Aviso, a los lectores hispanoparlantes, la entrega anterior fue publicada incialmente con la intencion de ser bilingue, pero por motivos de fuerza mayor, no fue asi. Me disculpo. Y hasta la proxima. Miau Miau. =^.^=

Putting it all together..

This is crap!!! *&^%$# I work till very late yesterday putting together the recipe for the salad and to my suprise it was not saved. I could have sworn that it was saved. But I just found a blank page. :(
 So my apologies to those who were counting on the recipe in English and Spanish but I'm sorry, google has a translator.


We talked about the things needed to bild the salad per yesterday's post.
Hard Boiled Eggs.
A trick shown to me was to place the eggs first in the pan, then fill it with water add tons of salt and a bit of white vinegar. Cook for about 7 to 8 minutes depending how many eggs and how done you like them. I Like my eggs with a bright colored yolk, not to hard so the yolk is not dry and with a sandy texture.

Crisp Green Beans,
but if you like them soggy and dark green, then go on with your bad self. I hate dark and soggy veggies, specially if they are green, really gross.
You can steam or boiled the beans. If you choose to boiled them be careful and be quick. Like the nursery rhyme, Jack be nibble, jack be quick. Boil water with salt, add the green beans once they been cleaned and trimmed.  If you have about two hand fulls of beans then give or take 6 minutes, if you are not sure if hey are done. Take one and if the fork pokes through evenly, you are good to go.

Sliced Cucumbers.
I don't think I have to tell you how to slice a cuke, but I will recommend to use an English cucumber. Why? It's sweeter and had a thinner skin and easier to digest.

Tomatoes.
You can use Roma tomatoes, or cherry tomatoes. If you use the Roma variety, they can be quarted length wise.

Potatoes.
Most cooks just boiled the potatoes for the salad. I wanted to go the extra mile when I made mine this last time and I roasted the potatoes. You can get really fancy and add all kinds of herbs and spices or just simply add salt pepper and olive oil. Bake for about 40 minutes at 350. The potatoes that work best are small red potatoes, or you can use new potatoes.

Tuna/Salmon/Anchovies/
White Albacore canned tuna can be used, or you can sear a tuna steak. I chose to use Salmon. In a small ball add a lot of minced garlic, grated lime or lemon rind, , salt  and pepper to taste mix and rub over the salmon then drizzle the juice of the fruited you grated. Bake at 350 till it's tender and to add a cripy leyer to the fish, place under the broiler for about 5 minutes. Let  it cool off. If anything you really want the fish at room temperature. The Anchovies, you can add them at your own risk. (GROSS)

Boston Lettuce or Butter Lettuce/Spring Greens.
With the Spring Greens, nothing much needs to be done, other than wash them and dry then. The Boston Lettuce are to be washed and then tear into bite size pieced and  place on he serving platter, bowl.

The Dressing.
This gets a bit tricky because there purist that insist on using herbs de provence for the dressing. Yes, I will admit this makes a mighty tasty dressing. But if you don't have them well you must improvise. So, I tend to have on hand fresh thyme, oregano and sometimes rosemary. Chop the previously mentioned, mince about four cloves of garlic, juice about three to four lemons, and if you like you can add a few springs of cilantro, give that new world kind of flavor. Dijon mustard as an emulsifier and good quality olive oil. Yes the dark kind, the kind that it hurts your pocket to pay that kind of money for but it's well worth it. :D Salt and peper to taste  Whisk everything together or if you can add all the ingredients together and put in a blender. This will keep for more than a week if you want it to last longer you can keep in a glass container.

Olives.
I almost forgot the olives, and that is because I don't like olives unless they are in salvadorean tamales or in pealla. Nice olives are what the recipe calls for but a good substitute is the Kalamata olives. I prefer sans olives.


So not all of that to just  place the greens or lettuce on the platter, place the fish in the center of the platter, and arrange the veggies around the fish.  then drizzle the dressing over the salad.
Here is a visiual aid to see  the the saladad looks like once assembled.

And this was the lovely Nicoise Salad. I hope that you get to make it, enjoy and in some cases expand your culinary horizon.

