WHOLE WHEAT PANCAKES

I don’t know which is more surprising: the fact that I’m actually posting this in the same week I cooked it (I’ve been lagging behind for what feels like all month), or the fact that it’s a pancake recipe. I don’t have anything against pancakes (heck, I named one of my cats Jimmy Pancake), but I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve made them in the past five years. They just don’t really have a niche in my life. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a diehard breakfast-cereal eater (mainly granola, baked oatmeal, or storebought shredded wheat), and that’s all I really ever want before about 11 a.m. Then for lunch there are usually leftovers of some kind hanging around, and although I’ve extolled the glories of breakfast for dinner, when it comes down to it I feel that dinner should include some vegetables, and pancakes with a side salad just seems too weird. So whither the pancake in my eating schedule? Afternoon snack? Not to mention that pancakes always take longer to make than I expect (sure, the batter is easy to mix up, but that cooking-one-or-two-at-a-time thing always seems to keep me standing over the stove more than I’d like) and most recipes make way more than two people can hope to eat in one sitting. And, with all that white flour and butter and sugar and buttermilk and whatnot, they don’t feel like such a healthy meal, either. So I go merrily along without them.

Except that there is nothing so cozy-looking as a stack of pancakes. Every now and then I see a delicious-looking photo on a food blog and I get a craving. Usually it passes unheeded; occasionally I ponder making pancakes but don’t find the time (I’m too busy six mornings out of the week and too lazy on the other). But this time it stuck. I spotted this recipe from Country Gourmet restaurant in the L.A. Times Food section (print media, how quaint), thought that it sounded both tasty and wholesome, and bought the buttermilk so there could be no turning back. And on Sunday afternoon, for lunch, I made us some pancakes. They were easy and they were delicious. I liked how nonsweet they were, almost savory, with a slight crunch from the cornmeal and a nuttiness from the wheat, but not heavy or dense. (Mine didn’t fluff up as high as those in the Times photo, but I may have overstirred the batter.) I slathered them with blueberry-lime jam, and as I expected, it was the best way to eat jam I’ve found so far. And, taking a tip from the food blogs, I froze the leftovers (this had never occurred to me before), so we can have them again next weekend.

Even if I were to become a habitual pancake maker, which is doubtful (at least once the blueberry jam is gone), I don’t see this being my go-to recipe, but only because it uses so many egg whites (I hate wasting the yolks) and buttermilk (which, although it does delicious things to baked goods, I just don’t have in my fridge on a regular basis). However, it is definitely a good one, and might have been my gateway drug. Next up, maybe oatmeal pancakes!?

1 cup (4.25 ounces) all-purpose flour
1 cup (4.5 ounces) whole wheat flour (I used white whole wheat)
2 tablespoons cornmeal
¾ teaspoon salt
1¼ teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ cup egg whites (about 4 egg whites)
3 tablespoons honey
1 teaspoon vanilla
2¼ cups buttermilk
¼ cup (½ stick) butter, melted

1. In a large bowl, sift together the all-purpose flour, wheat flour, cornmeal, salt, cinnamon, baking powder, and baking soda.

2. In a blender, purée the egg whites, honey, vanilla, buttermilk, and melted butter until thoroughly combined, about 30 seconds.

3. Gently whisk the dry and liquid ingredients together to form a batter.

4. Heat a griddle or large skillet over medium-low heat. Grease the surface (I used butter), then ladle half-cups of the batter to form each pancake. Cook until puffed and golden brown, about 1½ to 2 minutes on each side. You should have 8–10 pancakes.

Serves: 4–5 (2 pancakes each)
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: TBD

FLANK STEAK SALAD WITH PLUMS AND BLUE CHEESE

I get all excited whenever a shiny new Cooking Light arrives, but these days (dare I say since its dumbed-down redesign?), I only seem to find one recipe per issue that I actually want to make. Either the August issue had a greater-than-average number of tasty recipes, however, or I was in a mood to be seriously hypnotized by glamorous summery food photography, because I folded over nearly a dozen pages. One argument for the “hypnotized” theory might be the fact that I flagged this recipe, despite the fact that I have no particular fondness for steak or blue cheese. But I like arugula and plums, and the ingredient combo was excitingly surprising, yet somehow made sense. Plus the picture was so pretty! (Yep, definitely hypnotized.)

Mostly, though, I love the idea of main-dish salads in the summer, and I thought that this would be an A-friendly way to work more of them into our weekly menus, since he loves red meat and strong cheese. In retrospect, I needn’t have worried; later, when we were discussing the concept of salads for dinner, he clarified that he loves salads, “way more than pastas [pointed glance at me] or soups.” So I guess Summer Salad Nights are a go, and this was a decent way to kick off. It’s not one of those transcendent recipes that become more than the sum of their parts; it tastes just as you’d expect: like arugula, steak, plums, and blue cheese. (When the salad was mixed together, I could barely detect the dressing at all.) This disappointed me during the first few bites, but then I just sat back and appreciated the interplay between those four flavors—peppery, meaty, sweet, and sharp. I won’t be making this every week, but it was still an interesting, well-rounded, healthy, and satisfying meal (not to mention easy, quick, and attractive).

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
¼ teaspoon salt
1½ tablespoons olive oil, divided
4 teaspoons fresh lemon juice, divided
1 (1-pound) flank steak, trimmed
Cooking spray
1 teaspoon honey
⅛ teaspoon salt
8 cups loosely packed baby arugula
3 plums, thinly sliced
¼ cup (1 ounce) crumbled blue cheese

1. Combine pepper, ¼ teaspoon salt, 1½ teaspoons olive oil, and 1 teaspoon lemon juice in a small bowl; rub over both sides of steak.

2. Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat. Coat pan with cooking spray. Add steak to pan; cook 5 minutes on each side or until desired degree of doneness. Remove steak from pan; let rest 5 minutes. Cut steak diagonally across grain into thin slices.

3. Combine remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil, 1 tablespoon lemon juice, honey, and ⅛ teaspoon salt in a large bowl; stir well with a whisk. Add arugula; toss gently to coat. Arrange about 1½ cups arugula mixture onto each of 4 plates; top each serving with 3 ounces steak, about ½ cup plums, and 1 tablespoon cheese.

Serves: 4
Time: 25 minutes
Leftover potential: Low, although not impossible if you store all the salad elements (sliced steak, arugula, dressing, unsliced plums, and cheese) separately until ready to eat.

ARUGULA PESTO

Here’s a handy tip for summer: if you have extra arugula (which I often do, because I like it on my BLTs, but that uses just a fraction of a bunch), make arugula pesto! Of course, you can simply substitute arugula for the basil in a basic pesto recipe, but I also like this one from Simply Recipes, which uses walnuts instead of pine nuts (their meatiness stands up well to the peppery arugula) and softens the bite of the garlic by roasting it—very cleverly, especially for summertime there’s-no-way-I’m-turning-on-the-oven-in-this-heat weather, in a skillet on the stove. I’d made this once before, a couple of years ago, but never posted it; then, I had it on pasta, which was good, but this time, thinking about how well arugula goes with potatoes, I tried it on pesto potato pizza, where it was excellent.

2 cups packed arugula leaves
½ cup walnuts
½ cup fresh Parmesan cheese
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
6 garlic cloves, unpeeled
1 small garlic clove, peeled and minced
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Brown the 6 garlic cloves with their peels on in a skillet over medium high heat until the garlic is lightly browned in places, about 10 minutes. Remove the garlic from the pan, cool, and remove the skins.

2. Toast the walnuts in a pan over medium heat until lightly brown.

3. Combine the arugula, walnuts, and roasted and raw garlic in a food processor or blender. Pulse while drizzling in the olive oil. Add the Parmesan cheese and salt and pepper to taste and mix until blended.

