Tidbit: Miso Butter

Mix equal parts white miso and soft butter. Add it to all of the things. (About a tablespoon of each should be fine for a pound of produce. You know I believe that animal fats are fine in pursuit of eating leaves.)

Roast brussels sprouts are particularly good. So is fresh corn. Broccoli. Blanched kale. Sweet potatoes Or if you want to thicken a sauce, whisk this in at the end.

Quick Peanut Sauce

Take 1/2 cup smooth peanut butter. Add one tsp. brown sugar, two tbs. soy sauce, two tbs. vinegar, and one tbs. Braggs (or fish sauce, or more soy sauce.) Mix. Thin to desired consistency with water. (My mother makes this, and I used to make it from memory. I would attempt to thin the sauce with vinegar and soy sauce. It was flavorful. Then I asked her about her secret ingredient: it's water.) Correct the seasoning- add whatever makes the whole thing taste the way you want. Also, possibly add grated ginger, grated garlic, or toasted sesame seeds.

It's good poured over noodles- in which case I advocate the old-school technique- or as a dipping sauce for summer rolls, satay, or crudites.

Avocado Dressing

This is the other stuff that I ate tonight- after a month without farmer's markets, my last visit resulted in so much produce that every meal must include at least one bowl of greens.

Even breakfast.

Oh, it's the most wonderful time of the year: peewee avocado season. Itty-bitty avocados are now $1 a pound- that's a buck for like six! After one has exhausted all reasonable recipes for avocados, one becomes... creative.

This is good enough to make if you don't live in the tiny part of the world with peewee avocados. It's pretty tasty on salad, broccoli, lentils, artichokes, sandwiches, lots of things that aren't actually vegan.... It's like super double good mayonnaise with an avocado base instead of eggs.

Peel one clove garlic. Remove the bottom of the bulb. Drop into a food processor with 1/2 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp sugar, 1/2 cup olive oil, the juice of two lemons, and one peeled and pitted avocado (or two peewee avocados). Blend until smooth. Eat.

This will stay emulsified overnight- I'm not sure how it'd do after 24 hours, because it never lasts that long.

Mushroom Wine Brandy Sauce.

Sorry, no crappy uncropped picture today- first, because this recipe is not pretty, and second because my camera is 254 miles away. This is a nearly perfect gravy substitute: it's excellent on mashed potatoes or the inevitable platter of roasted root vegetables that shows up this time of year. (If current trends hold, I will be posting the very dish I mock within a month.) It's also good on steamed vegetables.

Stem and dice two cups of mushrooms. Dice 1/2 onion. Saute until soft in 1 tbs oil. Add one cup of red wine, one cup of broth, and one half cup of brandy and simmer until reduced by half. Add 1 clove minced garlic, 1/2 tsp fresh thyme, and salt to taste. Serve over other foods. If you eat it straight, you will feel ill.

Simmering the likker makes the alcohol evaporate- you know that. You probably also know the brilliant cooking tip C's mother shared with me: "If you use good wine, the food will taste better." Forget using good brandy unless you already have some in the house. What else is brandy good for?

The Cure for "Eating Locally Fridge"

Yeah, I don't know why all my pictures look like poop lately.

About a week after most people commit to eating more local food, their fridge is full of more greens than they can reasonably eat. Boiled greens, stir fried greens, sauteed greens, raw greens... a person gets tired. Thus, here's my recipe for "I SAY IT'S PESTO"- which is probably very much like the original form of pesto.

Peel six cloves of garlic. Chop coarsely in food processor with 1/4 cup olive oil and 1/2 tsp salt. (Or puree, I don't care.) Destem one bunch cilantro or parsley (which you might conveniently have left from your idiocy with chimp food). Add to food processor. Also destem an unreasonable amount of kale, spinach, arugula, mint, or more cilantro or parsley Put it all in the food processor. Puree, adding olive oil as needed to maintain goopiness. Add the juice of 1/2 lemon.

This is good on pasta, I will grant you. It's divine on green beans. It's also pretty good on greens that might not be so good in a pesto; blanched chard, turnip greens, or kale, chopped cabbage, maybe thinned with a little more lemon juice and use as a dressing for lettuce...

If you add 1/2 tsp of red pepper flakes, 1/4 tsp cumin, 1/4 tsp thyme, and use 2 tbs of wine vinegar instead of lemon juice and just parsley and cilantro, you have chimichuri. Which you should try on potatoes, fish, grilled meat, or vegetables. (Worst vegan ever.)

If you don't like cilantro but want to start, this is a good recipe. The anethole vaporizes, so the delightful soapy taste is absent. If you really want to trick your brain, eat this in circumstances that make you unusually happy. Then do it again. Soon, your brain will think that you like cilantro.