Weeknight Dinner Diaries

Suggested ideas for weeknight dinners and a dessert, all made and enjoyed around these parts.

Monday: Tomato, cucumber and bacon salad. Slice up tomatoes and cucumbers and fry up some bacon.  Let the bacon cool, then add to the vegetables, along with some sliced onions, if you like. For the dressing, a bit of mayo and sour cream is good. Salt and pepper liberally.

Tuesday: I’m such a lobbyist for leftovers. Let’s say you have leftover pork loin (cooked in a crock pot with apple juice and soy sauce, surprisingly delish) and roasted potatoes from the weekend. Cut them up and sauté in a pan with some spinach. Add curry spices. Eat with dollops of sour cream.  

Wednesday: There’s more time to mess around in the kitchen mid-week, so make this zucchini-bacon-and-cheese goodness. Slice up 4-5 zucchini and sauté in olive oil for 10 minutes or so.

Place the vegetables in a foil-lined pan and grate some cheese over them—mozzarella and Parmesan are always good. Add some diced ham or bacon. Bake at 425 for 20-25 minutes, and broil last five minutes. Let cool a bit before eating.

Thursday: If you’re running low on groceries by the end of the week, look around the pantry. You may be pleasantly surprised by the delicious things you can make using frozen, canned or jarred ingredients. For example: this posh-looking pumpkin soup had an unsexy start: an onion, garlic, canned pumpkin puree and chicken stock in a box.

Method: Dice and sauté a big onion in some olive oil and butter. Add a few minced garlic cloves when the onions are almost done. Sprinkle on some spices—I used Penzey’s Southwestern mix, but you can get creative here. A bit of curry spice is always good. Add the pumpkin, stock (I used about 12 ounces) and ½ cup milk, and bring the soup to a boil. Turn heat to a simmer and cook on low heat for 10 minutes or so.

Adjust the flavor to taste--I added 2 tbs. fresh lemon juice, 1 tbs. brown sugar, and ¼ cup plain yogurt. Play around until it tastes right to you. Add more stock or milk, if you like. Some diced ham or bacon, cut into 1-inch pieces and sautéed, is really good in this.  Eat with crackers or croutons, and extra yogurt.

Friday: Have dinner out but make dessert! Slice up some strawberries, sprinkle with sugar and top with sour cream. Some cookies or chocolate wouldn’t be amiss here, either.

Thanksgiving in a Bowl Soup

Sorry for the long silence, guys. Oh, I’ve been cooking, but I haven’t made anything exciting in weeks. Nothing that’s inspired me to write a post that’s longer than 140 characters. (See my Twitter feed, at right, for the latest in Yulinka Cooks non-news.)

This soup is a rare exception. I thought of it while driving home from a post-Thanksgiving shopping trip, knowing I had various soup-friendly ingredients to use up. The ingredients were chicken stock, a bunch of spinach, butternut squash puree originally made for ravioli, the aforementioned ravioli, and leftover turkey.

This is how it all came together. I brought the chicken stock to simmer and added the butternut squash puree (roasted squash, a few tablespoons each of butter and whipped cream cheese, hint of sage and nutmeg--yum). In the meantime, in a skillet, I sautéed a diced onion in olive oil, and added a bunch of chopped spinach to the pan when the onion was almost cooked. The spinach was sautéed for a few minutes until it wilted. I added the vegetables to the chicken stock; then I added few handfuls of pre-frozen butternut squash ravioli to the soup pot.

I hesitate to share my ravioli recipe because a) it was something I created on a lark one Sunday night, b) I didn’t really follow a recipe and I didn’t use a pasta machine to roll out my dough, two steps usually recommended for fresh pasta-beginners, and c) I really overstuffed the ravioli and most of them didn’t seal properly. (I used this pasta dough recipe, but in the future I’ll follow this excellent, detailed guide to making fresh pasta.)

