Watermelon Granita

What a sad life... too much watermelon... well, there must be some way to get rid of it. Right?

4 c. seedless watermelon, cubed
1/4 c. granulated sugar
1 tbsp. lime juice

Puree ingredients until smooth; DO NOT use a food processor unless you want sticky pink liquid all over the counter. Pour into freezer-safe 8x8 pan. Cover. Place in freezer. Come back in an hour - see, you can study and cook at the same time! - and whisk with a fork. It will probably not be remotely frozen yet. Return to freezer, this time for three hours or until ready for consumption- bet you can finish that pesky essay - and flake with a fork until the pink, watermelon-flavored brick achieves roughly the texture of shaved ice. Return to freezer in between quality control sessions, since otherwise you'll have to start all over again from the puree stage, keeping in mind that you'll have to re-flake it after it comes out of the freezer because it will have frozen solid.

A very refreshing, very easy, very low-calorie summer dessert that proves I can achieve deliciousness without butter, flour, chocolate, or an oven. Take that.

Strawberry mochi cake

This is the cake I made for Sunday Night Dinner a few weeks ago. I was looking for a way to use one of the five pounds of mochiko I have in my room, and I found a yummy looking recipe here (courtesy of Kirbie's Cravings). I wasn't sure how it would turn out, but it was a total success! The cake has a unique texture, sticky and chewy like mochi but light like a cake. The blog authoress has also used blueberries or cherries directly subsituted for the strawberries.

This recipe uses "sweet" or "glutinous" rice flour, which is sometimes also called "mochi-ko" after the Japanese. (Despite the name, it is actually gluten-free!) It can be found at Asian supermarkets or online, and possibly at whole food stores. It is very different from normal rice flour, so be careful!

Ingredients

• 16 oz (1 pound) "glutinous" or "sweet" rice flour
  
• 1 cup butter
• 2 cups sugar
• 1 (12 ounce) can (or 1 1/2 cups) evaporated milk
• 4 eggs
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 2 cups fresh strawberries, cut into small cubes (I used frozen)

Directions

1. Cream the butter with sugar. It helps to melt the butter a little first.
2. Mix in the evaporated milk to the butter/sugar mixture.
3. Mix eggs into the mixture.
4. Mix in the rice flour, baking powder and vanilla.
5. Stir in the strawberries.
6. Pour mixture into a 9 x 13 pan. (I recommend using foil--this stuff is hard to scrub off)
   
7. Bake for approximately 1 hour at 350 degrees.
8. Let cake completely cool, allowing the mochi to set, before cutting and serving.

Waffles

1 cup whole wheat or buck wheat pancake mix (not just flour!)

1 egg

1 milk

3 tablespoons

Great additions: small chopped up strawberries, apples, whole blueberries, raisins, and/or nuts (pecans best, walnuts alright)

Mix together non fruit/nuts ingredients until smooth and evenly mixed. Electric mixers work well. Once the soft ingredients are smoothly combined, add in fruit and nuts and stir in. PAM the waffle iron; once it's hot, ladle the batter in, making sure it will fill the whole surface, but not overflow too much. Leave inside for a few minutes, usually between 5-10 minutes (depending on the iron).

If you multiply the recipe, reduce the liquid to pancake mix ratio, as the batter gets too liquidy at the higher size otherwise. The right consistency should leave a dipped finger (clean, obviously!) with a slight coat, not lumpy nor watery.

Chocolate Whipped Cream

Ingredients:
1 pint (2 cups) whipping cream
3/4 cups sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder

Directions:
Combine ingredients in a bowl and chill for one hour. Beat until stiff.

Chocolate Decadence Cake

Another SND success! This cake is dense, moist and extremely rich. The recipe is originally from allrecipes.com but has been slightly altered.

Ingredients:
12 oz (2 cups) semisweet chocolate chips
4 (1-oz) squares unsweetened chocolate, chopped (OR 3/4 cup cocoa powder and 3 Tbsp oil)
1 1/2 cups (3 sticks) butter, melted
1 3/4 cups white sugar, divided
1/2 cup water
7 eggs, separated

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Grease your pan(s) very well (see below for the type of pan). If you like, you can line the bottoms with parchment, which might make it easier to remove the cake but tends to stick to the cake when you cut.

