le sauce

grilled halloumi with grape-walnut relish

The whole summer went by and I didn't grill any halloumi! Quite remarkable since some summer's I do nothing but. We bought two bricks of the stuff to take to a barbeque a few weeks ago, that we ultimately couldn't attend, and the shrink-wrapped bricks have been sitting around in my fridge ever since. (Luckily, it's not a fresh cheese and in North America, its sold packed in brine and sealed air-tight so it lasts a long time if refrigerated and unopened.)

Halloumi gets ooey and runny when heated, while still holding its shape and without separating like some cheeses would. It's not like I need a recipe for it when it's perfection simply brushed with oil and heated in a pan. (Aaaand, as it turns out, I already have several recipes and ideas for halloumi to begin with.) But I've never paired it with something as strong as rosemary or as sweet as grilled grapes, so I found this recipe intriguing. It's a great balance of flavours and salty halloumi still gets to be the star, with walnuts and grilled bread adding texture and making it a meal. It's something that's ideal for summer when you're likely standing over a barbeque weekly, but I found it works perfectly well using a grill pan on your stovetop too.

Grilled Halloumi with Rosemary-Grape-Walnut Relish and Garlic Bread

(Via Fine Cooking)

YS Note: *While this recipe instructs you to use an outdoor grill, you can easily make this on the stove using a seasoned or well-oiled grill pan or even a non-stick skillet. You can take all kinds of other liberties with this recipe too, like I did, opting for thyme over rosemary and using baguette slices.

1 medium red onion, cut into 3 to 4 thick slices 
2 Tbs. plus 4 tsp. extra-virgin olive oil 
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper 
12 oz. halloumi cheese, cut into 3/8-inch-thick slabs (or aged provolone, cut into 1/2-inch-thick slices) 
2 large cloves garlic, minced 
1 small loaf ciabatta (about 8 oz.),cut into 1/2-inch-thick slices 
1/2 cup walnuts 
1 tsp. minced fresh rosemary 
1 large bunch seedless black or red grapes (about 1-1/4 lb.) 
2 to 3 tsp. balsamic vinegar 

Prepare a high gas or charcoal grill fire.*

Drizzle the onion slices with 2 tsp. of the oil and lightly season them with salt and pepper. Pat the cheese dry and drizzle with 2 tsp. of the oil. In a small bowl, mix the remaining 2 Tbs. of oil, the garlic, and a pinch each of salt and pepper; brush the mixture evenly over one side of the bread slices.

Meanwhile, toast the walnuts in a small skillet over medium heat, stirring frequently, until golden-brown, 4 to 5 minutes. Coarsely chop the walnuts while still hot and transfer them to a medium bowl. Mix in the rosemary.

Put the onion slices and bunch of grapes on the grill grate. Cover and grill, turning once, until the grapes are bursting and the onions are grill marked, about 10 minutes. Transfer the grapes to the bowl with the walnuts, and the onions to a cutting board. Use tongs to simultaneously pull the grapes from their stems and crush them, dropping them into the bowl. Chop the grilled onions and add them to the bowl. Season to taste with the vinegar, salt, and pepper.

Clean and oil the grill grate. Put the bread and cheese on the grate and grill uncovered, turning once, until marked on both sides, 4 to 5 minutes (about 1 minute if using provolone).

Divide the cheese, bread, and relish among 4 plates and serve immediately.

Serves 4 as an appetizer or 2 as a light dinner

lime and harissa yogurt marinade

A while ago I was singing the praises of yogurt marinades, especially for the grill. They stay put better than oil marinades and of course they add a creamy element. Not that I grill chicken or meats that might dry out on the grill, but if you do, I bet this would be the marinade for you too. I like it on mushrooms, zucchini and other juicy vegetables that I cut into thick slices to be skewered or grilled in a wire basket.

