Cauliflower Puree with Sauteed Zucchini

It's been a while since I've posted, and a lot has happened in the meantime.  We've been pretty busy - Kristin and I have packed up and moved to Wisconsin to start a pair of new jobs.  That's meant a new home, new schedules, and a new kitchen.  As we're settling back into the routine, I'm happy to find more time to think about blogging again.

Kristin and I have few fundamental disagreements when it comes to food.  One thing we just can't see eye to eye on, though, is potatoes.  She - like the rest of the world - loves them.  I - the weird one - hate them.  Since I do most of our cooking, this leaves Kristin tragically craving potatoes.  We may finally have found a good compromise, since this cauliflower puree seems to scratch that itch for her without resulting to the scourge of potatoes.

Here's what you'll need: cauliflower, zucchini, sour cream, some soft melting cheese (I used Neufchatel, and have also used goat cheese here to great effect), a bit of butter, a splash of milk, garlic powder, salt, and pepper.

Feel free to vary the ingredients here to taste - much like potatoes, this puree will take to all sorts of flavors, so add, remove, or adjust seasonings to fit your particular meal.

Start by chopping down the cauliflower.  There's really no need to turn it into pretty florettes - you're going to puree it, after all.  The goal here is just to break it down into manageable pieces with a fair amount of surface area for easy cooking.

Throw the chopping cauliflower into a pot of lightly-salted water, bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 15 minutes or so until the cauliflower is tender, but not mushy.

If you really want to be a purist, you could stick to just some tasty pureed cauliflower, but I decided to top this dish with some chopped, sauteed zucchini to offer some additional flavor and textural contrast.

While the cauliflower is simmering away, dice your zucchini into nice, small pieces.

Saute the diced zucchini with a bit of butter, salt, pepper, and garlic powder.  It should only take a couple of minutes - take it off the heat when the zucchini still has some bite to it, otherwise you'll end up with a much more boring soft-on-soft texture with the finished product.

When the cauliflower is tender, drain it well in a colander.  You don't want watery puree, so drain it really, really well - shake it around, leave it for a minute or two, shake some more, and even consider pressing some water out.

When your cauliflower is well drained, throw it into a blender or large food processor along with a dollop of sour cream, the cheese, and a generous quantity of salt, pepper, and garlic powder.  Don't add any milk yet.

This process could also benefit a great deal from an immersion blender if you have one - if so, combine everything in the pot you used to simmer the cauliflower instead and just take the immersion blender to it.

Once everything is in the blender, give it a whir.  If it's being stubborn, add a splash of milk to help it mix - otherwise, there's no need.  Keep blending until you hit a texture you're happy with - just a few pulses for a thicker texture, or longer for a smoother, thinner texture.  Try a bit and adjust the seasonings to your taste.

Serve hot with plenty of sauteed zucchini on top.

Recipe: Cauliflower Puree with Sauteed Zucchini
Prep Time: 5 Minutes | Cook Time: 20-30 Minutes | Difficulty: Easy | Servings: 6-8

Ingredients

• 2 large heads Cauliflower
• 2 large Zucchini
• 4 oz Neufchatel Cheese
• 2 tbsp Sour Cream
• 2 tbsp Butter
• 1 tbsp Garlic Powder
• Salt and Pepper to taste
• Optional: Milk as needed to blend

Instructions

1. Chop cauliflower down into small pieces.
2. Add cauliflower to a pot of lightly salted water.  Bring to boil, then reduce heat and simmer 15-20 minutes until tender.
3. Finely dice zucchini.
4. Saute zucchini until just tender in a skillet over medium-high heat with butter, salt, pepper, and a dash of garlic powder.
5. When cauliflower is tender, drain well to remove as much water as possible.
6. In a blender or large food processor, combine drained cauliflower, sour cream, neufchatel cheese, salt, pepper, and garlic powder.
7. Blend cauliflower mixture to desired texture, adding milk as needed.
8. Serve cauliflower puree hot topped with sauteed zucchini.

Roasted Garlic-Herb Cheese Bread

Kristin and I faced a puzzle this week.  We knew we wanted some pasta to eat, but none of the ways to jazz up basic spaghetti with marinara seemed all that appealing to us.  We just couldn't figure out how to take the meal from standard to interesting.

