Kitchen Vignettes

Can you grill dairy foods?

That’s a dilemma (sort of) this weekend as we celebrate two holidays at once! For Jews, it’s Shavuot. For all Americans, it’s Memorial Day, the unofficial start of the grilling season.

As far as the food stuff goes, Shavuot is the “dairy” holiday. When we eat all things cheese (as well as other dairy products), especially cheesecake.

But, except for a few items, like grilled halloumi cheese, which is quite delicious (cut the cheese into strips, coat them with olive oil, stick them on a skewer and grill them until they’re crispy on the outside), we don’t grill most dairy products.

However, we can grill fish and eat them with other dairy products.

Or grill meat and eat some wonderful side dishes (and save the cheesecake for another time during the holiday).

This wheatberry salad fits perfectly into both holiday meals. It is a substantial side dish, you can make it ahead and it can be either dairy or non-dairy (leave the cheese out, substitute nothing or some other vegetable of tofu). You can make this into a meat-based salad too — add some cut up grilled chicken or beef, etc.

Matter of fact, this is a good, healthy salad choice for the entire summer.

My kids love when I make this kind of salad. This is the young generation’s way to eat now. Less meat, more whole grains and veggies. You can use this salad as part of a vegetarian meal.

Also, just as you can leave out the cheese, you can make this dish with a different grain (like barley or quinoa). Use different herbs. Play around with the recipe and invent on your own. Cook the grain according to the directions on the package. The rest, as the great sage Hillel said, “is commentary.”

Wheatberry Salad with Tomatoes and Olives

1 cup wheatberries

3 cups water

1 15-ounce can (drained) black beans

1 large avocado, cut into chunks

1/2 cup chopped red bell pepper

1 cup halved grape tomatoes

1/2 cup chopped red onion

1 cup chopped cheese or meat (optional)

1 fresh serrano pepper, deseeded and finely chopped

2 teaspoons fresh oregano leaves

1/3 cup olive oil

3 tablespoons red wine vingar

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

Place the wheatberries in a large saucepan and add the water. Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce the heat, cover the pan and simmer for about 50-60 minutes or until the wheat is tender. Drain any remaining liquid and place the wheatberries in a bowl to cool. Add the black beans, avocado, bell pepper, tomatoes, red onion, cheese or meat if used, serrano pepper and oregano and toss to distribute ingredients evenly. In a small bowl whisk the olive oil, wine vinegar, mustard and cumin. Pour over the salad and toss the ingredients. Add salt and pepper to taste. Let the salad stand at least 30 minutes before serving. Makes 6-8 servings

Farro is becoming trendy. So says this article, which I read recently.

Actually, farro has been pretty popular in my house for the last several years. It’s one of those whole grains, you know, the stuff everyone says is so healthy, full of fiber and nutrients and so on.

It’s popular with me because it tastes so good and because there are so many things you can do with it.

I first cooked farro because I was getting bored with white rice, brown rice, black rice, red rice and every other kind of rice. And with pasta, potatoes and egg noodles. And there’s been an overload of quinoa recently too.

But I wanted something filling and “starchy” as a side dish with dinner.

There was this little bag of farro in the store. It looked intriguing. I decided to give it a try.

SUCCESS! Farro is sumptuous and tastes sort of nutty and toasty.

I’ve made it dozens of ways, treating it just like rice: steamed, poached, sauteed, in pilaf. Plain. With vegetables. As a salad, drizzled with vinaigrette.

Every recipe is terrific.

Some say farro is the same as spelt, but it is actually a different, if similar grain. It is also a lot like wheatberries and oat groats (so you can substitute those in recipes). Farro is sometimes called emmer wheat.

Do try it. You can use it all summer in a salad and all through the year in other ways.

Here’s one recipe we love at our house.

Farro Salad with Carrots, Peas, Tomatoes and Dill

1 cup farro

1-3/4 cup water or vegetable stock

2 carrots, chopped

1 cup thawed frozen green peas

1 cup halved grape tomatoes

3 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons lemon juice

1-1/2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill

1 teaspoon grated fresh lemon peel

salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Place the farro and water in a saucepan and bring the liquid to a boil over high heat. Lower the heat, cover the pan and simmer for about 30 minutes or until the farro is tender, but still chewy. Set the farro aside to cool slightly. Cook the carrots in boiling water for 3-4 minutes or until tender. Drain and add to the farro. Add the peas and tomatoes and toss the ingredients to distribute them evenly. In a separate bowl or a jar, combine the olive oil, lemon juice, dill and lemon peel. Whisk the ingredients until well combine (or shake in a covered jar). Pour into the farro mixture and toss the ingredients. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Makes 4-6 servings

Vegetarian Thanksgiving Guests?

Every year I hear about people who go nuts because they have vegetarian guests coming for Thanksgiving dinner and they don’t know what to cook for them.

Maybe they’re truly flustered. Or maybe they’re actually upset that their teenager, who, like all other teenagers is otherwise the model of good manners and propriety, has just given up meat. Or they’re annoyed because their daughter-in-law (of course) has “turned” vegetarian on them.

Or something like that.

But really. I know change is difficult for most of us and the Thanksgiving turkey dinner seems almost sacrosanct, but there is always so much food on the table, most of it meatless, that a vegetarian can skip the meat and eat everything else, right?

It’s not as if you have to make an entire extra dinner.

