Blue Cayenne

This is a wonderful quiche recipe. It is adaptable to just about whatever you have in your refrigerator crisper.

I used broccoli, red pepper and spinach in my recipe and it was great. This is a Melissa Clark recipe and she used sweet potato, bacon and parsley in the original recipe.

While this quiche is special enough (and pretty enough) to serve at a party, it is perfect reheated in your oven for weeknight meals. I’ve enjoyed slices of this quiche with a bowl of hearty lentil soup (Egyptian Lentil Soup) but also with a light green salad dressed with an assertive vinaigrette (Little Black Dress Vinaigrette). Don’t tell anyone, but I’ve also enjoyed a slice (or two…or three!)  for breakfast with a steaming pot of my best Darjeeling tea and my morning New York Times .World news may be frightening but this quiche makes for a substantial and delicious start for the day.

The crust in this recipe is really nice, too. Clark’s trick for reinforcing the edges of the quiche shell makes for a sturdy quiche shell that holds together.

This recipe is from Melissa Clark’s Dinner in French cookbook. You can order the book through your local bookstore or on Amazon here.

Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen.

I have three cauliflower heads in my refrigerator right now–a beautiful orange one, a pristine white one and a spectacularly purple-hued  one. The bins at my farmers market have been  full of beautiful multi-colored cauliflowers in recent weeks. Although I live alone, the temptation to buy one of each was just  too strong last week. So here I am with a delicious overstock of cauliflowers and a wealth of delicious options.

I’m a summer soup kind of girl, so one of the cauliflowers is destined for a creamy Cauliflower Soup. I’ve featured Cauliflower Soup on Blue Cayenne before. In fact, there are a number of good cauliflower dishes here (just type cauliflower into the search box to the right!). Here is a link to the recipe I plan to make with the white cauliflower: Cauliflower, Potato and Cheese Soup.    It’s delicious and it’s pretty, too.

But…back to the intensely-colored purple Cauliflower. What to do with that one?

I decided to give it a main-dish “steak” treatment and let the just-tender texture of the cauliflower shine through. Then, I came across this easy romesco sauce recipe and voila! I had a wonderful dinner entree that maximized flavor and showcased the cauliflower’s purple beauty.

About the romesco sauce…

It has quite a long history. Spanish cooks have been making this sauce since the 15th century. Food historians believe the sauce originated around the Catalonian port town of Tarragona and was originally served as a sauce for fish. The original dish featured tomatoes but modern cooks have developed variations including this one that uses roasted sweet red peppers. 

The spicy romesco sauce is wonderful (and beautiful!) served as a base for the pretty cauliflower cutlet but keep in mind that it would be great served with other dishes as well. Ottolenghi has featured beautiful stalks of green asparagus perched a top a schmear of intense red romesco. (Gotta try that one soon!)

This recipe is from the cookbook Weekday Vegetarians by Jenny Rosenstrach. The book can be ordered through your local bookstore and on Amazon here.

Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen.

Every month Blue Cayenne features recipes from our archive of more than four hundred recipes. These recipes are our “Oldies But Goodies.” Today’s Oldies But Goodies recipe is for a classic dessert, Pavlova.

Here is the link: Pavlova..

Want to dive deeper into our archive? Just click one of the categories at the top of this page or use the category search drop down menu on the right side of this page.

And…here is a link to Blue Cayenne’s main page:Blue Cayenne Food and Photography Blog. . If you are in the mood to cook (or eat!), we hope you will take a moment to look at the many excellent recipes we have featured.