Barley Pilaf Salad With Three Basils Pesto

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First I made this.

Then I made this.

The combination of which resulted in this.

Personally, I think the first two photos are prettier but sometimes uglier is tastier and, in my humble opinion, this is one of those times.

Basil is one of my all-time favorite herbs and I've got three types growing in the greenhouse: Genova, Opal and Cinnamon. Combined with a nutty and delicious aged Italian cheese, they made a healthy, knock-out pesto and are the reason I'm submitting this post to Weekend Herb Blogging. WHB began over 3 years ago when my blogger buddy Kalyn... well, read here for the delightful and serendipitous explanation. WHB is being hosted this week by dear friend and neighbor Simona of Briciole. Check out her round-up this coming Sunday or Monday. If you'd like to join in the fun, read here about how to go about it. Then send Simona your link by Sunday, 3PM Utah time. You will be part of a multi-national group of food bloggers who post their fabulous recipes each week.

Basil holds a prideful place as one of the World's Healthiest Foods . And rightfully so. Not only is fresh basil packed with vitamins, it has so many healthful properties, among them anti-inflammatory, anti-oxident and anti-bacterial, that for me to write about them all would take so much time I wouldn't get to the recipe. So click here to read about what this humble easy to grow herb can do for your health, then come on back for a recipe that's not only packed with healthful goodness, I'm proud to say that all the ingredients are organic and come from within 50 miles of my kitchen.

Christine's Barley Pilaf Salad with Three Basils Pesto
Click here to print recipe

To make the Pesto:
Using a food processor, pulse 4 cloves of peeled garlic with 1/2 teaspoon coarse kosher salt until the garlic is finely chopped. Next, place 2 cups fresh basil plus 1/4 cup toasted pine nuts into the processor bowl and pulse until coarsely chopped. With the processor running, slowly drizzle 1/4 cup good olive oil through the feed tube until a paste forms and the pesto leaves the sides of the bowl. Stop there. Scrape the pesto into a bowl and fold in 1/3 cup finely grated Piave Vecchio cheese. Set the pesto aside until the pilaf is assembled.

To make the Pilaf:
1 cup hulless red winter barley
2 1/2 cups water
golden cherry tomatoes, cut in halves
6 small radishes of different colors, thinly sliced
1 Armenian cucumber, thinly sliced
1 cup blanched corn kernels, cut from 2 cobs
1/2 fennel bulb, cut in half again and thinly sliced
Preparation:
The barley needs to be prepared the day before assembling the pilaf.

Put the uncooked barley into a large metal pot and cover with cold water. Give it a stir and skim off any hulls that float to the top. (Even though it's called hulless, but there will be a few strays.)
Let the barley soak for about 8 hours then rinse well.
Return barley to the rinsed pot, cover with 2 1/2 cups of water and bring to a boil on high heat.
Reduce the heat to a simmer and cook, stirring occasionally, until the water has been absorbed and the barley is just tender and chewy, about 50 minutes. Remove from the heat, stir to separate the grains and pour into a ceramic bowl or casserole dish to cool. Refrigerate overnight.

Several hours before serving, add the tomatoes, cucumber, radishes, corn and fennel to the cooked barley and toss well. Gently stir in the pesto until fully combined.

This pilaf may be served chilled or at room temperature, on the back deck or down on the beach, and would be a healthy side dish to grilled fish or stuffed chicken breasts. Bon appétit!

Copyright © 2005-2008, Christine Cooks. All rights reserved

Barley Chevre Pilaf With Basil And Tomatoes

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Barley. Organically grown, hull-less, red winter barley. Grown about 12 miles from my kitchen, it cooks up into sturdy, fat, chewy (not gooey), delicious kernels of high-fiber goodness. I'm very excited about this. Due to the "gooey" factor, I'd not been overly fond of barley in the past. But that's all changed. These nutty, brown grains are highly addictive and I admit to being hooked. And then, of course, there's the fact that whole grains are really good for you and barley is a noted World's Healthiest Food.

So here is my barley offering, the first of many, made sometime during the past month when I was on hiatus. Do give yourself plenty of time to soak the grains before beginning the recipe.

