It’s been almost 3 months since this whole adventure began, and it’s been a good run so far.  Vacation gave me a chance to concentrate on the site, and consider improvements that would make your experience better.  WordPress.com was a fantastic starter for a newbie blogger like me, but it’s cousin wordpress.org is now calling.  Plug-ins, page customization; I want you.

For this to happen, I need to take a small hiatus.  In that time, I’ll be working to create a database of references and tutorials for you new cooks out there.  I’ll cover everything from how to how scramble an egg to how to bake the perfect pie crust.    In the future, more involved recipes will be concise, with links to techniques a beginner might need to know.  Never sliced an onion before?  There’s a link for that.  Wondering how to go about roasting a squash?  There’s a link for that, too.  Information will be at your fingertips, but not in your face (for you more experienced cooks.)  Oh, and there will be pictures.  Lots and lots of pictures.  Provident Potato 2.0 is coming.

Oh yes, and the emphasis will still very much be focused on using locally sourced, seasonal ingredients.  Expect more scholarly articles on food policy as well–because the more you know, the easier it is to do what you know is right.

Stay tuned.  Good things are coming….

Forgive me.

I’ve spent most of my free time this week pouring over CSS tutorials, trying to learn everything I can about designing a sleek, clean, and original page layout.  In case you don’t know me personally, this has involved a lot of confused staring at the computer, and questions that begin with “hey Jeremy…?” Oh, and I’ve also been stalking the crap out of some digital SLRs…with a generous birthday contribution from one Jeremy Clauson (Provident Potato food tester/dish washer/photoshopper extraordinaire), as well as Mom and Dad (who probably sent the money hoping I’d give it to Sallie Mae or Citi bank for student loan payments so they’d stop calling…sorry.)  Oh you heard right.  I’m getting a digital SLR.  A sexy, sexy digital SLR.

So to top this all off  I’m leaving for vacation on Thursday evening.  I know, right?  How much closer can I get to the brink of total insanity before I just attach a snowplow to my civic and go postal up the 405?  But I was guilted into it by my little brother who I don’t see nearly enough of, and I couldn’t turn down the opportunity.  I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t totally amped.  Of course preparing for a vacation is an epic journey itself, so I might not be able to get a post out before we leave.  I’m going to try.  The peach cobbler I have baking in the oven as we speak might force me to do it, because to be honest, I feel kind of bad holding out on you.  I tried to not document it, in a subconscious attempt to duck out of having to write a post before we leave, but half way through I caved.  It’s just too good.  The last thing I want to do is deprive you, and for as much as I would love to pack my ramekins into my carry-on luggage and re-attempt the recipe with cherries, I don’t think it’s going to happen…I mean about the ramekins.  Cherry cobbler is totally going to happen.

Speaking of promising too much, I’m seriously going to try to get some posts up while I’m in Michigan.  There’s a lot of laying around in the sun and attending to nothing to be done, and that might get in the way of my ambitious goal to keep working, but I swear I’m going to cook…so if nothing else, there will be posts with oh-so-much better photos for your reading/viewing pleasure upon my return.  You can count on that.

Mint and watermelon.  Could there be a more heavenly hot-weather combination?  I’ve been complaining for weeks about the unseasonably cold weather (65 degree-days through the 4^th of July?  Give me a break!) But last week the westside finally got a taste of summer, and it was glorious.  The door was wide open all day and it officially felt like California again.  To celebrate, I decided to try my hand at an aptly named drink created by the folks down at Waterloo and City called the Westsider.  It’s light, refreshing, and alcoholic—everything I expect a summer drink to be.  Plus it calls for the use of Gin, and is named for my side of town—I was in love with it before I even tried it. Watermelon is fresh on the east coast in mid-August, but we’re already getting our first harvests here.  The mint was considerably harder to find, and I’d be lying if I told you that I found it at the market (no, I shamefully bought it a Trader Joes…but it was from California!)  Mint likes cool areas with lots of sun and moisture, making it a perfect addition to any small herb garden.  It can be harvested from the same plant up to 3 times in one season, and is an annual so you don’t need to plant it the next year—rather, you should keep an eye on it because it is a willing grower, and can quickly overtake your entire garden!  Growing your own is the best way to ensure you’ll always have some on hand through the whole season.  The second I have an inch of outdoor space to call my own, I’ll be growing mint. This drink is so easy you won’t believe how impressive it turns out to be. I make two versions of it–one with homemade lemonade, and one with (gasp!) store bought.  Which version depends on how complicated is turning out to be, what time company is coming, and whether or not I think I can get food on the table before 9pm.  Of course a more put-together person would make this up the night before, but that’s just not my style (though I sincerely recommend you make it yours.)  Either way, I like to prepare this drink by the glass instead of in one big batch, so I can modify individual drinks to suit each person’s tastes…which is really just a nice way of saying that some of my friends are lightweights and prefer 1/4 cup gin to my suggested 1/3.  You and your liver talk amongst yourselves and decide what amount is best for you.

Westsiders

[Serves 4] -2 cups watermelon (or about 1/2 of a 2 lb melon), rind removed and cubed -About 20 fresh mint leaves -3 cups lemonade* (freshly made, or at least not-from-concentrate) -2 cups Bombay Sapphire Gin 16 ice cubes Puree watermelon, mint, and 1/2 cup of lemonade in a food processor or blender for 1-2 minutes until thoroughly broken down.  Strain mixture through a sieve to remove any seeds and larger bits of pulp. Add 4 ice cubes to a 16oz glass (pint glasses are 16oz exactly) and fill with 1/3 cup with the watermelon puree.  Add 1/3 cup of gin, and top off with lemonade (a little bump over 1/3 cup.)  Serve with a lemon wedge and sprig of mint and enjoy!

Homemade Lemonade

[Yields 3 cups—perfect for 4 Westsiders] -2/3 cups freshly squeezed lemon juice (requires 4-6 lemons, depending on ripeness.) -1/3 cup sugar -1 cup ice water -1 cup hot water Juice your lemons into a cup, strain or hand remove the seeds, and transfer to a pitcher.  [Note: Jeremy’s step mom Jill taught me that under-ripe lemons are a lot easier to juice if you let them sit in a bowl of hot (but not so hot that you can’t touch it!) water for a few minutes before rolling them firmly between your hand and the counter to loosen the insides.  If you do this before cutting into them, you will be able to extract more juice with less effort.  Ripe lemons need only to be rolled before cutting.  Ripe lemons will give right away to rolling, and feel soft when you press on them.  Unripe lemons will laugh at your attempt to roll them and stay nice and firm.  Obviously, buying ripe lemons is better than unripe, but I know that that's easier done in LA than other places.] Heat 1 cup of water with 1/3 cup sugar.  Stir constantly until sugar is dissolved and remove from heat.  Add mixture to the remaining 1 cup of cold water, and mix with the lemon juice.  Chill, and serve (or set aside for use in the westsider!) [Note:  I’ve found that the perfect ratio for lemonade is 1 part sugar, 2 parts lemon juice, and 6 parts water.  With that in mind, you can make any volume of lemonade you please!]

