Tostones Part II: Mojo de Ajo (aka garlic dipping sauce from heaven)

Remember my recipe for Tostones! posted a few weeks back? The green plantains that fry into smashed delicious, life-altering goodness?

Well, no toston is complete without a salty garlic-limon sauce to dip it into and make you feel really alive.

Without further ado, my recipe (and I fully admit there are endless varieties and ways to make this kind of dipping sauce) for...

Mojo de Ajo

- 2 cloves of garlic for every platano you're using (in this case, I fried up two platanos, so I used 4 cloves)

- some really good quality extra virgin olive oil

- lime juice (ideally fresh-squeezed, and lemon will do in a pinch)

- plenty of salt (I use kosher salt)

Mince your garlic as finely as is humanly possible. The day I made these tostones, I was lazy. So my garlic was pretty chunky. But it so doesn't really matter -- this sauce will still turn out like crack.

In a bowl, mix your garlic with some salt and mash it all up with the back of a spoon, to make kind of a garlic-salt paste.

Cover this concoction with several tablespoons of olive oil, and then add a couple of teaspoons of lime juice -- or more to your taste, however you like it. Too salty? Add more olive oil and lime juice. Too sour and limey? Add more olive oil. Not enough punch? Add a bit more lime juice. This sauce is really made by taste; can you tell?

Mix it all up, let it sit and meld and marinate and then when your tostones are all fried up, serve them along with this sauce and die and go to heaven.

Goes great over yucca, too, as well as over black beans & rice and grilled chicken.

Tostones!

As promised a while ago, here is my recipe for tostones! (Always with an exclamation point because DAMN THEY ARE THAT GOOD!)

Also known sometimes as platanos verdes or patacones, tostones! are the most delicious, heavenly, savory, yum yum yummers Latin American side dish you ever will come across. They're kind of like a cross between a potato chip (a really, really good, thick one, like a Kettle chip) and home fries and something else otherworldly.

If you've ever had platanos maduros before (the kind of plantain that is sweet when cooked), you're probably thinking, what the...? Platanos are sweet, not savory, crazy lady!

But the key here is the ripeness of the platano when you cook it, which is easily discernible by its color. A ripe -- and thus sweet-tasting when cooked -- platano is yellow in color, similar to its banana cousins. An unripe -- and thus savory and very umami when cooked -- platano is green in color. Thus the alternate term "platanos verdes" (green/unripe plantains) for tostones.

 Tostones are sadly, miserably, unfortunately, tragically quite hard to find in restaurants on the west coast. When I lived in New York City, I could get them everywhere and didn't eat them every day, thinking they were (as they ought to be) commonplace. Then I moved back to the west coast (San Francisco initially and Oregon now) and realized what a rare delicious golden treasure they are in this land of Mexican and Central American food with a sad dearth of proper Latin Caribbean (Puerto Rican, Dominican, Cuban) food.

Being the daughter of a Colombian, you would think I'd be partial to the maduros. My dad can't get enough of them, and I remember him teaching me to cook them when I was young. But as soon as I tasted my first toston, I was a lost cause: it was tostones for me, forever. I like the maduros, sure, and especially in certain meals, situations, etc. But give me a choice and I'll always choose the savory tostones.

So the only way for me to satisfy my toston craving is to make them myself. And while, yes, these are not the healthiest food in the world to eat, when you make them yourself, they totally fall into Food Rule #39 of Michael Pollan's: Eat all the junk food you want as long as you cook it yourself.

These go wonderfully with rice and beans; grilled chicken; fried eggs; anything else with even a little bit of latin flavor or that needs a carby, salty side. As for me, I could eat an entire batch solo, no problem. But only as long as the requisite mojo de ajo (garlic-lemon dipping sauce) is on the side.

And so, without further ado, I present to you my recipe for these gorgeous wonderful delights of salty and garlicky and yummmm:

DENA'S TOSTONES

•  As many platanos verdes (green plantains) as you can handle -- for me, this usually falls somewhere between my desire to eat 17 and my capacity to cook anywhere between 2 to 4
• Plenty of high-heat cooking oil, such as sunflower or safflower
• Salt water
• Salt

1. Peel your platanos -- they don't peel like regular bananas due to their un-ripeness. You'll need to score the outside in two to three vertical lines to get the peel to come off.

2. Slice them into fairly thick rounds -- they're going to get smashed into flat delicious toston-ness, so they need to start out pretty substantial.