2. Put the chocolate chips and chopped chocolate (or cocoa powder/oil mixture) in a bowl. Add the melted butter.

3. Heat water and 1 1/2 cups sugar in a saucepan until it boils. (You can also do this in the microwave--but be sure to stir it occasionally to let the sugar dissolve). Pour over the chocolate and stir until smooth.

4. In another bowl, whisk the egg yolks with 1/8 cup sugar until thick and creamy. Stir this into the chocolate mixture.

5. In yet another bowl, whip the egg whites with 1/8 cup sugar until they form soft peaks. This takes quite a while--I highly recommend an electric mixer. Gently fold the whites into the chocolate mixture.

6. Place the cake pan(s) on a jelly roll pan or a cookie sheet with 4 edges. Pour the batter into the pans, and put them carefully in the oven. Before shutting the oven carefully pour water into the jelly roll pan or cookie sheet, making a water bath.

7. Bake for 40-50 minutes. Be careful when you open the oven--the water bath makes a lot of steam. Carefully remove the cakes and let cool to room temperature, then refrigerate for several hours. The top of the cake will fall.

8. To remove the cake from the pan, run a knife around the edges of the pan. Then dip the cake in hot water (I used a 9 by 13" pan for this). This will slightly melt the edges of the cake, making it easier to lift from the pan. It's still a pretty messy process, though--don't be surprised if some of the edges stick or the top crumbles.

9. Enjoy!! This cake is excellent on its own, or with whipped cream of any variety.

**Note on pan size: the original recipe called for one 10" round pan. If you're using a pan with tall sides, like a springform, this will probably be okay. If you're using shallower pans (pie pans) then you'll need two; in this case size doesn' t matter so much.

S'morbs!

This is a cross between a rice krispie treat and a s'more. I am not certain of exact quantities, but here's a run-down of the ingredients I used when I made them yesterday:

6 1/2 tbsp. unsalted butter

10 oz. + 4 regular marshmallows

1 box graham crackers, honey flavor (three of the plastic sleeves)

Several handfuls chocolate chips, for melting

Pulverize graham crackers until they resemble coarse meal; use a food processor or a rolling pin, depending on your frustration level. Set aside. Melt butter in a deep saucepan, then add marshmallows, stirring to combine. When marshmallows are just melted, remove from heat and pour in the graham cracker crumbs, stirring until the mixture is homogeneous and incredibly sticky. Shape into walnut-sized balls (or orbs, if you will) and set on a baking sheet, preferably covered with something like aluminum foil to avoid having to wash the baking sheet, to cool. Melt chocolate chips and drizzle over cooled s'morbs.

I melted a few chocolate chips with the marshmallow mixture, which was good, and I think rolling the graham cracker goo around a chocolate chip center would also be delicious. The lovely Hh was good enough to photograph the finished product, so feast your eyes before you feast your stomach:

Gospel's Root Beer Recipe

You must print out the following VERBATIM, including this introduction:

TAKE:
2 lbs unrefined sugar (the brown, tasty kind)
2 lbs granulated sugar (the white, crunchy kind)
1 lb. (a standard-size 16 oz. bottle) molasses
1 gallon of water per pound of sugar
1 (or more!) deal of root beer/sarsparilla/birch beer extract
A whosawhatsits of CO2

PUT:
The water in the keg. Hot. Really hot. Hot as it comes out of the faucet.
The sugar in the water. Stir it around a bunch with a long stirring implement (one should be bought for this purpose. 3+ ft. long)
The extracts in the sugarwater. To taste, it is obligatory that all pledges/new members participate in the tasting process. Remember: the "root-beer-iness" gets sharper as it ages!
The lid on the keg. Try and get a solid seal. You can tell if it hisses when you fill the thing.
The CO2 into the keg. Then, pull the ring to let the CO2 out of the keg.
The CO2 into the keg and let it out a bunch of times. Like 5. This ensures maximum CO2-ness.
The keg somewhere cold.

WAIT:
For a while. Like, a week. Fill with CO2 often. Roll the keg around as much as possible.

MAKE:
Alison (for future Xenians, insert name of current president emeritus here: ___________) tap the keg.

DRINK:
But very...very...carefully...

Love,
Gospel, President Emeritus of Xenia, President '06-'07, VP '05-'06, Russian Pledge Chair, '04-'05, and Way Too Into the Fact That He Did Those Things.

