Rhubarb Mocktail

I've had a crazy busy week for the memorial day weekend. I've got an awesome strawberry rhubarb bread pudding to share with you later in the week, but I'm going to keep you in suspense for a few more days. Today is just going to be a real quickie as I share this recipe for a rhubarb and rosemary simple syrup that stirs into seltzer for a refreshing mock-tail! Check it out! Great for my prego buddies Maureen and Kristen!

I'm looking for more great N/A drink recipes for refreshing summer sippers, so if you've got one, shout it out!

Vegetarian Split Pea Soup

I spotted this recipe last week when I had zero groceries to my name and found myself rooting through all sorts of dry goods to piece together a meal. I was missing the onion and lemon, but today I had both of those essential ingredients for this vegetarian split pea soup, and it seemed the perfect day to discover if the myth that eating hot food on a hot day was fact or crap.

I halved this recipe and the only other alteration I made was to keep the quantity of lemon juice in tact as my lemon wasn't very juicy. When juicing lemons at home, a basic reamer will do ya, but if you do any more aggressive home juicing, I recommend this nifty gadget. It's perfect for when the mood for fresh agave margaritas strikes!

I always start with the best ingredients I can get, and this goes doubly so for a recipe with such a short ingredient list, so when I saw that the recipe called specifically for smoked paprika and mine was labeled "Spanish" I hit the interwebs to see if there's a difference. Pondering the provenance of your paprika? Hit this link for a little knowledge and use these tips to conduct a spice audit if your seasonings saw the better half of the last decade.

This soup was fast, tasted fresh and was very filling. I'm still sizzling, but that could have to do more with the fact that I'm too cheap to turn my Flintstone's era A/C on.

I've gotta bolt and get a kettle on for a water bath (as long as I'm already sweating!). Tomorrow I'll let you know how my first attempt at bread pudding goes. If you don't see anything, you can assume the answer is bad!

Watermelon Mint Salad

Produce stands mounded with watermelons are a sure sign of summer as are the sweltering temps we're already suffering through as we lead into the Memorial Day holiday. I whipped up this simple watermelon and mint salad for lunch, but it could easily be scaled up in size as an ideal dish to pass at your next holiday picnic. I saw a similar recipe online that also called for some diced jalepeno pepper. If I had one, it would definitely be in the mix!

The ingredient list is basic:
Watermelon
Mint
Flat leaf parsley
Green Onion
Olive Oil
White Wine Vinegar (Champagne or Red wine would work too)
Salt and pepper to taste

Cut the watermelon into large chunks, toss in finely chopped parley, diced green onion and a chiffonade of mint. Click here for a great video of this technique.

I stole the mint from Jane next door as per usual, and I'm now the proud owner of a mini herb garden of my very own. I picked up some mixed herb pots at Stein's Garden Center for about $6 a pop. Each included three different herbs. I was at the market later and priced out those packaged fresh herbs and they're about $3 each. If you've got a sunny spot in a window and can remember to water your herbs, you'll come out way ahead in the long run and will always have some fresh flavor to add to any meal.

For the dressing mix 2 parts olive oil to one part vinegar and add salt and pepper to taste. Toss with the other ingredients and let it hang out for a few minutes to really soak in the flavor.

Garnish with a few sprigs of the mint, and you're ready to be the toast of the potluck party.

Strawberry and Rhubarb Crumble

I've always had an affinity for baking, and for years I've fallen into the baker's camp versus the cook's camp. I enjoy the precision of the recipes: an exact teaspoon of this added to 3 cups of this folded into two of those and viola, a delicious sweet treat.

While I'm sure my husband would love it if I baked a bit more these days, there's always the danger that I'll turn into Miranda from Sex and the City, you know that episode where she digs the brownies out of the trash so she can finish the pan. Extra classy.

Well last week we had the lovely Sarah Karls over (don't know Sarah, she rocks, visit her at the Mansion Hill Inn in Madison, Wis.) and to celebrate my scrabble win I ended my hiatus from the oven and whipped up this fabulous Strawberry and Rhubarb Crumble from page 132 of Bon Appetit's May issue.

The great thing about crumbles and crisps is that even if you haven't had a ton of baking success, they are what many would call "chef's desserts" in that they don't require the precision of pastries. Measurements don't have to be exact for you to get a wonderful result.

I've currently got enough rhubarb to make crisp for all of China, so adding it to this dessert was a no brainer. In fact, the only items I added to Adam's market list were some berries and ice cream. He came home with Hagen-Dazs, this boy know what he's doing!

I didn't have the hazelnuts, but have plenty of others on hand, so I subbed in some pecans.

I also didn't have enough white sugar, so I used brown instead for a portion of it.

The most important flavor enhancer in this recipe is the vanilla bean. Whole beans are a splurge, but I am of the opinion that they are totally worth it. Extract don't even begin to touch the power of the pure vanilla seeds. If you do opt for extract make sure you're getting the real deal and not that McCormick extract.

I also really like how this recipe had you use your hands to make the topping, it was a lot more effective than the food processor technique that leaves the topping too uniform in texture.