Summer squash, garlic, onion, rosemary, and oregano

July is awash with summer squash, pretty much no matter where you live. Growing up in Vermont, I remember seeing baskets of green and yellow long necks lining country roads towards the end of summer with desperately scrawled “free” signs above them.  Neighbors would reel you in with offers of dinner, then insist that you take some squash with you when you left. By August, everyone is sick of this delicious, abundant, and multi-faceted vegetable.

I religiously wait for them to come into season, and when they do I just can’t get enough—summer squash is light, remarkably versatile, cheap, and easy to work with. If you think you don’t like it but have never tried it fresh (i.e. straight from the farm, not from Peru via your local grocer) you have to give it another try. It grows as fast as weeds, and lends itself really well to almost any flavor you’d like to throw at it. You can think of it as the tofu of vegetables, except less bland and overrated. Summer squash is high in just about every nutrient you’ve ever heard of—including vitamin A, B1, B2, B3, B6, C, K, Omega 3 fatty acids, folate, manganese…the list goes on—it’s so good for you that you that it makes the cut for the World’s Healthiest foods list.

If this is your first foray into summer squash, I applaud your willingness to give it a try!  This week, we’re doing squash 1 easy way for 3+ dishes. Perfect for new cooks and busy people everywhere! “But wait”, you say “won’t I get sick of all this squash?” Oh my god will you ever!  And that’s good, because once it’s gone, you can’t have it again until next summer—at least not the good stuff. You can find foreign-grown squash in every store across the country all year round, but it only resembles its locally grown cousin in looks—certainly not in nutrients or in taste. I find out of season summer squash to be mealy, bitter, and dry. A good summer squash is fragile, bruises easily, and holds the perfect amount of moisture and elasticity in its flesh for cooking quickly on high heat—the same traits make them perfect for the grill as well!

Summer squash pasta Parmesan

Of the 3 simple dishes I’m posting today, Jeremy’s pick for dinner was summer squash pasta Parmesan.  This week I’ll also serve squash fajitas with garlic mayo and cotija cheese, and polenta with sauteed squash (and any other veggies I have lying around, no doubt.)   Though I’m not profiling them tonight, this same preparation of squash is perfect for a tamale filling, and is an excellent in savory puff pastries.

Hey, I’ve been around the block and know the difference between a straight neck and a scallop. Take me to the recipes, please!

First, let’s start off with the very simple base that will be the foundation of all of these dishes—summer squash. Summer squash is the name for any squash whose skin and seeds can be eaten. Winter squash must be peeled and seeded before consumption, and their hard outer shell makes them ideal for longer-term storage than their summer brethren, which are only good for about a week after they’ve been harvested.

Within the summer squash family, the vegetables are generally interchangeable. Scallops or pattypans are the flatter, circular types, while straight and crooked necks are the longer, more commonly seen variety of yellow squash. Zucchini is a green long neck and tastes very similar to the yellow version—when available, I like to use both for added color, but either will do. Long or crooked neck refers to the top of the squash and is pretty self-explanatory—a crooked neck has a crooked neck, and a straight neck has a straight neck. As a general rule, the smaller the squash, the more sweet and flavorful it will be. I generally stick to medium-sized vegetables, as I find these have the perfect combination of flavor and ease of workability.

Cubing zucchini

Any summer squash can be used for the following recipes, but I generally stick to zucchini or yellows. Why? Honestly, it’s because those are most commonly available at my local market. Feel free to branch out and use any summer squash you’d like. Of course as always, if you’re not sure what you’re looking at, ask the farmer for some help. You cannot substitute a winter squash for a summer, and the seasons do overlap, so make sure you know what you’re bringing home!

For each of the 3 dishes I’ll be profiling this week, you can substitute basil, thyme, or parsley for the rosemary and oregano I call for.  Remember not to use more than two flavors at a time, and to be judicious with the pairing. If they smell good together, give them a shot. I wouldn’t mix rosemary with basil in this dish, but that’s just me.  Dry spices can be used in lieu of fresh (but fresh is better and cheaper at the market!)  A good rule of thumb is 1 teaspoon (tsp) dry equals 1 tablespoon (TBSP) fresh.

In addition to switching up the herbs, feel free to do the same with the vegetables. Squash pairs well with almost everything, including baby bok choy, fresh summer corn, spinach, kale, tomatoes, or peppers—so if you have something you think will taste good to add, by all means do! If you want to change each individual meal up a bit, start with this simple base and add other veggies to it as the week (or season) goes on.  Squash serves as an excellent base on which you can build complexity.

Sautéed summer squash

-1-2 TBSP olive oil (or butter)

-1-2 green summer squash, cubed

-1-2 yellow summer squash, cubed

-3 cloves of garlic, minced

-1 medium onion, chopped.

-1 TBSP minced rosemary (if using basil, chop roughly, do not mince.)

-1 TBSP minced oregano

Cut each summer squash in half, then again so that you have 4 long strips. Cut those into 1/2 inch cubes. Heat a skillet with 1 TBSP oil, and add onion, squash, rosemary, and 1/2 of the garlic to the pan. Toss to coat everything with oil. Cook on high, stirring often, for about 5 minutes, or until squash is tender but not mushy. Turn off the heat, add the rest of the garlic, and give it a quick stir to incorporate.

Voila! Easy right? Now, let’s make our first dish.

Summer squash pasta Parmesan

-1 batch of sautéed summer squash

-1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

-1 TBSP olive oil

-1/2 box your choice of pasta (I recommend rotini, campanelle, or penne)

-Salt and pepper to taste

Bring 6 quarts of water (or there about) to a rolling boil. Add half a box of the pasta of your choice and return to a boil. Cook approximately 7 minutes, or until al dente. Drain and add to your freshly sautéed squash, Add the extra olive oil and Parmesan to the mix and stir to incorporate. Add salt and pepper to taste.  Serves 2.

Summer Vegetable Fajitas

-Ingredients for 1 batch of sautéed summer squash

-*Handful of fresh spinach (optional)

-*1 red pepper, julienned (optional)

-4 hand-pressed flour tortillas (you can buy these at the store, or if you have a Mexican restaurant nearby that makes their own, see if you can buy from them. Most restaurants are happy to sell them to you, usually for a pretty good price.  I get mine from a place by where I work, and they’re AMAZING.)

*Use the sautéed summer squash recipe for this dish, and add the julienned pepper to the squash mixture before cooking. When squash is almost done, add spinach and cook until wilted, about 1-2 minutes. Add garlic and remove from heat.

Garlic Mayo

-1/2 cup light mayo

-1 TBSP rice wine Vinegar

-1 TBSP dry sherry

-2 tsp freshly ground black pepper (about 10-15 cranks of the pepper mill)

-3 medium cloves garlic, minced

Whisk until well combined. (Note: I used to make a version of this recipe by the gallon when I worked at Eat Good Food, and I always used a food processor. I’d be lying if I told you it wasn’t better in the Cuisinart, but I’m lazy and I hate cleaning the damn thing, so I generally just try to mince the garlic very fine and wisk well. Your call.)

