Turlu Turlu, adapted from Moro: The Cookbook
2 zucchini, trimmed and cut into 1 inch disks
1 eggplant, halved lengthways and each half cut into 4 wedges lengthways
1 medium onion, roughly chopped
2 garlic cloves
2 green peppers, halved, deseeded and thickly sliced
3 medium carrots, peeled, halved lengthways and each half cut into 3 lengthways
1 medium turnip, cut into 1 inch wedges
2 medium potatoes, cut into 1 inch cubes
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
2 teaspoons coriander seeds
1 can chickpeas
2 14-ounce cans of whole tomatoes, drained and chopped
4 tablespoons olive oil
6 garlic cloves, finely sliced
1 small bunch each of fresh Italian parsley and cilantro, roughly chopped
salt and fresh ground pepper

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. While the oven is heating up, sprinkle a teaspoon of fine sea salt on the zucchini and eggplant slices, and let them stand for 20 minutes before rinsing under cold water. The salt helps get rid of the excess water in the vegetables so they can roast up nicely.

In a large bowl, toss the eggplant, onion, 2 garlic cloves, peppers, carrots, turnips, and potatoes with the olive oil, allspice, coriander seeds, and a little salt and pepper. Spread the veggie mixture on a large roasting tray in a single layer, so the veggies can roast rather than steam.

Cook the vegetables for 45 minutes in the oven, and gently turn the veggies over every 15 minutes or so to prevent them from burning. After 45 minutes of roasting, add the zucchini disks to the tray and cook for another 15 minutes.

While the veggies are in the oven, make a sweet tomato sauce that will bind the dish together. In a medium saucepan, heat up the olive oil over a medium to high heat. When the oil is hot, but not smoking, add the 6 finely sliced garlic cloves and fry until the garlic begins to color. Add the chopped tomatoes and a pinch of salt to balance their acidity. Cook the sauce over a medium heat until most of the liquid that the tomatoes give out has evaporated. Season with salt and pepper and then stir in the rinsed chickpeas to heat them up.

To serve the Turlu Turlu, add the roasted vegetables to the tomato-chickpea sauce and then stir everything together with the fresh herbs. Taste, and season with extra salt and pepper if needed.

I found this Zucchini and Potato Tortilla recipe that helped me use up the last of my zucchini and a couple of pattypan squashes. Despite the addition of the zucchini, the tortilla still tastes like a traditional Spanish tortilla with a creamy texture from the slow cooked potatoes in olive oil. I realize that some people may freak out from the 1 1/2 cups of olive oil used to cook the veggies, but a lot does drain out at the end, and isn’t olive oil supposed to be healthy for you?

During the cooking process of this tortilla, I somehow managed to grate off the top of my right thumb and then cut my left thumb through the nail bed. My bad luck continued when I proceeded to burn both hands by stupidly grabbing the handle of the skillet after I had taken it out of the oven. The preparation was a total and painful disaster to my hands, but the end result was delicious! I am definitely making this again, but will just keep a better eye on protecting my hands. This Zucchini and Potato Tortilla is great to make in advance for a few lunches and makes 8 portions at 85 cents per serving.

Zucchini and Potato Tortilla
2 pounds zucchini
2 pounds boiling potatoes
1 1/2 cups olive oil
1 pound chopped Spanish onion
10 large eggs

Coarsely grate the zucchini and watch out for your fingers! Toss the grated zucchini with 2 teaspoons of salt and let it stand for 30 minutes to drain some of the water in the zucchini.

While the zucchini stands, peel the potatoes and cut them into 1/3-inch dice.

Heat the oil in a 12-inch skillet over a medium-high heat until hot, then add the potatoes, onion, and 3/4 teaspoon of salt. Reduce the heat to medium-low and cook the potatoes without browning them for around 30 minutes. Cook the potatoes uncovered and stir them occasionally.

Transfer the zucchini to a colander to drain, then squeeze small handfuls to remove as much liquid as possible. It is pretty incredible just how much water comes out of the zucchini, but keep on squeezing it in small handfuls until you get it as dry as you can.

Add the zucchini to the potatoes and cook, stirring occasionally, until the potatoes are tender and the zucchini is slightly browned, about 15 minutes. Drain the vegetables in colander set over a bowl so you can keep the oil that the veggies were cooked in. Let the veggies cool for 5 minutes.

Lightly beat the eggs in a large bowl, then stir in the vegetables, 1 tablespoon of the oil from the veggies, 3/4 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper.

Return 1 tablespoon of the cooking oil to the skillet and add the the egg mixture, pressing the potatoes flush with eggs. Cook over low heat, covered, until almost set and the underside is golden, around 12 to 15 minutes.

