Grilled steaks with blue cheese walnut relish

This recipe calls for sirloin steaks, but we chose chuck eyes, our favorite cheater steak. It’s about the cheapest cut of meat that’s worth grilling, and it’s often much cheaper than sirloin or rib eye but still tender enough. Make sure you get chuck eyes rather than mock chuck or chuck tenders, which are different cuts that need long stewing time to not be tough. Where you buy it makes as much difference as anything. Chuck eyes from Target are just passable, but chuck eye from a good grower/butcher combo are worth it, and still cheaper than fancier steaks from the same source. Either the farmers market or if you’ve got an in at a local small town locker are your best bets.

Grilled steaks with blue cheese walnut relish

Adapted from “American Favorites” by Betty Rosbottom

Ingredients

3 ounces blue cheese

1 tablespoon chopped walnuts

1 tablespoon chopped green onions

1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley

Zest of half a lemon

Steaks to grill

Dried thyme, salt and pepper

Method

Combine cheese, walnuts, green onions, parsley and lemon zest. If making ahead, cover and refrigerate. Bring to room temperature before using.

Sprinkle steaks liberally with thyme, salt and pepper, rubbing into meat. Grill until desired degree of doneness. Top with a generous tablespoon of cheese relish.

Rating: Super simple, and perfectly fine. The leftovers worked on a salad of roasted beets and greens.

Risotto with roasted asparagus and preserved lemon

 I was finally feeling up to a bit of cooking after a week of vertigo. I was amply rewarded with this very tasty meal.

Risotto with roasted asparagus and preserved lemon

 Adapted from healthylivingmarket.com in Saratoga Springs,N.Y.

The original recipe didn't call for roasting the asparagus, but I think the combo pack of the deepened asparagus flavors with the lemon was wondrous. It also called for God's own supply of chives, which I certain have in spades in the alley, but I'm glad I greatly scaled that back.

 Ingredients

12 ounces fresh asparagus

Olive oil for drizzling

4 cups broth

2 tablespoons butter

1 cup risotto

½ cup white wine

½ a preserved lemon, chopped

3 tablespoons chopped chives

¼ cup grated Parmesan

Method

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Snap ends off asparagus spears where they feel like they want to break, discarding ends. Place spears on baking sheet. Drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with coarse salt and pepper. Bake for about 20 minutes until just tender. (Mine were pretty thick and took about 20 minutes for that stage, so check sooner if you’re using the pencil-thin size.) Remove from oven and set aside. When cool enough to handle, chop most of the asparagus into pieces of an inch or two.

Meanwhile, heat broth to a simmer. In a separate saucepan, melt 2 tablespoons butter. Stir in risotto and cook, stirring for a few minutes until the kernels are well glistened and starting to dance. Add white wine and cook, stirring, until liquid is nearly absorbed. Add broth a ladle at a time, stirring and letting the liquid cook down until nearly absorbed each time. When broth is all absorbed (it will take a good half hour, so pull up a stool), add asparagus chunks, preserved lemon and most of the chives and Parmesan. Serve risotto topped with remaining asparagus spears and garnished with remaining chives and Parmesan.

Rhubarb mango scones

Dave maintains that our house was free. It just came with a really expensive rhubarb patch in the alley garden. Given the run-up in value of said rhubarb patch, I guess it behooves me to use it while it’s still in peak form.

Eastern Sky Scones

From “Rhubarb Renaissance,” by Kim Ode, part of the Northern Plate book series about flavors from the land of Bebop-a-Rebop rhubarb pie. The Eastern sky bit refers to the colors found at sunrise, courtesy of rosy rhubarb and bright yellow mango. If you ever have a chance to eat something Kim bakes, know that it falls into the category of treats for which it’s worth sinning.

