Squash, Apples And A Little Sage Advice For The Holidays

Best wishes from those of us here at Blue Cayenne (that would be me and Juliet) for a happy Thanksgiving. And, if the going gets tough around the table tomorrow, you might do well to remember the sage advice of Oscar Wilde: “After a…

Apples, Side Dishes, Vegetables, Vegetarian

November 16, 2018

Sticky Cranberry Gingerbread

Santa’s in the house (or, at least, in the neighborhood). It’s time to get your gingerbread on. This recipe is a riff on traditional gingerbread. It has generous dollops of fresh cranberry sauce stirred through the batter. What you get is a taste of traditional…

Cakes, Desserts, Vegetarian

November 12, 2018

Of Cabbages, Kings and Flying Pigs: Creamy Cabbage and Potato Soup

The time has come, the Walrus said,

To talk of many things:

Of shoes — and ships — and sealing-wax —

Of cabbages — and kings —

And why the sea is boiling hot —

And whether pigs have wings.

–Lewis Carroll

First, let’s talk a bit about cabbages.

Wild cabbage is thought to have first been consumed by humans thousands of years ago. Historical records show that ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans ate it. In fact, many considered cabbage a delicacy. Diogenes, the Greek cynic (You know the story. He was the one who carried a lantern around ancient Athens looking for an honest man.), is said to have consumed nothing but cabbage and water–not even a dolma for him!

The Egyptians and Romans were more fun, though. They consumed copious amounts of cabbage, to be sure, but their motives were skewed a bit more toward having a good time. They believed that eating cabbage before binging on alcohol would ward off a hangover and allow them to drink even more alcohol. No wonder Tut died at such a young age! It was the partying.

Later, at the height of the Ottoman Empire, the emperors sponsored sports clubs to demonstrate their power and train their cavalries for battle. The clubs also served another purpose. They provided the “bread and circuses” that kept the masses occupied and distracted. For a long time, the two most important Turkish sports clubs were, get this!, The Okras and The Cabbages–an homage to local production of the two popular vegetable crops. I don’t know about you, but I would have put my money on the Cabbages any day. I can only imagine the slime jokes that the Okra team was forced to endure.

During the age of exploration, European ship captains carried barrels of fermented cabbage to treat the wounds of their sailors and to ward off scurvy.

In more recent times, cabbage often has been relegated the background as a cheap food for the poor. Orwell’s 1984 envisioned the miserable life of the urban poor in tenements permeated by the smell of boiled cabbage. Lewis Carroll, though, approached cabbage with a little more serendipity in his poem The Walrus and The Carpenter (quoted above) from Through The Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There.

When World War I came along, cabbage took center stage again. The popular fermented cabbage dish, sauerkraut, was way-too-German for patriots in the west and was renamed “Liberty Cabbage.”

More recently, food scientists have extolled the health benefits of cabbage, a vegetable with almost no fat, that is rich in fiber and is high in vitamins C and K. Too, cabbage is a part of the brassica family that includes broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts and other cruciferous vegetables. Some scientists believe that regular consumption of brassicas can ward off some types of cancer, protect heart health and manage type two diabetes. Brassicas are also the second cheapest vegetable to consume, after potatoes.

Now that we’ve discussed cabbage, we need to move on to Lewis Carroll’s question about whether pigs can fly.

I’m pretty sure they can. Apparently, they get the window seat.

Here is a recipe for a warming chowder-like cabbage soup I like a lot.

Creamy Cabbage and Potato Soup

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Ingredients

1 T. extra virgin olive oil
1 medium onion (chopped)
1 russet potato (peeled and grated)
3/4 pound cabbage (about 1/2 medium head) (cored and shredded)
Salt to taste
5 C. vegetable stock
1 Parmesan rind
Freshly ground pepper to taste
2 C. milk or half and half
1 C. grated Gruyere cheese
3 russet potatoes (peeled and cut in medium chunks)
Garnish with French bread croutons, additional grated Gruyere cheese, grated carrots, minced fresh chives

Instructions

Heat olive oil in a large soup pot. Saute onions until they are tender (about 5 minutes). Add grated potato, shredded cabbage and 1/2 t. salt to the pot. Stir. Add stock, Parmesan rind, salt and pepper to taste. Bring soup to a simmer, cover with a lid, and cook for about 30 minutes. You want the vegetables to be tender.
Meanwhile, bake/boil/microwave three russet potatoes until they are tender. Peel the potatoes and cut them into medium-sized chunks. Set aside.
Add milk to soup pot and gradually add the Gruyere cheese, stirring constantly until the cheese has melted into the soup. Be careful not to boil the soup at this point. You don't want the milk to curdle. Add the cooked potato chunks and additional salt and pepper to your taste. Remove the Parmesan rind and discard.
Serve garnished with crispy croutons and your choice of colorful garnishes.
This soup is best on the second or third day after it is made. By that time, the flavors of the cabbage and other ingredients have matured.

