I have this new favorite cookbook – “Super Natural Every Day” and I am always daydreaming about the recipes. Sometimes I get caught up on ingredients I am missing but today I said “What the hey?” and made this otsu with what I had on hand. You’ll see firsthand where I made a mistake learned something.

Btw: this has TOFU in it. People have different reactions to tofu as a foodstuff depending on their experience or non-experience with it. If you’ve never tried it and are scared (is scared too strong a word?) I urge you to challenge yourself to go out of your comfort zone. Anyone who knows my husband, G, knows that he is a self-proclaimed “meat-a-tarian” with a limited palate. But he likes fried tofu. Hell, he likes fried anything pretty much. Anyway, the tofu in this dish is fried and my kids love it. It’s NOT slimy! It’s like a french fry. (Yuuuummmm, french fries!!!!) Anyway, you have to laugh at the irony of being scared of a plant based product but eating dead animals without hesitation. Especially when you think about what those animals are being fed and what is being injected into them to make them fat as well as to keep them alive despite pretty gnarly conditions. Enough with my (run-on) rant. Try this tofu! What’s the worst thing that can happen?

This is an amazing dish – the wholesome buckwheat noodles are coated in a complexly flavored sesame paste. Tofu rounds out the dish.

YOU NEED:

INGREDIENTS:
1 tsp pine nuts (if you don’t have pine nuts, double the sunflower seeds)
1 tsp sunflower seeds
1/2 c sesame seeds
1-1/2 TBSP sugar
1-1/2 TBSP soy sauce or tamari
1-1/2 tsp mirin (Japanese sake – I got it at Ralph’s)
scant 1 TBSP toasted sesame oil
2 TBSP rice vinegar
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
sea salt
12 oz soba noodles
12 oz extra firm tofu
olive oil
1 bunch green onions, sliced thin on a diagonal

All the ingredients listed are from Ralph’s, Trader Joe’s, Costco or my garden. None are from specialty stores. I had the ingredients from my regular monthly/weekly shopping excursions.

**NOTE: as always, I changed some of the ingredients to make them more accessible. I’m not sure how Heidi Swanson would feel about it and I’m sure it changes the flavors but my goal is to make recipes do-able without going to any special stores just for that dish. When you have a 1-1/2 year old who refuses to sit in a shopping cart, responds to her carseat as it if were doused in battery acid, and delights in running down an aisle with her arm out to knock EVERY box of cereal off the shelf, more than a Xanax, you need to keep it simple.**

TOFU PREP TUTORIAL
If you’re not familiar with preparing tofu – this part is for you. If you’re an old pro – you will want to skip this section.

Tofu comes in a little pool of water. You need to get rid of most of that water before you fry it because you know what they say about oil and water? They don’t mix. In fact they splatter all over you. Also, think of the tofu as a sort of sponge for flavors. The more water you get out of it the more flavors it can absorb. In this recipe, you’re getting the water out for better frying since we’re just salting it.

Here’s my method:
- Remove the tofu from its package over the sink.
- Slice tofu in a few large flat pieces (3 or 4)
- Place slices together on half of a paper towel atop half of a kitchen towel (the paper towel keeps any grody fuzzies or bits & pieces that were on your kitchen towel from touching your tofu)

- Fold the the other half of the paper towel & kitchen towel over the top of the tofu, covering it completely.

- Place something heavy but not too heavy atop. I use a cast iron skillet. This presses the water out of the tofu and into the towels.

Try to press your tofu for about 15 minutes if you can.
After 15 minutes, you are ready to cut your tofu into whatever size pieces you’d like. I usually cut mine into 1×2″ pieces.

Ok. So anyway, press your tofu first thing.

Did you do it? Great! Let’s start…

1. Toast the pine nuts & sunflower seeds in a large skillet over medium heat. If you don’t have pine nuts, just substitute more sunflower seeds.
Be sure to toss them in the pan often. Those pine nuts can burn quickly! I should know, I just burned a bunch. After about a minute, add the sesame seeds.

The second you start smelling the sesame seeds, remove from heat. You are making the sesame paste now in case you didn’t realize it!

