Winter salad with roasted cranberry vinaigrette

Posted on December 25, 2017 by Chelsea

I know it may seem a little odd to post a recipe for salad on Christmas Day. This is, after all, for those who celebrate Christmas, traditionally a day of heavy, indulgent food. It is about mashed potatoes, and standing rib roast, or lamb, or turkey, or well-glazed spiral ham, and pie. It is, as a dear old family friend of ours once declared (though he was talking about Thanksgiving), “not about lettuce!” I would offer in response that, honestly, neither is this salad. It is about the tartness of fruit, the jeweled colors, the crunch of nuts, the funk of the cheese. And sure, it is backed up by crisp cabbage and neutral greens, but really, it’s about a mix of brightness to break up whatever richness the rest of your table is heaving under, topped off by a puckering dressing of pan-roasted cranberries bobbing in balsamic vinegar (or lemon juice, if you prefer) and sweetened just enough with honey or maple syrup.

The dressing here is based on a recipe from PCC Markets. The spiced walnuts are lightly adapted from this Martha Stewart recipe – I’m not including it as part of my recipe since hers is so clear, but I will say that I used mustard powder and garam masala instead of her cumin and coriander, as I thought they would blend better with the rest of my salad ingredients.

Of course you can add or subtract anything you please here. Roasted root vegetables would add heartiness, arugula or radicchio would add peppery bitterness to the greens; pecans or hazelnuts could replace the walnuts as the spiced nut component. Dried cranberries or golden raisins could bolster and sweeten the cranberries from the dressing. If you aren’t a fan of blue cheese, a crumbled chevre would be a nice replacement.

Whatever beautiful additions or changes you make, be sure to toss it with the dressing at the very last minute – or serve the salad undressed and the vinaigrette in a small dish on the side – as the balsamic instantly sullies the brightness of the apples and radishes. And do serve the dressing with a spoon, so the burst cranberries can be fished out and liberally distributed. And whatever you’re eating this season, I hope it is delicious, and just what you wanted, and that it brings you joy. Merry Christmas.

Winter Salad with Roasted Cranberry Vinaigrette

Serves 6-8 as a side salad

20-30 minutes

For roasted cranberry vinaigrette:

½ cup fresh cranberries

2 tablespoons honey or maple syrup (plus more to taste, if needed)

1 tablespoon water

¼ cup balsamic vinegar or lemon juice

2 teaspoons Dijon mustard

¼ cup olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

For salad:

5 cups mixed greens, such as spinach, romaine, or butter lettuce

1 cup finely shredded red cabbage

5-6 radishes, topped and tailed, thinly sliced into discs

14 ounce can drained mandarin orange segments (or fresh segments from 3-4 mandarin oranges)

½ cup crumbed gorgonzola or other blue cheese

½ cup spiced walnuts (see above for a link to Martha Stewart’s recipe)

½ cup pomegranate seeds

1 green apple, quartered, cored, and thinly sliced

1 avocado, halved, pitted, and cut into cubes

To make the dressing, heat the cranberries, the 2 tablespoons honey or maple syrup, and the tablespoon of water in a skillet over medium-high heat. Swirl or stir occasionally until the cranberries pop, 5-6 minutes.
While the cranberries are cooking, whisk together the mustard, balsamic or lemon juice, and olive oil in a glass measuring cup or in the container you’ll be serving the dressing from. Plop in the cranberries and their collected liquid after they have all popped, whisk well, and season to taste with salt and pepper. If the dressing seems too tart you can add more honey or maple syrup, but remember it will taste diluted once it is distributed over the salad. Set aside to cool before serving.
While the dressing cools, assemble the salad: toss the greens and the cabbage in a large bowl. Add the radish, the mandarin segments, the cheese, the spiced walnuts, and the pomegranate seeds.
Just before serving, prep and add the apple and the avocado (you want to wait till the last minute for this so they don’t brown). Toss, if desired, or serve untossed so diners can see all of the bright components.
Add the dressing at the last minute, or serve alongside so diners can add their own dressing as they serve themselves.

Rain check…

Posted on December 18, 2017 by Chelsea

No new post today, I’m afraid, amidst the final grading push and the beginning pressures of the Christmas holiday to come. I will say, though, that if you have a spare couple of hours and feel like a project, this recipe for Irish whiskey salted caramels produces a lush, smooth, definitively spiked treat. I don’t know the origin of the recipe, but I found them at the blog Cheese and Chocolate, which seems not to have been updated in a while, but which nonetheless offers some pretty tempting ideas.

Until next week!

Autumn Bisque, now with post and recipe!