Greek yogurt is thicker than most but you can strain regular yogurt for an hour or two in the fridge to get the same consistency. Simply spoon a little more than a cup of regular yogurt into a cheesecloth-lined strainer set over a bowl and then refrigerate. And while just a little harissa adds the heat here and tons of flavour, a good substitute would be chili paste or sauce with a pinch of smoked paprika. You can take other liberties too, swapping lime juice for vinegar, honey for the marmalade. Just taste to find the balance of tart, sweet and spicy that you'd like. The marinade mellows a little on the grill so don't be afraid to make it a tad punchy.  

perfect for tonight: asparagus, many ways, while you can

It's around this time of year that I get super-excited about ramps, green garlic, fiddleheads--things that you can get during only the shortest window of spring in Toronto. I don't usually jump and down for asparagus. Sure, it's freshest right now too but it's sort of always around and though I do like it, asparagus was never my favourite. Until this spring. Seasoned with nothing more than salt, pepper and oil, I'm reminded that nothing compares to them when they're slightly charred outside with some crunch left just at the centre. Suddenly, I'm passing over curled fiddleheads for these straight, firm stalks, throwing them onto and under as hot a heat as I can summon, oven, grill or pan. 

Actually, it might have been the asparagus mimosa that I made a few weeks ago that kindled this flame. And I did appreciate their flavour and beauty in this very green soup I made a couple of years ago. I can highly recommend any of these methods to you as you snatch up the last local bundles over the next few weeks. I plan on grabbing a few more myself, and not just to eat them with my fingers, french fry-style right off the barbecue. I found this interesting recipe for asparagus all decked out with in-your-face flavour. And served with deep fried lemon slices? I can't think of a better way to round out a plate of asparagus cooked in chili paste and jalapenos.

And then there are the laziest ways ever to enjoy asparagus, especially on the unusually hot June nights that are coming and going this year: raw. Shaved or sliced thin, you can dress them the same way you would any salad. So while I'm feeling the pressure to peel my asparagus stalks in a way I never I have before (anyone else? practically faux-pas not to now, I'm sensing), they are still so damn easy to clean, and in that respect they beat their muddy-rooted or furled competition hands down. In case we're keeping score. 

yogurt marinades

I made a Greek yogurt-based tandoori marinade twice in the same week recently. The first time, it was for mushrooms that I broiled in the oven. Things started smoking, pans started burning but it was worth it to have the marinade turn into a delicious glue that charred in spots. The second time, an outdoor BBQ solved all problems and seemed to sear the marinade in place for more flavour on the food and less everywhere else. 

Which is why I like yogurt marinades generally. Oil-based marinades are great too, but there's often a lot left behind when food is transferred from it to the grill. What I also love about yogurt is that it's perfect for strong, spicy concoctions like tandoori paste or blends with harissa or jerk spices. You can pile on the chili-heavy blends for taste and the yogurt mellows out the heat.

I'm working on a favourite yogurt marinade for the grill to share with you, with lime zest and lots of spices. If you have any favourites of your own, do tell...!

black rice and ramp risotto

Black rice is even cooler than it looks. I confess I bought a bag of it with an idea for this very risotto in mind, and that I singled it out for its looks alone. I pictured it shiny, black and creamy with bright grilled greens on top. It was only in trying to learn more about it to share with you that I discovered that it's apparently crazy good for you too.

That black colour is an indication of the anthocyanin antioxidants that are found in it. It's the same antioxidant in other blue/purple-black food, like blueberries, but black rice contains much more of it, without all of those sugars and with more fiber.

And that colour?

It bleeeeeeeds out. It was almost as if I'd added red wine, not white, when the liquid hit the pot. The hue kept spilling out and while the black rice changed to dark purple, it didn't loose much more of its colour while it cooked. I ended up with that shocking, stained risotto I was after, and I was mesmerized while stirring. 

But enough about beauty and more about flavour. Ramps are one of those fleeting foods that pop up in markets and certain stores in Toronto for a short time in early spring. If you've never had them, they're wild leeks that and taste a little like peeled young garlic at the base, but whose leaves are flat, tender and full of flavour too. Grilled ramp leaves are spectacular and if you haven't tried them that way before, you are in for such a treat.

But, if you can't source ramps for this recipe, leeks, scallions or shallots can replace the ramp bulbs for building flavour in the beginning of this risotto recipe, and grill your favourite spring vegetable to have with this risotto: fiddleheads, asparagus or young leeks would be nice. 