3. Meanwhile, heat enough cooking oil to cover the bottom of your skillet by about 1/4 inch til it's hot; I usually set mine on medium-high.

4. If you've got a lot of tostones, fry them in batches: place each piece in the skillet so that it can lay flat but not crowd the others. Let them get just golden, about 90 seconds to 2 minutes or so, depending on the heat of your stove. You don't want them to brown. Once they've reached that gorgeous golden state, flip them so they get golden on the other side, too.

5. Once they're all golden on both sides, remove from the skillet to a plate with paper towels to soak up excess oil. You can turn off your skillet for now.

6. While they were cooking, you've set up a little toston-smashing station: Small bowl of salt water, a clean surface on which to smash (I sometimes use a plate for this), and a smasher -- I usually use one of our flat, heavy-bottomed glasses. A heavy mug can also work.


7. Take each toston onto your surface, place the smasher over it, and smash just until properly smashed but not falling apart. It can take a few tries to figure out where that line lies; you'll get the hang of it!




8. Dip each smashed toston in salt water and set aside.

9. Once all the tostones are smashed and salt-water dipped, heat up your skillet again, to about the same heat, and fry up the tostones til they cook through and get really golden and just this side of browned.

10. Remove to a paper-towel covered plate, sprinkle with plenty of your favorite salt (I like the big crystals of kosher salt for this job), let them cool just a bit, and enjoy with a dipping sauce of mojo de ajo. HEAVEN.

Coming soon.... my recipe for mojo de ajo!

A Sweet and Summery New Year

Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, begins tomorrow evening. This is the beginning of the High Holy Days and a time of introspection, retrospection, atonement, forgiveness, and hope.

The ten days between Rosh Hashanah -- a very joyous, sweet occasion -- and Yom Kippur -- a more solemn occasion, the day of atonement or 'at-one-ment,' the most important Jewish holiday -- are called the Days of Awe, and they are our opportunity to make right the wrongs of the past year, and to set hopes and dreams for a sweet year to come.

But what does all this have to do with food? It's also a time for eating and enjoying food with our loved ones, of course! It is a Jewish holiday, after all. (The typical and traditional dish of Rosh Hashanah is apple dipped in honey -- to help you taste the sweetness of life and mark the beginnings of a sweet new year.)

What's lovely about the High Holy Days in 2010 is that well, they start "early" this year. As one of my fave websites for all things Jewish, www.jewfaq.org, puts it: There is a joke about the Jewish calendar that goes something like this: "While sitting in synagogue, one man turns to his friend and says, ‘When is Hanukkah this year?’ The other man smiles slyly and replies, ‘Same as always: the 25th of Kislev.’" It’s a joke, but it makes an important point: The date of Jewish holidays does not change from year to year. Holidays are celebrated on the same day of the Jewish calendar every year, but the Jewish year is not the same length as a solar year on the civil calendar used by most of the western world, so the date shifts on the civil calendar. 

And as this wonderful post from one of my new favorite Jewish literary magazines, Tablet, puts it: This year, Rosh Hashanah, which typically falls a little later in the year, begins in early September, when summer fruits and vegetables are still overflowing.

So this Rosh Hashanah, we've got a great chance to put the 'sweet' and 'succulent' into our wishes and dishes for the new year, with bounty from our gardens and Farmer's Markets. Tablet has got some great recipe ideas, including this one (how GOOD does that look?!?):

Beet 'Carpaccio' With Wild Arugula, Goat Cheese, and Orange Vinaigrette 


1 pound large loose beets, golden, red and/or candy striped
4 cups wild arugula
¼ cup goat cheese, crumbled
1 orange, segmented and juiced, separated
1 tablespoon good quality local honey
¼ cup olive oil
¼ teaspoon sea salt
¼ teaspoon black pepper
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

1. De-stem and scrub beets. [Dena's note: save those beet greens and saute them with some olive oil and garlic for a deeeeelicious side dish! Beet greens are hubby's very favorite.] Wrap in foil and place on a sheet tray. Bake for 50 minutes or until tender. Transfer to a bowl, cover with saran wrap, and refrigerate for at least two hours.

2. After beets have cooled, peel all beets. On a mandoline or slicer, slice beets very thinly. This may be done with a knife, but will take a little longer. Keep all different color beets separate so that the color does not bleed.

3. Arrange beets in concentric circles in any pattern you wish on a serving platter.

4. To make the dressing, combine the orange juice (1/3 cup) and honey, whisk in the olive oil, and season with salt and pepper. Reserve.

