Sparkling Summer Salad: Or, How I learned to stop slicing and love the mandolin,

Posted by amanda in apple, budget, celery, cilantro, cucumber, healthy, lemon, quick, recipe, salad, summer, vegan, vegetable, vegetarian

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I get a terrible feeling when I come to the end of a recipe I have all the ingredients for (ish) only to read the final instruction: crockpot-ing, immersion blending, dutch oven-ing...or any number of other final touches for which I don't have the right kitchen tool (yet!). So, having recently acquired a very handy mandolin from the previous owners of my new house (when someone leaves something in a cupboard still in the box, that's a housewarming gift right?), I've spent the better part of the afternoon julienning everything slice-able in my fridge (which is more than you'd think! Skinny cheese sticks anyone? Strawberry stick-men? Long long banana slices? No?).

The very tasty outcome of this little experiment is a pretty awesome summer salad: it's crunchy, tart, filling, and refreshing, and above all, easy (especially if you have a mandolin or any other kind of slicing tool).

You're gonna want:
A large bowl
A little bowl
A mandolin (you lucky duck)

In your big bowl toss together:

3 stalks of celery, sliced thick
half a cucumber, julienned
2 large carrots, peeled and julienned
2 granny smith (or other tart) apples, julienned [to do this, cut the apple into 4 sides, then attempt to slice - I kept the peels on)
l large handful of fresh cilantro, roughly chopped

In your small bowl mix:
1/2 cup lemon juice
1-2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp apple cider vinegar (optional)
1 tbsp sugar (also optional - i wanted my dressing a little sweeter than lemony)
large grain salt to taste (I used a citrus chili salt mix and it was perfect)
cracked black pepper to taste

Drizzle the dressing over your salad mix and stir around until well distributed. Cover and keep in the fridge for an hour to let the flavours combine if you have the time, or serve fresh immediately!

DIY Veggie Garden

Posted by CK in cucumber, gardening, peppers, vegetable

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For a while now, I've been thinking about starting my own veggie garden. I honestly didn't think it was possible since I live in an apartment, until I found a wonderful chart on Pinterest (see image below). Planting your own garden can be an excellent way to make sure you're eating organic food and to save money (bell peppers can get expensive if you use a lot).


Starting indoors was perfect for me. When summer comes I will easily be able to transplant my garden into big pots onto my balcony. But before I started, I still had a lot of questions I needed answered: what type of soil should I get? What vegetables would I be planting? How big should my pots be? So, I went to Walmart where they were very helpful in helping me choose everything I needed to get my garden started.

First, I chose to plant cucumbers and mini bell peppers. As I don't have a very good track record with keeping plants alive, I thought they would probably be the easiest to plant and take care of.  Note that you can definitely use the seeds of the veggies you have at home! I was just too lazy and decided to purchase them :P

The very helpful young man at Walmart suggested I use Organic Choice as my soil of choice. It's specific to vegetables, is organic and is good for starting indoors and transplanting outdoors - using the same soil.

Once you get home, plant your seeds into pots. I bought biodegradable pots that I can just plant directly into my bigger pots once it's time to transplant, but you can easily use plastic yogurt boxes (make sure you pierce holes at the bottom).

That's it! 3 easy steps! Now, set next to a window and watch your veggies grow! :) Make sure to do a little bit of research on your veggies before you plant your garden. I found out that cucumbers and bell peppers need a lot of water so should water them daily!

Stute Kitchen will be taking a 2 week break to take care of the garden! We'll see you then with new recipes and an update on the garden! :)

Have fun!!

- CK

Cold Quinoa Salad

Posted by amanda in budget, celery, cucumber, dressing, easy, healthy, quinoa, recipe, salad, tomato, vegetable, vegetarian, yellow pepper

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The finished product~

After all that holiday cheer (turkey pies, bacon based salads, and wines of all kinds), it might be time to get back to basics...like vegetables, and primary colors. This cold quinoa salad has both of those things, and is really easy to make. Though he might just be trying to placate me, M said he liked this one too. I adapted this recipe from a recipe on a box of Casbah quinoa...it didn't look like it would have enough crunch or flavor as it was originally intended, so I adjusted some quantities and ingredients to make up for that:

Fluff your quinoa to give it texture and to
make it grainy

First, cook up your quinoa (225g, or 1.5 cups):
To do this, bring 3 cups of vegetable broth to a boil.
Then add your quinoa to the broth; stir, and reduce the heat to low. Allow this to cook for between 15-20 minutes: you want the water to be completely absorbed by the quinoa.
When cooked, fluff the quinoa with a fork.
Let the quinoa cool while you prepare the rest of the salad ingredients.






