Asparagus tomato salad with chive blossom vinegar

The house came with an abundance of chives. Now it has a superabundance of chives because frankly otherwise there would be weeds in that spot and I can tolerate chives more than weeds so I let them spread until I'm tired of it.

Plus the pretty purple blooms add color to the back alley garden while they last. They're the purple flowers in the foreground before the purple phlox bullies take over the back. And they keep out the other purple thugs: harebells. What is it with the color purple and restless plants?

Asparagus, tomato and pickled chive blossom salad

Adapted from athoughtforfood.net

Ingredients

2 pounds asparagus

1 pint grape tomatoes

2 tablespoons chive blossom vinegar

3 tablespoons olive oil

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon pepper

¼ cup crumbled goat cheese

Pickled chive blossoms for garnish

Method

Snap tough ends off asparagus and discard (or save for broth). Cut remainder into two-inch pieces. Steam asparagus until just this side of tender. Remove from heat and chill in ice water. (Or if you’re microwave-steaming in a bag, just toss the bag in the freezer briefly to halt the cooking process.)

When cooled down, put asparagus into a large bowl. Cut grape tomatoes in half, or in quarters if large. Toss with asparagus.

Combine vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper and whisk to emulsify. Toss with asparagus and tomatoes.

Divide asparagus mixture among 4 plates. Crumble goat cheese over salads and garnish with chive blossoms. Serves 4.

 

Chive blossom vinegar

Adapted from cathybarrow.com

Place 1 cup chive blossoms in a jar. Top with 1½ cup white wine vinegar. Cover with lid and keep in a dark place for 2 weeks. You can remove the chive blossoms at this point if it’s strong enough or else let it go a few more weeks. Strain into a jar and keep in the refrigerator to help retain its color.

Rating: Obviously I should have been making this vinegar ever since I lived with all those chive blossoms. It's got just the right touch of chive tang without being overpowering. This is so going in every vinaigrette until it's gone. (Vinaigrettes, I've had a few. Why haven't I written that book?) It worked very nicely in the asparagus tomato salad, and the goat cheese was a dandy touch.

Green goddess chicken club salad

 

The recipe for a chicken club sandwich looked delicious. But with a four-foot-square raised bed of leafy greens, salads, not sandwiches are on the menu these days. Better we eat it instead of letting the slugs feast on it. Besides, there's something very satisfying about weekly bringing in a big bowl of lettuce that you know would have cost you $10 at the store and would wilt to mush in next to no time.

But I had a leftover chicken breast  that we'd grilled after it marinated in a mixture of soy sauce, white wine and garlic chives. That also shouldn't go to waste. So I inverted the sandwich recipe a bit, using the dressing called for and using croutons in place of the bread.

Green goddess chicken club salad

Adapted from the sandwich version in “Great Tastes: Cooking(and Eating) from Morning to Midnight” by sisters Danielle and Laura Kosann of The New Potato blog.

Ingredients

1 slice sturdy bread

Olive oil

½ teaspoon dried thyme

3 to 4 tablespoons green goddess dressing

6 to 8 cups mixed salad greens

1 cooked chicken breast, sliced

¼ cup cherry tomato halves

2 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled

Freshly shaved Parmesan for garnish

Method

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Slice bread slice into 1-inch cubes. Toss with a drizzle of olive oil, thyme and some salt and pepper. Spread on a rimmed baking sheet and bake for about 5 minutes until crisp. Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, place 3 tablespoons green goddess in a large mixing bowl. Toss with greens, adding more as needed to get the desired dressing-to-greens ratio.

Divide greens among two plates. Top each with half of the chicken, half the tomatoes, half the bacon and half the bread cubes. Top with a few more dollops of dressing. Garnish with shaved Parmesan. Serves 2.

Green goddess dressing

½ cup mayonnaise

½ cup Greek yogurt

2 tablespoons lemon juice

¼ cup basil leaves

1 tablespoon tarragon leaves

1 tablespoon chopped chives

1 teaspoon anchovy paste

Combine all dressing ingredients in a blender or food processor and puree until smooth. Season to taste with salt and pepper. This makes a fairly sturdy dressing. There will be leftovers. This is not a problem.

Rating: Tasty. That dressing could pinch hit for a dip. And, well, there's bacon.

Lemon rhubarb scones with streusel topping

 

It's still peak rhubarb season here, so I thought I'd try yet another new rhubarb scone recipe to enjoy the largesse. And then I'll go back to my favorite rhubarb scones.

Lemon rhubarb streusel scones

Adapted from Anna at hiddenponies.com via tastykitchen.com

Ingredients

1 tablespoon butter, melted

¼ cup quick cooking oats

½ cup brown sugar, divided

1½ cup flour, plus 1 tablespoon, divided

½ cup whole wheat flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

¼ cup cold butter

1 teaspoon lemon zest

1 cup chopped rhubarb (about 3 goodish-size stalks)

1 whole egg yolk, beaten

1 cup sour cream

½ cup powdered sugar

¼ teaspoon vanilla or almond extract

2 teaspoons milk or cream

Method

Preheat oven to 425. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.

In a smallish microwave-safe bowl, melt 1 tablespoon of butter. Stir in oats, ¼ cup of packed brown sugar and 1 tablespoon flour. Mix well and set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together remaining 1½ cup flour, whole wheat flour, ¼ cup brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add rhubarb and lemon zest and toss to coat. Stir together egg yolk and sour cream. Mix into dry ingredients.