Please sign below to indicate that you have READ THESE INSTRUCTIONS, and so will NEVER PESTER GOSPEL FOR THEM AGAIN

Cheddar Biscuits

I intended to post this recipe after Sunday Night Dinner in November, but alas, I have only just emerged from the grip of procrastination.

2 c. unbleached all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting (gluten-free flour also worked fine)

1 tsp. salt

4 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. cream of tartar

1 tbsp. sugar

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

1 stick unsalted butter

1 c. grated sharp cheddar cheese

2/3 c. milk, preferably 2%

Heat oven to 425 degrees. Thoroughly combine dry ingredients in a large bowl. Cut butter into pieces and work into flour mixture with fingers until dough resembles coarse meal. Stir in cheese.

Make a well in center of flour mixture, pour in milk, and stir just until dough comes together. Do not overmix or the oven gnomes will exchange your biscuits for biscuit-sized rocks. Turn dough onto a lightly-floured surface and knead gently 10 to 12 times. Pat dough into a circle about 1/2 inch thick. Cut out biscuits using a 2" circle cutter (I used an inverted glass; you could also just cut the big square of dough into biscuit-sized squares, if you wanted). Do not twist cutter. Transfer biscuits to a lightly-buttered baking sheet and bake in center of oven until brown, approximately 12 to 15 minutes. Serve hot.

I added about 1/4 c. chopped fresh dill to this mixture. I think chives would also go well. Also, I realize 1/2 tsp. cayenne doesn't seem like enough to spice up that much dough, but the biscuits were much spicier than I anticipated.

Alex's Gluten-Free Brownies

These were incredible and she left me the recipe, so I'm taking the liberty of posting it here:

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup butter
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1 cup brown sugar, packed
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 2 large eggs
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 cup dark chocolate (chunks or chips)

Directions: Preheat the oven to 350 F. Melt butter and cocoa powder in a bowl in the microwave. Add brown sugar, vanilla, and eggs and mix thoroughly. Mix in cornstarch and salt. Add dark chocolate and stir. Pour into a well-greased 8x8 pan and bake for 35 minutes or until a fork comes out clean.

Apple Cinnamon Cupcakes with Streusel

These cupcakes caused my English professor to stop in the middle of a sentence to say "Oh my God." They're that good. I used Cortland apples from the farmer's market, but any crisp, slightly tart variety would be just as good. I recommend slicing the apples by hand rather than grating them, since they tend to disintegrate and produce far too much juice when grated.

Ingredients:

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened

2 cups sugar

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

4 cups coarsely shredded apples, such as Macintosh (about 1 3/4 pounds)

Streusel Topping:

6 tablespoons cold butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

3/4 cup flour

1 cup coconut

2 tsp. cinnamon

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 standard muffin tins with paper liners; set aside. Whisk together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt in a medium bowl; set aside. Put butter and sugar into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Mix in eggs and vanilla. Reduce speed to low; mix in apples. Add flour mixture; mix, scraping down sides of bowl as needed, until just combined.

Topping:

Stir together flour, sugar, and cinnamon. Cut in butter with pastry blender, two knives, or fingers. Mix in coconut.

Divide batter among lined cups, filling halfway; sprinkle generously with streusel topping and bake until tops are springy to the touch, 18 to 20 minutes. Remove cupcakes from tins; transfer to a wire rack; let cool. completely.

Pumpkin Apple Bread

Very moist bread with a nice, subtly sweet pumpkin-apple flavor. Makes 2 9x5" loaves.

Ingredients:
3 cups all-purpose flour
2-3/4 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp allspice
1/2 tsp nutmeg
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 cup granulated sugar
1 c light brown sugar, packed
4 large eggs
1 cup apple butter
1 (15 oz) can 100% pumpkin (NOT pumpkin pie filling)
1/2 cup apple cider or water (I used water, apple cider would probably taste great!)
2 cups diced apples (~1/2" cubes)

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. In a medium-sized bowl, combine flour, spices, cinnamon, baking soda, and salt.
3. In a large mixing bowl, combine sugar, brown sugar, eggs, apple butter, pumpkin, and water. Mix until just combined.
4. Add the flour mixture to the pumpkin mixture and beat until just combined. Make sure not to overmix or the batter will become tough.
5.Gently fold the apples into the batter.
6. Pour into two well-greased 9x5" loaf pans.
7. Bake for about one hour, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.
8. Remove from the oven and place on a wire rack. Let the loaves sit for 10 minutes in the pan, then remove them from the pan and let them cool completely.