This year I’ve made it a personal challenge to make ice cream, bread, pesto, pastes (that is not a typo – I haven’t tried to make pasta yet), pizzas and soups all without an ice cream maker, bread machine, food processor, pizza stone or stand mixer. My opinion: you don’t NEED most of that stuff! That said, I WANT a pizza stone but as for all the other expensive stuff clogging up my tiny countertops – this appliances can s____ it! I do, however, concede to the usefulness of the mandolin which I also do not currently own. But that’s another story… Another WANT not a NEED.

Regardless & irregardless of what you have or don’t have, need or don’t need, you are about to make a paste that calls for a mortar & pestle but which I’m here to assure you can be made just as easily in a regular old grotty old blender. Here we go!

2. Crush seeds/nuts with a mortar pestle. What? You KNOW I don’t have one! I crushed them in my blender.

The seeds look like sand.

Damp sand.

3. Add the sugar, mirin, sesame oil, rice vinegar, and cayenne pepper to the “sand” mixture.

Stir to combine thoroughly & adjust any ingredients to your taste.

It should look something like this.

5. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Read the soba noodles package direction before you go any further. They don’t cook like typical pasta.

The soba noodles will expand quite a lot so you really will need a large pot! Add salt to the water & cook according to package directions. **NOTE: save about 1/3 c of the cooking water just before draining.**

Drain the noodles when done & rinse under cold running water. (They will stick together in a huge clump if you don’t do that!)

6. Put your cut tofu into a bowl & toss with a little olive oil & salt.

Heat a large skillet to medium high and toss your tofu in there. This time I tossed in there helper skelter but usually I lay all my tofu out in neat lines as I find it easier to turn. Another instance of OCD which doesn’t seem to spill over into my housekeeping. Flip occasionally – tofu should be golden brown on all sides but not tough and chewy. Taste one to see how it is.

This is what it looks like as some of the sides are browned. You still want to try to brown those paler sides but if you miss some – no biggie.

Mmmmm a nice pile of fried tofu!

7. You’re almost done!! Save 1 heaping TBSP of the sesame paste.

Water down the rest with that 1/3 c of reserved pasta water. If you forgot to save it, just use 1/3 c of hot water. Transfer your soba to a large mixing bowl & pour the thinned paste/sauce over it along with half the green onions.

Toss to combine. Serve topped with a dollop of the sesame paste & green onions. Beautiful!

That reminds me! I forgot to tell you what I learned. When I started making this I realized I was out of sesame seed oil but I DID have some Hot Chili Sesame Seed Oil in my fridge. I thought, “I’ll just use half the amount.” The sesame paste definitely had a VERY noticeable kick to it after I did that. This really makes me mad sometimes! I spend a lot of time & energy on a dish only to do something to make it 100% inedible to the girls. You know, something like serve it with live snakes or add carrots. Or green onions. This time I played dumb about the spice factor but stealthily passed out unasked for cups of milk along with the food. AMAZING!! They both ate a lot. And drank a LOT of milk!

Next time I will use plain sesame seed oil… (Trader Joe’s has it cheapest btw.)

You know those days dinner sneaks up on you yet you STILL refuse to boil noodles again? This is the dish for those days…

Wait: isn’t couscous a form of pasta? D’OH!!!! At least some veggies have snuck in here. Or is it sneaked?

You need:

INGREDIENTS:
1 TBSP butter
2 TBSP olive oil
1/2 c pine nuts
1/2 c shallots (or onion if you have no shallots), finely chopped
1-1/2 c Israeli couscous
1/2 cinnamon stick (or 1/4 tsp cinnamon)
1 dried bay leaf
1-3/4 c vegetable broth (I used vegetarian chicken flavored bouillon)
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 c fresh parsley, minced
1/2 – 1 zucchini, finely chopped (OPTIONAL)
zest of 1/2 lemon
black pepper, to taste
small handful of crumbled feta cheese

NOTE: you can omit the zucchini or substitute any other veg you want to use up: broccoli, carrots, corn, frozen veg, greens (add these just before the broth as they need a shorter cooking time). Just be sure the veg is chopped finely.

This is so easy. I didn’t take pictures of the process as I was in a huge rush to feed the girls.

