This past weekend I was in Highlands, North Carolina, a charming mountain community that is home to a number of high-end restaurants. I was there in an unusual capacity—dispatched, you might say, to be one of three judges for their first-ever Iron Chef style culinary competition.

Who would be “King of the Mountain?” Four area chefs faced off, armed with kitchen staples, a box of Secret Ingredients, their sharpened French knives and wits, trying to execute as many daring dishes possible within a 40 minute time period. Yikes, 40 minutes!

And then, we judges got to sample, and score, on the basis of Taste, Presentation, and Creativity….in what seemed seconds.

Indeed, these chefs came up with some exceptional delectables. For one heat, the secret ingredient was sushi-grade Red Grouper. Witness: a gorgeous Grouper Carpaccio, translucent fillet dressed with peppery olive oil, basil and fennel. Grouper and crawfish in a spicy African Peanut Stew, presented in the hollow of a halved coconut. Grilled baby eggplant, mango, and grouper salad in a gingery-caramel-tamari-based dressing that was ultimate Umami.

Inspiring!

It wasn’t until the morning after the competition, while driving the winding way down the mountain, that I started to wonder, what would I have made in 40 minutes…

I didn’t arrive at any great answers. And when I arrived home, I made this Polenta Torta.

Now, even though it is not King of the Mountain caliber, it would score very high points for taste. Mushroom ragu can be as rich and complex as a meat bolognese, and in much less time.

Presentation and creativity score well in the acceptable range.

And, it can be made and assembled in that 40 minute time period…if you got your sharp knife and wits about you.

Polenta Torta layered with Spinach and Mushroom Ragu

For the Polenta:

4 cups Water
1 cup Polenta
1 t. Sea Salt
1 t. good Olive Oil

Bring water a boil and stir in polenta and salt. Stir continuously until polenta incorporates into the liquid. Simmer, stirring occasionally.

Polenta is very forgiving. If it gets too thick, thin with more water. If it’s too thin, just simmer along and it will thicken up. When it is a good, almost pourable consistency, remove from heat and stir in the olive oil.

Mushroom Ragu:
1 T. Olive Oil
1 T. Butter
1 medium Onion, small dice
½ Yellow or Red Bell Pepper, small dice
2 cloves minced Garlic
12 oz. coarsely chopped assorted Mushrooms: portabellos, shiitakes, oyster, cremini…you don’t have to get all of these, 2 or 3 varieties are nice
4-6 sprigs fresh Thyme
Salt
Black Pepper
¼ cup Red Wine
1 cup diced Tomatoes and juice
½ cup low fat Milk

In a skillet under medium heat, melt butter and olive together. Saute onions and peppers until softened; stir in garlic, mushrooms, and thyme. Season with salt and pepper. Saute until mushrooms brown. Add red wine, tomatoes and juice. Stir well, scraping up any browned bits in the skillet. Simmer and stir. Mushrooms will release their liquid and sauce will acquire a pretty reddish-brown hue. Stir in milk; taste for seasonings and adjust.

Spinach Sauté
½ lb. fresh Spinach
2 cloves minced Garlic
Olive Oil
shredded Pecorino Romano

Simple: Heat the oil, toss in the garlic for 30 seconds, then add the spinach leaves. Toss around in the pot until the leaves are coated and collapse. (another minute or two) Remove from heat and dust with a little romano cheese.

Assembly

In a 9×13 casserole dish coated with olive oil, spread a layer of polenta. Follow that with a layer of spinach, then a layer of mushroom ragu. Sprinkle some shredded pecorino romano at this point, if you like.

Repeat the process—all layers again.

At this point, if you are making things ahead of time, you can refrigerate the casserole. It will be ready to bake when you are.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake for about 30 minutes–until browned and bubbly.

For my Vegan Friends:
Polenta Torta lends itself to numerous variations.
Simply delete the butter and romano; no milk in the mushroom sauce.
It won’t be quite as Lush—but still very good.
Layers of swiss chard and marinara sauce would be Delish.
And, Pesto layers? Absolutely.

It has been at least eight years since we’ve had REAL snow in Nashville, the kind that starts in the morning as flurries and builds throughout the day, big fat clusters tumbling down, blanketing the trees, the front yards, the roads, diffusing light, muffling sound…. ultimately bringing the city to a standstill.

Wow. It got really quiet.

And, while I was home, cozy (and succumbing to a headcold), I decided to enjoy the snowy shut-down by making simple comforts: bread and soup.

I had enough of the necessary ingredients: and handful of vegetables for the soup pot, some flour and an unexpired package of dry yeast for bread. These are, after all, basic foods.