Yields: About ¾ cup
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: Good; keeps in the fridge for about a week, or can be frozen for months

MEDITERRANEAN PEPPER SALAD

I’m salad-obsessed. It must be the weather. I’m also, ever since my quinoa tabbouleh and chicken gyros successes, Mediterranean-obsessed. Why did it take me so long to discover feta? (I mean, I knew about it before, but I never used it at home.) And is there anything more perfectly refreshing on a summer day than a crisp, cool cucumber? I bookmarked this salad at Smitten Kitchen ages ago, and finally dusted it off to accompany my second go-round of chicken gyros. Not surprisingly, it’s as light and colorful and delicious as it looks. The quick-pickling of the red onions in a sugar-salt-vinegar brine (some of which is then incorporated into the dressing) is genius—it takes away their bite and gives them incredible zippiness, as well as an exciting neon-pink hue. I only made a few slight changes: left out the olives, because I hate them; used the tomatoes that Deb forgot; used pre-crumbled feta cheese because I had some I needed to use up, which ended up being less than 4 ounces (which was not sufficient—next time I’ll definitely use big cubes of the fresh stuff and plenty of it); and used only two bell peppers, red and orange, because the rest of the farmers’ market offerings were looking sad and wrinkly, subbing in another Persian cuke instead (this was an OK change; I still find raw peppers sort of intense in their crunchy-chewiness, and I love cucumbers, as already mentioned). Even though two of these changes were just ingredient-availability issues I hope not to repeat, I get the feeling this is a very forgiving salad you can mix up however you like. We’ll definitely be having it again this summer, possibly with hummus and pita crisps.

¼ cup red wine vinegar
¼ cup cold water
1 tablespoon kosher salt
2 teaspoons sugar
½ medium red onion, cut into ½-inch dice
3 bell peppers, your choice of colors, cored, seeded, and chopped into ½-inch pieces
1 kirby or Persian cucumber, chopped into ½-inch pieces
¼ pound firm feta cheese, chopped into ½-inch pieces
1 cup cherry or grape tomatoes, halved if they’re large
¼ cup olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Stir together the red wine vinegar, water, kosher salt, and sugar in a small bowl until the salt and sugar are dissolved. Add the red onion and set it aside for at least 15 minutes so the onions can lightly pickle (this is a good time to chop all your other ingredients).

2. Mix the peppers, cucumber, feta, and tomatoes in a large bowl.

3. Drain the onions, reserving the vinegar mixture. Add the onions to the bowl containing the pepper mixture. Pour ¼ cup of the vinegar mixture over the salad, then drizzle with olive oil. Season generously with salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste. Toss evenly. You can serve right away, or let the flavors mingle in the fridge for a few hours.

Serves: 4
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: Good.

FISH TACOS

I wanted fish tacos. And lo, I did make them. The End.

Except I’m not sure I know why I wanted fish tacos, considering I’ve eaten them maybe three times before in the course of my life. I’m guessing I just saw them on a food blog somewhere and they suddenly seemed like the most perfect, light, fresh, summery, Southern-California thing to stuff my face with. I’m especially susceptible to the romance of food photography in the summer, the sparkly lemonades, the effortless salads, the insouciant sandwiches, the kicky kebabs, the chic grilled steaks, all prettily arranged on sun-drenched picnic tables looking like they don’t care (bonus points if you know that movie reference), seeming to promise me entrance to some higher plane of casually elegant being where I will nonchalantly produce cool, delicious treats from my kitchen in mere moments without ever breaking a sweat.

Whatever the inspiration, it took me a long time to find a recipe that matched the Ideal Fish Tacos in my head. I wanted the fish to be breaded (I always think of the classic fish taco as being batter-fried, but a lot of online recipes just have you grill or sautée) , but not deep-fried (both for health reasons and because I’m a wuss when it comes to hot oil). Exactly like the panko-coated pan-fried halibut from my beloved fish and chips recipe, actually—in fact, I belatedly realized, I could actually just use that recipe, maybe leaving out the parsley and swapping lime zest for the lemon zest. Perfect! Except that neither Trader Joe’s nor Whole Foods had any halibut last week. I could have used cod, tilapia, or another whitefish, but then I spotted the frozen, pre-battered halibut (basically just fancy fish sticks) at Trader Joe’s and my love for halibut, combined with my laziness, won out. The fish looked to be decent, the ingredients relatively simple and wholesome, and it could be baked in the oven in about 15 minutes. It’s sort of funny that I ended up doing this, because during my intensive recipe search I’d stumbled upon, and rolled my eyes at, this Real Simple fish taco recipe that’s basically the same thing (albeit with Gorton’s fish tenders, which I suspect are several steps down from what I used). Luckily, the end result was really tasty, crisp without being greasy, even though the fish beneath the batter was a wee bit dry. In the future I’ll try breading my own (and forgoing the halibut if I must), but high-quality pre-battered stuff would be acceptable again if I were in a particular hurry.

I also, for some reason, had a really specific vision when it came to the condiments. When I think of classic fish tacos I think of cabbage and a white sauce (usually mayonnaise-based), neither of which I really like very much on their own, but I’ve got to admit they do go well with fish. The fish taco recipes I found online came with a host of varying condiment suggestions, from pico de gallo to pickled onions to mango salsa to guacamole, but my impulse was not to stray too far from tradition—and, for some reason, to avoid normal salsa, because somehow the combination of fish and tomatoes doesn't appeal. I decided to concentrate on the flavors that tantalized me most in the recipes I was skimming, all three of which seemed to marry well with both the fish concept and the taco concept: lime, cilantro, and avocado. I always use broccoli slaw (from Trader Joe’s) instead of cabbage with the fish and chips, so I decided to do the same thing here and found this simple, lime-and-cilantro-laced recipe for a fish-taco-friendly version. Ironically, Trader Joe’s didn’t end up having broccoli slaw that day, so I ended up using shredded cabbage after all—and it was still quite tasty. Then, taking a cue from this excellent recipe from Whipped, I pureed yogurt (the original used sour cream, but I prefer yogurt for most things) with avocado and more cilantro and lime for a fresh, zippy sauce that is also, I might add, addictive on tortilla chips, chili, or just, you know, your fingers.

Considering I cobbled it together from three different sources—and then ended up having to scrap my original plans and improvise thanks to the vagaries of ingredient availability—I’m really pleased with how this meal turned out. I’m not normally an inventive type, and neither A nor I was even certain how much we even liked fish tacos, but I had a dream…OK, that sounds a little grandiose. How about: I had a craving for a fresh and fun summer meal, and I satisfied it exactly. And just for a minute, eating my bright, pleasingly green-and-golden fish tacos and drinking a cold beer, I felt like one of those glossy food-magazine people. Except that we were eating indoors, sitting on the floor in front of the TV, fending cats away from the table, and I was sweating.

One final note: I used a 10-ounce package of fish and halved the slaw recipe and it served two (a generous three tacos apiece), with leftover avocado cream. You could easily scale up the fish amount and make the whole slaw recipe and serve three or four. I don’t think it would be worthwhile to end up with leftovers, though—except for the avocado cream, I can’t see this being good the next day.

Cilantro-lime slaw:
4 cups broccoli slaw or shredded cabbage
⅓ cup thinly sliced green onions
¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon olive oil
¼ teaspoon salt

Avocado cream:
1 ripe avocado, peeled, seeded, and chopped
½ cup sour cream or plain yogurt
¼ cup fresh cilantro
Juice of ½ large lime
Salt to taste (a few good pinches)

Pan-fried fish:
1 pound 1½-inch-thick halibut fillets (or cod, tilapia, or another whitefish)
¾ cup panko
1 teaspoon coarse kosher salt
1 teaspoon finely grated lime zest
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 large egg whites
2 tablespoons dark ale
2 tablespoons olive oil
OR
10 ounces to 1 pound good-quality breaded frozen fish fillets

6–8 corn tortillas

1. To make the slaw, toss together the broccoli or cabbage, the green onions, and the cilantro in a large bowl. Mix in lime juice, oil, and salt and toss well to coat.

2. To make the avocado cream, place the avocado, sour cream or yogurt, cilantro, lime juice, and salt in a food processor or blender and process until smooth.

3. To make fish, cut halibut into sticks and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. While oil is heating, combine panko, salt, lime zest, and cayenne in a shallow bowl; in a separate shallow bowl, whisk egg whites and ale. When oil is hot, dip fish sticks in ale mixture, turn to coat, and shake off excess; then place fish in panko mixture and turn to coat all sides. Add fish sticks to skillet and cook about 2 minutes on each side, until all sides are golden and fish is opaque in center. Transfer fish to paper towels, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and serve immediately. OR, if using frozen fish fillets, skip this whole step and prepare according to package directions.

4. Heat a skillet over medium heat and warm tortillas on each side for a minute or so, until soft and pliable. Place tortillas on plates and top with a piece or two of fish and generous amounts of slaw and avocado cream.

