Zucchinis and Twitter

Zucchinis and Twitter

It's that time of year again when good looking zucchinis are in every New Jersey market, and you can't help buying them because they look so fresh and healthful.  If you have a garden you probably have been resorting to dropping zucchinis off at neighbors houses. (Ringing the front door bell and running? -  well, maybe not that bad.)

In any case, here's a yummy way to not only use up but to enjoy zucchinis (and/or any kind of summer squash) in a versatile and delicious preparation:  Zucchini Butter.

(from Food 52's website)

Zucchini Butter is perfect warm and unctuous slathered on bruschetta, as a dip for crackers, carrot sticks or even zucchini sticks.  Or you can just do what my friend Carol did and simply eat this out of the bowl.  She proclaimed this "the best zucchini I ever ate", and my friend Barb texted me the next day for the recipe to make for her weekend guests.

This comes from the website Food 52, which I initially found because it sponsors and publishes an awesome competition for the best cookbooks of the year, but which I keep in my Twitter feed because it showcases some of the best food trends and recipes out there.  (www.food52.com, @food52 on Twitter)

Did I mention that Zucchini Butter is easy, cheap, and would keep well in the fridge for a day or two if all of it is not eaten immediately?

Yep, you should buy some zucchinis right now and have this tonight.  Disclaimer -  this may have been fantastically delicious because of the great quality of the ingredients I used:  fresh from the farm zucchinis and onion, flaky Maldon sea salt, black pepper imported by a friend from India, and olive oil purchased from Natirar Restaurant which they import themselves from Tuscany.  Which all goes to prove that sometimes great cooking is really just great shopping.

But don't despair if you don't have these same exact ingredients - the silky smooth "buttery" texture that the zucchini takes on from cooking down and having its flavors concentrated will still be present and wonderful; if not that elusive sweetness and freshness that you get from cooking with just picked ingredients.


Jennie Cook's Zucchini Butter adapted from Food 52's Twitter Feed, from July 24, Kristen Miglore

1/4 cup good tasting extra virgin olive oil
1 small white onion (OR 2 shallots, OR 3 large cloves of garlic - in fact, anything from the allium family, to give that onion-y flavor)
Sea salt, if you have it, kosher or regular salt if you don't
Freshly cracked black pepper
3 or 4 medium zucchini (1.5 to 2 lbs.), grated to make anywhere from 6 to 8 cups (can mix in yellow summer squash too!)

Saute the onion (or shallots), sprinkled with salt and pepper, in the olive oil in a large skillet on medium low heat for 5 or 10 minutes until softened and translucent.  (If using garlic, cook only for 30 - 60 seconds.)

In the meantime, squeeze out handfuls of the zucchini to rid the squash of excess water, and then add all the wrung out grated zucchini to the skillet.  Add more salt, turn up the heat to medium high, and cook, stirring occasionally, for 15 minutes.  It's ok if the zucchini browns here and there, it will just add to the flavor.

Serve warm, or gently reheat if used later.  Yields about 2 cups.



Enjoy the bounty of the Garden State in summer!  And sign up for my All About Twitter class at the Library on Friday, September 27 from 12 - 1 to learn how to get connected.

Diane Whitman
@whitlibrarian
Reference Librarian
Jersey Girl/ Tweeter

It's (truly) All Good

It’s  (truly)  All Good

I’ve been trying to find cookbooks that support the bounty of fresh, organic produce I’ve been getting from my CSA, Dogwood Farms (read – use up before it overtakes my fridge.)  Here are several I picked up at the Library.

The first one that caught my eye was appropriately called The Farm by Ian Knauer.  This one had lots of recipes for seasonal produce but what really stood out to me in this cookbook were the number of recipes that included bacon!  Truth be told,  I like bacon as well as the next person, but lately it has been so overused that chef Michael Symon recently tweeted:  “Bacon:  the duct tape of food.”  It’s almost like cheating – add bacon, and everything tastes great!

Besides the bacon, many of these recipes called for more cheese, meat and fat than I was comfortable with.  I was looking for recipes that were fresh and healthful, not just good tasting, and where the produce itself takes center stage.  Next.

Another promising candidate was Vegetable Literacy by Deborah Madison.  Here was a book that read almost like a primer for the professional cook.   In fact, its subtitle is “Cooking and Gardening with Twelve Families from the Edible Plant Kingdom with Over 300 Deliciously Simple Recipes.”  Each chapter contained its own little lesson about the growth habit of the vegetable, who its botanical cousins were and what flavors paired well with it.  The recipes were interesting but were often of the side dish variety, again, not quite what I was looking for. (I am soooo picky.)

