I am back!  Back to cooking, back to blogging, back to the USA, back to San Francisco!

Steven and I returned from our 10 month German adventure at the beginning of November, and have been doing all the things people do when they return to a place they have missed dearly.  I’ve been visiting with family and friends, eating at my favorite restaurants, shopping at my favorite grocery store, jogging along the waterfront, and of course visiting the farmer’s market.

The first saturday we were back I convinced Steven to go to the Palo Alto farmer’s market with me by offering to stop along the way for oh-so-tasty and impossible-to-find-in-Germany breakfast sandwiches.  Eggs.  Bacon.  Cheese.  Bagel.  One would think this delicious combination would be America’s #1 export!

At the market, colorful, plump winter squash were stacked high on vendors’ tables along with whole stalks of brussels sprouts, baseball-sized pomegranates, and all sorts of pears and apples.  What a bounty!  Always a squash lover, I decided to pick up a sugar pie pumpkin.  It’s one of my favorites since it has a wonderful flavor that’s not too sweet, has a good texture, and is fairly easy to peel and carve.  I also picked up some fresh hot red chiles, cilantro, and torpedo onions since I had this curry in mind.  I love coconut milk based curries, and this somewhat unusual one with pumpkin is no exception.  It’s rich and flavorful, a little sweet, a little spicy, but not too heavy since it is brimming with vegetables.  Served atop brown rice, it’s substantial enough for a meal in itself, though it would also be lovely in a spread with other curries, raitas, noodles, etc.  Squash is in peak season right now too, so it’s a great time to try this.

On a totally different note, thanks for sticking with me while I dropped off the face of the planet during our move! :)  and Happy Thanksgiving!

Spicy Pumpkin and Peanut Curry

1 c. water
1/3 c. chunky peanut butter
zest and juice from 1 lime
1 T. soy sauce
1 T. tomato paste

Olive oil
4 medium red torpedo onions, cut into 1-2 inch chunks (or substitute 2 medium red onions)
1 medium sugar pie pumpkin, peeled, deseeded, and cut into 2-3 inch chunks

2 large handfuls cilantro, chopped, divided
2 fresh red chiles, finely diced
3 large garlic cloves, minced
1 inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and minced

1 400ml can coconut milk
1/4 cup roasted peanuts, chopped, for garnish (optional)

Mix together the water, peanut butter, lime zest and juice, soy sauce, and tomato paste in a bowl and set aside.

Heat the olive oil in a large skillet (14 inch) or a chef’s pan over medium high heat, then add the onions and saute until softened and the edges are beginning to brown, 4-5 minutes.  Add the pumpkin and stir fry for about 4-5 minutes.  Add half the cilantro, chiles, garlic, and garlic, and stir fry for about 2 minutes.  Add the coconut milk and peanut mixture and stir until well mixed.  Loosely cover with tinfoil, reduce heat to medium low, and simmer until the pumpkin is tender and the sauce has thickened, about 15-20 minutes.  Add more water if the sauce becomes too thick, or boil vigorously if the sauce is too thin towards the end.

Serve with rice and garnish with the other half of the cilantro and the chopped peanuts.  Enjoy!
(Note:  This curry goes particularly well with Half Moon Bay Brewing Company’s Pumpkin Harvest Ale!)

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Spicy Split Pea Soup, and Thoughts on Comfort Food

- Spicy Slivered Green Beans with Lime and Cilantro

- Sweet and Spicy Baked Beans

I have been craving some serious American food as of late.   A week ago I had the overwhelming urge to make meatloaf.  Then it was chili.  Then it was deviled eggs.  This past weekend I was dying for pulled pork + coleslaw + eastern north carolina bbq sauce.  Today the craving was shrimp louis salad with thousand island dressing…

Reality check, reality check… no, this isn’t the 1960′s…  I actually *like* Louis salads — shrimp, crab, lobster — let me have it!

In german grocery stores there is something that *vaguely* resembles thousand island dressing called (embarrassingly) “American” dressing.  It has the same pale orange color, but the similarities end there.  When I think of Thousand Island dressing, I think of something tasty but with mixed connotations — perhaps bourgeois, perhaps unsophisticated, but still rich and well flavored.  It should be thick and creamy, a little pickle-y, a bit tomato-y, rich but not overly so, a little spicy, even a little sour…  This “American” dressing in the grocery store just wouldn’t cut it, so I decided to make my own, which was a good decision indeed.

Made with ingredients that are typically on-hand, this is a great dinner for a night when you don’t really feel like cooking.  It helps if you have some hard boiled eggs ready and some already cooked bacon, but by nature, this is am improvised salad.  If you don’t have any bacon on hand and don’t feel like cooking it, then don’t bother.  It’s still good (though of course, everything is better with bacon:) )  Same with the eggs, and with any of the toppings. Make due with what you have — I am sure you won’t be disappointed.

