Warm olives make a great dinner starter

Had lunch the other day at Little Red's Pub and Eatery in St. Marys. The lunch was absolutely excellent. Both Judy and I always enjoy a visit to Little Red's.

Judy ordered a starter for the table, a plate of warm olives. I had forgotten how good a mix of various types of olives can be when simply warmed in a pan with olive oil and a sprinkle of rosemary.

I am sure chef Chris Woolf did more, he's a true kitchen magician. Both Judy and I agree his version seemed more flavourful, more complex, than my take on the old standby. That said, my mix of warm olives with a sprinkle of rosemary tasted awfully good at dinner tonight.

For olives, the North London Loblaws on Fanshawe Park Road at Richmond St. is a good store if it is close to  you. What edged them to the front of the line were the good packaged olive mixes by Delallo I found there. Olive Medley and Pitted Olives Jublilee were the two mixes that I took home.

Note: these are in the specialty foods area of the store and not on the shelves with the regular canned and bottled olives. Look for the serve yourself olive counter. I believe the Olive Medley and the other packaged olives are on a shelf below the display.

Tonight I simply warmed some olives in olive oil in a fry pan with a sprinkle of rosemary. Start simple I say. Next, I'm going to try some of the recipes I found on the Net:

Warm Spiced Olives (Taste.com.au)
Warmed Spiced Olives (Epicurious)  
Warm Marinated Olives (Martha Stewart)
Warm Marinated Olives Two Ways (Merci Mama)

Google "warm olives." I got more than 30 million hits. Take your time. Fine a recipe that appeals to you and give it a try. You can't miss -- unless, of course, you don't like olives.

Leftovers can make a heart healthy dinner

My doctors insist that I eat healthy meals. That advice translates into lots of vegetables, very little red meat, minimal dairy and reduced consumption of both simple carbohydrates and sugar. My doctors prefer complex carbohydrates to the simple ones found in processed foods such as white bread.

The pasta may have been the enriched and not the whole grain type which would have been better, but we practised careful portion. And even regular, refined and enriched pasta is not anywhere near as high on the glycemic index as white rice or a baked Russet potato.

Dinner tonight answered all the demands, tasted great and was put together in ten minutes from leftovers found in the fridge.

Last night my wife and I enjoyed spaghetti squash with a tomato sauce. A lot of folk don't like spaghetti squash. I think they compare the squash to pasta and this is a mistake. You must enjoy spaghetti squash as the interesting vegetable it is. It has a light, clean flavour with lots of crisp snap if it is not overcooked. It goes well with a variety of sauces. One must keep an open mind.

For tonight's meal, first we dumped 75 g of pennine pasta into a pot of boiling water. It would be done al dente in seven minutes or so. While the pasta was cooking, we tossed our leftover veggies into a skillet with two cloves of lightly fired diced garlic. After 30 seconds, we added diced sweet peppers, asparagus, broccoli, mushrooms, tomatoes and spaghetti squash to the skillet.

All was heated over medium heat with frequent tossing. After about four minutes, some fresh grated Parmesan, do not use the grated stuff that comes in a shaker box, was sprinkled onto the veggie mix. The cheese disappeared into the mix immediately. At this point the left over spaghetti squash, chopped into pieces about the length of the pennine, was added to the pan. About an ounce of low-fat goat cheese was crumbled on top and the entire mix stirred until the cheese melted, coating the hot vegetable mix.

At this point the pasta was done. It was drained and added to the fry pan, mixed with the veggies and served. My wife called the resulting dinner "delicious." I called it good and satisfying. My doctors, I am sure, would call it healthy.

As you can probably tell from the picture, a little extra Parmesan was added at the table. And when I got seconds, I sprinkled some chopped cashews on top as well. At this point, I came around and agreed with my wife. This dinner was now "delicious."

Be bold in the kitchen. Good ingredients make good meals.

I didn't have a recipe for tonight's dinner but I had lots of good ingredients handy: cod fillets, apples, sweet red peppers, cherry tomatoes, asparagus and basmati rice. I baked the veggies for various lengths of time. I thought the asparagus could need the most time and the tomatoes the least. I'd say more about my approach to this dinner but the result was not what I was seeking and so I'll stay mum. I wanted caramelized. I got simply cooked.

I sprinkled some hot pepper flakes on the fish hoping for a big burst of heat but I didn't use enough and the effect was way too subtle.

But, and it is a big and important but, the ingredients were excellent. Nothing was burned. The fish was flaky. All the veggies were fresh and they all tasted it. My wife gave the dinner a thumbs up. It wasn't what I wanted but it still worked.