Spread garlic mayo generously over a tortilla. Add about 1/2 cup of the squash mixture to the center of the tortilla, and cover with cotija cheese crumbles. Pepper jack, provolone, or swiss are all decent substitutions for cotija if you prefer—if you opt to use a melting cheese, throwing the whole ordeal in the toaster over for a minute is highly recommended. This particular dish is great for lunch as well. Squash will keep for about a week in a tightly sealed container, and garlic mayo will last even longer. Warm up in your toaster oven (avoid the microwave because it will make mush of the tortilla) and enjoy!  1 batch of sauteed squash makes about 4 tortillas, which generally serves 2 around here.

Sautéed summer vegetable polenta

Polenta

-1 cup polenta (a.k.a. yellow corn grits)

-3 1/2 cups chicken stock (homemade is best, but in lieu of that, try Organic Better than Bouillon)

-Pinch of salt

-1/4 cup Parmesan

-1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

-Salt and pepper to taste

Note: I use Bob’s Red Mill polenta corn grits for a base, and the amount of liquid I suggest in this recipe is based on my use of this product. If you buy another brand that recommends you use more or less water per cup of grits, go with their measurements—just be sure to use chicken or vegetable stock instead of water!

Bring water and salt to a rolling boil. Slowly add the dry polenta, stirring as you add. Lower heat to low, and cook 5 minutes, or until thick and creamy. Add the Parmesan and mozzarella cheese, and stir to incorporate. Turn heat off, and cover until ready to serve.  Serves 4.

Vegetable sauté

-Ingredients for 1 batch of sautéed summer squash

-1 ear of fresh corn, grilled lightly (you can do this over a gas range if you don’t have a grill) corn cut from cob.

-1 red pepper, diced

-1/2 cup chicken stock

-2 handfuls of spinach (about 3 cups fresh)

-1 TBSP flour

Sauté onions, peppers, 1/2 garlic, herbs, and squash in the olive oil over high heat for about 3 minutes until they start to give up some of their juices. Add spinach and cook for another 2 minutes, until spinach is wilted and squash and peppers are tender but still firm. Turn down the heat to medium-low. Add the chicken stock, grilled corn the rest of the garlic. Sprinkle with flour and stir to combine. Heat until chicken stock thickens a little, then remove from heat and serve over hot polenta.  Serves 3-4.

Stay tuned for more summer squash recipes, coming soon! In the meantime, happy eating!

Carolina Coleslaw on a Bison Fajita

I’ve spent some time in the south, and you can’t live there for more than a month without falling head over heals for the local food.  My residency in Asheville, NC was what sealed the deal for me.  Carolina BBQ is tangy and succulent, and is enough to make even the most stalwart Mid-West BBQ fan sit up and take note.  For me, Carolina coleslaw was a culinary revelation.  There’s nothing like it, and there’s really nothing better.  Light, fresh, and perfectly piquant, it just screams summer. With the 4th of July coming up this weekend (my favorite of all holidays!) it seemed only right to post one of my favorite all-purpose summertime foods.  My recipe for Carolina Cole Slaw is one of my proudest creations.  It’s light, easy, cheap, and oh-my-god-delicious.  It goes with everything from bison fajitas* (pictured above) to ribs, burgers, and dogs–making it a perfect offering for 4th of July pot lucks (it’s what I’m bringing to mine!)

Ingredients:

1 small, heavy head of red or green cabbage

1 medium white onion

1 cup, plus 3-5 TBSP apple cider vinegar (to taste)

1 TBSP grainy mustard

2 teaspoons celery salt

3 TBSP sugar

2 TBSP olive oil

Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste (start with about 2 teaspoons salt, and 7 cranks of the pepper grinder)

Removing the core of a cabbage

Thinly sliced cabbage and onion

Heat all ingredients except the onion and the cabbage in a sauce pan until the salt and sugar are dissolved–this won’t take long, nor will the liquid need too much heat to achieve this, so don’t walk away from the pan while it’s heating!  Remove from heat, and allow to cool completely.

Slice the cabbage in half and remove the core.  Cut the cabbage into thin slices.

Slice the onion in the same way you sliced the cabbage–first in half from end to end, then into thin half-circle slices (see photo.)

Add the cabbage and the onion to the cooled dressing, and incorporate well.  I like to toss the mixture for 2 minutes, allowing each slice of cabbage to be exposed to the dressing.  Refrigerate for up to 1 week in a sealed container.  This coleslaw is best after 24 hours, and I recommend making it the day before you plan to eat it.  If you opt to marinate overnight, be sure to give the ingredients a toss every few hours (or whenever you think of it) to redistribute the dressing back into the salad.  Serve with whatever summer food you like, and eat the extras on sandwiches, fajitas, or straight from the container!

*To make the bison fajitas pictured above, marinate a shoulder steak of bison or beef overnight in a tenderizing marinade.  Grill, and slice on a bias.  Warm a tortilla in your toaster oven, then cover it with a thin layer of sour cream.  Layer your beef or bison on top.  If you live in a place where avocados are grown, slice one up and add it to the pile (this is a worthy “splurge” item for those of you not living in SoCal.)  Sprinkle some green onion on top (if the season for green onions is over, a bit of minced red onion will do the trick) and finish with a generous helping of Carolina Coleslaw.  Enjoy!

Red wine marinade with a Lindner Farms Bison Chuck steak

I woke up late last Sunday, and didn’t make it up to the Hollywood farmer’s market until about an hour before it closed.  It’s usually pretty slim pickings for red meat when you don’t get there early, so I figured I’d let whatever they had dictate what I made for dinner.  All that remained for many vendors were the tough braising meats. Stews are great, but not when it’s 80-90 degrees during the day.  Lucky for me, I was able to nab a beautiful grass-fed shoulder steak from Lindner Bison Farm.  Bison is similar to beef, but much lower in fat.  When grass-fed, it’s also high in Omega 3 fatty acids, vitamin E, and iron.  Shoulder cuts of bison (or beef) are flavorful, and far less expensive than loin, rib, or sirloin cuts, but they require a little preparation to be at their best.

Know your way around the butcher shop? Click here to skip right to the marinade recipe.

Shoulder Cuts

First, let’s discuss the cut.  The name “chuck steak” might fool you into thinking you can just throw this bad boy right on the grill, but you’d disappointed if you tried.  Depending on where in the shoulder a cut is from, the meat will run the gamut from very tough (pot roast and boneless short ribs) to not-tough-when-tenderized (shoulder steak, chuck steak, shoulder petite tender) to reasonably tender, sometimes without tenderization (shoulder petite tender medallions, shoulder top blade steak, flat iron steak.) Each farm will offer a slightly different product and cut, so it’s always smart to double check with the farmer before you buy.  Certain shoulder cuts require stewing and can’t be tenderized any other way, so it’s important to know what you’re bringing home.

What causes some cuts to be tougher than others is the amount of collagen fibers in the tissue. The more an animal uses a muscle, the tougher the meat in that area will be.  Shoulders get a lot of use, so the resulting meat is tougher.  There are several ways to break down collagen, and they are not all created equal.