Serves: 2–4
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: Not good, except the avocado cream will last for several days in the fridge and makes a great dip for chips or veggies.

COOKIES AND CREAM ICE CREAM

Ever since Christmas, there’s been a box of Candy Cane Jo-Jo’s waiting patiently in my freezer for exactly this purpose. Cookies and cream is one of my favorite ice cream flavors, and Candy Cane Jo-Jo’s (Trader Joe’s delectable holiday-season-only chocolate sandwich cookies with crushed candy cane bits mixed into the cream filling, like the glorious love child of an Oreo and a Thin Mint) are my favorite (storebought) cookies, so of course I had to try combining them. I used David Lebovitz’s Philadelphia-style (i.e., non-egg-based) vanilla ice cream recipe from The Perfect Scoop, leaving out the vanilla bean since I wanted the peppermint and chocolate flavors to be the main attraction, and followed Lebovitz’s advice in the back of the book for adding mix-ins. Needless to say, the finished product was glorious. I’ve mainly stuck to the fruit ice creams so far, because it gave me some pretext of wholesomeness, but now the genie’s out of the bottle. I’m intoxicated by the possibilities for other variations: regular cookies and cream, oatmeal cookie, chocolate-chip cookie, peanut butter cookie…heck, not just cookies, but candy, nuts—I could throw anything I wanted in there! I’ll try to restrain myself, but it’s going to be a struggle. Good thing we seem to have entered the too-hot-to-make-ice-cream-in-my-un-air-conditioned-apartment phase of the summer.

3 cups heavy cream, or 2 cups heavy cream and 1 cup whole milk
¾ cup sugar
¾ teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups crushed cookies

1. Pour 1 cup of the cream into a medium saucepan and add the sugar. Warm over medium heat, stirring, until the sugar is dissolved.

2. Remove from heat and add the remaining 2 cups cream, or the remaining 1 cup cream and 1 cup whole milk. Stir in the vanilla extract.

3. Chill mixture thoroughly in the refrigerator. Meanwhile, chill crushed cookies in the freezer.

4. Freeze in your ice-cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Quickly stir in the crushed cookies before transferring ice cream to a storage container.

Yields: About 1 quart
Time: 15 minutes, plus chilling and processing time
Leftover potential: Good

BLUEBERRY-LIME JAM

We’ve gone blueberry picking in Somis every June for the past three years, and each time we come home with more berries. This year we harvested 8¼ pounds, enough for copious snacking, our old favorites blueberry buttermilk cake (twice) and blueberry frozen yogurt, and, as I’d hoped, a new endeavor: a small batch of blueberry jam. I wanted something quick and painless—a fun Saturday activity with Friend P, not an all-day project, so I turned to this recipe in the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving. I always feel like a cheater using pectin, especially when I dump in all the sugar it calls for, but sometimes you just can’t beat the convenience, and anyway, this jam turned out wonderfully. You can’t taste the lime specifically, or at least you don’t take a bite and think “Lime!”, but it adds a certain something. I halved the recipe and, after barely more than 90 minutes of work (relaxed, chatting, laughing work, not the sweaty, slogging work of some of our previous jamfests), I had four pretty jars of purple-blue goodness (I used these adorable, squat wide-mouthed jars M gave me for my birthday) and next to P’s ruby-red strawberry ones. We’ve only eaten this on toast so far, but I can’t wait to try it on pancakes. (Other ideas for using homemade jam: stir into oatmeal or plain yogurt, or make oatmeal-jam bars.) Next year, maybe we’ll pick enough berries for me to make a full batch.

4½ cups crushed blueberries (about 9 cups whole berries)
Grated zest and juice of 1 large lime
1 package (1.75 ounces/49 to 57 grams) regular powdered fruit pectin
5 cups granulated sugar

1. Prepare jars and closures as in steps 1–2 here.

2. In a large, deep, stainless steel saucepan, combine berries and lime juice and zest. Whisk in pectin until dissolved. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring frequently. Add sugar all at once and return to a full rolling boil, stirring constantly. Boil hard, stirring constantly, for 1 minute. Remove from heat and skim off foam.

3. Fill jars and process for 10 minutes, as in steps 7–9 here.

Yield: 6 8-ounce jars
Time: 2–3 hours
Leftover potential: But of course.

CHICKEN GYROS

I’m pretty picky about using recipes only from reliable sources, and so most of the ones I make are from cookbooks, magazines, or blogs I read regularly. But sometimes, thanks to the vast, wonderful randomness of the Internet, I end up following a string of links, arriving at a good-looking recipe, bookmarking it, and later having no memory of how I ever found it to begin with. Often I never work up the courage to make recipes with such unknown provenance, but this one—originally from Elly Says Opa! but repeated on a number of other blogs, always a good sign—just looked too tasty to pass up, and I’m so glad I took the chance, because: yum.

I already have a chicken-in-pita and three other-things-in-pitas-with-yogurt-sauce recipes in my repertoire, so I was a bit worried this would be too similar, but it had its own distinct identity—and it tasted like an ultra-fresh version of real, restaurant chicken gyros. The effect was helped immensely by my lucky decision to invest in the delicious, pillowy (if slightly pricy) Greek pitas I spotted at the farmers’ market, so I highly recommend seeking out some good-quality non-pocket pitas—or making your own, something I plan to look into promptly (I tried to make pocket pitas once and it was a flop, but I’m guessing non-pocket ones might be easier). I liked the flavor of the chicken marinade—the vinegar and the yogurt were especially nice touches—but next time I’ll amp up the flavor a bit: unlike most marinades, the original recipe didn’t call for salt, adding it to the chicken later instead, and I found the result slightly underseasoned; also, I’d consider marinating longer if time allows and using smaller pieces of chicken (breast tenders, maybe) to allow more marinade coverage. I definitely recommend using Greek yogurt for the tzatziki, which allows you to skip the yogurt-straining step, but next time I’d add the optional lemon juice to compensate for the fact that Greek yogurt tends to be less tart than normal plain yogurt. I was tempted to use just regular yogurt and not strain it, as in all my other yogurt-sauce recipes, but I ended up loving how thick and creamy, and thus more authentic-seeming, the sauce was--so don't fear; the Greek yogurt/straining and cucumber shredding/squeezing are totally worth it.

I’ll be making this again really soon..like as soon as we get back from our upcoming vacation, and probably all summer long. It’s light, it’s easy, and A and I both loved it.

For chicken:
1¼ pounds boneless, skinless chicken pieces (breasts, thighs, or a combination)
4 cloves garlic, minced
Juice of 1 lemon
2 teaspoons red wine vinegar
2 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
2 heaping tablespoons plain yogurt
1 tablespoon dried oregano
Salt and pepper to taste
For tzatziki:
16 ounces nonfat plain Greek yogurt (if you can’t get Greek yogurt, use plain whole-milk or part-skim normal yogurt and strain it in a cheesecloth-lined strainer over a bowl for several hours or overnight to remove as much moisture as possible)
1 large cucumber, peeled and seeded
3–5 cloves garlic, crushed and minced
1–2 teaspoons white wine vinegar
Salt and pepper to taste
1 squeeze of fresh lemon juice (optional)
Drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil (optional)
For gyros:
Sliced red onion
Sliced tomatoes
4–5 Greek-style (pocketless) pitas (original recipe called for 4, but ours came in a package of 5 and we found we had enough chicken and toppings to make a fifth gyro)

1. To make the chicken marinade, whisk together the 4 cloves minced garlic, lemon juice, red wine vinegar, olive oil, yogurt, oregano, and salt and pepper in a bowl. Add the chicken and rub the marinade in. Cover and refrigerate for at least an hour.

2. To make the tzatziki, grate or shred the cucumber, wrap it in paper towels or a dish towel, and then squeeze out as much moisture as possible. Mix together the cucumbers, yogurt, garlic, white wine vinegar, lemon juice (if desired), and salt and pepper to taste. Refrigerate tzatziki for 30 minutes or more, so flavors can meld. Before serving, drizzle a little olive oil over the top if desired (I didn’t do this).

3. When ready to cook the chicken, preheat the broiler (or grill, or pan on the stove). Cook the chicken until cooked through, allow to rest for a few minutes, then slice into strips.

4. Heat your pitas for a few minutes in a warm oven or in a skillet on the stove. Top the pita with the chicken, tzatziki, tomatoes, and onions, then roll up and enjoy.

