Kale Miso Soup

There's a Buddhist monastery near my parents' house. It is, technically, all-you-can-eat. Now I'm not ashamed to say I like a good buffet. In the NYC area, the best is no doubt East Buffet in Flushing, a lavish banquet hall that has every permutation of Chinese (and some Japanese) food, plus the crown jewels of any Chinese buffet: lobster and Peking Duck.

The United Nations used to  rotate international lunch buffets in the Delegates' Dining Room, but I've heard they've since downscaled. I overdosed on rice krispie treats at Goofy's Kitchen in DisneyWorld and I haven't touched a krispie since.

But a Buddhist buffet. Sure you can gorge yourself on a cruise or in Vegas, but in an ascetic monastery that practices unleashing yourself from earthly desires? It just doesn't seem right.

But if there were a Buddhist buffet where you could eat with abandon, this is the type of thing you'd eat. I made this because I was sick and I wanted something nourishing and alive. Like, fermented alive. That's where the miso came from.

But that wasn't enough to be a meal so I boosted it with more goodness: seaweed, soft tofu, edamame, cauliflower, broccoli, kale, and whole cloves of garlic. The recipe is too simple and I feel like writing it out is condescending. It's just a pot generously filled with good things, boiled until cooked. It's lavish, but in a simple sort of way.

Blueberry Lavender Chia Pudding

Good cookbooks have recipes that are more like suggestions. Mark Bittman is my idol in this regard. His 3-sentence recipes are spare and classic. He unburdens you and insists that anything can be substituted for anything-- pears for apples, habanero for jalapeño, chicken for duck or beef or turkey or pheasant.

Once you have these basics down and are comfortable enough in the kitchen, you'll just intuit how they'll come together. A master chef combines technique with an instinctual knowledge for flavor combinations. An avant-garde eggplant and sweet creamy white chocolate is just one step away from a traditional eggplant and sweet creamy ricotta.

I'm always amazed by the singer who hears a song and can instantly harmonize with it. How does she know to go so low? Why does that high note sound so good?

Maybe she knows the science. Or maybe she's heard enough songs that she can replicate. It's probably just a natural knowledge that takes years to cultivate.

I've never had blueberry and lavender at a restaurant. It's possible I've seen a recipe for it and its been unconsciously logged in my brain. The idea also must have manifest because both are blue-purple.

Either way, you learn to trust your instincts. This is like summer in Provence ... at a yoga retreat. It's also devilishly, Bittmanly easy.

RECIPE: Simmer 2 cups of the milk of your choice. Turn off and add 2 heaping tablespoons of lavender and one vanilla bean and steep. When cool, strain and add 1/3 cup chia seeds and 1 tablespoon of maple syrup. Stir and let rest overnight. Add blueberries to taste. Serves 2 by morning.

Squash Blossoms Stuffed with Souffléd Tofu

The other night, I felt conned into a dish. It was the type of service where everything is "amazing". Every order is a "wonderful choice." Words stop meaning anything.

I prefer the truth and I think that's always the best if you want the customer leaving happy. (The salesperson who tells the woman that a skirt looks fabulous when in fact it hits her in all the wrong spots is doing no one any favors.)

So anyway, the dish. It was squash stems. I'm usually into root-to-bud eating. I eat broccoli stalks and kabocha skin and celery leaves. But these stems were stringy and quite tough. And not tough in a hardy green sort of way (I dare to eat kale even when it's not massaged). It was just more a chew toy than actual sustenance.

So the next day I found these squash blossoms at the farmer's market. Exceptionally edible, always tender, perfect capsules for some other delicious filling. This time, I filled them with seasoned tofu, aerated and firmed by whipped egg whites. I am contemplating filling the blossoms with something heartier, like a meat mixture. Or maybe a tautological thing, a zucchini mousse with the stem very very finely chopped so you can actually eat it.

RECIPE: In a blender, whiz up egg whites from 3 eggs for 2 minutes. Add a package of lite tofu, salt, and whip until mixed and you are content with the saltiness. I like the mild taste of tofu, but you could do it up maybe with liquid aminos to get more of a cheese taste. Stuff into cleaned zucchini blossoms. Add 1/4 cup of water to a large wok and bring to a simmer. Add blossoms and steam, covered, for about 7 minutes, until the tofu mixture puffs up and solidifies. Grind pepper to your liking.