With broccoli as the star, mirepoix the reliable supporting players, and potatoes comprising the creamy base, it doesn’t take long to make this hearty soup. It also isn’t essential that you add any dairy to achieve richness, although a modest cupful of lowfat milk added at the end is rather nice. A few shavings of sharp white cheddar, too.

But this is a much lighter version of Broccoli-Cheddar that is often served out in the world, all floury and cheesy and fat-laden.
The potatoes add the creaminess, body to the soup. As they cook along, they all but disappear.

like under a blanket of snow.

Chunks of potatoes will break down, adding flavor and body to the soup.

The soup is beginning to thicken, a good time to add the broccoli florets.

Creamy Broccoli Soup
3 T. Olive Oil
4 medium Russet Potatoes, peeled and diced
1 head Broccoli, stems and florets separated, stems chopped
2 medium Onions, chopped
3 Carrots, chopped
3 Celery, chopped
3 cloves Garlic, minced
3 1/2 qts. vegetable stock, or water
Salt-n-Peppa to taste
1 cup lowfat Milk
1/2 cup shredded Vermont Cheddar

Warm olive oil in a stockpot on medium heat. Sauté the diced potatoes for 5 minutes. Add broccoli stems and the mirepoix (carrots-onions-celery) and stir into the mix, sauteing another 5 minutes. Stir in the garlic and season with salt and black pepper.

The vegetables will begin to soften, and stick to the bottom and sides of the pot. Keep stirring, then add the vegetable stock (or water)

The soup will get a glazy thickness to it. Add the broccoli florets to cook into the batch last. Once they are softened, taste for salt and pepper. Stir in a cup of milk and some shredded Vermont Cheddar for added dairy richness and tang.

And now, for the bread part…….

The thing about bread is Time.

That’s all. And it’s not time where You are actually doing anything—it’s the yeast that’s doing all the work. After you mix up the dough, you just have to check in on periodically, give it a punch, knead it and leave it be. And, put it in the oven to bake.

So, I amend that—it’s really about Patience. It’s worth it. I would like to bake bread more than I do—I am not mindful enough to put it into the plan of a day. And while the recipe for this Rosemary Cracked Wheat Bread is not exceptional, I share it to encourage you.(and myself!) It’s not hard. It’s fun. And, delicious. Just simply to get in the kitchen and bake!

Serve the crusty loaf warm, with a slap of butter on it.
Or, get out your fave olive oil, dress it up with a few strips of sundried tomatoes, polka dots of balsamic….carve a little parmegiano-reggiano….

Rosemary-Cracked Wheat Bread

1 cup warm Water
1 package Active Dry Yeast
1 T. sugar
2 t. Sea Salt
2 T. Olive Oil
1 cup Cracked Wheat Flour
1 1/2 -2 cups Unbleached White Flour
2 T. chopped fresh Rosemary

Stir yeast and sugar into warm water. Yeast will begin to activate–bubble. Add salt and olive oil. Add cracked wheat flour and at least 1 cup of the unbleached white flour and make a soft dough. (add more white flour if necessary.) Knead until elastic. Form into a ball and place into a bowl. Cover with a damp cloth and allow to rise in a warm place for an hour. Punch down again, reform into a ball.

Score with a knife, sort of criss-cross fashion.
Brush with olive oil, sprinkle with coarse sea salt and chopped rosemary.
Let rise for another 45 minutes.

Bake at 375 degrees for 35-40 minutes. Crust with be nicely golden and the bread will “thunk.”

Here’s a tale of food blogging interconnections….

I have been reading a most splendid foodblog written by a British woman living in Rome; please go meet rachel of rachel eats. Several of her December posts featured Chestnuts in marvelous incarnations–pâte, soup, cake. Both her pictures and prose really got me longing for them, in some fashion. Alas, with other holiday goings-on, I never got ’round to chestnut hunting.

But I did read the small print on my brand new bag of Christmas Lima Beans from Rancho Gordo, where it mentioned that they were also called Chestnut Limas, due to their exquisite chestnutlike flavor. For those of you who may not know about Rancho Gordo, these are the guys growing all manner and form of wondrous heirloom beans, sought out by fine chefs across the country. And, they make it pretty darn easy for you to get them, too. (a favored stocking stuffer in this household…)

I discovered them through another blogger,
claudia of the esteemed cookeatFRET, through whom, I believe, is also how I found rachel.

So here we come full circle. Rancho Gordo’s Christmas Limas, made into this simple stewy-soup influenced by two foodbloggers, satisfied my two desires: I got to cook up these festive heirlooms during festive times, and I got to have a tasty hint of chestnut.

