Basil Pesto

 By Kathryn Washburn Breighner

The basil in the garden is flourishing now and needs to be harvested. Pesto seemed like a good idea for tonight's dinner.

And this is so easy!  In a food processor, add:
4 c packed basil leaves
2 cloves of garlic, peeled
3/4 c pine nuts or walnuts

Pulse these ingredients until they are just coarsely chopped. Add 1/2 c grated parmesan, salt and pepper to taste and while running the food processor, dribble in 3 T olive oil.  The mixture will come together.

How to use the pesto? Many ways:
*Freeze in ice cube trays and then remove when frozen and put into a freezer bag to add to stews or pasta.
*Toss with 1 pound of pasta like I did.
*Slice fresh tomatoes and top with 1T of pesto.

I knew we would have leftover pasta and pesto so tomorrow, I'll add some fresh cherry tomatoes and chunks of buffalo mozzarella for a tasty pasta salad.

Basil Water--A Great Summer Drink

By Kathryn Washburn Breighner

Looking for something cool and refreshing to drink in the summer months? Head to the garden or herb pot and harvest some basil.

Put the basil in the bottom of a glass, add ice and water.....and enjoy!

I have a lot of basil right now and this drink makes great use of it and is oh, so tasty. I'm always looking for new ways to use basil and this drink couldn't be easier or better.  Cool off with an ice cold glass of basil water!

Chicken Dumplings in Green Curry

By Perry Washburn

My son Daniel rang me midday from college. "I'm coming home tonight to get winter clothes. Let's cook."

After much debate, and on a quest for something "new", he found this recipe for dumplings - perhaps better called meatballs - in The Complete Asian Cookbook. Luckily we have one great and several good Asian groceries in town. As I teach Thai classes, I keep more basic Asian ingredients on hand than most people, and know where to find the rest. Daniel marveled at my fav Asian grocery, and the Asian ladies pulling lively blue crabs out of a bushel basket, barrel-full-o-monkeys style. (Double Dragon on 2nd Ave. for Des Moines locals.) The lemon, lemon grass, curry and basil flavors in this dish were stellar.

Here's the recipe, with my additions or changes in parentheses.

1 lb chicken minced
3 green onions, diced
2 tablespoons cilantro, chopped
1 stalk lemon grass, white part only, finely diced
1 tsp chicken stock powder (I used 1 tsp Penzey's chicken soup base)
1 1/2 cups cooked jasmine rice
1 egg plus one egg white (I used 2 whole eggs)
(1/2 cup bread crumbs)
2 Tbs oil
2 Tbs Thai green curry paste
3 cups coconut milk (or 4)
4 fresh kaffir lime leaves
1/2 cup basil
1 Tbs lemon juice

Mix together the chicken mince, spring onion, cilantro, lemon grass, 2 Tbs fish sauce, the stock powder (I mixed in the Penzey's soup base with the fish sauce before adding), and some pepper. Add the rice and mix well with your hands. (I found my "dice" or "mince" was not fine enough, so I threw it all in the food processor. Much easier.)

Beat the egg and the white (or in my case both eggs) with a mixer until thick and creamy, then fold into the chicken mixture. (I had NEVER tried to beat whole eggs. Didn't know it would work. A revelation! You don't quite get to soft peaks, but close. Because I used the extra yolk, and Penzey's paste, these may have been slightly more soupy than normal. I wanted the binding power of the extra yolk. But they were too loose to roll, so I added bread crumbs to get to meatball consistency.) With floured hands (I used lots) roll tablespoon sized balls, and place on a tray. Cover and refrigerate for 2-3 hours. (I cheated, and we put them in the freezer for 15 minutes).

Heat the oil in a large frying pan (I used my 18-inch cast iron skillet for this, and needed all of it). Add the green curry paste, and stir over medium heat for 1 minute. (I added some of the thick cream from the coconut milk at the beginning, as this is the traditional way to start a curry. Make sure you DON'T shake the coconut milk, or you will mix it all up. It naturally separates; use the thick part first. Don't ever buy "light.") Gradually stir in the remainder of the coconut milk, and reduce to simmer. Add the lime leaves and the dumplings, cover and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. (I used a stiff spatula to turn them. I found in my cast iron skillet, these actually browned; I had to get under them to turn them. They would have broken with a spoon. I turned them often.) (If the sauce gets too thick, add more coconut milk. As the cans are commonly 19 oz each, you will have extra.) When the dumplings are done, stir in the basil, remaining fish sauce and fresh lemon juice. Serve over rice.