Nutrition

Calories

1271 cal

Fat

88 g

Carbs

63 g

Protein

60 g

Click Here For Full Nutrition, Exchanges, and My Plate Info

https://bluecayenne.com/of-cabbages-kings-and-flying-pigs-creamy-cabbage-and-potato-soup

This recipe was adapted from one that appeared in the New York Times.

Chowder, Soups, Vegetables, Vegetarian

October 27, 2018

Let’s Party With Chocolate Bourbon Pecan Torte! Blue Cayenne is three!!!

It’s Blue Cayenne’s Birthday! This improbable journey started on a blustery October day three years ago. I desperately wanted to be a better writer, a better cook, and a better photographer, but I needed a nudge–a structured project to bring all those elements together…

Cakes, Chocolate, Desserts, Vegetarian

October 22, 2018

Barley And Lentil Salad With Feta

What a delightful way to get some fiber! According to the medical experts, you need about 30 grams of fiber each day (women/25 and men/38). This salad meets about half of your daily requirement. If you hog all the avocado, you get even closer…

Avocados, lentils, salad, Salad Dressings, Salads, Vegetables, Vegetarian

October 17, 2018

Fast Food: Skillet Chili

This probably never happens to you, but I sometimes find myself wanting to get in and out of the kitchen quickly after a tiring day. If I can do that and still produce a great meal, I’m one happy camper.

This is a recipe for a spur-of-the-moment meal, skillet chili. You’ll want to make it soon because it is very good and because you can make it in about half an hour. Don’t be afraid to adjust the spices to make it just as spicy as you want it to be. Be sure to use a good quality chili powder, though. The quality of your spices makes all the difference in this simple dish.

There is an extra bonus with this recipe. You get a recipe for wonderful pickled red onions.

The pickled onions are a perfect accompaniment for this chili (or, any chili) but this onion condiment is also good with a lot of other foods–salads, sandwiches, other Mexican foods, ice cream. OK. Maybe not ice cream.

The Epicurious site had a good line about pickled onions. “The first time you make pickled red onions, you will very likely slap your forehead and exclaim to anyone who may be listening, “What took me so long?” Because this simple condiment–which couldn’t be easier to prepare–has an uncanny, almost magical ability to completely transform just about every sandwich, burger, taco, sausage, and salad it touches.”

What took me so long, indeed.

Vegetable Skillet Chili

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Ingredients

For the Pickled Onions

1 lime
1 red onion or shallot (thinly sliced)
Salt (to taste)
Sugar (to taste)

For the Chili

Olive or grapeseed oil
3 garlic cloves (minced)
1 t. chile powder
1 t. dried oregano
1 t. whole cumin seeds
1 15-ounce can white kidney beans (or equivalent freshly-cooked dried beans; I used Rancho Gordo Marcella beans)
1 15-ounce can black beans (or equivalent freshly-cooked dried beans)
1 15-ounce can diced tomatoes (I used equivalent amount of fresh tomatoes and a little tomato sauce)
Salt to taste
Fresh cilantro, diced avocado and sour cream to garnish

Instructions

To make the pickled onions, slice a red onion as thinly as you can. Put the onion into a bowl with the juice of one fresh lime. Add salt and sugar to your taste and stir. Let the mixture sit on your counter for about 20 minutes. The onions will give off some of their red color and you will have pretty pickled onions after a brief period of marinating.
To make the chili, heat oil in a large skillet. Add the onion and saute until the onion is soft and beginning to take on a little color. Add the spices and garlic and saute briefly until the mixture is fragrant. Add the beans and tomatoes to the mixture and a little salt. Simmer until the tomatoes are heated through and begin to break down. This will take about 20 minutes.
Taste and adjust seasonings. Garnish with pickled onion, chopped cilantro, sour cream and diced avocado.