Serves: 4–5 (1 apiece)
Time: 30 minutes, plus at least 1 hour of marinating
Leftover potential: Good (store chicken, tzatziki, pita, and toppings separately, of course). Tzatziki has even more flavor on the second day.

QUINOA SOUP WITH AVOCADO AND CORN

Now this is a quinoa and corn recipe I definitely like! (As opposed to my previous attempt at one, which was just OK.) This was the first time I’d used quinoa in soup, and even though it’s really more of a stew, or even an extra-brothy version of a regular quinoa pilaf (especially in the leftovers, the quinoa absorbs a lot of the liquid), it’s getting me inspired about other ways to use my new favorite grain.

The recipe is from Lorna Sass’ Whole Grains for Busy People (which I’m tempted to check out the next time I’m at the library), via the Seattle Times, via Cheap Healthy Good. It’s extremely easy and quick, making it one of those rare summer-weeknight soups, and has a nice flavor reminiscent of tortilla soup. The avocado and lime are what really do it for me; in particular, something about the creamy texture of the avocado with the toothsome quinoa, the crisp corn, and the savory broth pleased me immensely. I was also impressed that the avocado retained its shape and greenness even after several days in the refrigerator followed by reheating in the microwave. I’ve got to admit that A wasn’t as enchanted, but he also doesn’t really like avocado much unless it’s in guacamole. But it’s a testimony to how much I liked this soup that I’m not too bothered by his lukewarm reaction: this is one of those recipes I’ll keep on making anyway, because he’ll tolerate it well enough at dinner and then leave all the leftovers for me.

Since I’m a lime fan, I altered the recipe slightly so that the lime juice is added to the soup at the end, instead of just using lime wedges as a garnish. I figured this would help prevent the avocado from browning in the leftovers, and it also tasted darn good. I also used lots of salsa and cilantro, and more than 1 cup of corn because I had two big ears of the fresh stuff. I might use a bit more broth next time, just to make it more soup-like. Otherwise, perfect!

4 cups chicken or vegetable broth
1 cup quinoa
1 cup fresh or frozen corn kernels
⅓ cup chunky salsa, or to taste (I used more)
1 large ripe but firm avocado, diced
Salt to taste
¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro, or to taste (I used more)
Juice of 1 lime, plus extra lime wedges for serving if desired

1. In a large pot or Dutch oven, bring broth to a boil over high heat. Add quinoa, reduce heat to medium-high, and cook (still boiling) 15 minutes.

2. Add corn and salsa. Stir. When the soup comes back up to a simmer, turn off the heat and remove the pot from the burner. Add avocado and lime juice and stir gently. Add cilantro, plus salt and pepper to taste. Stir again.

Serves: 4
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: Good

FARMERS’ MARKET POTATO SALAD

I…think I like this salad?

I’m not a potato salad fan, but I seem to have a continuing fascination with the non-mayo-based varieties. Mostly, I was entranced by the colorful photo accompanying this recipe in Cooking Light with its bounty of summer vegetables, particularly the holy trinity of corn, tomatoes, and zucchini. Even better, it’s a warm salad (I have a weird aversion to cold food sometimes); the potatoes are roasted until crisp and brown. So is the corn, which I was skeptical about at first (30 minutes? But corn kernels are so tiny!), and indeed the corn gets quite worryingly browned, but that actually makes it taste even better (as I discovered when I found myself compulsively snacking on the seemingly burnt corn detritus left behind on the baking sheet). However, the dressing: it really tested my growing tolerance for mustard (2 tablespoons is a lot), and I think there’s a reason that I hardly ever use tarragon—its licorice taste was strongly present here. So, on the plus side, this is a beautiful, healthy, fresh salad bursting with tasty vegetables and strong flavors…but I’m not sure I necessarily loved those flavors. A was enthusiastic, though, and the online reviews are all great so far, and I like that this is light enough for a side dish (we had it with prosciutto-and-basil-wrapped chicken, my go-to accompaniment for labor-intensive or unproven salads) but substantial enough for a vegetarian main, so I’ll probably make it again. I am tempted to cut back on the mustard slightly or swap in parsley or rosemary for the tarragon, but maybe that would be messing too much with what gives this salad its zest and zip. Is it time for me to learn to stop worrying and love tarragon?

1 cup fresh corn kernels (about 2 ears)
2 pounds fingerling potatoes (use a mix of red, purple, and yellow for maximum effect), cut into 1-inch pieces
3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
2 tablespoons whole-grain Dijon mustard
½ teaspoon hot pepper sauce (such as Tabasco)
¾ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
¾ cup sliced red onion
¾ cup diced zucchini
1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

2. Place corn and potatoes on a rimmed baking sheet (for easy cleanup—the corn tends to stick—I recommend coating the baking sheet with parchment or foil), drizzle with 1 tablespoon oil, and toss to coat. Bake for 30 minutes or until potatoes are tender.

3. Meanwhile, heat a large skillet over medium heat. Coat pan with ½ tablespoon olive oil. Add onion and zucchini and cook 4 minutes or until lightly browned, stirring occasionally.

4. Combine tarragon and next 5 ingredients (through pepper) in a small bowl, stirring with a whisk. Gradually add 1½ tablespoons oil, stirring constantly with a whisk.

5. Place potatoes and corn in a large bowl and drizzle with dressing while still warm; toss gently to coat. Add zucchini mixture and tomatoes and toss gently to combine.

Serves: 6
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: OK; can be eaten warm, at room temperature, or chilled

ORANGE POPSICLE ICE CREAM

Further proof (as if I needed it) that David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop is an invaluable investment: A few weeks ago, two friends of mine visited me from Minnesota and we took a short roadtrip up to the central coast. For sustenance, we brought along a large bag of oranges from the farmers’ market—but then we stopped for dinner at a mutual friend’s parents’ house in Santa Barbara and they gave us a lovely parting gift (in the manner of Southern Californians) of a huge sack of oranges and lemons from their backyard tree, so even after three days of snacking, we came home with more oranges than we’d started with. I like eating oranges, but with strawberries and cherries and peaches and nectarines all coming into season, they’re not the first thing I reach for when I want some fruit. So I needed some sort of tasty recipe that used up a lot of oranges (sure, I could just juice them, but where’s the fun in that?), and naturally I thought, “I wonder if I could make orange ice cream?”

Of course I can, and The Perfect Scoop has the recipe. Now, orange is not my favorite fruit flavor. When I was a kid, the orange popsicles were always the last ones left languishing in the variety pack, getting sticky and syrupy in that weird way old popsicles do, until I would reluctantly finish them off (or foist them on unsuspecting friends) because my parents insisted that I finish the box before they would buy another. And don’t even get me started on the sad occasions at a relative’s house when the promised “ice cream for dessert” turned out to be just orange sherbet, which as far as I was concerned was practically health food in disguise. But I did have a soft spot for Creamsicles (or Dreamsicles, as we used to call them—was that just the knock-off brand? If so, it no longer seems to exist). Sure, I’d rather have a Drumstick or an ice cream sandwich any day, but if those weren’t available, a Creamsicle still made a worthy frozen treat, superior to the lowly everyday Popsicle. I still buy them occasionally, for that nostalgic vanilla-orange taste (plus there are now raspberry ones, which are even better).

So I was excited to see that not only did Lebovitz have an orange ice cream recipe, but he was comparing it to a Creamsicle. And indeed, although a whiff of vanilla would amp up the similarity, it does taste like a creamy orange popsicle—but even better, of course, what with the freshly squeezed orange juice and lack of corn syrup. At first I was ambivalent; it tasted quite sweet and…well, intensely orangey. But to my surprise, by the time we’d finished off the batch, I’d fallen in love. This is precisely the kind of unique recipe that makes it so thrilling to have an ice cream maker. I’d still probably turn down storebought orange sherbet if it was offered to me, but I ended up making this two times in a row. It’s refreshingly citrusy yet without the pucker of lemon, and (in California at least, with our juicy, plentiful oranges) you can make it cheaply all year round. Orange you glad I gave it a try? (Sorry; couldn't resist.)

I don’t know if it’s because the temperature’s on the rise or just because it contains fruit juice instead of a puree, but both times I made this, it came out of the ice cream maker fairly runny, rather than thick and fluffy like my first sour-cream-based ice cream. I was worried this would lead to a melty or icy finished product, but I stuck it in the freezer anyway and was rewarded with perfectly textured ice cream; I think the alcohol saved the day by preventing it from freezing too hard.