The first and most popular method among inexperienced cooks is to utilize a chemical tenderizer—this is what you get when you buy a bottle of tenderizing marinade from the store.  It also comes in powder form.  Higher quality products utilize enzymes like those found in papaya and pineapple, which are very good at breaking down connective tissue and collagen.  Chemical or not, I find that aggressive tenderizers like these are almost too effective, and have a tendency to make the outside of the meat mushy.

The second method is to manually break down the collagen.

Use a fork or Jaccard to help tenderize a tough steak

A Jaccard is small hand-held instrument with hundreds of small, razor sharp pins sticking out of it, which you use to pierce the meat.  It is very effective, but if you don’t have one, a fork will do the trick.  But wait, you say!  Won’t that let the juices escape?!  I get this question a lot, and the answer is no. When you sear the meat, you lock the juices in.  The small incisions are seared as well, so don’t worry about making them before you marinate.  Never ever, however, puncture meat while it cooks.  This is where you get yourself in trouble.

Poking holes in the meat before it cooks serves 2 purposes—first, it literally breaks apart collagen bonds.  Second, it opens up the center of the meat to the marinade, which will further tenderize the cut.  Which brings me to the third method, which is marinating.

When the goal is tenderization, you must use an acid in your marinade.  Non-acidic marinades will flavor your meat, but will leave it just as tough as it was to begin with.  Vinegar, wine, and citrus are the acids of choice in my kitchen, but when it comes to red meat, I always go with vinegar or wine.

Interestingly enough, if you use too much acid for too long, you can actually make the meat tougher than it was to begin with!  The science behind this is interesting, but for the moment, I’ll spare you the details.  Suffice it to say that the best tenderizing marinade will contain an acid, and be left on the meat for no more than 24 hours.  I’ve marinated meat for as little as 3 hours, but 24 is undeniably the best amount of time to let it sit.

No section on tenderization or shoulder cuts would be complete without acknowledging the power of heat to break down collagen.  Sustained, low heat will tenderize a cut of meat better than almost anything else, but this will always break down the tissue to a texture we generally associate with stew.  There are numerous stew cuts in the shoulder slab, but for now, let’s address the gorgeous bison chuck steak I bought at the market.  Cow chuck steak can be used if you don’t have bison, as the meat from these two animals is very similar.

You can use the following tenderizing recipe with any non-pot roast cut of shoulder meat—tell the farmer you’re buying from what you intend to do, and he will give you the cut you need.  Every once in a while I run into a vendor who sends a hired hand to the market for him who really doesn’t know what he’s selling.  It’s rare, but if you can’t get a confident answer from your meat guy and can’t find anyone else to buy from, you’re safe buying the following cuts for this recipe: Chuck steak, chuck eye steak, shoulder top blade steak (aka flat iron), shoulder center (aka ranch steak), shoulder petite tender, and shoulder petite tender medallions.  Don’t be fooled into buying a roasting cut!  You can use this marinade for any steak you please, but shoulder cuts are nice and cheap, and lend themselves well to tenderization.

First, go ahead and prep your marinade (recipe below) in a lipped bowl or baking dish that is just wider than the steak (the wider the pan, the more the marinade will spread out, leaving less of the meat covered.)  Set aside.

Marinating bison chuck steak

On a plastic cutting board, give your meat a once over with the fork or jaccard (on both sides!) and transfer it over to the marinade.  Flip it over a few times so that both sides see some love before covering it and putting it in the fridge.  I flip my meat every time I think of it, which comes out to be about once every 3-5 hours or so.  Make sure the side that has seen the least love gets flipped into the marinade before you go to bed, and flip it back over the next morning while your coffee brews.  If you do this, you will end up with something special when you get home from work and are ready to cook.

Note: Many people prefer to marinate their meat in a plastic bag so they can forget about it once it’s in the fridge.  This is undoubtedly an easier way to marinate, and guarantees an even soak.  However, I don’t like plastic bags.  I hate the waste and find that they flavor the meat, especially when used with acidic marinades.  Glass is the only container for me, but the method you use is entirely up to you.

Marinades

Now that you’re a bonafide shoulder meat expert, let’s move on to marinades.  I’m going to let you in on a secret that will change your life—marinades are simple and can be made from almost anything as long as they contain these 4 elements: Acid, base, sugar, spice.  Easy right?  So for instance, I always use olive oil as my base.  Oil helps keep the meat moist while cooking.  The acid is where I like to mix things up.  Today’s recipe utilizes red wine, which is great, because then you have an open bottle and an excuse to drink it (you don’t want it to go bad now do you?)  On nights when I prefer to drink a beer or a nice gin and tonic, I opt for vinegars.  Apple cider vinegar is great, especially for the tougher shoulder cuts, and can be procured locally almost everywhere.  Balsamic is always a winner, because it’s delicious.

Next is the sugar.  You don’t need much, but a little sugar helps to brown the outside and seal in the juices, as it caramelizes when it hits the hot pan.  It also helps to cut the acidity of the wine or vinegar.  A teaspoon of brown sugar will do, but I prefer a little Worcestershire—It pains me to report that Lea and Perrins uses high fructose corn syrup, as well as “natural flavoring” which generally translates to “chemical flavoring.”  Annie’s makes an organic version that I plan to try when I run out of what I currently have.

Finally, the seasoning.  I use garlic in everything, and marinade is definitely no exception.  Depending on the meat, I’ll use a spattering of herbs—rosemary and thyme are great, but there are plenty of others you can try as well— oregano and basil is another winning combo.  Again, ask the farmer who sells herbs at the market if she has any recommendations, or just smell a few and give the ones you think would taste good a shot.  Whatever you pick, It’s generally best to keep it simple.  Refrain from using more than 2 herbs at any one time.

Now you know the principal behind tenderizing marinades.  You can swap out any of the following ingredients for other ingredients of the same nature (acid for acid, base for base, etc.)  The measurements are essentially the same no matter what you’re using, though I tend to reduce the acid to 1/2 cup if I’m using vinegar.

Red Wine Steak Marinade

3/4 cup reasonably fresh red wine (if you wouldn’t drink it, don’t marinate with it.)

2 TBSP olive oil

2 TBSP Worcestershire (or 1 teaspoon of brown sugar or honey)

4 cloves of garlic, minced

Approximately 1 TBSP fresh thyme, minced (1 teaspoon dried)\

Approximately 2 TBSP fresh oregano, minced (1 TBSP dried)

7 good cranks of freshly ground black pepper

1 teaspoon table salt

Wisk the ingredients together, then add jaccarded meat to the mix.  Let the steak marinate in the refrigerator for at least 3-4 hours, but no more than 24.

When the steak is ready, remove it from the marinade pat dry with a paper towel.  You want to remove any excess marinade before you cook, because marinade will steam the steak and rob you of the nice, crispy outer layer.