Barley Chevre Pilaf with Basil and Tomatoes
Christine's original recipe

Ingredients:
1 cup uncooked hull-less, winter barley (preferrably organically grown)
water for soaking
2 1/2 cups water for cooking
2 tablespoons roasted walnut oil
1 tablespoon golden balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons finely chopped basil (green and purple)
2 ounces good chevre
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
freshly ground black pepper
Campari tomatoes

Preparation:

Put the uncooked barley into a large metal pot and cover with cold water. Give it a stir and skim off any hulls that float to the top. (It's called hull-less, but there will be a few strays that managed to stick around.)

Let the barley soak for about 8 hours then rinse well.

Return barley to the rinsed pot, cover with 2 1/2 cups of water and bring to a boil on high heat.

Reduce the heat to a simmer and cook until the water has been absorbed and the barley is just tender and chewy, about 50 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from the heat, stir to separate the grains and pour into a ceramic bowl or casserole dish.

While the grains are still warm, gently stir in the oil, vinegar, herbs and cheese. Adjust the seasonings with the fresh lemon juice and some freshly ground black pepper.

To serve: On a serving plate, make a ring of sliced tomatoes, slightly overlapping each other, leaving a space in the center of the plate. Mound the pilaf in the center of the plate and garnish with a sprig of basil.

Cook's Notes:

My friend Simona wrote an article about our local organic grain farmer, Kevin, and his grain CSA, which you can read here.

Pilafs I have known generally have more vegetables in them. I would encourage you to add vegetables of your choosing to this recipe, at will. As I will.

Copyright © 2005-2008, Christine Cooks. All rights reserved

No Name Pan Sautéed Potatoes

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I'm still working on a name for this dish. I'm sure it has a name (in that I'm sure it's been done before), I just don't know what it is yet and a Google search was of little help. I served this to Simona and her husband last night and got such rave reviews that I decided that even without good photos (yet), I had to get it on the blog.

Potatoes have received a bad rap from the low carb/low glycemic police. Packed with nutrients, potatoes can and should be part of healthy eating as long as the high-fat toppings and deep-fat, high heat frying are avoided. (This coming from a once avowed low carber who wouldn't have eaten a potato to save her life until recently. More coming on this subject in another post.) That is not to say that would I serve potatoes daily or even weekly as they are a high-starch food that can seriously mess with blood sugar levels, but I no longer fear them as I once did. And it has been found that purple and red potatoes especially are packed with antioxidents. So I say go ahead and enjoy a potato now and then - in its simple humble skin - the way nature intended. This is an easy and very tasty way to serve potatoes with simplicity and minimal fat. I would have sprinkled fresh chopped parsley on the finished dish but am having issues with my greenhouse parsley at the moment. If you make this dish, please have some fresh flat-leaf parsley on hand.

With apologies for the especially bad photo below (what can I say? My settings were off), here's the recipe:

(Nice photo coming soon)

No-Name Pan Sautéed Potatoes
Christine's original recipe
Ingredients:
3 medium sized unpeeled Yukon Gold potatoes (red or purple varieties may be used instead)
5 cloves garlic, peeled and left whole
fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped (for finishing)
1 tablespoon kosher salt (more or less depending on your taste)
freshly ground black pepper (to taste)
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 teaspoon unsalted butter
Preparation:
If you have two cast iron pans or other heavy skillets of the same size, prep them both over medium heat with a teaspoon each of olive oil and butter. Set one pan aside for flipping the potatoes. If you don't, be prepared to flip the potatoes onto a plate and then back into the pan.
Using a mandoline, or if you are very adept and have very, very sharp knives, slice the potatoes paper thin. I know that Yukon Golds are mostly round, but try to slice along the largest side.
If you have a handy little gadget like this, slice your garlic cloves paper thin also. If you must use a knife, slice them as thinly as you can.
After you have melted the butter and olive oil in one pan, remove it from the heat and begin layering the potato slices, beginning at the outer edge of the pan, overlapping the potatoes slightly, going around the pan and spiraling inward until your potatoes reach the center. The entire bottom of the pan should be covered with potatoes. Repeat this process two more times then sprinkle one-third of the garlic over the potatoes along with several generous pinches of kosher salt.