⅔cup sugar
Grated zest of 3 oranges, preferably unsprayed
1¼ cups freshly squeezed orange juice (from 4 or 5 large oranges)
1 cup sour cream
½ cup half-and-half
2 teaspoons Grand Marnier or another orange liqueur

1. In a blender, pulverize the sugar and orange zest until the zest is very fine. Add the orange juice, sour cream, half-and-half, and Grand Marnier and blend until the sugar is completely dissolved.

2. Chill the mixture thoroughly in the refrigerator, then process it in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

Yields: About 1 quart
Time: 15 minutes of active work, plus chilling and processing time
Leftover potential: Good

QUINOA WITH CORN, SCALLIONS, AND MINT

After discovering a love for quinoa, I started searching online for interesting, good-quality recipes that used it. But I didn’t find as many as I expected, mainly because most people seem to use quinoa as an improvisational platform—throw some random vegetables and herbs and maybe a dressing on there and call it a day. There’s nothing wrong with that, but (a) as a quinoa newbie and habitual rule-follower I was looking for specific instructions; and (b) most of these quinoa creations began to look suspiciously similar after a while. Who knew it might be so hard to find fresh and unique quinoa ideas? This one from Gourmet jumped out at me initially because I always get obsessive about eating fresh corn at this time of year, and secondly because the honey-butter dressing sounded strange and intriguing.

The method here is a little annoying; the quinoa is first boiled and then steamed, which the recipe claims will ensure “an unbelievably light and fluffy texture.” I’m not sure I noticed that much of a difference from quinoa cooked the regular way, although admittedly most of the pain of the steaming method came from my worries about which sieve to use—I have to use my fine-mesh one for rinsing raw quinoa because the raw grains are so teeny, but that sieve is too small to hold the quinoa once it’s cooked and expanded, so I had to use the colander/pasta insert that fits atop my saucepan, and I kept worrying that the grains of quinoa would fall through the larger holes, but mostly they clumped together obligingly and stayed put. Once that was resolved, it was a little awkward, but not terribly time-consuming, and in all other respects the recipe is fairly easy (although I hate cutting corn kernels off the cob—they fly everywhere!). I did fear that the dressing plus the corn would make for a too-sweet concoction, but that wasn’t the case; actually, it had a really subtle (almost too subtle?) flavor, mostly of mint and corn. It’s not my favorite quinoa dish (that honor goes to quinoa tabbouleh), but it’s light, pretty, refreshing, and versatile (it can be eaten warm, room-temperature, or cold, making it a nice work lunch or picnic dish), so I’ll probably make it again at some point.

Two tips: Thanks to this recipe, I now always boil my corn in the husk; not only is the corny flavor intensified this way, but it’s easier to shuck afterward (you don’t have to tug as hard to get the leaves off, and the silk seems to behave itself more instead of sticking to everything). And also, as you can see in the photo, I threw some crumbled feta atop this and it was quite good.

2 ears corn, shucked
1½ teaspoons finely grated fresh lemon zest (from 1 lemon)
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1½ teaspoons mild honey
¼ teaspoon salt
⅛ teaspoon black pepper
1 cup quinoa (about 5 oz)
2 scallions, chopped
¼ cup chopped fresh mint
Crumbled feta (optional)

1. Put corn in a deep, wide pot, then add water to cover and bring to a boil, covered. Remove from heat and let stand, covered, 5 minutes. Transfer corn with tongs to a cutting board. When cool enough to handle, cut kernels off cobs with a large heavy knife.

2. Meanwhile, bring salted water to a boil in a 2-to-4-quart pot for cooking the quinoa.

3. Wash quinoa in 3 changes of cold water in a bowl, draining in a large sieve each time. Add quinoa to boiling water and cook, uncovered, until almost tender, about 10 minutes. Drain in sieve, then fill the same pot with 1 inch of water, bring to a simmer, and set sieve over pot (water should not touch bottom of sieve). Cover quinoa with a folded kitchen towel, then cover sieve with a lid (don't worry if lid doesn't fit tightly) and steam until quinoa is tender, fluffy, and dry, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand (still covered) 5 minutes.

4. Meanwhile, whisk together lemon zest and juice, butter, honey, salt, and pepper in a large bowl until combined.

5. Add quinoa to dressing and toss until dressing is absorbed, then stir in corn, scallions, mint, and salt and pepper to taste. Top with crumbled feta if desired.

Serves: 4
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: Good

SWEET POTATO OVEN FRIES

I’ve made these four or five times without managing to post them here, partly because I was still tinkering with the process and partly because I could never really get a good-looking photo of them. But now that I’ve recommended them as a side dish for BBQ pulled chicken sandwiches, I’d better get on with it. I feel a little shaky giving direction on this one because I cobbled it together from a couple of different recipes and can never quite remember the exact steps I’ve followed from one batch to the next, so it turns out a little different every time and the method is more intuitive/improvisational than my usual approach. OK, it’s not like making sweet potato fries is rocket science: Throw some sweet potato pieces in an oven with some oil and you’re probably going to get something pretty tasty unless you burn them. There are a million oven-fried sweet potato recipes out there, and individual tastes vary so widely regarding fry thickness, crispness, brownness, etc. that there’s no way to claim this is as by any means the “best” approach. But it suits me, so here we go.

When initially struck by the sweet-potato-fry craving, I turned to Mollie Katzen’s recipe in The Vegetable Dishes I Can’t Live Without (Serious Eats has it online here). On the plus side, Katzen’s clever trick of finishing the fries in a low-temperature oven to dry them out and crisp them up ensured that the end results were distinctly fry-like, rather than just being roasted sweet potatoes in disguise. But the downside was significant: Scrupulously following Katzen’s ¼-inch sizing guidelines yielded fries that were much too thin for my taste. They were crispy all right, but verging on desiccated, with the same crunchy texture all the way through, whereas I like a good balance between crisp shell and tender interior. Their sweet potato flavor had subsided into the browned, anonymous taste of veggie chips. They weren’t necessarily unpleasant—except for the ones that got outright burnt, a hazard of too-thin pieces—but they didn’t quite satisfy my desire for sweet potato fries either.

For the next round, I tried a recipe from Pinch My Salt that featured a number of useful improvements. Leaving the skin on helped give a more rustic, fry-like flavor, texture, and appearance and perhaps a tiny bit of extra fiber, with the welcome side effect of simplifying the prep work. Even though it dirtied an extra bowl, tossing the fries with the oil (for some reason Katzen just oils the baking sheet, not the actual potatoes) helped immensely in making me feel like my fries had been actually fried, not just dried. The fries were thick enough to maintain their soft orange interiors and avoid burning. Still, at the end of the cooking time I found myself lowering the temperature and crisping them up a bit per Katzen’s method. And as for the rosemary-garlic paste, it was good, but not amazing enough for me to go through the extra effort every time; a lot of the added flavor got lost for me once the fries had browned.

So, in the end, I use Katzen’s oven temperatures with Pinch My Salt’s skin-on, slightly-larger, oil-and-salt-tossed method, but I use my own judgment as needed. I can be inconsistent in slicing my fries, so they vary somewhat in size (¼ inch is definitely too skinny, but sometimes ½ inch just looks too chunky, although it’s good to remember that the potatoes do shrink somewhat while baking), and inevitably some of them verge on too browned while others lean toward too soft, but I kind of like the variety—that way there’s something for every taste! And the majority of them are just right.

One final tip: These are plenty good plain, but if you want a dipping sauce, forget the ketchup. Sweet potato fries + barbecue sauce is where it’s at.

2 medium-large sweet potatoes (about 1 pound)
1 to 1½ tablespoons olive oil
Coarse salt to taste

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper or foil (optional, but helpful).

2. Scrub sweet potatoes and cut them lengthwise into (approximately) ½-inch-thick slices. Stacking two slices together, cut them into (approximately) ½-inch-thick strips.

3. Put the sweet potato strips into a large bowl with olive oil and ½ teaspoon salt. Toss well to coat. Arrange the fries on the baking sheet in a single layer.

4. Bake for 10 minutes, then use tongs or a spatula to turn the fries over, rotate the pan, and bake for another 10 minutes or until tender and browned. If you like softer fries, taken them out of the oven; if you prefer crisper ones, turn the heat down to 200 degrees and bake for up to 20 minutes more, until they have shrunk and dried a bit. Watch them closely during the whole baking process and be sure not to let them burn.