Heat a skillet or grill on high heat with 1 TBSP olive oil (if using a grill, rub the oil directly on the dried steak.) When hot, add the steak.  Cook on high for 1 minute on each side, then turn down the heat and cook for an additional 3-4 minutes per side for a medium rare 1’’ steak.  Cook times will vary, and trial and error is the best way to know for sure how long it takes (I know, I wish I had a better answer for you too.  Fact of the matter is that the cook time will ultimately come down to the heat your stove/grill throws off, and how your pan/grill grate absorbs and holds it.)

Remove the steak from heat and let it stand for 3-5 minutes before cutting.  When cooking, the juices will be active, and if you cut into it the moment you remove it from the heat, they’ll all rush out onto your plate where they are least useful.  Standing for just a few minutes helps the meat re-absorb the juices and gives you a superior steak.

Note: It is important not to overcook bison.  Shoulder meat in general tends to be lean, but bison is even leaner, so be careful or you’ll end up with a hockey puck!  Better to err on the side of underdone than overdone.  If worse comes to worse and you cut into the meat and find it too rare, don’t worry about it.  Put it back on the heat for a few more minutes.  Even if you just want to test the doneness of the steak, be sure to let the it rest for few minutes before cutting into it!  If you don’t get it right on your first try, just consider it part of your kitchen initiation.  Pay attention to the cook time and temperature you used (I keep notes myself) and you’ll be spot on next time around.

For shoulder cuts, you’ll want to carve the steak against the grain on a bias.  The grain generally runs the length of the cut, so you’ll cut on the width (i.e. so you get more slices that are shorter as opposed to less slices that are longer.) Tilt your knife towards you in order to create a slice of meat that is wider than the width of the steak (i.e. on a bias.)  Make your slices as thin as you can for maximum tenderness!

I used my bison to make fajitas, but you can also use it on salads, in sandwiches, or straight up with some fluffy mashed potatoes and a veggie of your choice.

Enjoy!

It totally tastes as good as it looks...possibly better.

There’s nothing better than breakfast on the weekend.  Something about waking up late and having a leisurely cup of morning joe always puts me in the mood for a good meal.  I’m a big fan of looking at finished food, and there are few things more satisfying than the visage of pancakes, bacon, and eggs, glistening in the yellow-blue light of late morning.

I’m a Vermont girl, so no pancake meal is complete without a generous serving of maple syrup.  Though I live in LA, I’m fortunate enough to have a dad who makes his own syrup and always brings me some when he visits.  If you’re not so lucky, you’ll probably need to buy your syrup from far away.  Everything else in this recipe can be found locally, so don’t fret.  Just be sure to buy the real stuff, which is high in potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, zinc and iron.  Imitation is nothing more than chemically flavored high fructose corn syrup.  Yuck.

I’m obviously very taken with syrup, and as such I’ve made my pancake recipe light on the sugar so the maple syrup can really shine.  Plus, I adore a set of over-easy eggs that I can break open and sop up with the bread-y, syrupy pancake.  Throw in some bacon and you’ve got the ultimate weekend meal—sweet, savory, and rich!

This recipe is so simple you won’t believe how good it is.

Ingredients (as always, buy local if you can):

1 egg

3/4 cup (2% or higher milk fat) organic milk

2 TBSP vegetable oil

1 cup all purpose flour

1 TBSP sugar

1 TBSP baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp vanilla

1 TBSP butter

(Know your around the kitchen? Click here to cut to the chase.)

Stir all of your dry ingredients together in a medium sized bowl.  In another bowl, wisk together your wet ingredients until they are fully mixed (leave out the butter, that’s for greasing the pan!)  Make an indent in your dry ingredients, and pour the wet ingredients into the middle.  With as few strokes as possible, stir the batter together.  You don’t want to over work it (avoid a mixer like the plague) as stirring forms gluten bonds in the flour.  Stirring until there are no lumps will render your pancakes tough.  Stirring until the wet and dry are just incorporated (but still a bit lumpy) is perfect.

Heat a cast iron skillet (or your trusty Cuisinart Green Gourmet sauté pan) on high with 1 TBSP of butter in the bottom.  Swirl the pan so that the butter evenly covers the surface.  Use a 1/4 measuring cup to ladle 4 scoops of batter into the pan (leave enough space in between for the pancakes to double in size as they cook.)

Once the pancakes are in the pan, turn down your heat to medium high and keep an eye on them—when they start to bubble enough that they bubbles break (they’ll start to bubble lightly before they are actually ready so don’t be fooled…) go ahead and get your spatula under them.  The edges will usually look slightly dry when they’re ready as well.  If they look nicely browned on the bottom, go ahead and flip them over.  Sometimes you just have to flip one to see if it’s ready.  If it’s not, no worries—it will still be edible, just not browned nicely, and now you know what you were looking at before the flip was not enough bubbling!  Give the rest a little more time, and flip them when they are ready.  You’ll get the hang of it.

It only takes a minute or so to brown the other side of the pancake, as most of the cooking is done before the flip.  If you want to make the whole batch before serving, line a pan with wax paper, and lay your pancakes on top.  Cover loosely with a damp paper towel and put in a warm toaster oven until you’ve finished the rest (a regular oven will due as well.)  Don’t leave them hanging for more than 10 minutes or so though, or they’ll dry out!

I serve my pancakes with over-easy eggs and bacon (sunny-side for my boyfriend, Jeremy!)  Bacon will take the longest, so I like to cook it first and set it aside.  When you put the pancakes in the oven to keep them warm, throw the cooked bacon in with it and it’ll be the perfect temperature when you’re ready to eat.  I use the same pan for everything, so once I’ve cooked the bacon, I drain the grease (not down the drain unless you love paying plumbers to come out and unclog them…use a jar and you can use the fat again later, or just throw it out when it’s full.)  Wipe out the pan, cook the pancakes, set them aside, then cook the eggs.  While my eggs are cooking I’ll warm up the maple syrup on the stove so it’s warm (but not hot) when I’m finally ready to sit down.  Want to go more local?  Fresh seasonal jams are great on pancakes, as is honey, which is available locally pretty much everywhere food is grown.

These pancakes are simple, can be made with things most cooks will have lying around, and are crowd pleasers!

Serves 2-3, depending on how hungry you are!

I know what I’m doing, just give me the quick and dirty!

Combine your dry ingredients and wet ingredients in separate bowls.  Add the wet to the dry, and stir in as few strokes as possible to combine the two.  Ladle 1/4 cup servings into a hot greased pan.  When bubbly and browned on the bottom, flip and quickly cook the other side.  Serve with bacon and eggs, and of course, maple syrup!  Want to go more local?  Fresh seasonal jams are great on pancakes, as is honey which is available locally pretty much everywhere food is grown.

Green Bean Casserole is the kind of dish you see most often around the holidays.  Sadly, a lot of people associate the name with pitiful, mushy green beans in a gravy of canned mushroom soup with some sort of chemically-founded fried onion thing on top.  Sound like something you’ve seen before?  Well that’s not what we’re making here today.

