Sweet potato adds a nice twist to an old favorite

This time of year, the local organic delivery service brings a predictable bounty: squash, apples, squash, sweet potatoes, squash, kale, Squash, SWEET POTATOES – AHHH!

I’m not one to complain, because eating locally and seasonally is important. It’s just that in the middle of winter, one starts to run out of ideas for how to create new flavors and dishes out of the same ole’ ingredients.

Why moreovers: because they aren’t leftover from anything: I simply have more of them than I need.

Finding myself with an abundance of sweet potatoes, a baked off 5 or 6, ate a few with dinner and pondered what to do with the rest. The result, sweet potato gnocchi. I’d never made gnocchi before, so I’m not sure what caused me to venture into these tenuous waters with sweets. The process was somewhat arduous. However, the end result was rewarding: It made me feel as though I’d broken through a barrier of sweet potato and squash dishes. It’s also encouraged me to be a lot more adventurous with these ingredients in the future (though, let’s face it, I’m a bit impatient for spring’s bounty).

For those of you who’ve made Gnocchi before and feel comfortable with the ratios, you’ll know how best to proceed for the Gnocchi you prefer.

Here are a few great links with instructions for pulling together Potato Gnocchi:

Anna Maria Volpi’s fabulous pictorial Gnocchi Recipe

About.Com’s Easy Gnocchi

My recipe is as follows:

Scoop out the flesh from 4-5 medium sized sweet potatoes

Puree the flesh in a food processor to establish a base consistency. Above is a picture of my blended sweets prior to adding the other ingredients.

Place in a bowl and add 1.5 cups of flour, 1 egg (beaten) and 1 cup of Parmesan cheese. Don’t forget Mrs S. and Mr. P.

Mix together until it starts to become a dough (this can be quite messy…just warning you). Once the “dough” has come together, put a sheet of parchment down on a cutting board and on a flat cookie sheet. Sprinkle some flour on each.

Remove a palm-sized ball of dough from the mixture and roll it out on the floured cookie sheet by hand, until it starts to take the shape of a long, thin, baton. When its approximately the size of your index finger, begin to cut into half inch pieces with a knife. Now, one of the common methods for shaping gnocchi involves rolling the small pieces over the tines of a fork. I had no patience for this. I gave each piece a quick roll in my hand, dropped onto the floured sheet and pressed lightly into the center with my thumb.

After I’d filled the tray with gnocchi, I covered them with plastic wrap and put them into the fridge for a few hours. Don’t know why. I just did.

Boil water with salt. Cook gnocchi about 7 minutes. They’ll start to float on the top, at which time i gave them a couple more minutes. Turned out it was 7 in total.

While they’re in the pot, boiling away, add a half a stick of butter, a half a cup of chicken stock, white pepper and a glug of wine to the pan. Cook down until the sauce starts to bubble and reduce. Then, add your pieces of sage, probably 8-10 sprigs, torn and bruised, to the pan.

Cook on medium until you smell the sage and the mixture starts to brown. This should coincide with the finished gnocchi. Drain the little suckers, but reserve some water for the butter sauce.

Add your gnocchi and a half a ladle of the pasta water to the pan and cook on hight until the mixture begins to thicken.

Plate, add a few of the moreover pieces of fresh sage and the remainder of the parm (less, of course, if it’s only you). It should look roughly like the photo above (which look different from each other because I’m still messing around with the best indoor settings on my camera. It’s a never-ending struggle).

This recipe isn’t perfect. If you have one using sweet potatoes that you prefer, I’d love to hear about it.

More later,

Will

(NOTE: I added the cherry tomato after I took the picture, feeling that the color and sweetness would help. It did)

This version of recipe play brings us back to the always important issue of material re-use. Sounds scientific. It’s not. It merely means identifying opportunities to use the moreovers you have from a recipe (broccolini stems, in this instance) in other, creative ways. In these tough economic times, this isn’t only a good use of resources, it’s extremely economical as well.

For those of you who haven’t experienced the wonders of broccoli stems, you’re missing out. Just beneath the tough external skin lives a sweet flesh, perfect for dicing up into batons and eating raw with a nice vinaigrette, or, in this instance, for adding subtle, herbaceous sweetness to a light, primi course pasta.

Chow lists some other ideas foodies have suggested for broccoli stems.

You might notice I’ve used spaghetti a lot lately. Well, if that’s what you have on hand, don’t be afraid to use it. It’s more versatile, in my humble opinion, than many types of pastas and is amenable to a variety of different types of treatment.

If you’re making broccoli for another meal, simply cut the stems and reserve for later. They won’t keep too long, so don’t forget about them in the back of the fridge. They’ll get lonely, and when you finally get around to using them, that neglect will come out in the flavor.

First things first; cook the pasta to al dente in salted water and drain. This dish will not turn out well if you forget the salted water.

Next, approach the broccoli stem. Shave off the rough exterior skin with a veg. peeler. Then, continue with the peeler, turning the stem to shave off even slices. continue until you have what amounts to a rough handful for each small serving of the pasta. I made about three servings.