Anyway, when the ravioli were almost cooked—it only took about 2 minutes—I added some diced, roasted turkey to the soup pot. Some stirring, a bit of kosher salt, some black pepper, and the soup was done. It was creamy, slightly sweet, nourishing and filling. It was like a festive holiday meal with your family, assuming you like your family. It was Thanksgiving in a bowl, in short. I will be making this again and again.

Note: Keep in mind that you can substitute quite a lot of ingredients here—you don’t need butternut squash ravioli; just use a favorite pasta or diced, cooked potatoes (or forget the starch altogether). Instead of turkey, you could use leftover chicken, ham or diced sausage. But do make the butternut squash puree.

From the Archives: Early Fall Eats

I've been out and about, readers, but here are some favorite fall recipes to tide you over:

Rice-stuffed tomatoes. Great when you're tired of BLTs and Caprese salad. Yes, it can happen.

Eggplant and zucchini stacks. Towers of vegetables, sauce and cheese.

Butternut squash and mushroom salad. Butternut squash recipes on food blogs means fall is truly here.

Eggplant and pepper ragout. A sort of ratatouille.

And to wash it all down, see this piece from OnMilwaukee.com on favorite fall beers. (I prefer Lakefront Pumpkin Lager.)

Two Summer Recipes

The first summer I had a blog I liked making complicated recipes. Stuffed zucchini, stuffed tomatoes, stuffed this and that. These days I’m far more likely to toss zucchini slices on a grill or slice up tomatoes for a salad. I’m not really inspired to make multi-step dishes that have you chop, dice and sauté. My tastes have changed, for whatever reason. Every once in a while, though, I miss hands-on cooking and make something other than grilled veggies. Last week, I cooked up these two dishes:

Sauteed zucchini with onions and corn (grilled Polish sausage on the side). Dice and sauté an onion in butter in a skillet. When the onion’s golden and soft, add two thinly sliced zucchini, and keep sautéing until they’re soft. Add some crushed garlic; sauté 30 more seconds.

Add the kernels from one cob of corn—parboiled, grilled or even raw if your corn’s really good. Sauté a few more minutes. Take off the heat and let cool 5 minutes. Top with feta cheese and chopped scallions. Serve with protein of choice (also great with pasta).
Braised cabbage with Middle-Eastern spices: I have pretty standard cravings—chocolate, good bread and so on—but every once in a while I’ll crave cabbage. That’s right. In particular, I’ve been in the mood for braised cabbage like the kind served at the lunch buffet at Casablanca, a Middle-Eastern restaurant in Milwaukee. This was my attempt to recreate their recipe:

Clean a small head of cabbage and cut it up into chunks--about a dozen. Heat up some olive oil in a large sauté pan and cook the cabbage slices, flipping them over once in a while, for about 15 minutes. It's okay if they fall apart. You might have to cook them in batches. Put the browned cabbage in a foil-lined pan.

Finely dice two fat garlic cloves, and sauté them in a couple of tablespoons of olive oil. Sprinkle in a healthy shake of cumin, cinnamon and turmeric; sauté for about 30 seconds. Sprinkle the garlic and spices over the cabbage chunks. Evenly add 1.5 cups crushed tomatoes to the cabbage (or 1.5 cup tomato sauce). Top cabbage with 1 cup crumbled Feta cheese. Bake at 425 until the cabbage is soft and the Feta is melted and golden brown; about 25-30 minutes.

Summer Non-Recipes

Hello, readers. Did you miss me? No? I didn’t miss this place either. I haven’t been cooking much lately, you see. Instead, I’ve been having dinners of cut-up vegetables and salsa, raw sugar snap peas and dip, grilled zucchini with feta. Simple and summery. You don’t expect me to dig out my camera and spend my evenings blogging about that, right? Right.

Over the past couple of months, though, I did come up with a little arsenal of quick non-meals that might inspire you to give up cooking for a while, too. (For more on this phenomenon, see Mark Bittman’s 101 simple summer salads piece from last week’s New York Times.)

Here are some ideas:

Thinly sliced cucumber round sandwiches with cream cheese and turkey (above).