Ingredients

2 cups flour

3 tablespoons sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon ground cardamom

8 tablespoons cold butter, cut into small chunks

1 cup rhubarb, cut into half-inch pieces

1 cup chopped mango

1 cup heavy cream

Decorative pearl or sanding sugar for garnish, optional

Method

Preheat oven to 450. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Combine dry ingredients. Using a pastry cutter, blend butter into flour mixture until it resembles coarse crumbs. Stir in rhubarb and mango. Add cream and stir just until combined. Turn out onto a lightly floured board (a dough scraper helps) and knead a few times until it forms a workable dough. Pat out into a 9-inch circle. Cut into 8 wedges (again, the dough scraper comes in handy). Transfer to prepared baking sheet. Sprinkle with sugar if desired, and bake for 13 to 15 minutes until light golden brown. Let stand for a few minutes, but serve warm.

Rating: The first bite reminds you that, oh yeah, that’s what rhubarb tastes like. The mango helps keep it moist and adds sweetness. The texture, while not as light as classic scones given the heavy fruit inputs, is still pleasing. Like anything Kim bakes, it’s great. Even if you had to do it yourself.

Chicken salad with tarragon, homemade mayo and grapes

 

A good picnic is the sum of its parts, and sometimes the whole is better than the individual parts.

Today's was hard to go wrong, with soaring eagles overhead, fair weather and a passable picnic packed into the saddlebags on the bike. I might have managed a closer shot of the eagle, above, but I had left the longer lens at home to make room for the footed acrylic glasses in the camera bag. Clearly, food always outweighs photography for me.

This recipe comes from Alana Chernila, whose book includes a chapter entitled "Eat Outside," which I totally get behind. She includes this recipe after her descriptions of elaborate feasts remembered and reimagined from Tanglewood, where they know how to properly picnic. Like me, they realize that it isn't a proper picnic without a cloth tablecloth, although given today's setting I went for the more casual floral variety, suitably heavy to stay put on the windswept bluff.




Chicken salad with grapes
From "The Homemade Kitchen" by Alana Chernila

Ingredients
5 cups cooked chicken
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon water
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup grapeseed oil
2 tablespoons plain yogurt
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley
2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon leaves
5 chives, finely snipped
3/4 cup seedless red grapes
1 cup celery diced
1/2 cup pecans, toasted and chopped
Lettuce for lining plate

Method
Toss chicken with lemon juice and set aside.

Combine egg yolk, water and mustard. (You can use pasteurized eggs if you're concerned about your raw eggs.) Combine oils and whisk into egg yolk mixture, adding in a fine stream. When it's emulsified, add yogurt and salt.

Mix chicken with dressing, herbs, grapes, celery, pecans and some ground pepper. Taste and season with salt if needed. Serve on a bed of lettuce

Rating: Fine enough, but oddly despite featuring homemade mayo, it wasn't sublime. I've actually made a better version of this from a Rachael Ray recipe, of all things. So not bad, but it didn't knock it out of Spring Lake Park.

Also on the menu: Asian coleslaw (6 cups cabbage/carrot mix, 1/4 cup rice wine vinegar, 1 tablespoon chopped cilantro and 2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil), cantaloupe wedges, some homemade pickles, and chocolate cupcakes I found in the freezer. So all in all, a perfectly fine picnic.

Grilled pork chops with rosemary lemon butter

Sometimes, recipes don’t adhere to reality. But they can still work out.

Rosemary-Lemon Pork Chops With Ember-Smoked Butter

From “Weber’s New American Barbecue,” by Jamie Purviance via the Star Tribune

Ingredients

4 pork chops of desired type and thickness; just make sure they're all roughly the same

¼ cup olive oil

2 lemons, divided

2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons chopped fresh rosemary leaves, divided

1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon country-style Dijon mustard, divided

1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon minced garlic, divided

6 tablespoons butter, softened

Method

Mix olive oil, zest and juice of 1 lemon, 2 tablespoons chopped rosemary, 1 tablespoon mustard, 1 tablespoon garlic, 1¼ teaspoon salt and ½ teaspoon pepper in a glass pan. Coat pork chops with mixture. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Mix butter, zest of remaining lemon, 2 teaspoons rosemary leaves, 1 teaspoon mustard, 1 teaspoon garlic, ½ teaspoon coarse salt and ¼ teaspoon black pepper. Form into a log, wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour.

Remove pork chops from marinade, draining excess. Grill until desired doneness is reached; these don’t take long. They call for using lump charcoal, which we always do. Obviously you can grill them on any grill, but it’s pertinent for this next bit.