The lesson? Good ingredients tend to give good results. I failed to add much to this dinner but it had a lot going for it right from the get-go. It was a rather delicious failure. My doctors would give my cooking attempt  two thumbs up even if my dinner wasn't going to qualify me for a cooking competition on television.

Check out the New York Times Cooking pages for asparagus recipes

All I am trying to promote is healthy eating. I am certainly not promoting my cooking. When it comes to imaginative ways to prepare and present asparagus the New York Times Cooking site is doing a damn fine job.

I grilled the asparagus illustrating this post but that's all. For recipes please click on the link. New York Times Cooking: asparagus.

I'm not sure that eating well will make one live longer but I do believe it will make your live a healthier life and make dining, even at home, much more fun.

Cheers!

Quick and healthy; not fine dining but still good

My mother was not a great cook but a practical one. Practicality was common back in the early '50s when I was a boy. Give her a holiday and she'd give you roast chicken or turkey, depending upon the number of guests at the holiday banquet. A day later she'd give you leftovers. There was never any waste.

One of her favourite solutions for dealing with holiday leftovers was chicken or turkey pie. And her not-so-secret ingredient was a Campbell's condensed cream of chicken soup. And so in memory of my dear, departed mother, my wife made Margaret-inspired chicken pie complete with Easter dinner leftovers. Even the pie crust was a leftover, made from the remnants of pastry used to make Sunday's lemon meringue pie.

The big difference between my wife's version and the '50s original is that Judy uses low fat condensed soup. Four cans have approximately 5 g of saturated fat and no trans fats at all. Judy tells me she puts two cans of cream of chicken into a pot, adds a cup each of carrots and peas, adds up to two cups of chicken chunks, sprinkles on some thyme and heats all with frequent stirring.

When thoroughly heated, Judy pours the mixture into a suitable pie plate. To keep the fat, and total calories in check, Judy does not line the pie plate with pastry. She uses one layer of pastry on top of the pie and that's it. It looks messy when served but still attractive.

The turnip served with the chicken pie was also leftover from Easter. The broccoli was bought for the holiday but not cooked. It still had nice crunch and its presence added freshness to an arguably faded entrée.

Ingredients

• 2 cans of Campbell's condensed, low-fat, cream of chicken soup 
• 1 cup of frozen peas if leftovers are not handy
• 1 cup of diced, cooked, but not over cooked, carrots
• A sprinkle of thyme. If dried thyme is used, use sparringly. Fresh thyme is not so intense.
• And enough pastry for a top crust.

Asparagus pesto is more common than I thought

My wife and I both like pesto. The other day we had a chance to sample a vegetable lasagna with a basil-based pesto replacing the common tomato sauce. It was good. We were surprised at how much we enjoyed it.

When I told our youngest daughter about the lasagna, she said said she was familiar with pestos and note the plural. There are a lot of pesto recipes and some are completely new to me -- but not to our daughter. She told us she made a green pea-based pesto and it was excellent.

This started me thinking. Why not an asparagus-based pesto? After all, it is spring. It would be the perfect creation to celebrate spring's arrival. A search of the New York Times Cooking site found a recipe. A simple Google search found lots more. One of my favourite takes is a Williams Sonoma recipe Rigatoni with Asparagus Pesto and Ricotta Salata.

I took a crack at the NYT's recipe but found it wanting. The next night I took another try. This time, I made the pesto first. I'm not much of an ingredients-juggler when it comes to making dinner. I'm still in the KISS stage: Keep It Simple Stupid.


Let's go over my ingredient list:

• 1 bunch of asparagus (230 g used for the pesto with six spears held aside to be served whole.)
• 1 clove of garlic, minced (I actually used more but I'm going to cut back to one clove.)
• 20 g of pine nuts
• 25 g of walnuts plus a few to adorn the finished dish when served
• 1/2 cup loosely packed grated Parmesan cheese plus some to sprinkle on finished dish
• 1 Tbsp of olive oil
• Juice from half a lemon (Squeezed the remaining half over the dinners at the table.)
• 1 good pinch of salt
• 150 g of pennine (I cook 75 g of pasta per person. Sometimes I cook even less.)
• 50 g of chopped baby spinach
• A handful of small cherry tomatoes and four large cherry tomatoes 
• 4 ounces of cooked ham or cooked chicken

I grilled and caramelized the asparagus for the pesto but my wife has convinced me the result wasn't worth the effort and time. The next time, I'll just steam the asparagus. I'm sticking with my amount: 230 g.