I plan on whipping up another crumble tonight. I've got an apple in the fridge so it might make the cut. Use whatever fruits and berries you've got on hand. This same topping would be wonderful over a combo of pears and apples with raspberries or maybe a blueberry/blackberry duo would do it. Use what's in season, what you've got and what you love and it's sure to be delish!

Garbanzo and Walnut Pasta

So today didn't entirely go to plan. I hopped in the car to head to the DMV to get a replacement title, and the sucker died right on my street. (I think the old gal was worried I was selling her. Don't worry babe, come home and I'll drive you straight into the ground.)

Any who, I am stranded at home and our supplies are running incredibly thin. There's no onions, no fresh herbs, and the carrots and celery are looking a little on the sad side.

So as fashion expert Tim Gunn would say, I hit a make it work moment.

Yesterday's lovely salad left a good 3/4 quarters of a cup of garbanzos in a Tupperware in my fridge, so I put them to good use. I simmered a couple teaspoons of olive oil, added two cloves of crushed garlic and let it do it's thing for about a minute. Then I added the garbanzos, about 1 cup of chicken stock, salt, pepper, red pepper flake and a heaping teaspoon of Wild Tree's Spaghetti Sauce Blend. I took that to a boil and let it simmer covered for about 15 minutes.

Meanwhile I toasted a healthy handful of walnuts and got my pasta cooking. I used Cavatelli because we had it on hand. What the heck is Cavatelli? If you don't know you should. It's got great bite, coats well and is wonderful in soups. See this pasta primer for a glossary of shapes.

Once toasted, I threw the nuts in the food processor (the best kitchen tool in the world!) and hit pulse a few times.

I removed the nuts, and threw the bean blend in until it reached a velvety consistency.

I tossed the nuts, bean blend and pasta in my skillet for a sec and plated it up, topped with a healthy dose of parm. There's plenty for another serving, which is good, as I won't have any way to get supplies for lunch tomorrow!

This was a hearty comfort meal and while I don't have the caloric count, it can't be terrible for you. A bit of fresh parsley chopped in with the nuts and a squeeze of lemon juice in the final toss would have made this even better, but I made it work and am looking forward to my leftovers.

Best part, I didn't drop $20 on a so so pizza delivery.

Asparagus Salad with Garbanzo Beans, Mint and Sweet Onions

A can of garbanzo beans has been staring at me in the cupboard for weeks, and I finally decided to crack it open, but what to do with garbanzos? Who bought these things anyway?

I still had a few stalks of asparagus in the veg bin, so I let Google do the work and paired the two ingredients together in my search bar and came up with this wonderful fresh salad at Chow.com. You can see the recipe here.

The only thing I didn't have on hand was the cheese it called for, and I simply swapped in parm.

The sweet onions, fresh mint swiped from Jane's garden (thanks Jane), a healthy squeeze of lemon and my wonderful olive oil (from the man who wondered where our men were in Provence) made this salad a pure delight.

This would be an easy one to take to the office. Just keep the cheese separate from the marinating salad until you're ready to eat. Delish!

Lightened Up Chicken Fried Rice

My lips are still tingling from this tasty chicken fried rice I whipped up for lunch today, the best part? It's a modified eatingwell.com recipe, so it's a heck of a lot lighter than the Chinese takeout version, and you don't have to worry about that pesky MSG (what the heck is MSG anyway?) . Don't worry - if you aren't a big fan of heat, simply omit the drizzle of hot sauce.

Full disclosure, this is the first time I've ever made fried rice. I honestly can't believe I haven't before. It was an excellent way to work my way through the veggie bin (you could really sub in any veggies you've got on hand) and to use up small leftover bits of white rice and baked chicken (brown rice, pork, you know use what you've got!).

Plus, I got to use the delish fresh eggs I picked up at the farmers market Saturday. Not sure if you farm-fresh eggs are still fresh? Use this trick to test eggs for freshness and ignore that arbitrary date stamped on the package.

Ingredients:
4 stalks asparagus cut into one inch pieces
1 carrot cut into one inch pieces
2 stalks celery cut into one inch pieces
2 scallions diced
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger (need some help decoding specific cutting instructions, check out this helpful video from Home Cooking New York)
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1.5 cups cooked rice
1/4 to 1/2 cup chopped cooked chicken breast
2 tablespoons grapeseed or canola oil (Why grapeseed? See the facts at Wild Tree)
4 tablespoons reduced-sodium soy sauce
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
1 teaspoon sesame seeds
Hot sauce to taste, I prefer Sriracha!

Scramble eggs until set, transfer to a bowl

Heat grapeseed oil over medium high heat in a wok it you've got it, a skillet works great too. Add asparagus and carrots and cook for two minutes, stirring. Add rest of the veg as well as garlic and ginger, cook for another two minutes. Add chicken, rice, soy sauce, vinegar and sesame seeds, cook until rice absorbs the liquid. Fold in the eggs. Remove from heat. Stir in sesame oil. Throw in your favorite bowl, top with hot sauce to your limit, add chop sticks, insert in mouth.