Fennel Thyme Weeknight Chicken

When I cook for myself, I usually make some variation of pot of vegetables. Whatever's in season, plus some miso or hoisin or pesto or fish sauce/lime/sesame oil. Sometimes I just eat it cold. Sometimes I roast the veggies but not when I'm starving or when it's 90 degrees out. And when I'm cooking for others, I go all out. If not in time and effort, then definitely in flavor ambition. I exercise my kitchen appliances, frequent my spice stadium, and tend towards skate and rabbit over chicken and beef.

But even I cannot resist the charms of excellent roast chicken. I felt a little apologetic making this the other night. "Oh, it just a homey recipe." "I thought I'd make us something normal."

But really, roast chicken is one of the most magnificent things you can ever eat as a diner, and perfect as a cook. But I just don't make it. It could be something of a next-best-thing syndrome. You won't make a splash with a roast chicken.

I guess the older I get, the more I can see the virtues of a simple roast chicken, that classic is not boring. I'm not sure if I'll cycle more chicken into my repertoire, but it's a thought.

RECIPE: Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Sear a chicken, quartered, in a cast iron pot with some olive oil. I half-skin the chicken because I am like that. When you're on the second side, add 3 diced carrots, 1 red onion, 15 cloves of garlic, fresh thyme, red pepper flakes, fennel seeds, salt and pepper. Continue to cook until the aromatics blossom and the onion becomes transparent. Add juice of one lemon. Then semi-cover the pot and place in oven. There should be a good amount of liquid from the ingredients. This is the braising liquid.

Braise for about 20 minutes. Then uncover the pot and broil on high to reduce liquid and re-goldenize the chicken. Serves 2-3.

White Nectarine Orange Blossom Smoothie

White peaches, white nectarines, white cherries, white tea. Racial implications aside, there's something about the "white" flavor that's more delicate. An orange nectarine is assertive and heady. Being a stone fruit it doesn't have strong bass notes, but it's medium-bodied. An alto sax, let's say.

But a white nectarine is more ephemeral in a piccolo or harp sort of way. A white peach is more easily damaged.

There are occasions for both, just as there are occasions for a voluptuous Cabernet and a barely-there Pinot Grigio. For me, I like something in between -- something that has the perfumed air of a white fruit, and the oomph of its more pigmented cousin.

So this is just that, a white nectarine smoothie fortified with banana and pear. The orange blossom water ties it together. Orange blossom water is very strong -- you only need 3 drops or else your smoothie will taste like soap. But it also plays hide-and-seek within the flavors, sometimes there, sometimes not, sometimes totally in your face.

RECIPE: In a blender, add one banana, one pear, and one white nectarine. All cut of course. Add three drops of orange blossom water, a handful of ice, and enough water for the blender to catch. Serves 2-3.

Cauliflower Steak au Poivre

If you ever eat out with me, you'll learn I have a way about ordering. I get the pressed duck, the whole roasted eggplant, the Cobb salad tossed tableside. The dish I order is usually veggie-forward, though I've been known to order a steak out of the blue. If there's something that requires an action step -- dipping, flambéing, wrapping, ladling, etc -- I'll usually get that. But I'm also perfectly content with a fork-to-mouth sort of thing.

And sometimes I get the indulgent thing, though I don't always go out of my way for, say sweetbreads or foie. I will almost always get the dish with the unusual ingredient or preparation. You know, like centrifuged albino strawberries and the like.

This cauliflower steak au poivre is really such a Jess Restaurant Dish. It just is. But, luckily, it doesn't take restaurant-level effort.

RECIPE: Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Cut a 1" slice of cauliflower in its widest part and place on a pizza stone or grill pan. Something that will retain heat. Oil up the cauliflower and season with salt and coarse black pepper on both sides. Roast for 30 minutes, or until the top is golden and a fork can be inserted easily. Serves 1.

Buffalo Kale Salad

Is it just me, but did the rise of kale come really quickly? Not too long ago, I thought of kale as a difficult vegetable, an ornamental and sturdy plant that had to be stewed for hours. And who wants to eat gray-green sulfurous greens? Now of course, people eat kale not only on its own, but also as crackers, salads, pesto. Kale is the "green" in "green juice", the counterweight to the equally beloved bacon.

And now one of the most intimidating features of kale -- the stiff, structured ruffles -- are now a selling point.

