Kaddo Bowrani (Afghani Pumpkin)

I crave this dish fairly regularly, having become addicted to the version at The Helmand in San Francisco. Well, Helmand is open again but I haven't made it back yet, and I picked up a lovely sugar pumpkin at the pumpkin patch last month.

I cobbled the recipe together from the Chowhound Home Cooking board. I used Allstonian's pumpkin recipe, and mainly followed the yogurt and meat sauces from a SF Chronicle article. The SF Helmand pumpkin is sloooowly cooked in tons of oil and sugar which makes it rich, creamy and truly amazing, but not quite right for a main dish.

It came together relatively quickly, in about 1.5 hours with some down time to steam a vegetable and make a salad -- not a typical weeknight meal for us but I'll certainly make this again when I can carve out the time, and hopefully while pumpkins are still available.

Pumpkin:
One 2 to 2.5 pound sugar pumpkin
2 T vegetable oil
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 t ground cinnamon

Yogurt sauce:
1 cup plain full-fate yogurt
1 clove garlic, crushed
½ t dried mint
¼ t or more salt

Meat Sauce (see recipe to follow)

Preheat oven to 350.

Cut the ends of the pumpkin to create a flat surface, and peel with a U-shaped peeler. Cut into wedges, quarters or sixths depending on the size of the pumpkin. Remove seeds and strings.
Heat 2 tablespoons oil in a Dutch oven. Brown the pumpkin pieces, turning every few minutes until golden brown on all sides. Do not scorch it.

Mix sugar and cinnamon, and sprinkle over pumpkin. Bake for 30 minutes, or until tender, basting with the juices half-way through. [From the recipe post: This seems like a lot of sugar, but go with it. The dish doesn't come out sweet in the end, and it just isn't as tasty if you cut down on the sugar.]

While the pumpkin is baking, make the yogurt sauce and the meat sauce.

Yogurt sauce: mix together ingredients until smooth and season to taste with salt.

Meat Sauce
2 T corn oil or other neutral oil
1 large onion, finely diced
1 1/2 pounds ground round
1 small can tomatoes, roughly pureed*
2 large garlic cloves, minced
1 1/4 t ground coriander
1 1/2 t salt
1 t freshly ground pepper
1/2 t ground turmeric
2 T tomato paste
1 1/3 cups water

* I drain the juices into the pan then whir the tomatoes briefly in the can with an immersion blender

Heat the oil in a heavy, medium-sized saucepan until it ripples. Add the onions and sauté over medium-high heat, stirring frequently, until they are golden brown, about 20 minutes. Add the beef, stirring to break it up into tiny pieces, until the meat is no longer pink, about 5 minutes.

Stir in the tomato, garlic, coriander, salt, pepper and turmeric. Cook for 5 minutes. Blend in the tomato paste. Add the water and bring to a boil over high heat. Cover, reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes.

Use 2 to 2 1/2 cups of the sauce for the Kaddo Bourani. Cool, cover and refrigerate the remaining sauce for another dish. Yields 5 cups sauce.

To serve, place the pumpkin wedges on a serving plate, ladle the meat sauce over all, and drizzle with the yogurt sauce. Delicious!

NOTE: The photo above is sourced from and links to a really great food blog, Habeas Brulee. Check it out! I can't wait to make that pumpkin seed-cocoa nib brittle!

Turkey Parmigiana

Since Parmigiana dishes are mostly an American riff on Italian food, I don't feel the least bit bad about the liberties I took tonight. We had turkey cutlets because they're quick and readily available at TJs, but I didn't feel like preparing or eating any of the French-influenced sauces recommended in my Cook's Illustrated Quick Recipe cookbook. "Can you make Parmigiana?" asked R. Why yes, in a manner of speaking.

It turned out to be a tasty dish easily made of items we always have around: matzo meal, eggs, frozen homemade marinara, and havarti cheese slices (makes for quick-n-easy cheese toast). My sensibilities were far more offended by the sauteed bock choy I served along side, but that's my anti-fusion issue.

