The phyllo crisps are a great alternative to croutons. You can use a variety of herbs. Rosemary, oregano, parsley and chives are all great options. Stacking this salad also makes for a great presentation.

Serves: 3

Ingredients

For the herbed, Parmesan crisps:
3 sheets of phyllo dough
1/4 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup of melted butter
1/2 teaspoon of freshly chopped thyme
1 teaspoon of freshly chopped sage

For the baby green salad:
8 oz. of mixed baby greens
Champagne Mustard Vinaigrette

Preparation

For the herbed, Parmesan crisps:
1. Preheat the oven 375 degrees F.
2. Melt the butter in a small pan.
3. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Lay one sheet of thawed phyllo dough and brush generously with the melted butter. Sprinkle with grated Parmesan herb
4. Repeat with the other two phyllo sheets.
5. Place the baking sheet in the refrigerator for about 10 minutes or until the butter firms up.
6. Cut the phyllo sheets into 3″ squares.
7. Back until golden brown. Approximately 10 mins.

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I am supposed to be watching my food intake as I continue to prep for my test. Let’s not call it a diet, as that traps me a bit. So…this is cheating a bit but to adhere to my mindful food intake, I just had one serving.

Serves: 2

Ingredients

For the phyllo wrapped banana:
3 sheets of phyllo dough
1/4 cup of finely chopped pistachio nuts
2 ripe bananas
6 TBs. of melted butter

For the pistachio vanilla ice cream:
8 oz. of vanilla bean ice cream
2 TBs. of honey
2 4 oz. ramekins
1/4 cup of chopped pistachio nuts

Preparation

For the phyllo wrapped banana:
1. Preheat the oven 375 degrees F.
2. Melt the butter in a small pan. I don’t like microwaving to melt butter because of structural change of the butter.
3. Lay one sheet of thawed phyllo dough and brush generously with the melted butter. Sprinkle the the sheet with the pistachio nuts.
4. Repeat with the other two phyllo sheets.
5. Cut the phyllo sheets in half on the vertical.
6. Place a banana on each half and roll them up.
7. Brush with melted butter and sprinkle with pistachio nuts.
8. Bake until golden. Approximately 15-20 mins.

For the pistachio encrusted vanilla ice cream:
1. Set the ice cream at room temperature til softened but still firm.
2. Brush some honey into each ramekin.
3. Sprinkle the pistachio nuts into the ramekin and roll them around in the ramekins to get good coverage.
4. Spoon the vanilla ice cream into each ramekin, cover with saran wrap and place into freezer until hardened.

Serve with a simple chocolate sauce and fresh berries.

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This recipe is really for K. She emailed me the other day and asked for suggestions on what to do with 7 lbs. of blueberries. I love getting these questions! My brother was in a cook off a few weeks ago and the ingredient was mushrooms. He asked me for a dessert dish… I said, a tart with ground mushrooms crust, mascarpone creme, with fresh strawberries and a reduced balsamic syrup. He didn’t make it. I think that’s why he lost the cook off.

Let’s get back to K. This recipe doesn’t take care of 7 lbs. of berries. It’s a start and I’ve got a blueberry almond tart recipe in the works.

This is a really rich dessert. Zabaglione is a custard that’s usually spiked with Marsala wine. I like to use Port and sometimes a sweet Moscato.

Serves: 4-6

Ingredients

For the Mascarpone
1 lb. of Mascarpone cream at room temperature
1/4 cup of powdered sugar
1 1/2 cup of heavy whipping cream
1 1/2 tsp. of vanilla extract

For the Zabaglione
4 egg yolks
4 TBs. or to taste- sometimes, if the mood strikes, I’ll add up to 1/2 cup of sugar. =P
3 TBs. of port

1 pint of blue berries and some cookies for garnish

Preparation

For the Zabaglione
1. Beat the egg yolks until they’re light and fluffy. I’d use a double boiler if I had one but a heatproof glass bowl, over a pan with simmering water does the trick.
2. Whisk in the sugar.
3. Add the port wine.
4. Whisk over simmering heat until cream begins to thicken. When you start seeing little bubbles forming, it’s good to go. Be careful not to boil.
5. Let it stand to cool a bit.

For the Mascarpone cream
1. In a mixer, whisk the cream, vanilla extract and powdered sugar until it’s smooth and thickened.
2. Smash out the mascarpone cream into a bowl and fold in the whipped cream.
3. Stream in the warm Zabaglione and mix until smooth.

Spoon some of the Mascarpone Zabaglione into a glass, top with blueberries and serve with some almond cookies. I hope you enjoy it, K!

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I’ve got a few cookbooks on the shelf…ok, shelves…ok, several books…fine, a lot of books on the shelves. So much so that C said, “You can’t shouldn’t buy anymore cookbooks until you make at least one recipe from each book on those shelves.”

So…here’s one. It’s a modified recipe from Patrick O’Connell’s Refined American Cuisine. DON’T let the long list of ingredient deter you from this recipe. It’s essentially chopping and pan frying, and it’s simple to make. So sharpen your knife and with little tweaks here and there and you’ve got the wonderful colors and flavors of Spain on your plate.

