Madhu Knits and Cooks

Pan-Fried Salt and Pepper Eggplant - Excellent Savory Flavors

Yes, another Hetty McKinnon To Asia, With Love recipe to report on today - the pan-fried Salt and Pepper Eggplant.  This simple, marinated eggplant is coated in cornstarch before being lightly pan-fried and dusted with a savory and sweet salt and pepper / five spice mix.

The complex flavors of the spice mix are a great complement to the sweet and sour eggplant, which is perfectly tender under its crisp cornstarch coating. 

I would make this recipe again, and continue to use less oil (I basically just lightly coated the pan instead of filling it to 1/2 inch). 

The only downside of this multi-step recipe is the number of dishes it uses (marinating eggplant, cornstarch mix, salt and pepper mix, paper towel-lined plate for the post-cooked eggplant) so it might not be an everyday dish!

Solid Classic Egg Salad

Egg salad, egg salad - how you have entered our lives!  Building on the success of my first homemade egg salad, I decided to try a more traditional, mayonnaise-based egg salad from the Cook's Illustrated team.   

This egg salad was pretty good - the eggs cooked better this time (less dry) and the inclusion of mayonnaise didn't result in too bland of a flavor.  Instead, the herb, red onion, and celery flavors came through pretty well.  I added some leftover tarragon to this recipe as well. 

And while the dijon mustard added a nice tang, I think a slash of champagne vinegar would have also helped add more diversity of flavors to this otherwise tasty egg salad.  I look forward to making this recipe again! 

Eggs, Eggs, Eggs! Herbed Deviled Eggs - Likely Not a Recipe Repeat

Inspired by my deliciously herby egg salad, I decided to try some Herbed Deviled Eggs.  Unfortunately, as it turns out, chopped herbs aren't as wonderful in deviled eggs.

I found their texture to be displeasing in the otherwise smooth filling.  And unfortunately, I also found the mayonnaise in this recipe to be too overwhelming, and it also washed out the flavor of the herbs.  So not great texture and not great flavor. 

Granted, I didn't have sour cream on hand to cut the mayonnaise flavor, and I also didn't bring the eggs to a boil on high enough heat, so the yolks were also overcooked.  Combination of user error and a recipe that didn't match my tastes.  On to the next!

My First Egg Salad - Sans Mayonnaise, Slightly Tart, and Full of Herbs

I don't know if I had ever consumed egg salad prior to a few years ago.  Why?  I wasn't a big fan of cooked eggs growing up (hence 2018 for my first hard boiled eggs attempt), and I also have similarly never been a huge fan of mayonnaise.  So you can tell why egg salad hasn't been that appealing.

How did that change?  Well, ever so slowly, I have been trying egg salad sandwiches, largely because vegetarian sandwich options can sometimes be very limited.  This includes during a driving trip we took to Nova Scotia last summer.  As it turns out, limited options can lead to great discoveries, including a truly marvelous, herby egg salad sandwich at the Bread Gallery in West Hants, Nova Scotia.

While tasting that remarkable egg salad, not heavy on mayonnaise and very heavy on fresh herbs, I thought I was a full egg salad convert.  Sadly, in the months that followed, I largely ate mushy, bland, and too mayonnaise-filled egg salads.  So when I finally decided to make an egg salad at home, I searched for recipes that would be heavier on the herbs and light on the mayonnaise.

I was quite surprised to ultimately find an entirely mayonnaise-less, herb-heavy recipe on Milk Street.  Thankfully, the result was great - not quite what I remembered from the Bread Gallery, but very good with tarragon, chives, parsley, red onions, and ground turmeric.  And the best part - some light tartness from some champagne vinegar.  

Halving the recipe was great for 3 - 4 servings. The only modifications I would make moving forward are to chop the eggs a bit smaller than the recipe calls for and perhaps experiment with a bit of vegenaise for slightly more creaminess.  Otherwise, I loved that the eggs weren't pulverized into a mushy, dry paste like too many egg salad sandwiches and that the fresh herb flavors came through.

Milk Street's Ndambe - A Sadly Bland Attempt at a Senegalese Sweet Potato and Black-Eyed Pea Stew

Sometimes meals can taste too healthy.  And while I generally strive for the intersection of healthy and flavorful, today's recipe, Milk Street's Ndambe, illustrates how easy it is to veer too far in one direction or the other.

It's particularly sad given how pretty this soup looks, with its bright orange, red, and green colors.  My guess is that I should have probably used vegetable broth instead of water to add more flavor, and also lots more herbs beyond the 1/2 cup of chopped parsley and lemon juice added at the end? 

I don't know if I will make it again, but at least I know with its sweet potatoes, black-eyed peas, and fresh vegetables, it's a recipe for longevity!

Savory, Creamy, Sweet, and Tart White Bean, Apple, and Celery Salad - A New Lunchtime Staple

Rancho Gordo continues to deliver not only amazing heirloom beans, but also equally impressive recipes.  My latest attempt was their innocuously named Celery and White Bean Salad.  