Notes:
-You can use pumpkin pie spice in place of the spices; instead of all the different spices, just add 1 tbsp pumpkin pie spice and 1 tsp cinnamon.
-You can also make this into 6 mini-loaves, or 1 large loaf and 3 mini-loaves. Bake mini-loaves at the same temperature for about 40-45 minutes.

Vegetarian Goulash

Easy, tasty, loaded with starch and protein, and very little measuring required!

Preparation/cook time: 45 minutes; serves 6-ish

Ingredients:

• 4-ish servings of spiral pasta
• Half a package of vegetarian "ground beef" (Quorn, Morning Star, etc.)
• One large can of stewed tomatoes
• One can of corn (or half a package of frozen corn)
• Half a jar of tomato sauce
• Two fistfuls of grated cheese
• Sliced green olives (the more the better)

Preparation:

• Boil the pasta until it's slightly al dente; drain well
• Mix pasta, "ground beef," tomatoes, corn, olives and cheese in a large casserole dish
• Add pasta sauce until everything is sufficiently gooey, but not so much the casserole is floating in it
• Sprinkle with more grated cheese, if desired
• Bake 30 minutes on 350℉

Variations:

• Substituting Italian olive salad for the plain green olives is pretty fantastic.
• If you know something about cooking (or are just feeling adventurous) you can experiment with adding herbs and spices - it's tasty on its own, but it was particularly good when I added "Pasta Sprinkle" (sweet basil, Turkish oregano, thyme and garlic).
• Note: you can make this with gluten-free pasta, but it can't be simultaneously gluten-free and vegetarian - most meat substitutes use some form of gluten to hold it together, so you have to use real meat for the gluten-free variety.

Lizzie's scone recipe

The recipe you've all been waiting for (because I thought I'd lost it again and was embarassed to call my mom AGAIN and ask her to read it to me over the phone for like the fourth time in the last year... and against the likelihood of my losing the stupid little piece of paper YET AGAIN):

3 cups flour

1 pinch salt (if using unsalted butter)

1 tablespoon baking powder

3/4 cup butter, room temperature if you're smart

1/2 cup sugar

3/4 cup dried fruit bits*

1 egg

3/4 cup milk**

stir together flour, salt, and baking powder to combine (with a fork or whisk). cut in the butter and pinch it into the dry ingredients as you would into a pie crust: DO NOT OVER-MIX! pinch together until flaky/crumbly. stir in the sugar and fruit (or whatever else you'd like to add in). whisk the egg and milk together in a measuring cup, then add them to the dough. rest in the fridge, covered in saran wrap, 30-60 minutes. divide into little balls 1.5-2 inches in diameter, bake at 350 for 20 minutes.

*have successfully used dried cherries, cranberries, raisins, chocolate chips, shredded coconut, crystallized ginger, chopped or roasted nuts, candied orange peel... mix it up!

**to add a more subtle flavor to the scones, add an extract to the milk, or warm it in a saucepan just until bubbles form, add a flavoring (fresh or dried rosemary, crushed fresh ginger, loose or bag tea leaves, mint leaves, whatever), and let it sit until cool.

Falafel

Important Note: This recipe is a scaled-down (by half) version of one that feeds about 30 people (which is what I used for the Sunday Night Dinner). By default, this should feed about 15, and so do the math to figure out how much of what things you need for the given size. Mostly, it’s helpful to note that chickpeas get surprisingly large over night, and so when you purchase the dried chickpeas, bear in mind that they will probably feed more than you think. Furthermore, this recipe does not include the recipe for Tahini sauce, which is traditionally used as a topping.

Also, the spices listed here can be messed around with. When I last made falafel it was not as herby as I would have liked, and so these are measures in accordance with more Lebanese tastes. If you like your falafel to taste like nothing, then feel free to toy with spice amounts – particularly cinnamon and coriander, which give it most of its deep flavor.

