Veggies

Something Hiromi said about carrots gave me an idea for this week's Recipe Tuesday, Dear Reader. I've done all manner of main dishes, but haven't put up any side dishes (with the exception of rice... and come on... It's RICE). No pictures, 'cause I refuse to make 40 side dishes at once, and when I do sides, it's more a 'throw together' kind of thing without any 'recipe' to it. SO I thought I'd explain a bit more about what I like to eat as for veggies and how I like to eat them and along the way I'll tell you how I cook them and maybe you, Dear Reader, can get some ideas for your own kitchen. Sound good? Let's go.

So, first how I like to eat them.... Out at restaurants, I usually eat a salad, not cooked veggies. If I do order veggies, they're usually sauteed or steamed, and if they're plain, I'll actually ask for a side of vinagrette rather than butter. Hey... There's an idea! Steamed, vinagrette. I'll also add veggies into a lot of things I cook just to mix it up a bit. I made my Honey-Ginger Chicken tonight, changed a few things in the sauce (threw in a good 2 tablespoons of McCormick's Carribean Jerk seasoning, used plain ketchup, 1/2 honey-1/2 maple syrup for the honey in the original, a smidge of mustard, some barbecue sauce, more soy)... In addition, instead of serving it OVER rice, I made the rice a full side-dish, throwing in some frozen carrots and peas to the rice when I removed it from the boil along with some of the same seasoning blend to keep some continuity. I'll cut veggies differently. I'll roast them (cut into chunks, drizzle with olive oil, roast in 350 degree oven until tender), I'll throw various seasonings at them, I'll mix it up as I go. Here's a few of my favorite ways...

Carrots: I don't like carrots much. Never have. Especially not raw. Small bits, occassionally, I'm good with them. But give me a good steamed carrot, with some butter and honey and some fresh grated ginger, and it's good. Or just butter. I can deal with that. Now, we're not talking HUGE amounts of butter, we're talking a tablespoon for like, 2 cups of carrots. Easiest thing with carrots is to get a bag of baby carrots, pre-peeled. Wash them good, though. I hate the fact that most groceries, no matter where you are, insist on 'spraying' the veggies. What a mold fest, you know? And no, I'm not lucky enough to live by a Whole Foods. I don't think. Hmmm... Nope. No Whole Foods. Farmer's Market season is coming soon, though. YAY! So you pop either baby carrots or carrot chunks into a steamer basket, and simply steam them until you can insert a fork into them without too much resistance. There should still be some 'bite' to them, just not super-crunchy. While that's going, in a separate bowl that will hold all the carrots, mix together a couple tablespoons honey and a teaspoon of VERY finely grated fresh ginger. Microwave this for about 30 seconds so it's liquid and thin. When the carrots are done, dump them into the bowl with the honey/ginger mix in it, pop a tablespoon of butter onto the top and toss or stir to coat everything. Voila. Honey-ginger steamed carrots. If you use a bowl with a lid (large tupperware, for example) you can just cover the bowl and turn it over to mix it up.

Peas: My favorite side dish for peas is a 'spring pea gratin' that Emeril did one year for some holiday. Since I don't trust his lawyers to NOT come after me if I post up the recipe, I'll just point you to it. Go HERE for the way I like to eat peas. One caveat though... I usually do the cheese THEN the breadcrumbs. To me, it turns out better. But that's just me.

Green beans: Do not mention green bean casserole to me. That is the foulest substance on the face of the planet and I refuse to eat it. It's GROSS. I like french-cut green beans if I buy canned or frozen. Again, steamed. After steaming, toss the beans with a tablespoon of lemon juice and sprinkle dill on them. Good stuff, dill. Works really well. Another option is to fry up a couple slices of bacon until crisp, drain all of the grease from the pan and throw in a few handfuls of frozen french-cut green beans. Saute them in what is left of the bacon drippings until they're warmed through, remove to a paper towel to drain them REALLY well (I'll put down some paper towelling, then the beans, then more towelling and just kind of pat them). After that, put them in a bowl and crumble the bacon on top. This works really well for fresh green beans as well.

Potatoes: I've given mashed as a side with the chicken-fried steak, but more often I'll bake a potato. Scrub it well, poke it on each end with a fork, rub it with canola oil, rub it with salt, and pop it in the oven straight on the rack. I typically do it at 350 degrees, for as long as it takes for it to get soft. Serve it with whatever you like as a topping. YUM. My toppings typically are going to be one of: a tablespoon of butter, a tablespoon of cream cheese, some sour cream, a slice of good ol' american cheese, bacon crumbles... Depends on what I'm in the mood for. And yes... I eat the peels. You can also saute potatoes, roast them... Roasted are good. Twice-baked are good (take a potato, bake it, cut it in 1/2, scoop out the center leaving the skin intact, mash it, mix it with cheese, put it back in the skin, rebake until the cheese is melted).

Squash: Squash is a good side dish for me. I'll saute up some crookneck (summer squash) and zucchini with some mushrooms. I'll slice up summer and zucchini for a gratin (layer in a baking dish alternating with cheese and breadcrumbs). I like acorn squash roasted (slice it in 1/2, remove the seeds, put a 2 tablespoon pat of butter into the cavity, olive oil it, pop it onto a baking sheet cut side up and bake at 350 until it's soft and slightly carmelized). There's so many things you can do with squash, really. I mean zucchini bread CAN be eaten as a side. Cook up some spaghetti squash and use an actual pasta sauce for it. Gnocchi. It's so versatile. Bread it. Chunk it and throw it in a roast for roasted in meat juices. YUM. Shred it and make a patty out of it using egg as a binder. Brown the patties.

Potato salad: I'm gonna digress for a moment here onto potato salad. Dan's family used to drive me INSANE when they served potato salad. This is what his mom, his grandmother, his step-dad and Dan liked as potato salad. It had: Potatoes, peeled/boiled/drained/chopped, mayonnaise, and Baco's. Occassionally, they'd throw in just the whites of hard boiled eggs chopped up. That's it. THAT IS NOT POTATO SALAD! That is some wierd dish that shouldn't have ever been developed. There is zero flavor to it beyond the mayonnaise. NO mustard, no veggies, just mayo. Eww.
I make potato salad the way my mom does: Potatoes (quartered, boiled, drained, peeled, chopped), mayo, mustard, sweet pickle relish, green onions, celery, hard boiled eggs (the full egg), garlic salt, seasoning salt. That's potato salad. You can add bacon bits, but PLEASE please please please (please??) fry up some bacon and crumble it. Do not use that wierd orange-y brown stuff that 'tastes just like bacon!'. It doesn't. Trust me. I've had to eat enough of it.

Spinach: My favorite way to make spinach is to buy baby spinach, rinse it well, DRY it well, saute it in a small amount of butter and olive oil that's had some bits of garlic softened in it until it's barely wilted, then toss with sesame seeds. YUMMY. Add a bit of lemon juice so it doesn't turn strange colors. You can mix this up with sauteed shrimp for a stellar shrimp salad. If you do that, don't toss with sesame seeds, but sprinkle them on top of a sesame dressing.

Any veggie can be used as a side dish, Dear Reader. The key is to find the flavors you like and exploit them. Going through the list, I like my veggies sweet, lemon-y, and a bit crunchy... Saute it for a different flavor (you can saute just about any veggie), make a gratin, combine them in a method you don't THINK will work, throw in mushrooms, use a vinagrette for flavor, use herbs with abandon, add in just about anything and it'll be good. Play with your food, people. PLAY! Life's too short to eat boring, over-cooked veggies.