Mastering the Mandoline

I've had a mandoline sitting in my kitchen cabinet for well over ten years.

I don't remember buying it, but I know it was from Kmart because it is Martha Stewart brand. Probably purchased in my newly married, childless phase when I thought old Marth was the last word in all things domestic.

It's been packed and moved, but never thrown away or sold at a tag sale.

I think I tried to use it once. I'm not entirely sure.

Last week…I dug into the back of the pots and pans cabinet and pulled out the old Martha mandoline. I was finally going to make that thing work, or throw it away.

Fortunately, I was successful! It was surprisingly easy and I am still in possession of all ten fingers.

So, can you guess what I made with these?

Yep, you got it! Cucumber salad!

As a kid, I hated cucumber salad. Actually…I probably would have liked it if I had tried it but I was such a fussy pain in the ass that I turned my nose up at it and had never eaten it until I was 41. Yes, you  read that right. I just tried it this year, thanks to my new diet and my German friends.

The (mostly) clean eating has changed my palate for the better and certain vegetables that I had no interest in before have now become my best friends. The idea of cucumber salad was totally appealing at this point, so I was excited to try it out at a fabulous dinner that my friends had made. It was authentically German and consisted of Sauerbraten, spaetzle, red cabbage and cucumber salad. Every bit of it was delicious, but I found myself craving the cabbage and cucumber salad long after the dinner.

Unfortunately the cucumber salad was one of those a little of this and a little of that type of recipes and was not written down. There were only a handful of ingredients, so I just made do and tinkered around.

I texted my friend again and asked about peeling the cucumbers. No quick reply, so I just left the skin on. Of course after I sliced them all I got the response….PEEL THEM! Oh, well!

After slicing the 7 cucumbers, I put them in a colander and sprinkled with kosher salt. I let them sit for about 30 minutes and then squeezed out the excess liquid. I added 1/4 cup white vinegar, 2 tablespoons of canola oil and pepper. The salt I added was enough and I didn't need to add more.

Mixed it all up and let it sit in the fridge for a few hours.

I am assuming my guesswork was on target. I know this because my 11 year old son…who loves hamburgers and ice cream more than anything else…ate THREE helpings of cucumber salad. Then asked for it again the next day. When the container was empty…he asked me to make more!

So there you have it. Healthy, kid-friendly, perfect for hot weather.

Cooking With Friends

My mother likes to tell me about when she was young, and how her parents never cooked because they owned a restaurant. My grandmother couldn't boil water, and my grandfather was working six days a week. They either ate food from the restaurant or something from a can.

A good friend of mine is in a situation better than my mother's, but still pretty regimented. Her family owns a local restaurant, and her husband is there six days a week in the kitchen. She does cook at home, but has a fairly limited repertoire. We were having a playdate last week and she mentioned that I was always cooking different things and she needed to get more creative in the kitchen. I suggested we make an evening out of trying out some new recipes, and we got together the following week to experiment!

It was remarkably easy to find something that fit the bill for a dieter (me), allergies including wheat, eggs, nuts and dairy (her kiddos) and vegetarian (my husband).

Apparently my friend had been dreaming of ratatouille since her daughter's christening almost seven years ago. She ate some at the party and hasn't had it since. Seeing that this is the perfect season for all of the ingredients, we went for it!

Ratatouille is remarkably simple. The only real labor is cutting up the veggies. It consists of just seven main ingredients and a couple of added spices! No dairy, no sugar, no gluten, no carbs.

1/2 onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, very thinly sliced
1 cup tomato puree
¼ tsp. oregano
¼ tsp. crushed red pepper flakes
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 small eggplant
1 zucchini
1 yellow squash
1 long red bell pepper
Few sprigs fresh thyme
Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Pour tomato puree into bottom of an oval baking dish, approximately 10 inches across the long way. Drop the sliced garlic cloves and chopped onion into the sauce, stir in oregano, crushed red pepper flakes, one tablespoon of the olive oil, and season the sauce generously with salt and pepper.

Trim the ends off the eggplant, zucchini and yellow squash. Trim the top of the red pepper and remove the core.

On a mandoline, adjustable-blade slicer or with a very sharp knife, cut the eggplant, zucchini, yellow squash and red pepper into very thin slices, approximately 1/16-inch thick.

Atop the tomato sauce, arrange slices of prepared vegetables concentrically from the outer edge to the inside of the baking dish, overlapping so just a smidgen of each flat surface is visible, alternating vegetables. You may have a handful leftover that do not fit.

Drizzle the remaining tablespoon olive oil over the vegetables and season them generously with salt and pepper. Remove the leaves from the thyme sprigs with your fingertips, running them down the stem. Sprinkle the fresh thyme over the dish.

Cover dish with a piece of parchment paper cut to fit inside.

Bake for approximately 45 to 55 minutes, until vegetables have released their liquid and are clearly cooked, but with some structure left so they are not totally limp. They should not be brown at the edges, and you should see that the tomato sauce is bubbling up around them.

Recipe courtesy of The Comfort of Cooking

Ready for the oven

After we've all attacked it! So good!

Knowing that the four children would need more than just ratatouille for dinner, I introduced my friend to two previous favorites here on Cooking With Auntie Ina. Balsamic Chicken and Chicken Souvlaki. Both are a big hit with my son, so I figured her kids would get on board. Again, healthy and allergy-friendly.

Let's just say it was a success…

Cooking with a friend can be so much fun! Especially one who has a gorgeous kitchen and fabulous oregano AND olive oil imported from Greece! The kids got to try some new foods, the adults had a delicious and healthy dinner and we got to catch up and have some laughs while we prepped it all. Followed it up with watching the kids play in the pool, it was a great night that we plan to do again. 

I can't wait to see what we come up with next!