Ingredients

½ kg dried chickpeas
½ cup fresh parsley, chopped
½ cup fresh cilantro, chopped
1 head garlic, peeled and crushed
2 medium-sized onions, chopped
2 eggs
Lots of olive oil (for frying)

Other Ingredients – To the Taste

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground cumin
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon paprika
½ teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon ground, dried coriander

Instructions

Soak chickpeas in water overnight for 24 hours, making sure the pot is plenty big to accommodate the beans as they grow. Drain well. Get a large container and mix chickpeas, chopped parsley, chopped cilantro, chopped onions and spices. Use a food process to grind it to a relatively fine texture (stop every now and then to make sure the blade doesn’t get stuck too long) – don’t worry if it doesn’t seem to hold together quite yet. When this is done and all of the processed mix is in a container, mix eggs into it (to better bind it together). Mash it all together until it is consistent, then begin forming into balls and then slightly flatten them until they are around 2 inches in diameter (no more!). Try to make sure they are well-packed so they don’t fall apart when you plop them into the oil to fry.

Heat oil in a deep pan over high heat, then fry until browned, adding in the same number of patties each time. Lay to rest on a cooling rack covered with paper towels to de-oil them somewhat and let them cool.

Serve with tahini sauce with some form of pita-like bread, with cucumbers, tomatoes and olives.

Kotlets

This is the Iranian food that I've made a couple of the times at the house.  They are the oval-shaped fried pieces of deliciousness.  Recipe as follows:

Ingredients

1 lb ground beef
1.5 lb potatoes, yellow, yukon
4 eggs
2 tsp salt
1 tsp turmeric
0.5 tsp pepper
Oil (olive preferred)
Flour

Instructions

Peel the potatoes, cut into quarters, and boil then in a pot in which you can mash them until they are soft enough that a knife sticks through them easily.  Drain them and mash them (with a ricer, if you have one available - it makes it much easier) until they are very well mashed - you don't want any big chunks, and as few little chunks as possible.

Mix the ground beef, eggs, salt, turmeric, and pepper together in a separate bowl until uniform.  Add the now-mashed potatoes, and mix all together until everything is of one consistency.

Put a fair bit of oil in a frying pan (at least a centimetre of oil, perhaps more - you are basically going to be deep frying these one side at a time) and turn the heat on.  Make smallish-flatish-ovals out of the potatoe-meat mixture.  You can vary the size as you like, but I usually make them somewhat smaller than my palm.  Play around with what you like.  You probably want them ~1.5 centimetres thick (although, that's just a rough estimate).  Bread with flour.  Place in the frying pan with the oil that has now heated up.  You can, and should, fill up the frying pan with these.  Watch the side that is in the oil; once one side is done, you will need to turn it over to fry the other side.  

It's hard for me to describe how to know when one side is done frying.  I know when they're done because I've seen my dad make them and have eaten them a lot and know how brown they should get, but that doesn't particularly help you.  The kotlets will get brown as they fry.  You want them pretty brown, but not charred.  If in doubt, cook a bit longer than you'd like - you'll soon find out if it's too cooked, as things will taste a bit charred, but they still taste pretty good, and you can easily adjust from there.

So yeah, fry on both sides, then take them out of the oil.  As you take kotlets out of the oil, add new ones in, so that you have approximately the same number in the pan and all times (so that the oil does not heat up too fast).  Add more oil as necessary.  When you take the kotelts out, let them sit on a cooling rack for a bit, or at least between some paper towels to get some of the oil off.  

Enjoy!

Jam Tea Cookies

So I don't have to make them up again next time...

3/4 c. butter (1.5 sticks)

1/2 c. brown sugar, packed

1/2 c. granulated sugar

1 egg

1.5 tsp. vanilla extract

3/4 tsp. baking soda

dash salt

2 c. all-purpose flour

1 tsp. cardamom, rounded

jam or jelly of your choice

Cream butter and sugar until fluffy and light yellow. Beat in egg and vanilla. Add dry ingredients and stir until homogeneous. Roll dough into tiny balls - perhaps 3/4 of an inch in diameter - and place on a greased cookie sheet. Bake for 8-10 minutes in a 350 degree oven, or until golden. Let cool and "glue" two cookies together with jam. Apricot and raspberry go well with the cardamom, but fig would probably be excellent too. Ooh, now there's an idea...

enchiladas

as eaten at the barbeque - one batch serves about 15 as a side, 5-6 as a meal

vegetable proto-glop:

