Green Zebra

Meatless Monday Catch-Up

September 20, 2010

Meatless Mondays 28 – 38.

I know you all just think I fell off the Meatless Monday wagon. That I am too ashamed to even admit it.

But you are wrong.

We’re still doing Meatless Monday. I just haven’t been writing about it. There are several reasons why:

They have been lame.
They have been lame.
And, they have been lame.

Remember when I said I wanted to do no repeaters?

Fail.

Remember when I said having plain noodles or rice was a cop-out and I wouldn’t do it?

I’m a hypocrite.

Remember when I said we’d — all of us — be eating Meatless Monday together, even if it wasn’t on a Monday?

I was on drugs.

But I’m a stubborn one. I’m not giving up. Just yesterday, I was busy stewing up a Meatless Monday enchilada recipe for dinner to be made with my freshly made green tomato sauce.

This isn’t tomato sauce made with unripe, green tomatoes.

Rather, it is made with the variety of tomato (Green Zebra and Green Grape in this instance) that is green when it is ripe:

A delicious, delicious variety. Probably one of my favorites.

And one that should never, ever be made into tomato sauce.

And yet I did, because what the hell else am I going to do with two buckets full of them? They’ll rot before we can eat them with fresh mozzarella. Not to mention that if I ate that much mozzarella, I would start to look like a log of the stuff myself.

What to make with green tomato sauce, what to make with green tomato sauce…

Green enchiladas! Yes! (I mean, that would look OK, right? Sort of like salsa verde??)

What to add, what to add…

Those extra frozen red beans from the batch I made in June!

And it was all downhill from there. The red beans had big chunks of chorizo that I had forgotten about, wrecking my Meatless Monday plans (yeah, I know it was Sunday, just go with me here). The addition made the sauce a sick orangish color that looked like vomit. So I figured, what the heck, I’ll add some of these chicken legs… The very legs that had been holding up one of my roosters up about three hours before.

And I sat there stirring that ungodly brew, sort of crying about those stupid roosters and thinking of becoming a full-time vegetarian.

Seriously. There is nothing like butchering your own meat to push you over the edge.

Wait. That isn’t accurate. I’m sounding way too cool. You are probably thinking, “Wow. She killed them herself?” No, no, no. I’m a ninny. I always think I can do it, but I actually can’t. It’s happened several times out here. Me thinking I can kill any number of varmints. But I never can.

I do hunt upland birds, but I think I can do that because there is always the chance I will miss them. A good chance. It’s certainly never a sure thing.

Going into the coop, where I have fussed and carried on to keep the chickens safe and not afraid of me. To go in grab them and kill them? Nope. Sorry. No can do.

That’s what dads are for.

My dad.

It was the nicest thing he’s ever done for me. I know it was hard for him because he babies my chickens even more than me. He offered to help since he had the time. I knew he didn’t really want to do it and yet I let him do the whole dang thing. Dave was finally obligated to help him once he realized it was really happening. He didn’t want to look like a ninny, either. But the truth is, no one really wanted to do the deed, Dave included.

And I hid in the kitchen wringing my hands.

What a weenie.

I did do a brave thing later on. I actually cooked a couple of the legs.

And it made me sad. I’m not going vegetarian, but it does seriously make you consider every bite.

Every dang bite of every morsel of chicken. You gettin’ my drift? Chewing chicken has never been so hard…

So, for Meatless Monday tonight I had this:

It might have been the best one ever: Blue cheese on triscuts with red wine. Just me and my blue cheese with a book and some wine.

Meatless Monday suddenly took a turn for the better.

Will the Real First-Tomato-of-the-Season Please Stand Up

August 2, 2010

I feel like a loser. July 23rd and my first tomato of the season.

Maybe that’s not so bad. I think I was waiting into August one year… But who really knows for sure. I’d share my “garden journal” with you, but I’m too lazy to scan it. Suffice to say, it is hardly conclusive. It contains things like:

First mosquito bite of the season 4/17
5/03: Cold wet and windy
Notes from ’04: Chickens ate and pecked everything

And other profound and critical bits of information.

This year, if you remember, I got my plants again from a local grower. They were not quite as stunning as in year’s past, but were every bit as intriguing: Blackcherry, Roman Candle, Green Grape, Potato Leaf, Green Zebra (old standby), Jubiliee, Greensilver, and… if I didn’t plant a Brandywine, I will be ticked off! Did I not plant a Brandywine??!

July 26th (the day I am writing this) is hardly the time to realize I forgot to plant my favorite tomato. Let’s table that discussion for now.

I finally picked a red tomato. It was the Blackcherry, which isn’t a CHERRY tomato at all:

I guess it’s hard to tell the size of these. They fit into the palm of your hand — exactly the size of a Grade A Extra Large Egg. And very pretty.

I’m excited for these to ripen, too. They’re called Roman Candle

I’m very vexed by this one, called Green Silver:

It’s all flopped over and too heavy for itself. Stunted, floppy, lame. Plus, an unripe tomato fell off it and rotted already. Bad Juju.

In general, I’m not too happy with the tomatoes this year. For all the hot weather we’ve had, it seems to me they should be bigger and more laden with fruit.

And, I’m not surprised at all to find the beginning of blight, with all the rain we’ve gotten. Inches and inches and inches of rain. Rain splatters the leaves with the dirt and causes leaf disease. From my perspective, life is too short to go through all the steps necessary to prevent blight. Believe me, I’ve tried.

