When I was younger my mom made chicken cacciatore every few months. I always liked the meal. She served it HOT straight from the oven in metal dishes. I made this version of cacciatore for a 30 min dinner. Instead of chickpeas you could substitute sauteéd chicken, tofu or tempeh. Serve with pasta to make a complete meal.

]]> http://www.cooksimple.com/chickpea-cacciatore/feed 0 http://www.cooksimple.com/smoked-salmon-pasta http://www.cooksimple.com/smoked-salmon-pasta#comments Mon, 29 Aug 2011 11:30:40 +0000 carrie http://www.cooksimple.com/?p=1226

I’ve been trying to build up my collection of easy, weeknight recipes. It seems most of my recipes take an hour when you count prep + cooking time. I usually don’t have that type of motivation or time on weeknights thus I’ve been trying to figure out what I can make in 15 min to 30 min. I’m also on the lookout for make ahead recipes that I can make Sunday & eat through the week. Send any ideas my way! This is an easy recipe for pasta that can be adapted to whatever cheeses & vegetables you have on hand. You could even replace the smoked salmon with canned salmon or tuna. Lemon is key, however, so don’t leave that out!

]]> http://www.cooksimple.com/smoked-salmon-pasta/feed 1 http://www.cooksimple.com/lentils-with-chicory http://www.cooksimple.com/lentils-with-chicory#comments Tue, 07 Jul 2009 17:18:53 +0000 laurel http://www.cooksimple.com/?p=420 I had chicory/escarole (I can’t tell the difference) twice so far in my farm share and neither time had I found a recipe that was anything above barely tolerable. Bitter greens are always easier to cook with if you blanch them first, but I always feel like I’m losing all the nutrients, and hence, the reason you’d eat greens in the first place. I was about to give up all hope and just turn to the Southern style of greens which consists of cooking with bacon, ham, or other pork parts. However, I was reading Wally Lamb’s I Know This Much is True and was inspired.  In it, a character talks about eating lentils and escarole as prepared back in the old country (Sicily). I thought, “I love Italian; I bet this will work.” Of course, there was no recipe in the book, so I had to make it up, to what I think is a pretty tasty concoction.

Ingredients

• 1/2 C French lentils
• 4 C Free range chicken stock
• 4 T olive oil
• 1/4 C chopped onions
• 1/2 C chopped carrots
• 2 stalks celery, chopped
• 2 C white wine
• 1 bunch chicory/escarole
• Salt and pepper
• 2 C cooked small pasta (I used orecchiette, but any small pasta would do)
• Grated Italian cheese for garnish (Parmesan, Asiago, etc.)

Directions

In a large frying pan over high heat, warm up some olive oil. Add the onions, celery, and half the carrots. Cook till the onions start to turn translucent. Add half the chicken broth, half the white wine, and all of the lentils. Stir and reduce the heat to medium. Add salt and pepper to taste. This will need to cook till the lentils are tender, which will take anywhere from 30-45 minutes depending on the bean. Let it simmer uncovered adding water if the liquid runs out.

Meanwhile, in another large pan over high heat, heat the rest of the olive oil. Saute the carrots for a few minutes. Then add the chicory and saute for another minute. Salt the greens with a few shakes of the salt shaker. Then add the rest of the chicken broth and white wine to the pan. Turn the heat down to medium-low and allow to simmer until the greens are wilted and tender. This takes about 20-30 minutes. At 20 minutes test the greens. If they still taste bitter, let them cook some more. Add more salt and pepper to taste.

When both the lentils and the greens are done, mix them together. In this way, you’re using the liquid that has many of the healthy nutrients from cooking down the greens. There should still be a little bit of liquid, but not a lot – it should be just a little bit saucy. Mix in the cooked pasta. Serve with a healthy helping of grated cheese.

Ingredients

• Plain potato gnocchi (frozen, fresh, or homemade)
• 8 large tomatoes, blanched, peeled, deseeded, and crushed (for this recipe 2 tomatoes per person is a good rule of thumb, everything can scale to that)
• 2 lemons
• 3 T olive oil
• 4 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 t salt (more or less to taste)
• 3 T butter
• 10 large basil leaves, sliced
• Fresh ground pepper

Directions

In a large sauce pan over medium high heat, saute garlic in olive oil for about 30 seconds, careful not to burn the garlic. Add the tomatoes. Fresh tomatoes are pretty crucial to this. Canned tomatoes are a little too sweet and salty. Plus, it’s really fun to squish the tomatoes with your hands into the sauce pan.

Add salt and pepper to taste and mix well. Cook uncovered until to a consistency that you like. I typically just let it cook down while the gnocchi is cooking.

Place the gnocchi in deep bowls. Add the butter and lemon to the sauce and mix well. Spoon over the gnocchi and garnish with basil. Serve with a spoon or a big loaf of bread.

1. Practice, practice, practice. You likely won’t get it right the first time you do it. But somewhere between the 5th and 10th time you make it, you’ll start to get a feel for the way the dough should be.
2. Do not overcook. When the little pillows pop to the surface, get them out of the water or they will turn into mashed potato soup.

I’ve made a couple different varieties, but will start with the recipe for regular gnocchi and give variations in the notes.

Ingredients

• 4 dry white potatoes, like russet (this is pretty crucial, if you use something like  a new potato or yellow potato they will be too wet and they flavor will overwhelm the recipe)
• 2 or 3 eggs
• 1/2 C or so of semolina flour
• 1 C or so of regular flour
• 1/4 t of salt

Directions

Bake or steam the potatoes. When they’ve cooled to the touch, remove the skins and mash in a large bowl. Get all the lumps out and if you’re a perfectionist, push the potatoes through a ricer. Wait till the potatoes are just warm to start making the gnocchi (if you want to make this a two day process, put the mashed potatoes in the fridge).

To the potatoes, add the flours and salt. Make a well and crack the eggs into it. Scramble them and gradually start to incorporate the flour and potatoes. Then toss the fork aside, and combine the ingredients with your hands till mixed. Turn the dough onto a floured, wooden cutting board. Wash the gook off your hands and flour them.  Knead, adding flour as necessary to prevent from sticking to your hands or the cutting board. This is one of those places where you’re going to have to figure out what the right consistency is by trial and error. I typcially knead for about 5-7 minutes, but many recipes say to go as long as 8-10.

Cut the dough into eighths. Take one and roll out like a snake. I like to make mine about 2cm in diameter (Paul says it’s about the same diameter of a rolling pin handle). Don’t roll it too narrow or they won’t be pillowy.

Flour your knife and cut the rolled out dough into 2cm pieces. Then is the fun part! I didn’t get how to do this for the longest time, so I’m providing step by step pictures of how to do this.

1. Press one of the pieces against the tines of a floured fork. (Most will tell you to use the back, but obviously the front works, too.)
2. Push the dough towards the tip of the tines.
3. The dough will start to pull up from the fork, so just grab the bottom of it and pull it in on itself towards the tip of the times.
4. Roll it off the tip of the fork and place on a floured surface. Repeat about 100 times.

Once you’ve got them all rolled and forked you can either cook immediately or freeze. To cook, drop into boiling water, stirring occassionally until they float to the surface. If you want to freeze them, put them on a floured cookie sheet in the freezer. Once they’re frozen, transfer them into a container.

I prefer gnocchi with some sort of saucy, sauce (I’m not a huge fan of it with pesto). I also really like sweet potato gnocchi. For that, substitute sweet potatoes for the regular potatoes and add a T or so of sugar and a t or so of nutmeg.