I like to make a creamy sauce that catches inside all the nooks and crannies. Tofu adds body and umami, without the negating effect cream tends to add to salad. Recently at Thistle Hill Tavern, I had buffalo cauliflower and kale salad with slaw dressing. This is my middle ground.

RECIPE: Wash and dice kale into bite-size pieces. Melt 2 1/2 tablespoons of butter and add to blender. Add one block of tofu, 2 teaspoons of Frank's hot sauce, and a pinch of salt. Blend into dressing mix with kale salad.

Frozen White Peach Rosé Sangria

Everywhere you look, summer shows its abundance. Tomatoes bursting with ripeness. Zucchinis the size of baseball bats. Too-small bikinis strained over too-large chests. A farmer's tan after an unintentional nap in the sun.

This week I had an overabundance of white peaches and rosé. The recipe can go a million ways. Skin the peaches and use white wine for a snowy treat. Add champagne and call it a bellini slushie. Fortify it with vodka to get the party started or add some elegance with some Pimm's.

For me, I kept it simple. When blended, white peaches take on a creamy quality as bananas do. The result is rich and tongue-coating and with a splash of something boozy, a nice toast to the summer bounty.

RECIPE: Cut peaches into bite-size pieces and freeze. When frozen, add to blender and add enough rosé to achieve your desired consistency (loose, stiff, etc). Add lemon juice to taste.

P.S. I painted that painting background at a fundraiser for the Young Lotus Circle, an awesome organization that empowers women and girls in Asia. Check them out!

Flax Fish Sticks with Special Sauce

It started with a baseball game -- hot dogs, popcorn, soft serve, peanuts, fries. The whole works.

This time I had a taste of tater tots. The last time I had tater tots was in elementary school, when fried potatoes were still considered your daily vegetable.

They weren't really tasty. Or well-executed. They were definitely from a an institutional food services company. And yet they were so good. Perfect, really. A perfect snapshot of me 20+ years ago, buying a $1 red-and-white paper boat of tater tots with money I saved up just for the occasion.

And so this dish came from another long-ago memory. The Big Mac and its Special Sauce. Special sauce is probably a model recipe, a perfect representation of the salty-fatty-sweet trifecta. Even if I never eat a Big Mac again, I'm sure it's engineered to stay in my memory until I die.

My sauce breaks down the McDonald's recipe and translates the ingredients into something cleaner. The fish sticks are covered in flax seed meal, which give it a texture and nuttiness not unlike fried breading

Would you ever eat Flax Fish Sticks with "Special Sauce" at a baseball stadium or fast food restaurant? Never. But for a moment, you can be transported there, guilt trip not included.

RECIPE: 

Cut one salmon filet into dunkable pieces. Air dry on a plate, so the surface will toast rather than steam. Preheat toaster oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Meanwhile, in a blender mix 1 cup cottage cheese, 2 tablespoons ketchup, 1 teaspoon paprika, 1 slug of vinegar, and a pinch of onion powder. Add salt to taste. Remove the sauce from the blender and add 1 heaping tablespoon of sweet relish. Set aside.

Sprinkle flax seed meal on the fish plate and coat pieces thoroughly. Cook in toaster oven. Your time will depend on the thickness of your fish. I made them thin and cooked them for about 7 minutes.

Blackened Summer Salad

Summer in NYC is not normal, both in the "regular" and "consistent" sense of the word, and in also in the "standard" and "expected" sense of the word.

You might spend a day sunning dreamily in Prospect Park, then in a disturbingly balmy and fragrant subway platform. You might spend two days on the beach, then five days in a freezing office.

Many New Yorkers leave the city on the weekends, true. And sometimes the city can feel pleasantly sparse. Until you hit all the summer tourists.

This dish's ingredients say summer -- corn, basil, tomatoes. But the preparation says something else -- it's deep and charred and moody. It's NYC in the summer.

RECIPE: Preheat oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit. Mandolin one red onion. Slice kernels from one ear of corn. Drop in two handfuls of grape tomatoes. Toss with olive oil and salt. Roast for 40 minutes, until tomatoes burst and the veggies char. I use this stoneware tray that retains heat.

Take out of the oven and put in bowl. Add pesto and chopped parsley. Serves 1 as the main attraction, 2 as a side.

Chorizo Scallop Cabbage Pouches

Anything that requires wrapping is not an everyday food. Growing up, we only made "shambosh", a curry-beef samosa, on holidays. Grandma's yearly zongzi-making is reason enough to visit. From dumplings to spring rolls, tamales to tortellini, wrapped things are the stuff of special occasions.

