Zucchini-chickpea pancakes

Pancakes! Fritters! Fried vegetables encased in a batter of some kind! I heart them, yes I do.

These dudes are perfect to make when you have a massive zucchini vine that seems to sprout new babies on a daily basis. My zucchini plant only has three leaves right now, since I planted the seeds really late in the season, but yours may not! Even if you have no garden whatsoever, guess what's abundant and cheap at the farmer's market? That's right: zucchini.

Zucchini-chickpea pancakes

chickpea flour
water
zucchini
fresh basil
salt, pepper, paprika
olive oil

First, make a batter with roughly equal amounts of chickpea flour and water--maybe a cup of each. I totally never measure for these, so add more water or more flour if you need it. Aim for the consistency of pancake batter.

Next, cut up your zucchini and basil; I used one and a half medium zucchini and a big handful of basil leaves. You can either grate the zucchini or julienne by hand. If you want to work by hand, I think it's easiest to cut the zucchini lengthwise into three or four slices, then stack and slice on the diagonal. For the basil, just chop roughly.

Mix your zucchini and basil into the batter. Season with salt, pepper, and paprika.

You want a high proportion of vegetables to batter, so they're just coated. If you have too much vegetable content, add a bit more flour and water; if you have too much batter, add some more zucchini.

Heat up a nonstick or cast iron pan on high. Add a little olive oil and swirl to coat. Drop spoonfuls of the batter into the pan, flattening them and filling in any gaps with the back of your spoon. Work a few at a time, so you have space.

When the first sides are browned, flip them over. If your pancakes are really thick, you may want to give them a minute to start browning on the second side, then put a splash of water in the pan, slap on the lid, lower the heat, and let steam for a minute; this way the middle of each is sure to be cooked. Otherwise, just continue to sear, turning the heat down a bit if they start to get over-brown.

As you finish each batch of pancakes, remove them to a plate and cover them with a paper towel, or keep them warm in a low oven, uncovered. Repeat until all the batter is cooked.

These are good on their own, but they're much better with something delicious on top. I had mine with diced tomato and some drops of sriracha sauce, but all kinds of stuff would work. White bean and garlic puree, roasted corn, hummus, baba ghanouj, black bean salsa: whatever.

I made seven 3-inch pancakes and ate them all.

Tempeh chard braise

It shouldn't surprise anybody to hear that the meat substitute of choice at our house is tempeh. (If only we could buy it downtown! But no.) We usually marinate it, sear it, and serve it on top of a gigantic green salad.

The other day, we had tempeh, but no salad greens. Instead, we had kale and chard. This could work, right?

Braised tempeh with chard

tempeh
olive oil
vegetable broth
tomato sauce
soy sauce
red wine vinegar
garlic
red pepper flake, fennel seed, oregano
chard (stems & leaves)
salt, pepper

Start by marinating the tempeh. First, cut your block of tempeh into pieces about an inch square and half an inch thick. In a large bowl, mix together about 1/4 cup of olive oil, a cup of vegetable broth, a couple big spoonfuls of tomato sauce, a few minimal shakes of soy sauce and red wine vinegar, and several cloves of crushed, peeled garlic. Since I was working from frozen vegetable broth and tomato sauce, I heated them both up on the stovetop before I added them to the mix. Season the marinade with red pepper flake, fennel seed, and oregano. A bay leaf couldn't hurt, either.

Put all your tempeh into the marinade, arranging it so it's totally covered by liquid. If you don't have enough liquid, you can add a bit more broth.

Now leave the tempeh to marinate for at least a half hour, and preferably longer. An hour or two is ideal. I personally tend to cut my time as short as possible, because I start cooking when I'm already hungry, but I haven't noticed a huge difference in flavor with a longer marinade.

While your tempeh is soaking, wash a bunch of chard. I used one of the gargantuan bunches with stems two inches wide, partly because they were taking up inordinate room in the refrigerator and partly because I wanted substantial stem content. If you're using smaller chard, you may want to use two bunches. Any color should work fine. Cut (or rip) the leaves off the stems and separate into two piles. Trim your stems and cut them into convenient half-inch pieces. If you have gargantuan chard, cut each stem vertically a few times before you mince across. Essentially, you want to treat it like celery and cut it accordingly.

Give the leaves a rough chop, keeping them separate from the stems. Now set everything aside until your tempeh has marinated enough to cook.

When you're ready, heat up a frying pan, preferably one large enough to hold all your tempeh in one layer. Nonstick or cast iron is good. Warm some olive oil in the pan, add your tempeh (reserving the marinade), and sear. When you've got a reasonable brown color on each side, pour the marinade into the pan and bring it to a simmer. Add your chopped chard stems, turn the heat down to medium, and cook everything together, stirring occasionally, until the liquid is mostly absorbed and the tempeh and stems are tender. Add the chard leaves and a little salt and pepper, mix, and cook for another minute, or until the greens are wilted. Correct seasonings, and you're done.