5. Remove fries from oven and salt to taste.

Serves: 2
Time: 35–45 minutes
Leftover potential: Poor, but not hopeless. These are best when fresh from the oven, and it’s rare that we have leftovers, but A has satisfactorily reheated them in the microwave the next day (although I'm sure the texture becomes more like roasted sweet potato than like fries), so do save them if you can’t finish them.

BBQ PULLED CHICKEN SANDWICHES

I rarely make sandwiches, except for grilled cheeses and BLTs, but something about summer and all the accompanying glossy magazine photo spreads of picnics and barbeques makes me long for breezy, crowd-pleasing, down-home, checkered-tablecloth fare. This recipe from Cooking Light fit the bill admirably; it’s fast and easy enough to throw together on a weeknight, not too junky, and thoroughly delicious, with a complex sweet-sour-spicy flavor. (The original recipe title was “Black Pepper and Molasses Pulled Chicken Sandwiches,” but I've changed it because (a) it'll never get called that around our house and (b) it's odd to me that black pepper gets marquee billing when it's not especially prevalent in the sauce.) A few recipe commenters griped that the sauce wasn’t spicy enough, but mine had plenty of kick, probably because I substituted chipotle chili powder for part of the regular stuff, which I highly recommend for added heat and smokiness. I’m definitely glad that I took the advice of the majority of commenters and doubled the original sauce-to-chicken proportion; everyone who didn’t complained that there wasn’t enough sauce. (I’ve incorporated that change, and a few related method tweaks, into the recipe below.) I actually quadrupled the sauce quantities because I was doubling the amount of chicken—the thighs I bought came in a 1½-pound package and the commenters said the chicken mixture freezes well, so I figured what the hell? But the rolls we bought at the farmers’ market (so tasty!) were larger than 2 ounces, like small hoagie rolls, so we ate more chicken per serving than Cooking Light dictates, and A enjoyed the meal so much that within a few days, all the leftovers were gone before I could even freeze them. Upscale sloppy joes FTW!

This meal was so successful that I’m already planning to make it again just two weeks later (yes, I’m behind on my posting; I was on vacation!)—complete with sweet potato oven fries on the side, which are perfect for dipping into any leftover sauce.

6 tablespoons ketchup
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
2 tablespoons prepared mustard (i.e., not mustard powder; I used Dijon)
2 tablespoons molasses
1½ teaspoons chili powder (swap in chipotle chili powder for ½ teaspoon of the regular if you like)
1 teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
¼ teaspoon ground ginger
12 ounces skinless, boneless chicken thighs, cut into 2-inch pieces (I just realized I totally neglected to do this the first time around, but they turned out just fine anyway; I think it just helps them cook fast enough to meet Cooking Light’s “30-minute meals” criteria)
4 (2-ounce) sandwich rolls, sliced in half horizontally
Dill pickle slices

1. Combine all ingredients except rolls and pickles in a medium saucepan; bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low; cover and cook, stirring occasionally, about 25 minutes or until chicken is done and tender (you can cook longer if you wish). If sauce looks too thin, simmer uncovered for about 5 minutes. Remove from heat.

2. Remove chicken from saucepan with a slotted spoon, reserving sauce in pan. Place chicken on a cutting board and shred with two forks. Place chicken in a bowl and mix in reserved sauce (start with ½ cup) until desired consistency is reached. (Any leftover sauce makes a good dip for sweet potato fries!)

3. Place chicken on rolls and top with pickles.

Serves: 4
Time: 40 minutes
Leftover potential: Good (obviously, store leftover chicken, pickles, and rolls separately!)

FRESH APRICOT ICE CREAM

Until I moved to California, I had never tasted a fresh apricot. I’m not sure I’d even seen one before. I may not have even given a thought to their existence, although if I’d considered it, of course I would have realized that the dried ones had to come from somewhere. But it’s not like I sit around eating dried apricots all the time anyway.

Nowadays I’m getting to be an old pro at this Californian thing, so I get happy when fresh apricots start showing up at the farmers’ market in the spring. I’ll admit, however, that my happiness springs less from my and enjoyment of the apricots themselves and more from the fact that they herald the beginning of stone-fruit season. It turns out that I think fresh apricots are OK, but they don’t hold a candle to nectarines or peaches or even plums in my affection. Still, when I suddenly realized that I need to start making ice cream in all the fresh fruit flavors of my dreams NOW NOW NOW before it gets too hot, I turned to apricots because they’re the most genuinely in season. And of course, David Lebovitz had a recipe for fresh apricot ice cream in The Perfect Scoop. And it involved almond extract, my favorite!

Lebovitz encourages you to use super-ripe, squishy apricots, but I may have been a little early in the season because I had trouble finding ones that weren’t hard. Yeah, I could have waited a few days for them to ripen, but I wanted to make the ice cream right away because I had time that day and I’m impatient like that. So I asked the fruit-stand proprietor if he had any overripe apricots and he pointed me to a box behind the counter where the softer, bruised and dented specimens were tossed. Even those weren’t crazy ripe, mostly just bruised here and there, but I got them for the bargain price of 80 cents (as opposed to the normal price of $2.50)!

The ice cream was easy to make (slice apricots, simmer in water, stir in sugar, blend with other ingredients) and churned up nice and fluffy. At first I was a little disappointed with the flavor—it was on the tart side (maybe because of the ripeness issue) and I couldn’t taste the almond, just intense apricotiness. But after a few days—I don’t know if the flavors developed in the freezer or if my mood just shifted or what—I started to really love it. It was so fresh, unique, and summery; it’s like I finally understand what fresh apricots are for, and I feel lucky to have access to them.

1 pound squishy-ripe fresh apricots (10–16, depending on size)
½ cup water
½ cup sugar
1 cup heavy cream
3 drops almond extract
A few drops of freshly squeezed lemon juice

1. Slice the apricots open and remove the pits, then cut each apricot into sixths. Cook them with the water in a covered medium saucepan over medium heat until tender, about 8 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from the heat and stir in the sugar until dissolved. Let cool to room temperature.

2. Puree the apricots and any liquid in a blender or food processor until smooth. (If there are little fibers left, you can strain the mixture through a sieve.) Stir in the cream, almond extract, and lemon juice. Chill mixture thoroughly.

3. Process in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

Yields:1 quart
Time: About 20 minutes of active work, plus a few hours of chilling, plus processing time
Leftover potential: Good, for about a week

QUINOA PILAF WITH SWEET POTATOES, KALE, AND BACON

I was going through simultaneous sweet potato and kale phases a few months ago, and I’m currently possessed by a quinoa mania, so when I saw this recipe at Serious Eats, trying it was a no-brainer. It seems better suited for fall or winter than spring, but kale and sweet potatoes are still available at the farmer’s market, so it’s not completely unseasonal. And, as you might expect when bacon and vegetables and quinoa are involved, it was quite tasty.

Since I love roasted kale, I was initially excited to see that both the kale and the sweet potatoes are roasted for this recipe, but now I have some doubts about whether roasting is really the right treatment for kale in this format. First of all, at least in my oven, 475 degrees is pretty high heat for kale; some of mine burned before the sweet potatoes had even gotten golden. If I were to roast the kale again, I’d do it at a lower temperature, then remove it, raise the heat, and roast the sweet potatoes—but that’s a lot more inconvenient for a weeknight meal. And then I felt a little sad stirring that crisp, snackable kale into the warm quinoa, where it just got soft again. It seemed to make the whole pilaf a little on the dry side, and it tasted a bit bitter. Maybe I just overdid my kale, but I do wonder if just wilting the kale in a skillet might be a better option. When fall rolls around, I’ll try it both ways and let you know. But minor kale-roasting quibbles aside, this is a delicious, wholesome, and colorful, and substantial quinoa concoction.

2–4 slices of bacon, diced
1 small onion, cut in half and sliced thin
1 cup quinoa
1½ cups water
1 teaspoon salt, divided
1 large sweet potato (about 10 ounces), cut into ¼-inch cubes
1 bunch kale (about 8 ounces), chopped coarsely
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 scallions, green parts only, sliced thin

1. Preheat the oven to 475 degrees.

2. In a medium saucepan with a tight-fitting lid (I used my Dutch oven), cook the bacon over medium heat until the bacon is crisp and the fat is rendered, about 10 minutes. Reserve the bacon bits.