There are a million reasons why preparing this dish from scratch is better, the most important of which is taste!  Fresh green beans, when prepared properly, should have a fresh yet substantial texture when you bite into them.  The sauce for this dish is complex, and is lower in calories than its commercial counterpart (canned soup.)  Canned vegetables are subjected to sustained heat in the process of preservation, which weakens their cell structure and renders them mushy and devoid of nutrients.  Canned soups are generally high in sodium, and usually contain monosodium glutamate, a.k.a. MSG.  MSG is a chemical that enhances flavor by tricking your brain into tasting something it doesn’t actually taste.  If you’re a regular reader, you know my feelings on eating chemicals (I’m not for it.)

Utilizing freshly harvested green beans makes this a spring and summer dish by nature.  Green bean plantings are generally staggered, so the crop will be available all summer long.  In LA, green beans are abundant at the market starting in early June, and lasting straight through the end of summer.

Green Bean Casserole can be made as a side, or it can be the main attraction.  It takes a little bit of prep and a few dishes, so I generally like to add a bit of pasta to it so it can stand alone for dinner.  If you wish to keep this as a bean-only casserole, just double the amount of beans and omit the pasta.  As always, when preparing dishes that take a little bit of time and effort, I like to double the recipe and freeze half for another time!  When stored properly in an airtight container, it should keep in the freezer for 2-3 months.  On that note, I want to remind you not to confuse effort with ease!  Put on your favorite radio program, pour yourself a glass of wine, and get ready for a relaxing hour of cooking.  This dish has a few more steps than your average simple casserole, but none are difficult (especially with these made-for-beginner, step by step instructions!)

I know my way around the kitchen, take me straight to the recipe!

Kitchen Tools (feel free to skip this if you already know your way around the kitchen):

-Medium to large soup pot for blanching beans (my soup pot holds 12 quarts, though a smaller pot will work fine as long as it is large enough for the beans to move freely in the water.)

-Colander

-4 quart pot for boiling pasta water (you can use the soup pot again once you’re done cooking the beans in it, though I prefer my thinner aluminum pots for cooking pasta, because they heat up faster and hold less water.)

-Sauté pan with a thick bottom (I use Cuisinart’s green gourmet non-stick skillet because it is versatile and allows me to cook with less oil than more traditional pans.  It is PTFE and PFOA free, and is one of the most environmentally friendly pans out there.)  I bought mine at bed bath with one of those 20% off coupons, and it was a steal!

-12×12 glass baking dish.  I like Pyrex myself, click here for a picture of what I use.

-Wooden stirring spoon with flat end

-Large bowl that can accommodate all of the beans plus some water and ice.

Ingredients (as always, I recommend buying locally produced organic ingredients, from your farmers market when possible):

The finished product

-1/2 lb fresh green beans, rinsed with tips cut off either end

-4 medium onions, ends cut off and peeled.  Cut it in half, then cut the halves into 1/4 inch thick slices

-1 tsp fresh rosemary, minced

-12 oz fresh button mushrooms, sliced (wild mushrooms work too, but since their flavor will blend into the sauce, I don’t recommend using anything too expensive.)

-4 TBSP butter (you can sub olive oil if you wish to sauté the mushrooms, but stick with butter for caramelizing the onions)

-3 medium to large cloves garlic, minced

-2-4 TBSP flour

-1 1/2 cup chicken stock (or vegetable stock)

-1/2 cup half and half (milk is fine too if that’s all you have on hand, as long as it’s 2% or greater milk fat)

-Approximately 3 cups of egg noodles, cooked just under al dente (you can substitute this for regular wheat pasta if you prefer, just don’t use long pasta like spaghetti.)

-1 large handful of fresh basil leaves, chopped

-Salt and fresh pepper to taste

Bring 6 quarts of water to a rolling boil in a medium to large soup pot.  Drop your rinsed and trimmed beans into the water for exactly 4 minutes.  While they blanch, fill a large bowl with cold water and one tray’s worth of ice cubes.  Drain beans immediately after 4 minutes, and submerge into ice water to stop the cooking process. Set aside.

Melt 2 TBSP butter in a sauté pan over medium-high heat, and add sliced onions.  Add the rosemary, and sprinkle with a pinch of salt (approx. 1/2 tsp) and a few cranks of freshly ground pepper.  Cook for 2 minutes on medium heats, stirring frequently, then drop the temperature down to medium low (hot enough to still hear them sizzle, not so hot that you burn the butter–better to start too low than too hot).  Stir every minute or so for about 15 minutes, or until onions are brown and mushy looking.  Be careful not to burn the onions or the butter, as this will cause the mixture to become bitter.  Empty the pan into a small bowl and set the onions aside.

Bring another pot of water (about 4-6 quarts) to a boil (the big pot you used for the beans will due, though I prefer a smaller pot with thinner metal that will allow the water to boil faster.)

Once your water is on, wipe out the sauté pan (no need to wash it, just wipe out any leftover onion bits so they don’t burn.)  Heat on medium-high with 2 Tbsp butter (or olive oil), and all of your sliced mushrooms.  Sauté for about 4 minutes stirring frequently until they begin to give up some of their moisture.  Add garlic and cook for 1 minute. Sprinkle (do NOT dump!) 3 Tbsp flour over the mixture and stir to mix well.  Cook for one more minute stirring constantly, then add your stock slowly while stirring to incorporate.  If you add the stock too fast or don’t stir fast enough while you add it, the flour may start to create lumps in your sauce.  If this begins to happen, stop adding liquid for a moment and stir rapidly to smooth out the mixture.  If you end up with a few lumps, don’t worry about it.  Bring to a simmer, stirring often.  Once it simmers, add the half and half.  NOTE:  If you use milk instead of half and half, add another Tbsp of flour to your mushrooms before adding the stock to help thicken the final mixture.  Turn down the heat to medium-low, and cook for 6-8 minutes until the sauce thickens up a bit.  Add your fresh basil once the sauce has reached the proper consistency.  If you finish this step before your pasta is done (next step) simply turn off the heat and leave on the stove until your pasta is ready.  NOTE: if your sauce ends up looking a little thick, add another 1/4-1/2 cup of stock to it to loosen it up.  You want it to be just slightly thicker than the consistency of melted ice cream.

If you’re planning to eat this dish once it’s done (as opposed to freezing it or setting it aside for later), preheat your oven to 350 degrees now.

Your pasta water should be boiling by this point.  Add pasta and cook until almost al dente–I find that cooking for about 2 minutes less than suggested on the box usually works well, but you’ll want to test it a few times towards the end to be sure.  You want the pasta to have a slightly undercooked bite to it so that it won’t become soggy when you bake it with the sauce.

While you are waiting on your pasta, remove your beans from the ice bath.  If you’re in a rush, simply cutting them in half will due.  I like to slice them down the middle along their seam first, then cut them in half.  I find the texture of beans cut in this way is superior to the texture of whole beans.

