Many excellent things this week. Veterans Day = day off from work. Husband’s birthday. And the pièce de résistance: a brand new kitten.

And with the cold weather coming in, friends visiting, and the approaching holidays, things are finally starting to feel normal again.

It’s been a slow road getting back into the kitchen since we moved. I’m not a huge fan of our new (electric) stove, or our weirdly laid-out kitchen cabinets (I’m too short for this place). And of course the enormous piles of work all around me don’t do much to motivate me to cook.

But this week things finally seem to be settling into place. Winter’s on its way, I’ve got a kitten snuggled up on my lap, and cooking something wonderful just seems so… right.

So to celebrate our extra day off from work, my friend Lina and I made this Cauliflower and Parmesan Soup, adapted from yet another excellent Smitten Kitchen masterpiece. It’s delicate and flavorful. Creamy, without any cream. Silky, warm, and comforting. A perfect soup to welcome in the winter.

Ingredients:

2 heads of cauliflower (mine were small to medium sized heads)

1 ½ quarts of vegetable broth (possibly up to 2 quarts)

2 yellow onions, diced

6 cloves of garlic, sliced

1 cup grated parmesan

olive oil

salt and pepper

Prepare your cauliflower: take off the stems and leafy parts, and cut out the core. Cut the florets into manageable chunks and wash thoroughly (if they’re fresh from the farm and have dirt and stuff on them, like mine, soak the pieces in a big bowl of water for a few minutes). Cut them into smallish pieces (maybe about 1 ½  inch pieces — precise size doesn’t matter that much, but you do want some uniformity amongst the pieces so they all cook in the same amount of time).

In the bottom of a soup pot, add the onions and garlic, along with a glug of olive oil. Cook on medium-high heat until the onions have begun to soften (5ish minutes). Add 1 ½ quarts of vegetable broth and the cauliflower. Bring to a boil and then reduce the heat to a simmer. Cook until the cauliflower falls apart when you press on it with a spoon (how long this takes depends on how big your pieces were, but mine took around 20 minutes).

Puree soup with an immersion blender, or in batches in the food processor. For this particular soup, we’re going for a silky smooth puree, so let the blender run a little longer to make sure there’re no chunks left. (Once it’s pureed, if your soup seems a little thick, you can thin with additional broth to reach your desired consistency.) Melt in the parmesan (on low heat if necessary). Season with salt and a generous helping of freshly ground pepper, and serve.

The past few days have a been a giant collection of failure. Soup is necessary. Soup is one thing I know I can do well.

This is a spicy black bean soup that’ll soothe the terrible right out of your week. It’s excellent. Savory and a little smoky, with a nice light kick from the jalapeño — a sprinkle of creamy feta adds richness and decadence to an already mouthwatering bowl.

It’s the closest thing we’ve got to traveling back in time and starting over.

Ingredients (recipe loosely adapted from Bon Appétit):

6 cups of cooked black beans*

1 ½ cups of bean cooking liquid*

1 cup vegetable broth

26 oz. chopped tomatoes (I use the ones in the box, but canned will work)

1 teaspoon cumin

½ teaspoon chili powder

1 jalapeño, diced (seeds and ribs included)

1 onion, chopped

1 carrot (or ½ a monster carrot — see image below), chopped

3 small or 2 large celery stalks, chopped

3 cloves of garlic, sliced

about ½ a cup of cilantro leaves, loosely packed (optional, for all you cilantro haters)

feta cheese

olive oil

salt and pepper

*Use dried black beans (I wouldn’t try this with canned). Cook the black beans according to the method described in Spicy Beer-Glazed Black Beans. Instead of cooking them in a pot, you can also cook them in a slow cooker on the high setting for somewhere around 3 to 4 hours, checking their tenderness every 20 minutes or so after the 3 hour mark. For this soup, you’ll want to cook the beans until they’re very tender and soft. As always with beans, salt toward (or at) the end of cooking (if you don’t have time to soak the beans, it’s possible to do this particular recipe without soaking — just make sure you add lots of water, and be prepared to wait a little longer for them to cook fully).