Posted on December 11, 2017 by Chelsea

I promised you a recipe when I was feeling a bit better, and suddenly a week slid by! It’s not that I wasn’t feeling better (though suspected food poisoning that requires two days – TWO! Two entire days! – home from work does take a while to recover from); it’s just that the end-of-semester panic that seems to make many of my students momentarily forget how to write seemed to strike me too. The words dulled and tripped and, in the face of multiple fires breathing their way up and down Southern California and all the other apocalyptic promises of the impending end of the year, chose to stay inside, thank-you-very-much.

But it’s time to shed that cocoon and step back out, and besides, this soup, with its medley of root vegetables, apple for sweet tartness, and luxurious quantities of cream, is all the velvet goodness a winter table requires. Its inspiration comes from a gorgeous bowl at my sister’s wedding last fall – a soup so rich and luxe and flavorful it was practically a down comforter. I knew it had root vegetables in it, I knew it had cream and herbs, maybe butternut squash, maybe sweet potato… so I wrote to the catering director at the venue and got into a very silly standoff: I wanted an email with a recipe, she wanted me to call (during HER business hours, east coast time – didn’t she know I was at work too? Didn’t she know I abhor phone calls?!) so she could tell me how she makes it, which sounded more like procedure than like an ingredient list with quantities. This went back and forth for a week, with me refusing to call and her refusing to provide a recipe, and finally I just gave up. Ten months later, the time to recreate the soup arrived, and I had only my muted memories from a night soaked in champagne and joy to go on.

To that end, I have no idea how close this is to the original. I picked sweet potatoes, parsnips, and celery root for an intriguing background flavor – you could change up the vegetable choices and use winter squash, or carrots, or even rutabagas. I suspect the venue’s version had even more cream, and I don’t think it included the spritz of nutmeg I added (mostly for looks, but we liked the flavor of it too), but there’s something about pouring in over a cup of heavy whipping cream and watching the contents of the pot go from bright orange to decidedly pale gold that makes a home cook’s arteries start whispering threats. I also don’t think the venue added a last minute slug of irish whiskey, but I’d recommend that you do, since just that little bit somehow rounds out the flavor in a way nothing else could.

What I do know is: this is cozy. It’s smooth, and rich, and pleasantly filling, and would be perfect with a bright, citrus-spiked salad full of radishes and pomegranate seeds and bitter lettuces.* And a thick wedge of bread to round things out. Maybe this one. And it leaves me lacking only one soup, with three weeks to go, to make this project complete.

* wow, that sounds good, doesn’t it? Want one next week? I’ll see what I can do…

Autumn Bisque

Makes 10-12 first course servings; about 6 main course servings

About an hour

4-6 cloves garlic

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 medium white onion, diced

5 cups chicken or vegetable stock

2 cups peeled and diced celery root

2 cups peeled and diced sweet potato

2 cups peeled and diced parsnips

1 green apple, peeled, cored, and diced

3 sprigs fresh thyme (plus more to serve, if desired)

1 sprig fresh sage (4-5 leaves)

1 bay leaf

1½ cups heavy cream

1-2 ounces whiskey, brandy, or marsala, optional

1-2 teaspoons salt, to taste

sprinkle of nutmeg, to serve

Set the oven temperature to 350F. In a small, oven-safe bowl, drizzle the garlic cloves with a little bit of olive oil, some salt and some pepper. Top tightly with aluminum foil and stow in the oven until the garlic smells sweet, 20-25 minutes. There’s no need to wait for the oven to preheat.
While the garlic is roasting, melt the butter in a large pot over medium heat. Add the diced onion and cook gently with 2 pinches of salt until the onions are tender and slightly translucent, but not browned. This is called sweating, and should take 8-10 minutes, during which time you can peel and dice the other vegetables.
With the onions softened, pour in the stock, then dump in the diced celery root, sweet potatoes, parsnips, and apple. Stir in the thyme, sage, and bay leaf, then raise the heat, cover with a lid, and bring to a boil.
Once the liquid is boiling, reduce the heat to medium or medium low, keeping the soup just at a simmer until the vegetables are fork-tender: easily speared but not disintegrating; about 30 minutes. The apple will be softer than the others; the celery root will likely take the longest.
When the vegetable chunks are tender, remove from heat and add the roasted garlic – once it has cooled a bit from its time in the oven, just squeeze the cloves right out of their skins, and straight into the soup. Then, very carefully and working in batches, relocate the soup to a blender and blend until very, very smooth. Hot liquids can expand rapidly in the blender, causing small “explosions,” so leave some room in the top, leave a space with the lid for air to escape, and consider covering the top with a thick kitchen towel just in case.
Transfer the smooth soup back to the pot. If you’re feeling especially fussy, you could try straining it first. I didn’t, but if you do, let me know how it goes!
Back in the pot, stir in the heavy cream and the alcohol, if using, and the salt. Start with 1 teaspoon, taste, then add more if you feel the soup needs it. Return to low heat until warmed through.
To serve, ladle into bowls, dust lightly with nutmeg, and top with a sprig of thyme if you’re feeling fancy.