3. Drop the onions into the hot bacon fat and sauté, stirring occasionally, until they soften, about 5 minutes. Add the quinoa and toss until coated with the fat and slightly toasted, about 2 minutes more. Add the water and ½ teaspoon of the salt, bring to a boil, stir once, cover, reduce to low, and let cook undisturbed until the water is absorbed and the quinoa is tender, about 15 minutes.

4. While the quinoa is cooking, toss the sweet potatoes and kale with the olive oil and salt and spread in a single layer on a baking sheet. Bake until the potatoes and kale begin to brown in places and the potatoes are tender, about 15 minutes.

5. When the quinoa is cooked, stir in the potatoes, kale, bacon, and scallions.

Serves: 4
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: Good.

STRAWBERRY-SOUR CREAM ICE CREAM

Neither A nor I really likes sour cream. Or, to be more accurate, we think of it in the same category as mayonnaise and cream cheese: good in certain contexts, but mystifying in its overall popular appeal. While sour cream is fine in a stroganoff or twice-baked potatoes, and it can be excellent in baked goods, you’re not going to catch us piling dollops of it onto our tacos or chili. I’ve become more neutral on the subject over the years; my aversion stems mainly from the quantities in which sour cream is often presented—it’s ruined so many restaurant meals by appearing unannounced in huge blobs that smother the entire plate, so you can bet that those Daisy commercials that show people happily eating it by the heaping spoonful give me the willies (similarly, although I now like a thin layer of mayonnaise on my BLTs, I still habitually resent mayo due to years of being presented with soggy sandwiches dripping with the stuff). But A harbors a distinct antipathy for many white, creamy foodstuffs, so when I announced to him that I’d found the perfect way to use up the rest of the sour cream in our fridge (I’d had to buy a whole container just for 3 tablespoons’ worth to go into his birthday cake) and the solution was making strawberry ice cream (from David Lebovitz’s indispensible The Perfect Scoop, of course), he replied, “Why would you do that?” I swore up and down that all online testimonials suggested it wouldn’t taste much like sour cream—tangier than normal ice cream, sure, but less tangy than frozen yogurt—but he remained skeptical until presented with a spoonful.

Folks, this is some good ice cream. As I predicted, the flavor wasn’t unusual—it’s just a really good strawberry ice cream, bright and fresh—but the texture sent me over the moon. I don’t know whether to thank the sour cream or perfect weather conditions, but this is the first recipe that’s turned out really thick and creamy for me right out of the ice cream maker. Thanks to lack of air conditioning, a temperamental freezer, and my refusal to bother with custard-based recipes, I’ve gotten used to homemade ice creams that taste delicious but vacillate between melty and icy. This one was amazingly light and fluffy, so much so that it nearly overflowed the bowl of the ice cream maker. I churned it while home alone on Saturday night, after returning from the pub with several beers in me, and I’m relieved there was no one around to see how greedily I licked the spatula, the beater, and even the freezer bowl, but I’m sorry that A didn’t get a chance to try this when it was freshly made. We’ve been eating bowls of it for dessert all week and it’s still fabulous, but the newly-churned version was incredible, cold, sweet, and pillowy, like strawberry whipped cream. For health purposes, strawberry frozen yogurt will remain my go-to recipe, but next time I have leftover sour cream, I know exactly what I’m doing with it.

1 pound fresh strawberries, rinsed and hulled
¾ cup sugar
1 tablespoon kirsch or vodka (I used kirsch)
1 cup sour cream
1 cup heavy cream
½ teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice

1. Slice strawberries and toss in a bowl with sugar and kirsch or vodka, stirring until sugar begins to dissolve. Cover and let stand at room temperature for 1 hour, stirring every so often.

2. Pulse the strawberries and their liquid with the sour cream, heavy cream, and lemon juice in a blender or food processor until almost smooth but still slightly chunky.

3. Refrigerate for 1 hour, then freeze in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions.

Yields: About 1¼ quarts
Time: 15 minutes of active work, 2 hours of waiting, plus processing time
Leftover potential: Best when freshly made, but will keep nicely in the freezer for at least a week

QUINOA TABBOULEH

Alert the media: I may be having an official love affair with quinoa. Something about its fluffy al dente texture is so comfort-foody to me that it feels secretly indulgent, yet it’s actually angelically light and wholesome. And this recipe for it is even better than the first one I tried.

My parents loved making tabbouleh when I was a kid, but the chewy, health-foodish bulgur that was its base grossed me out. Nowadays I’ll eat tabbouleh as part of a restaurant platter, but it definitely plays a supporting role to the hummus and falafel, and I certainly never felt compelled to make it at home until I started obsessively searching the Web for more quinoa recipes and saw this one at The Kitchn. Ta-dah: Trade bulgur for quinoa and I freakin’ love tabbouleh! Aside from the quinoa, it’s not really much different from my recipe for fattoush, except with feta and onion and without cilantro. You’ve got your tomato, cucumber (not included in the original recipe, but included in many similar recipes, and I’m never sorry for an excuse to eat cucumber, so I added it here), parsley, and mint in a lemon dressing—what’s not to love? And love it I did. I went a bit easier on the herbs (the quantities here are pretty huge, and mint and parsley are probably A’s least favorites; also, I admit I may have gotten tired of mincing) and it was perfectly delicious, but I don’t think the full amounts would be as overpowering as I feared, so I’ll be bolder next time. I also eased up on the feta; the original recipe called for 8 ounces, and Trader Joe’s sells crumbled feta in 6-ounce containers. I didn’t even use the entire container and it seemed plenty cheesy to me, but I know feta lovers are a passionate bunch (I’m more feta-neutral), so just eyeball whatever looks good to you. If you want to be vegan, this would still even be tasty with the cheese left out entirely.

Anyway, I served this with hummus and pita crisps, although it makes a perfectly satisfying light meal on its own—as I can vouch, because even though A claimed to like quinoa tabbouleh, he didn’t make a dent in the three leftover servings. Which, actually, was just fine with me; I happily ate them all myself over the course of the week. In fact, I wish I had some right now. This will definitely be one of my go-to dishes this summer.

1 cup dry quinoa
½ red onion, diced
2 medium tomatoes, seeded and diced, or 1–2 cups of cherry tomatoes, halved
1 small cucumber, peeled, seeded, and diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 bunch parsley (about 2 cups), minced
1 bunch mint (about ½ cup), minced
6–8 ounces feta
¼ cup good extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
Salt to taste

1. Rinse the quinoa well under cold water, then add to a medium saucepan with 2 cups of water and ½ teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil, then turn down the heat to medium-low, cover, and cook until the quinoa is fluffy and chewy, about 20 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, put the diced red onion in a small bowl, cover it with water, add a pinch of salt, and let soak. (This will give the raw onion less bite.)

3. When quinoa is cooked, empty it into a large bowl and allow it to cool almost to room temperature, stirring occasionally. (This will help the vinaigrette coat everything without the quinoa absorbing too much of it.)

4. When the quinoa feels just barely warm to the touch, whisk together the olive oil, lemon juice, and a healthy pinch of salt. Pour it over the quinoa and stir until the grains are evenly coated. Drain the water off the onions and add them to the bowl along with the tomatoes, cucumber, garlic, parsley, and mint, and stir to combine. Crumble the feta over the top and gently stir it in as well. Taste the salad and add more lemon juice or salt as desired.

Serves: 4-6
Time: 45 minutes
Leftover potential: High. The flavors actually deepen overnight. Will keep in the fridge for at least a week; can be eaten cold or at room temperature (I like it best somewhere in between). Great for work lunches because it’s not too heavy but still prevented me from being ravenous at 5 p.m.

AVOCADO, STRAWBERRY, ORANGE, AND ARUGULA SALAD

I’m a latecomer to avocados; I didn’t even start liking guacamole until my college years, when I tasted the good stuff in Mexico. But moving to California, where avocados are so very cheap and good and plentiful (so much so that you might actually know some people who have avocado trees in their backyards and bestow big bagfuls upon you), made me feel contractually obligated to use them, and now I am enamored with them. It helps that our farmers’ market has a cheerful, capable vendor A and I refer to as The Avocado Lady, who has the infallible magical power of selecting precisely the right avocado for you based on size, type, intended use, and when you want to eat it, so that all I have to do is stroll up and say “I’d like something that will be ripe tomorrow night” and I’m presented with a perfect avocado every time.