1 package turky cutlets (~1 lb.)
1 T flour
1 egg
1/2 cup matzo meal
1/2 t Italian seasoning
2 T + 1/2 cup grated parmigiano cheese
salt and pepper
2 cups marinara-type tomato sauce, or make a very simple marinara with lightly sauteed garlic and one can of tomatoes, puree to use
Cheese slices suitable for melting

Arrange the turkey cutlets on a plate and allow to rest 10 minutes at room temp. Meanwhile, spread the flour in a plate. Lightly beat the egg in a pie plate and arrange it next to the flour. Mix the matzo meal, 2 T grated cheese, Italian seasoning and salt and pepper to taste in a third plate. Begin prep for a salad or veg side. Pour a glass of wine. Then blot the cutlets with paper towel and lightly salt and pepper.

Using tongs (this gets messy), dredge the turkey cutlets one by one in flour, egg and the matzo meal mixture. Shake lighly after each dredging to rid excess. Some cutlets will follow apart, salvage the small pieces that make sense and keep going. Transfer the turkey cutlets to a plate and let sit for ten minutes while the coating sets. Turn on the broiler, heat the sauce and cook the veg and a pasta shape to accompany and make the salad.

Heat a 12" nonstick skillet on med-high and add 1 T EVOO. Heat until it's hot enough to sizzle a crumb of matzo meal mixture, but not smoking. Add the turkey cutlets and cook for 2 minutes, turn over and cook for 30-60 seconds until just browned. Transfer to aplate lined with paper towels, and continue to saute the turkey in batches as necessary.

Arrange the cutlets in a casserole and ladle a few tablespoons of sauce over each, then top with the remaining grated cheese and torn-to-size pieces of sliced cheese. Place under the broiler till the cheese is bubbly and slightly browned. Remove and plate on top of a bit more tomato sauce. Toss the pasta with the remaining sauce. Serve with cutlets over the pasta and with the veg and/or salad, enjoy with a glass of wine, of course.

Lamb Kebabs & Gumbo (sort of)

Monday was lamb kebabs made of ground lamb, scallions, matzo meal, an egg and a bunch of a Persian 7-spice mix I'm trying to use up. We have tons of crudite left over from MZ's birthday (of course we didn't run out of anything) so I made a Greek salad and a cucumber-yogurt sauce to go with the kebabs in w/w pita. It was a really good dinner, and very on the fly. MZ ate everything, so worth repeating.

Still trying to work through the crudite, tonight I made a sort of gumbo. I saw this recipe and thought of the turkey andouille sausage in my fridge, then realized that real gumbo has celery and bell pepper, which would address a few other lurkers, too. So I made up this combined Cook's Illustrated-Quick Cook never-the-twain shall-meet recipe that saved me from the insanity of a 1-hr roux or the disappointment of a pallid imitation. And served it over brown rice, completely separating this stew from its roots. Although MZ tasted not a bit (after devouring a spicy hot tamale pie last night), we liked it, I'll make it again.

Not Quick but Not Altogether Traditional Shrimp & Sausage Gumbo
1 lb. turkey andouille sausage
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup flour
2 red onions, diced small
1 celery rib, diced small
1 medium red bell pepper, diced small
6 cloves garlic, minced
2.5 t Penzey's Cajun spice mix
2 bay leaves
1 bottle clam juice
1 quart low sodium chix broth
10 oz frozen okra
3/4 lb. cooked bay shrimp
1/2 cup thinly sliced scallions

Assuming this is a raw rather than smoked version of "Andouille", brown the sausage in 1 T vegetable oil in a dutch oven. Remove to a collander lined with paper towels to drain.

This part is straight out of Cook's Illustrated -- it's fussy, but amazing chemistry and really doesn't take that long to get the desired result: In the same pan, heat the oil to 200 degrees. Lightly spread the flour over the oil, and stir to combine. Turn heat to medium and stir constantly until the roux turns a copper penny shade. The flour will thin considerably (thus the need for something in the end to thicken the stew, according to CI). Add the onions, celery and red pepper and stir to combine. The mixture will seem a bit gluey but wonderfully fragrant. Stir frequently as the vegetables soften, ~8 minutes. Add the seasoning and garlic and stir.