Sometime in the coming month  I will bring other culinary delights to the  blog. There are some ideas being thrown around. I am also open for serious suggestions. But let me save some time and effort, don't ask how to boil water, how to crack an egg, how to make instant soup.  I will blatantly ignored. :)


En el proximo mes traere otras delicias culinarias. Hay algunas ideas rondando por ahi, pero tambien estoy dispuesta a escuchar sugerencias serias.  Pero permitame que les ahorre tiempo y esfuerzo, no me pregunten como hervir agua, como quebrar un huevo, como hacer sopa instantena, que seran friamente ignorandos.

Kitty is back!

It’s been two years since my last post.  I think an entry is long overdue. I will try to retake the Meatless Mondays posts. I  hope to discuss how music and food go hand in hand as one the most fun yet bizarre creative outlets that come together and display some pretty amazing things. At least for me, some of my favorite foods have some king of musical reference attached to them.  Christmas Eve in  the suburbs of Boston makes me thing of  Rosemary Clooney, Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra. I remember the smell of garlic, fish, oregano,basil women talking loudly about when to take the baccalà out of the oven, and how grandpa John should not be hitting the Johnny Walker too hard.  On my 21^st birthday I went to my first grown up concert. I went to the bay with my friend Shari Pittman to watch the Gipsy Kings live . We had oysters and some kind of red wine that I don’t remember but when I eat clams, oysters, or  mussels  I remember  sounds of the gypsy guitar.

So the first recipe will be something along those lines, there was no music associated with this dish, at least not till now.  I went to Montreal in April of 1996, and I remember that I wanted to eat something different, I had just recently tried Vietnamese, Thai food. I wanted something  really “French”  to my surprise I was taken  to this café  in Laval. And my lunch was ordered for me. I was a little nervous because I was hoping it wasn’t snails, or goat’s brains or anything like it. I was brought a salad! I thought I are you friggen serious, a salad  is going to be my very French experience in Montreal.  So this is where you should not judge a book by its cover.  I was brought  a Niçoise Salad. I thought this was a whole bunch of left overs thrown together.  I asked what it was.  I asked if this was some kind chef’s special and if  he didn’t want the tuna  to go bad? And for that I got the nastiest look. I did deserve it. So I took my fist bite. And it was love at first bite. I ate all of it. The next day I went back again.  I  went back to Boston, I searched high and low for a restaurant that served my beloved salad. But it seem like only high end restaurants would serve it.  So I had given up.  I could only eat this in Montreal or if I ever visited France. At this time I was not that into cooking. I just thought that I would never eat it again. The thought did cross my mind to make it at home but my roommates at the time where more like the ramen noodles kind of people.  My parents more or less my step mother if it’s not traditional Italian or American fair it was not going to be made in her kitchen. And yes, the women in my family are very territorial about their kitchens. Now , I am as well.

Years have gone by since that spring in Montreal. I am not big on abiding rules. But I also don’t like to stray from the classics.   The traditional Niçoise Salad had no potatoes and only raw veggies are to be used. Well, if you have had it, it has boiled potatoes, cooked green beans.

This past week, I had a craving for it. But I figured I didn’t want to use canned or seared tuna  and the boiled potatoes are just boring. So, yes I changed it up a bit. I roasted the potatoes, and instead of tuna, I used salmon, and at least here, on this side of the ocean, plum Roma tomatoes are used, I used cherry  tomatoes (baby tomatoes) The culinary sin I did commit was I used iceberg lettuce because I forgot to get Boston lettuce or butter lettuce, in most cases spring greens will work just as well. If anything spring greens gives it that woodsy twist. Now, I really dislike olives, but the salad calls for olives. Nicoise olives or in some cases Kalamata olives, my personal preference is sans olives.

And where that the music part play in all of this?  I owe you the musical  reference for another day!!! Ha Ha Ha. (The recipe will be up by tomorrow night, I’m tired :P ) Lunch at work, picture taken yesterday. 

Han pasado ya dos años del ultimo escrito. Creo que algo nuevo esta mas que retrasado. Intentare retomar las publicaciones de Lunes sin Carne. Espero discutir la realcion que la musica y la cocina van mano a mano, como los mas divertidos y raros medios creativos de expression. Y cuando se juntan algo maravilloso puede ocurrir.

