weekly scenes

What is life? Life is moving from one meal to another. Picking up a fresh artisan loaf on your way home. A fresh-brewed espresso. The thoughtful gentle taste of fresh herbs. It's about the delicacies that make the hardships a little bit easier. Sharing moments with friends and letting time stand still. Because food has a way of lighting life up and making it great.

vegan carrot soup with coconut lime drizzle

Note: This post was previously published as a part of my freelance work here

Carrots can be found in season almost year-round. Most people get tired of the classic ways to eat them, so today I want to suggest one of my favorites: pureed. When carrots are all mashed up, they make great soups. This particular recipe takes an Asian spin with cilantro, lime, and coconut. After you’ve downed it you’ll be packed with good nutrients, and full enough to get through the afternoon.

Ingredients:

Soup:

-          2 Cups Carrots, Chopped

-          2 Celery Stalks, Chopped

-          1 Yellow Onion, Chopped

-          ¼ tsp Saffron Threads

-          1 Tbs Curry Powder

-          1 ½ Cans Coconut Milk

-          10 Cilantro Sprigs

-          1 Tbs Coconut Oil

Drizzle:

-          ½ Can Coconut Milk

-          Juice from 1 Lime

Directions:

1.       Melt coconut oil in a large pot.  Add carrots & onion to cook, stirring every few minutes.

2.       After 15 minutes, or once carrots are almost fully cooked, add celery for 5 more minutes.

3.       Stir in saffron and curry powder, and sauté for another 3 minutes.

4.       Add coconut milk. Stir & let simmer.

5.       After 10 minutes, kill the flame and let the soup sit.

6.       While the soup is cooling, squeeze juice from one lime into your ½ can of coconut milk. Mix it up with a fork & set aside.

7.       Using an immersion or regular blender, puree the soup mixture. Add the cilantro sprigs right at the very end, so that they get chopped up, but are not sitting in the heat for long.

8.       To serve, garnish with coconut lime drizzle & a few pieces cilantro.

paleo squash & seafood bisque

Like everyone else, I've been eating healthier in the New Year. This is one of my many recipe creations in the venture to do so. It is a spin on seafood bisque with squash-based broth and no dairy. The seafood dresses it up, and adds healthy protein. Each bite feels like an indulgence. Things just shouldn't taste this good, and be this healthy.

Ingredients:

1 Onion

1 Large Garlic Clove

2 Acorn Squash

5 Cups Water

1 Tsp. Vegetable Bouillon or a Bouillon Cube

.4LB Scallops

10 Clams

16 Shrimp

2 Tsp Moroccan Seasoning

1 Tsp Tumeric

1 Tsp Chili Powder

1 Tsp Safron Threads

Ghee & Olive Oil for Sauteing

Salt & Pepper to Taste

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Slice the acorn squashes in half and lay them on a foil-lined baking sheet. Dress with a bit of oil, salt, and pepper. Roast until caramelized.

2. Remove squash from the oven. Once cooled, scoop out the innards and set aside.

3. Using hot olive oil, saute chopped onions and garlic in a large stock pot.After they are cooked through, add squash, water, and spices. Important, do not salt until the very end. Oysters add a lot of saltiness to a dish and you don't want to overdo it.

4. Using a hand blender, turn the squash and onions into a fine liquid. Let simmer.

5. In a separate saute pan, caramelize scallops and shrimp in ghee. Set them aside in a bowl when finished.

6. Toss oysters into the squash broth and cover the pot. The steam that is trapped with your lid will cook the oysters. Remove the lid once all have opened. After 5-7 minutes they should be done. 

7. Kill the flame and mix in scallops and shrimp.

8. Taste for seasoning and add as much salt/pepper as is needed.

9. Serve!

cantaloupe gazpacho with spicy crab salad

Talk about a no cook meal. This dish is fast and easy to whip up. I made it for dinner the first time after we got back from a backpacking trip and were too exhausted to cause much of a production. All you need is a hand blender and some fresh ingredients. Did I mention that it's delicious and healthy?

Ingredients:

(gazpacho)

1 Canteloupe

1 Cup mint leaves, unpacked

1/2 Tbsp sea salt

Juice from 1 lemon

(crab salad)

10oz Lump Crab

1 Green Pepper

1/2 Cucumber

2 Tbsp Lottie's hot sauce (any other will work too)

2 Tbsp olive oil mayo

Juice from 1 lemon

S & P to taste

Directions:

1. Blend soup ingredients together using a hand blender, and stick in the refrigerator to chill.

2. Dice half of your cucumber and all of your green pepper. Slice the other half of your cucumber into in strips for garnish.

3. Mix diced vegetables with all other crab salad ingredients.

4. To serve, fill a shallow bowl with gazpacho. Using a large spoon, form crab salad into a large ball and place it in the center of your dish. Add cucumber for garnish.

free lunch!

My office is located at Philadelphia's most southern tip, in the old Navy Yard. It's a beautiful place to be, with old retired battle ships, sprawling greens, and old general's houses with wrap around porches. Nowadays many companies are moving in and setting up camp. The yard has officially reached 10,000 employees, and last week we had free lunch to celebrate! They brought down 10 or 15 of the best food trucks in the city and let us go at it. Even better is that I'm broke and had no lunch that day, so I was super stoked on the free food. Fun times.

vegan spicy thai seitan salad

I finally recreated a dish that I used to love before turning vegetarian! When I decided to go veg I did it party to avoid processed foods which also meant no imitation meat. Some of my old favorite dishes could be pulled off with tofu, but for spicy Thai beef salad, it just didn't quite cut it. 

I then discovered seitan about a year ago, and heard that it was possible to make at home using whole wheat flour and vital wheat gluten. Anything that I can cook up in my own kitchen by stirring a few whole ingredients together and adding heat is unprocessed enough for me. 