Trust me, these full-bodied, creamy limas will dispel any unpleasant notions and ill childhood memories of the others, (those awful starchbomb Fordhooks that make me shudder and quease now as I type.)

The pity that Christmas Limas do not retain their gorgeous color and mottling as they cook is replaced by the pleasure of their rich flavor.
Indeed, they have a layer of chestnuttiness…..

You could make this recipe more elaborate, with the addition of something meaty, like mushrooms, pancetta, or spicy chorizo—but there is enough serious-goodness inherent in this already very meaty bean. Keeping it simple best showcases that.

Thanks and shoutouts to foodblogging sisters rachel and claudia for sharing great information and sparking inspiration.

Christmas (Chestnut) Lima Bean Soup
2 T. Olive Oil
1 large Onion, diced
3 fat cloves of Garlic, minced
1 piece of red (or orange) sweet bell pepper, small dice
Sea Salt (about 1 t.)
Black Pepper (scattering of cracked )
Red Pepper Flakes almost 1/4 t.–could be as little as a pinch
1 cup Christmas Lima Beans
4 cups vegetable stock, or water, or combination

The night before: place one cup limas into a pot and cover with filtered water. Limas will more than double in size. Drain, but reserve soaking liquid.

The day of:
In a deep saucepot, saute onions, pepper, and garlic in olive oil until the onions are translucent, with edges beginning to brown. Season with salt, black pepper, and red pepper flakes. Stir in drained limas, then add reserved liquid, then stock/water. Stir well and bring to just under a boil—a rolling simmer. Let this cook along uncovered for about two hours, stirring occasionally. The limas will soften, yield creaminess, giving this soup a thick velvet texture. As the beans cook, the liquid can get very thick. But, it’s so forgiving; if you want it thinner, just stir in some more water.

Makes 4 servings.

Simple elements form the base: garlic, onion, sweet pepper. This is what I had on hand. A little chopped leek or celery would be nice, if you’ve got it.

Letting the beans roll around in the saute before adding liquid is a very good idea.

I am crazy about this color.
For a heartier meal, serve over rice, garnish with arugula.

I like to place a clump of arugula on top of the rice, and then spoon the Christmas Limas over—collapsing the greens. Delicious.

One potato, two potato, three potato, four….bushels!

These days, everyone’s CSA share baskets are spud-loaded.
Baby yukon golds, fingerlings, heirloom purple caribes, butte russets…

Even our own easement guerrilla garden experiment with sprouted eyes has been productive. As the vines die back, I’ve been digging and unearthing a surprising number of red new potatoes, most the size of a golf ball, and a few the size of my fist. Miraculous, I tell you.

With all these potatoes comes the need for new recipes. And while these tubers will keep for a spell in a cool place, they are also meant to be enjoyed now!

This French Roasted Potato Salad is delicious, healthy, and simple; the pommery vinaigrette makes it. We teach this recipe in our teen cooking camp as part of a menu that includes marinated grilled flank steak and asparagus salad with lemon aioli. It’s one that’s well-loved by adults and kids alike.

The salad is tasty whether it’s served warm or room temperature. And, unlike mayo-based versions, there are no worries about the dish sitting out too long, going out of temperature, and forming enough toxins to do in your father’s side of the family at the reunion.

Take it to the picnic fearlessly.

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French Roasted Potato Salad
2-3 lbs New Potatoes, cleaned, dried, and cut into medium thick slices
(or try another potato–white, yukon gold, fingerling, or a variety)
1 medium Onion, sliced
Olive Oil
Sea Salt
Black Pepper
fresh Rosemary–a few sprigs
1 cup pommery vinaigrette (recipe below)
1/2 cup chopped fresh Italian Parsley
1 bunch Scallions, chopped

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Place sliced potatoes and onions on a roasting pan and toss with olive oil until all is well coated. Sprinkle with sea salt, black pepper, and chopped fresh rosemary. Roast until browned, about 25-30 minutes. With a slotted spoon, remove the potatoes and onions and place into a mixing bowl. Pour the pommery vinaigrette right onto the roasting pan, scraping up the browned bits and pieces of onion and potatoes as the vinaigrette deglazes the pan. Pour over the potatoes and toss well. Taste and adjust seasoning. Garnish with chopped fresh Italian parsley and scallions. Serve warm or room temperature.

Serves 10-12

Pommery Vinaigrette

¼ cup Red Wine Vinegar
1 Tablespoon Coarse Grain (pommery) Mustard
1 clove minced garlic
½ teaspoon Salt
¼ teaspoon coarse grain black Pepper
Pinch sugar
½ cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Sometime in the mid ’90’s, in what now seems like the way-back machine in terms of the life and times of our Nashville Farmers Market, it wasn’t so easy to find the best homegrown tomatoes. The plethora of vibrant heirlooms had not arrived on our agri-scene. You could count on Smileys’ Farm for Bradleys. The Howells had Beefsteaks. From time to time, smaller vendors would show up with their garden varieties and set up stands in the back market shed.