We ate our tempeh and chard by themselves, but clearly this would be great over rice, barley, or whatever grain you like. If you want to go nuts (or serve more people) you could even do risotto. Voila: dinner!

Midsummer farmer's market

$25 got me:

- 1 dozen brown eggs
- loaf of bread
- bag of grape tomatoes
- bag of green beans
- 2 zucchini
- 1 cucumber
- 1 head celery (which I'm actually v. excited to use to make celery salt)
- 4 ordinary tomatoes
- 2 heirloom tomatoes
- 3 bell peppers
- 3 mildish hot peppers
- 1 red onion
- 2 yellow onions
- 1 head garlic
- 3 yellow pluots
- & 3 white nectarines.

Strawberry cake

Strawberry update: I totally made the cake Rebecca recommended. Since I don' t have anything even faintly resembling a springform pan, I used a smallish rectangular pyrex casserole dish. I also used whole wheat flour instead of the presumptive white. Together, these two circumstances resulted in a cake too shallow for the berries to really sink in and provide moisture. The result tasted good, but it was dry.

After some experimentation, I concluded that the best way to save dryish strawberry cake is to toast it in the toaster oven, split it in half, and spread it with peanut butter. Voila: peanut butter and jelly sandwich cake! In conclusion, I win.

Awesome salad

Clearly, in the heat of the summer (such as it is here in weirdo California--why is it 68F out today after a week of 95F days in April?), no one wants hot food. Therefore, I present: salad.

The big problem with green salad is that it often isn't filling, so you end up staring balefully into the refrigerator 45 minutes after you're supposedly done with dinner. Let's combat this.

What can you put in salad to keep it cool, yet make it substantial?
- Cooked kidney beans, white beans, chickpeas, or what have you. Canned beans are always a good idea when you don't want to heat up the kitchen. You can always toss them with some vinaigrette or quickly saute them with some oil and garlic to improve the flavor.
- Cold meat, such as shredded chicken, tuna, or some finely sliced beef. The problem here is that you often have to cook the meat beforehand. It's a great use for leftovers, though.
- Grains, especially those with substantial protein. Quinoa is the clear star here, but things like bulgur and barley work as well. Using a rice cooker keeps the heat to a minimum, and you can always make a large batch and eat it cold the next day.
- Eggs. A fried egg over a crisp green salad and croutons is a total treat, and takes three minutes to cook. Hard-boiled eggs take a bit longer, but can be done in larger batches, kept for days, and served completely cold.

I decided to go the hard-boiled route.

Egg and green bean salad

eggs
green beans
a good vinaigrette (or oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper.)

The proportion of eggs to beans is up to you; I like using slightly more beans than eggs.

First, hard-boil your eggs. Everyone has their own best method for this. Since we've moved to our awesome new house, complete with a real powerhouse of a stove, I've changed my method. I put the eggs in the cold pan, cover them with water, and bring them to a boil. After boiling for one minute, covered, I turn off the heat and just let the pot sit for five to six minutes. Then I take out the eggs, rinse them thoroughly in cold water, cover them with ice, and put then in the refrigerator to chill. This produces perfect eggs with a tiny dimple of damp at the center of the yolk. However, since everyone's kitchens are different, you should do whatever works best for you.

While your eggs are chilling, cook your beans. I reuse the hot egg water for this, so as not to deal with multiple pots of boiling water in the middle of July. Just wash the beans, trim them, cut them into bite-size pieces, and boil for about three minutes, or until they're done to your taste. Rinse them in cold water to stop the cooking.

By this time, your eggs should be cool enough to peel. Whack them all over with the back of a spoon, and start peeling at the wide end. Once you get under the membrane, the whole peel should come off pretty easily. If you're having trouble, try peeling the eggs under a little stream of water.

Chop your eggs roughly. Put them in a bowl with your beans and a couple spoonfuls of vinaigrette. Mix, mashing the yolks with the back of a spoon, until there's a faint coating of yolk over all the beans and egg whites. Taste and adjust any seasonings.

Now, how do you want to eat your salad?

- Plain, in a bowl. This is usually my first choice, because I am lazy and this salad is good on its own.
- In a sandwich. Yes. Sounds weird; is awesome. Toast bread (or not), spread with dijon mustard or a touch of olive oil, add salad, lettuce, and whatever other vegetable sounds good (roasted red pepper?), and eat. Awesome.
- In another salad. You know how some delis and diners make tuna or chicken salad plates, featuring a big green salad topped with the prepared meat? You can totally do this with any substantial salad. I actually ended up with both my egg-green bean salad and some carrot salad leftovers, so I decided to use them both. The resulting salad: mesclun mix, egg/bean and carrot salads, chopped grape tomatoes, and finely sliced radishes, with a bare scraping of vinaigrette.

Now eat it. Hooray: cold, vegetable-ridden summer lunch!