Place the skillet in a preheated oven at 350 degrees F. Let the tortilla cook until it is set all the way through, around 15-20 minutes. It is hard to overcook the tortilla due to all of the olive oil from cooking the veggies, so be sure that the center of the tortilla is cooked all the way through.

Once the tortilla is cooked, run a rubber spatula around the tortilla and gently shake the skillet to loosen the tortilla. Carefully slide the tortilla onto a serving plate and cut into 8 wedges. You can serve the tortilla warm or at room temperature.

The only “bright spot” of this daunting day was finding this recipe for a Tunisian Tuna Sandwich in a Metropolitan Home magazine in one of the doctor’s waiting room. This week after Carlo regained his appetite, I made it and we both enjoyed the salty tang of the sandwich. This recipe makes enough for 2 large sandwiches at $2.23 each, a fraction of what you would pay at a fancy sandwich shop.

Tunisian Tuna Sandwich
1 medium Yukon Gold potato, peeled, cubed (1/2-inch pieces)
2 large eggs
2 5-oz cans water-packed, albacore tuna, drained
1/4 cup capers, drained
1/2 cup chopped parsley
juice of 2 lemons
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil, plus more for serving
salt and pepper
2 demi-baguettes or rolls
Harissa

Boil the cubed potatoes in salted water until they are tender, and then drain and let them cool. Cover the eggs with cold water in a small saucepan and cook them over a high heat for 12 minutes, then cool them in a bowl of ice water. Once they are cool, peel and slice the eggs.

In a large bowl, combine the tuna, capers, parsley, lemon juice, olive oil and mix with a fork. Season with salt and pepper to taste. I just kept on adding lemon juice and a bit of olive oil until the mixture tasted how I liked it. Lastly fold in the potatoes into the sandwich filling.

Gently toast the cut baguettes or rolls, and pull out the the soft insides of the bread. Spread the bottom side of the bread with a generous amount of harissa and top with a sliced egg. Then add the tuna stuffing on top and drizzle with a bit of olive oil to finish off the sandwich.

The deal was that if you bought a sack they would roast them from free with the big chile gas burners in front of the store. When I saw the ad for the Hatch Chile Fest, I had no idea how big the sack was, but we love green chiles so we immediately knew that we wanted to get one. Turns out that I bought 1 1/8 bushels of Hatch green chiles, or basically a 30-lb burlap sack of freshly roasted green chiles for $28.99.

This photo is deceiving because it doesn’t illustrate just how many chiles we have. Obviously we had more than we could possibly eat this week, so Carlo and I decided to pack up the chiles in ziploc bags and freeze them in small batches, so we can have enough until next season.

We ended up filling 30 bags each with 6 chiles inside, equaling around 180 Hatch green chiles for us to eat. Unfortunately, the chiles have now overtaken our freezer.

Since it was still early after we bagged all the chiles, I decided to make some Hatch Huevos Rancheros for breakfast to make a dent in our bounty of chiles. These spicy eggs feed 4 people at $1.27 per serving.

Hatch Huevos Rancheros
10 to 15 Hatch chiles, stemmed and deseeded
1/2 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
olive oil
salt and black pepper
8 eggs
8 corn tortillas
cilantro, chopped
4 tablespoons Mexican crema

Put the Hatch green chiles in a pan and cover them with water, although I threw in a chicken stock cube for some extra flavour. Simmer the chiles for around 30 minutes and then take them off the heat for a few minutes. Blend the chiles and liquid in a food processor until smooth.

Heat up some olive oil over a medium heat, and saut?© the onion and garlic. Once they have softened, add the chile puree and let everything simmer for 5 or so minutes. Season the sauce with salt and pepper to taste.

Toast your corn tortillas in either a toaster oven or frying pan. Place two tortillas on each plate and cover with a few scoops of Hatch green chile sauce. Drizzle some Mexican crema over the sauce and top with two fried eggs. Sprinkle some chopped cilantro over the eggs and enjoy.

By the way, this will probably be the first of many Hatch green chile posts over the next few months. Check your local grocery store to see if they are doing any special roasting events over the next couple of weeks. In case you can’t find any Hatch green chiles, you can used the canned version or roast fresh Anaheim chiles as a substitute.

Another word he thinks that I made up is clafoutis, and when I ordered one for desert at DB Brasserie a couple of years ago, he finally believed that it was a real word. Clafoutis is just as fun to eat as it is to say: Basically it is a French sweet omelet that is quite custard-y and filled with baked fruit.

Clafoutis are so easy to make and look quite spectacular when you serve them to guests. You can either bake one for dessert or for breakfast, with either occasion making for a delicious treat. This recipe for Plum Clafoutis makes enough for 6 people at 80 cents per serving.