In a large bowl combine:

Half a cucumber (I prefer skin intact) - thickly sliced and quartered
3-4 stalks of celery  - sliced
1 quart grape tomatoes - halved
1 yellow pepper - roughly chopped
(half a red onion would probably delicious chopped into this, though I didn't do so myself)
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley (you could up this even, especially if you love parsley, and go to 1/2 cup)









In a small bowl, whisk together:

Apple Cider Dressing

1/4 cup virgin olive oil
4 tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
1.5 clove garlic, minced
2 tsp red pepper flakes
3 or 4 good cracks of black pepper



Once the quinoa has cooled, combine it with the vegetables. Drizzle the dressing over the mixture and let sit in the fridge for a few hours to let the flavours settle.

A nice touch would be to add 2 handfuls of fresh baby spinach to the mix before serving.

Tomato, Cucumber and Yogurt Salad

Posted by CK in cucumber, recipe, tomato, vegetarian, yogurt

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B, A and I got together for a potluck last week and we each came up with amazing dishes that filled our tummies! :) This salad is very simple but oh-so-delicious! If you're missing the freshness of summer, this is the salad for you.

You'll need:

• 2 medium tomatoes, diced
• 1 large cucumber, diced
• 4-5 tablespoons of natural yogurt (depending on the constistency you like)
• 2 teaspoons of dry parsley
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced

1. Toss your diced tomatoes and cucumber into a bowl
2. Mix yogurt, dry parsley and garlic into a small bowl to make your dressing. I recommend doing it separately so you can add garlic, yogurt or parlsey to taste before mixing it up with your veggies.
3. Pour your dressing onto your vegetables and enjoy!

Perfect for a last minute salad or last minute dish!

- CK

Cottage Component 1: Picnic-Perfect Summer Salad

Posted by amanda in budget, celery, cucumber, dill, dressing, easy, feta, healthy, onion, pasta, pasta salad, pepper, quick, recipe, salad, spinach, tomato, vegetarian, yellow pepper

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It's summer tiiiimmmme and the cooking is eeeeaasy here at Stute-kitchen :) Team Stute has returned from a fantastic weekend away at a cottage with good friends, gorgeous weather, and GREAT food. Combining our forces we came up with a delicious cottage-time lunch: pasta salad and barbecued skewers. Fresh ingredients and a new spin on these old classics takes traditional summer food to a new level of goodness.

You're gonna need:

• Roughly 2 generous cups of uncooked shell (conchiglie) pasta
• One yellow pepper, seeded and cut into slim chunks (or however you like your pepper in a salad), if you go really chunky, use 2 peppers
• Half a cucumber, sliced into half circles
• 2-3 stalks of celery, diced roughly
• 1 pint (usually a container) of cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
• 1/4 of a sweet onion (though any kind would likely do, this salad gets more onion-y the longer it exists, so choose wisely), finely chopped
• 3 tbsp fresh dill, chopped
• 3-5 generous handfuls of baby spinach (mixed greens will do in a pinch, but they don't keep as long once the dressing is mixed in).

Dressing: Whisk together...

1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup lemon juice
2 heaping  tbsps Red Wine Vinegar
1 clove of garlic, minced
Ground Black Pepper to taste

Topper:

Roughly 1.5 cups of light feta cheese -though really, add as much or a little as you like - , rinsed, dried, and crumbled (my new technique is to rinse the block from the brine, and then squeeze the liquid out in my fist, over the sink - this dries and crumbles simultaneously, then you can just brush your hands off in the salad)

To assemble:

1. Cook the pasta (roughly 8-10 minutes to get it al dente), rinse in cold water, and set aside.

2. Combine all your veggies, except the spinach, in a large bowl, using your hands to mix gently, being
sure to distribute the dill.

3. Add pasta to veggies, again, stirring with hands.

4. Add spinach by handful, assessing how much or how little you will want personally. Mix with hands (this avoids breaking the pasta shells)

5. Pour dressing over pasta and veggies (if you don't like getting oily, use a utensil here, but I swear, hands is the way to go)

6. Chill.
7. Crumble feta into salad before serving. Mix.

This makes roughly 10 servings, depending on the appetites in the room. Be sure to wait 20 minutes or so before hitting the lake!!!
-A