Ingredients

For gazpacho sauce:
3 1/2 lbs. tomatoes, cored and coarsely choppped
1/2 cucumber, peeled, seeded and coarsely chopped
1 red bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1/2 jalapeno, seeded and chopped
1/2 medium Vidalia onion, coarsely chopped
2 stalks celery, coarsely chopped
1 tsp. minced garlic
3 TBs. extra virgin olive oil
1/2 tsp. Tabasco
1 TBs. fresh lemon juice
1 TBs. rice wine vinegar
1 tsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. ground cumin
1/2 tsp. celery salt
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

For Gazpacho salsa:
3 TBs. peeled, seeded and minced tomato
3 TBs. peeled, seeded and minced cucumber
3 TBs. seeded and minced red bell pepper
3 TBs. seeded and minced green bell pepper
3 TBs. seeded and minced yellow bell pepper
1 tsp. seeded and minced jalapeno pepper
1 TBs. minced red onion
1 tsp. minced shallot
1 tsp. very finely chopped cilantro
1 tsp. finely chopped fresh tarragon
1/2 tsp. celery salt
1 TBs. extra virgin olive oil
1 TBs. sherry vinegar
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

For cod:
2 TBs. of extra virgin olive oil
4 6oz. cod fillets
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
6 TBs. of store bought black olive tapenade for topping. If you’re in the mood to make a fresh batch, check out my black and green olive tapenade.

Preparation

For the Gazpacho sauce:
1. In a blender or food processor, puree the tomato, cucumber, bell pepper, jalapeno pepper, onion, celery and garlic in batches until smooth. Strain.
2. Add the olive oil, Tabasco, lemon juice, vinegar, sugar, cumin and celery salt. Mix well and refrigerate. After the sauce is chilled, season with salt and pepper, bring to reoom temperature before serving.

NOTE: recipe makes approximately 5 cups. You’ll have left overs for a nice chilled out soup.

For the Gazpacho salsa:
1. Combine the tomato, cucumber, bell peppers, jalapeno pepper, red onion and shallot.
2. Stir in the cilantro, tarragon, celery salt, extra virgin olive oil and sherry vinegar.
3. Season with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper and refrigerate.

For the cod:
1. Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium high heat.
2. Liberally season both sides of fish with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.
3. Depending on thickness, my cod fillets were a little over 1″ thick, cook the cod about 4 minutes per side, until edges are crisp and have a deep golden color.

Plating

1. Pour enough Gazpacho sauce to cover the bottom of a deep plate.
2. Drizzle olive oil around the sauce.
3. Spoon 1/2 cup to a 1 cup of salsa, depending on preference.
4. Top the salsa with a cod fillet and spoon 1 TBs. of black olive tapenade.

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I don’t know about other bloggers of my ilk, but it’s a rare occasion that I have the interest to dine out and even rarer still that I get excited to try a place. It had been a long time since I’d been out to Ann Arbor and when I heard about eve, my interest was piqued.

So…how was it? This is where I’d go into the “Bon Appetite” like review and bust out a lovely entry about what the dining experience was like. Yeeeah, no. There are enough sites out there that give you reviews. Would I recommend eve to friends, yes but I’d tell them to not get the lamb loin and order the Moroccan scallops. I’d also suggest another dish, that we didn’t order, the Thai barbequed tofu napoleon. How can we suggest without trying? Well, I made a variation of it and loved it. I’d think eve’s would be much better.

Here’s my variation on the recipe with some liberties.

Serves: 6-8 depending on how high the stacks

Ingredients

2 14 oz. blocks of extra firm tofu
2 cups of Thai BBQ Marinade
2 mangoes peeled and sliced widthwise
1 squash zucchini cut in half and thinly sliced widthwise
1 cup of seaweed wakame salad
extra virgin olive oil
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Optional: 1/2 of coconut milk to taste for the bbq sauce

Served with cumin roasted baby carrots.

Preparation

For the mangoes and zucchini:
1. Preheat the grill or grill pan. I like to grill the mangoes to get their sugars out and caramelized. Grill the mango slices about 2 minutes a side.
2. Season the zucchini slices with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper. Drizzle with olive oil and grill until tender about 6 minutes total. Cover to keep warm. Set aside.

For the tofu:
1. Preheat broiler. In a non-reactive saucepan, reduce the thai bbq sauce over low heat until thickened to consistency of peanut butter. I added additional coconut milk to this because I am a sucker for it and so are C and my sis. It’s optional though.

2. Season the tofu generously with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.

3. Heat olive oil in a large sauté pan over medium high heat. Sauté the tofu until it’s lightly golden, but still tender inside. Remove from pan and place onto a baking sheet greased with olive oil.

4. Brush tofu with BBQ sauce and broil the tofu until the BBQ starts to bubble.

Plating

1. Place one slice of tofu down, add some seaweed salad to cover the tofu.
2. Add a grilled zucchini slice and then mango slice. Repeat until desired stack height.

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