Add the cooked beans, pasta, and 1/3 of your caramelized onions to the mushroom sauce.  Stir so that everything is evenly covered, then transfer into the 12×12 glass baking dish.  Spread the rest of the caramelized onions on top so they form an even cover.  Don’t worry if you don’t have enough to cover the whole top, just distribute them evenly.  Cover with aluminum foil, and place in your preheated oven to bake for about 15-20 minutes.  The thicker the sauce turned out, the less time you will need to bake.  If you ended up with a very thick sauce and pasta that is not undercooked (it happens!) then stick with 15 minutes in the oven.  Thinner sauces with under cooked pasta are better when cooked for closer to 25-30 minutes.

This dish can be refrigerated and baked a few hours later, cooked right away, or frozen for another time completely.  If you freeze it, be sure to thaw it in the fridge overnight and give it a good stir to mix it up before baking.  If it looks a little dry, you can add a touch of milk to it to loosen it up, but not too much or you run the risk of soggy pasta.  Microwaving can cause the cream to separate, so don’t even think about it!

I served this with a simple salad of baby greens, green onions, and balsamic vinaigrette.  Technically, there are enough veggies in this dish to call it a day, so salad is optional.

Bon Appetit!

I came across the above cartoon this morning, and I have to admit that it kind of pissed me off.  I can’t argue with the value that makes this cartoon funny; eating organic is an activity that some people can’t afford.  There are people out there trying to feed their entire family with $100 a week, and if you’re one of those people, organic might be out of reach.  But is that really you?  Most people who say they can’t afford organic actually can, but choose not to prioritize it. While it’s true that some people simply don’t know the risks involved with buying conventional, I think plenty more do know, but choose to turn a blind eye anyway.  The eloquent and wise Barbara Kingsolver:

Whether on school boards or in families, budget keepers may be aware of the heath trade off (of buying conventional over organic) but still feel compelled to economize on food–in a manner that would be utterly unacceptable if the health risk involved an unsafe family vehicle or a plume of benzene running through a school basement.

It’s true, isn’t it?  Would you move your family to an area where chemicals were in the ground water?  Would you take your small children to a new home that had lead paint?  Most reasonably responsible people would say no, but don’t hesitate to expose their families and themselves to the very same dangers when it comes to food.

This cartoon is frustrating in a few ways.  First, it capitalizes on a well-accepted fallacy about food production, which pegs organic as an artificially inflated market, selling health at a premium just because it can.  Second, it goes to show how ignorant Americans really are about how food is grown in the first place.  Organic food is not more expensive because sellers know that conventional foods are poison; it’s more expensive because growing food is a labor-intensive (and therefore expensive) endeavor when done without chemicals.  Many conventional foods are also heavily subsidized by the US government, making them look much cheaper when you buy them at the store than they actually are.  Organic is left to fend for itself.

If all of this wasn’t bad enough, organic must also fight against it’s image of being exclusively for the wealthy.  If you too believe this, I’ve got news for you–you’re paying for conventional foods, and you’re paying dearly.  The cost is measured in the tax money you give to corporate farm subsidies (estimates put the number between $17 billion and $20 billion a year), the toll chemicals take on the soil, and the price you’ll pay for poor health (yours, or that of your fellow Americans whose hospital bills you foot if they can’t pay.)

Scientists aren’t sure about the long-term effects of chemicals in food, but they agree that chemicals are definitely going into what we eat.  It’s basic biology–food grown in synthetic fertilizer is going to be comprised of synthetic nutrients, even if it isn’t sprayed with pesticide.  Food grown in compost-enriched soil will be comprised of naturally occurring nutrients. The plant will always be a reflection of the soil it is grown in, and I’m not sure when humans decided that eating chemicals was safe.  So with all of that said, we agree that certified organic is better…right?

Well…it is and it isn’t.  Not all organics are created equal.

To be USDA certified organic, farmers must promise not to use chemical fertilizer or pesticide on their crops.  They can’t plant genetically modified or cloned seeds either.  For meat to be certified organic, animals cannot be treated with hormones or antibiotics, nor fed food that might contain these things.  These are all positive improvements over conventional, thought the organic goods you get from your local farmer’s market are almost certainly going to be of higher quality than the organic you find in the store.  There are several reasons for this.  The first and most simple reason is because fruits and vegetables taken from the soil in the morning and served on your dinner plate in the evening had as much time as possible in the soil, rendering them more flavorful and more nutritious than their prematurely picked and shipped counterparts.  Organic veggies cut green from a vine in Peru in the morning, loaded onto a truck in the evening, and then served on your dinner plate a week later are simply not going to compare–on the nutritional or the flavor front.  Nothing in the USDA certification process says that an organic plant has to be ripe when it leaves the fields.  Nor does the organic seal promise that a cow or chicken must be grass-fed, kept in a clean and humane area, afforded sunlight each day, or anything else you might think of when you see the re-assuring, ethical-looking stamp of certified organic.  I think it’s deceptive to sell people, who probably really care about the planet, a product that guzzled barrels of oil in shipping.  My closest commercial organic market was selling asparagus from Mexico last week, when I know for a fact that it’s currently in season here.  I find that down right blasphemous.

So what do you do with all of this information?  I choose to buy my organics locally from farmers I can question myself if I have any concerns.  Most of them are more than happy to answer my queries, as they pride themselves on their farming practices.  Many of them are not certified organic but don’t spray their crops, and fertilize with compost and manure instead of synthetics.  Actually, many of my favorite vendors have signs reading “no pesticide” but can’t call their food organic because they haven’t purchased the certification from the USDA.  Certification is cost-prohibitive, and many local farmers don’t see enough financial benefit to buy in.  They aren’t spraying their land, because many of them live on family farms that they expect to pass to their children someday.  Spraying chemicals has rendered 30% of the world’s farmlands unusable.  A farmer with a vested interest in his land won’t spray it, because he knows that in doing so he digs his own grave.

Organic certification has its problems, but the best way around them is to buy from the source.  It costs a little more to buy pesticide free products at the farmer’s market than it costs to buy conventional, but then again it costs a little more to produce pesticide free foods (you don’t think those potato bugs pick themselves off the plants, do you?)  I think it’s a worthy investment, and I hope that with this information in hand you will now agree.  I mean, what does your health insurance run you each month?  Car and house insurance?  We don’t shell out for these things because we love giving our money away; we purchase them because they make our lives safer and more secure.  I’m not waiting for science to catch up with conventional foods to let me know what sickness I’ve fated myself to have as a result of penny-pinching.  Something deeply instinctual inside me tells me not to eat chemicals, and for the most part, I listen.

Until we start paying for the actual cost of growing food (instead of accepting the “bargain” prices of toxic food) we’ll never have a chance of making it as a species.  In just over 50 years, 30% of the world’s previously fertile soil has become barren because of chemical fertilizers and sprays.  30%!  Remember that number, because as population growth spikes exponentially, so will the percentage of unusable land should we fail to pay a little more for the privilege of having land to grow on at all.  Are you going to be the one to hammer that last nail in the coffin?  It won’t be on my conscience.  You might want to think about whether or not it will be on yours.

Note:  This article was written with the aid of numerous insights provided by Barbara Kingsolver, in her book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle (chapter 8).