There, we discovered that the tastiest tomatoes also happened to be the ugliest. This we gleaned from one vendor–a gentleman with a shock of white hair and twinkly blue eyes who hawked his malformed “maters” along with his chow-chow and pepper sauces.

“Over here we got the best for the best price,” you’d hear his voice carry across the market shed. “Not a pretty face, but got a pretty taste. Come get your Catface tomatoes.”

Who could resist that call? You’d have to check it out…

He had quite the homely collection of reds: gnarled, scarred, with strange protuberances, overall resembling more the other end of the cat. But, the price was right; our man was convincing. We took a chance on a box of catface tomatoes.

Our white-haired friend explained that the “catfacing” happened early on in the development of the fruit—something about cooler temperature and watering issues—and that the later fruits of the plant “grew proper.”

“Even if they don’t look it, they still have the flavor.”

Oh yes. Those wonky catface tomatoes had an intense acid-candy sweetness. For catering purposes, we couldn’t use them on trays of caprese, for instance. But brushed with olive oil, roasted with onion, garlic, and a few sprigs of thyme, they made a chunky sauce that was moanin’-good.

These days, I don’t hear about the catfaces. All the odd-formed tomatoes are lumped together and sold under that all-encompassing term “culls.” Tally and John of Fresh Harvest Co-op have a considerable number of these less than perfect appearing fruits, offered for half the price of their primos. Such a deal!

Throughout the season, I ‘ll buy a lot of these culls, roast them, and freeze the sauce in tupperware containers. The roasted tomatoes freeze beautifully. They keep that taste of summer and will provide real solace during the winter drear. Tally asked me to post my recipe and remind us all that it’s a good idea to get our favorite tomatoes now and throughout the season to put up–one way or another—-while they are available. Who knows what twists and turns the summer weather will take?

Another reminder: Roasting is easy, but this year I will learn to can. I’m told it’s easy too. There’s only just so much freezer space….
More on that later!

These are ready to oven roast.

Post-roasting, the skins practically come off by themselves.

Keep some sauce in jars to refrigerate and use within a few days. Freeze the remainder.

Chunky Roasted Tomato Sauce
5 lbs. Tomatoes
1 medium Onion
4-6 cloves Garlic
Olive Oil
a few sprigs of fresh Thyme
Sea Salt
Coarse Ground Black Pepper

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Core tomatoes and cut in half, placing the flat surface down onto a roasting pan. Cut an onion into sixths or eighths and place around the tomatoes. Scatter the garlic cloves and sprigs of thyme. Drizzle or brush the vegetables with olive oil, then salt and pepper them. Roast for about 25 minutes, until tomatoes skins wrinkle and blister.
Cool, and then remove the tomato skins. (They slip off easily.) Chop large pieces and pack into containers to freeze. Or toss over some capellini and dust with a little parmesan! Makes 2 qts.

It was the desire for more color that took an already delicious pasta dish to a higher level.

Unexpected!

I was to prepare a large batch of linguine tossed with sauteed Swiss chard, pine nuts, golden raisins, and red pepper flakes, always a favorite for its healthy dose of green things in pasta, with a little sweet-and-heat.
It was one of several dishes I cooked recently for a local dinner held at Kipp Crusa and Tallahassee May’s farm.

Tally either grew or gathered all the lush produce for the meal. When she delivered the locally grown goodies to my home, she brought in a sack bulging with chard: long white stems with large dark green leaves that resembled ceremonial fans for an Egyptian deity. Fabulous.

And yet, she lamented the lack of Rainbow Chard, a variety loved for its brilliant, almost iridescent yellow, pink, and purple stems. “I hope you don’t mind, but I brought you some beets.”

Mind? No, never would I mind such a thing.

The beet greens and chard cooked beautifully together, the beet’s magenta stem and veined leaves providing a lively color burst. And, a little more. In contrast to the supple chard, the beets added an assertive, earthy bite to this rustic dish.

Pasta-wise, I have typically made this with whole wheat linguine. For Tally’s dinner, I chose to continue the mix-up by using whole wheat, regular, and spinach linguine—a blend sometimes referred to as “Straw and Hay.”

This is a discovery worth repeating—-and sharing.

Today, I’ve got small quantities of Swiss chard and Red Russian Kale harvested from my urban farmette, plus a few spring onions grown tall and fat from all our rain. I’ll toss in the leaves from a beet bunch in my fridge–in short order, this festive straw and hay will be ready to enjoy for dinner! The remaining beets will turn up in the next day or two in a salad or side dish.