5. Right before serving, toss arugula in the reserved dressing and place in the center of arranged beets. Top with crumbled goat cheese and orange segments. Serve immediately.

Yield: 4 servings


A Greenmarket Rosh Hashanah from Tablet Magazine on Vimeo.

James' Root Cellar Smash

My dear friend James is a fantastic cook. The kind who doesn't even really have to work at it, you know? Who just like throws stuff together and it looks and tastes divine. Someday I'll get there. Til then, I keep working at it.

So of course I had to ask him for a recipe to share during this crazy month of NaBloPoMo. And he responded with a great little recipe that will likely come in handy next week as our nation prepares to eat as a way of giving thanks.

Reading it through, YUM is all I can say. I might need these to show up on our Thanksgiving table!

James' Root Cellar Smash

• Three white sweet potatoes (sometimes called Japanese sweet potatoes at the grocery store)
• One large, orange sweet potato (any more and it would be too sweet)
• A couple of your favorite potatoes (Dena's note: russets always work great in mashed potatoes)
• A large turnip would be exciting as well, but I haven't tried that variation yet

This recipe is very forgiving -- you can make changes to the ingredients as you see fit and based on what you might have in your root cellar.

Peel and cut up into similar-sized chunks all of the above. Boil them until they are fork-tender.

When done, smash it all up -- I like things lumpy.

Pour in that stick of butter and cup of half & half you've been heating up in a small pan on the back of the stove. Season liberally with salt and pepper (taters need gobs). Here's the totally inspired part -- add a goodly dash or two of cinnamon.

Papi's Aji

So in many northern Latin American countries, there is a condiment that's on every table, restaurant or home, no matter what: aji (pronounced "a-hee"). Sometimes it's spicy, sometimes not. But it is always there in a little container with a spoon in it, and it goes on anything and everything.

My Colombian dad always had a bowl of this on our table, and it never went empty, no matter how much I spooned onto my rice (mmmmm).

I thought of it the other day and HAD to make some. It's super easy and super-delish, and very customizable. It's kinda like salsa....but different. There are no tortilla chips involved, though of course you could do that if you're into that kind of thing. ;-)

Dena's Papi's Aji Bogotano 
(aka Aji, Bogota-style)

• 2 ripe tomatoes, chopped
• 3-4 scallions, chopped
• As much cilantro as you like, chopped
• Some glugs of extra virgin olive oil
• A few tablespoons of red wine vinegar

Combine in a bowl and let sit for at least 30 minutes. You want to make sure there's enough vinegar for the acid in the vinegar to make everything yummy, but not so much that it's overpowering.

Spoon it onto your rice, your beans, your platanos fritos, avocado, chicken, beef.... anything savory. Makes a great meat marinade.

Add diced hot pepper (like jalapeno, minus the seeds) or some Tabasco if you like heat, but it will then cease to be Bogota-style. Which is fine and still yummy!

When I was young, I used to just eat rice with aji on top. Makes a fantastic snack, let me tell you. Makes a great bachelor dinner, too, by the way.

This keeps for a few days in your fridge. Make a batch and try it out!

Hubby doesn't like cilantro (did you know that's genetic? Bizarre. So glad I got the gene that makes it taste delicious) so I left it out on the side. MORE FOR ME!

Buen provecho!

Mark Bittman's Kasha Varnishkes

The New York Times' Mark Bittman is making kasha varnishkes today. It looks DELISH. I am so in the mood for comfort food -- pasta is definitely it.

And I'm expanding my Jewish food repertoire!

P.S. Love his blog, Bitten. Check it out.

Zoe's Greek Salad

So I just got back from visiting my best friend, Zoe, in her hometown of Boston. And while I was there, she made a salad for us to have with dinner one evening.

Now, this may sound like a not big deal. But let me tell you, friends: I have never seen Zoe cook anything other than...popcorn. And I love that about her! It is part of her very considerable charm.

We went grocery shopping (Whole Foods) and talked about how to pick a good tomato and why it's so important to buy them organic. And bought the rest of the fixins for Zoe's masterpiece salad.



It was delicious and it was also a delight to watch Zoe in the kitchen. I have to admit I felt a little like a proud mama hen watching.

So next time you need a light, summery salad that is super easy to put together to go along with your lunch or dinner, Zoe's Greek Salad is a great choice!*




Zoe's Greek Salad

- 2 ripe, summery-smelling, slightly tender to the touch organic tomatoes
- 1 large English cucumber (the kind without seeds, usually comes shrink-wrapped in plastic)
- Feta cheese, diced and crumbled
- Extra virgin olive oil
- Salt & pepper to taste

Dice the tomato, cucumber, and feta into similar sizes. Toss with the olive oil and salt and pepper and ENJOY.