You can remove the affected stems, but — trust me — it won’t stop the spread. It might slow it, but it won’t stop it. Some varieties are more susceptible. I don’t use chemicals, so I just live with it. Embrace the blight, I say. And leave it at that.

I am looking forward to gorging myself on tomatoes. Tomatoes with basil. Tomatoes with basil and fresh mozzarella. Tomatoes with basil and fresh mozzarella and avocado. Tomatoes with basil and fresh mozzarella and avocado and olive oil. Notice the increase in fat with each sentence? Only the last one reaches the true epiphany.

Feed me that (with balsamic vinegar, of course) and I will die happy.

Throw-and-Go Green Chile Posole

November 25, 2009

Great for Turkey Leftovers!

Disclaimer: This was throw and go for me.

Remember, I am the one with all the psycho frozen accouterments in her freezer. But…

But.

If you follow my psycho ways, unfolding in snippets on this site, you too can have this ridiculously amazing posole made for dinner in about 20 minutes.

Another Disclaimer: I like to geek-out in my approach to many things in the cooking world. I eschew (it’s a big vocab day, people) casseroles and church cookbooks that use gross canned ingredients.

Actually, I don’t.

I just think I do.

It’s hard to explain.

I’ll try.

I’m a snob. But see, even though I’m a snob, I still like when other people make the kind of food I don’t like to make. I love it, in fact. Rarely, do I stick my nose up at anything (except beets). But for some reason, I can’t bring myself to use recipes that use cream of chicken soup, lipton onion soup mix, etc.

As I write this, it’s sort of coming clear to me (Really, who needs therapy when you can write and solve your own problems?): It’s the martyr thing! Everyone knows I’m a martyr! That must be it. Even though I like the dishes made with these maligned ingredients, I feel as though I can’t use them. Why? Because it is too easy! I have to work in order for it to be worthy.

That’s really stupid, isn’t it?

Anyway. I digress.

My point, is that I have concocted a way to make dinner fast and still find a way to be smug about it. How great is that?

I did use one secret canned ingredient in this concoction of mine because I had no other choice. (Driving to the grocery store is an automatic “then I’m not making that tonight”.) Of course, the next time I make this, I will feel the need to find the ingredient in its natural state and do it the ‘right’ way. Only then will I be confident to say ‘it isn’t worth the work’ and feel just fine about this super easy way to make it.

Remember the Barbecued Pulled Pork from summer? And the fact that I really prefer the pork without the BBQ sauce? And that I always sneak some out and freeze it? Provided Lola doesn’t get to it first and eat half of it? (That really happened, by the way). Well, the pork I used for this recipe, was in fact, the pork from the pulled pork I made and posted during the summer. Anyway, you use about a pound or two of pulled pork. Whatever you happen to have.

Next time I make this, the plan is to use leftover dark turkey meat. I bet it will be as good, if not better! If you try it first, let me know!

I grabbed about two precious cups of frozen chopped onion and sautéed that in Garlic Confit oil with about three cloves of Garlic Confit for a few minutes.

Then I added 8 cups (because that was the amount I had in the frozen bag, which, in hind sight, was too much) of frozen chicken stock made from — once again — garbage. But I haven’t photographed that process yet, so it will be a post for another time.

Because I wanted this be green (the color), and because I’m still trying to figure out how to use all those whole frozen Green Zebra and Aunt Ruby German Giant green variety tomatoes (They really make for a nasty color sauce, or salsa.), I thought, “Aha! I’ll grate some frozen green tomatoes into the broth. Once again, I realize it is only me who happens to have frozen green tomatoes at the ready. But really. You can use fresh red, or canned. I used a microplane grater and grated about 3 small tomatoes.

I added two cans of hominy. Yes, this was to be a mother-load batch of posole, due to that damn ridiculously large amount of chicken stock.

I added about a cup of chopped frozen peppers. (Hot green ones) I just realized I never posted my chopped and frozen pepper process? Duh. It’s the exact same process that I use for onions. And just as handy.

I toasted about 3 tablespoons each of coriander seed and cumin.

Then I ground that up in my mortar and pestle and threw that into the pot.

But here was the problem: it turns out that green chile is actually a type of pepper. That is to say, jalapenos or Thai hot peppers just won’t do. At least, that’s what I learned when I researched it. I never knew that! So I was stumped. Lord knows I wasn’t about to get in the car and go to the store to buy some. So what could I use, what could I use… something green…

La Victoria Green Sauce? The one and only thing I put on top of my signature tacos? … no. Too thick. And the ingredients list green tomato as the first ingredient. No ‘green chile’ in sight…

Should I just give in and roast some poblano or pasilla dried chili?

No, dammit. I want a green posole! Like the one at the top of Vail mountain that I pay $8 a bowl for.

So I dug around in my pantry and came up with this:

Green Chile Enchilada sauce. I don’t even know where I got it or how old it was. And I poured it in.

Wa-la! A few grindings of pepper. A sprinkling of salt to taste… Simmer for another few minutes…

Then I fried up some corn tortilla strips, topped each bowl with pepitas (fancy name for shelled pumpkin seeds) and a big handful of crumbled Cotija Mexican cheese. And in my bowl, went a big dollop of cottage cheese. I know it sounds gross, but it’s like a mild sour cream with a lot less fat. It’s really good!

Start to finish: 20 minutes.

And of course, you don’t need to get this stuff from your freezer. You can just go out and buy it and use it fresh and chop what you need. But once I was almost done throwing this together on the fly in just minutes, I realized it was this poster-child recipe for all the stuff I’ve made and frozen over the past months. And so fast!

…Well for me anyway.

Nah nah nah nah boo boo.