chopped salad, parmesan rosemary biscotti, chai-spiced chocolate ice cream

This week, we made a hefty chopped salad for dinner. I know, a salad for a vegetarian and a mostly vegetarian, right? Lame. But this is a really good salad. The recipe is from the Smitten Kitchen, and instead of salami, we used Italian veggie sausage. The only other changed I'd make in the future is to use half the salt called for in the recipe. 

To go with the salad, I made parmesan rosemary biscotti, from My Name is Yeh. I made these when Drew wasn't home and they were so good that I shamelessly ate two right away.

I also made chai-spiced chocolate ice cream, from Sweet Cream and Sugar Cones, whose authors opened up the Bi-Rite Creamery in San Francisco. Drew and I stopped there on our road trip from California to Wisconsin and loved the place. 

kale salad with pecorino and walnuts

This kale salad with pecorino and walnuts, from Smitten Kitchen, was the last thing I made before I left for a 2 week trip to Shanghai to visit Drew. 

I had just returned from a 10 day trip to Chicago and Minnesota, and after eating anything and everything, I was in need of some detoxing (though I think the cheese and walnuts defeated the purpose here). The salad was super salad and a breeze to put together. I like kale, but usually when I make it, I just saute it and that gets boring, so I'm glad to have another way to eat it. 

pasta with pistachio pesto

The garden, despite the random gopher appearance, is doing pretty well. Along with beans, carrots, collard greens, and red chard, we have beets. Lately, our preferred way of eating beets is in a salad.

Did you know that you can wrap beets up in aluminum foil and roast them in your oven? And that you don't even have to peel them first? Or cut them up? And after they're done, the skins easily slip off. This was news to me, but now I'm a huge fan. I roasted the beets for about 45 minutes at 375 degrees, and after they cooled off, I effortlessly peeled off the skin. I also roasted pearl onions and quartered mushrooms, and Drew and I served them on top of spinach. We've never eaten pearl onions, but Drew was suddenly inspired (by what, I have no idea) to roast them.

Drew and I like to try out new recipes, and the results usually fall into 3 categories: 1) so good we should definitely make it again; 2) good, but not good enough to make again; 3) disappointing. It turns out there is a 4th category: surprisingly good. Last night we made pasta with pistachio pesto, and it turned out a lot better than we expected. Not that we expected the results to be disappointing; we just didn't think this dish was going to be so good. 

The recipe is from Food and Wine, and it's super simple and quick to put together. The pesto is made up of pistachios, garlic, olive oil, and mint, processed in the food processor and then mixed with grated pecorino. Instead of orecchiette, we used trottole. Normally, we eat whole wheat pasta, but sometimes we shake things up a bit and we happened to be at Target, where it is sold (it's a Target brand of pasta). 

Drew and I enjoyed this dish a lot, and we couldn't stop raving about it. With a few bites remaining, Drew declared that he was stuffed and I wasted no time polishing off his leftovers. In my defense, I had run a half marathon earlier in the day, and if there is ever a time to finish Drew's leftovers, it's on a day when I've run 13.1 miles. Make this dish, and you'll understand.