Habañero HOT Sauce

We’ve been (well, Sean’s been) buying habañeros from Two R’s Farm at the Boulder Farmers’ Market every week since they opened for the season in April. They’re a buck a piece and, though I don’t reach for them while cooking, Sean can’t get enough of them and uses little slivers in almost everything.

After my hiccup reflex from über-spicy, I do agree that they’re great peppers. Sean describes them as an intensely hot pepper with a tropical mango/pineapple undertone that, when coaxed out, make for a very flavorful HOT sauce.

So, we picked up six.

Sean cooked five carrots, four cloves of garlic, and one large onion (all from the market) in olive until they were soft.

Next, he added the six habañeros, two medium sized tomatoes, 1/2 cup lime juice (freshly squeezed, of course), 1/4  cup white distilled vinegar, 1/4 cup water (or more as needed while blending), and honey to taste (he used approximately 1/4 cup of local Uncle Pete’s Honey).

And then… wait for it…

The Vitamix. The. Vitamix. The best decision I’ve ever made, besides dating Sean, was buying a Vitamix.

Sean pureed everything- peppers, tomatoes, lime juice, vinegar, honey, carrots, onion, and garlic until it was smooth and then poured it back into a pot to simmer for another five minutes.

He let it cool as we ate the dinner he had been preparing for us while making the hot sauce. Then, he filled some small jars and preserved them in a hot water bath.

There was a little left over, so we put it in the fridge, and I must say- by the next day I found this sauce to be really good. Don’t get me wrong- it’s hot as hell. But, as Sean says, it has an earthy sweetness from the carrots and a nicely balanced flavor you get from the sautéed veggies. It exudes a touch of tropical flavor in an incredibly hot sauce that’s toned down by the other ingredients, including a touch of local honey.

A little goes a long way, so, I think we’re all set on hot sauce here for a while.

Grilling on the Stove Top with a Himalayan Salt Brick

I bought a Himalayan Salt Brick from Savory Spice Shop to explore something new in my kitchen. Lucky for me, I’m dating a chef, so it turns out he took on the opportunity to try something new and let me drink wine and take photos. Not such a bad arrangement.

A Himalayan salt brick is a large slab of Himalayan crystal salt that you can heat up to high temps to bake, sauté, or grill; chill to serve cold foods; use to cure meats; and present as a serving platter. It’s a gorgeous slab of light pink marbled “stone,” and I’d wanted one ever since they were first for sale at Savory.

Sean and I used our brick once before in the oven, and I never got around to a blog post… been busy guiding food tours, you know.

Baking on the brick was similar to baking on a pizza stone. The stove top, however, was a new frontier.

Sean spent some time researching this one. If you have a gas range you can set the flame in a way that the stone isn’t directly in contact with fire, but heats up. An electric range, however, requires something to be positioned between the stove top and the brick.  We used a tart shell, but a cake ring or wok ring would work also.

After a trip to the Boulder Farmers’ Market, we had carrots, onions, and squash for grilling.

Sean sliced them and threw them on the hot salt brick while marinating some extra firm tofu that had been frozen, pressed, thawed, and marinated in a little peanut oil and Harissa Spice Mix from nowhere other than Savory Spice Shop.

Our meal was simple, yet took quite some time to execute since we spent forty minutes or so heating up the brick, which crackled and poped in ways that concerned us it was going to crack on the stove. The brick did impart a slightly salty taste to the veggies, which were grilled plain, but didn’t give off a flavor that stood up to the Harissa blend. In the end, the food was great and our dinner was fun, but it was a very long process to prepare what could have been a quick meal on the grill outside or the stovetop.  But then, we wouldn’t have been able to say we grilled on a salt brick, now, would we?

Cheers!

Hazelnut Pesto

I bought a bouquet of basil at the Boulder Farmers’ Market. When I picked it up, I knew it was large. When I got it home, the enormity of this bouquet really struck me. What’s a gal to do with so much basil? Pesto, of course.

I had raw hazelnuts in the house, so I decided on hazelnut pesto. I’d never made it before, but walnut pesto is great, so hazelnut pesto should be great, too. And, it is.

First, I roasted a couple cups of hazelnuts in the oven at 200 degrees until they became fragrant. Reminder: PAY CLOSE ATTENTION WHEN ROASTING NUTS! You turn your back for a second and they burn…

When they were cool, I peeled off the skin.

Then it’s all quite simple. I peeled some garlic from the market, washed the basil, found my olive oil.

It took four batches in my mini food processor, plus a little sea salt and freshly ground black peppercorns, and I have multiple meals-worth of pesto.

Finally, I filled two ice cube trays to freeze my pesto so I can enjoy the flavors of the summer harvest in the fall or winter. When I thaw my little pesto cubes, I’ll add some grated parmesan cheese.

Enjoy!

Green Bean and Purple Potato Salad

I love stopping by the Black Cat Farmstand at the Boulder Farmers’ Market on Saturday mornings to see what Chef/Farmer Eric Skokan is harvesting. I’ve been getting into the habit of letting him suggest I try something, and then I ask him how I’m going to prepare it. He almost effortlessly rattles off a recipe to highlight something seasonal, and I rush home inspired to try it. This past week I bought his first harvest of green beans. They were a light green color, which leads me to believe they have some special name other than “green beans,” but for the purpose of this post, they were Black Cat Farm Green Beans. Chef Skokan suggested I blanch them, cool them off, and add them to a potato saldad in a mustard vinaigrette.  So, that’s exactly what I did. I bought a pound of local purple potatoes from the market that day and boiled them after blanching 2 big handfulls of the beans. When they were cool, I coarsely chopped them, mixed them with the green beans, and tossed them in a maple mustard vinaigrette. I let this chill in the fridge for a few hours before serving with turkey burgers and corn on the cob. A perfect summer meal. For a simple Maple Mustard Vinaigrette, whisk together:

•  2 TB Grade B Pure Vermont Maple Syrup
• 2 TB Dijon Mustard
• 1/4 cup Walnut Oil
• 1 TB Apple Cider Vinegar
• a splash of soy sauce