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The pictures are awful, but these oven-roasted mushrooms are amazing!

If I had known how good these mushrooms in garlic were going to turn out, I would have been more careful about the pictures!

Mushy focus!

This is a wonderful variation on the classic stove-top champiñones al ajillo or mushrooms in garlic sauce, that is a staple of Spanish tapas places and that I have posted before (with butter or with olive oil)My friend, Marianne and I made them as sort of an afterthought as we were packing the oven with roasted vegetables for our New Year of Eating Right. Why not throw these in too, since we have some space?

Genius.

Get the crusty bread ready, because you are going to want to mop up every bit of sauce.

Blurry photo, clearly delicious

Oven-roasted mushrooms in garlic (Champiñones al ajillo, al horno)

10 oz. button or baby bella mushrooms

2-3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced

1 Tbs extra virgin olive oil

1 Tbs chopped parsley, optional

Salt to taste

Preheat oven to 400°F. Wipe mushrooms clean. Trim off woody stem bits and cut into ¼” slices. Mix mushrooms, garlic , and oil in an ovenproof dish and roast, turning once, for about 30 minutes or until mushrooms are shiny, opaque and dark brown. Sprinkle parsley over, salt to taste and serve with toothpicks as a tapas dish or mix with warm pasta for a light primo piatto (first dish/appetizer).

Tags: Champiñones al ajillo, cooking, food, Mushrooms in Garlic Sauce, recipes, roasting mushrooms, roasting vegetables

Comments 4 Comments
Categories baking, Entertaining, Food, Party Snacks, Recipes, Side Dishes, Spanish, Tapas, Vegan, Vegetarian

The Green Goddess Helps Those Who Help Themselves (A Salad Dressing)

17 Jan

So Marianne and I continue preparing food that encourages healthy eating and healthy weight for the new year. I like to make one meal a day a salad; as crunchy and varied as possible. Unless my mom is home making the powdered Italian stuff in the cruet (which I freely admit I love), I generally make my own, simple vinaigrettes or tahini-based dressings, but clearly it is time to branch out.

Do pack the tablespoon with the herbs; it is very hard to get an accurate measure of this, isn’t it?

Marianne’s brother, Peter, is famous for his Green Goddess dressing (and his pecan pie, but that’s for another day when I get his recipe!) and although I’d never had it before (see dressing history, below) , I happened upon a Green Goddess recipe in Food to Live By: The Earthbound Farm Organic Cookbook (a personal favorite that Marianne’s boys gave me a few years ago, as it happens) and well…game on! Continue reading →

Tags: cooking, dip, food, Green Goddess dressing, healthy salad dressing, recipes, salad ideas, what is Green Goddess dressing

Comments 5 Comments
Categories Food, gardening, Recipes, salad, Side Dishes, Vegetarian

Sauteed Onions and Mushrooms II (This time dairy-free)

14 Jan

The last time I posted Sauteed mushrooms and onions, it was a rich and unctuous burger-topper sauteed in butter that I learned from my friend Marianne – the wife of one male and mother of two more, and so an expert in crowd-pleasing, no-holds-barred burger toppers and other such make-happy-the-hungry-horde type stuff.

Into the frying pan

But now it’s January, the birth month of good intentions (and the trail head of the road to hell, but never mind) and Marianne and I are looking at ourselves and deciding it is time to try slimmer versions of our favorite meals. We’ve been getting together on Sundays and making good, healthy,veggie, low-whatever refrigerator items for the week.

Thus, this new take on sauteed onions and mushrooms. No dairy (Susu, are you listening?) and yet still unctuous and savory (mushrooms tend to do that). Try it on black bean burgers with quinoa or without and feel truly virtuous!

Golden is good, but wait for it…darker is better

Sauteed Onions and Mushrooms

2 Tbs extra virgin olive oil

1.5 Cups sliced onion (slice against the stripes)

10 oz. sliced mushrooms (button or baby bella), woody stems trimmed or removed

2 shakes adobo seasoning (or one pinch each of: garlic powder, onion powder, salt. Oregano is optional, and you can add more of any of them to taste)

Heat the olive oil at medium high in a large skillet until loose and fragrant. Add onions and stir to coat. Add mushrooms and stir to coat. Sprinkle with adobo seasoning, lower heat to medium low and cook, stirring occasionally, for about ten minutes, until onions are quite wilted and mushrooms are darkened and soft.

Tags: barbecue foods, burger toppings, cooking, food, onions and mushrooms, recipes, vegan sauteed onions, vegetarian sides

Comments 10 Comments
Categories BBQ, Food, Recipes, Side Dishes, Vegan, Vegetarian

Leek and Asparagus: A Delightful Accessory for Scrambled Eggs

9 Jan

Today we have a guest post – my friend Ashley who is my accomplice in many of the recipes you see on this blog (most of the beverage recipes, funnily enough).