Black-eyed Chicken

By Perry Washburn
This fall finds me on the run, frequently looking to make something tasty - fast.

I had thawed a package of chicken thighs, and I knew I had a bag of basil from an Asian market run that needed to be used. And a bunch of leftover white rice. The rest was a fridge raid. My girls loved this! Here's how this really fun dish came out.

1 pound of chicken thighs, cleaned, boned and diced
Sesame oil
4 stalks celery, chopped
1 small onion, diced
1 cup green onion, with the white and green separated
1 cup basil, chopped
2 Tbs spicy brown bean sauce (check your Asian market)
1/2 tsp ground chili garlic oil (ditto)
1 can black-eyed peas, including the juice
1 tsp Penzey's vegetable soup base

Saute the chicken in a tablespoon or so of sesame oil until it's starting to lose its pink. Add the celery, the onion, and the white/light green part of the green onions. Continue cooking until they are beginning to wilt. Add the bean sauce, the chili/garlic oil, the blackeyed peas and the soup base. Cook for 5 minutes or so, until it's all well mixed. Stir in the basil and green onion, and serve over steamed (or in my case, reheated) rice.

Tomato Basil Tart

By Kathryn Washburn Breighner

I made this tart last night with my last trip to the garden for the year to harvest tomatoes and basil. I covered the basil but it was 29 degrees this am so I'm afraid to check. Bushels of tomatoes got picked and moved to the garden shed for protection.

So it was necessary to use tomatoes and basil in last night's dinner dish and this tart fit the bill. I have played with various versions over the summer and this one got it right--ricotta cheese, mozzarella and parmesan cheeses, eggs, basil, garlic, tomatoes and a pie crust. Simple ingredients that turned into a perfect meal.

I first made a pie crust, single layer, and baked it for 10 minutes at 350 degrees just to set the crust. When I took it out of the oven, I immediately added 1/2 c of shredded mozzarella and let it sit for 5 minutes so that the cheese melted. These two steps--short prebake and the addition of the mozzarella cheese while the crust is hot--sets the bottom of the crust so that the tart doesn't sink until it resulting in a very flaky bottom crust.

Next, take 2 tomatoes--I used an orange and a red, slice thinly, salt, and place on paper towels to drain while the crust is in the oven.

In the food processor, I added and pureed:

1/2 c ricotta cheese
2 eggs
1 clove garlic
3/4 c fresh basil
salt and pepper

Place the tomatoes on top of the melted mozzarella in the pie crust and add the cheese puree.

Top with:
1/2 c grated parmesan cheese
1 c shredded mozzarella cheese

Bake the tart in the 350 degree oven for 45-50 minutes until the top is golden brown.

The great thing about this tart for us is that it was not only dinner last night, but lunch today. It's excellent cold. Enjoy!

Drying Herbs: Italian Parsley & Basil

By Kathryn Washburn Breighner

For the next few weeks, we will be furiously "putting up" the herbs from our garden before the frost. Italian parsley is what I harvested today. I have a huge crop of it and preserve it in two ways: drying and freezing.

The first step in this process is the most laborious: picking, cleaning, culling. This would be one step easier if you are using farmer's market herbs--you don't have to pick them like I do. This time of year, there are a variety of herbs at the markets just waiting to be "put up" for use months from now.

Freezing is easy. Pull the leaves from the stalks so you are only using the leaves. Chop fairly fine and put into a small freezer bag pushing the parsley to the bottom and in a fairly even row across the bottom. Then roll the bag beginning with parsley end pushing air out as you roll. Seal the bag and freeze. I usually will do several bags like this and then remove the parsley rolls and put into one freezer bag. When you're ready to use the parsley, just cut off a chunk.

The other freezing method is the one I used on basil today. I chopped the basil and packed tightly into an ice cube tray, covered with water and stuck in the freezer. When they are frozen, pop out the basil cubes and put into a freezer bag. The basil cubes can be used in any recipe except for perhaps a fresh basil caprese salad. Throw the cubes in marinara sauce, soup and use for Thai curries. I will also dry basil.

Today I filled two ice cube trays with basil and four dehydrator racks with Italian parsley. The parsley will dry in the dehydrator for about 12 hours on low and then I will crumble it into a bowl and put in an airtight bag.

Yet to come to our kitchen for drying: dill, cilantro, coriander, oregano, thyme, and sage.