All you have to do is heavy up on the sides. That means the usual mashed potatoes and/or sweet potatoes, plus a bunch of vegetables. And if you add a rice or pasta recipe or a recipe for a whole grain casserole that should do it.

Then everyone is happy. The turkey lovers (I confess to be that) can have their turkey and the vegetarians can be satisfied too.

Suggestions for recipe that make good side dishes and that will also nourish and please vegetarians: Spinach Pie, Mujadarah (a bulgur wheat/lentil dish), brown rice and mushroom pilaf, eggplant Parmesan, Bulgur Wheat Casserole with Dried Apricots and Pistachios, Macaroni and Cheese. Dozens of others.

And try this one, for Vegetarians. Meat eaters will love it too.

Farro Pilaf with Winter Squash

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, chopped

2 teaspoons chopped fresh ginger

1 cup diced winter squash (such as butternut)

1 cup farro

2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley

1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves

salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

1-3/4 cups vegetable stock

Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally, for 2 minutes or until the onion has softened slightly. Add the garlic, ginger and squash and cook, stirring occasionally, for another minute. Stir in the farro, parsley and thyme. Season with some salt and pepper. Pour in the stock. Bring the liquid to a boil. Boil for one minute. Turn the heat to medium-low, cover the pan and cook for about 25 minutes or until all the liquid has been absorbed. Makes 6 servings

Holiday weekends at my house remind me of two things: Tel Aviv Airport, with its zillions of people trying to get through security, which takes about 3 hours, and a scene from the movie The Godfather where Connie, crying her eyes out, calls her mother, who holds a baby on her hip while she stirs a pot of sauce and people are talking and kids are screaming and no one can hear anything.

But I wouldn’t have it any other way. It’s a balagon, to be sure, but worth everything because I get to see my kids and grandkids and despite the noise (when you get older you forget that children up to a certain age cry at least once a day) and the mess and the unbelievable amount of fruit we go through, I love every fatiguing minute of it and look forward to the next one.

When that many people come to the house (we are 6 adults and 4 children ages 14 months through age 10), you have to keep the food simple. So we do. We’ve managed to work out the kinds of stuff we like to eat over the years although we have some differences among us. But we all like Spinach Pie and Grand Finale Cookies (both from my book, Hip Kosher) and salads, depending on the season. We had end-of-summer tomato salad during the Labor Day weekend (tomatoes, basil, avocado, lime juice and olive oil) and corn on the cob and grilled stuff.

We also like salads made with whole grains. My daughter Gillian recently suggested that I experiment with oat groats, so I made this salad, which seemed to go over well and was really easy to cook. You can make the dish with any cooked whole grain. I consider oats somewhat sweeter than, say, farro or bulgur, so I liked the idea of including carrots and raisins, which are on the sweet side.

Don’t pay attention to the package instructions for cooking the groats. Most instructions for whole grains call for too much water and too much time, which make the grains mushy.

Oat Groats Salad with Carrots and Raisins

1 cup oat groats

3 carrots, coarsely chopped

3-4 scallions, chopped

1/2 cup raisins

2 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves or 1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill, optional

3 tablespoons olive oil;

3 tablespoons white wine vinegar

salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Place the oat groats in a saucepan, cover with 2 cups water and bring to a boil over high heat. Turn the heat to low, cover the pan and cook for about 35 minutes or until the groats are tender but still a bit chewy. If there is any remaining water, strain the groats to discard the water. Spoon the groats into a bowl. Cook the carrots for 3-5 minutes or until tender but still firm. Drain and add to the groats. Add the scallions, raisins and herb, if used and stir the ingredients to distribute them evenly. Pour in the olive oil and vinegar and season to taste with salt and pepper. Toss ingredients and let rest for at least 15 minutes before serving. Makes 6 servings

Too Hot for Dinner

Today is one of those hot, sticky, humid days when I find it impossible to eat the kind of big, old style protein-starch-veggie dinner that was standard in my growing up years. So I’ll make a salad, which is to say, I’ll look in the fridge, chop up what I find, maybe add some lettuce and tomato and pour a fresh, homemade vinaigrette dressing over it.

Voila! Dinner!

Okay, I might cook a whole grain, like farro, which I absolutely love to eat and make into a salad.

The good thing about salad is the interchangeable parts. You don’t have the same leftovers, deli items or frozen foods that I do, so experiment a little. Add cut up veggies, cheese, meat, fish, whatever. The recipe is entirely flexible.

Farro Salad with Vegetables, Scallions and Whatever

1-1/2 cups farro

1 cup cooked cut up broccoli, green beans, snap peas, frozen peas or lima beans, etc.

1 cup halved grape tomatoes

3-4 scallions, chopped

1 cup diced cooked chicken, salmon or shrimp

1/2 cup crumbled feta or blue cheese, optional

1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley

1/4 cup olive oil

3 tablespoons white wine vinegar

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves

salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Place the farro in a saucepan and add enough water to cover the grain by one inch. Bring the water to a boil over high heat. Lower the heat, cover the pan and cook for 25-30 minutes or until the farro is tender but still slightly chewy. Drain if any liquid remains, and place the farro in a bowl. Let cool slightly. Add the broccoli, tomatoes, scallions, chicken or fish, cheese, if used, and parsley. Toss ingredients to distribute them evenly. In a small bowl, mix the olive oil, wine vinegar, mustard and thyme and pour over the salad ingredients. Toss, taste for seasoning and add salt and pepper to taste. Let rest for about 15 minutes before servings. Makes 4 servings