Skip to content

Posts tagged ‘pumpkin seeds’

Jan 18

1 Comment

Pumpkin seed mole (pipián verde)

Pepita_pipian

I realized a few days ago that over the span of my cooking years (the last ten years or so) I’ve inadvertently drifted toward simplicity. I love vegetables, I love eggs, I love simple braises and pasta dishes. I love simple desserts that feature fruits, good dairy, or nice chocolate. I’d generally choose a simple stew and a hand-torn hunk of bread over a meticulously-plated meal of dozens of components, and if a meal is going to take hours to prepare I’d rather it be because it’s braising or roasting away in the oven while I’m comfortably enjoying happy hour or socializing or reading a book or otherwise enjoying myself outside of the kitchen.  I can’t imagine my life without the significant time I invest in food – writing, talking, planning, shopping, preparing – but over the years my feeling about cooking and food seem to have clarified around trying to appreciate and focus on the simple things. The beauty of a poached egg broken open on a pile of perfectly cooked greens; the brightening power of a huge handful of fresh herbs; the allure of caramelized edges; the power of a bit of acid, fat, or salt in transforming something humble into something revelatory. Much of the time, the joy of cooking is about finding opportunities to turn something simple into something really spectacular without adding complicated technique, expense, or effort-intensive time (and that’s exactly what I love to share with students when I teach).

But sometimes, simplicity simply doesn’t cut it. There are worlds of dishes and cuisines that require more complication – even if only because they’re unfamiliar – and those recipes provide opportunities to learn something new, to invest a bit more in a meal to make it special, or to provide yourself with something you can’t otherwise access.

This recipe is one of those. There’s nothing inherently complicated about it, aside from a decent number of ingredients, but if you’re not regularly making mole sauces at home or don’t generally have a good stock of Mexican ingredients (and especially if they’re hard to find), it presents itself as more of an investment. An investment solidly worth it, I might add, but an investment nonetheless.  Read more

Jun 27

Sweet and spicy caramelized pumpkin seeds (for salads, and otherwise)

If you’ve been around here for a while, you’ve probably noticed I like to use pumpkin seeds quite a bit (like with sunchokes, on free-form salads, with roasted vegetables, in muffins, always in my go-to granola, in chewy granola bars, in cookies). They’re the best substitute I can think of for nuts, which I can’t eat, and in their raw and unsalted form they’re easy to add just about anything for a little extra roughage, protein, and nutty flavor.

Caramelized_pumpkin_seeds

But these are no everyday pumpkin seeds. I mean, sure, you could eat them every day, and they’re by no means difficult to make. But these are are pumpkin seeds gone luxury, coated in a sweet and spicy mixture of brown sugar, butter, and spices and baked until toasted and caramelized. They emerge from the oven crunchy, buttery, sweet, and spicy, and completely addictive. I made this batch to put on a salad for a dinner party at a friend’s house, and together with leaf lettuce, roasted carrots, vinegar-soaked red onion, sugar snap peas, and a mish-mash of herbs from my mother-in-law’s garden they were perfect.  Read more

Jun 7

3 Comments

Roasted sunchokes with pumpkin seeds, pickled red onion, and shaved Parmesan

Duo_sunchokes

It took me years to take a serious look at a sunchoke (aka Jerusalem artichoke). I’d pass them by at the market, eagerly turning to more comprehensible things. I had no idea what they were, much less how to prepare them, and I wasn’t even sure if they were vegetable or some exotic form of ginger. I mean, look:

Sunchokes_board

Not exactly the sort of vegetable that inspires confidence. That peel. Those knobs. The sheer wall of intimidation, having no idea what one might do with such a thing.

But, boy, was I wrong. Despite their gnarly outer appearance, sunchokes are pretty fantastic. They have a sweet, nutty, almost creamy flavor that retains a hint of crisp even when thoroughly cooked, sort of like a water chestnut, and they’re lovely roasted or pureed or even deep-fried in thin slices like potato chips. There’s no need to deal with the peel, which is thin and edible, and cutting off the knobs is actually kind of fun. Should you find yourself facing a sunchoke, do not shy away! Go on in. Read more