Chicken and Basil Stir Fry

We all liked this recipe! I was looking for a recipe that used the basil that came in the CSA box. I have so many ideas for using basil but wanted to try something a bit different.

This recipe is a keeper...quick, fresh, and good.


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Kale Chips

Seriously? These are supposed to taste like potato chips? It wasn't that they were bad, but I do think it was a jump to say that they taste like potato chips. Have these people never eaten a potato chip?

Eleanor took some to a swim meet for her coach to try (remember...he's quite aware of the peanut butter sweet potato soup). He thought that the chips didn't look like a legal substance.

I like kale in other recipes, so next time I'll stick with something a bit more traditional.

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Chocolate Soy Nut Butter

Our new favorite product is chocolate soy nut butter! Eleanor has been so sad that she can't have nutella. Well, she probably really can because her allergy isn't to hazelnuts but in the conservative allergist world the recommendation is made to avoid all nuts.

She asked the pediatrician if she could be tested for hazelnuts. After he described the process, she decided that she wasn't ready to go through multiple layers of testing just yet. I had a flash of an idea about a product I had remembered seeing years ago, soy nut-chocolate butter. Whole Foods carries it.

Eleanor had been making panini sandwiches with peanut butter and fruit and dipping the sandwich into chocolate syrup...but now she has been eating this spread as well.

We have found her product...hooray!


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Mocha Almond Biscotti

I did mention this version in my post 6/13. This is the exact recipe I have used since I clipped it from Eating Well magazine years and years ago.

I no longer make it with almonds due to the allergy in our home, but I made the chocolate and plain version recently for a UPAF event at Paul's work. His company does a lot of work in raising money for this fund....and part of this year's festivities was a bake sale. I was planning to make cut-out sugar cookies since I have a musical note cookie cutter and a violin shaped cookie cutter, but I really had way too much to get done on a day off after a swim meet (like meals and laundry and de-trashing the house) to make cut outs. I think that these will sell since it's a nice treat with coffee or tea.

The basic ratio of wet to dry ingredients does work for other flavors of these cookies...sweet and savory.

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Fresh Tomato Basil Spaghettini

This recipe is from the now closed Palomino Restaurant in Minneapolis that I clipped out of the newspaper year and years ago. Of course, I have adapted it a bit over the years...but not too much because it's really good.

16 oz. spaghettini
1/4 c olive oil
4 t minced garlic
3/4 t kosher salt
3/4 t pepper
2 T sliced, drained sun dried tomatoes (or a little more)
1 medium tomato, cored, seeded, cut into 1/2 inch dice
1/2 c white wine
1/2 c chicken broth
2 small bunches of fresh basil, shredded, divided
2 T. chilled butter
2 T grated Parmesan cheese
2 T toasted pine nuts

Cook spaghettini for 2 minutes in boiling water until partially done; drain. Set aside. Heat saute pan over med high heat. Add oil and garlic and saute garlic about 1 minute but do not brown. Mix salt and pepper, dried and fresh tomatoes and add to garlic tossing to combine. Add wine and chicken broth, stirring up any bits stuck to the pan. Add the pasta and half the shredded basil.

Cook until volume of liquid is reduced by half. Stir in butter. Put on serving plates and top with Parmesan, remaining basil, and pine nuts.

It's a good basic recipe working well with any type of add-ins such as broccoli, shrimp, chicken, etc. We like it pretty basic...just the way it's written above. At times I have cut back a bit on the olive oil... but it really does taste best with the butter added at the end. I may decrease it to 1 T or so of butter but it's best not to omit this. I mean, the menu (see picture on right) says that it is heart healthy....go figure.

I don't think a summer has gone by since I got this recipe that I haven't made it with garden basil and a garden tomato. Just perfect this week with fresh CSA basil. I had to use a grocery store tomato, so I do know that this will be better in a few weeks with some locally grown tomatoes; however, it's pretty good anyway.

Bacon and Date Scones

Paul took my list and went to the grocery store the other day. Yay....although I can tolerate grocery shopping, I really dislike shopping altogether. I have come to accept grocery shopping as a necessity but am really happy to not have to do it once in awhile. Paul took the list, so that means that he has to decode my writing. And that's how we ended up with a container of dates.

I thought that my scawl..."DW deterg" was pretty clear so I was expecting him to come home with dishwasher detergent, but he thought it was a certain kind of date. I thought about taking the dates back to the store but instead decided to make something with the dates. OK...maybe my writing wasn't really clear about what we needed, but I didn't think it was THAT bad! I probably have spent too much time at work trying to decipher illegible writing so my scale may be a bit off!

The drive from Los Angeles to Palm Springs features a number of date farms. Last spring we stopped for a date shake since that's what helped make that part of the dessert famous. We had planned on going an a tour of a date farm but high winds and a sleeping baby made it seem like a better idea to stop and have a shake instead. We enjoyed walking around the store and seeing so many varieties of dates. It doesn't seem like date shakes are too common outside California...and that's too bad since they are good.

For years I wouldn't eat dates. Not because they are a wrinkly dried fruit most of the time I see them, but because I THREW UP DATES AS A KID! It's so strange how that sticks with you for so long. A couple years ago I decided I needed to try to get over that issue, and I think I have. I gorged myself on dates wrapped around almonds as a kid after my parents made those as a Christmas treat. I think I was in 2nd or 3rd grade, so it really was time to get over it....and I'm glad that I did! Maybe next I'll try root beer and French onion soup....or maybe I'm not ready for that yet even though it has been nearly 30 years! I know that I'm not unusual is struggling to get over this since I have had this conversation with a number of people. I even have a slight aversion to bread pudding since my friend Meghan has talked about her experience with that.

Anyway, I was paging through an older Bon Appetit magazine deciding if there were any recipes I wanted to put in my pile to try, when I came across this one. Perfect...I had just gotten bacon at the warehouse club, so fate seemed to dictate trying this recipe. Hmmm....bacon and dates in my at home food supply....

Eleanor is not a date fan...but all three of us really liked these scones. Maybe it has to do with the stick of butter, or the sweetness of the dates, or the bacon? Whatever it is these are really good!
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Goat Cheese, Greens, and Garlic

These aren't from the garden...although those tomatoes are on the way. We had some extras from the store, so some freshly ground salt and freshly ground pepper and we were good to go. That was the perfect thing to serve with this pizza.

I had some chard that I had blanched and frozen from the CSA box a couple weeks ago and decided to use it since it is likely that there will be more greens coming our way.

Paul did the lip curl/sneer when I mentioned this was the dinner plan, but he was won over after trying this recipe. The crust was really good but did require planning ahead. I really did let it rise as recommended in the recipe. It was OK since I made it in the early afternoon, ran some errands, punched down the dough, drove to the Y for swimming and body pump, and finished it when we came home.

I was thinking about making the pizza Elizabeth posted earlier this summer but felt I should try something else...just for the sake of the blog.

Greens+Garlic+Goat cheese=GOOD
I would make this recipe again...for sure.







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