the vinaigrette over the top and watch as the warm potatoes suck up the tangy dressing. Toss everything very well and leave to marinate at room temperature until the rest of your meal is ready to be served. Taste just before serving and re-season, as needed, with salt and pepper.

Happy Independence Day! I love today. I love waking up early to get to work, in the kitchen. At 8am, I practically ran to the kitchen, hitched on an apron and started boiling, cutting and marinating. Today’s menu was short but fresh and well-seasoned.

We enjoyed:

• Tomato Bruschetta
• Blue-cheese All-Natural Burgers with Balsamic Onions
• Lime-marinated Colossal Shrimp
• Lemon Cilantro Potato Salad
• Butter Lettuce Salad (from my garden!)
• Ginger-Chili-Thyme Smoked Pork Butt (for pulled pork sandwiches tomorrow!)

Recipes for all of these items to come shortly. For now, get a lick of my tomato bruschetta. I used two types of basil and two types of tomatoes, along with finely chopped garlic, lemon juice, salt and pepper.

Tomato Bruschetta

• 8 plum tomatoes, chopped into small chunks
• 1 pint grape tomatoes, sliced in half
• 1 handful of genovese basil, cut into thick strips
• 1 sprinkle of micro-basil
• 4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 4 tablespoons, lemon juice
• 4 glugs, olive oil (about 5-6 tablespoons)
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1 french baguette, sliced into rounds

The tomatoes didn’t taste quite like August yet, so I let them sit with some sea salt for a couple hours to pull out the juicy sweetness. I added both basils - the micro-basil came from my backyard pots. (I can’t recall the name of the baby basil, but it’s yummy and slightly thai in aroma.) I also added the garlic, lemon, olive oil and salt and pepper. I never put the mixture into the fridge, letting it sit in a pretty white bowl on the table all morning. I prefer tomatoes at room temperature; they actually taste like tomatoes!

Here’s a view of the two types of basil:

I sliced up the baguette and drizzled a little of garlic oil on top of each slide. The broiler was set and I popped them baguette slices onto a baking sheet and put them fairly close to the flame, leaving my oven open for the few minutes it took to toast. Serve a generous scoop of bruschetta on each slice of baguette, along with your favorite white wine. What do you do with your tomatoes?

I had quite an interesting exchange this evening. We had run out of vegetables from our farm share so I popped into the local fruit stand to pick up some salad greens and fruit. Calareso’s Fruit Stand is located in Reading, Massachusetts, and sells fresh vegetables, fruit, plants, flowers and baked goods. (During the winter, they sell Christmas trees and  evergreen wreaths.) The stand is a fairly hot spot during the early evening hours, especially with folks picking up last minute additions to their dinner table.

I picked up some cherry tomatoes, noticed they were from Mexico and returned them to their spot. Just not worth the increasing my carbon footprint, let alone the unknown pesticides. I pondered a package of strawberries from California, and decided to let my hunger for strawberries overtake my desire to buy local or organic, and shoved them into my cart (of course, quietly looking around for the “local” and “organic” police, who were no where to be found).

I added several greens to my cart, including bags of arugula, basil and mixed salad greens marked solely with the Calareso’s label. I began to wonder where all these greens were born. Calareso’s didn’t have a farm per se, so they likely purchased all these items at some wholesale market. But beyond that, where the heck did these greens come from? If I wasn’t going to eat organic, I could at the very least focus on supporting farmers in New England, or at least the east coast, and do my little part to reduce my carbon footprint. I really, really wanted to know where these greens came from, so decided to broach the subject at the checkout. And, despite a young 20-something gal at the register, I decided to give my “local” speech a shot.

I told the young woman that I had a notion for her to float up the corporate chain. It went something like: “Wouldn’t it be awesome if you labeled the origin of all your produce so I could choose to support local farmers?”

She said something like: “Well, we buy from the produce market daily and the growers change daily, so that’d be impossible to maintain.”

So I was like: “Well, you could have laminated signs that you wipe clean and re-write on each morning.”

And she was all: “Well, that’s a lot of work.”

So I was like: “Well, I guess, but it’s worth it for your customers. I want to know and I’m sure lots of others would appreciate knowing they were supporting local farmers.”

As her eyes glazed over, she said: “Well, that’s an interesting an idea.”

I realized I was speeching to deaf ears and decided to move on with my non-local groceries. Once home, my husband giggled at my attempt to wise up some 20-something. I insisted that kids these days were allegedly far more eco-aware than us old folks, and that my fruit stand clerk was an anomaly. Or, at least, I hoped.

As I assembled the above salad, I worried for all those 20-somethings who didn’t care where their food was born. Sure, the salad is pretty and was quite tasty, but I grieved for my hard-earned dollars potentially going to corporate farmers. I grieved for the carbon release I had supported. I grieved for all those 20-somethings who simply don’t know better yet… but knew, one day, they would.

This salad made me so happy. I devoured it the moment I stepped into Venice, while sitting along the Grand Canal with my friend, drinking a glass of Prosecco. After four hours on a train, I was tired and hungry but didn’t want to over-indulge. This gentle salad fit the bill, dressed simply with olive oil, orange juice and salt. Fennel season in New England is now over, but plan to add this recipe to my arsenal next year.

I’ve been back but a day and have so much to do to catch up at work. But now heading off to a conference, and hope to share all my 800 photos with you in the coming weeks.

Sometimes, you don’t realize that you have glamorous vegetables in your kitchen. I always think of fennel salad as fairly glamorous and thus a touch out of reach for the everyday home cook. I’m not quite sure where this crazy notion originated.

Sure, fennel is a bit unfamiliar to the everyday cook. It’s not used as regularly as say broccoli or spinach. It has a slightly anise flavor that turns many who encounter it off, like my husband. It’s also this odd bulbous shape that doesn’t lend itself well to easy preparation. Either cut it up for roasting, or what else? Break out a mandolin for fine shavings? Who has a mandolin?

Well, of course, I do. But this bulb never touched its fine blades. I was inspired by a Barefoot Contessa episode, one in which she uses the slicing blade of her food processor to prepare the fennel. It’s such a natural thought, but one that never crossed my mind. (I suppose I’m a little slow…)

Confessions aside, I sliced me up some fennel (two bulbs, to be exact) and tossed the results with orange slices (peeled, sliced across the grain to create pinwheels) and fresh arugula. All of these items came from our local CSA this past week. The oranges were of course shipped in from Florida and thus not local, but they were organic and that’s the best you can ask for during these cold New England winters.

I piled all these farm finds on a plate and tossed in the juice from 1/2 a lemon, some generous pours of my favorite extra virgin olive oil, kosher salt and freshly ground pepper. A quick mix blended the glorious orange sweetness with the peppery arugula and the licorice-scented fennel. The lemon juice made it all sparkle. A quick chop of the fennel fronds, a glorious herb in and of itself, on top provided the perfect final touch, like diamond earrings to a gorgeous ball gown.

I towered a generous serving in a bowl for myself, and a slightly smaller serving for my husband. He went back for seconds. This from the man who spit up the roasted fennel I had prepared for him earlier in the season. He loved this salad. I consider my recipe successful when my husband, who hates all forms of vegetables, goes back for seconds.

Late Winter / early Spring is the season for big, full bulbs of fennel and fresh oranges (from the South). Do search them both out and whip up this glamorous salad. So glamorous, in fact, I’ll be eating leftovers while watching the Oscars tonight. Now it’s just deciding what couture goes with fennel… Anyone?