Dip It!

The weather being the best conversation starter there is, let me just tell you that I have nothing but complaints on it. It’s been a continuation of winter for about as long as spring has officially started.

As much as we WANT to buy spring fare, what I really want to EAT are stews and roasts and real mac’n'cheese.

The produce vendors however, are plowing on and trying to convince us of the season by offering asparagus, rhubarb and (globe) artichokes. And because I am a sucker for marketing, i fell into their terrible ploy (for the third time, might I add!), caved and bought artichokes.

As a child I have never been incredibly fond of artichokes, and a bout of stomach flu a few years back left a truly terrible memory involving the lovely thistle hearts(variation, a pseudo-writers best friend!) paired with spaghetti, and I will leave the rest to your imagination. I mainly got them at the markthalle because my toddler boy is absolutely in love with dipping. Dipping for him, is food at it’s funnest (as opposed to funnIEST). i figured therefore, that artichokes (how many times will I type artichokes in this post, hmm? well, better read on and count!) were a nice change and a bit of fun for the rainy dinners.

The artichokes were steamed and I served them with two dips: a variation on the classic italian salsa verde - a green sauce (my linguistics skills are unparalleled) made with fresh herbs, capers and anchovies - for the husband and me, and a surefire winner for all of us, which is a tahini-yoghurt sauce spiced with ras-el-hanout (a very fragrant north african spice/herb mix including cumin, fenugreek, coriander and mild chili, to name a few).

Artichokes with Double Dip

prep time: 5 min/dip and 40 min total for the artichokes

For the Artichokes

count one artichoke per person

pot with a steamer inlay or a pressure cooker fitted with a steamer inside.

Cut of the long Stem of the artichokes to about 1/2 cm of the globe. Chop pf the tips of leaves with scissors or simply cut a couple of cms of the top. Place in a bowl of cold water with a splash of lemon to prevent them from turning black.

When you are ready to cook, place the artichokes ionside the steamer basket and steam them for about 15-20 min or until tender. Reduce the cooking time appropriately if you are steaming them in a pressure cooker ( my guess would be about 10 min after the cooker is starting to vent steam)

Serve the artichokes hot or cold. to eat, pull out the leaves and dip them into a classic vinaigrette, or even just olive oil and lemon or this, or whatever else you like. To eat the artichoke heart, pull or cut out the hairy fuzzy part, the heart is what lies underneath.

For the Salsa Verde

4 tbsp olive oil or more
1 tbsp basil
1 tbsp mint
1 tbsp flat leaf parsley
1 tbsp cilantro (optional)
1 tbsp capers (either salted or brined, be sure to rinse the salted ones well!)
3-4 anchovies, packed in oil or salt (again, if salted, make sure to rinse them well)
splash of lemon juice, or more to taste

Put all the ingredients in a food processor and whizz together until it all comes together. Alternately, you can chopp up the herbs, capers and anchovies finely and blend with the lemon juice and the olive oil. Your sauce needs to look green, and solid, between a vinaigrette and a pesto.

For the Yoghurt-Tahini Sauce

1 tbsp tahini (sesame butter)
1/2 cup of yoghurt
juice of one lime/lemon
1 tsp mint
1 tsp ras-el-hanout

salt and pepper to taste

Whisk together all the ingredients and let stand for a little while. The tahini will cause the sauce to thicken slightly. If you find it a little to runny, add some more of the sesame butter.

Both sauces/dips will keep covered in the fridge for a few days, but make sure to check because mint can sometimes cause dishes to go bad quickly.

More From the Healthy Ones

After having made this salad (and yes, I am quoting myself — sue me!) approximately 100 times in the last weeks, we all got a little bored of broccoli. This is when I remembered a similar take on raw vegetables with fennel. It’s more of a guideline than a recipe and (i feel supremely pontifying typing these words) you can use the base with many different vegetables.

The fun thing about this salad and the other one, is the classic combo of acid and salt, somewhat like a salt and vinegar chip. You could replace the fennel with carrots, or green beans or cooked potatoes even.

Fennel Slaw with Toasted Sesame

prep time: 10min, marinate for as long as you can stand!