This room temperature / chilled bean salad is a tour de force.  It has crunchy, bright diced celery and carrots; apple; blue cheese; lemon juice; and parsley.  The original recipe also calls for pecans which I omitted because of my nut allergy.  Combined with a base of creamy alubia beans, each bite is delightful.

I made some additional recipe edits beyond the pecan omission.  I used approx. 1 - 1.5 cups of cooked alubia beans (8 minutes high pressure in the Instant Pot, natural release).  I substituted gorgonzola for the Stilton, and a honeycrisp for the green apple.  I also added more salt and pepper to amp up the flavors. 

I will be making this salad again and again, including later this week!

Hetty McKinnon Obsession Continues - NYT Silken Tofu with Spicy Soy Dressing

As recent posts have shown, I've been on a true Hetty McKinnon kick the past few months.  The latest?  Not from one of her wonderful cookbooks, but instead a NYT Cooking recipe.  

I slightly freestyled this recipe for Silken Tofu with Spicy Soy Dressing because I was using a partial block of leftover silken tofu, but the result was really wonderful. 

Salty from the soy sauce, savory from the sesame oil, slightly sweet from the sugar and rice wine vinegar, spicy from the chile oil, and crunchy from the scallions - yum. 

A benefit of using a partial leftover block of silken tofu is that it had naturally drained in the fridge, making prep that much more of a cinch. 

The tofu I used had been out of the fridge for an hour or two, so slightly more room temperature than cold, which I liked a lot.  

Lisa Fain / The Homesick Texan's Salsa Tatemado - Mild, Smokey Tomato Salsa

With Cinco de Mayo fast approaching, I decided that I wanted to up my salsa game and turned to the excellent Homesick Texan for advice.  I settled on Lisa Fain's salsa tatemada recipe because it seemed sufficiently different from other salsas that I've made.

The salsa ended up being quite easy to prepare, even with my substitution of tomatoes on the vine for plum tomatoes and my use of a foil-lined quarter baking sheet instead of a skillet.  You basically roast the heck out of the ingredients before blending the ingredients with salt and water.

The result was smokey, mildly spicy, and had an unexpected herbiness from the fresh cilantro blended into the salsa.  I added extra salt to to get more of the ingredients' flavor to come out, and moving forward I will likely play with the cilantro ratio.  There was something  unpleasant I found about the fresh cilantro blended in with the roasted ingredients, even though I otherwise like cilantro. 

Regardless, this will likely be a recipe repeat this summer!

Unique Whole Baked Cauliflower that Tastes Like Falafel

Whole baked cauliflowers - they are a thing!  This next attempt from Milk Street, the Cauliflower with Spiced Tahini and Garlic-Chili Oil, definitely was the opposite of the lightly flavored Miznon whole cauliflower.  This cauliflower burst with strong dried spice (cumin, cinnamon, sumac, cardamon) flavors, bright parsley, and an olive oil / tomato glaze of sorts.  And I omitted the pine nuts, which probably would have added another strong flavor!

In all, my husband said this cauliflower almost tasted like falafel, which seems fairly accurate with the deep, dried Middle Eastern spice flavor.  I would make this again for a crowd, but would need to pair it with carefully picked sides as this definitely is a distinct flavor explosion.  

Cooking note:  The cauliflower was 1.6 pounds and I cooked it for 40 minutes in a more tight foil wrap, and it baked up fine!

My First Yeasted Crackers - KAF Soda Crackers

I keep ordering King Arthur Flour (KAF) flour, which means I have needed to use up my existing flour to open up pantry space!  Enter the KAF Gourmet Soda Crackers recipe to use up the last bits of my KAF Italian-Style Flour Blend.  

This recipe had the added benefit of being my first attempt at yeasted crackers.  The dough was incredibly easy to construct, just whisking the dry ingredients together and then adding melted liquids.  I did end up using approx. 30g of all-purpose flour because I ran out of the Italian blend (yay - mission accomplished!).

Then let the dough rise in fridge overnight before resting and rolling out.

I didn't get the dough as thin as called for in the recipe, perhaps because I used a tapered rolling pin instead of one of my (many) flat pins.  I also didn't have pizza seasoning or smoked / seasoned sea salt, so subbed instead mostly Italian seasoning, dried thyme, and Maldon sea salt (approx. 1 tsp. total of seasonings).  I probably could have added a lot more flavoring as the baked crackers seemed like they could have handled more bold flavors.

I baked the crackers for approx. 8 minutes instead of 10 because I was worried about overbaking them after they became golden.  That amount of time was perfect for the smaller crackers, but not the larger pieces, which ended up slightly soft post-cooling.

However, I would definitely make these crackers again.  They were flavorful with a nice yeasted flavor lightly complemented by the salt and herbs.  I also bought some herbes de provence which I think will be great on these crackers.  And the prep was super easy to boot!