Then, it became clear.  Leave the spaghetti alone, and just make something awesome to go with it.  Alongside our simple pasta, I put together some garlic bread made from home-roasted garlic and topped with just a little bit of Mozzarella, Parmesan, and Asiago cheeses.  It was just what we needed.

You don't need terribly much for this bread.  Start with bread, of course - supermarket-made will do, though I look forward to repeating the recipe with my own baguettes when I have a little more time.  The bread will be topped with a compound butter made from salted butter, a bulb or two of garlic, plenty of herbs (I used Herbes de Provence), salt, and pepper.  Over all of that goes some Mozzarella, Parmesan, and Asiago cheese.

What really makes this bread great is roasting the garlic.  You can make perfectly good garlic bread from raw minced garlic or even from garlic powder, of course.  Roasting whole bulbs of garlic really intensifies the flavor and adds some sweetness in place of that raw-garlic bite.  It's fantastic, and so easy.

First, peel as much of the outer, papery layer from the bulbs as you can.  If you miss a bit, it's hardly the end of the world - we'll squeeze individual cloves out from the bulb later, anyhow.

With a sharp knife, cut the top 1/4 inch or so off of the whole bulb (from the pointed tip).  If your bulb was uneven like mine, you'll need to go clove-by-clove after the first slice.  Make sure the actual flesh of each clove is visible from the top.

I've found that the easiest way to cleanly roast garlic is inside of foil, with the foil sitting in the cup of a muffin tin in case it leaks.  With your garlic bulbs safely nestled in foil in the muffin tin, drizzle with a generous amount of olive oil, then some salt and black pepper.  Fold the foil closed over the top of the bulbs, and you're set to go.

Roast your foil-covered garlic bulbs at 400 degrees for 35-40 minutes until the cloves are golden brown and tender.  Be very, very careful checking this - you can burn your fingers very easily.

Let the garlic cool for a good ten minutes, then it's ready to turn into roasted garlic butter.  Add a stick of softened butter, your roasted garlic, a good dash of herbs, and some salt and pepper to the bowl of a food processor.

Whir it up until you've got a nice, smooth compound butter.  If you want to save some of this butter for later, roll it into a log in some parchment paper or plastic wrap and chill it in the fridge.  For our purposes, though, we'll take it straight to the bread.

Drop the oven down to 350 degrees and it should hit the right temperature when the bright is right about ready to go in.

Slice your bread in half lengthwise and spread generously with your garlic butter.

Bake the buttered bread in a 350 degree oven for 7-10 minutes until the buttered top has soaked in and more or less set.  You don't want the bread to be quite done at this point, but it should be close.

Turn the oven up to broil while we cheese the bread.

Sprinkle just a bit of mozzarella cheese over the top of the bread, then grate Asiago and/or Parmesan cheeses over the top of the rest.  Throw it back in the oven under the broiler and watch it carefully - it should be a minute, at the most, before the cheese is well-melted and bubbly and the edges of the bread get dark and crispy.

Slice it up and serve hot - preferably alongside a dish with some good sauce to soak up.

Recipe: Roasted Garlic-Herb Cheese Bread
Prep Time: 15 Minutes | Cook Time: 50 Minutes | Difficulty: Easy | Servings: One Loaf

Ingredients

• 1 loaf French Bread
• 1-2 large bulbs Garlic
• 1 stick Butter, softened
• 2 tbsp Herbes de Provence
• 1/2 cup Mozzarella Cheese
• Grated Parmesan and Asiago cheeses to taste
• Salt and Pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Peel papery outer layer from garlic bulbs and slice off top 1/4 inch of cloves.
3. Line cups of a muffin tin with foil and place garlic bulbs sliced-side up.  Drizzle with olive oil and a sprinkle of salt and pepper.  Close foil over garlic.
4. Roast garlic at 400 degrees for 35-40 minutes until golden-brown and tender.  Let cool 10 minutes and squeeze cloves out from skin.
5. Reduce oven heat to 350 degrees.
6. Combine softened butter, roasted garlic cloves, herbes de provence, salt, and pepper in the bowl of a food processor.  Process until smooth.
7. Slice bread in half lengthwise and cover generously with garlic-butter.  Bake at 350 degrees 7-10 minutes until nearly done, then remove from oven and set oven to broil.
8. Cover garlic bread with a small amount of mozzarella cheese.  Grate Asiago and Parmesan cheese over top to taste.
9. Broil cheese-covered bread 30-60 seconds until cheese is melted and edges are crispy.
10. Serve hot.