I don’t have that many avocado recipes yet, though, so I was excited to see this one from Gourmet at The Bitten Word, chock full of ingredients I like and bursting with beautiful bright colors. Since goat cheese tastes like dirt to me (I keep trying, I swear!) I almost skipped the cheese entirely, but I subbed in feta at the last minute and was glad I did; it kept the sweet-savory balance intact. I also ended up using a couple of mandarin oranges instead of a navel orange, because when I sliced open my navel orange it was all tragically dry and stringy (I think that’s the first-ever bad orange I’ve encountered in the six years I lived here), so I squeezed out enough juice for the dressing and discarded the flesh. I actually liked the mandarin orange segments a lot; they were a lot less labor-intensive and held together neatly for tossing and eating. Surprisingly, though, I didn’t really like the dressing here, even though it’s just a lime-orange version of my go-to lemon vinaigrette. Maybe the juice from the rogue orange tainted the whole thing, but I kept tasting the dressing over and over again as I whisked it, and it seemed to vacillate between anemic at best and off-tasting at worst. It didn’t ruin the salad for me because I loved all the other ingredients so much, but it certainly lacked the pizzazz needed to elevate this from “big bowl of cut-up foods I enjoy” to more than the sum of its parts. Perhaps having orange in both the dressing and the salad was overkill, and my taste buds were hoping for a more contrasting flavor? I wonder how the balsamic vinaigrette from the rather-similar-now-that-I-think-about-it arugula and strawberry salad would work with this recipe. I know people routinely eat avocado halves with balsamic vinegar poured in the pit cavity, so it wouldn’t be a crazy flavor combo, right? Or possibly, since I thought this salad also needed a crunchy, earthier element like nuts, I should just merge the two recipes and be done with it. I’ll experiment and let you know how that goes. But regardless, I’ll make this again. It’s a tasty way to get your fruits and veggies in one bowl and will make a refreshing light dinner on a hot summer day.

1 navel orange
1 cup strawberries, sliced or quartered
1 avocado, halved, pitted, peeled and cut into ½-inch pieces
2 teaspoons fresh lime juice, divided

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
3 cups baby arugula (2 ounces)
2ounces mild goat or feta cheese, crumbled
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Cut peel, including all white pith, from oranges. Working over a small bowl, cut segments free from membranes. Squeeze membranes for more juice so that you have 1½ teaspoons of orange juice in the bowl. In a larger bowl, gently toss together the orange segments, strawberries, avocados, and ½ teaspoon lime juice.

2. To the small bowl of orange juice, add oil, remaining 1½ teaspoons lime juice, and salt and pepper to taste.

3. Toss arugula with dressing, top with avocado-strawberry mixture, and sprinkle with cheese.

Serves: 2–3
Time: 15 minutes
Leftover potential: Poor, unless ingredients are stored separately (but even then, avocado will get brown)

COCONUT CUPCAKES

Every year at about this time, I crave coconut cake. That’s because when I was little, my mom would always make me a birthday cake shaped like a bunny, with coconut fur and jellybean eyes. I loved those cakes. But soon, my taste in birthday desserts started skewing toward the chocolatey, and I never looked back. I don’t think I’ve tasted coconut cake in years, and I haven’t even had cake for my birthday in recent memory; since moving to California, I’ve established a tradition of having a beach bonfire party, so hot dogs and s’mores are the new treat of choice. Plus I like cookies and candy and pie and ice cream more than I like cake. Plus I’ve got no one to make a cake for me (mom is far away, and baking is not one of A’s many skills), and it’s a little sad to have to make your own birthday cake, right?

Not if you’ve got a food blog! When I saw these cupcakes at Ezra Pound Cake a few months ago, I knew I needed a good excuse to make them, so I bookmarked them for my birthday. Besides the fact that they were (a) coconut and (b) cupcakes, what tempted me most about them was the inclusion of almond extract, one of my favorite flavors, and buttermilk, which is always stellar in baked goods, and the cream cheese frosting (I don’t love frosting, but I make an exception for cream cheese frosting—which is odd, because I don’t love cream cheese, either). Plus, the recipe was from Ina Garten, as so many delicious things tend to be. My birthday was on a Friday this year, which was not terribly conducive to cake-baking, but I quickly overcame that obstacle by simply declaring Saturday my birthday as well. Friday would be my office party and my bonfire, and Saturday would be cake baking, fun stuff (a trip to Descanso Gardens and a mini-golf outing), dinner at my favorite sushi restaurant, cake eating, and gift opening.

When I embarked on my baking and was setting out all the butter on the counter to bring it to room temperature, I realized this recipe is definitely a once-a-year treat. We’re talking three sticks of butter for a dozen cupcakes, plus the buttermilk and cream cheese. Aside from my Butter Guilt, however, the baking and frosting proceeded smoothly (it’s pretty much just standard cake procedure). I made no recipe changes, except that I used the ol’ milk + lemon juice buttermilk substitute because I didn’t want to make a special trip to the store to buy a whole carton when I just needed ½ cup. Real buttermilk is always better, though, so in the future I’ll try to make the effort. The cupcakes were still plenty good, but when I use buttermilk I can always taste that nice tang and notice the extra-tender texture it imparts, while when I use a substitute it just seems more…neutral.

These cupcakes were so, so good—exactly what I’d been craving. The cake part was good but unobtrusive, buttery and not too sweet, a perfect canvas to showcase the coconut flavor and the frosting (I did think the cake seemed just a little stiffer than I like it, but that may have been my fault, not the recipe’s). The frosting was excellent: perfectly pillowy texture, again not too sweet. The weird thing was that the cupcakes seemed to actually get better with time. I liked them when we ate them on Saturday, but the frosting seemed too tangy and cream-cheesy, and the coconut flavor wasn’t as strong as I’d been expecting. We stuck the rest of the cupcakes in the fridge, and the next day when I had one (after letting it sit out on the counter for half an hour or so to bring it back up to room temperature), I was amazed. Either my palate was out of whack on Saturday, or the coconut had really permeated the cupcakes by Sunday. I’d thought I was going to try to pawn off the rest of the cupcakes on my coworkers on Monday, but it turned out there was no way I was going to part with them, and we enjoyed cupcakes for dessert every night this week. Now they’re gone and I have something to look forward to next April, because these are definitely becoming a birthday tradition for me.

I’m so glad I went ahead and made my own cake. For one thing, I’d forgotten how happy it makes me to blow out the candles. But more importantly, it feels really good to indulge in exactly what you want. I’d considered just going out and buying two cupcakes from the cupcake shop in our neighborhood, and that would have been fine, but it wouldn’t have been as satisfying. Baking is fun, and when you put labor into something you’re going to eat and it turns out just as good as you’d hoped (or better), it’s like a gift to yourself. Happy birthday, me.



For the cake:
¾ cup (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup sugar
2 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
¾ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
¾ teaspoon pure almond extract
1½ cups flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon kosher salt
½ cup buttermilk
3½ ounces sweetened, shredded coconut

For the frosting:
½ pound (8 ounces) cream cheese, room temperature
¾ cup (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
¼ teaspoon pure almond extract
12 ounces confectioners’ sugar, sifted
3½ ounces sweetened, shredded coconut

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Line a muffin pan with paper liners.

2. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar on high speed until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. With the mixer on low speed, add the eggs, one at a time, scraping down the bowl after each addition. Add the vanilla and almond extracts; mix well.

3. In a separate bowl, sift the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

4. Add one-third of the dry ingredients to the batter, then add half the buttermilk. Repeat with another one-third of the dry ingredients and the rest of the buttermilk, then add the remaining dry ingredients. Mix until just combined. Fold in coconut.

5. Fill each paper liner to the top with batter. Bake for 25 to 35 minutes, until the tops are brown and a toothpick comes out clean. Cool in the pan for 15 minutes. Remove to a baking rack and cool completely.

6. Meanwhile, make the frosting. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the cream cheese, butter, and vanilla and almond extracts. Add the confectioners’ sugar and mix until smooth.

7. Frost the cupcakes. Sprinkle with the remaining 3½ ounces coconut.

Yields: 12
Time: 1½ hours
Leftover potential: Good. We kept them in the fridge, bringing them up to room temperature before we ate them, and they were still just as good six days later.