Category Archives: Side Dishes

Roasted cauliflower and Brussels sprouts w/ bagna cauda

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One of the best things about working downtown again: killer happy hours within walking distance! I recently checked out happy hour at Lecosho, Matt Janke’s (formerly of Matt’s in the Market) newest restaurant nestled in the Harbor Steps, which just so happens to be a stone’s throw away from my work.

I had heard nothing but great things about this place and finally had a chance to try some of their nibbles at the last Foodportunity event — they served up a delicious, yet scary-looking (think bologna and meatloaf having a love child), duck mortadella over a crostini.

When I joined a friend for a proper meal at the restaurant, we shared the hand-made cavatelli with wild mushrooms and a side order of the cauliflower with bagna cauda. I absolutely fell in love with the cauliflower — perfectly crisp and packed full of garlicky-salty flavor! So naturally, I decided to try making this dish at home. Happy hour prices or not, the Amateur Gourmand is all about being economical these days :) .

You know what cauliflower is (doi!), but what exactly is bagna cauda, you ask? Bagna cauda means “hot bath” in Italian. A hot bath (or warm dip, rather) made up of olive oil, butter, lots of garlic and anchovies, and usually served fondue-style with veggies. The dish at Lecosho had the bagna cauda mixed into the roasted cauliflower, which I really liked.

I said anchovies…did I lose you? Don’t knock it till you try it people! Anchovy filets add so much depth of flavor! And, once those suckers dissolve and cook down, there isn’t any pungent fishy flavor…just the perfect salty bite.

So anyway, I’m also trying to watch my figure these days so I opted to leave butter out of my version of bagna cauda (I know, I know, first anchovies, now this…). The flavors were still spot-on and I didn’t feel so much like a blimp after eating a bowl…and then licking the bowl clean :) . I had some Brussels sprouts on hand who wanted to join the party so I threw them into the hot tub time machine as well.

If you have any kiddos or men in your life who need a little extra convincing to finish their veggies, give this recipe a try (let’s face it, some grown dudes are worse than kids when it comes to veggies).

Roasted cauliflower & Brussels sprouts w/ bagna cauda

Serves 2 as a side dish

For the veggies:

  • 1/2 lb cauliflower, cut into bite-size florets
  • 1/2 lb Brussels sprouts, dark outer leaves and stems removed, cut in half
  • Olive oil
  • Fresh parsley, minced (for garnish at the end)

For the bagna cauda:

  • 1/4 cup olive oil
  • 4 garlic cloves, minced
  • 4-5 small flat anchovy filets
  • Crushed red pepper flakes, to taste

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Toss veggies with olive oil and lay in single layer on baking sheet. Roast until browned, approximately 25-30 minutes.

cauliflower brussels sprouts raw

Start on bagna cauda when veggies are about 10 minutes from being finished (you want the bagna cauda to be warm when you coat the veggies). In a medium saucepan, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add crushed red pepper flakes and garlic and sautee until garlic starts to soften, about 2-3 minutes.

oil garlic pepper flakes

Add the anchovy filets – YUM! :) Reduce heat to low.

anchovies added

Using a wooden spoon, break up the anchovy filets; cook on low heat until they have fully dissolved into the oil mixture, about 5 minutes.

anchovies dissolved

When veggies are done roasting, remove from oven and coat with finished bagna cauda. Toss to coat evenly. Now, if for some reason this isn’t salty enough for you, by all means add more salt. I found it to be plenty salty with just the anchovies.

dressing roasted veggies

Top with minced parsley and serve immediately while hot. Buon appetito!

roasted veggies with bagna cauda plated

Roasted beets w/ herbs and feta

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My boss invited our staff over for a lovely dinner at her house this week. While she handled the main dish (delicious seafood stew from Tom Douglas’ Tom’s Big Dinners cookbook), the rest of us contributed side dishes and dessert. I volunteered to bring a veggie side dish, and knew instantly that I wanted to do a beet dish — they are in season and are absolutely delicious. And I also wanted to get one of my coworkers to give real beets a try — she had only ever tried canned beets (ick!) and decided she wasn’t a beet person.

beets uncooked

Anyway, I consulted my new Williams-Sonoma Cooking From the Farmers’ Market cookbook and decided on a roasted beet dish (recipe below). Then during one of my lunch breaks, I hopped downstairs to Pike Place Market to gather my ingredients (ahhh, the joys of working at the Market :) ). My vendors of choice for this dish: Frank’s Quality Produce and Pike Place Market Creamery.