Slowly add the clam juice in a steady stream, stirring constantly. Now add the chicken stock. When the mixture is full combined, add the okra*. Bring to a boil, add the bay leaves and turn to a simmer for 30 minutes.

Add the reserved sausage and simmer another 30 minutes to allow the flavors to develop. Adjust seasonings and add the shrimp. Stir, simmer for 5 minutes and serve over rice, garnished with thinly sliced scallions.

Easily serves 6-8 people.

* This is where I should have added a 28 oz can of drained diced tomatoes, but MZ woke up and I lost track. I would do this next time, if only to increase the vegetable content of this one-dish dinner.

Oyako Donburi

This remains one of our favorite meals. I added a cup of thinly sliced Napa cabbage, because I had it on hand. I prefer the baby spinach leaves. MZ loved the shiitake mushrooms and chicken.

Not much cooking over the weekend, but we did learn that MZ loves ikura. She kept asking for more orange balls. She also likes Little Star pizza.

Petrale Sole again, with Indian Spices

Petrale sole is cheap and good right now. Halibut? $17.99/lb. Wild King Salmon? $19.99/lb. Sustainably fished Chilean Seabass? A whopping $24.99/lb. But fresh, wild Petrale sole is a mere $12.99/lb. And it is much tastier, in my opinion, than tilapia, The Other Cheap White Fish.

So we had it again tonight, this time I added 2 t. of curry poweder to the dredging mix of matzo meal and flour. Unable to look at any more potatoes or rice, I made whole wheat orzo, then McGiver'd a bechamel out of the dredging flour and the reserved pasta water, in the pan in which I'd cooked the fish. It came out surprisingly well!

The veg was charred cauliflower with chiles, onions, cumin, coriander and turmeric, finished with some yogurt and lime juice. Wow, I actually found hot serrano chiles, this was no dish for MZ. Good thing she likes salad now, her veg was the juice from chewed dressed lettuce (she spits out the mangled leaves), as well as tomatoes, cukes and shredded carrots from the salad.

Tomatillo Pork Stew, A Steak and a Soup

I made a pork and tomatillo stew earlier in the week, a variation from a real recipe in a slow-cooker cookbook. I had Niman Ranch pork shoulder and decided to go the easy way with jarred salsa and a can of green enchilada sauce. I should have known better, it was good, but kind of flat and one-dimensionally salty in spite of the browned onions, chile and 1/2 bottle of beer I added. I won't take that many shortcuts in one recipe again.

Tonight was skirt steak, grilled out in the wind, and Beets Two Ways. This is what we call it, I habitually buy beets with the greens, and we make a roasted beet with blue cheese salad as well as sauteed beet greens. I roasted the beets during MZ's nap, and sauteed the greens while the meat was resting. R. grilled the meat and made the salad, so it was a pretty easy dinner, along with some roasted purple potatoes.

I've been trying to get a grip on our refrigerator. It was good to get those potatoes used up, as well as some russets that have been sitting around since Chanukah, a bunch of leeks, some chicken stock left over from stretching S's fabulous matzo ball soup, and a ham steak I bought, then rejected, for my New Year's black eyed peas. I started off making potato leek soup, rustic-style with the potatoes lightly broken up rather than fully pureed. I added some ham and then couldn't resist throwing in some frozen spinach. No dairy, and it's hearty enough for a meal with some good bread and a salad. A keeper.

Turkey Cutlets with Thyme-Riesling Sauce

I always forget how easy turkey cutlets are, and how tasty when prepared as directed in Cook's Illustrated The Quick Recipe. I riffed on the Hard Cider-Thyme sauce based on what was open and needed using. Sauce was made with a cup of slightly off-dry riesling and finished with a small amount of cream. Served with shredded Brussels sprouts braised with shallots and with mashed potatoes. Very good, and on the table in 35 minutes.

I have lots of potatoes, a few leeks and a ham steak, so look for potato leek soup sometime very soon. I think I want to try a more rustic, not-pureed version.