Grilled zucchini and summer squash slices, cut into chunks and eaten with some feta and cubed ham or turkey.

Grilled zucchini slices topped with cheese or bacon or thinly sliced ham, like open-faced sandwiches.

Cut-up carrot sticks with black bean and corn salsa.

Slightly sautéed sugar snap peas or green beans, topped with feta.

Hot, grilled onion rounds (especially red onions) topped with cheese.

Sliced radishes, sprinked with kosher salt and topped with cheese or turkey.

Summer Salad

Here's a beautiful little salad I made for dinner tonight. No long story about its origins this time. This is simple stuff--diced veggies, a bit of cheese, some ham, olive oil and vinegar. It was a hot summer day; the salad was cold and crunchy. I ate it outside on our little patio as the sun set.

Here's what you do: cut up some radishes, carrots and cauliflower florets. Or use whatever vegetables you have on hand. It's all good here. Add some chopped parsley, dill and scallions. Crumbled feta, diced ham or turkey and a hard-boiled egg, quartered, work nicely here, too. Dress with whatever you like. Crunch away.

Roasted Cauliflower with Stuff

Here’s a really delicious and simple way to cook cauliflower. Cut it up, roast it in the oven with cheese, onions and some spices, and add whatever protein you have on hand. It’s a low-maintenance meal-in-a-dish that can be as light or rich as you like.

Preheat the oven to 425. Cut up a large head of cauliflower. Place in a foil-lined pan. Add about 2 tbs. olive oil, a good shake of paprika, and salt and pepper to taste. Stir so the vegetable chunks are evenly coated.

Cut up a medium red onion into slices; dice ¼ pound bacon into 1-inch pieces. Add the onion and bacon to the pan. Roast for about 20-25 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes or so.

Remove from the oven and add cheese—practically any kind and any amount will work here. I added about ½ cup each shredded cheddar and diced havarti. Roast 10 more minutes, or until the cauliflower is tender but not overcooked. Add 1 cup frozen peas, and stick the pan in the oven for another minute or so, until the peas are defrosted.

Serve with good, toasted bread. This is also great over rice, especially when topped with a poached egg.

Weekend Eats

*I kicked off the grilling season a few weeks ago. Yes, the weather isn't getting much warmer than 55 degrees around these parts, but we stubbornly huddle around the grill in our winter coats. I like grilling vegetables, especially eggplant, bell peppers, onions and tomatoes.

I slice everything into rounds, toss them on the grill, and cook about 15 minutes, flipping the veggies often. When the vegetables are done and everything's cool enough to handle, I slice the eggplant and peppers into strips, toss them in a bowl with the tomatoes and onion rounds, and add chopped parsley, minced olives, cubed mozarella, a bit of olive oil and a splash of red wine vinegar. This salad is good as a relish, but I often end up eating it out of the bowl with a tablespoon.

*I rarely find myself on Milwaukee's south side, but last weekend I took a drive to A&J Polish Deli, 1215 W. Lincoln Ave. It looked just like the Russian groceries on Milwaukee's North Shore. The two exceptions were Polish-speaking clerks and a great selection of cheese, deli meats, sausage (including kielbasa that's very good on the grill).

Chicago & Vegetarian Russian Food

*I love grocery shopping on Chicago’s Devon Avenue. The Indian and Pakistani groceries always yield fascinating and reasonably-priced spices and vegetables. Another favorite store is the City Fresh Market (3201 W. Devon Ave.), which carries lots of Eastern European and Russian foods. The produce is cheap. I came back to Milwaukee with four bags of groceries. I know I should get excited about Chicago’s museums or nightlife or something, but I always look forward to Devon the most. (For more on Devon Avenue, go here.)

*It’s true that Russians think vegetarianism is loony. It’s also true that traditional Russian food is often labor-intensive. Yet it’s possible to have a quick, vegetarian Russian meal, like the one I made after a day in Chicago. For example: potatoes, boiled or fried, with chopped dill and sour cream; sautéed mushrooms and marinated vegetable salad. You could also open up a jar of lutenitsa or eggplant caviar or any kind of pepper-eggplant-tomato appetizer (check out the selection at your local Eastern European grocery, like, say, Fresh City Market, above).