Now, if you have onion lying around, the acid will be a nice complement. I had green onion, so I shaved it in a like manner.

Now, add a small glug of oil to a saute pan and set it to medium. As soon as the oil heats slightly, add a crushed, but still intact garlic clove. It’s important to flavor the oil slightly, but not to cook the garlic or add it to the dish. As soon as the smell becomes strong (you know, that garlic smell you love) and the garlic begins to brown, remove from the pan.

Add the stems and onion to the oil and saute gently (low-med). You’re just looking to heat them slightly and add the flavor of the garlic oil.

Now, I wanted the subtle flavors to pop, so I opened the cupboard and turned to my old friend Cider Vinegar. I’ve capitalized it here because, well, it deserves the respect.

Add one to one and a half caps full of the CV. to the pan and toss. As always, remember to season appropriately with Mr. S and Mrs. P.

Add halved cherry tomatoes and toss (As always at Recipe Play, I encourage you to experiment with your own vegetable additions. Remember, the goal is for this to be a light, pre-main course pasta dish, or a light lunch. If you come up with something fun, please drop me a line).

Add pasta with tongs and saute ever so slightly, tossing to distribute the ingredients. Add a bit of shaved parm or pecorino romano and toss again once, plating immediately and serving with fresh cracked black pepper.

More later

Tis the season for holiday parties and the inevitable aftermath of mix matched h’orderves and leftover cheese and fruit plates.

While snacking on these types of leftovers for dinner (hey, we’ve all done it) fits more with your idea of a cocktail party and less as proper meal, think again.

Store bought and catered snacks are great fodder for recipe play.

Take, for example, mini-crab cakes. In this version of recipe play, I merely heated up crab cakes in a saute pan with the following:

• 1/8 cup chicken stock
• Dried basil
• Tablespoon of tomato sauce
• Frozen corn

Cook pasta to al dente. Drain.

As the crab cakes come to temperature (they’re likely frozen, or merely cold) mash them with a fork and combine the mixture. As soon as it starts to sizzle and brown ever so slightly, add spaghetti in batches with tongs to ensure a proper mixture.

Finish with a dash of basil and fresh cracked black pepper. If you have a red bell pepper lying around looking for something to do, dice half and add to tossed pasta for a hint of sweetness and that always-important dash of color.

If you’re looking for more of a comforting dish, add mozzarella or parm into the pan while the crab cake mixture is hot and be sure to fold it in to ensure the cheese is melty.

Enjoy.

Comfort food, pumpkin style

A great Italian store near my apartment (Vace) sells this amazing stuffed pasta. I’ve had my eye on it for about 6 months, but the season just didn’t seem right. I added a thinly sliced celery, shallots, sauted (smashed not chopped or diced, and removed after about five minutes) a handful of walnuts and dried cranberries, shaved Parmesan and roughly chopped Italian parsley.

Toast shallots and celery in pat of butter and olive oil, add smashed garlic and saute until slight colored. Remove the garlic. Add pasta to salted boiling water. Cook 6 minutes.

Add the walnuts and toast for a couple of minutes. Add cranberries and reduce heat to barely a simmer.

After the pasta has cooked, drain and save some of the water for the pan. Add pasta to pan and a bit of the water, toss over medium heat a few times and add a few grates of parm. Toss a few times, add Mr. S and Mrs. P and parsley. Turn off heat, toss a few times and let sit. Serve pasta on warm plates with extra shaves of parm and chopped parsley.

It’s a very seasonal dish, mixing the semi sweet pumpkin flavors with the dried berries, toasted nuts, celery and garlic, and then rounded out with the salty, smokey parm and the ever-vegetal parsley. It’s a beautiful combination. Serve it with a nice oakey Chardonnay and maybe a mixed green salad with a simple vinaigrette.

This is definitely a keeper for the fall. Serves large numbers easily and re-heats well.

I’ll upload the specific recipe when I make it a second time (and now that i know it’s worth the attention).

W

Don't attempt to adjust your screen, my camera just sucks

Few things are more delicious than a mushroom, sautéed properly in butter and salt and pepper.

Mushrooms encapsulate the dark, earthy flavors of the fall and were, last night, the primary ingredient in one of my favorite comfort foods.

• Butter
• Olive Oil
• Linguine
• Mushrooms (use what you have – I used two cartons for a generous helping)
• Truffle Oil
• Parsley
• Parm
• Salt and Pepper

Wash mushrooms and dry. Slice mushrooms, not too thin. You can use all sorts of different kinds of mushrooms for this dish. I encourage you to try different kinds.

For this recipe, I have used both white button and baby bellos, and bellos and shitakes. The later is slightly more flavorful for obvious reasons.

Drop a dollop of butter, maybe a tablespoon, in a pan with a touch of olive oil.

Sautee mushrooms in butter and olive oil, add a pinch of salt and be patient.