Broccoli-Cheese Soup

If you've had it nowhere else, you've probably had Broccoli-Cheese Soup at Panera Bread.  Theirs is pretty tasty, particularly in a bread bowl.  Not that the bread bowl changes the flavor of the soup - it's just an added bonus that you get to devour a broccoli-cheese flavored breadbowl once the soup is gone.  This is quite in keeping with my general philosophy that soup and stews are best eaten with bread as an implement rather than silverware.

As it ends up, it's pretty easy to make broccoli-cheese soup at home, too - and it's quite a lot healthier than Panera's.  Give it a try!

It's a nice, vegetable-heavy cast of characters today.  Broccoli takes the forefront, in a broth of milk, cream, cheese, and chicken broth (vegetable broth or none at all is okay if you're going vegetarian).   Onion, salt, pepper, paprika, and nutmeg add a bit of flavor, and flour thickens things up nicely.

You've got a lot of vegetables to chop.  Start with the onion.

Then the broccoli!  It's hard to tell from the picture, but I contentedly included some stems as well.  The soup will simmer long enough to cook them thoroughly, so don't be afraid of a bit of stem with your florette.

Saute the onions with some butter in a large dutch oven or stock pot.  Use a bit more butter than you strictly need to keep the onions from sticking, as you'll need to give the flour something to mix with in a moment.

After 3-4 minutes of cooking, when the onions are becoming translucent, reduce the heat a bit and add the flour.  Stir for a bit and you'll end up with a truly unpleasant looking mixture.  Fear not.

Once the onions, butter, and flour are combined, it's time to get things simmering.  Add the milk, cream, chicken broth, and broccoli and simmer over medium-low heat for about a half hour.

That half-hour of simmering is the perfect chance to grate your cheese.  Yes, you could buy shredded cheese, but storebought shredded cheese generally comes with an extra helping of chemicals, and is covered in a starchy or pulpy coating to keep it from sticking - we don't need all that extra stuff.

So while everything simmers, bust out the grater and turn a block of cheese...

...into a pile of cheese.

After a half-hour of simmering, the flour from the onions will have thickened things up nicely, and the broccoli should be nice and tender.  Taste a piece (careful, it'll hold the heat like crazy!) to be sure it's at an edible texture - if not, give it another 10 minutes or so.

Once the broccoli is tender enough for your liking, mix the cheese in a bit at a time.

Once that's all mixed through, season to taste.  I like plenty of black pepper, a good amount of salt, some paprika, and just the barest dash of nutmeg.  Yes, nutmeg.  Trust me.

Give it a couple of minutes to make sure everything is melted and the flavors well-married, and it's time to eat!

If you're particularly picky about texture, you can give the finished soup a spin in the blender on puree until it's smoother.  This will result in a more Panera-esque soup, but also results in much smaller chunks of broccoli.  Personally, I just leave it alone and enjoy the rustic texture.

Recipe: Broccoli-Cheese Soup
Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 40 minutes | Difficulty: Easy | Servings: 8-10

Ingredients

• 4 Heads Broccoli, chopped
• 1 large Sweet Onion, diced
• 5 cups Milk
• 1 cup Heavy Cream
• 1/2 cup Chicken Broth
• 1/2 cup Flour
• 1/4 cup Butter
• 12 oz. Grated Cheese (cheddar)
• 1 tbsp Salt
• 1 tbsp Black Pepper
• 2 tsp Smoked Paprika
• 1/2 tsp Nutmeg

Instructions

1. Dice onion and chop broccoli into bite-sized pieces.
2. In a large dutch oven over medium-high heat, saute onions with butter 4-5 minutes.  Reduce heat and add flour, stirring until combined.
3. Add milk, cream, chicken broth, and broccoli.  Simmer over low heat 30 minutes until broccoli is tender.
4. Slowly add grated cheese and seasonings.  Stir until cheese is melted.
5. Optional: Puree to desired texture.
6. Serve hot.

