Main Dish Archives - Page 10 of 20 -

May 20, 2015

Cremini Fontina Pizza

Pizza Fridays have recently made a comeback at our house, although it’s probably more accurate to say we’re more on an every other Friday routine. Combined with a movie night, it’s such a pleasant way to unwind, relax, and start the weekend with the kids. Pepperoni pizza seems to remain everyone’s favorite except mine, but Ryan and the kids have all been good sports about letting me sneak in another variety of pizza here and there. In terms of my favorite pizzas, I especially love this cremini fontina combination layered with garlic oil and a scattering of red onions. It’s just a tad more work than pepperoni pizza but completely worth the few extra minutes of preparation. I slightly adapted Jim Lahey’s no-knead pizza dough to make a whole wheat flax version that has become my go-to recipe for pizza dough. It’s simple, no-fuss, and the pizza turns out perfectly crusty and chewy every time. Just remember to start the dough the evening before to allow for an overnight rise. Here’s to many more family pizza/movie nights to come!

Cremini Fontina Pizza

Serves: 3-4

Ingredients

Garlic Oil

2 garlic cloves, minced
¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
3 tablespoons olive oil

Pizza

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
¾ cup sliced red onion, about 1 small onion
8 ounces cremini mushrooms, sliced
8 ounces mozzarella cheese, shredded
4 ounces fontina cheese, shredded
chopped fresh parsley for garnish, optional
½ recipe No-Knead Pizza Dough (see recipe below)

Instructions

Garlic Oil

In a saute pan, mix the garlic, red pepper, olive oil, and dash of salt. Warm over low heat for 10 minutes. Stir occasionally and do not allow the garlic to brown. Transfer to a small bowl and set aside.

Pizza

Preheat oven to 500. If using a pizza stone, preheat stone as well. (Ideally pizza stone should be preheated for an hour. This truly does make a difference.)
Using the same pan, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add the garlic and onion and saute until onion begins to soften, about 2-3 minutes. Add mushrooms, season to taste with salt and pepper, and cook until most of the liquid has evaporated, another 4-5 minutes.
Place dough on a lightly floured surface or parchment paper. Gently stretch and shape pizza dough to a 12"-14" circle. Brush a layer of garlic oil over entire crust.
To assemble, layer the mozzarella and fontina cheeses followed by the mushroom onion mixture.
Bake for 8-10 minutes, until cheese is bubbly and begins to brown. Garnish with chopped fresh parsley, if desired.

No-Knead Whole Wheat Flax Pizza Dough

Ingredients

550 grams all-purpose flour, about 4 cups
270 grams whole wheat flour, about 2 cups
2 tablespoons ground flax seed
2½ teaspoons salt
¼ + ⅛ teaspoon active dry yeast
2½ cups water

Instructions

In a large bowl, whisk all ingredients together except water. Gradually add water and stir with a wooden spoon until all of the flour is incorporated. Use hands if necessary to bring dough together. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let rise at room temperature for 18-20 hours. Dough should double and appear bubbly when ready. Divide and form dough into 2 mounds. Cover with plastic wrap and allow dough to rest another 20-30 minutes, until dough is pliable.
This makes enough for 2 12"-14" pizzas. I usually use half of the dough on one day and freeze the remaining half for another day.

Notes

adapted from Jim Lahey's No Knead Pizza Dough

May 6, 2015

Sirloin and Napa Stir-Fry

I attribute all that I know about Chinese cooking to my mother and her hard work in the kitchen, always wanting to nourish our family. I don’t recall any formal cooking lessons or even ever helping out all that much while she cooked, but somehow along the way I learned from her. She knows how to throw together elaborate meals without using recipes or instructions. For a while Chinese cooking was the only type of cuisine that I’d be brave enough to attempt without a recipe. It’s how I started learning to trust my own intuition and instincts at the stove, making adjustments as I went along.

Chinese stir-fries are frequent dinners for us and I’ve decided to share this sirloin and napa stir-fry because it’s simple and makes a great base recipe for creating other stir-fries. It’s also one of the few ways my kids will eat cabbage and I always feel victorious when my kids willingly branch out from the usual broccoli, spinach, and peas. An entire head of cabbage may seem like a lot at first, but it shrinks down considerably as it cooks. When stir-frying beef, always be sure to place the meat in the freezer for 30 minutes before slicing in order to make slicing the meat easier. Also, slicing thin and across the grain leads to more tenderness by relaxing the muscle fibers of the meat. Once all of the ingredients are prepped, stir-frying is generally pretty quick. I kept this one fairly minimalist by using only sirloin, onions, and napa, but you could also add carrots, broccoli, peppers, or whatever other vegetables you may have on hand.

As we gear up to celebrate Mother’s Day, I am especially thankful for my own mom and for the multitude of things I have learned from her. This post is dedicated to you, Mom!