But wrapped foods are a warm, loving gesture. Dim sum, after all, means "touches the heart." But with the right recipe, you can get the same effect ...without taking an entire day to get there.

This dish is simple, savory, and clean. Stuffed cabbage is another homey Grandma thing, but here the inside is simplified and purified.

I think in some cases, it's noble and grand to sacrifice your time and labor to feed someone. And in other cases, I think it's better to take it easy on the cooking so you can spend that time with that someone.

RECIPE: Separate 10 leaves from a small cabbage. The cabbage must be small because the leaves are more supple and the leaves fit the scallops better. Simmer them in a pot with 1/2 cup of chicken broth. Cook until they're translucent and pliant, like a swath of thick cloth.

Chop chorizo and add to one cabbage leaf, along with scallop. Fold the sides first, then the top, then bottom part, where the leaf met the base. Lay into a pan. When you've wrapped all your scallops, add the broth you used for the scallops. Cover and simmer for 5-8 minutes.

Season with sea salt and paprika.

Spice Stadium

You have your shirt, your pants. Your starch, your protein.

What adds the refinement is the something extra -- the necklace, the tattoo, the perfume, the turban.

And so it is with spices.

I really got into spices about a year ago because they represented a new frontier of taste sensitivity and alchemy.

Cooking is visceral, intuitive. Pastry is precise, fastidious. Spicework is more mysterious and abstract than both. Spices add the element a pinch of complexity here, a dash of nuance there. To me, they can hold memory and personality more than chicken or bread or a cookie (even a madeleine).

I chomp fennel as a breath freshener and dip hard-boiled eggs in fennel seeds and salt after a morning workout. Szechuan peppercorns, of course, go in mapo tofu, but also, once, an ice cream made even more shivery. Cumin is the obvious choice for an Indian-swaying dish, but also plays a more subdued role in Asian and Mexican dishes.

I like the pop of mustard seeds and the way they act as natural emulsifiers. White pepper reminds me of Chinese restaurants, red pepper flakes of pizzerias.

I use turmeric to stain the shells of hard-boiled eggs, and cinnamon to roasted apples, bananas, pears. Star anise boiled in soy sauce is so familiar to me, I often don't even recognize it as it is, but rather as a scent of my youth.

Like polka dots, poppy seeds are fun for their pop-art cheeriness. Sumac became my obsession for awhile, adding flakes that were a little sour, a little berried. And, yeah, it just sounds cool.

Garlic powder and powdered ginger are my secret weapons, a marinade's addictive X factor. I bought fenugreek on a whim, and marveled when it filled my kitchen with the smell of maple.

Since my mother is from Madagascar, I use vanilla pods with abandon -- cut up in my French Press, pulverized whole in my smoothies. I must feel those black spots on my tongue.

Sweet paprika, smoky paprika, they are like some reversible vest, sweet silk on one side, and leather when reversed.

And like my jewelry and scarves and makeup and perfume... I use some spices a lot, and some not at all. Though I own them, I have yet to use juniper berries. Nigella tastes too bitter. I can respect celery seed for its assertive celery-ness, but never think to include it.

I organize my spices on a kitchen rack, stadium-style. You can also put them in a drawer, though the bottom containers will be covered. My dream is to house my spices in a shallow drawer, the type architects use to protect their blueprints.

(For further inspiration, Melissa Clark and Amanda Hesser both have lust-worthy setups.)

Mushroom Shirataki Alfredo

When did you stop eating alfredo sauce? Maybe when you stopped eating mayo. Or started gutting your bagel before putting on your cream cheese.

Alfredo sauce seems like a vestige of a white bread, white sauce time. The last time I had pasta with alfredo sauce was at the Rainforest Cafe some 20 years ago. It came out over-sauced and semi-congealed, and since then alfredo has never been a must-order for me.

But somehow the memory has stuck. I eat shirataki noodles, but they're quite literally nothing. They have no calories, no nutritional value. All sensation and no sustenance.

Enter Alfredo. The sauce here is laughably dietetic compared to what alfredo sauce really is. But I think you'll find it's plenty creamy. The shirataki noodles just need to be caressed, not clobbered.

So the sauce is -- and I'm bracing myself for some alfredo purist backlash -- a blend of cream cheese and fat-free cream cheese. I mean, it's good. Slightly tangy, lusciously thick, and mercifully light in calories.

