Puntarelle and Tiny Potato Salad - Recipe

Salad of Puntarelle, Tiny Potatoes and Teleme

Sarina and I both fell in love from afar with these tiny little potatoes from Olsen Farms. We spotted them from a few booths away at the farmer's market, and even though we have several rows of potatoes growing at home, we had to have them. I know it is hard to see the scale, but each one was just a bit bigger than a large marble.

On the same day, I found this puntarelle (the leafy green you see in the picture). It looks a bit different than any pictures I found on the web with the same name. Possibly it was younger. Apparently it is in the chicory family. Certainly quite bitter, to the point where I wouldn't really eat it raw.

This wilted salad was my idea of how to pair these two beautiful ingredients. I added radishes, which accentuate the sharpness of the greens, creamy Teleme cheese and roasted garlic to tame them, and peaches and fine balsamico for a bit of sweetness. Toasted walnuts would be an excellent addition. Another soft cheese, a blue cheese or even feta could replace the Teleme

This same concept could be applied to other bitter greens, especially in the chicory family (escarole, radicchio, etc). If it was a head type instead of individual leaves, grilling would be a fine option.

Salad of Wilted Puntarelle, Tiny Potatoes and Teleme
Serves 4
Vegetarian and gluten-free; vegan if you omit the cheese

• 1 head of garlic
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 2 cups tiny potatoes (or cut up larger ones)
• 1 bunch of puntarelle, tough part of the stem removed
• 1 peach, peeled and cut into 8 sections
• 4 small pieces of Teleme cheese, room temperature
• 8 small radishes
• 8 slices of baguette
• salt
• balsamico

1. Slice the top 1/8" off the top of the head of garlic, wrap in tin foil, and roast in the oven or toaster oven at 375 F. for 30 minutes or until tender.
2. In a large skillet, heat the 1/4 cup of olive oil over a medium-high flame. Add the potatoes and 1/4 teaspoon of salt, and cook, stirring occasionally in a single layer until tender and the skins are beginning to brown. Blot with paper towels.
3. Drain excess oil from the skillet and add the puntarelle along with a pinch of salt and cook until it is beginning to wilt, about 1 minute.
4. Brush the baguette slices with olive oil, toast them, squeeze roasted garlic cloves on them and spread.
5. To assemble the salad, divide the greens among 4 plates. Top with the potatoes, peach sections,, cheese, radishes and roasted garlic toasts. Sprinkle on a bit more flaky sea salt and give them each a drizzle of balsamico.

Zucchini Carpaccio - Recipe

 

The general idea for this lightly cooked zucchini carpaccio came from Paul Bertolli's magnificient Cooking by Hand, which I've reviewed here. I was looking for a something fresh and summery to balance out an Italian menu. It makes an attractive and refreshing alternative to a typical salad. Do it when you have perfect, fresh from the garden zucchini that deserve a turn in the spotlight.

I changed the garnish a bit; instead of pine nuts and basil I chose mint and dill flower heads (along with the olive oil and parmigiano reggiano). Dill flower heads have an intense taste, somewhat reminiscent of caraway (which is in the same botanical family).

The original calls recipe for steaming over water, but I found that the microwave works great. You can cook a batch in a single layer for 30 seconds at a time until they reach the perfect degree of tenderness. In retrospect I think next time I will cook them just a little more than you see in the picture.

I've been enjoying serving family style instead of individual plates. It is less fussy and creates a sense of generosity and community that can be absent from individual plates. This salad looks beautiful on a big platter, and you can make it an hour or two in advance and hold it in the refrigerator until a few minutes before serving.

You'll need a mandoline or mad knife skills to make this. Slices of even thickness are essential both to the appearance for even cooking.

Zucchini Carpaccio
Serves 6 as a light salad course
Vegetarian and gluten-free; vegan if you omit the cheese

• 2 green zucchini, about 1 inch in diameter and 7 or so inches long
• 2 yellow zucchini or summer squash, same dimensions or 4 yellow pattypan squash (the UFO looking guys)
• 4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 4 teaspoons sherry vinegar, champagne vinegar, or good red wine vinegar
• 1 tablespoon minced shallot
• 2 teaspoons flaky sea salt
• black pepper
• small handful of fresh mint leaves
• small handful of fresh dill heads or regular fresh dill, or other herb of your choice
• Parmigiano-Reggiano

1. Trim the ends of all the squash. Using a mandoline, slice somewhere between 1/16 and 1/8" thick. Discard slices that are mostly skin. Working in batches that will fit in a single layer on a microwave safe plate, cook 1 minute. Then cook 30 more seconds at a time until they are quite tender. Reserve on a sheet pan in the refrigerator, keeping the single layer so they don't tear.
2. Let the shallot macerate in the vinegar for a few minutes, then whisk in the olive oil and 1 teaspoon of salt.
3. When you are ready to serve, arrange either on chilled individual plates or a family style platter. You can see the arrangement I used above, overlapping alternating slices of 1 green zucchini with 2 yellow pattypan, but go with what you feel.
4. Drizzle on the dressing.
5. Tear and distribute the herbs. (If you have the dill heads, break them up into small flowers, they are real purty).
6. Use a vegetable peeler to distribute thin slices of parmigiano-reggiano.
7. Add a final sprinkling of sea salt to taste.

Summer Salad Amuse Bouche - Recipe

Only worth doing if you have a garden, or at least farmer's market produce from today. Super simple but a pretty amazing pop of gazpacho-like flavor in your mouth.

Finely diced Kirby cucumber
Peas in their pod, thinly sliced - keep just the slices that have both pod and seed
Peeled cherry tomato
Tiny lemon basil leaves
Maldon sea salt
A few drops of your best olive oil

Sometimes it doesn't have to be complicated...