Lastly, don't be intimidated by risotto if you've never made it at home. Yes, there is some stirring involved and a few things you have to watch out for, but the good news is, most of the signs you're looking for are obvious...

halloumi with grilled radicchio and vegetable marrow

i've already been to a barbeque this year. it was on that lovely, hot weekend near the end of march. the hosts were eager and i was willing. it was so nice. and then, it snowed last friday. just a tiny bit, but, despite spring being "here" and all, 99.999% of my meals are still being cooked inside. good thing all you need to grill food is a grill pan.

 

if you've never grilled radicchio before, you have to try it, and if you think you're not a fan of radicchio, you really have to try it grilled. the wedges suck up flavour and get all wilty and blacken but they still stay distinct and even hold a little crunch after all of that. the vegetable marrow, very much like zucchini (which you can use in place of vegetable marrow if you like), could get too soft over high heat, but don't let it. i think of this meal as a warm salad, so i like the vegetable marrow grilled but not all mushy. 

oh, charring is nice, isn't it? the one time you're rewarded for taking things a little too far. those grill marks equal flavour. but! i do not suggest grilling your halloumi in a grill pan, even though i throw it on the bbq all the time. on a grill pan, the cheese tends to melt between the groves and even on a seasoned pan, that makes it almost impossible to get the cheese slices off. i use a non-stick pan instead. yes, another pan to wash but have you had fried halloumi? SO worth it.  

 
halloumi with grilled radicchio and vegetable marrow

4 vegetable marrow (or zucchini), sliced lengthwise

2 small radicchio, quartered, including loose leaves

1 block of halloumi, sliced crosswise into 12

handful basil, chopped

zest of one lemon

marinade:

3 tbs extra virgin olive oil

1 tbs red wine vinegar

juice of ½ lemon

1 tsp dried thyme

1 tsp dried marjoram

¼ tsp salt

¼ tsp pepper

whisk marinde ingredients together in a large bowl. add radicchio and vegetable marrow slices, toss well and allow to sit for 20 minutes.

 

heat a grill pan over medium high heat. grill all of the vegetables on all sides until slightly charred, and the radicchio wedges have wilted. return the grilled vegetables to the bowl with the remaining marinade and toss well.

 

heat a non-stick pan over medium heat. fry halloumi slices on both sides till golden, about 2 minutes per side.

 

transfer vegetables to a serving platter, lay halloumi slices among them and pour any remaining marinade over top. sprinkle with basil and lemon zest. serve immediately.

serves 4 as a starter or side.

sweet and savoury vegetable stew with grilled bread

stew might not be exactly the right word to describe this, because it doesn't actually "stew" that long. in fact the preparation takes more time than the cooking--there are lots of delicious vegetables here that bring the sweet and the savoury to this...stew. but it's warm, rich, deep in flavour and body the way a stew is, so if it looks like a stew and it tastes like a stew, then i say even if it cooks in 20 minutes, it's a stew.

and i suppose the prep could take closer to 20 minutes if you drag someone into the kitchen with you, like i did. pour yourselves a glass of wine and chat while you chop. it's one of those meals. not, i confess, not, a meal that makes it onto the weeknight plan i discussed in a recent post. it's a sunday night supper to be spooned slowly onto bites of bread made fitting for such a satisfying stew...

 

i love you, fire-roasted chilies

the first time that i went to lahore tikka house and ate their already spicy pakistani food, my friend ordered a plate of chilies on the side. that's kinda like asking for hot sauce to put on your hot sauce soup. i mean, i love heat but i was a little surprised that he ordered them and i stared at the plate of blackened peppers for...at least 5 seconds before diving in. right after i took that first searing bite, i understood. it was all about the taste. the chilies were still temperature hot, straight off the open flames, but they had all of thier fresh chili flavour, just a little sweeter, a little more mellow for being cooked. i barely made my way through a couple of them but i loved every bite. 

with that meal in mind, i threw some chilies on the grill at our last barbeque. everyone had a taste and a few brave souls had much more, but most agreed there was something addictive about chilies cooked this way. if you're a fan of all things spicy, i recommend trying this the next time you're cooking on the grill. i bet even if you're scared off at the first bite, you'll be back for the second bite as soon as you're able. 

a random bite of our father's day bbq! (plus, a garden update)

 

i think this past sunday, father's day, was the most gorgeous day of the year so far. it was warm, sunny, breezy, and my family and i sat at the table in the backyard, under the canopy tall, old trees for hours. to celebrate the special day, we had a barbeque and everything except the potato salad went on the grill, from the radicchio and peppers to the (meat-free) jerk "chicken" which was a huge hit. 