The recipe calls for goat cheese, but you all know how I feel about that (bleeech!). So I made a switch-a-roo and used feta instead — mmmmm, feta! :)

Roasted Beets w/ herbs and feta

Serves 4 (I doubled the recipe to make enough to serve our larger gathering)

Slightly adapted from a recipe in Cooking From the Farmers’ Market

  • 6 beets (approx 1.5 lbs total weight), greens removed (I used a combo of red and golden beets — love the color contrast)
  • 1 tsp chopped fresh thyme
  • 1 tsp chopped fresh chives
  • 3 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
  • Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
  • 2 oz crumbled feta

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Wrap the beets individually in aluminum foil and roast until tender when pierced with a fork, about 1 hour.

beets in foil

When cool, peel and quarter the beets and place in a serving bowl. Note: Since I was preparing this dish the night before, I put the beets in two separate covered bowls (so the red beets wouldn’t bleed onto the golden beets) and stored them in the refrigerator. Right before dinner, I reheated the beets in the oven.

beets peeled

Meanwhile in a separate bowl, mix together the thyme, chives, and olive oil.

oil and herbs

Remove the beets from the oven and season with salt and pepper. Drizzle the oil-herb mixture over the beets and toss. Add the feta and toss. Check the seasoning and adjust as needed with salt and pepper. Serve and enjoy!

beets finished

Slow-cooked BBQ pulled pork sandwich w/ coleslaw

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To round out my adventures in BBQ, I am sharing this simple pulled pork sandwich and coleslaw recipe. And when I say simple, I really mean it — all’s you need is a slow cooker, some pork shoulder, veggies, buns and the homemade BBQ sauce and honey-dill vinaigrette from Monday’s blog post.

Now before you get all excited and jump into this recipe, let me heed this important warning: do not – I repeat – do not use pork tenderloin instead of the shoulder. Being the pig novice that I am, I assumed a tenderloin would work just as well, and since it was on sale the day I went grocery shopping, I went with it. No bueno, no bueno at all. I ended up with a tough and rubbery piece of meat that wouldn’t shred without the help of a chainsaw. So there you have it…pork shoulder, people.

Slow-cooked BBQ pulled pork sandwiches w/ coleslaw

makes 4 sandwiches

Pulled pork sandwiches

Coleslaw

  • 1/2 head of small red cabbage, shredded
  • 1 cup matchstick carrots
  • 1 granny smith apple, julienned
  • 1/2 cup chopped scallions
  • 1 cup homemade honey-dill vinaigrette
  • salt and pepper, to taste

Set slow cooker to low setting and add BBQ sauce. Season pork with salt and pepper and add to slow cooker; cook for 4 hours. Remove pork and shred using forks (or your fingers). Add shredded pork back into slow cooker and toss with BBQ sauce; cook for another 15-20 mins. Meanwhile, combine all coleslaw ingredients in a medium bowl; cover and refrigerate for 10-15 mins. When pork is finished, scoop over toasted buns and serve alongside coleslaw (or you can add coleslaw into the sandwich) and baked sweet potato fries.


Baked BBQ chicken legs w/ potato salad

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So I love warm, sunny weather. And I love BBQ. But oddly enough, I have yet to BBQ anything on an outdoor grill by myself. And the reason for this…I’m deathly afraid of outdoor grills! Not because these things are evil or scary, but because I’m one hot tranny mess of a klutz and I just don’t trust myself to operate an outdoor grill alone. Hence this recipe is a baked BBQ chicken recipe.

If anyone wants to come over and make this recipe on my outdoor grill, I’d be more than happy to have you! And if you’re wondering why the heck I even own an outdoor grill — my friend Matt convinced me to get one a few years ago when we had an impromptu BBQ on my deck…I haven’t used it since. :)

OK, before we jump into the recipe, let’s chat briefly about the pre-cooking magic that went into this. To get uber tender and flavorful chicken legs, I soaked them in this basic brine solution for about 2 hours (note: when brining, you want enough liquid to completely cover all your meat):

  • 2 quarts water
  • 1/2 cup kosher salt
  • 1/2 granulated sugar
  • 4-6 cloves of garlic (smashed, to release flavor into the brine)

You can be creative with this brine by adding in any other herbs or aromatics. I kept it simple since I was going to coat these leggies in some finger-lickin’ good BBQ sauce. That said, here is the rest of the recipe. On deck for tomorrow: slow-cooked pulled pork sandwiches w/ coleslaw and sweet potato fries.