Cook the soup:

Add onion, carrot, and celery to the bottom of a soup pot with a couple glugs of olive oil. Cook on medium-high until the vegetables begin to soften. Add the garlic, stir, and cook another two minutes. Stir in the cumin, chili powder, and jalapeño. Add the black beans, bean cooking liquid, vegetable both, and tomatoes. Bring to a boil, stirring regularly to prevent burning. Cook at a steady boil until all the vegetables are tender.  During the last 10 minutes, add half of the cilantro ( ¼ cup loosely packed). When everything’s fully cooked, take a few ladles of the soup out of the pot and puree it in the food processor before returning it to the soup pot. Serve topped with some more cilantro and a generous sprinkle of feta cheese.

I’ve definitely been in need of a little culinary encouragement lately. Getting inspired in my new kitchen (with its weird cabinet arrangement, electric stove, and poorly designed fridge) has been a little slow going. When I saw sunchokes in the farmers market the other day, I had a feeling they might be just the inspiration I’ve been looking for. I’ve never worked with sunchokes before, but I’ve ordered many a delicious artichoke soup in restaurants, and I knew that some of those soups were made with a combination of sunchokes and artichokes. I reasoned that an all sunchoke soup wouldn’t be a big stretch. Turns out I was right.

Sunchokes, also called Jerusalem artichokes, are little knobby things that look kind of like ginger but taste pretty similar to regular artichokes. This soup is soothing and deliciously simple, with a subtle, smooth artichoke-y flavor. The parmesan gives it a slight richness, while the lemon and parsley keep it bright and fresh. It really is a great soup, and I’m definitely planning on making it again. You should too.

Ingredients:

roughly 2 lbs of sunchokes

1 white onion, chopped

approximately 2 tablespoons of butter

4 cloves of garlic, chopped

3 ½ cups of vegetable broth

juice of ½ a lemon

½ cup of milk

¼ cup parmesan, grated

a handful of Italian parsley, very finely chopped

Peel all your sunchokes. This takes a little time because some of them are so knobby. We noticed that the peeled flesh began to discolor rather quickly in the air, so we threw the peeled ones in a bowl filled with water and a couple splashes of apple cider vinegar, just to help keep them from browning too much while we finished the rest of the peeling. Also, if you have a choice, try to select sunchokes with fewer knobs on them — this will make your prep a lot easier.

Cut your sunchokes into roughly 1 inch pieces and throw them in the bottom of a pot along with the onion and butter. Add a little salt and pepper. Sauté in the butter until the onion is soft and translucent. Add the garlic, stir, and cook another minute before adding the broth. Cover and bring the soup to a boil. Simmer, stirring occasionally, until the sunchokes are tender and can be mashed apart with your stirring spoon (like potatoes). Puree the soup using an immersion blender or in batches in the food processor. If you prefer a thinner soup, you can thin with a little additional broth at this stage. Test for seasoning and add salt and pepper if necessary. Squeeze in the juice of ½ a lemon. Stir in the milk and parmesan, returning the soup to the heat to help melt the parmesan if needed. Dish it up, and top each bowl with a pinch of very finely chopped Italian parsley. Yum.

I’m sorry. I’ve been a bad blogger. I’ve taken you for granted and disappeared and just assumed you’d be waiting for me when I got back.

(Are you?)

I made something. Something delicious. Does that make up for any of the hard feelings?

If it’s any consolation, I want you to know that it’s not you — it’s me. I’ve just been busy, that’s all. Super busy. I moved, had a ton of dental work done, quit my office job, and started teaching again. The teaching prep has pretty much consumed me these past couple weeks, so that’s why I haven’t been around lately.

But I know that’s not what you want to hear.

I made this for you. Well, for me. But I was thinking about you when I asked Tyler to photograph it. That counts for something, right?

I got the main idea from my friend Sara, who makes this crazy-delicious thing she refers to as “vegetable mush.” The name tragically belies the greatness of the dish. I’d heard her talk about her mush for a long time, and when I finally tasted it, the first thing out of my mouth was, “You really need to think about renaming this.” It is SO much better than it sounds.

This is not her recipe — I actually don’t know how she makes hers — but I took a guess, used what I had, and happened upon something great. It’s full of savory, summery flavors, and it’s surprisingly healthy. I’m definitely going to make this again and again.