* I know I sound like a commercial. But I'm really so proud! And thrilled that she is letting me feature it on this blog.

Spa Dinner

As I mentioned in my menu plan for this week, we had a "Spa Dinner" last night. Which really has nothing to do with a spa or a spa diet other than I for some reason associate curried chicken salad with spa fare. That with artichokes and you're practically wrapped in a towel in the steam room.

As promised, here is my recipe for the super easy and really delicious Curried Chicken Salad. This is a great spring dinner and makes excellent lunch leftovers. I got the inspiration from Epicurious and then made it my own from there. Feel free to do the same!

Dena's Curried Chicken Salad

2 boneless, skinless organic chicken breasts
1/2 cup light mayonnaise
1/2 cup plain organic yogurt
4-5 teaspoons good quality curry powder, depending on how you like it
Juice from 1 lime
1 teaspoon honey
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
1 medium organic red onion, chopped (about 1 cup)
Half a large, firm, crisp organic apple (like a Fuji or a Granny Smith), chopped
1/2 cup salted roasted organic cashews, roughly chopped

Bring enough water to cover both chicken breasts to boil in a saucepan. Add chicken and simmer, uncovered, 6 minutes. Remove pan from heat and cover, then let stand until chicken is cooked through, about 15 minutes. Transfer chicken to plate and let cool, about 10 minutes. Chop into 1/2-inch pieces.

While chicken is cooling, whisk together mayo, yogurt, curry, lime juice, honey, salt, and pepper in a large bowl. Add chicken, onion, apple, and cashews and stir gently to combine.

I like to add raisins in on occasion, or use fresh organic grapes instead of apple, depending on the season and my mood.

As for the gorgeous and delicious artichokes, a brilliant step-by-step tutorial on how to make them (it's easy) is here on one of my fave food blogs, Citymama. I serve it with a simple garlic aioli -- combine mayo with finely minced garlic, add some lemon juice, and voila: you're instantly fancy.

To roast asparagus: preheat oven to 350F. Cut off ends, about 2-3 inches from bottom depending on their tenderness. On a rimmed baking sheet, toss asparagus with extra virgin olive oil, plenty of salt and pepper, and chopped garlic. Pop in the oven for 10-15 minutes.

Enjoy your version of Spa Dinner!

The Simplest Cabbage Salad Ever

Tonight I'm making Cuban-marinated chicken, sauteed broccoli with olive oil and garlic, and my purple cabbage salad.

This cabbage salad is delicious. And good for you. And gorgeous. And so easy to make, because it only has 3 ingredients, not including salt and pepper.

Without further ado....

Dena's Purple Cabbage Salad

1 organic purple cabbage, quartered and cored
Extra virgin olive oil
Lemon juice
Salt and pepper

Once you've removed the core from the cabbage, slice it as thinly as you can into ribbons. Watch your fingers.

Put the ribbons of cabbage into your salad bowl, and dress with as much olive oil and lemon juice as tastes good to you -- some people like more lemon or less according to personal taste.

Add plenty of salt and pepper -- do not skimp here! The salt and pepper really bring out the flavor.

Toss well, serve, and enjoy.

French Green Beans with Crispy Shallots

I got this recipe for our Thanksgiving meal from Everyday Food magazine, and I was expecting it to be pretty decent; the recipe didn't look super special or anything, just like a nice, new take on the tired old classic green bean dishes that show up at everyone's Thanksgiving table.

I was blown away -- this dish was gooooood. It was fresh, bright, very, very tasty, and so incredibly easy to make. And what's more, my husband, who does not like green beans in any way, shape, or form, loved them. In fact, we both loved them so much, I'm making them again this week, and then again for Chanukkah the week after.

Keep in mind this is meant to be served as a cold side/salad of sorts. The green beans are supposed to be cold when served, which also makes this a great dish to bring to a potluck holiday party.

I am offering here my only very slightly modified twist on the original recipe, with many thanks to the creative cooks at Everyday Food for the original!

French Green Beans with Crispy Shallots

1 lb french green beans, trimmed
1 cup vegetable oil
3 shallots, very thinly sliced into rings
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp dijon mustard
3 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook green beans in boiling water until bright green and crisp-tender, 4-5 minutes. Drain into a colander and run cold water over the beans to cool them down and stop the cooking. Leave them in colander to drain and air dry.

