White Bean and Arugula Pasta Sauce

This is really not as fancy as it sounds. Or, if it is, it's one of the easiest fancy things there is.

My mom used to make this for me when we got home late at night after school/work/band practice/dance class/rehearsal/trying to escape the country/etc, and it takes no time at all yet is utterly delicious. That is, if you like arugula and white beans.

It should also be noted that Firefox's spellcheck wants me to change "arugula" to "jugular". So, alternately, I'm calling this White Bean and Jugular Pasta. Enjoy.


Ingredients:

One can of white beans (I use Great Northern)
A healthy handful of arugula. Use your discretion; I like lots.
Five medium tomatoes
Half an onion
Five cloves of garlic
Olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste


Chop the tomatoes into small cubes, dice the onion, and finely chop the garlic. Heat the oil in a medium saucepan or frying pan. Before the oil is spitting, throw in the onion and garlic and cook until the onion begins to get translucent. Watch the heat, you don't want to scorch the garlic.

Throw in the tomatoes and cook for awhile, until the they get softish and start to go to mush, stirring so it doesn't stick.

When the tomatoes are breaking up and beginning to look like tomato sauce, drain and rinse the white beans well under cold water and then toss them into the pan. Cook a few more minutes.

When it looks like it's about done (your call, really), throw the arugula on top of everything, turn down the heat to low, and cover with a lid. Let it sit like this for a few minutes, until the arugula is wilted and soft. It shouldn't take long.

Serve with pasta or get creative. I'm sure it'd be good with couscous or quinoa.




Yes, that is a tomato the size of your face...

I've been getting most of my produce from local farms recently, since it's all in season. Smith's Berry Barn in particular has fantastic you-pick tomatoes (33 varieties) and peppers. My favorites are the huge yellow and green zebra.

Spice Cake

Double post today! Mostly because I'm a sucker for attention and Carrie made a request.

A little background: A little over a year ago when I moved from Chicago to Portland, my Chicago friends and I had a huge barbecue. This involved about two straight days of cooking, at the end of which I decided I hadn't had enough. I was, however, out of recipes. So... I made this cake. It consists of a basic cake batter which I then add half the spices in my drawer to and, if I'm feeling ambitious (today I wasn't), I add a lightbulb. This final detail is key if you want the real Random Cake Experience.

I post this recipe in honor of my fabulous Chicago room mate, Carrie. She really needs to get her butt to the West Coast.


Ingredients:

2c flour (I use one cup regular unbleached, one cup whole wheat pastry)
1c brown sugar
3 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

1 cardamom seed, shelled and crushed to smithereens. (if you're lucky, you have a mortar and pestle. If you're me, you disturb you apartment complex by smashing the bejesus out of it with a hammer.)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp allspice
1 tsp ginger (fresh or powdered)

2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1c milk
1 stick (1/2 c) butter

Preheat the oven to 375˚ F and grease a bread pan. Or a cake pan. Or some muffin tins. Your choice, just adjust the time for how deep the batter is in the pan.

Mix the dry ingredients together. Add the spices and integrate evenly.

Cream the butter. Add the sugar gradually until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time and beat until well mixed and not lumpy. Add the vanilla and mix more some more.

Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix til combined and not lumpy.

Pour into the baking pan and bake on the middle rack of the oven for half an hour.

Borscht for a sick room mate

Borscht (pron. "bore-sh-ch") is Russian beet soup. It's made mostly in winter out of root vegetables, but my room mate has a cold and I have some beets, so here we go.

As far back as I can remember, my mother's side of my family has been making some variation or other of this. I'm making my Grannie's version, which has lamb shank in it, but my vegetarian mom does a really good variation sans meat that I'll include here, as well.

For the kitchen-phobic, this is a good one. It's ridiculously easy, the hardest part being controlling the amount of beet juice you get on every kitchen surface (including yourself).

As far as the meat is concerned, you can use a wide variety of things. I went to the Lebanese grocer up the street and got two smallish shanks of lamb. That's about as Russian as you can get. Otherwise, you could use a leftover roasted chicken carcass (mmm, carcass), a whole, uncooked chicken (in which case you'd want to make sure it cooked long enough for the meat to be falling off the bone), or leftover bones from roast beef or lamb or pork etc. It's a good way not to let those go to waste. I suppose you could also use chopped up bits of meat, if you wanted a stew-like thing going on, but I'm just gonna stick with tradition here.


Ingredients:

The right music
Lamb shank
3 medium-ish beets
3 medium-ish potatoes
a quarter or so of a large red cabbage. You can use more if you like.
half a large onion. Or the whole onion. Up to you.
A few cloves of garlic.
salt and pepper to taste
water
a couple tablespoons of cooking oil such as grapeseed, canola, or olive




In a large pot over medium-high heat, heat the cooking oil til it coats the bottom of said pot easily when tipped. Toss in the lamb shank and cook til it's browned on all sides.

Peel and chop the potatoes and beets into bite-sized cubes. When the meat is browned, toss them in with it. Give a few stirs.

Chop the onion and garlic and add those after the beets and potatoes have been cooking about ten minutes.

Chop the red cabbage so it's in medium-length shreds and throw it in when the onion is getting soft. Sauté for a few more minutes.

Add salt and pepper and stir to mix. Then add about five cups of water, or enough to cover about an inch over the veggies. Turn the heat to medium and cover.

Simmer for up (or over) an hour, depending on how soft and mushy you like things. I like chunks, so I go with about forty five minutes or so.

Serve with a glop of sour cream and the freshest dill you can lay your red Commie hands on.




Variations:
If you're using a soup bone, toss in the veggies to sauté first, and when they're all going throw in the bone. If you're using a whole chicken, put it in when you add the water.

For vegetarians, sauté the veggies and then instead of water, add five or six cups of vegetable broth or the equivalent of water and bouillon. It's just as good, but your babushka won't know what to think of you.