Mixed greens with tuna, green beans, and broccoli

This was the first meal that we made in our new home in Tucson. Pretty simple mix of fresh ingredients, plus some albacore from the can. We purchased just about everything at a Trader Joe's nearby; I'd nearly forgotten how totally wonderful that store is. 

Nothing special for the dressing. Jenny used a bit of the oil from the oil-packed tuna, and then drizzled some balsamic vinegar over the top of it all. I got tomatoes on mine, but Jenny isn't a huge fan of raw tomatoes. Right there on the plate is also one of the forks from our Jasper Morrison set, Knife Fork Spoon, a highly recommended set of tableware.

Avgolemono & Greek Salad

After receiving the America's Test Kitchen big book of chicken and poultry recipes, I was looking forward to making a true chicken stock from scratch, something I've never tried before. When Jennifer requested her favorite soup, avgolemono, I thought that would be a perfect place to start for a rainy, windy winter's day. I decided to pair it with a simple Greek salad, once again dipping into Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything.

First, the avgolemono. Made of about 4 pounds of whole legs, one diced onion, two bay leaves, and 12 cups of water, the stock simmered uncovered for three hours. I only poked at it every once in a while to skim off the foam and fat that settled on top.

According to America's Test Kitchen, you can simmer up to five hours to get a fuller chicken flavor, but we were getting hungry. So, I strained the solids and discarded them (the chicken at this point had really good texture but hardly any taste; we might have been able to save it by turning it into chicken salad, but neither one of us thought it would be worth it). Then I added a cup of arborio rice, which simmered for about 20 minutes while I prepped the rest of the ingredients: 1 cup of fresh lemon juice, 1/4 cup chopped parsley, and four eggs whisked together. When the rice was tender and plump, I whisked the juice/parsley/egg combo into the soup. I whisked as quickly as I could to keep the eggs from cooking into egg-drop strands. There were still some slight bits of white, but overall the soup was thick and creamy.

The salad was really basic, and I stuck to Bittman's recipe word for word, mostly to see how it would come out. He uses all the usual suspects (lettuce, olives, feta, mint) and one unexpected (radish). A little olive oil and fresh lemon juice on top finished it off.

Black-Eyed Pea Dip with Toasted Pita

We rang in 2007 with black-eyed peas, bacon and collard greens for lunch. Black-eyed peas, eaten before noon on New Year's Day, are considered good luck.

I had quite a bit of leftover beans and decided today to make a dip with them. I served them with oven-toasted pita chips. Perhaps we'll wrest a little more luck out of this year, yet.

Black-Eyed Pea Dip
Drop two cloves of garlic in the food processor, pulsing until they're finely chopped. Then add about two cups of black-eyed peas (if you're using canned peas, rinse and drain them first. Better yet, use freshly cooked peas. They're so inexpensive!) and process until creamy. Add one teaspoon of natural peanut butter, the juice of one small lemon, and salt, pepper and Tabasco to taste.

Toasted Pita
Cut pita rounds into triangles. Spray the bottom of a jelly roll pan with nonstick spray, then arrange the pita triangles on a single layer in the pan. Brush the tops of the pita with a lightly beaten egg white (I suppose you could also use more cooking spray) and bake them in a 450-degree oven for about five minutes. If need be, crank the oven to broil for the last minute or so.


We ate it with Escarole and Fennel Salad with Pears and Gruyere and called it lunch.