1 yellow onion, food processor-ed all to hell

1 green pepper, also food processor-ed all to hell

3ish cloves garlic, chopped finely

1 1/2 cups frozen corn

saute onions, garlic, and peppers together until decently caramelized. season with salt, chili powder, and red pepper flakes to taste. add frozen corn, saute until uniform in temperature. set aside. a batch of proto-veggie glop usually makes more than you can use for a single batch of enchiladas - to make a double batch of enchiladas, use 2 small onions, 2 green peppers, 5 cloves of garlic, and just over 2 cups of frozen corn.

enchilada sauce:

1 small can (8 oz.) tomato sauce

1 teaspoon cumin

1 teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon garlic powder

salt and cayenne pepper to taste

mix. use 8 oz. of water to rinse can, mix into sauce to thin (really, the thinner, the better). set aside.

assembly:

1 package (8) large tortillas, each cut in half

1 can (vegetarian) refried beans

1 batch proto-vegetable glop

8 or so oz. cheddar cheese, grated

1 batch enchilada sauce

cover the bottom of a 9x13 inch baking dish lightly with enchilada sauce. spread a tablespoon or so of refried beans on a half a tortilla, add a largeish spoonful of so of veggie glop, a sprinkling of cheese, and roll up into a tube. place in the baking dish seam-side down. repeat until all tortilla pieces have been used up. pour the rest of the enchilada sauce over the pan, making sure to cover all enchiladas. sprinkle with cheese. bake at 350 for about 20 minutes or until bubbly and delicious.

serve hot, or cold for breakfast.

variations:

add some ground beef into the veggie glop instead of the corn.

chicken might be good, too.

Hummos!

This recipe actually comes from my aunt, via my mom. And given that my aunt is actually more Armenian than my mom, believe that this is legit. However, in my experience the hummos speaks for itself. ; ) Also, SO ridiculously easy.

Blend in blender in this order: (liquids should go in first)

¼ cup lemon juice

¼ cup juice from garbanzo beans can (or can use water )
1 15 oz. can garbanzo beans (drain and save liquid to use)
1/3 cup tahini paste--by recommendation of my mom, only use the jar types, not the kind that is in a can.
¼ tsp salt (or to taste)
1 clove garlic - minced

Blend together. If too thick, add a bit more juice from garbanzo
beans a little bit at a time – (don’t let it get too thin!)
May garnish with parsley &/or paprika
and if desired serve with olive oil sprinkled on top…

Serve with pita pocket bread or naan (or any amazing bread of your choice...Armenian string cheese is also a great thing to eat on the side with this, although where you get it in Vermont I have no idea. Try an international grocery store at home. )

white bean shit

disclaimer: i did not name this recipe. my mother did, and as she invented the recipe, the name stuck. it is much more delicious than it sounds.

serves: 8-10 as a side dish; would go really well with the chicken dish mluby posted recently.

1 white or yellow onion, chopped
2-3 cloves garlic, chopped finely
1 tablespoon dried basil
2 teaspoons dried oregano
1 zucchini, cut into smallish chunks
1 (16 ounce?) can chunked-up tomatoes
1 (same size) can white beans
1 lb. orzo, most of the way cooked and drained
2 c. chicken or beef bullion/stock

saute onion and garlic in olive oil with herbs until translucent. add zucchini chunks and cook on medium heat until tender, stirring occasionally. add tomatoes (with liquid) and beans (drained, rinsed, drained), and then add the orzo and bullion. stir and cover. simmer 10 minutes or so, add salt and pepper to taste. if orzo is not sufficiently tender, add more stock or just water. serve with grated parmesan if desired.

pico de gallo (salsa)

serves: single batch for family dinner consumption, double batch for parties

1/2 (red) onion, food-processed all to hell
1 jalapeno, treated in much the same way
2 cloves garlic, same
(1 ripe mango, chopped into bits)
4 or so good ripe tomatoes, chopped into bits also
a handful of roughly chopped cilantro
juice of one lime
kosher salt to taste, at least 1/2 teaspoon

chop and combine all ingredients, adding cilantro last. best prepared at least 2 hours but no more than 6 hours before serving - lets the flavors combine, but longer than that and the tomatoes get funky.

good as a dip for chips or as a sauce for burrito/fajita-type meals.