pumpkin seeds

If you carved a pumpkin this week, then you had a bunch of pumpkin seeds laying around afterward. I've always loved roasting them for a post-carving snack.

I wanted to say a little more than "spread on tray and put in oven" for this post, so I turned to Wikipedia for some pumpkin seed info. Pumpkin seeds are a good source of stuff that's good for us: iron, zinc, essential fatty acids, potassium, and magnesium. There's also new research showing that they are high in tryptophan. So when you're feeling jittery from eating all that trick-or-treating loot, down a handful of pumpkin seeds to help you relax.

There are various "favorite" ways for preparing pumpkin seeds. I separated mine from the pulp and rinsed them in a colander. Then I forgot about them and left them to dry overnight in the sink. The next morning I spread them on a foil-lined baking sheet and lightly salted them. I baked them at 350 for about 15 minutes. They were crispy and light brown on the outside and just a little chewy on the inside.

First I ate them by the handful while they were still warm from the oven. Later in the day I mixed some with sweetened dried cranberries for a sweet and salty snack. Then I topped a green salad with the last of them.

Why do I only do this once or twice a year? I only roast them when I've cut up a pumpkin for some reason. It's just not the same to buy them from the store. I like to get my hands in the pumpkin guts.


This is my entry for Weekend Herb Blogging. This is a weekly event that collects recipes for herbs and vegetables, sponsored by Kalyn's Kitchen. This week it's being hosted by Kalyn herself, so head over on Monday to check out the weekly recap of recipes. Kalyn has begun the countdown to Thanksgiving... speaking of tryptophan.

spring rolls

My mom's in town for a week, so I had a helper for my first attempt at making spring rolls. We are having warm sunny weather during the days, so cool salad-type lunches are in order.

You can buy spring roll wrappers in the Asian foods aisle of most major grocery stores. I also bought stick noodles for the filling and Thai Kitchen peanut satay sauce for dipping. (Thai Kitchen labels their gluten-free products clearly.)

First we prepared all the fillings. We cooked the noodles so they'd have a few minutes to cool and get sticky while we got the other fillings ready. We had lettuce, sunflower sprouts, carrots (purchased pre-sliced for ease), mango, yellow pepper, and some tiny shrimp for my mom. You can pretty much take any fruits or veggies out of the crisper drawer and slice them up. It's a good way to clean out small amounts of something before it goes bad. (I was hoping to add some mint and cilantro, but they expired. It's the risk you take when dealing with fresh food sometimes.)

We decided to make one spring roll at a time, because it takes up a lot of counterspace, more than I really have in my kitchen. I filled a square glass baking dish with warm water and submerged my spring roll wrapper for about 20 seconds. Then I placed it on a clean, damp tea towel (which I had previously placed over the cutting board I was using as the wrapping work station). I pulled up the edges of the towel and blotted the wrapper until it was slightly sticky. Then I put my fillings in.

It's best to keep the fillings as log-shaped as possible, and don't let them get too close to the edges.

Once the fillings are in place, bring up the bottom of the wrapper, trying to keep the fillings as tight as possible before letting the wrapper seal with the top part. Fold in the left and right edges, then roll up tight. You'll find the wrappers can take quite a bit of rolling abuse, as long as you don't try to unseal and unroll them.

Our first ones were sort of loose and fillings spilled out on the plates when we sliced them in two. Our second ones were much tighter. You really can pack a lot in them.



These can also be deep-fried. I haven't tried that yet, but looking forward to giving it a whirl!

It's fun to make these, and I bet it's a good project for kids, but it's a lot of work for basically a salad. I'm sure I'll get faster the more I make them.


This is my entry for Weekend Herb Blogging. This is a weekly event that collects recipes for herbs and vegetables, sponsored by Kalyn's Kitchen. This week it's being hosted by The Well-Seasoned Cook, so head over there on Monday to check out the weekly recap of recipes.

valencia oranges with pomegranate vinaigrette

I've had very little experience with pomegranates other than enjoying the Persephone myth. I think that until I moved to California (at the age of 25) I assumed they were some sort of exotic Ancient Greek food that wasn't even around anymore. (We just didn't have pomegranates in Rhode Island.) But they've become all the rage recently because of their healthy juice. I tried it once, a couple years ago, and wasn't that impressed. When I saw that pomegranates were coming in season I decided to give them another chance. I'm supposed to be trying new things--or revisiting and retrying old things.