Enter Gwyneth Paltrow’s new offering It’s All Good, and its recipes are exactly what I want to be making this summer.  Yes, it veers off into the realm of fervent veganism, as well as being gluten free, but you can look at this in two ways:  it might expand your culinary horizons, OR, you could just re-adapt the recipes back so that you use flour with gluten, regular sugars, add meats and cheeses, whatever, if you like.  (Cheating?  Well, nobody's perfect!  Except maybe Gwyneth...)

One thing I loved about this book is that the salad dressings are all phenomenal, plus they're different enough from one another that you could vary the salad ingredients and enjoy lots of different tastes to keep you happy all season.

If you are looking for a healthful, fresh way to cook that is also gourmet delicious, and truly easy, It's All Good is your book.  Great example, this refreshing peach basil summer smoothie combination that I bet you haven’t had before.  Wonderful for breakfast, I poured out two glasses full, but after one taste, I decided not to share and drank them both!  (Full disclosure:  I did make another batch for my husband, but it wasn’t quite as good, as the peach wasn’t as sweet and ripe.  So if you don’t have a giant luscious peach like I did, use two smaller ones, and decrease the lime to ½ a lime if they’re not dead ripe and sweet.)

Crazy Delicious Peach/Cucumber/Basil Lime Smoothie

1 large ripe peach, pitted, not peeled

1 cucumber, peeled

1/3 cup of fresh basil

1 lime, peel and pith removed

1 cup or so ice cubes

Coarsely chop up the first four ingredients, and add them to your blender in order.  Add  ice cubes.  Blend away.  Be amazed.

(If I hadn’t scarfed down the whole thing immediately, the glasses would have looked so pretty decorated with a peach slice and a basil leaf…!)

Can’t wait to see what I get this week from the farm!

Diane Whitman

@whitlibrarian

Gwyneth Fan

If you want to see what a CSA is about, check out their website:  dogwoodfarmsnj.com.

This Week at SBPL I Discovered ...The Omnivore's Dilemma

While technically an omnivore's dilemma is what most people encounter every day when deciding what to eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner, it is the book by Michael Pollan that I refer to here.   The Omnivore's Dilemma is the source for those ghastly statistics and details swirling around McDonald's Chicken McNuggets and the like.  In the past six years since the book was published I have seen it referenced in many a news article, blog, lecture, talk show, etc that has anything to do with nutrition.  So, I was curious.

All of this information, including the 60 Minutes show I saw last night about sugar being a poison, both educates me and overloads me.  I like some of this junk food.  Do I really need to give it up entirely to be healthy? Isn't just a little once in a while OK?  I suppose it is a personal choice, but to be better informed I checked out The Omnivore's Dilemma this week to read it for myself.

 I admit it!  When I opened the book I immediately flipped through to the chapter on McDonald's food.  I was not disappointed.  It's facts include the analysis of the 38 ingredients used to make a Chicken McNugget,  including butane and other bits you wouldn't want to find in your kitchen much less on your plate. At least 13 of the elements are derived from corn. The others I have a hard time pronouncing much less spelling.

The term "omnivore's dilemma" was coined 30 years ago by a research psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania.  It really does sum up my daily experience with food.   I am always questioning what I am eating for either calories, nutrition, ingredients, carcinogens, organic, cage-free, etc.  Will it make me fat? Will it give me cancer? Will it help me sidestep heart disease?  These and other questions create the dilemma about food choice and are prompted Pollan to write his book.  He notes that there is a serious problem with any meal that requires a scientist or investigative journalist to determine the ingredients. He has a compelling point here.

 Modern life can be just a little too complicated for me sometimes and it's nice to be able to keep at least some things simple.  Chicken should just be chicken, not 38 ingredients.  I trained myself to like my coffee black last year just because I was tired of worrying about dairy fat, calories, carcinogens, etc. in the myriad of "milk and sugar" choices.

Frequently I just eat what I want to taste.  However, as an adult, the more I know about what produces the tastes I crave the better, like it or not. 

The book is organized into three parts.  The first focuses on the modern or "industrial" diet that consists of convenience foods.  The second part of the book takes a look at the organic diet including the foods from the local farmer as well as the big guys such as Whole Foods.  The third part of the book talks about man's original diet, the hunter-gatherer diet a person can from the source directly.

I am looking forward to reading the rest of the book this week.  I hope that its facts and figures will help me to make the choices I know deep down I should make.  And, if I still feel like having a fast food dinner once in a while, at least I will know exactly what my choices really are.  

By Rosemary Gohd, PR/Marketing