Thursday, January 2, 2014

Crazy 'bout vegetables (or lighten up)

Recipes: Winter veggies with sausage, Homemade sausage


Oh, excess! That's what the mid-winter holidays are all about, isn't it - excessive shopping and gift-giving, excessive card-sending, excessive partying, and, most of all, excessive eating! Some day, some way, we all have to come down from the heights and face reality. We don't feel so good.

Enter January. It's the time for lightening up, for New Year's resolutions, for cleaning the house and cleansing the body. It's time for serious veggies.

When I got home from our Christmas trip to Oregon, the fried food we ate on the long drive home stayed with me. Yes, it had been fresh and well-made. Yes, it was in a good restaurant. Nevertheless, it was deep-fried, and I hardly ever eat fried food. Now I remembered why, and I wanted vegetables. Luckily, our northern California garden had carrots and broccoli and cauliflower ready to harvest. You wouldn't have to have a flourishing winter garden to satisfy this need - you could be just as lucky at a local farmers market, or wherever you find your best, your freshest winter vegetables.

Winter Veggies with Sausage


Here's one way to cook those fresh garden vegetables for a light and healthy meal. You could add a little sausage because your partner, like mine, feels he or she needs some protein. Your early January dinner will be mostly vegetables, though, and cooked in the cleanest, simplest way possible.

The Carrots


Look at those gorgeous carrots, fresh pulled from the soil. How could you do anything with them that wasn't pure?

  • Wash, trim ends, and peel the carrots. Slice them into 1/4 inch-wide discs.
  • Put an inch or two of cold water in a small saucepan with a lid. Add a pinch of sea salt and the sliced carrots, and turn the heat on to medium. Put the lid on slightly ajar.
  • You'll know the carrots are done by testing them with the tip of a paring knife - it should take 10 to 15 minutes. They should feel just barely soft - you don't want to cook them so much they fall apart. When they are done, drain off the water by holding the lid slightly ajar while you tip the water out. Then add a good sprinkling of sea salt and a tablespoon of butter. Put the lid on tightly, and shake the pan to distribute the salt and butter. They're ready to serve.

If the rest of dinner isn't ready yet, you can hold the carrots as is with the lid on tightly. You can even warm them gently, if you want to, when you're ready to serve them.

The Potatoes, Broccoli, and Cauliflower


Steaming is an easy and healthy way to cook vegetables, and I especially like it because you can steam several kinds of vegetables in the same pot - just add them in order based on how long they take to cook. In this case, we'll put the potatoes in first (for this dinner, I started the potatoes before starting the carrots in the above recipe), and when they're nearly done we'll add the broccoli and the cauliflower because they don't take long.

  • Put 3 or 4 inches of water in the bottom of a medium to large pot with a steamer rack and a lid. Turn the heat to medium under the pot and put the lid on to get the water boiling.
  • Wash 2 medium red potatoes and quarter them. I like to leave the skins on, because they taste good and that's where most of the vitamins and minerals live.
  • Put the potatoes on the steamer rack in the pot, and close the lid. You can sprinkle a few grains of sea salt over the potatoes if you wish.
  • Wash one stalk of broccoli and cut the end off, leaving a couple of inches of stalk. Strip the leaves. Cut the stalk off at the base of the florets and peel it. If it is thick, cut it in half or in quarters. Then separate the broccoli florets into small clusters, no more than an inch thick.
  • Wash 1/2 small head of cauliflower, remove the leaves, and cut off the base. Separate the cauliflower florets into small clusters, no more than an inch thick.

Keep testing the potatoes with the tip of a paring knife. When they offer only a little resistance, but are not yet completely soft, add the broccoli and cauliflower pieces to them. Sprinkle with a little sea salt and put the lid back on. Steam for 5 to 8 more minutes. Again, test the stems of the broccoli and cauliflower pieces for tenderness. They should be tender-crisp, i.e. not completely soft.

You can put a pat or two of butter over the vegetables in the pot, and let it melt. When you serve it, you can put more butter on it, or squeeze a fresh lemon over it. It's all good.

The Sausage


Look for really good sausages, and then keep some in the freezer. They add that bit of protein and meaty taste when that's all you need to make your dinner fab. Look for sausages that don't have any kind of filler in them, and you can serve them to your gluten-free friends too. Sausages are great to have on hand.

I like Trader Joe's sweet chicken Italian sausages, and I also buy house-made sausages from my friends at Taylor's Sausage in downtown Oakland. Their rice-based boudin blanc, an award winner as best sausage in the Bay Area, is one of my favorites. You may have a sausage maker in your town too - get to know them.

Use two large or three small sausages for two people. Mix and match kinds if you like. Put an inch of water in a medium frying pan and put the uncooked sausages in it. They can be frozen or not. Bring the water to a slow boil and simmer the sausages, turning them now and then, until they are cooked through.

Either cook the water in the skillet away (if you can watch the skillet carefully) or pour any remaining water out. Add a tablespoon of olive oil and fry the sausages lightly, just to get a bit of color and crust on them.

Cut the sausages into chunks and arrange on your serving plate with the vegetables.

Homemade Sausage


Sausage is easy to make at home, especially patty sausage, and it's a lovely addition to your cooking skills. Imagine homemade sausage for breakfast with eggs, or a steaming bowl of chili with homemade sausage. Yum! If you have a good meat grinder (a food processor doesn't work so well for this, although many food processors have a meat grinder attachment, which does work), you can even grind your own meat. It's almost as good, though, to buy the meat already ground from a good meat market. Look for one that grinds its own meats.

This recipe makes enough to eat today plus extra to freeze in patties for later use. If you want only enough for today, you can cut the recipe in thirds, starting with a pound of ground pork.

Adapted from a recipe in Bruce Aidell's Complete Sausage Book.
  • 3 pounds ground pork, not too lean
  • 2 tablespoons anise or fennel seeds
  • 1 tablespoon minced garlic
  • 2 teaspoons red pepper flakes
  • 4 teaspoons sea salt
  • 2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground cayenne
  • 1/4 cup water, as needed
You can make this recipe spicier by increasing the red pepper flakes to 1 tablespoon and the ground cayenne to 1 teaspoon.

Mix all ingredients except water together in a large bowl until well blended, preferably with your hands, adding water as needed to moisten the mixture.

Stuff into medium hog casings (you need a sausage stuffer to do this), or form into patties and fry. No additional oil will be needed.

Form whatever sausage you don't need tonight into patties and freeze on a parchment-lined cookie sheet. When they are frozen, transfer the patties to a freezer baggie. Uncooked sausage keeps in the freezer for 2 to 3 months (or for 3 days unfrozen in the refrigerator).

Wishing You Good Health and Happiness in the New Year!

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