Color begins releasing when you saute the stems with spring onions.

The greens like to swim in the stock.

Greens, Straw and Hay
3-4 T. Olive Oil
3 Spring Onions, chopped-use both white and green parts
1 bunch Swiss Chard, Beet Greens, Red Russian Kale (any or all in combination)
cleaned, dried, destemmed:chop stems like celery and set aside; coarsely chop leaves
You’ll have 2 heaping cups of chopped leaves.
1 t. Sea Salt
1/4 t. Red Pepper Flakes
1 cup Vegetable Stock
1/4 cup Golden Raisins
1/4 cup Pine Nuts

Pasta Assortment: use about 2 oz. of each (6 oz. total)
Linguine, Spinach Fettuccine, Whole Wheat Capellini

Heat a large skillet, add olive oil. Sauté spring onions and the chopped stems from your selection of greens on medium heat for 5-7 minutes. Sprinkle with sea salt and red pepper flakes. Stir in coarsely chopped leaf greens and sauté for another 2 minutes. Pour in vegetable stock and stir well. Leaves will collapse. Add golden raisins and toasted pine nuts. Toss throughout the mixture. Set aside.

Bring a 4-5 qt. pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Cook your sturdier pasta first: follow package directions. Whole wheat linguine takes 10 minutes, regular takes 7-8. Do a little math, and figure the timing so that you can add the second pasta after 2 minutes so that all is done at the same time. Drain, and reserve 1 cup liquid.

Gently toss pastas with sauteed greens, insuring a good distribution of all the elements throughout. If the mixture doesn’t seem wet enough, add a little of the reserved pasta water.

You may want to grate a little parmegiano-regianno over the top, if you like. It is delicious, of course. But there’s enough good flavors–and textures—in this dish that you may not want to.

Serves 2 as main dishes or 4 as first course.

A tangle of flavor and color…

Use what you’ve got.

Sometimes you don’t have what is called for, but chances are you’ve got something else that would serve just as well.

Call it an adage or philosophy–this way of thinking brings together creativity, practicality, and economy, and can be most useful in problem solving. I had to remind myself of this when it came time to prepare for a cooking demonstration for this year’s Earth Day Celebration.

I had been asked to feature things that I’ve been growing in my tiny urban farmette. Figuring I’d have an abundance of mesclun, scallions, garlic, fresh herbs, I had envisioned presenting a variety of vinaigrettes, tossing them on the myriad greens, passing out samples of sumptuous salads.

But, Mother Nature and my seeds did not cooperate with this vision. Our burst of warmth in late February-early March gave way to cooler temperatures and wetter weather. My seedlings, which eagerly sprouted up in my window box greenhouse, remained inert, post-transplant.

They stood in the ground, I believe, and shivered.

It was plain in my two-days-before-the-event assessment that I would have plenty of chives and Italian parsley, but only four scallions of size and a handful of petite greens—slim pickings for a food demo and tasting.

Time to play my “what’s-in-the-pantry game”; surely it held some wonderful things to pair with my local garden offerings.
And, indeed there were: I found quite the assortment of white beans and peas, all in almost-empty bags and boxes.
Time to put these dribs and drabs to good use.

I chose black-eyed peas, yellow-eyed peas, navy beans, great northern beans, baby limas and flageolets—visually, a pleasing look—variants of white—and all similarly sized to throw into the pot together. In my fridge, I had celery, carrots, and an orange.
An idea began to form:
A light, nutritious white bean medley salad, with crunchy bits of celery, carrot, and scallion, dressed in a refreshing vinaigrette of orange, Italian parsley, and chives.

It was well-enjoyed by the Earth Day cooking demo attendees, but because our intention was to not use paper at the festival, I had no recipe cards to share.
So, here for all of you who kindly attended and all of you, dear readers, is the appropriately renamed for its use-what-you’ve-got sensibility:
my Earth Day Salad.

White Bean Medley
1 cup assorted White Beans and Peas
2 T. Olive Oil
1 medium Onion, small dice
3 cloves Garlic, minced
¼ teaspoon Salt
pinch Red Pepper flakes
1 Bay Leaf

Soak the beans and peas for at least four hours. Rinse.
Heat a 2 quart saucepan. Add olive oil. Sauté onions until translucent, about 2 minutes. Add garlic, salt, and red pepper flakes. Continue sautéing for another 2 minutes. Add beans/peas, stirring so that all are coated. Add 4 cups water. Stir. Cover and cook on medium heart for at least one hour, stirring occasionally. Add more liquid if necessary.
Remove from liquid and cool. Remove bay leaf. Taste for seasoning.