Stuffed Peppers

I’ve always thought of stuffed peppers as a heavy, multi-step dish, but it doesn’t have to be that way. You can make lighter, brighter stuffed peppers in less than an hour. These peppers are a good meal to make when you need something reasonably light and healthy in preparation for, say, Thanksgiving feasting.

Method:

Prepare a cup of rice according to your favorite method.

While the rice is cooking, take 6 small bell peppers—I used green, yellow and red—and remove the tops (reserve them), seeds and ribs. Bring a big pot of water to a boil, and blanch the cleaned peppers and tops for six minutes. Remove; dip in a bowl of chilled water (or hold them under cold running water for 5 minutes). Place in a colander; let drain.

In the meantime, sauté a large, chopped onion in some olive oil. When the onion is turning golden and translucent (about 8 minutes), add a pound of ground meat—beef, pork, chicken or turkey (my preference). Sauté until just done; salt and pepper generously. Add 1 tsp. paprika and cayenne to taste. Take the mixture off the heat, and add ½ cup cooked rice, ½ cup good canned tomatoes, chopped, and 4 oz. cheese—I like feta for this. Mix.

Preheat the oven to 400.

Spread 1 cup chopped tomatoes on the bottom of a Dutch oven or a baking pan. Place peppers in the pan and fill with the meat and rice mixture; top with extra cheese and pepper tops. Pour 1 cup chopped tomatoes over the top. Bake 20-25 minutes, until the peppers are thoroughly hot and the cheese is melted.

Let cool a little before eating. Top with sour cream. Serve with the extra rice.

Butternut Squash, Potato & Mushroom Gratin

I finished off my last box of farmer’s market tomatoes last week. It’s finally time to move on to root vegetables. I’ve been avoiding this moment, you see. Potatoes and butternut squash are available year-round in Wisconsin, while tomatoes are a seasonal, summery delicacy. Still, the times are a-changin'. This week it snowed and the temperatures dropped into the low 30s. The thermostat in my condo is stuck on 63. Winter’s here.

Slow-roasting is a great way to warm up the house (watch the thermostat jump past 68), and this recipe is a great way to cook potatoes and hard squash. This is based on Paula Wolfert’s potato and butternut squash pie, as featured and duly praised by the Wednesday Chef. Naturally, I tweaked the recipe.

Method:

Peel a medium butternut squash and 2 large potatoes. Slice into thin rounds (about 1/8 inch), and place in a large bowl. Preheat the oven to 350. Finely mince a couple of garlic cloves and a handful of parsley leaves. Add to bowl.

Mix in 4 oz. of some kind of cheese, shredded or diced. Wolfert’s recipe calls for an intricate mix of ricotta and hard sheep milk’s cheese, but, come on, nearly any kind of cheese will taste good with roasted butternut squash and potatoes. I’ve made this with ricotta and provolone, but I’ve also used havarti and blue cheese—trust me, it’s all good.

Mix the potatoes, squash and cheese mixture; season generously with kosher salt and black ground pepper.

In a skillet, sauté 8 oz. sliced mushrooms, preferably portabella, in olive oil. Season with salt; add a minced garlic clove during the last 30 seconds of cooking.

Spread out the squash/potato mixture in a foil-lined pan and top with mushrooms.

Pour a cup of milk over the vegetables. Bake at 350 for 40 minutes; then raise the temperature to 425 and bake 30 minutes. Broil for 5 minutes. Let cool a little before eating. This goes great with a pumpkin beer.

Eggplant and Veggie Ragout

One of my favorite ways to cook eggplant is to use it in some sort of stew with plenty of tomatoes, and maybe other vegetables as well. You could call it ratatouille; in my family, we just called it “ovotsch,” Russian for vegetable. Unfortunately, I don’t have anything close to an exact recipe—it all depends on what’s in the fridge. Sometimes I sauté the vegetables and then simmer them on the stove; sometimes I just cut everything up and roast it in the oven.