And More Basil--Tomato Soup, too

By Kathryn Washburn Breighner

Perry is right that for those of us in northern climates, finding basil in the winter is a task. Perry's find of inexpensive fresh basil at the Asian grocery store spurred Nathaniel to visit his nearby Asian grocery in Tampa and he came home with the same large bag of basil for only a few dollars.

There are no Asian groceries near us so sadly, that option is not available. I have an indoor AeroGarden which I use in the winter months to grow herbs. I love it! I currently have an abundant crop of purple basil, sweet basil, dill, mint, thyme, chives, and parsley. I don't know how I made it through the winter without the AeroGarden. There is a separate post on the blog about the AeroGarden.

In the summer, I usually have 3 different kinds of basil in the garden and as the season ends, I 'put up' the basil in a variety of ways. We can marinara sauce, lots of it using my tomatoes (70 tomato plants last summer!) We dried baskets full of basil using the dehydrator--wow, does each tiny jar of basil require a large quantity of fresh basil.

And I freeze basil in cubes as I described to Perry in my comments to his posting. Easy to do with any herb that you have extra of: rinse and chop, pack into ice cube trays (I had to buy some to use for the herbs since we no longer use ice cube trays to make ice!), top with water to cover, freeze, and then pop out of the trays and put in a freezer bag. I typically freeze 8-10 trays of basil to use in the winter.

One of our favorite quick winter soups is a Tomato Basil

2 32-oz. jars of tomatoes, I only used the ones I've canned, so if you have to buy canned tomatoes (AAGGHH!), use 2 28-oz cans
2 T olive oil
1 minced onion
4 garlic cloves minced
2 c vegetable stock
8 cubes of frozen basil (or 1 1/2 t dried or 1/4 c fresh basil, minced)
salt and pepper

Saute the onion and garlic in the oil. Add the tomatoes, vegetable stock, basil cubes, salt and pepper (I use Penzey's black and red pepper).

Simmer for 15-20 minutes breaking up the tomatoes while they cook.

Serve with fresh croutons. I make mine with cubed leftover bread tossed with a little olive oil and Penzey's Sandwich Sprinkle and baked at 350 degrees for 15 minutes, tossing occasionally.

Basil!

By Perry Washburn

Basil is one of my favorites. Kathie grows tons of it, in her brief summer. I grow it in pots on my deck. David T undoubtedly has better access to fresh basil than those of us snowbound. But we here in snowy Iowa just had a wonderful, tasty week, thanks to some fresh basil.

I get annoyed at basil prices. $3.99 for a few nasty looking leaves? Well, I HAVE done it.

But this week was our friend Vickie's birthday. I decided, late in the day, on Thai. And happened to be near my fav Asian grocery. THAT is where to look for basil. I ask the woman in the back for some. She goes into the cooler, bags me up a gallon bag full for a buck or 2, and I am in business.

Fried rice. It stopped the meal, lots of ooohhs and aaahhs. Just chop up a bunch (as little as, say, 3-4 tablespoons for a batch made from a 4 cups of cooked rice. More won't hurt!). Put it in just before serving. As Aida says: this tastes so FRESH!

The fried rice I made last week was simple. Rice, sesame oil, fish sauce, soy, Asian broccoli, and basil. This "deluxe" version is one I use for cooking classes. Both are GREAT.

Fried Rice with Chicken and Basil

4 cups cooked white rice, refrigerated several hours or overnight
3 Tbs sesame oil
1 egg, beaten with 2 Tbs water
1 lb diced chicken thighs
3 green onions, chopped (including the green)
3 Tbs chopped garlic
2 Tbs chopped ginger
¼ cup red bell pepper
1 tsp red pepper flakes
1 Tbs fish sauce
2 Tbs soy sauce
1/2 cup basil, coarsely chopped (Thai basil if you can get it)
1/2 cup cilantro, coarsely chopped (omit if you worry about tastebud overload)

In a wok or non-stick skillet, fry the egg in a bit of the oil. Cut into pieces, or chop, and set aside. Add remaining oil to skillet. Add the garlic, ginger, pepper flakes and chicken, and fry until the chicken is just tender. Add the rice, breaking up any lumps, then the green onions, egg, fish and soy sauces. Stir, and heat through. Add the basil and cilantro, stir well and serve.

End note:

Friday night, our traditional pizza night, brought the basil out again. A simple sweet tomato sauce, some diced leftover chicken, a healthy covering of loosely chopped basil leaves and a thin coating of mozzarella. WOW!

Head to your local Asian grocery, if you have one. They know basil. What a winter treat!