Moroccan Carrot Salad

So carrot salad - sounds a little gross, huh?  It reminds me of jello molds and various other weird 1950's-esque potluck dishes.  For some reason, it sounds like it should have mayonnaise and raisins in it.  Maybe carrot salads in the US traditionally have both in them.  Actually, I just Googled "carrot salad recipes" and they do in fact traditionally have raisins and mayo in them.  Gross.  And it appears that they sometimes have pineapple in them, or various other fruits.  Also gross.  This carrot salad has none of the above.  And I'm not exactly sure what inspired me to make a carrot salad, except that I was thinking Moroccan and had a ton of carrots from the CSA in the fridge.  But I saw a recipe on Epicurious for a Moroccan Raw Carrot Salad and it piqued my interest.  The best thing about it was that there was no mayo or raisins involved, just evoo, lemon juice, cilantro and spices.  Actually, that was the second best thing.  The best thing was that the carrot salad was good.  Really good.  Alex ate forkful after forkful, and he was even more skeptical about making carrot salad than I was.  I knew it had to be good after I saw Alex go back for his third forkful.

Recipe after the jump!

Faux-Moroccan Roast Chicken with Harissa Sauce and Couscous with Fresh Cilantro and Lemon Juice

So I must admit that I am rather proud of myself for sticking with my resolution to make more Asian recipes this week.  And here I am making Moroccan food, which I also mentioned that I had been wanting to make.  I seem to be on something of a Moroccan (or faux-Moroccan because I'm certainly no expert on Moroccan food) kick lately.  Not too long ago we made Quasi-Moroccan Turnip Greens and Moroccan Meatloaf.  And before that I made some Crispy Roasted Chickpeas with a homemade Moroccan spice blend.  We also made a Moroccan carrot salad, but I will have to post about that later.  I really enjoy the flavor combinations in Moroccan food - the sweetness of cinnamon, the smokey cumin, the spicy cayenne, the floral coriander...  It all just works so beautifully together.  I go through spice phases and this seems to be my current phase.  

Anyway, you have to try this chicken.  I know that I am always roasting chicken breasts and then posting about how wonderful they were, but these were truly spectacular - moist, juicy and very flavorful.  The light dusting of flour on the chicken helped to turn the skin nice and crispy by forming a light crust.  Otherwise I think that the skin would have remained flaccid and gummy from soaking overnight in the marinade.  The chicken was really lovely when dipped into the spicy and vinegary harissa sauce.  It would have been good without the harissa, but the harissa really gave it that something extra.  Plus it gave it some heat and I just can't help but to enjoy spicy things.  The couscous was pleasant, but a little bland. Then again, I purposefully looked for a couscous recipe that sounded a little bland because I figured that the thicken would be very flavorful and I didn't want competing flavor profiles.  Really all I wanted with the couscous was a nice side that would complement or balance out the chicken.  And I got that.  If I were to serve the couscous with a slightly less flavorful main dish, I would probably cook the couscous in chicken stock (instead of water), add more lemon juice/zest, and perhaps toss a bit of cayenne pepper in with the couscous while it steamed.

Recipes after the jump!

Coconut Shrimp

I have had this recipe bookmarked to try for awhile.  And when I say bookmarked, I mean that I flagged it with a little sticky when I first bought The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook.  I tend to scan through brand new cookbooks within the first few days and bookmark/flag all of the recipes that really interest me.  And then once I make those recipes, the flags come off.  What can I say?  I'm a lawyer.  I love little stickies and I particularly love those highlighters that come with flags in them.  They are awesome.  Ok so I'm a geek.  What of it?

Anyway, considering that I had been waiting months to make this recipe and was all excited about it, in the end I thought it was not that exciting.  Don't get me wrong, it was good.  I ate it all, but I don't think I would make it again.  Now part of that might be due to the fact that I had to substitute sherry for cognac (since I didn't have cognac, brandy or rum), and I tend to find sherry to be a bit overwhelming.  I briefly considered adding some dry white wine in lieu of the cognac and maybe that would have been a better substitution.  I also thought that the toasted coconut got soggy way too fast when you added it to the shrimp, which seemed to defeat the purpose of toasting it in the first place.  I'm not sure.  I think I was just expecting more from the dish since the rest of the recipes I have tried from the cookbook have been so great.  I also really love the combination of shrimp and coconut - but I just didn't get much coconut flavor from the dish.  All I really tasted was sherry (which, again, was more my fault than anything else).  I also thought the dish was crying out for something else to give it another layer of flavor.  Perhaps some minced ginger (just a little bit) would have been a nice addition?  I don't know.  But in the future if I have a craving for coconut shrimp, I will probably make these Coconut Shrimp instead.

Recipe after the jump!