This time, I had some grilled eggplant slices left over from one of the season’s last cookouts. I layered the eggplant in a Dutch oven, and topped it with onion and carrot rounds sautéed in olive oil for 10 minutes (I used 1 large onion and 2 big carrots). The third layer was sliced tomatoes, lightly sautéed and well salted, plus a couple of bay leaves, a teaspoon of sugar, a splash or red wine vinegar and a few garlic cloves.

I splashed some white wine and a little water over the top (about a cup of liquid altogether), and baked the whole thing in the oven at 325 for about an hour.

Later, when the vegetables had cooled, I add a splash of red wine vinegar, some salt and ground black pepper to round out the flavor. This should be eaten cold or at room temperature, preferably the day after cooking. Great with potatoes or grilled meat.

Rice and Pesto-Stuffed Tomatoes

Like all foodies, I bemoan supermarket tomatoes. When I buy tomatoes in the off-season (which is, like, October to late August), I shell out for expensive cherry tomatoes. I ration a pint to last for days, and I wouldn’t dream of using these pricey little gems for cooking. I’m just as stingy when tomatoes are in season. Chop, sauté or roast ripe, juicy, sweet tomatoes? No way. I eat them raw, sliced in salad, with a sprinkle of salt and a swipe of mayo. This year, I ate my way through a box of tomatoes. Then I bought more. And more… Until I gave in and started cooking with them.

This recipe is inspired by the Wednesday Chef's rice-stuffed tomatoes.

I halved 6 large tomatoes and scooped out the seeds and flesh into a bowl. The tomato shells went into a foil-lined pan. I sautéed a small onion in olive oil in a non-stick saucepan, then added ½ cup dry rice and sautéed it until the grains were coated in oil.

I added a cup of water to the pan, brought the water to a boil, then lowered the heat to a very low simmer and covered the pan until the rice was done (15 minutes). I let the rice cool a bit, then stirred in about 3 tablespoons of pesto.

I stuffed each tomato half with about 2-3 tablespoons of rice, and topped the tomatoes with grated provolone (mozzarella or Parmesan would work just as well here). In the saucepan used for making rice, I brought the tomato liquid to a boil and then simmered until it reduced a bit. I poured the liquid over the tomatoes, and baked them at 425 for about 45 minutes. These tomatoes are best eaten lukewarm.

Eggplant and Zucchini Stacks

These veggie towers come by way of the late, great Milwaukee food blog Haverchuk. Former blogger mzn’s ode to deconstructed eggplant parm inspires me every September. A couple of weeks ago, I layered eggplant and zucchini rounds with tomato sauce*, pesto and cheese, but you could keep this as simple as just the eggplant and sauce.

The general idea is this: Peel and slice 1 big eggplant and 1 big zucchini into rounds. Brush with some olive oil, salt lightly, and grill or roast until soft (about 30 minutes at 425 on a foil-lined cookie sheet in the oven; 10 to 15 minutes on the grill). Let cool.

Layer the largest eggplant rounds in a foil-lined casserole pan. I managed to fit about seven slices into my pan. Spread a couple of tablespoons of tomato sauce* and pesto over each slice of eggplant. Sprinkle with some shredded mozzarella or provolone cheese. Place another slice of eggplant or zucchini on top of each of the sauced eggplant rounds. Top with more sauce, pesto and cheese.

Repeat the next layer with the smaller eggplant and zucchini rounds. Keep layering the vegetables until you’re through. Top the final layer with sauce and sprinkle with grated Parmesan. Bake at 425 for 15 minutes; then broil for 5. Let cool. This is best served lukewarm.