Orange-Herb Vinaigrette

6 Tablespoons Olive Oil
1 heaping Tablespoon Orange Zest
¼ teaspoon Salt (or more, to taste)
a few grindings of fresh cracked Black Pepper
pinch Red Pepper flakes
1 Tabelspoon Orange Juice
2 Tablespoons White Balsamic Vinegar
1 heaping Tablespoon Italian Parsley, chopped
4-6 sprigs Garlic Chives, or Chives, snipped into small pieces

Start with the olive oil in the bottom of the salad bowl. Add the zest and allow to infuse for a few minutes. Then add salt, black and red peppers, orange juice, vinegar, parsley, and chives. Stir together well, and then proceed to the next step:
Creating the Salad
3 large Scallions, including green tops, chopped
3 ribs and leaves Celery, finely chopped
3 Carrots, finely chopped
cooked Bean-Pea Medley
4-6 pieces Red leaf lettuce, coarse chiffonade

Add carrots, celery, and scallions to the salad bowl. Stir so that all the ingredients are well coated.
Next, add the bean-pea medley. Fold these into the mixture, again so that everything is well coated with the vinaigrette. Fold gently so you don’t break up the beans. Finally, fold in the shreds of lettuce.
Taste for seasonings–adjust for salt, top with a little more zest and black pepper.
Serves 8

Cooks Notes:
Serve the salad room temperature. The longer it sits in the vinaigrette, the more pronounced the fresh flavors become.
The salad is vegan, but lends itself readily to other ingredients.
Try adding these:
Soft Goat Cheese
Crumbled Feta
Toasted Walnuts or Pinenuts

Sometimes a certain dish or ingredient or aroma can trigger a memory:
Food is powerful that way.

After Maggie and I made her south Louisiana red lentil soup, it set me thinking—people all over the world eat these delicious little discs, and in so many different ways.

I recalled how my daughter reported making, with great relish, a simple, spicy, and fortifying red lentil soup when she lived in Bahar Dar, Ethiopia.

In 2006, Madeleine spent four months in this lakeshore town doing her public health internship for the Amharic Development Association (ADA.) She found cooking at home to be a necessary, but daunting prospect.

Her ADA-provided house, located in the faranji (foreigners) neighborhood, appealed at first glance: a cream and periwinkle concrete bungalow in a yard of flowering bushes and a producing lime tree. Its charming garden and cheerful exterior belied its beyond-Spartan furnishings.

The kitchen was outfitted with a library desk, a hot plate, and nothing more. A bare faucet jutted out of the living room wall, around which, at her coaxing, the landlord clumsily hung a long, shallow sink. The refrigerator was absent, a promise never delivered.

“Everything about eating is hard,” she wrote me. “To eat chicken, you must buy a live chicken from the market, take it home, slaughter it and clean it. The onions that I bought on Saturday have already rotted. Tonight I had oatmeal.”

A daughter’s struggles with the very basics of living are the sorts of things that make a mother toss and turn at night —especially when there’s ends-of-the-earth distance involved. So I was ecstatic to learn that she’d found a nutritious dish easily made in such austere conditions. And it tasted good!

There’s precious little required: the lentils themselves, garlic, onions, dried spices, tomatoes, water. And that precious little was accessible to her. Even then, the lentils had to be painstakingly sorted— rocks the same size and color were in the mix. That accomplished, a satisfying meal was just thirty minutes away.

I got to experience “the kitchen” firsthand. As her internship was winding up, Bill and I made the long journey to visit her and this land of extremes. Before embarking on our family adventure south to Omo Valley, we spent a week in Bahar Dar and often cooked meals in her home.

A rough and wide dirt road leading to her ‘hood was lined with assorted vendor stands and shops selling everything from coffeebeans to phonecards, the air laced with dust, spice, smoke from wood-burning ovens. On our walk to her house, we would stop at a favored store to buy water and produce for dinner.

Everything was so small–golf ball sized onions and plum tomatoes, avocados that were mostly pit. Once home, I enjoyed selecting large ripe limes from the garden tree: a squeeze in the mesir wat —vegetarian lentil stew— added brightness.

There’s a real pleasure in living so immediately, using what little you have at hand to make a good meal for yourself.
I’m grateful that it’s a pleasure whose challenge I don’t have to face daily.

Ah, Spice, smoke, dust: some Bahar Dar memories conjured up in a spoonful of thick red lentil soup.

Cooking the spices–”blooming”– in the oil, followed by lightly toasting the lentils before adding liquid brings depth of flavor to the soup.