 

 

the jerk marinade was my friend's mom's recipe and this weekend was the first time i'd tried it. it was smoky, savoury, and almost perfect--except that despite using two scotch bonnet peppers (crazy, right?) it could have been hotter. i thought the recipe overlooked the "deseeding and deveining" step, but no. it turns out i should have thrown the whole peppers in, as the recipe implied. can't wait to try it again and i must ask to share that recipe with you. if you like jerk, i'm sure you'll love it.

one of the nicest things about sitting in the backyard on sunday was getting to enjoy the flowers that had newly bloomed. when we bought our house last year, james and i inherited a stunning back garden. we haven't lifted a finger this year and already the garden has given us something new to appreaciate every week. it was so well planned that as soon as something shrinks back, another gorgous set of flowers comes out of nowhere, like the fuschia and pale pink peonies (that's my mom holding them in the picture below, but she'd kill me if i posted the full picture) and what i thought was a really lazy flower with a tendancy to crawl along the ground. which apparetly i'm supposed to stake, my mother told me with just the tiniest bit of exasperation. i'm just amazed anything is growing in my presence at all! like our tomato plants whose canopies are getting so big (hooray!) and the summer squash...but notice the little rows of mache in their pretty rectangular box, as small as the last time i showed them to you. the strawberry plants are also too sad to show you at this time. the hard rains have been tough on them. *sigh* i hope to have better results to share with you soon. i try to be patient with these plants and send a lot of positive thoughts their way. but this weekend, i was probaby sending panic thier way, cuz i'm freaking out a little. i need those wild strawberries to happen!  it's the start of summer now, time is almost up!

   

  

grilled ramps

i plan to try making many dishes with ramps this year like risotto, quiche, soup--anything i might use leeks for and more. because they are also referred to as wild leeks, after all, and their flavour sits somewhere between leeks, onions and young garlic. but since the small bunch i grabbed last week was my first of the year, i wanted to have them more purely to really enjoy their taste. this is not really a recipe. it's too easy to be called that. it's just a play-by-play of my dinner last thursday: grilled ramps, leeks, asparagus and grilled bread too, with soft pungent cheese (almost everything i ate that night was pretty pungent actually) and of course some olives and pickled chillies.

first, i went to the market and grabbed some fresh ramps, raw "ramembert" (sheep's camembert by eweda), and some gorgeous sun-dried tomato, garlic and herb bread. then i fished a leek and some asparagus from my fridge. i chopped off and discarded the hard, unusable parts (dark green leek tops, ramp roots, tough asparagus bases), split the leeks down the middle, washed everything. dried everything. sliced the bread. and with the ramps...

i cut those in 3: the white bulb from the red stalks, stalks from the green leaves, because each part is more delicate than the last so they will cook at different speeds. i brushed all of the vegetables and the bread with a faint coating of extra virgin olive oil. i set a grill pan over medium-high heat and when it was heated, i brushed it with oil too. and then grilled, in order of toughness--leeks, ramp bulbs, asparagus first. when they were done, the bread and ramp stems (which i don't think a lot of people eat but i just let them cook till soft and i enjoyed them), and finally the ramp leaves which also get some nice char marks, but only take a second to turn bright green and soften. 

all the grilled vegetables on one platter, platter on the table, grilled bread, room-temperature soft, smelly cheese, olives, pickled hot peppers. oh, and wine. obviously. i could definitely eat this way on market day, every week till fall. more real recipes with ramps to come--quickly, since they won't be around for long. get some fast!