This was my first time cooking with the stuff, and I'll admit, I didn't make the seitan myself this time around. I will surely try, but for now, I just wanted to see how it acted. I was very, very pleased with the results and even made my coworker try the salad out because I needed to share it with someone. It tastes much like the original spicy Thai Salad - bright with a kick of spice - and makes a great lunch option. An added bonus for all you vegetarians out there, it's also chock full of healthy protein.

Ingredients:

18 oz. seitan

3 scallions, sliced fine

1/3 cucumber, shredded

3 baby carrots, shredded

15 sprigs cilantro, minced

1 tbsp white vinegar

1 tbsp chili sauce

1 tbsp soy sauce

Directions:

1. Mix all ingredients in a medium-sized bowl

2. Place in the refrigerator over night, and serve on large leaves of lettuce.

*Tip: wrap it up like a burrito for a fun way to eat

potato salad with black radish and basil mayo

This recipe combines two recent fascinations of mine: flavored mayo and black radishes. You heard it right, black. These winter radishes are by far the most interesting vegetable I've come across in a while. Put one in your mouth, and you think it an ordinary radish. Until...it starts to turn spicy on you! A horseradish-y flavor kicks in at the end and it's such a fantastical surprise. If you life in a climate like the northeast, pick them up at your local farmer's market. In Philly, I got mine from one of my favorite farmers, Tom Culton, of Tom Culton Biologique. I've deemed him the "Willy Wonka" of vegetable farmers for the amazing creations he brings to market such as these guys.

What's more, I bet you never knew that radishes were great detoxifiers and cleansers! They're especially great at breaking up phlegm in the body. I've had a bit of a cold, and there's nothing like some radishes to help loosen things. In Chinese medine they're also used to promote digestion for this very reason. Another bonus, radishes are rich in water, so they're great at filling you up in a low cal way. 

By way of the mayo, I've been experimenting with fun flavors over the past year. Have you ever had a sandwich with chipotle mayo, or perhaps garlic? Amazing, right? This guy is a basil mayo, mmmm. Of course, there's a little guilt here, but the good news is that it has so much flavor that a little bit goes a long way. I've been messing around with some healthier, vegan options. So stay tuned until I get that guy perfected. Until then....

Basil Mayo Ingredients (Makes a mason jar-full to have on hand)

3/4 Cup lightly chopped basil

3 Medium garlic cloves, lightly roasted

1 Cup mayo

1 Tsp vinegar

1 1/2 Tsp salt

1/2 Tsp pepper

2 Tbsp pesto

Directions:

1. Place garlic and basil in a food processor and chop until fine

2. Add all other ingredients and mix until well blended

Potato Salad Ingredients:

1 Cups chopped fingerling potatoes

1 Black radish, quartered and sliced

3 Tbsp basil mayo

1 Tbsp white vinegar

1/3 cup olive oil

2 Celery stalks, chopped small

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 F 

2. Spread potatoes out on a greased foil-lined baking sheet. Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Bake until tender.

3. Mix potatoes, radish, celery, basil mayo, and white vinegar in a large bowl

4. Chill in the refrigerator over night and eat

house-cured salmon

Lox is my favorite food, hands down. I was raised on it, it's in my blood and I crave it like water. When I heard that it was actually pretty simple to make at home yourself, I had to try. It took two tries to get it down perfectly, but for a food that is so luxurious in feeling, it is amazingly stupid easy to do. You can bet I'll be doing this a couple times a month....for the rest of my life.

It came in handy when the hurricane rolled around that I had just produced my second round of homemade lox. Adam and I were shut up inside, and so what better to do than cook up a storm. We've been on a bit of a benedict kick, and we decided to make a salmon version using the lox and Adam's homemade lemon hollandaise sauce. Even we were impressed at how delicious it all turned out - the perfect hurricane dish. :)

Ingredients:

1 fresh cut of salmon, choose your size (I like to get my salmon for lox at Wholefoods. It is the best high quality, wild caught, and fresh fish that I've been able to find in Philadelphia.)

chopped dill

1 part salt: 2 parts sugar (ex.1 cup salt, 2 cups sugar)

Directions:

1. Lay out a sheet of plastic wrap and set your salmon ontop, skin and all.

2. Sprinkle the cut with chopped dill, and cover evenly with about 1/2 inch of your sugar/salt mixture.

3. Wrap everything up tightly, and set it in something to catch any juices that may leek out. I used a flat casserole dish.

4. Place everything in your refrigerator for 36 hours.

5. After letting the salmon sit for 36 hours, pull it out and unwrap. Rinse the fish off to remove all salt/sugar.

6. Using a sharp knife, cut the skin off of your fish. Then, do make pieces of lox, cut in thin, long, angular slices.

mamma's last of summer salad

There are three reasons why I like to cook: my mother, my father, and my love of eating. My parents are two of the best chefs I know. Eating well is never a problem whether you're at their house or even just within their presence. 

Last time I was home my mom put this salad together for lunch. It's healthy ingredients - beats, shrimp, artichokes, olives, heart of palm, and arugula - are brightened by a lemony mint vinaigrette  I told you, the woman knows what she's doing.

Ingredients (serves 3):

6oz shrimp - peeled, deveined, and cooked

1 cup pitted kalamata olives

3/4 cup pickled beets

3/4 cup pickled artichokes

1.5 cup arugula

3 heart of palm stalks

salt & pepper

Dressing:

1/2 cup chopped mint

1 cup olive oil

juice from 1/2 lemon

Directions:

1. Blend together dressing ingredients.

2. Lay out a bed of arugula on each plate. Place other ingredients on top one by one, circling around the plate.

3. Drizzle with dressing, salt and pepper.