My Crazy Chicken (Turkey) Rice Noodle Stir-Fry

Look at how good I am!  Two nights, two Asian recipes in a row.  Go me!  Or go us, since Alex has been equally responsible for cooking (although I have done all of the menu planning and almost all of the grocery shopping).  So thank you hubby for making my Asian recipes possible.  And thanks also goes out to our friend Mark for telling us about this recipe in the first place.  I can't remember how long ago it was that Mark first told me about this recipe, but Alex and I made it once years ago and then forgot about it entirely.  And then when I was thinking about Asian recipes earlier this week I suddenly remembered this recipe.  Luckily, all we needed from the grocery store were some rice sticks/stir-fry noodles and some basil and we were in business.

Yum.  This recipe was even better than I remembered.  I think last time we used ground chicken instead of ground turkey and the chicken was dry and didn't soak up much of the sambal and lime juice mixture.  And if I recall correctly, the noodles were overcooked and a bit gummy, so they didn't soak up the sambal-lime mixture either.  But this time the entire dish had some serious flavor and a good measure of heat to it.  We slightly increased the amount of sugar and lime juice in order to give the sauce balance (before we did so all we were tasting was sambal with undertones of fish sauce).  And then I squeezed some additional lime juice over the top of the noodles before we ate to give it some more fresh lime flavor.  Don't skimp on the fresh basil for garnish, because the basil that you toss with the noodles loses a lot of its bright, fresh flavor once it is heated up.  So you really need the fresh basil in addition to the basil that you threw into the wok with the scallions.  But even without the fresh basil, this dish is delicious and very easy to make.  From start to finish, it took less than 30 minutes, including prep time.  I guarantee that it won't be another few years before we make these noodles again!

Recipe after the jump!

Brussels Sprouts with Kimchi Puree and Bacon

So to address my lack of Asian (or Asian-inspired) recipes of late, I decided to make a brussels sprouts recipe from the Momofuku cookbook.  Now I know that brussels sprouts aren't an inherently Asian ingredient.  In fact, I would be shocked if they ever turned up in any form of Asian cuisine.  But these are tossed in kimchi puree, so that has to count for something, right?  Granted, there is bacon and butter in there, but come on.  You have to give me points for trying, especially since I didn't get home from work until about 8:45 pm tonight with the brussels sprouts.  Luckily I had Alex at home cutting up the bacon batons and making the kimchi puree.  I really do need to use this cookbook more.  When you flip through it there are so many fabulously interesting recipes!  And most of them are at least nominally Asian, which goes perfectly with my renewed desire to cook lots of Asian (or Asian-inspired) recipes.  Next up, the Pan-Roasted Asparagus with Poached Egg and Miso Butter (even though asparagus are not exactly in season right now) or the Pan-Roasted Bouchot Mussels with OS.  Yum.  

I think I will cut down on the amount of butter next time, because I didn't really think it added much to the brussels, except to make them a little soggy.  I would have preferred that the brussels remained charred and crispier.  So maybe I will halve the amount of butter next time and char the brussels sprouts just a few more minutes.  Since our brussels sprouts were pretty small, I only cooked them for 10 minutes once I returned them to the oven.  Next time I will go at least 12 minutes, but probably the entire 15 minutes, and then cut down on the butter.  But I loved the combination of the brussels sprouts, the kimchi, and the bacon.  It's not a flavor combination that would ever occur to me on my own, but they are awesome together.

We served our delicious brussels sprouts with some sunny-side up eggs with runny yolks that we drizzled with soy sauce and topped with more of the kimchi puree.  I think that together they made the perfect meal. 

Recipe after the jump!

Hmmmmmmmmm....

I just looked through my posts for the past 1-2 months and realized that they have all been primarily American or Italian, which is very unusual for me.  I will do my best to mix it up a little more than I have been.  I have a few Asian recipes on deck that I have been waiting to try, it's just a matter of tracking down all of the ingredients and having the time to really cook.  But I promise to send some more Asian recipes your way as soon as possible!  Hopefully in the next week I can make this Thai Noodle Salad recipe I have been dying to try and/or some form of stir-fry.  I also want to cook more Moroccan food (perhaps a couscous and a tagine are in order).  So I just wanted to let you know that I just noticed how American my recipes have skewed of late, and I promise to try to balance it all out ASAP.

Ricotta Gnocchi

Ricotta gnocchi sounds delicious, doesn't it?  It brings to mind light, fluffy, pillowy goodness.  And when I found this recipe on Mark Bittman's blog on the NY Times, I couldn't resist making it.  Who knew homemade gnocchi was so easy to make?  Anyway, these gnocchi were pillowy and delicious, but they were far from light.  Instead they were very rich.  And I mean very very rich.  Then again, if I had really thought about it, I would have expected them to be rich - they were essentially made of cheese (ricotta and Parmigiano-Reggiano), eggs, and flour, and then tossed with butter.  It's kind of a given that they would be rich.  I have had actual potato gnocchi that somehow seemed lighter to me (or at least less rich).  But, regardless of how rich they were, these gnocchi are delicious and full of cheesy goodness.  I think I will add a few more sage leaves in the future (we used the 10 that Mark Bittman called for) because I didn't get quite as much sage flavor as I wanted.  Instead the dish tasted almost exclusively of browned butter and cheese.  Which isn't really a bad thing if you think about it...

Recipe after the jump!