*This is how I’ve been making tomato sauce lately: Cut up a bunch of tomatoes. You need good, farmer’s market tomatoes for this, preferably ultra-ripe ones. Toss ‘em in a foil-lined pan with a couple of peeled garlic cloves, a splash of olive oil and red wine vinegar, 2 tsps. each of sugar and kosher salt and ¼ tsp. red pepper flakes. Roast at 400 until the tomatoes are pruney and caramelized, about an hour. Let cool. Run through a food processor for a couple of seconds. I like a chunky sauce; so I hit the “pulse” button on my KitchenAid for about 15 seconds. Ta-da!

Eating Local

Sometimes it bothers me that I don’t blog much about Wisconsin and Milwaukee-area foods. Problem is, I rarely eat out and I rarely buy local during the non-farmer’s market season. When I do shop local, though, I go the whole nine yards.

Case in point:

The Gingergold apples are from Barthel Fruit Farm, 12246 N. Farmdale Rd., Mequon, Wis.

The tomatoes (the most delicious I've had) are from Witte's Vegetable Farm, 10006 Bridge Rd., Cedarburg, Wis.

Go get 'em, Wisconsinites.

Summer Salad

Here’s a nice summer salad that calls for local, farmer’s market ingredients that are now in season. Boil a bunch of new or fingerling potatoes. Let cool, slice in half, and put in a salad bowl. Add diced tomatoes, chopped scallions, chopped cucumbers, minced red onion, cubed ham and quartered, hard-boiled eggs.

For the dressing, get a little bowl and mix a couple of tablespoons of sour cream, a teaspoon of mayo, ½ teaspoon of mustard, a teaspoon of olive oil and a pinch of sugar. Dress the salad; sprinkle liberally with kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Braised Cabbage

Enough with the melancholy; let’s talk cabbage. I’ve been craving something cabbage-y ever since I had a lunch of coleslaw and fried potatoes back in Tallinn. It’s been cooler here in Wisconsin; so I went with braising-—a surefire way to make cabbage mild, rich and almost dip-like. This recipe, which I made up as I went along, was good with grilled chicken and even better on its own the next day.

In a large plan, I sautéed a chopped onion and some diced bacon in a splash of olive oil on high heat until the onion was soft and translucent, about 6 or 7 minutes. Deglazed with some marsala wine, and added a whole head of shredded cabbage, stirring it often. Then another good splash of marsala and white wine (about ¾ cup altogether), since I had two open bottles that I wanted to finish up.

Sautéed on high heat until the cabbage cooked down, which only took 10 minutes or so, and added kosher salt, a bit of paprika and a bay leaf. Turned down the heat to low, covered the pan, and let the cabbage cook another 30 minutes. About 10 minutes before it was done, added about 5 ounces of chopped ham and a couple of ounces of yogurt cheese (available at Russian groceries, but all kinds of cheese will work here, especially Parmesan, goat and feta). Topped with chopped scallions for serving.

Turshi

One of the things I like the most about cooking is transforming a charmless, underwhelming ingredient into something delicious. That’s why I enjoy pickling and marinating so much: you start with a blah vegetable—cucumbers, say, or cabbage or mushrooms--add some ratio of salt, sugar and vinegar, wait a while, and end up with that briny/tangy flavor that only pickling can produce. Magic!

In the past few months I’ve made pickled mushrooms, this marinated vegetable salad and gravlax (as well as pickles and sauerkraut in years past). I’m pleased to add turshi to my pickling repertoire. I first learned about turshi—Armenian pickled vegetables—from Anya von Bremzen’s cookbook Please to the Table. I’ve had mixed luck with Anya’s recipes so I hesitated to try it, but then reader and commenter Victoria Frolova kindly offered to share her grandmother’s version. I used bits and pieces from both recipes to come up with my own. It tastes a lot like the marinated vegetable salad mentioned above, but crunchier and spicier.