Turn onto a lightly floured surface and knead gently about a dozen times. Pat dough into a 9-inch circle in the middle of the parchment-lined sheet. Sprinkle with reserved streusel mixture. Cut dough into 8 to 12 wedges. (I opted for 8 because I thought my odds of successfully cutting them into 8 were better, since the dough is a tad tacky.) Don’t separate the wedges.

 

Bake 18 to 24 minutes until light brown and cooked through. Reslice into wedges along the cut marks. Let cool slightly before drizzling with a glaze made of the powdered sugar, extract and milk.

Rating: By the time these came out of the oven, I'd developed a bad attitude about this recipe. While not difficult, the recipe is a little more time-consuming and dishes-producing than your standard scones, entering into the this-better-be-worth-it category. And I thought so even after being able to cheat by already having some leftover almond-flavored glaze so I didn't have to whip that up too. Plus, they looked like they'd taste like hockey puck scones -- something about the oats and that touch of whole wheat. But they weren't bad at all. They're very moist inside, more cake-like than scone-like since they're highly leavened and lack that scone crumb. The lemon flavor doesn't really stand out much, but as I say, they're not bad. 

But these are still far and away a better rhubarb scone.

Grilled chicken salad with lemon tahini dressing

We braved the sweltering back yard long enough to pick salad greens before both they and we wilted. A quick wash and trip through the salad spinner followed by a trip to the chill chest worked wonders for reviving the lettuce. A quick batch of Harney's raspberry herbal ice tea helped pick us up a bit, enough to contemplate how to make a dent in a very large bowl of fresh greens. I had a grilled chicken breast on hand, so this seemed like a logical solution.

Grilled chicken salad with lemon tahini dressing

Ingredients
1 chicken breast
4 to 5 cups fresh salad greens
1/4 cup thin slices of cucumber
6 cherry tomatoes, sliced
Lemon tahini dressing
Quick garlic croutons

Method
Lightly brush chicken breast with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Grill about 10 minutes until done, depending on thickness. Let rest until cool enough to slice into thin slices.

Place 2 tablespoons of dressing in a large bowl. Add salad greens and toss to coat, adding more greens or dressing as needed. Transfer to serving plates. Top salad with sliced chicken, cucumber, tomatoes and croutons. Drizzle with more salad dressing as desired.

Quick garlic croutons: Cut 3 slices of a sturdy bread like sourdough into 1-inch cubes. (I practically cheated by using the remnant of last week's cheddar herb bread from Asa Red Wheat Bakery -- so good.) Place on a rimmed baking sheet. Drizzle with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt, some dried thyme and a bit of powdered garlic. Bake for 5 minutes at 350 until brown and crispy.

Lemon tahini dressing

From “The Complete Kitchen Garden” by Ellen Ecker Ogden

½ cup fresh lemon juice

½ cup olive oil

½ cup tahini

2 tablespoons honey

2 large garlic cloves, minced

1 teaspoon salt

Pepper to taste

Combine lemon juice, olive oil, tahini, honey, garlic, salt and pepper in a food processor. This makes at least 1½ cup, so you'll have leftovers.

Rating: This dressing is tasty, with a nice sharp tang from the fresh lemon juice. But it's a bit gloppy. If you're looking for a drizzleable dressing, I'd suggest starting with a quarter cup of tahini instead and adding more if needed.  As is, it's more the kind of dressing that binds things together, which sometimes you want, but probably not when just tossing with loose greens. It worked well with the chicken, however.

Smoked salmon asparagus pasta

 

This is one of those "what's in the house" meals that happens after you've had one of those "why we live here" Saturday morning runs. First stop is the Midtown Farmers Market, followed by Surdyk's for the Belgian beer sale, then Kramarczuk's because we were close by, then Bill's Imported Foods for a vat of olive oil, feta and kalamatas; a quick library stop for a cookbook and a British mystery, then Kowalski's to fill in the gaps and home by the parkway for the spring blooming trees show.

Somewhere in there, some really nice looking smoked salmon landed in our cart, and a quick google on the phone brought me to this recipe. A trip through our potted herbs on the patio rounded out the meal. The ability to wander a few feet from the side door and come back with a bowl brimming with random acts of herbs is one of my favorite parts of spring. That and the frothy crabapple out front even now being plied by dozens of hungry little bees.

Smoked salmon asparagus pasta

Adapted from The Splendid Table''s Penne With Smoked Trout, Cream and Asparagus

Ingredients

1 pound pasta, such as penne or farfalle

½ pound asparagus, ends trimmed

2 tablespoons olive oil

6 large garlic cloves, finely chopped

1 packed cup of fresh herbs (I used basil, chives, lemon thyme, tarragon and marjoram)

Zest and juice of 1 lemon

1 cup cream or half and half

8 ounces smoked fish, such as salmon or trout

 

Method

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Chop asparagus into 2-inch pieces.

Add some salt and pasta to the boiling water. Cook for 5 minutes. Add asparagus to the pot and cook until pasta is al dente. Drain, reserving some pasta water.

In a large saute pan, heat olive oil. Cook garlic until fragrant. Add herbs, lemon zest and juice, cream and salt and pepper to taste. Add smoked fish and cooked pasta and asparagus. Toss together, adding some pasta water if mixture seems dry. Serves 4.

Rating: Spring really did happen. A very nice combination of flavors makes a quick at-home evening meal, and is nice enough you wouldn't mind serving it to company. I used half and half because it's what I had on hand, and I think it was rich enough.

And all of it brought to you by one happy trunkload.