I don’t recall when I first combined kale & capers, but it is certainly a winning combination. The salty brine of the capers and the thick texture of the kale are reminiscent of seaweed. Paired with creamy white beans, this is a delicious, healthy, quick and easy meal that I make again and again. I usually use dry navy beans, this time I tried it with a can of butter beans that had been sitting in the cupboard, and I think it turned out even better than usual with the larger soft beans. I imagine that black-eyed peas would work well too.

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I’m always disappointed when French Onion Soup is on the menu at restaurants and I can’t have it because it’s made with beef broth, so whenever I see a unique variation on the recipe I save it. I have several soup versions to try, but these dumplings posted by Kerry over at Serious Eats caught my eye as I had a half packet of wonton wrappers that needed to be used up.

I made a vegetarian version of the recipe, using what ingredients I had on hand, and these dumplings were so rich and delicious, I made them again to finish off the wonton wrappers a few days later. I substituted Jack Daniels for the cognac the first time, and dark rum the second. Both substitutions worked well, creating a lovely rich broth.

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In a combined effort to continue getting through our pantry items in anticipation of our move this fall & to create an original recipe for entry in Culinarty’s Original Recipe Round Up, I created these Chard & Tepary Bean Empanadas.

Teparies are an heirloom bean varietal native to the southwestern United States and Mexico that are very similar to the pinto bean, in fact, my description of their flavor, is that they taste like pinto beans that have already had sugar and fat added to them, even though they have not. Tepary beans can be ordered from Rancho Gordo. There are two varieties of teparies, white and tan. The white teparies are a bit sweeter than the tan. I use a blend of the two.

Just to be thorough with my very first food blog event entry, this is also my entry to MLLA-13 conceived by Susan of the “Well-Seasoned Cook” and currently being hosted by Sunshinemom of “Tongue Ticklers”

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We’re moving in a few months so I am always cooking with an eye to using up our pantry items. Browsing through Herbivoracious, Michael Natkin’s gorgeous blog, I came across a couple of simple (but well paired) polenta dishes and I immediately thought of the three quarters full bag of polenta in my pantry. Keeping Michael’s suggestions of gorgonzola and aged balsamic, I substituted some brocollini that needed to be used up for the chard and added in some homemade rosemary basil oil. The result was a quick simple delicious meal that didn’t require a trip to the grocery store.

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I cook Indian often, ever since I fell in love with a particularly ghee filled dal on an otherwise uninspiring thali plate and discovered the next day that I could recreate it perfectly for a third of the cost.

Indian is a fantastic cuisine, at least to my probably untrained palate, because I can make three dishes the first night, planning for leftovers, and then add a dish or two a night, and all of a sudden the week has passed with delicious meals every night that didn’t require too much thought.

This particular recent batch of Indian dishes have also had the uncharacteristic trait of being relatively quick to make. I started off on this latest Indian cooking bought with a half a head of cabbage that needed to be used up. This curried cabbage (adapted from somewhere on the internet that google does not want to reveal) has turned me into a cabbage lover:

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I found this recipe for Gorgonzola, Wild Rice and Greens in the Vegetarian Times. While I’ve cooked with wild rice on various occasions, I’ve never really been that enamoured of it and generally end up tossing whatever recipe I bought it for and mixing the rest in with my brown rice blend. This recipe sounded so good though (what with the gorgonzola and all), that I decided to give it another try. Of course, I once again forgot that broccoli rabe & broccolini were different things until I got to the grocery store. I decided to go with it though since I’ve never seen broccolli rabe for sale, so here is my adaption with crisp broccolini instead of wilted broccoli rabe. I’m glad that I gave wild rice another chance, it works wonderfully in this dish (then again, it might just be the cheese).
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A few weeks ago I made this Onion and Fennel Bisque, which called for a whole two tablespoons of Pernod. While the soup was quite good - I actually liked the fennel in it and I don’t tend to enjoy fennel - I wondered what else to use the rest of the 750ml bottle in.

Google didn’t reveal much, mostly meat recipes, but I did come across one appealing recipe for Fresh Spinach with Leeks in Pernod, which I slightly modified and paired with some cumin spiced white bean and rice patties for a quick one dish meal (quick after the beans & rice are cooked of course) . . .

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