1. Over medium-low heat, melt butter in a large saucepan. Add pine nuts & stir until golden brown. WARNING: only a minute or two max! Remove from heat & put aside in a small bowl.

2. Using the same saucepan, heat oil over medium heat. Saute shallots until golden (for about 3-4 minutes), stirring occasionally. Add zucchini or whatever other veg you have on hand! Cook for another minute or two. Add couscous, cinnamon stick and bay leaf, and stir often until couscous browns slightly. Yes, the couscous is uncooked when you first put it in!

3. Add broth, bring to a boil, then simmer covered on low until broth has been absorbed and couscous is tender.

4. Remove from heat and stir in parsley, pine nuts, lemon zest & feta. Season with black pepper to taste.

This is REALLY yummy and great the next day!

Maddie is on a high carb diet.

Guess where I got this? The back of the Trader Joe’s package!! I don’t trust these things normally but this is great. I just made a few adjustments.

This morning Maddie was eating this dish (yes, for breakfast) and I remarked, “When I was a kid we didn’t eat pesto.”

She asked me what we ate instead.

“Oh, we ate Spaghettios, Fluff-N-Nutter sandwiches on Wonder Bread, Steak-ums, American Goulash (homemade Hamburger Helper), Campbell’s Tomato soup with grilled cheese sandwiches (on Wonder bread with Kraft singles and margarine). I could go on.

All that sodium, those chemicals & preservatives and look how great WE turned out!

If I’d known how easy this stuff was to make I’d have made it years ago. Try it – it’s very easy and beautiful and you’ll love the results. (Note to Libby: you can get all the ingredients at Trader Joe’s.)

All you need is:

INGREDIENTS:
30 large leaves or 60 small leaves fresh basil
generous pinch of salt
2 cloves of garlic, peeled
3 TBSP pine nuts, toasted
4 TBSP olive oil
4 TBSP parmesan reggiano, grated

1. Add basil, salt & garlic to blender and blend into a thick paste. You might find you need to add 2 TBSP of the olive oil to get it going.

I used coarse sea salt but I prefer using fine sea salt as the coarse didn’t chop up well in my blender and I got a few bites of it when I ate. If you have a powerful blender or food processor you’ll have no problem!

2. Add pine nuts and remaining 2 TBSP olive oil & blend some more. Add cheese and blend till you have a creamy pesto sauce.

Serve on pasta, as a pizza topping, smeared on crusty bread, or tossed in a salad!

Shock of shocks – both my kids love this! Even G loves it. Holy cow.

Try it next time you make Summer Pizza!

Slightly adapted from Lidia Bastianich.

Hope you all had fun last weekend! All I remember doing was jumping in a jumper with a bunch of little kids and hiking in the noon day sun WITHOUT sunscreen or hats. Real smart.

Here’s a tasty, simple little salad I made last Friday. I saw the fennel at the farmer’s market last Wednesday and at $1 a bulb it seemed a good deal.

You know who got me into fennel? My dad. He makes a really good salad.

Here’s what you need:

INGREDIENTS:
1 medium-large zucchini, sliced into paper thin coins
2 small fennel bulbs, trimmed & shaved paper thin (or as thin as you can get them!)
2/3 c loosely chopped fresh dill
1/3 c fresh lemon juice (about 3 juicy lemons)
salt
4 or 5 generous handfuls of arugula
1/2 c pine nuts, toasted
1/3 c feta cheese, crumbled
OPTIONAL: Honey

1. Combine the fennel, zucchini and dill in a bowl.

Toss with the lemon juice, olive oil, and 1/4 tsp salt.

Just EXACTLY enough lemon juice, any extra carelessly spilled

Set aside and let marinate for 20 minutes, or up to an hour.

2. Just before serving salad, put the arugula in a large bowl. This is also from my garden – from last summer if you can believe it. It’s been producing since then. Wow!

3. Scoop all of the marinating veg on top of the arugula and pour as much of the lemon juice dressing as desired on top of that. Toss gently. Adjust dressing to your taste with more lemon juice, salt or pepper. If the lemon juice is too sour – add a bit of honey.

Not THIS!!!

4. Sprinkle pine nuts & feta on top & toss gently. Serve!

Source: Super Natural Every Day