Note: when sautéing mushrooms, don’t turn or stir too often. Mushrooms contain quite a bit of water, and if you’re constantly reintroducing a cold side of the mushroom to the hot pan, you’ll end up, in essence, steaming the mushroom and producing limp, rubbery shrooms rather than slightly browned, flavorful and properly sautéed ones.

First you’ll hear the sizzle, then see increasing amounts of steam, and then the water will begin to render out into the pan. After a few minutes of this, turn the mushrooms and repeat.

Before the first turn of the mushrooms, add linguine to salted, boiling water. Cook to Al Dente, roughly 8-9 minutes depending on your stove and the boil.

After a few turns, the mushrooms should be well sautéed – looking slightly colored, and not gray and watery. If they arrive at their destination a bit early, remove from the heat while the pasta finishes. When the pasta is done, drain.

Add mushrooms back to the heat at a simmer. Add two teaspoons or truffle oil and toss or stir. Add pasta with tongs in phases, mixing the mushrooms and the pasta. Add chopped parsley and continue to toss over the simmer, ensuring that the mushrooms and pasta are well mixed. Finally, drizzle a tablespoon of truffle oil over the mixture. You should smell it as it rises up in the steam off the pasta mixture. You may want to experiment with the amount of truffle oil you use (not all t-oils are created equal, I’m afraid). Toss one or two more times and add to individual bowls. Add a pinch of sea salt, a few cracks of black pepper, a few shaving of Parm and a pinch of raw chopped parsley and serve. Goes well with a full bodied white or a medium bodied red.

More later,
Will

Tonight, I found the following: frozen shrimp (Trader Joe’s pre-cooked frozen shrimp), frozen asparagus spears, linguine, a lemon, pre cut, but fresh, flat leaf parsley, two garlic cloves, unsalted butter and grated Parmesan cheese.

What I ended up pulling together was one of the best dishes I’ve made in some time. Most of the fun is eating it, of course, but it’s rewarding to create something new out of nothing, a creation all your own that deserves in your own private recipe book.

So, here’s my memory of how it all came together:

• Boil water for the pasta and add a tablespoon of salt to the water. FULL DISCLOSURE: I rarely measure but this is safe bet for salting cooking water for pasta.

• Thaw the shrimp (I picked out about 12-15) in a colander under cold running water for 5 minutes or so. cut the tails off and set aside.

• Thaw the asparagus spears under the cold running water

SIDE NOTE: resist the urge to use the microwave to thaw either of the above ingredients. There are a million reasons why.

• ..back to the asparagus. Dry the spears and cut into two-inch sections.

• Take a zester or, what I prefer, a peeler and pull three to four long peels off the lemon. Dice the peels of lemon.

• Crush the two cloves of garlic and dice

• Add a quarter inch pat of butter to the pan (I eyeball this)

• One tablespoon of olive oil

• Set the heat on low-med

• when the butter starts to bubble, add the garlic.

• Cook on low-med for about a minute and then add the shrimp for two minutes (it’s cooked, so all you really want to do is heat it)

• Add the asparagus, the lemon peel, salt, black pepper and parsley (a generous four finger pinch)

• Toss the mixture a few times and let it sit.

• The water in the shrimp and the asparagus will continue to render out into the pan. That’s a good thing.

• The water should be boiling now, so add your pasta and cover with a lid. You’re really only going to want to cook the pasta for 4-5 minutes until PRE al-dente. You’ll add to the mixture in the saute pan later so it will continue to cook a little.

• You’ll notice that there is more liquid in the pan now that you’ve let it sit for a few minutes. Turn up the heat to medium-medium high and continue to toss.

• JUST prior to pulling the pasta off the heat and draining, add a generous amount of the Parmesan cheese to the mixture. Don’t mix it in, just let it sit on top of the mixture.

• Drain the pasta and immediately add it in phases to the mixture, tossing or mixing after each bit. You don’t want the starch to overwhelm the flavor so don’t add so much pasta that the shrimp look lost. They like each other, so keep them close together.

• Now, at this point I added about a teaspoon of white truffle oil I had laying around. It’ sa nice finishing touch just before the last toss of the pasta.

• The cheese will be all “melty” now. turn off the heat, transfer to a bowl, finish off with another dusting of the cheese and perhaps some finishing sea salt and enjoy.

I thought it was an amazing summer dish that’s a snap to pull together last minute. I imagine it would be even better with completely fresh ingredients, but after making this, these are probably things i’ll keep on hand in the freeze for those nights i forget to shop for fresh food.

One point of note on the lemon. I find that the rind, rather than the juice, is incredibly more effective in imparting that fresh lemon flavor. It obviously lacks the acid and doesn’t add to the liquid. I’ve become a big fan of this method.

Okay, well, that’s it for now. I have a ton of these types of dishes I pull together.

In the future, I’d like to take on challenges from the blog. Perhaps some of you will write to me at wbsullivan@gmail.com and give me a list of ingredients to try to make something with. I promise I will be most honorable in figuring something out on my own without the help of the Web or a recipe.