Miso-Glazed Brussels Sprouts

Oh man, I love Brussels sprouts. Even as a child, they were one of my favorite vegetables. My mom used to get the frozen ones that comes packed in a butter sauce, and eventually switched to growing them in her large backyard garden. I had never seen anything like the giant stalks with the little sprouts popping out all over them.

Now they’re super trendy on restaurant menus in Austin. I’ve been enjoying them at East Side King (at the Liberty), and at Uchiko for quite a while, just to mention two places. And their preparations are much more piquant than the simple roasted-with-butter one I usually make at home.

Today, I tried something new, a piquant Brussels sprouts recipe of my own. With a bunch of ingredients I had on hand, I whipped up a quick sauce that I glazed the panfried sprouts with.

Holy cow, they were good. The sharp sauce was a great complement to the strong flavor of the vegetable. The Brussels sprouts came through all earthy and sweet, and the sweet-sour-salty-spicy glaze matched it perfectly.

 Miso-Glazed Brussels Sprouts

2 teaspoons white miso (this is really mild)

1 Tablespoon soy sauce

1 T. brown sugar

¼ teaspoon red chili flakes

Juice of half a lemon

1 Tablespoon sunflower or safflower oil

1 pint Brussels sprouts, ends trimmed, halved

Whisk together the miso, soy sauce, brown sugar, chili flakes, and lemon juice. Set aside.

Heat the oil in a frying pan over medium-high heat. Add the Brussels sprouts. Try to get them cut-side down, to help maximize the browning of the cut inner leaves. After about 3 minutes, flip one over and check for browning. If it’s well browned, from the center to the outer edges, stir and keep frying for another 5 minutes, stirring occasionally until they’re just beginning to get tender. If it’s not yet browned all the way across the cut side of the sprouts, keep cooking for another minutes before beginning to stir.

Turn the heat off and pour the miso mixture over the Brussels sprouts. Stir to coat and serve.

Carrot Tarragon Soup

This weekend's downtown farmers market was small. All the venders lined just one street, and I was a little worried there wouldn't be much to be found.

I was glad to be wrong. There were plenty of folks with fresh fruit and veggies. I got a beautiful bunch of carrots from Bar W Farm, and couldn't wait to use them.

Coconut, to me, is one of those foods that can make almost anything delicious. The creamy, tropical flavor is one of my favorites. And I thought it'd go really well with the sweet, juicy carrots.

Lick Ice Creams, in South Austin, has a carrot-tarragon flavor that I adore. It's sweet and a little herbal, and really nice and creamy. That inspired me to try tarragon in my soup.

Though it used only a handful of ingredients, the soup was a success. It was earthy and creamy, with the delicate anise flavor from the tarragon shining through. Next time, I think I may try orange or tangerine juice in place of the lemon, just to switch things up.

Carrot Tarragon Soup

1 can coconut milk (the full-fat stuff)

2 Tablespoons roughly chopped tarragon, divided

1 Tablespoon sunflower or safflower oil

1 pound carrots

2 cups vegetable stock

Juice and zest of half a lemon

Salt, to taste 

In a small pot, combine the coconut milk with 1 tablespoon of the tarragon. Cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, until it begins to simmer. Turn the heat to very low and continue cooking, stirring occasionally, for 15 minutes. Turn the heat off and let the tarragon steep in the milk.

Meanwhile, chop the carrots in bite-size pieces. (This is just to increase the surface area of the carrots. They'll be pureed at the end, so don't worry about them being attractive.) In a large saucepan, heat the oil over high heat. Add the carrots and a pinch of salt and cook until they're beginning to brown, about 10 minutes. 

Add the vegetable stock to the carrots, and simmer until the carrots are tender, about 10 minutes. Pour in the coconut milk, add the remaining tarragon, and stir to combine. Turn off the heat and puree the soup with an immersion blender. Stir in the lemon juice and zest and serve.

Fried Tofu

 

We eat a lot of tofu in this house. I'm a big fan of the stuff, cooked or uncooked, and I love the texture that frying imparts to tofu.

But I have an aversion to deep-frying, for a few reasons:

1. Deep-frying is scary. Hot oil can burn skin pretty easily, and it can splatter and splutter everywhere, making a mess.
2. It's expensive. We try to cook with good oils, and it feels wasteful to use quarts of oil to cook one dish. 
3. If the temperature's not right, your food can get greasy. Who wants that?

So we panfry. Panfrying also gives the tofu a nicely chewy exterior, and it uses much less oil than deep-frying does. It can still splutter, especially if the tofu goes into the pan wet, but it's not too bad.