And I’m updating the name. Hopefully this sounds a little more appealing.

Oh, and also, I’ve served it with a side of sautéed beet greens. I’ll give you both recipes. Two in one. That’s got to put me back on your good side.

Smashed Cauliflower and Summer Squash with Parmesan

Ingredients:

1 cauliflower, cut into medium-sized florets

3 summer squash (the varieties I had are pictured above — any will do), chopped

¼ of an onion, chopped

olive oil

salt and pepper

red pepper flakes

4 extra large or 5-6 medium cloves of garlic, chopped

vegetable broth

parmesan

Add cauliflower and squash to a pan with a couple glugs of olive oil, a dash or two of red pepper flakes, and a little salt and pepper. Sauté on medium-high heat until the vegetables are just beginning to soften. Add garlic, and stir. Add a little glug of vegetable broth (we’re just adding a thin layer of broth to the bottom of the pan to keep things nice and soft — we’re not making a soup). Stirring often, check on the doneness of the vegetables. Add glugs of broth a little at a time as the pan starts to dry out. When the vegetables fall apart when you press on them with a spoon, they’re done. Mash with a potato masher, adjust seasoning to taste, and serve with parmesan on top.

Sautéed Beet Greens

Ingredients:

1 bunch of beet greens, de-stemmed

red pepper flakes

olive oil

salt and pepper

1 extra large clove of garlic, chopped

Thoroughly wash your beet greens, and de-stem them by cutting out the big middle vein in each leaf. Chop or rip them into bite-size pieces. Add them to a pan, along with a couple glugs of olive oil, salt, pepper, and a few dashes of red pepper flakes. Sauté on medium heat until the greens have begun wilting. Add the garlic. Keep sautéing for another couple of minutes until the greens are melt-in-your-mouth tender (I think this whole recipe takes about 10 minutes total). Serve as a warm, flavorful side-dish with just about anything.

Here’s a recipe I made before the chaos started. It was born out of a desire to use some of the many beets we get in our CSA in a slightly different way than my usual roasting. A couple of my friends suggested similar methods, and I’ve seen various takes on this in several cook books, so this is the rendition I threw together. These babies were particularly difficuly to photograph well, but the taste, I assure you, out-performs the visual.

They’ve got a little kick from the cayenne pepper and cumin, plus a nice zip from the lemon zest. Topped with a light and aromatic yogurt sauce, the dish really starts to sing. Full of bold, refreshing flavors, the sauce creates the perfect compliment to the warm, fried deliciousness of the beet cake.

Yogurt Sauce:

plain greek-style yogurt (nonfat, 2%, whatever you want)

1 large clove of garlic, pressed

4 green onions, chopped

Stir all the ingredients together until thoroughly combined. Chill until ready to serve. The more time you let this chill, the more the flavors will develop, so definitely do this first. Then start on your beet cakes.

Beet Cakes:

6 raw beets (I used a combo of red and yellow beets, but any will work)

2 eggs, beaten

½ cup of flour

½ teaspoon of cayenne

½ teaspoon of cumin

½ teaspoon of onion powder

zest of ½ a lemon

salt and pepper

Grate your beets. Toss grated beets into a large bowl with all the spices and lemon zest. In a separate bowl, combine eggs and flour. The egg and flour mixture will combine into a gooey paste. Add the egg and flour mixture to the beets and mix it in, working it through until everything is evenly combined.

Add a few glugs of olive oil to a nonstick skillet (you can use a regular skillet, too, but you’ll need more oil). Heat the oil over medium heat. Test to make sure the oil’s hot by dropping a tiny shred of beet into the pan — if it sizzles, the oil’s ready. Drop a spoonful of the beet mixture into the pan and flatten it as much as possible (I found it easiest to do this with a silicone spatula). You can cook several of these beet cakes at a time, depending on the size of your skillet. After a minute or two, peek at the underside of the beet cake — once it’s crispy on the bottom, you can flip it. When both sides are nice and crispy, it’s done. Transfer onto a dishtowel or a couple paper towels to drain any excess oil. If you’re worried about them getting cold while you cook the next batch, plop them on a baking sheet and stick them in a warm oven while you continue cooking.

Serve as soon as possible, with a dollop of yogurt sauce on top.