Baked BBQ chicken legs w/ potato salad

serves 4-6, depending on how hungry you are :)

BBQ chicken

  • 2 lb chicken legs (or any other part – I just heart legs!), skin on
  • 2 cups homemade BBQ sauce (more or less depending on your preference)
  • Minced scallions to garnish

Potato salad

  • 2 lb red potatoes, diced into 1-inch cubes
  • 1 cup chopped scallions
  • 1 cup chopped celery heart
  • salt and pepper, to taste
  • 1/2 cup to 1 cup homemade honey-dill vinaigrette

Preheat oven to 375-degrees. Bring a large pot of water to a boil; add salt. Line a large cookie sheet with aluminum foil. Remove chicken legs from brine solution and pat dry; arrange in one layer on cookie sheet. Using a pastry brush, brush first layer of BBQ sauce onto chicken. Bake for 15-30 mins while basting with additional BBQ sauce. Turn chicken legs over, baste with more BBQ sauce and cook for additional 15-30 mins or until internal temperature reaches 180-degrees on an instant-read thermometer. Meanwhile, boil potatoes until fork tender, about 10-12 mins. Drain and add scallion, celery and honey-dill vinaigrette. Toss together until well incorporated; season with salt and pepper. When chicken legs are done, garnish with minced scallions.

Baked Bbq Chicken LegsPotato Salad W/ Honey-Dill Dressing

The ultimate lemon challenge

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A few weeks ago, when my post-holiday “lemonade” cleanse took an unexpected bad turn, I was left with more lemons than I knew what to do with.

So the challenge for the remainder of the week: make as many recipes that called for lemons. Those damn lemons were no match for my competitive drive and frugal mind – it was on like Donkey Kong! After tapping into a few of my favorite go-to recipes, trying new recipes from cookbooks and even asking for recommendations on Facebook (btw, thanks for all the wonderful ideas, folks!), I successfully used up every last one of those pesky lemons. A double bonus: I managed to incorporate many of my leftover CSA produce as well. Below are highlights of some of my favorite dishes from the “challenge.”

Pioneer Woman’s Baked Lemon Pasta

I love, love, love the Pioneer Woman’s cookbook and was thrilled to find this simple and delicious pasta recipe featuring the lemon as the star ingredient. You can easily adjust this recipe to feed a larger group if you’re entertaining. It also reheats wonderfully – I should know, I ate it for lunch for 2 days in a row :) .

Food Network’s Chicken with Lemon Herb Sauce

For this recipe, I opted to deglaze the pan with the herb sauce before serving it over the chicken. Flavor-wise, this was a good decision. The downside: the sauce went from a beautiful bright green to a poopy brown color – ick. I served the chicken with some brown rice and this recipe for grilled mushrooms basted with a “lemony” sauce.

Ina Garten’s Lemon Yogurt Cake

By midweek I was having a bit of a sweet tooth so I decided to step my challenge up a notch and face my ultimate fear in the kitchen: BAKING! I had actually seen a recent episode of Barefoot Contessa where Ina made this lemon yogurt cake and it took everything in me not to start licking the TV screen, haha!

I had some blueberries that I needed to use up so I added them to the glaze to give the cake a little extra pizazz. The cake was every bit as delicious as Ina promised it would be, but I actually prefer it sans glaze. Then again, I’ve never been a huge fan of glazes or frostings on my baked goods.

Chicken Souvlaki with Lebanese Tabbouleh

I have my lovely coworker Nathalie to thank for this meal — she responded to my S.O.S message on Facebook and shared her DE-LICIOUS Lebanese tabbouleh recipe. To round out the meal, I decided to keep with the Mediterranean theme and serve it alongside Cooking Light’s chicken souvlaki with homemade tzatziki sauce.

For those wanting to try the Lebanese tabbouleh, here is the recipe from Nathalie:

Serves a kajillion (but it stays fresh in the fridge for several days).

  • 1.5 cups bulgur wheat
  • 6-8 large tomatoes, finely diced
  • 1 large onion, finely diced
  • 1 large bunch parsley, minced
  • 3-4 fresh mint leaves, minced
  • ½ cup good quality olive oil (Jenn’s Note: Since this isn’t a cooked dish, it’s important to get a very good quality olive oil)
  • Juice of 10 lemons
  • 1 Tbsp cinnamon (Jenn’s Note: the subtle hint of cinnamon really makes this dish!)
  • ¼ tsp minced garlic (or to taste)
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Soak the bulgur in cold water; set aside. While the bulgur soaks, prep the remaining ingredients and mix together in a large bowl – adjust the seasonings to taste. (Jenn’s Note: I started off by adding about 1/3 of the lemon juice and gradually added more until the flavor was to my liking). Drain the bulgur and add to the rest of the ingredients; mix together well. Refrigerate for 3-4 hours before serving.

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