Goat-Cheese Meatballs

Is there anything more comforting than good, traditional Italian food?  Pasta isn't just an easy, standby meal - it can be a treat with just a bit of effort.  I like to fit some protein into my pasta meals, and what better way to do it than with meatballs?  Now there's nothing wrong with a standard, run of the mill meatball - but this week,  I was looking for a way to take things up a notch.  I pawed through the kitchen for something interesting to add, and realized that we had some goat cheese.  Inspiration!

At first, I considered trying to stuff each meatball with a cheesy center, but there wasn't enough goat cheese for that.  Still, it worked fantastically well crumbled up and added right to the mixture.  The whole meal took on that earthy flavor, and most bites were punctuated by a touch of creamy, fluffy cheese.  It was really a nice spin on a meatball, and one that I think I'll make again in the future.

Our meatball ingredients are more or less what you'd expect.  No fancy beef/pork/sausage mixtures here - I just stick to ground beef, mixed with eggs, breadcrumbs, milk, onion, and good Italian seasonings like Thyme, Basil, Oregano, Rosemary, Garlic, and a bit of Coriander.  The goat cheese adds some interest.  And, of course, you'll need some pasta to serve it over and plenty of sauce for simmering.

Meatballs are pleasantly straightforward.  Step one: combine everything but the cheese.  You'll have to dice the onion first, of course, but everything else can be more or less dumped into a large mixing bowl and mashed together.  Use your hands to mix it up well, don't be a chicken.  If it's too wet, add some more breadcrumbs.  If too dry, a bit more milk.

Now crumble up your goat cheese into pieces small enough to distribute well through the meatballs.  I aimed for roughly pea-sized, with some ranging slightly larger and smaller according to the whims of the cheese.

Combine the cheese with the rest of the mixture, again by hand.  Mix gently, as you don't want to pulverize the cheese.  The whole point is to have nice, cheesy bites, so you need those chunks to be relatively intact.

It's time: shape that mixture into some actual meatballs!  You can use an ice-cream scoop if you like, but I prefer to keep going by hand, aiming for 1 1/2 to 2 inches per meatball.  This recipe will make a lot of them.

Now into the sauce!  Most meatball recipes have you fry the meatballs first, but that's really not my preferred method.  They tend to cook unevenly or dry out that way.  Simmered in the sauce, they'll cook evenly and stay moist.  Perhaps best of all, they'll also lend a fantastic meatiness to the sauce itself.

After about 25 or 30 minutes, your meatballs will be cooked and your sauce will be transformed.  Even the jarred sauce that I used for this meal took on a much different texture and a really pleasant heartiness from the meat and cheese simmered into it.

The one real downside of cooking your meatballs in the sauce is that it makes it nigh impossible to finish the pasta itself in a pan with sauce, as is ideal.  This, however, is not the end of the world.  You'll be too busy devouring meatballs to really notice.

And that's it!  Serve hot over your pasta of choice.  Garlic bread would not go amiss as an accompaniment.

Recipe: Goat Cheese Meatballs
Prep Time: 15 Minutes | Cook Time: 30 Minutes | Difficulty: Easy | Servings: 10-12

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 to 2 lbs Ground Beef
• 2 Eggs
• 1 Onion, diced
• 4 oz. Goat Cheese
• 1/2 cup Bread Crumbs (pref. Panko)
• 1/2 cup Milk
• 1 box Pasta
• 1 family-size or 2 large jars Pasta Sauce
• 2 tsp Oregano
• 2 tsp Garlic Powder
• 1 tsp Rosemary
• 1 tsp Basil
• 1 tsp Thyme
• 1/2 tsp Coriander
• Salt and Pepper to taste

Instructions

Simmer pasta sauce in a large pot over medium-low heat.

In a large mixing bowl, combine ground beef, diced onion, milk, breadcrumbs, eggs, and seasonings.  Mix well by hand.

Crumble goat-cheese into pea-sized pieces.  Incorporate gently into beef mixture.

Shape mixture into 1 1/2 to 2 inch balls.  Add to simmering sauce.

Cook meatballs 25-30 minutes in sauce.

Serve hot over pasta.  Top with Parmesan Cheese to taste.