Northern Ethiopia Style Red Lentil Soup
2 T. Olive Oil
1 t. Turmeric
1 t. Coriander
½ t. Cumin
½ t. Salt
¼ t. Red Pepper Flakes
1 medium Onion, small dice
2 cloves Garlic, minced
1 cup Red Lentils, rinsed
2 cups Water or 1 cup Vegetable Broth, 1 cup water
2 cups diced Tomatoes and juice
1-2 Bay Leaf

Lime juice, plain yogurt
Cilantro

Heat a 2-3 qt. saucepan (using medium heat), and add the olive oil. Stir in spices and allow them to “bloom” in the oil. Add onions and garlic, and stir so that all the pieces are well coated with oil and spice. Sauté until translucent, 3-5 minutes. Stir in lentils and cook for another 5 minutes, allowing the lentils to gently toast. Add vegetable broth, water, diced tomatoes and juice. Stir well. Add Bay leaves. Cover and simmer for 25 minutes. Stir occasionally. The lentils will break down and thicken. Thin with additional water or broth.
Taste and adjust for seasonings.

Garnish with a dollop of plain yogurt, a few sprigs of fresh cilantro, and a squeeze of fresh lime, if desired.

Delicious also served over a bed of rice.

In Ethiopia, one would serve injera–the large spongey pancake made from fermented teff. Lacking said grain, I took Maggie’s recipe for Skillet Buttermilk Cornbread and made corn cakes!

Buttermilk Corn Cakes
1 cup Plain White Corn Meal
1/3 cup Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
1 t. Salt
¼ t. Pepper
1 T. Sugar
½ t. Baking Soda
1 Egg
1 ½ cups Buttermilk
4 T. Vegetable Oil

Measure all the dry ingredients and whisk together in a bowl. Make a well in the dry mix, break in the egg, pour in the buttermilk and vegetable oil. Stir together–so that the batter is well mixed, but do not overbeat. There may be lumps, and that’s okay. Heat a skillet; when it’s sizzly-hot, ladle in the batter.
Flip after about one minute (you’ll see the edges brown and bubbles coming up through the center)
Repeat until you have used all the batter. If it gets too thick, you can thin it with a little buttermilk.

My friend Muna is well-known as a couturiere, but few are aware that she is as talented in the kitchen as she is in the sewing room. That same creative force that finds an exquisite fabric and fashions it into a standout ball gown finds its way into her dolmas (Turkish for “stuffed thing”.)

I first sampled those delectables when I helped serve at a party in her home a couple of years ago.

Her stuffed grape leaves were delicate wraps encasing a lemony herbed rice, but it was her stuffed onions, caramel-sweet, bursting with that same intense filling that kept me greedily circling back to the buffet. I couldn’t help myself. I rationalized this rapacious behavior as a cook’s curiousity–hmm…what’s in this dish–but it was more than that. They were addictively delicious.

After the sixth or seventh loop around the dolmas platter, clearly I was not curious–just hoggish—and had to stop. I pulled Muna aside, and pleaded,
“I must know how to make these.”

Muna was breezy, “Sure, I’ll teach you. I love to share my recipes.”

At last, I learned from the Dolmas Maestra. I recently helped her give a cooking class in a friend’s home. (And, it’s no surprise, there are other specialties in her repertoire worth sharing–more to come!) It’s always exciting to learn about new ingredients, new combinations of flavors, new cooking techniques. Muna is generous that way, so now to spread the fruits of that generosity for you to enjoy.

Stuffed Grape Leaves and Onions (Dolmas)
2 cups Basmati Rice—rinsed 2-3 times
3 stalks Celery, finely chopped
5 medium Onions: cut top and root end off each, slice lengthwise almost halfway to the heart of the onion and parboil until the onion can be easily pulled apart into “stuffable” pieces. Of the 5, take 1 whole and the hearts of the remaining 4, and chop finely.
1 large Tomato, finely chopped
2 big bunches fresh Italian Parsley, finely chopped
5 cloves Garlic, minced
Juice from 4 large Lemons (almost 1 cup)
1 T. dry Mint
1 T. Dillweed
1 ½ T. Tamarind Paste
1 small can Tomato Paste
Salt
Black Pepper
½ cup Olive Oil
Jar of Grape Leaves—rinse and dry the leaves, then de-stem

Heat olive oil in a large skillet. Add finely chopped garlic, onions, celery, tomatoes, parsley and sauté for a few minutes. Stir in rinsed rice, lemon juice, mint, dillweed, salt, pepper, tamarind and tomato pastes. Continue stirring and cooking until all the ingredients are well combined and the rice is well coated. Mixture is partially cooked.
Stuff the onions first.
Cut each grape leaf in half—down the center. Place a spoonful of rice mixture into the middle of each piece and roll up neatly—the leaves will be tight, but open on each end.
Layer in a Dutch oven or deep skillet (first onions, then grape leaves)and put a plate on top to press down on the rolled up pieces.
Add a little water.
Cook for the first 10 minutes on high, then simmer for one hour.
Cool slightly, and serve. Makes 25 stuffed onion pieces and 50 stuffed grape leaves.