Sirloin and Napa Stir-Fry

Ingredients

Marinade

¼ cup tamari or soy sauce
1 tablespoon honey
1½ tablespoons sherry
1 tablespoon sesame oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 scallions, thinly sliced, about ½ cup
1 tablespoon black sesame seeds
⅛ teaspoon ground black pepper

Stir-Fry

1½ pounds sirloin or flank steak, thinly sliced against the grain
1 small yellow onion, halved and thinly sliced
1 head napa cabbage, about 2- 21/2 pounds
2 tablespoons neutral oil with a high smoke point, divided
2 cloves garlic, minced
¾ cup water mixed with 2 teaspoons cornstarch or arrowroot
additional scallions and sesame seeds for garnish

Instructions

In a medium bowl, whisk together marinade ingredients. Add sliced sirloin, mix together, and marinate for at least 20 minutes.
Pull and discard any damaged outer leaves from the cabbage. Cut the bottom off the cabbage and slice in half lengthwise. Cut each half lengthwise again so that you have 4 quarters. Slice each quarter crosswise into shreds, about ½-inch thick.
Heat a large skillet over high heat. Add 1 tablespoon oil and heat for a few seconds. Stir in minced garlic and heat until fragrant, about 30 seconds. With a slotted spoon, remove beef from the marinade and add to the skillet, reserving the marinade. Stir-fry beef just until it turns pink, about 1-2 minutes. Transfer beef to a bowl and briefly set aside.
Heat remaining tablespoon of oil. Add onions and stir-fry until onions begin to soften, about 3-4 minutes. Add the cabbage and stir just until cabbage wilts, about 3-4 minutes. Return beef back to the skillet, along with the reserved marinade and water cornstarch mixture. Stir until sauce thickens and beef is cooked through. Season to taste with additional salt and pepper. Serve with rice and garnish with additional scallions and sesame seeds.

Notes

*If you prefer a dryer stir-fry with less sauce, reduce the amount of water.

April 24, 2015

Baked Salmon and Lentils with Quinoa, Shaved Cucumbers, and Dilled Yogurt Sauce

Last week I had the opportunity to attend Sprouted Kitchen’s food photography workshop at Cannelle et Vanille’s beautiful studio in Seattle. After being a quiet admirer of Sara and Hugh’s work for so long and then finally being able to meet them and learn from them was like a dream for me. Both of them are so remarkably talented, yet they are so humble and approachable. It was a weekend full of refreshment and inspiration and I’m still processing it all. Our lunches and snacks were all from Sara’s new cookbook, Bowl + Spoon, and after those meals, I seriously wanted to come home and cook through her entire cookbook. Sara’s approach to “bowl foods”- mixing favorite foods with different colors, textures, toppings, and sauces- is the inspiration behind this salmon and lentils plate (could also be easily eaten in a bowl). Since both salmon and lentils are favorites in this house, I started with those then added quinoa as our grain and shaved cucumbers with microgreens for a raw vegetable. I topped it off with a creamy dilled yogurt sauce and sprinkled on some lemon muscovado sunflower seeds for crunch. Setting out all of the components and letting everyone assemble their own plate is such a beautiful way to serve and enjoy a meal. Everyone can have more of what they like, less of what they don’t like, and it seems that kids especially enjoy having some ownership of what goes on their plate. There’s lots of flexibility to this meal- you could use rice or millet instead of quinoa, chicken instead of salmon, or other shredded greens instead of the cucumbers and microgreens. Don’t leave off the lemon muscovado sunflower seeds though; it really adds the perfect finishing touch to the whole meal.

Baked Salmon and Lentils with Quinoa, Shaved Cucumbers, and Dilled Yogurt Sauce}

Ingredients

Dilled Yogurt Sauce

1 cup whole milk or lowfat plain yogurt
6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
3-4 tablespoons fresh dill
½ teaspoon fine-grain sea salt
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Muscovado Sunflower Seeds

1 tablespoon muscovado sugar
1 teaspoon lemon zest
½ teaspoon fine-grain sea salt
1 cup sunflower seeds

Lentils

1 cup french green lentils, sorted and rinsed
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
¼ cup thinly sliced scallions
fine-grain sea salt and fresh ground pepper to taste

Cucumbers

1 English cucumber
1 cup micro greens

Assembly

3 cups cooked quinoa (1 cup uncooked)
1¼ pounds baked salmon with potlatch seasoning

Instructions

Dilled Yogurt Sauce

Place all ingredients in a blender or food processor and blend until creamy and smooth. Season to taste with additional salt and lemon juice. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Muscovado Sunflower Seeds

In a small bowl, mix together the muscovado sugar, lemon zest, and ½ teaspoon sea salt.
In a large skillet over medium heat, toast the sunflower seeds until they start to become golden brown, about 5-7 minutes. Sprinkle the lemon sugar mixture over the seeds and stir constantly until sugar melts and coats the seeds, about 1-2 additional minutes. Transfer to a plate to cool. Season to taste with additional salt if needed.

Lentils

Place lentils is a small pot and cover with water by 3 inches. Bring to a boil, then lower heat and simmer until lentils are tender and soft, about 30 minutes. Drain, reserving ½ cup cooking liquid. Toss warm lentils with vinegar and season with salt and pepper. Allow lentils to rest for 5 minutes. Taste again and season with additional vinegar and salt if needed. Add olive oil and scallions and stir to combine. Transfer to a serving bowl and set aside. If lentils seem dry when ready to serve, stir in some of the reserved cooking liquid.

Cucumbers

Use a vegetable peeler to shave cucumber into ribbons, stopping when you get to the seeds. Place cucumber ribbons in a serving bowl and toss with the micro greens.

Assembly

Serve each plate with a portion of quinoa, salmon, lentils, and cucumbers with greens. Drizzle a generous amount of dilled yogurt sauce over each plate and garnish with a sprinkle of sunflower seeds.

Notes

-inspired by Sprouted Kitchen's Bowl + Spoon
-lentils from Alice Water's The Art of Simple Food
-muscovado sunflower seeds from Heidi Swanson's Super Natural Everyday