Green onions, cilantro, garlic, ginger, carrots, and baby bok choy

When I originally set out to create the Provident Potato, it was my intention to help inquiring minds learn to cook.  I know a lot of people who would like to learn, but can’t figure out where to start.  Cooking regularly is an art, and it’s different from simply following a recipe.  You waste a lot of food if you don’t know how to put one ingredient into multiple uses.  Cooking seasonally asks one to make many different dishes from similar ingredients, and if you’re just learning to cook, this blog is a great place for you to start.  With this in mind, I’ve written detailed instructions for those of you out there who might not yet be old hands in the kitchen.  If you know what you’re doing, feel free to skip the details and head straight to the parts that are most useful to you.

You can make gyoza with a variety of fillings, but it is best served in its vegetarian incarnation in the spring when green leafy veggies are abundant.  Many recipes for gyoza call for using cabbage, but I prefer to use baby bok choy (which is actually a type of cabbage, but your non-cabbage eating friends will never know.) Baby bok choy is far milder than it’s grown up self, and it lends itself well to sharing the spotlight with other flavors.  It’s also insanely good for you!

Vegetable Gyoza

Filling:

-8 heads of baby bok choy, washed and chopped into 1/2 inch pieces

-4 medium carrots, peeled and shredded (use a cheese grater)

-5 cloves garlic, minced

-2-3 Tbsp fresh ginger root, peeled and minced

-1 good handful cilantro, stems removed, roughly chopped

-2 green onions, chopped into 1/8 inch rounds

-2 Tbsp sesame oil

-1/4 cup chicken stock (vegetable stock is fine too, if that’s how you roll)

-bowl with a 1 Tbsp rice vinegar and 4 Tbsp water in it

Dipping Sauce:

-1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce

-1/4 cup rice vinegar

-1 green onion, chopped into 1/8 inch rounds

Pour sesame oil to a non-stick saute pan and heat on high for about 1-2 minutes until oil is hot (but not too hot or it will splash when you add ingredients…you’ll know how long it takes after a try or two.  Oil should sizzle when you add things to it, but should not spit and scream.)

Add 3/4 of the garlic, all of the ginger, and the bok choy.  Turn down the heat to medium.  Stir to incorporate and cook for about 3 minutes until bok choy looks slightly wilted, but still fresh.

Add carrot, the rest of the garlic, and the chicken (or vegetable) stock.  Return heat to high and stir intermittently for 2 minutes, or until the stock has reduced by about half.  Turn off the heat, add the cilantro and green onion, and stir to incorporate.  Add salt to taste.

Lay out a sheet of wax paper onto a cutting board.  Carefully lay out 6 wonton wrappers, and spoon a generous Tbsp of filling into the middle of each wrapper.  The idea is to fill the wrapper, but not so full that you tear the delicate dough when you fold the whole deal in half (see image below.)  Dab your finger into the rice vinegar/water bowl and wet the outer perimeter of each wonton wrapper.  Use just enough water to wet the outer perimeter of the wonton.  Too much will make the dough too soggy to lift–too little and you won’t be able to seal the triangle when you fold it over.  You’ll get the feel for it after you do a few.

Fold each filled wonton wrapper in half to form a triangle with the filling in the middle, making sure each side is completely closed without any filling sticking out.  Fold the corners of the triangle in towards the center, so what you are left with is a triangle with no points.  You can leave the points if you like, but I find they tend to cook a lot faster than the rest of the pocket, and are prone to burning. Set the first 6 aside, and repeat this process until you’ve used all of the filling (or run out of wrappers!)

Gyoza before and after the fold

At this point, you can do one of two things (or both, if you’ve made a lot!)  If you would like to save the gyoza for use later, you can easily freeze them at this point (skip this paragraph and move on to the next if you plan to cook right away.)  Because the liquid in the wrapper has made the dough weak, you need to take steps to prevent them from losing their shape. Lay a sheet of wax paper onto a cookie sheet, or simply fill up the cutting board you are currently using, making sure that the gyoza don’t touch.  Layer another sheet of wax paper on top, and carefully put a plastic grocery bag over the whole deal, folding the edges under to keep as much air out of the package as possible.  You can use saran wrap for this as well, but re-using bags is better, and easier too.  Place the pan on a flat surface in the freezer and let everybody firm up for about 3 hours.  When the dough feels frozen to the touch and is stiff when moved, you can transfer the whole batch into a freezer bag or other container.  Remember, air is your enemy in the freezer!  The less air in the package,  the longer your gyoza will keep without getting freezer burn.

If you prefer to eat these bad boys fresh, give the non-stick pan you sautéed the veggies in a quick wipe out to get rid of any remaining veggie particles (leftover oil is fine, veggies will burn.)  Add 1 TBSP olive oil to the pan and heat until hot.  Add gyoza, seam side up, to the pan.  Make sure each gyoza gets some oil on its bottom and is not sticking when you put it into the pan.  The oil will give it a crispy outer layers, and will keep it from sticking.  Lay as many gyoza into the pan as you can without overlapping them.  Cook for about 2-3 minutes and check the bottom of one or two to make sure they’ve browned sufficiently before flipping.  Cook the other side for about 2 minutes (they won’t brown quite as nicely as the other side because they will be sitting in less oil, so be careful not to burn them!)

Plate and serve with the dipping sauce, and enjoy!  If you’re serving these to guests, get ready to be hailed as an amazing cook.  Yeah, they’re that good.

I served this with a simple green salad (lettuce, green onion, baby greens, and balsamic vinaigrette)

Serves 2 for dinner (also FANTASTIC as hor d’oeuvres!)

Notes:

-Wonton wrappers are almost the same as gyoza wrappers, but they’re more common and therefor easier to find locally.  The principal difference is their thickness.  Wonton wrappers are thinner than gyoza wrappers, which make them a little more fragile, but I think they’re better because they crisp up nicely in a pan without having to be fried.

-This recipe calls for the use of sesame oil, rice vinegar, soy sauce, and wonton wrappers.  If you live in California, these are relatively easy to find locally (with the exception of soy sauce–perhaps you know of one you could share with other readers in the comment section?)  Marukan Rice Vinegar is made in California, making it an excellent brand to use if you live here.  It’s also one of the best, and I used it long before I started this project.  Sesame oil is a relatively simple thing to make, so you can find it locally in many places.  California has many to choose from.  I’m still using up my old supply, but I’ll let you know who I buy from when I buy more!  If you don’t live in a place with as much abundance as California, and can’t find these ingredients from local sources, don’t despair.  You don’t have to be 100% local in everything you use in your cooking to make a huge impact on your carbon footprint.  Do what you can, and don’t worry about what you can’t do.  Some action is definitely better than no action.  Of course if you find locally sourced substitutes for this recipe, be sure to let us know in the comment section!

-The filling for the gyoza can easily be used as a topping for pasta as well.  If you have the veggies, but don’t have the time to make gyoza, try adding the filling to pasta instead!  Just increase the stock from 1/4 cup to a whole cup, and add another Tbsp of sesame oil to the filling before you toss it with the boiled and drained pasta.

Happy eating!