In a small saucepan, heat vegetable oil over medium-low and let it get good and warm. Working in three batches, fry shallots in oil until golden and crispy, 2-4 minutes per batch. Transfer shallots to paper towels, and season generously with salt.

In a small bowl, whisk lemon juice, mustard, and olive oil to combine; season dressing with salt and pepper. Place green beans in serving bowl and drizzle with dressing, then top with fried shallots. Enjoy!

Tomato Side Salad: The Taste of Summer

I am one of those people who cannot eat fresh tomatoes nine months out of the year. I just would rather not eat them at all than eat the (scarily toxic) things that pass for tomatoes for most of the year. And I rarely eat them when I'm at a restaurant, unless I know they've obtained them locally.

But the three months when tomatoes are in season? Pure heaven. Nothing signals, embodies, and imbues one's being with the essence of summer like a vine-ripened fresh tomato. Seriously.

And I recently discovered the best tomatoes I have EVER eaten, even better than the ones my husband grew in our garden when we had a yard two years ago. Even he agrees! If you live anywhere near the Bay Area, do yourself a huge favor and make sure you taste one of these before the season's over. Their taste may very well last me through to next season. Each bite tastes like the essence of ripe summer tomatoes intensified by 100. I'm not kidding. They really are that good.

Inspired by these amazing tomatoes, I took a hint from one of my favorite food blogs and made my Tomato Side Salad to go with the burgers I made last Sunday night. Grass-fed beef from only 50 miles away and tomatoes from 75 miles away -- a summer Sunday dinner doesn't get better.

Dena's Tomato Side Salad

As many dry-farmed Early Girl tomatoes as you are in the mood for, sliced

1 sweet Italian onion, sliced paper-thin

salt and pepper to taste

Arrange the onion over the tomatoes and add plenty of salt and pepper. Eat and be blissful.

Dena's Quinoa Pilaf

First, a word about quinoa in case you've never heard of it (with thanks to South Beach Diet online for the following information):

Move over couscous — there's a new grain in town, quinoa (pronounced keen-wa). Actually, quinoa isn't new at all — it's been grown for thousands of years in the Peruvian Andes and has been a staple in some South American diets for centuries. North Americans are just beginning to discover quinoa's unique nutritional makeup and versatility.

Quinoa grains are the seeds of a leafy, spinach-like plant. The Incas referred to quinoa as the "mother grain" because of its high protein content — the highest amongst the grains — and because it's a great source of vitamins and minerals, particularly potassium, the B vitamins, magnesium, zinc, and copper.

Quinoa is as easy to make and use as rice, but cooks in half the time. To cook, rinse grains and combine one-and-three-quarters parts water with one part quinoa, bring to a boil, and simmer for about 15 minutes. Serve it up as a side dish, as part of a one-pot meal, or as an addition to soups and stews. Any uncooked leftovers can be stored for several months in an airtight container.

Since quinoa is still relatively new to the American marketplace, at the moment you may only find it in specialty food stores or very large supermarkets. And though it can be expensive, keep in mind that besides its many nutritional benefits, it increases about three or four times in volume after cooking, which gives you more bang for your buck.

The recipe I like is below, but I also totally use it as a rice substitute on occasion.

Dena's Quinoa Pilaf

1 ¾ cups water or chicken stock
1 cup quinoa
½ cup shelled unsalted pistachios
1 tbsp plus 1 tsp extra-virgin olive oil, divided
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 small red bell pepper, finely diced
2 scallions, thinly sliced
1 small tomato
½ red onion
2 tsp white wine vinegar
Salt & freshly ground black pepper

(To turn it into a main course, I add sauteed veggie Italian sausage or diced chicken.)

Heat oven or toaster oven to 350 degrees F. Rinse quinoa with a fine-mesh strainer.

Combine water (I use chicken stock to give it that nice rich flavor – low sodium and low fat, of course) and quinoa in a medium saucepan; bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer until tender, about 15 minutes. Drain and place in a mixing bowl.

While quinoa is cooking, spread pistachios on a baking tray and bake until lightly browned and fragrant, about 10 minutes. Cool and roughly chop (I actually leave them whole).

Heat 1 tsp of oil in nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and red onion until they become fragrant and softened. Then add bell pepper, tomato, and scallion and cook until softened, about 3 minutes. Add to quinoa, along with pistachios, vinegar, and remaining oil; stir to combine. If making it a main course, add protein. Season with salt and pepper to taste and serve.