Al menos para mi ese es el caso, algunos de mis platillos  favoritos tienen alguna referencia musical adjunta. Las noches Navideñas a las afueras de Boston me hacen recorder a Rosemary Clooney, Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra. Recuerdo el olor a ajo,pescado,oregano,albahaca, mujeres hablando en voz alta a que momento hay que sacar el baccalà del horno. Que el abuelo John no se de tan fuete con Johnny Walker.

Cumpli los 21 años y fui a mi primer concierto  “de gente adulta”. Fue en la bahia de Boston con mi amiga Shari Pittman a ver a los Gipsy Kings en vivo. Comimos ostras y bebimos vino que no recuerdo que tipo era pero que me pego fuerte. Ahora, cada vez que me deleito de ostras, almejas, mejillones recuerdo el sonido de la guitarra gitana.

Asi, que la primera receta sera algo parecido a lo antes mencionado. Hasta ahora al menos no habia una referencia musical con este plato.

Fui a Montreal en Abril de 1996 y recuerdo que queria comer algo diferente, recientemente habia probado por primera vez la comida Vietnamita y Tailandesa. Queria algo verdaderamente Frances y para mi sorpresa me llevaron a un café a  Laval. Y ordenaro mi almuerzo por mi. Estaba un poco neriviosa por que esperaba que no fueran caracoles, cesos de cabro o algo parecido. Y es que me han traido una ensalda. Pense “esto es en serio (*&^%$?”, una ensalda seria mi experiencia a la Francesa en Montreal! Aqui, es cuando dicen que no hay que juzgar a un libro por su forro. Me llevaron una ensalada Niçoise. Pense que eran sobras y la tiraron en un plato y listo. Pregunte si era un especial del chef que no queria desperdiciar el atun. Por ese comentario me gane una mala mirada, me lo merecia. Tome el primer bocado, y fue amor a primera mordida, me la comi toda. Al dia siguiente, regrese.

Al regresar a Boston, busque alto y bajo  por un restaurante que sirviera mi querida ensalda, pero al parecer solo restaurantes de la high la servian. Me di por vencida. Solo podria deleitarme si visitaba Montreal o Francia.

En ese tiempo no me interesaba mucho la cocina, simplemente pense que jamas comeria eso. Brevemente me cruzo la idea de preparala en la casa. Pero mis compañeros de piso tenian preferencia par alas sopas Maruchan. Mis padres, mas bien mi madrastra si no era cocina tradicional italiana o americana no seria preparada en su cocina. Las mujeres de mi familia son territoriales con sus cocinas. Ahora yo lo soy tambien.

Años han pasado desde aquella primera en Montreal.

No soy de las que siguen normas, pero tampoco me gusta desviarme mucho de lo clasico. La ensalada Nicoise tradicionalmente no contiene papas, y solo se utilizan  vegetales crudos. Pero si la la han probado, ahora si contiene papas,ejotes cocidos(julias verdes/habichuelas verdes.) Esta semana pasada se me ha antojado. Pero no queria utiliar atun dorado o de lata, las papas cocidas se me hacen muy aburridas. Asi que cambie un poco la receta, rostice las papas, en lugar de atun, salmon. Y al menos aqui en este lado del charco su utilizan tomates Roma, yo utilice tomates cereza o mini tomates. El pecado culinario que si cometi, fue de usar lechuga corriente porque olvide comprar lechuga Boston o lechuga de mantequilla, en algunos caso se puede substituir por lechuga salvaje que para mi funciona major. Esta lechuga le da un sabor mas de “campiña”. A mi no me gutan las aceitunas a menos que sean en tamales o paella. Esta receta las requiere, aceitunas de Nice, o Kalamata son un buen substituto, mi preferencia personal sans aceitunas.

A todo esto que dond esta la refencia musica? Les debo la referencia musical con todo y recetas. Ja Ja Ja  (la receta estara lista mañana, ya tengo sueñito) Foto tomada ayer a la hora del almuerzo en el trabajo.