With the asparagus steaming, toast 20 g of pine nuts in a skillet over medium high heat. When these begin turning golden brown, remove from the heat and set aside. Next, toast the 25 g of walnuts. When done, set aside with the pine nuts, keeping a few walnuts separate as a garmish for the dish when served.
Next, fry the minced garlic in a little olive oil for possibly 30 seconds over medium high heat. The garlic should not turn dark brown. It should be a golden colour. Place this aside with the toasted nuts, as well.

Grate half a cup of Parmesan cheese. Don't tamp it down. Leave loose in measuring cup. Lastly, squeeze the juice from half a lemon and set aside. Now, take the steamed asparagus and dice well. This is especially important if using a food blender. If the pieces are too large, they hang up, jam and require a lot of finagling to be coaxed into making contact with the spinning blades.

Drop the well diced asparagus into the blender, add the toasted pine nuts, toasted walnuts, golden minced garlic, a Tbsp of olive oil, half a cup of freshly grated Parmesan cheese, and the fresh squeezed lemon juice. There should be about two Tbsps of juice. Give the mixture a couple of good shakes of salt and blend all into a light green pesto. Remove pesto from blender bowl and set aside. It won't sit long.

Chop the cooked ham or cooked chicken into large chunks and toss into a frying pan with a little olive oil. While the meat is heating, drop the pennine into a pot of fast boiling water. Give the pot a stir to keep the pasta from sticking. It will be done in about eight minutes.

While the pasta is cooking, add the tomatoes to the skillet with the ham or chicken. If all goes well, the tomatoes will be just beginning to split from the heat as the pasta closes in on al dente. Drop the chopped baby spinach into the pot with the pasta, swirl the pasta and spinach around and drain. I find smaller bits of spinach clump less than large pieces. The goal is to have the spinach spread out through the pasta.

Place the remaining asparagus spears in the microwave and cook for a minute or less. The spears will cook quickly. Take care not to overcook.While the spears are cooking, add the asparagus pesto to the cooked pasta mixed with spinach. Toss in the chunks of heated ham or chicken and the cherry tomatoes and mix well. Serve.

Decorate each serving of pasta with a few roasted walnuts and sprinkle on a some Parmesan cheese, too. Place the larger, cherry tomatoes and the whole steamed or microwaved asparagus spears on the side. It should look good and taste even better. I'm working on improving my presentation but the flavour demands no serious tweaking.

There was a lot of pesto. I can see stretching this to coat four servings of pennine. (This assumes you are content serving only 70 g of pesto per person.) With more pasta, the pennine might be easier to see. The pennine seems hidden with this presentation.

We eat a lot of asparagus in the spring. There is an asparagus farm just minutes from our London, Ontario, home. I'm confident I'll get this looking beautiful at some point in the near future.

It is not always what you eat but what you don't

It was lunch time, I was hungry and I didn't feel like cooking. The situation had all the ingredients for a recipe for disaster. I could see a gilled cheese sandwich on the horizon. Not good. I opened a can of Campbell's low sodium chicken with rice soup. Better but still not good.

My heart doctors have been very clear. Don't overdo the saturated fats, keep to chicken and fish as much as possible when it comes to meat, and eat nutritious meals and not just filling ones. A quick check of the Campbell's label confirmed that this soup was not going to meet all the demands. And when I took a taste, I realized it wasn't even going to be a sinful delight. It was too bland for my liking.

I emptied the contents of the can, plus a can of water, into a small pot and placed it on the stove to heat. I added two tablespoons of basmati long-grain rice to the soup. It needed more rice. I coarsely chopped an ounce of chicken and added that to the pot as well. I grabbed a large carrot, peeled it and quickly diced it into small pieces. I added this to the pot as well.

Next, to kick up the flavour, I added about a quarter teaspoon of fresh thyme. My mother loved thyme with chicken and so when I think of chicken, I think of thyme. Judy, my wife, doesn't have the same memories. She likes to use less thyme than I.  I dropped a bay leaf into the heating soup. It would remain in the mix for five minutes and then out it comes. Such a small pot of soup very quickly takes on the flavour of the bay leaf.

Lastly, I added a little salt and pepper to taste and then tossed in about a half a teaspoon of Paese Mio bruchetta calabrese. This can be hard to find. When I run out, I substitute dried hot pepper flakes. The goal here is to up the kick of heat delivered by the soup.

Because of the rice, my soup needed to be left on simmer for about twenty minutes. On the bright side,  it didn't take a lot of attention. I essentially left the soup on simmer and went off to watch a little television. In twenty minutes, the rice was fluffy and nicely cooked and the soup was ready to enjoy.

If I make this again, the next time I'd love to add one celery stalk diced into smallish chunks. I like my soups to be filling. Celery would add bulk but not calories. Perfect.