1-2 fennel bulbs cut in thin slices, with a mandoline if you have one you showoff, you!
juice of one big lemon
1 tsp salt
2 tsp sesame seeds
olive oil

In a salad bowl, mix the lemon juice and salt. Add the sliced fennel and toss to combine. Heat up a pan on high heat and toast the sesame until fragrant. Sprinkle still hot over the fennel and add olive oil. Eat straight up or let it marinate a while.

the Gwyneth Salad

Lately, we’ve been having lots of dinners that we were so impatient to eat, that i forgot to take pictures of them. Or that i was too embarassed to blog about for lack of a ‘recipe’ to share. These dinners having all been on the fattening side of life (I am talking ‘Raclette’, here people!), this is where i seem to still be stuck, too.

Enter: the gwyneth salad

I saw this salad when it appeared in the ny times dining section and was strangely appealed to it. Really, though who wouldn’t want to it a salad involving raw broccoli? I can hear my sister making gagging sound all the way from Switzerland (wave! hi!) and frantically trying to tell me not to make ANYTHING involving broccoli.

Good thing I learned long ago that it doesn’t always pay to follow directives from your older sibling - one incident involved me eating soap after having been told it was chocolate. I was 2, and no, no bubbles appeared out of my mouth and nose, contrary to one particular tintin album - and followed through with the recipe. Of course, I couldn’t help but substitute a few things here and there, for instance 4 raw garlics cloves and raw broccoli sounds like something only a crazy person on a macrobiotic diet would eat (hence the ‘gwyneth’ for all you trashy magazine readers out there). And 3/4 cup of olive oil seemed equally excessive in light of our recent raclette-fest, so i used enough to cover my pan. oh, and I only marinated it for about 40 min, because I couldn’t stop myself from eating it!

Marinated Raw Broccoli Salad

prep time: 10min, marinate for 1h, I dare you!

1-2 heads of broccoli, cut in florets with the stalks sliced a few mm thick
1 1/2 tsp red wine vinegar
1 tsp salt
2 tsp cumin seeds
1 peeled garlic clove, halved
pinch of dried red pepper
1 tsp toasted sesame oil
olive oil

salad bowl, saucepan

Mix the vinegar and salt in a salad bowl and toss through the broccoli. Cover the bottom of a saucepan with olive oil and heat the cumin seeds and the garlic clove until fragrant.* Add the sesame oil and the dried red pepper. Pour the mixture over the broccoli, combine and marinate at room temperature for 1 h. The salad keeps in the fridge for about a day or so. don’t forget to take out the garlic before serving!

*oh, and if you feel like swishing some hot oil around your pan chef-style… don’t do it. Olive oil doesn’t look really great when it’s splashed on a white wall…

Back to Our Regular Programming - A Simple Lunch for Two

We are back at home and settling into our old routine and cooking habits after weeks of indulgences at my parents house.

Since the husband works from home, and I am still on maternity leave, we share a lunch of salad or soup with a sandwich on the side. I am a huge fan of soups of all kinds, since they are quick to make (especially if you have a pressure cooker), tasty and generally pretty healthy. With the addition of fresh herbs and/or spices, you can turn pretty much anything on hand into a soup(yes, probably even Nutella!)

Today, was a leek and red lentil dahl which turned out reliably tasty, with the perfect amount of spicy and lots of cilantro. Being borderline obsessive about nutrients, I added some fresh veggetable in form of leeks, which i substituted for onions. My obsession, by the way is a futile attempt to right the wrongs caused by my uncontrolled chocolate consumption, and it is in that spirit, that I recommend adding fresh vegetables or herbs to a soup with dried benas or lentils. The vitamin C in fresh produce helps the iron contained in the legumes (I know, I am a total show-off for using the smartypantsword “legumes” to talk about dried beans, peas and lentils of all kinds!) to be absorbed by your body - This fun fact brought to you courtesy of every german midwife I encountered in my two pregnancies!

Leek and Red Lentil Dahl

Prep Time: 10 min cooking time: 15 min

2 tbsp of olive oil
3/4 cup (100 g) red lentils
1 cup (250 ml) water
1 small leek, cleaned and thinly sliced
1/2 tsp curcuma
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
1/2 tsp coriander seeds
1/2 tsp mustard powder
2 small dried chilies (or more)
fresh cilantro ( I used about 1/4 cup for 2 servings)
salt to taste

1 medium sized saucepan / stockpot

Grind all the spices together in a mortar or an electric grinder. Heat up the olive oil in a stockpot and fry up the spices at medium heat until they fragrant.

Add the thinly sliced leek and the lentils and cook, stirring for a few more minutes. Add the water and bring to a boil. Cover and let it simmer on reduced heat for about 10 minutes or until the lentils are tender.
Add salt and garnish with the cilantro.