Served separately from the eggs

Ashley is from Maryland, which from my perspective is the South, although I suppose you can argue Middle Atlantic (for those of you who are curious where Long Island falls in the regionality game, we are kinda Middle Atlantic and kinda New England, which makes it very challenging to decide which Growing Zone to follow when planting in my garden! I welcome input on that. But let me meander back to Ashley and the South).

Prosecco mimosas are the appropriate accompaniment

Ashley, like so many good Southerners has a terrific fondness for ramps (wild leeks) and anything that resembles them. So when making a breakfast recently, she decided to use the leeks in my fridge to accessorize the scrambled eggs I had on tap. Ashley has an aversion to butter (yeah, crazy, right?) so she used about a tablespoon of olive oil. You could certainly substitute, but I liked them just like this.

Mixed up with the eggs

From Ashley:

Here is a very rough write-up of the leek eggs that we ate (and we used to call wild leeks ramps, so there might be other recipes out there that call for ramps instead of leeks…):

Take 1/2 pound leeks (approx. 2 medium) and scrub them to death. Remove the end green parts. Because they are so incredibly difficult to clean, you may have to clean them, start to cut them, stop and clean them again. But in the end the effort is well worth it.

Trim the ends and cut into small pieces. Saute until leeks are tender. While it apparently tastes better with butter, you know my aversion to butter, so this is where I use olive oil.

Open your friend’s refrigerator and pilfer her leftover roasted asparagus. How can you let perfectly good asparagus go to waste!? Cut the asparagus into 1/2 inch pieces. As the leeks are almost finished cooking, add the asparagus until it heats up.

Scramble 2 eggs (per person). Add the warmed leeks and asparagus.

We didn’t do this, but when I’ve made it before, I’ve added a little parmesan/grana padano cheese and that makes it irresistible! Thyme is also a nice spice to add to this. And of course, there’s always sriracha for the bonus kick.

Pedro’s Better-Than-Perfect White Rice

3 Jan

Sometimes perfect isn’t good enough. Sometimes, perfect is boring. Sometimes you think you’ve got something down perfectly pat, only to discover that someone else can actually do it better.

Allow to boil, uncovered, until water goes below the surface

Such is the story of this recipe. I have posted my Perfect White Rice in accompaniment with a variety of bean recipes a number of times on this blog. It comes out perfect every time: grains moist but separate, texture cooked through but not mealy.

Light and fluffy white rice

But my dad’s rice (which uses exactly the same ingredients, as it happens) is just better. Mine is a great accompaniment. But his? You can eat it right out of the pot with nothing else and find bliss. It’s just white rice, but it has the slightest sheen of oil, a satisfying plumpness, just the right saltiness.

And now, here it is. ¡Buen provecho!

Perfection!

Pedro’s Better-Than-Perfect White Latin Rice

2 Cups water

1 generous Tbs extra virgin olive oil

1 tsp coarse salt

1 Cup medium grain rice (not parboiled), rinsed in a strainer

Bring water, oil, and salt to a boil at high. Add rice. Stir. Return to boil, lower heat to medium high and allow water to boil away until the top is no longer under water and the bubbles come up through holes in the surface. Turn rice over with a spoon bringing the bottom to the top. Cover and cook on low heat for 20 minutes. Serve. Or stand next to the stove and just eat it out of the pot. I’m telling you.

Hot, Cheap & Easy’s Five Top Posts and Wrap-Up for 2012

31 Dec

Whoo-hoo! This year I became a published book writer for the first time with Eat Your Way Around Puerto Rico – a digital dictionary that tells folks what to eat in Puerto Rico and how to ask for it! I also successfully transitioned my little guy to kindergarten (where he has only had the school lunch three times); was an invited speaker at a variety of events (more related to education than food, but an accomplishment nonetheless) and presenter at others; did a number of articles for publication; and did bunches of other things that I am happy about. In a year full of tension and tragedy, I feel very very fortunate to have made it through so well.

And of course Hot, Cheap & Easy has been rollicking along, with 141 new posts (current total is 291, including this one) getting visits from 149 countries and increasing visitors by 150% over last year. The blog has a Facebook page now (like it!) where I post food news and fun that doesn’t quite fit within the scope of the blog.

So here are the five most-visited posts of the year…followed by a shout-out to my most supportive fellow bloggers! I wish you all a delicious 2013….and THANK YOU, GRACIAS, MERCY BUCKETS for all your visits and comments and suggestions!

Hot, Cheap & Easy’s Top Five Countdown for 2012 Continue reading →

Tags: cooking, food, mozzarella balls, New Years Round-Up, pastelón, pattypan squash, recipes, spider dogs, strawberry rhubarb jam, top five recipes of 2012

Comments 10 Comments
Categories BBQ, Camping, Comida Criolla, Food, Puerto Rican, Recipes, Spanish, Vegetarian

Pan-Roasted Tomatoes (a great spread for toast!)