Plum Clafoutis
2 eggs and 1 egg yolk
7 ounces milk
2 ounces cornstarch
1/2 cup sugar
just over 1 pound plums
3.5 ounces heavy cream
4 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon Grand Marnier

I bought these beautiful prune plums from the farmer’s market. They are smaller than red plums and have a yellow flesh that turns pink once they are cooked.

Preheat your oven to 410 degrees F. Wash the plums and slice them open to remove the stones.

Heat 2 tablespoons of butter in a frying pan. Once the butter is melted, add the plums and 2 tablespoons of sugar. Cook for a couple of minutes and then add the Gran Marnier. You can be super flashy and light the dish to burn off the alcohol, or you can just cook the plums for a few more minutes until the alcohol is cooked off.

Butter a large pie dish and sprinkle the inside with sugar.

In a small bowl, mix the cold milk together with the cornstarch. In a larger bowl, beat the eggs with the egg yolk, and then add the sugar and mix. Next add the cream and mix further. Lastly add the milk and cornstarch mixture and beat everything together.

Place the cooked plums in the pie dish, face up. Pour the batter over the plums and cook in the oven for about 30 min, until the top of the clafoutis is golden.

Remove the clafoutis from the oven and let it cool for 10 minutes or so. Sprinkle with a little sugar and eat the clafoutis lukewarm with a touch of fresh whipped cream.

While that might be quite pricey for some home cooking, think about how much crab salads go for in fancy restaurants? We would be paying at least $15 for the lunchtime equivalent of this salad in a Vegas restaurant, and when we can’t eat out like we used to, special lunches like this help me feel like I’m not totally constrained by life on a severe budget.

You can buy a pound of fresh lump crab meat at Costco for $15, which comes in really handy for recipes like this. The chunks are really big and tasty, and you don’t have to mess around with cooking the crab and then pulling all the meat out of the claws and body. The recipe also includes a pretty ingenious way to cook all of the thick asparagus that is cropping up at our farmers’ market by thinly slicing the stalks and lightly cooking them for salad greens.

Crab, Avocado, and Asparagus Salad
1 pound thick asparagus
7 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
6 medium basil leaves
1 small shallot, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley leaves
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
1/4 cup salted roasted pistachios, coarsely chopped
1 pound jumbo lump crab meat
2 Hass avocados, diced
2 hard boiled eggs, diced

Cut off the asparagus tips and cut each tip in half lengthwise. Cut off the very woody end of the asparagus stalk and then use a peeler or mandoline to shave the spears lengthwise. Blanch the asparagus tips and shavings in a boiling pot of salted water until they are just heated through, around 10 seconds or so.

Quickly drain the asparagus and place it in a bowl of ice water to stop them from cooking. Once the asparagus is cool, remove it from the water and drain it well. You might have to use some paper towels to pat the asparagus dry so you don’t end up with a soggy salad.

Whiz up the olive oil, lemon juice, basil, shallot, and 1/4 cup of the parsley in a food processor. Taste the dressing and then season with salt and pepper.

Mix together the crab, asparagus, and hard boiled eggs in a large bowl. I tossed in around half of the dressing and let the salad topping sit for a few minutes for the flavours to marry.

Mix the asparagus with the pistachios and remaining parsley in a bowl and drizzle with a little bit of dressing. Place the salad on each plate and then top with the crab mixture for a special lunch.

These Sherried Mushrooms with Fried Eggs on Toast were definitely special and very delicious: thick crunchy bread topped with savory mushrooms and fried eggs. I know that hopefully sometime in the all not too far off future, I will return to the hot cereal at the desk and real breakfasts like this will be only weekend occasions, but for now, I’m enjoying my special breakfast treats. This breakfast recipe feeds 4 people at $1.17 a serving.

Sherried Mushrooms with Fried Eggs on Toast
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for brushing
3/4 pound mixed mushrooms, such as button and cremini, sliced 1/4 inch thick
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1/2 small onion, thinly sliced
1/4 cup dry sherry, such as Oloroso, or you can use good Spanish sherry vinegar
Four 1/2-inch-thick slices of rustic white bread
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
8 large eggs
2 tablespoons coarsely chopped flat-leaf parsley

Heat up the oil in a frying pan, and add the mushrooms and season with salt and pepper. Cook them over a medium heat until they soften, around 4 minutes. Throw in the onion, and cover and cook the mixture until the onion has softened and the mushrooms are browned, around 3 minutes or so. Add the sherry or sherry vinegar and stir it in until it is almost evaporated. Season with salt and pepper, and remove the pan from the heat, and cover the mushrooms and onions to keep them warm.

Toast the bread slices. You can either do this in a 400 degree oven, or in a toaster oven. I rubbed some raw garlic on each toasted slice and then drizzled some olive oil over them. Delish!