Method:

This recipe is based on one liter of liquid. You will need about 3 large carrots, a medium head of cauliflower, 2 large red peppers, 2 or 3 celery stalks, a large onion, 5 cloves of garlic, a bunch of herbs like dill and parsley, kosher salt, sugar, bay leaves, hot chili peppers, peppercorns and maybe some vinegar. Slice carrots and celery into matchsticks, separate the cauliflower into florets, peel and cut the onion into rounds, cut peppers into strips, and mince the garlic. You could also add zucchini, tomatoes and cucumbers, sliced into rounds.

Bring a pan of water to a boil and blanch the carrots and cauliflower for about two minutes. Drain, then layer the vegetables in a large glass jar with garlic, chili peppers and herbs.

For the marinade, bring a liter of water to a boil and add 6 teaspoons of kosher salt, 8 teaspoons of sugar, a couple of bay leaves and a small handful of peppercorns. Let the marinade simmer a little until the sugar and salt dissolve. Victoria suggests adding a tablespoon of white vinegar at this point if you want a tangier flavor, which I did. Cool the marinade for five minutes, then pour it over the vegetables and seal the jar. Keep turshi in the fridge; it should be done in about two weeks (mine took two and a half). Start tasting after a week or so.

Zucchini Cheese Pie

This Mediterranean vegetable cheese pie has been on my mind ever since Ann at Redacted Recipes blogged about it. I’ve been meaning to whip it up this week, but when the time came I didn’t have most of the ingredients. That rarely stops me, however, so I’d like to present my take on a vegetable cheese pie: a layer of zucchini covered with ricotta-parmesan-pepper-tomato topping. I actually used homemade farmer’s cheese (aka my famous tvorog) in place of ricotta, which worked very well. A nice discovery, as I rarely use farmer’s cheese in savory recipes.

Method: I covered the bottom of a round, foil-lined pie pan with thinly sliced, salted zucchini rounds and roasted them at 425 until they were soft, 20 minutes or so. (You could also sauté the rounds in olive oil instead.) In the meantime, I combined a cup of farmer’s cheese with an egg, ¼ cup of grated parmesan, a couple of ounces of mozzarella, some leftover roasted red and yellow peppers, and a little leftover tomato sauce. (You could leave out the peppers and tomatoes just as well, or use other vegetables in their place.)

I spread this mixture over the soft zucchini, and baked the pie at 425 until the cheese was firm and golden-brown, about 25 minutes, plus the last five minutes under the broiler. The pie tastes best lukewarm, so let cool 10-15 minutes.

Roasted Vegetable Salad(s)

I wow my co-workers with my culinary prowess at least once a week. No, I don’t bring baked goodies to work. Nor do I feast on elaborate leftovers. It’s my “vegetables with stuff” that impress. I often roast whatever veggies I have in the fridge and mix them with cheese, herbs, dressing and maybe chicken or fish for lunch the next day. These salads, even when eaten out of a plastic container, look colorful and pretty. Served on real plates, my lunches look like something out of Gourmet (or maybe the Whole Foods salad bar, but you get my point).

My salads revolve around some combo of zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, asparagus, cauliflower and carrots. Is there an easier way to cook these vegetables than to roast them? You cut ‘em up, toss them in a foil-lined baking dish with a splash of olive oil and some kosher salt and pepper, and stick 'em in the oven for a while.

I usually roast at 420 or 425; peppers take about 45 minutes; zucchini, asparagus and carrots, 20 minutes; see this for more on tomatoes and cauliflower. Cooking chemistry does its thing, and the vegetables emerge from the oven sweet and nutty. (I also like to roast fruit: once, I made a delicious roast chicken with grapes and pitted cherries -spread the fruit in a roasting pan, plop a prepped chicken on top, and follow your usual method. Past-their-prime strawberries, peaches, apples and pears all improve in the oven. Add some caramelized onions to your roasted fruit, and voila: instant chutney.)

I top the cooled vegetables with scallions, dill or parsley, olives, if I have them, and goat or feta cheese. For the dressing, I usually use olive oil, a squeeze of lemon or lime juice, or some red wine vinegar. Sometimes I mix in a little roasted garlic. Or I make creamy dressings with mayo, plain yogurt or sour cream, and olive oil.