23 Dec

The problem with warehouse shopping places like Costco is that when you are just one and a half people (little man being that half because he only eats half the variety that I do so far) the food comes in packages that are far more than you can consume before it goes off. We just can’t eat that many avocados or tomatoes or asparagus before they start looking nasty, no matter how good the price.

Nice char!

But, I was tempted into sins of excess by a quart of bright orange tomatoes in a plastic shell that reminded me irresistably of Sungolds. Why I was buying tomatoes out of season and out of state is a question you can reasonably ask. I hang my head in locavore-gone-wrong shame and go on with my story. I bought them. I did.

Sauteed leeks

They were delicious, ridiculously sweet and kept me on the salad path for days. That is a path I need to be on. But a week, two weeks later, predictably, the cup that was left had passed its prime and I had a locavore-gone-wrong guilt hangover.

Prosecco mimosas – pink grapefruit and orange juice

Solution? Pan-roasting. Our friend, Ashley had stayed over and it was a Saturday, which of course calls for bacon and eggs and Prosecco Mimosas (my new fave is pink grapefruit – 2 parts juice to 1 part prosecco…or 1 parts prosecco to two parts juice…or a glass of prosecco with a splash of juice….)! We added to that a leek saute (that Ashley will have to give me the recipe for; once she started fighting with the leek cleaning process, I backed away and didn’t look again until it was on my plate) and the following recipe that used up the tomatoes in a delicious and satisfying way! So, tomatoes used up, guilt assuaged, breakfast… delish!

On toast with basil (what’s left in the little pot by the kitchen window)

Pan-Roasted Tomato Spread

1 tsp olive oil (optional, especially if you have a nonstick pan)

1 Cup grape tomatoes

1 pinch sugar

1 pinch salt

1 tsp fresh basil (optional)

Place all ingredients (except optional basil) in a small skillet. Heat at medium, stirring occasionally, until the tomatoes begin to split and char. Remove from heat and spread on toast. Top with basil.

Classic Tapas: Champiñones al ajillo (Mushrooms in Garlic)

22 Dec

I have such good memories of Old Madrid, fragmented yellow afternoon light poking into the bar from the narrow street outside; standing at a stainless steel bar focused on stabbing mushrooms with a toothpick as they swam in garlicky sauce in a red clay cazuela, the peasant poetry of light red wine poured into a homely, stemless glass with a thick bottom, crusty rounds of bread crumbling under your elbows. Nothing better to do than spend the summer evening exploring more windy streets and more interesting little appetizers.

Whether you’re preparing a cozy tête à tête with something light to nibble on, looking for a simple vegetable dish to round out your appetizers or accompany a meat, seeking something to serve with the aperitif at your next cocktail party, or just want something a bit more befitting your station than Cheese Doodles to nosh on while you watch T.V. with a glass of something, look to Spain, and specifically to the iconic tapas: Champiñones al ajillo or mushrooms in garlic sauce, Spanish-style. Continue reading →

Tags: cetas al ajillo, champiñones al ajillo; tapas, cocktail mushrooms, cooking, easy buffet recipes, easy party snacks, food, jewelry party food, mushrooms, recipes, Spanish appetizers

Comments 6 Comments
Categories Entertaining, Food, Party Snacks, Recipes, sauce, Side Dishes, Spanish, Tapas, Vegetarian

Yuca Salad Revisited – You May Never Make Potato Salad Again

5 Dec

There is no better big-dinner, buffet, picnic, or other party dish in my arsenal than Yuca Salad (aka ensalada de yuca, yuca en escabeche). None. I kid you not.

Pimiento-stuffed olives

It is easy, has big flavor, is unusual, goes with everything, is portable, and very cheap…it is even vegan, but no one has to know until they’ve tried it. I have served it to pretty much everyone I have ever cooked for (and if I haven’t done it for you yet, it is just a matter of time) and gotten rave reviews every time. Continue reading →

Tags: cassava, comida criolla, easy party dishes, escabeche, manioc, potato salad alternatives, Puerto Rican, vegan, vegetarian, yuca, yuca an vinagreta, yuca salad

Comments 18 Comments
Categories Comida Criolla, Entertaining, Food, Party Snacks, Puerto Rican, Recipes, salad, Side Dishes, Spanish, Vegan, Vegetarian

Sauteed Onions and Peppers with Curry (super side dish or turkey burger topper!)

1 Dec

On its own or with rice, these mildly curried vegetables are a worthy side dish!

The post-Thanksgiving self-flagellation and sporadic attempts to lose five pounds (okay, ten) before Christmas have begun. Continue reading →

Tags: cooking, curry, easy curried vegetables, food, recipes, sauteed onions and peppers, turkey burger topper, vegan, vegetarian

Comments 6 Comments
Categories Food, Recipes, Side Dishes, Vegan, Vegetarian

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