Top the toast with the mushroom mixture and then fry up a couple of eggs per person. Place the eggs on top of the mushroom toast and sprinkle with some parsley.

Egg Salad, from Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Simple Meatless Recipes for Great Food
6 hardboiled eggs, peeled and diced
1/4 cup homemade mayo
1 tablespoon fresh squeezed lemon juice
3 tablespoons finely chopped pickles or cornichons
3 tablespoons fresh chopped dill
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Put all the ingredients in a big bowl and mix them together. Add more mayo as needed and season with salt and pepper to taste. This egg salad can be kept in the fridge for up to 2 days.

A delicious egg salad sandwich, but sadly lacking any bacon since we were out. We got the idea of bacon on egg salad sandwiches from Austin’s Thundercloud Subs, which serves the Office Favourite sub with egg salad, bacon and cheese–possibly the best sandwich ingredient trifecta!

This Orrechiette Carbonara recipe fits the bill for a light pasta dinner, but one that is full of complex flavours. Carlo and I couldn’t get enough of it when I made it for dinner, and it even tasted wonderful as cold leftovers the next day. This pasta recipe feeds four people at $1.15 per serving.

Orrechiette Carbonara
4 applewood-smoked bacon slices, diced
2 medium leeks (white and pale green parts only), halved lengthwise, then cut crosswise into 1/3-inch pieces
3/4 cup frozen peas
10 ounces orecchiette (little ear-shaped pasta) or small shells
2 large eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese plus additional for serving
1 tablespoon chopped fresh Italian parsley

Cook the bacon in a large skillet over medium heat until it is crisp, about 8 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the bacon to a paper towel to drain. Pour off all but 2 tablespoons of fat from the skillet if necessary. Add the leeks and slowly saut?© them over medium heat until they are tender, about 6 minutes. Set the leeks and bacon aside.

Meanwhile, cook the pasta in large pot of boiling salted water until just tender but still firm to bite, stirring occasionally. I threw in some frozen peas at the last minute to up the vegetable quotient in the dish. Drain the pasta and peas, while reserving 1/2 cup of pasta cooking liquid for the sauce.

Whisk the eggs and 1/2 cup of grated Parmesan in a medium bowl to blend; gradually whisk in 1/4 cup of pasta cooking liquid.

Add the pasta and peas to the leeks in the skillet, and stir the mixture to heat everything up. Remove the skillet from the heat. Pour the egg mixture over the pasta and stir until the sauce is just creamy and the eggs are no longer raw, about 2 minutes. (Return the skillet to a very low heat if the egg mixture is runny; do not overcook or the eggs will curdle.)

Add some of the remaining 1/4 cup of pasta cooking liquid to the pasta if it is too dry. Stir in the bacon and parsley. Serve the pasta, topped with some freshly grated Parmesan cheese.

I’ve been surprised to find that I like breakfast at home perhaps better than going out. I don’t have to get showered or changed, and you never have to wait for a table. This recipe for Huevos Divorciados, or Fried Eggs on Corn Tortillas with Two Salsas, is great, and if you are only cooking for two, you can make the full recipe and even have leftovers for Sunday. These eggs feed 4 people at $1.48 per serving.

Huevos Divorciados
1/2 lb plum tomatoes
1/2 lb fresh tomatillos, husks discarded and tomatillos rinsed
2 fresh jalape?±o chiles
1-inch wedge of large white onion
2 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons salt
3 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
1/4 to 1/2 cup water
8 large eggs
8 (6- to 7-inch) corn tortillas

Heat a frying pan over moderate heat until a bead of water evaporates quickly on it, then roast the tomatoes, tomatillos, jalape?±os, and onion, turning each with tongs, until they are charred on all sides, 10 to 15 minutes. Core the roasted tomatoes, discard the stems from the jalape?±os, and discard half of the seeds from each chile.

For the red salsa: Coarsely pur?©e the tomatoes, 1 jalape?±o, 1 garlic clove, and 1 teaspoon salt in a food processor, and then transfer the mixture to a bowl.

For the green salsa: Coarsely pur?©e the tomatillos, remaining jalape?±o, remaining garlic clove, remaining teaspoon salt, cilantro, and 1/4 cup water (add more if needed for desired consistency), and then transfer the salsa to a bowl.

Fry two eggs per person to your liking, and heat up the corn tortillas. You can fry them in a little bit of vegetable oil in a frying pan, or you can do what I normally do, and stick them in the toaster oven for a couple of minutes until they crisp up.

Place two tortillas on each place and top each of them with one fried egg. Spoon the green salsa over one tortilla and egg, and then spoon the red salsa over the other side.

Have a wonderful weekend!