Continue this process until all the potatoes, garlic and salt have been used. You may also grind black pepper over these layers if desired. I chose to grind my black pepper over the whole thing when I'd finished with the layering.
Place the pan over medium heat and cook until the bottom layer of potatoes are well browned and crispy. Adjust the heat, if necessary, to avoid burning the potatoes.
Here's the fun part: Place the other skillet over the one holding the potatoes and, using oven mitts please, hold the two pans together and flip so the potatoes drop into the second prepared pan. Easy, huh?
Now put the potato-filled pan over the heat and cook until the bottoms are crispy-brown, just like the first side.
When all this is done you should have a beautiful and thin pancake-like potato dish that is crispy on the outside and creamy on the inside.

To serve, cover the pan with a plate that will hold the shape of the potatoes intact and again, using oven mitts, flip the pan over the plate, dropping the potatoes in one glorious piece onto your plate.
Sprinkle with freshly chopped parsley, cut into wedges and serve immediately.

Having been very lax at blogging lately and sorely missing some of my favorite food events, this is my entry for this week's Weekend Herb Blogging. The ever-popular WHB was established by my friend Kalyn over two years ago and is being hosted this week by Ramona of The Houndstooth Gourmet. Click here to read about the humble beginnings of WHB and here for how to join in the fun.

Copyright © 2005-2008, Christine Cooks. All rights reserved

Low(er) Glycemic Carrot Hazelnut Cake

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I'm currently taking a series of classes at the Eureka Co-op in regional French cooking with local chef Alex Begovic. In our last class Alex made a simple carrot cake for dessert, unadorned with pineapple or other too-sweet detractions. Just lots of carrots plus chopped hazelnuts. It was delicious, the flavors were perfect, it wasn't too sweet, and I was determined to take the recipe home, up the fiber and lower the glycemic impact. I think I did a pretty good job. The cake came out moist and delicate despite the large chunks of hazelnut you see in the photo. And the carrots fairly sing their presence. A very nice nosh to have with your afternoon tea.

Low(er) Glycemic Carrot Hazelnut Cake
Adapted from a recipe by Alex Begovic
Ingredients:
2 cups shredded carrots
2/3 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
2/3 cup white whole wheat flour
1 cup Splenda Granular (or 1/2 cup Splenda-Sugar Blend)*
1 cup toasted hazelnuts, chopped (husks removed, see Cook's Notes)**
1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, melted
3 eggs (I used 2 large and 1 x-tra large)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt (fine kosher is best)
Preparation:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Butter a 12x8 glass baking dish and set aside.

Using the fine shredding disc on a food processor, shred enough peeled carrots to equal 2 cups. (I shredded too many carrots, the excess of which ended up in this soup.)

Whisk all the dry ingredients together in a large bowl, the hazelnuts will go in later.

In a small bowl whisk the eggs until blended then whisk in the melted butter, a little at a time so you don't cook the eggs.

Stir the egg-butter mixture into the dry ingredients until blended.

Stir the shredded carrots and the chopped hazelnuts into the batter until fully incorporated.

Pour the batter into the prepared dish and bake in the oven for 30 minutes. Alex said it should cook for a full 35 minutes, but mine was done within thirty.

Allow the cake to cool in the pan for about 10 minutes then loosen the edges with a spatula and turn out on a board. Flip the cake right side up and set on a rack to cool.

This can be served warm or at room temperature, with whipped cream or without. It goes especially well with Simona's orange ice cream. You'll have to ask her to post it though. ;)

Cook's Notes:

*If you're not a Splenda user, 1 cup of sugar is what Alex used in his cake.

**Please notice the measurement here. Measure 1 cup of hazelnuts THEN chop them.

To toast and husk hazelnuts, place the hazelnuts on a baking sheet in a 350 degrees oven for no more than 15 minutes or until you can smell the nuts. Immediately remove the nuts from the oven and pour onto a clean terrycloth kitchen towel. Enclose the nuts in the towel and rub them vigorously until most of the husk has been removed.

I used 2 large eggs and 1 extra-large egg because that's what I had on hand. They worked well in this cake because I used white whole wheat flour for one-half of the flour called for, and it's been my experience that this coarser flour needs more moisture. You could up the fiber even more by using 1 cup of the white whole wheat flour and 1/3 cup regular flour or even whole wheat flour. Just remember that you will may need to adjust the eggs to add more moisture. I wouldn't compensate by adding more butter.

This cake may be made vegan by substituting 1/2 cup Earth Balance Stick for the butter and 3 ripe mashed bananas for the eggs.

Copyright © 2005-2008, Christine Cooks. All rights reserved