Summer pasta dish

With summer truly upon us, that can only mean one thing, and that thing is fresh corn and too much zucchini.  Our landlords gave us a giant zucch, which normally is no better than junk, but we experimented with taking the seeds out before cooking it, and that vastly improved things. This pasta dish was quite tasty, and a good way to eat your veggies, too.  I've been trying to cook my pasta more like how they did it in Italy (disclaimer: I have no idea how they did it in Italy, but somehow it just tasted better. Altitude?), and the solution I think I've stumbled onto is to just put a ton of salt into the water once it reaches a boil. Like, a tablespoon or more.  This seems to give a bit more chew to the pasta, as well as improving the taste, though it is hard to improve on the taste of pasta.

Side note - ever notice how when you're running through a neighborhood around dinnertime, you can always smell who's cooking pasta?  mmm.

Anyway, I recommend this one. Quick, easy, tasty, healthy, cheap - it wins on all fronts.

Summer Pasta Dish

1-2 zucchinis (for 2-3C of chopped zucchini)

2-4 ears of corn

1 lb pasta, small shapes

~1/2C chopped herbs (basil, cilantro, parsley, mint, whatever you've got on hand)

Grated cheese for on top

Salt for the water

Pepper to taste

Bring a big pot of water to a boil.  Once it boils dump in a lot of salt, and then the pasta, and toutouille (this is a well-established verb in Jospe households that means "to stir the pasta once you've put it in the water".  It can also refer to tossing a salad after you have dressed it, but is generally reserved for the cooking of pasta).

Meanwhile, cut the zucchinis in half, use a spoon to scrape out the seedy parts, and chop into rough cubes.  Cut the raw corn off the cobs.  Chop the herbs.  Throw a glug of olive oil into a pan, and saute the zucchini until it's soft enough that you want to eat it. At the last minute, toss in the corn, and cook that for about a minute.  

Once the pasta is al dente, drain, and combine the zucchs and corn and pasta and mix in the herbs.  Sprinkle plenty of fresh-ground pepper on top and grate a pile of cheese on top. Enjoy!

Overnight waffles

Brendan makes these really good waffles, that have become a bit of a staple for post-training brunch type activities with CSU.  I was hosting a training, and needed the recipe so I could make waffles.  They're tasty enough that here's the recipe - I believe it's from David Lebovitz's book "How to Cook Everything", but I'm not actually sure.  The recipe isn't hard; the only hard part is remembering to get it started the night before.

Overnight Waffles

Serves 4-6

1/2 tsp instant yeast

2C flour

1 tbs sugar

1/2 tsp salt

2C milk

8 tbs melted butter

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

2 eggs

Combine the dry ingredients, stir in the milk, then the butter and vanilla.  It'll be loose. Cover with plastic wrap and leave overnight at room temperature.

Grease your waffle iron, preheat it.

Separate the eggs, stir the yolks into the batter.  White the whites until they hold soft peaks.  Stir them gently into the batter.

Spread a ladleful or so of batter into the waffle iron, cook for 3-5min, and serve immediately. Preferably with lots of berries! And maybe maple syrup.  Most delicious.

Grits and greens

This was surprisingly delicious. We had some sad-looking greens (I really don't remember what sort at this point... looks like kale maybe?), some tofu, and some mushrooms that needed eating. How to make something edible out of this?  We decided that maybe a pile of cheesy grits under the greens would be a good idea.  We were right!  Quite simple, really - we had a tub of Quaker corn meal, and there's a recipe on the side for "cornmeal mush".  Ok, let's make some mush: 

Boil 3C water

Add 1C cornmeal and a hefty pinch of salt to another cup of water

Pour that mixture into the boiling water

Turn down the heat, stir, and cook for 5-10 minutes until it's nice and thick

Add things to make it taste good - cheese, butter, more salt

Cook your veggies, I recommend lemon and salt if you're sauteeing kale. Dump on top. Wolf down, because you're starving, and this sort of dish really only tastes delicious when you're starving.

I don't really know how we made the tofu. Looks baked. That's a good idea, I'm going to bake some tofu next time.

6-Grain hot cereal

The other day, I discovered that cracked what, or kasha, would cook in roughly the same amount of time as old-fashioned oats. i.e. the amount of time it takes for me to shower in the morning.  And, that they add a really nice wheaty flavor to oatmeal, and some different textures. I remember the last time I cooked kasha, I thought that it was just mush, and kind of gross because of that.  Well, it turns out oatmeal is also just mush. Oatmeal is also cheap, easy, and good for you, and I've learned to tolerate it (though not quite tolerate it enough to eat a large enough quantity to get me through the entire morning without a snack).  Anyway, kasha was a welcome addition. Yay!

From there, it was not a giant leap of imagination to consider if I could make my own fancy 7-grain cereal.  You know, like this. The only major failing is that I like some chew to my cereal, which you can get with old fashioned oats, but not so much with quick cereals, and when it comes to things like brown rice and barley, you kind of have to grind them up finely to have them cook in 5 minutes. So, the major failing here was that the cereal mostly tastes like mush. But, mush with a wider variety of flavors than just oats.  I suppose leaving some of the flax seeds whole, and having an interesting nut/seed mixture to sprinkle on top, would help with the texture.  Anyway, if you're bored of regular oatmeal, and want to mix things up, give this a try.  

Homemade 6-grain cereal 

probably not any cheaper than the real stuff, and probably doesn't cook up as neatly.

1C old fashioned oats

1/2C bulgur

1/2C kasha

1/4C brown rice, ground up roughly (I did this in our spice grinder)

1/4C barley, ground up roughly

1/4C flax seeds, ground up 

To cook it, well, doesn't really matter, but I found using a smidge more water than usual was helpful in making more of a porridge and less of a solid glob.  So, 2/3C cereal + 5/3C water, more or less. And a good pinch of salt.  I like to dump it all in a pot and stick it on medium-low-ish while I shower, and once I'm clean it's done.  If you let it sit for a minute or two (while you put on moisturizer, for example), then you can stir up anything that stuck to the bottom of the pot.  

Top with tasty things. Maybe some milk, nuts, seeds, dried fruit, frozen fruit (protip: frozen fruit will cool it off so you can eat it sooner), ice cream... 

Oh and if you were really thinking ahead, you'd have made some overnight iced coffee.  Because obviously if it's iced coffee weather it's hot cereal weather. Geez, I am so confused when it comes to food temperatures!  (we can all agree that ice cream is an every-weather food, right?)