Shrimp Louis with Homemade Thousand Island
Serves 2

Thousand Island Dressing:
1 1/4 c. mayonnaise
1/3 c. chili sauce (something with some sweetness and not *too* spicy)
1/4 c. roasted red pepper, finely chopped
1 large hard-boiled egg, finely chopped
3 T. cornichons (or regular dill pickles), finely chopped
2 T. smooth dijon mustard
2 T. capers, finely chopped
2 T. green onions, finely chopped
salt and pepper
20-40 dashes hot pepper sauce (Tabasco, etc. to taste)

Salad:
8 large leaves romaine lettuce, cut into ribbons, approximately 6 c. total
2-3 T. cilantro, chopped
2/3 lb. cooked, shelled shrimp (about 15-20)
4 cherry tomatoes, halved
1/2 a small persian cucumber, cut into bite sized pieces
10 pimento stuffed green olives
1 hard boiled egg, cut into wedges
6 slices cooked bacon

Mix all the ingredients for the dressing in a bowl. Season to taste.

In a large bowl combine the lettuce and cilantro. Add 4-6 T. of dressing, and toss until well coated. Add more dressing if the salad looks dry.

Divide lettuce mixture on two plates. Artfully arrange shrimp, tomatoes, cucumber, olives, and egg on top of salad. Top with bacon slices. Serve with a small amount of dressing on the side, if desired. Enjoy!

**Note: There will be leftover dressing

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Mint and Parsley Salad with Persian Cucumbers

- Simple Basil Buttermilk Salad Dressing

- Deviled Eggs

Spicy Slivered Green Beans with Lime and Cilantro
Serves 2

1 large handful of young green beans (about 1/3lb), ends trimmed
Olive Oil
3/4 t. red pepper flakes
1/2 T. minced cilantro
juice from 1/2 a lime

Stack the green beans so they are all facing the same direction. Slice the green beans into roughly 1/2 inch slices.

Heat olive oil in a medium skillet over medium high heat. Once the oil is hot, add green beans and saute for about 1 minute. Mix in red pepper flakes. Cover skillet with a tight fitting lid or plate, and cook for an additional 1 minute or so, until beans are bright green. Remove lid and mix in cilantro and lime juice. At this point, the beans will be warm but still crisp. If you like your beans a little softer, cook an additional 1-3 minutes; otherwise, serve right away. Enjoy!

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

This recipe celebrates the art of simple cooking — five ingredients plus a little chopping is all it takes to turn what some might consider a ho-hum vegetable into something unique and delicious.

Green beans a ho-hum vegetable? I can sense your indignation already…. Let me explain: green beans, broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, lettuce — these are the vegetables I remember growing up with… Beets, chard, sorrel, fava beans, squash, nettles, fennel, bok choy, peppers, artichokes, dandelion, avocados — these I didn’t discover until much later in life, basically until I got out on my own and had to do my own grocery shopping. The vegetables that fall into the first category — those that I grew up with — don’t make appearances on my table as often as one might expect; I have come to appreciate the fact that the vegetable kingdom is huge and has so much to offer that I’ve never tasted, and I gravitate towards tastes that are somewhat new to me.

Usually when green beans were served in my home growing up, they were accompanied by crumbled bacon, roquefort, and chopped toasted almonds (SUPER DELICIOUS!), but tonight I wanted something lighter with a bit of a kick. Alongside the green beans I served roasted poblano peppers stuffed with a mixture of slow braised pork, rice, and diced peaches and apricots (fruit and pork is always a lovely combination). Even though it’s only late May, all of the produce for tonight’s dinner — green beans, cilantro, limes, poblano peppers, peaches, and apricots — was purchased at my local farmer’s market. I oddly feel out-of-season eating spicy peppers these days, but perhaps the long Memorial Day weekend will allow me to welcome summer, along with its signature vegetable offerings.

Anyhow, I do hope you give this a try– it literally come together in less than 10 minutes, and is a unique and usual way to serve green beans, both because of the cut and flavor of the beans. In the future I might make a version using adobo sauce and minced garlic, or alternatively with preserved lemon and dill (<– this one’s totally different, I know)… If you have other suggestions for green beans, I’d love to hear them (especially since Steven declared green beans ‘his favorite vegetables’ tonight while we were eating dinner, and because my repertoire could use some expansion at this point…) I also think this would be nice with okra (another favorite vegetable around here), once it’s in season.

Still Hungry?  Try one of these:

- Slivered Dandelion Greens with Chorizo