SPECIAL TIPS:

When assembling the ingredients, you’ll notice one uncommon element– Tamarind Paste–which this curious cook could never have discerned and what indeed makes this dish extraordinary. Its particular tart/sweet pulp is also found in chutneys and more commonly known sauces like Worcestershire and Pickapeppa. I bought it at an international market, K&S, here in Nashville.

Dried mint leaves and fresh lemon juice are also key.

Muna rinses the basmati rice–at least twice–to remove any excess starch. The benefits are two-fold: Rinsed rice is more receptive to the flavors of accompanying ingredients and will steam up in less liquid.

Rather than wrapping the filling in the center of each leaf–the traditional method– Muna splits each leaf up the spine and rolls the filling up, cigar-fashion. “It makes a big difference.” she says, “the leaves cook more tender and the rice mix has more flavor. And, don’t worry, the filling won’t fall out.”

Using a lightly oiled Dutch oven, layer the bottom with the stuffed onions first, which buffer the grapeleaves from searing onto the bottom of the pot and infuse them with their sweetness.
Only a small amount of water is needed. Muna weighs the top with a dinner plate. “The plate on top is my mother’s trick. She also taught me that it is best to cook it on high heat for the first ten minutes. That high heat sears the onions. Then reduce it to low and just leave it alone for almost an hour.”

I don’t eat much meat anymore.

It didn’t come as a lightening bolt; there was no conscious decision. I consider myself an omnivore. I still relish the rare juicy-grilled ribeye. But, there has been a gradual shifting in my tastes, a falling away of carnivorous desires.

No doubt, I trace it back to an experience from a few summers ago, while Bill and I were on our first Out-West driving trip. Our serene cruise across these rolling Great Plains was sporadically jarred by scenes of agricultural squalor: CAFOs, “concentrated animal feeding operations.” Miserable, crowded feedlots…wrong for myriad reasons. These sorts of images settled in the psyche…and demanded resolution.

So, over time, I’ve moved away from a lot of meat in my diet. I haven’t missed it. When I do choose it, I do enjoy it. And, I try to buy that which is locally pasture-raised, pesticide-antibiotic-hormone free.
I’m happy to embrace the Michael Pollan Manifesto:
“Eat food. Not so much. Mostly plants.”

Following is a simple and beautiful “Mostly Plants” kind of recipe that I recently made for a small dinner gathering.
There’s much to love about it:
cheerful colors, contrasting textures, a balance of sweet-roasted buttery squash with savory-toasted pearly grains.
Its seasonings are minimal:
salt, pepper, and a hint of nutmeg are all that’s needed to enhance the butternut squash.
And, it’s versatile, pleasing just about anyone:
Vegetarians, vegans, heart-healthy dieters, weight-watching point-counters,
and evolving omnivores like me.

Sweet Peppers stuffed with Roasted Butternut Squash and Israeli Couscous

1 large Butternut Squash
4 large Sweet Red, Orange, Yellow Bell Peppers
1 large Onion
Olive Oil
Salt
Black Pepper
Nutmeg
1 ½ cups Israeli Couscous

Serves 6

Peel and cube squash; dice onion and one of the peppers. Toss together with 2 Tablespoons of olive oil. Sprinkle with sea salt, cracked black pepper, and just a few pinches of nutmeg. Spread out on a shallow baking pan and place in a hot (425 degree) oven. Roast for 20 minutes—until cubes are lightly browned. Remove and allow to cool on the pan.

Fill a deep skillet or pot with water and bring just to a boil. Cut remaining peppers in half, remove seeds, and plunge into water. Blanche for 5 minutes, then pull them out and let them drain and cool.

In a 2 quart saucepan with medium heat, coat the Israeli couscous with 1 Tablespoon of olive oil and sauté—about 5minutes– until the couscous gets a toasty look to it. Pour in 1 ½ cups of water and bring to a boil. Cover tightly and reduce heat to simmer. Cook for 12 minutes—until water is absorbed. Remove from heat and spoon in roasted vegetables, scraping in all the browned bits and oil. Fold the vegetables evenly throughout the couscous.

Coat a baking dish with oil. Place in pepper halves and stuff with couscous mixture.
Bake in a 350 degree oven for 20-25 minutes.