Place a slice of butter on each chop. And this is where the instructions get wacky: Use tongs to lift an ember of lump charcoal “about the size of an orange” and “very carefully” set the ember on top of each piece of butter for 1 to 2 seconds to smoke and melt the butter. No really. My husband, the designated drinker/griller for this event, made a sound worthy of Saturday morning cartoon characters at this suggestion, so we skipped that part.

The rating: The pork chops by themselves are fine enough; hard to say how much of that was due to the marinade and how much is due to good Hilltop chops. But the butter is a keeper. It’s so, so tasty, even without the vaguely ridiculous ember anointment. Plus, the leftovers are awesome on bread fresh from the oven. Or fish, or steaks, or any number of other things.

Oh, and those Hasselback potatoes in the picture came from the same recipe source and off the same grill. But I’m not including that recipe because in my opinion it’s clearly in need of refinement before it’s worth talking about, flavorwise. I did find one reader comment useful in preparing those: To help keep from accidentally cutting all the way through, place wooden skewers or chopsticks on either side as you slice. That part worked OK, but I'll be doing some experimenting with better flavor infusion before you see these again.

Chicken thighs with preserved lemon

This is so simple it barely counts as a recipe, but it's good enough I'll share anyway.

From  "Food52 Genius Recipes from Canal House

Ingredients
Chicken thighs, skin-on, bone-in
Olive oil
Salt and pepper
Preserved lemon

No really. That's it. If you want something more precise, they specified 8 thighs, 1 tablespoon olive oil and rind from half a preserved lemon, but obviously, just cook as many thighs as you need to serve and scale accordingly.

Method
In a large deep skillet over medium heat, heat enough olive oil to skim the bottom of the pan. Season chicken liberally with salt and pepper and place skin-side down. Cook without moving or turning until chicken is well-browned and crispy. Just do yourself a favor and don't check for 15 minutes. Flip it over, add preserved lemon rind and cook for another 15 minutes. They didn't call for putting the lid on, but I covered it for the final side cooking to make sure it got cooked through. If you've got a splatter guard, you'll be happier when it comes time to clean up the kitchen.

That's it. And it's tasty.

Pork burgers

Right before the Midtown Farmers Market opened up for the season, I used up the last of the meat we filled the freezer crevices with last fall from Hilltop Pastures. I thought of that final package of ground pork when I saw this recipe.

Pork burgers

Adapted from "Food52 Genius Recipes," ambitiously subtitled 100 recipes that will change the way you cook. This particular recipe is adapted from Suzanne Goin. The full recipe calls for making your own aioli and Romesco sauce. I cheated with purchased aioli and used my hot tomato chutney in place of the sauce.

Ingredients

3 tablespoons olive oil, divided

½ cup diced shallots

1 tablespoon minced garlic

1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves

½ teaspoon ground cumin

3/8 teaspoon ancho chili powder

2 pounds ground pork

4 ounces fresh chorizo

3 ounces diced bacon

2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley

1¼ teaspoon salt

6 slices Manchego cheese

6 hamburger buns

2 ounces arugula

Aioli

Romesco, chutney or other tomatoey condiment

Method

In large skillet, heat 2 tablespoons olive oil over medium heat. Add shallots and cook until nearly softened. Add garlic, thyme leaves, cumin and ancho chili powder and cook a minute more. Season with salt and pepper. Let cool.

Mix shallot mixture with pork, chorizo, bacon, parsley and salt. Form into 6 patties. Chill patties for an hour. (This is a pretty crumbly mixture, and refrigerating it helps it hang together.)

If grilling, preheat grill. Brush patties with remaining tablespoon olive oil. Cook 3 to 4 minutes a side until desired degree of doneness. (You may want to use a grill pan, depending on how wide your grill rack grates are.) Or cook in a skillet until done. Top with a cheese slice, cover and cook briefly until melted.

Spread buns with aioli and top with burgers. Top with Romesco or chutney, then arugula.

Rating: Tasty, and not at all dry like some pork burgers can be. I'm sure homemade aioli and Romesco sauce would have been even tastier, but I won't quibble with tasty.