I got 2 pomegranates in my Planet Organics order this week and they've been sitting on the counter for the last few, days waiting for me to decide their fate. I browsed through some books and the Melissa's website. Finally I settled on juicing them for a syrup. I had grandiose ideas of making buckwheat pancakes with pomegranate syrup one morning. Yeah, that didn't happen. I drink coffee and eat a banana. I don't make breakfast.

Per the directions in Melissa's Great Book of Produce, I rolled the pomegranates on the hard countertop, listening for the popping juice sacs. Then I tried to make a little slit in the first one. Juice spurted out all over. I managed to get most of it into the dish. I squeezed and squeezed, and juice was dribbling out. So I made the slit bigger. More juice. But eventually I squeezed the poor thing to death and it ripped apart in my hands. Heh, seeds. I nibbled on a few. The ones that still had red stuff around them were sweet, like little candies. Since some seeds fell in my juice, and I didn't feel like straining or scooping them out, and the pomegranite didn't yield as much juice as I thought it would, I changed my mind to making a vinaigrette. I've made a raspberry vinaigrette for citrus salad before and I had some citrus on hand, so it was a perfect new plan. The seeds would be a nice little crunch.

The skin of the second pomegranate started to tear as I was rolling it on the countertop so I had to quit doing that and try to squeeze out as much juice as possible, before all the juice sacs were actually broken. So, not as much juice, but more sweet seeds.

After juicing pomegranates, your kitchen will look sort of like a crime scene.

I whisked the juice with some champagne vinegar and olive oil. It turns out the only citrus I had were valencia oranges. (I usually like to make a citrus salad a little further into the winter, with a mix of blood oranges, tangerines, ruby red grapefruits, ie, more of a variety.) I sliced the peels off, then separated each segment.

I had planned to have this for dessert, but I changed my mind and ate it as a snack before I started cooking dinner. It was so sweet and tasty.

I saved the orange peels and later in the evening, after I was done making and eating dinner, I simmered them on the stovetop with a cinnamon stick. Garlic smells great while it's cooking, but afterwards it needs to be eliminated. Orange and cinnamon is much more pleasant.


This is my entry for Weekend Herb Blogging. This is a weekly event that collects recipes for herbs and vegetables, sponsored by Kalyn's Kitchen. This week it's being hosted by Cook (almost) Anything, so head over there on Monday to check out the weekly recap of recipes.

(I got a new camera this week. Thanks Mike! Clicking on any photo will take you to the full-size image on flickr.)

eggplant with basil and feta

This recipe is inspired by the Crispy Eggplant with Spicy Tomato-Feta Cheese Sauce in the book Vegetarian Cooking for Today. We've modified it quite a bit for our tastes. It's the recipe that convinced Mike several years ago, after we both read Fast Food Nation, that it's not so bad to cut down on meats. It's also the recipe I wanted to make a couple weeks ago when I had an eggplant but ended up without basil.

eggplant
1 egg
small bit of milk
pototo starch
bread crumbs
tomato sauce
crushed red pepper
fresh basil
feta cheese

I got a medium eggplant from my Planet Organics delivery on Thursday. Peel it and slice it into rectangles, about 1 inch by 2 inch by 3 inch. Let the pieces sit on a plate, salted, for about 10 minutes to draw out some of the moisture. Pat dry with paper towels. Bread the pieces by dipping in potato starch, an egg-milk mixture, and finally bread crumbs. (I use Gluten-Free Pantry Herbed Crumb Coating. I hate the breading process--it seems to take forever. A little trick I have is to ask Mike to do it for me.) Place breaded pieces on a baking sheet and bake at 400 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes, until the outsides are crispy and the scent of herbed bread crumbs is intoxicating.

While the eggplant is baking, heat up some of your favorite store-bought or homemade tomato sauce in a small sauce pan, adding a pinch of crushed red pepper. Wash and pat dry some basil leaves. Sometimes I slice them into attractive little shreds. Get the pack of feta cheese from the fridge. Place eggplant pieces on plate, spoon sauce over them, then top with basil and crumbled feta.

It's a very satisfying meal, combining some of our favorite flavors. It's warm and filling for cool weather, but if you can get good fresh basil you have great summery flavor. And everything is better when it's topped with feta cheese.


This is my first entry for Weekend Herb Blogging. This is a weekly event that collects recipes for herbs and vegetables, sponsored by Kalyn's Kitchen. This week it's being hosted by Once Upon a Tart, so head over there on Monday to check out the weekly recap of recipes.