Fried Tofu
1 tablespoon sunflower or safflower oil
1 block extra-firm tofu, chopped however you want it in your finished dish

Heat the oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add the tofu to the pan in a single layer and cook, without stirring, for a few minutes, until the underside turns golden brown. Stir with a heatproof spatula and cook some  more, stirring occasionally, until the cubes are mostly browned on all sides. This can take about 10 minutes. Sometimes a side or two of the tofu doesn't get browned, but it's not really a big deal.

Serve with any sauce, or add to a dish like a stir-fry or stew.

Oven-Roasted Broccoli

 

We watched an old episode of Good Eats the other day. The show focused on broccoli, one of my favorite vegetables.

Broccoli season has arrived in Austin, and I got a huge two-pound crown from Harvest Time Farm Stand at the farmers market on Saturday morning.

Alton Brown's recipe for  Oven Roasted Broccoli looked wonderful. I roast broccoli a lot at home, and we usually eat it dressed with just olive oil, salt, and chili flakes. This recipe has toasted bread crumbs and cheese, making it heartier and good for the cold snap that just came in.

I made the recipe with a few modifications. There was no panko in our pantry, so I made fresh bread crumbs in the food processor and toasted them in the oven. I also added lemon zest and juice to the finished recipe. Then each bowl got topped with a fried egg and a few roasted tomatoes.

It turned out really well. The broccoli was still a bit crunchy, and the bread crumbs and cheese gave it a deep nutty flavor. The original recipe calls for either Cheddar or Parmesan. I used Cheddar, but I think I'll try Parmesan next time. The Cheddar, while delicious, didn't get distributed evenly in the broccoli, gathering in chunks. Don't get me wrong; the clumps were salty, crunchy, and delicious. But I think the Parmesan may coat the broccoli more evenly.

Fall-Time Escabeche

I love all kinds of pickled vegetables. And with all the great produce we get in Austin, I find myself making pickles pretty regularly.

Growing up, I ate a lot of Mexican food at a little neighborhood taqueria in Chicago. The place, called La Fiesta, is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week (and has been for as long as I can remember).

When you sit down there, nice ladies bring out a basket of chips with a bowl of salsa and a bowl of escabeche, a spicy and sour jalapeno and carrot pickle. A few other places in the neighborhood put in other vegetables, like cauliflower, but I always chose La Fiesta because of their spicier version, as well as their giant burritos (which NEVER have rice in them).

And in Austin, this is the season when carrots and jalapenos are ripe at the same time. And because cauliflower and onions are also in season here, I put those in too.

First, I chopped all the vegetables up. I could only get tiny carrots at the market, but they were sweet and tender.

 

Then I sauteed them in a little bit of olive oil. I got a couple of jars together and put a few peppercorns, a few coriander seeds, and a little bit of dried oregano in each one. (Normally, I'd add a bay leaf or two to each jar, but I was out.)

I made a brine with water, vinegar, and salt and heated it to dissolve the salt. Then I packed the veggies into the jars, covered them with the brine, and slapped a couple of lids on them. When they were cool, I stuck them in the fridge, where they'd start curing.

 

I'll find out in a couple of days how it went. The hardest part is waiting. For the flavors to really come together, it takes at least a few days, but really, it's better after a week or so. It's got to be refrigerated, since the jars are unprocessed, but they seem to keep for a few months. I have a jar in the fridge from earlier in the season (sans cauliflower), and it's really delicious.

Escabeche
This is more of a guideline. You can use whatever vegetables are available, and flavor the brine with different spices. But for me, it always has to have at least carrots and jalapenos.

4 cups bite-size vegetables 
3 to 4 jalapenos, sliced into rings
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 cup water
1 cup vinegar (I used mostly cider vinegar, with a little bit of white vinegar.)
1 heaping teaspoon kosher salt
2 bay leaves
1/2 teaspoon peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon coriander seeds
1 teaspoon oregano

Saute the veggies and jalapenos in the olive until just beginning to become tender, about 5 minutes. Meanwhile, heat the water, vinegar, and salt, stirring until the salt dissolves.

Divide the bay leaves, peppercorns, coriander seeds, and oregano between 2 pint-size jars. Pack the vegetables into the jars and pour the brine over. Cover the jars with lids and allow to cool to room temperature. Let it sit in the fridge for at least a few days before eating. They should last a few months, but they usually get eaten much quicker.

Roasted Baby Eggplant

Cute little things.

Eggplant is one of my favorite vegetables. That said, eggplant season is so long in Austin that I often get tired of them by the fall.

But when I saw these sweet baby eggplants at the farmers market, I had to try them.

Roasting is always a good option when I prepare eggplant. It's super simple and it brings out the natural succulence of the eggplant, making it sweet and juicy.

      

Here's how I made them:
1. Cut the eggplants in half lengthwise.
2. Toss them in a big bowl with salt, pepper, and olive oil.
3. Bake them at 375 for about 30 minutes.
4. Eat with your fingers. (It's hard not to, really.)