Mix it with some sauteed mushrooms and you have a dish that's an umami powerhouse. Enough to make you an alfredo eater again.

Strawberry Snack Mix

Necessity is the mother of invention. Or annoyance. Or disappointment.

FreshDirect, as you may know, makes a trail mix they call Rainbow Delight. It's raisins, peanuts, sunflower seeds, cashews, walnuts, pumpkin seeds, and of course -- the source of the rainbow -- M&M-like candy.

Due to a shortage of some sort, there was a period of time when some bags, packed in some factory, replaced the rainbow candies with plain chocolate chips.

Oh. No.

So while we wrote to customer service and waited out the great rainbow drought of 2013 (the M&Ms have since been re-instituted), I made my own snack mix.

It doesn't have a name yet, but it's red. It's sweet and salty and -- something relatively new to the snack mix game -- a little squishy.

So what's in it? It's a mix of unsalted cashews, chocolate-covered raisins (I also tried blueberries, but raisins are more than sufficient), dried cranberries, salted peanuts, and freeze-dried strawberries.

It's a summery snack mix and sort of sexy, too.

I know this is true because recently in Paris I found that Pierre Hermé had his own version, based on his famous Ispahan rose-raspberry-litchi macaron.

His version is a little more refined, but that's not always what you want in your pre-meeting food grab.

Chia Kale Cappuccino

It's times like these that I really feel like a parody of myself.

But you know, I do like green smoothies. And I like chia. And I like kombucha and excellent latte art.

And yet, there's a part of me that rebels against that $12/bottle mentality. Or the imbalance of juicing for 5 days and gorging for 15.

I made the Chia Kale Cappuccino because I wanted something a little more substantial than a juice. But more vibrant than coffee. This is a Sunday-morning-after-a-workout sort of drink, the type of thing that you can sip virtuously, ponderously, tranquilly.

The chia seeds are the energy-bestowing base. The kale is the cleansing head. I never attempted latte art, but maybe I'll give it a shot with a kefir foam or something.

RECIPE: Beforehand, add 1/4 cup of chia seeds to 2 cups of the milk of your choice. I like unsweetened almond milk. Let the chia seeds inflate overnight. You'll have lots leftover for your other chia milk needs.

Next morning, make the kale smoothie to your liking. I put in some combination of apple, pear, orange, grapefruit, mango, pineapple, cucumber, bananas, and mint. If you're gonna go green, stay away from beets, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, etc.

Add chia seed milk to bottom of glass and gently pour kale smoothie on top. When you're making the smoothie, make sure it's less dense than the chia milk.

Note to chia neophytes: Should you wipe your counter of chia seeds, you will later find them sprouting in your sponge! Pretty gross, I know.

Broccoli Eggs Benedict with Tofu Hollandaise

Roasted cruciferous doesn't need much. Perhaps some tahini a la Maoz. Or with bacon a la every restaurant. Anchovies are also welcome.

But after an especially satisfying dinner of roasted cauliflower, I craved a reprise. Here the broccoli gets a breakfast treatment with a soft poached egg, a sourdough English muffin, and a vegan hollandaise.

I roasted the broccoli while I heated the water for the eggs. Then I whizzed up the hollandaise, a mix of silken tofu, turmeric, olive oil, cayenne, and liquid aminos (for the umami oomph). Then the English muffin went into the toaster while I poached the eggs. When it comes to breakfast, I seek a compactness of movement.

The slippery egg and hollandaise slips into the dry and deliciously burnt florets. It's a lascivious way to cook the otherwise staid broccoli. But really, it had it coming.

Chocolate Mint Kasha Buttons

The other day, I had a cupcake with wheatberry buttercream frosting. I made a joke that it doesn't seem possible. What's next, quinoa fudge.

And then I remembered this guy, which I made as a gift for someone who loves chocolate and mint. The crunch is similar to that of a Crunch bar, but with a bit of farminess to it, a taste of the soil along with the cooling green of the mint.

I added the tiniest bit of peppermint extract into melted chocolate, then mixed with the kasha. You can change it up with other small cereals of varying processing -- puffed wheat, Smacks. More chocolate for a bon-bon. More kasha for something like a granola bar.

I molded the chocolates in this mysterious porcelain tray I got from Fish's Eddy. The leaf adds something of a fern-in-a-fossil effect, which I may want to continue if I pursue this ancient grain-chocolate thing.