Pasadena personal chef service, Om Chef posts food news, research, recipes, resources and experts on how, why and what to eat for ultimate taste, optimum health and environmental sustainability
This Mediterranean Salad is a classic horiatiki/Greek salad gone wild.....Greek feta cheese, tomatoes, cucumber, red or gold bell peppers, Italian parsley, red onion, and Kalamata* olives from your favorite small producer are supplemented with carrots, purple cabbage, asparagus, mushrooms, avocado, romaine. and fresh flat leaf parsley, basil, and oregano ...most any vegetable can be added, this is what was on hand for this particular Mediterranean Salad.
Red onions and mushrooms may be marinated for an hour to mellow the onion.
To 3TB of Red Wine vinegar add 1tsp of honey, 1 tsp of dried oregano, 2 TB chopped fresh oregano, 1 minced clove of garlic, and 2 TB olive oil....add 3-4 sliced crimini mushrooms, and 1/4 thinly sliced red onion....allow to rest for one hour.
The marinade will be used as the dressing, and added to the final salad
Slice or chop tomatoes, cucumber, and vegetables available, toss with marinaded onions and mushrooms,
crumble in 2 oz of feta cheese, toss, and drizzle with marinade.
Serve with warm brown rice, pita bread or your favorite baguette
Salads are the time to be creative, go a little wild with your ingredient selection! No two salads should ever be exactly the same....
Just be sure to taste as you go along
Glazed, candied, and honeyed nuts are a delicious and ultra healthy pantry staple. A perfect way to dress up a salad, awesome added to yogurt, mix with cooked grains, especiaaly toasted rolled oats for instant gourmet Om Granola, or as a fab stand alone snack.
Pricey, and often made with corn syrup, when purchased commercially, but ultra EZ to make yourself.
Glazed nuts can be made with multiple ingredients, and multiple steps.
Shown here are glazed nuts at their quickest, simplest, and only slightly sweet.
Begin by toasting nuts on low heat for aprox 5 minutes.
Any combination of nuts and seeds can be used.
Shown: chopped almonds, walnuts,
pecans, and poppy seed
Remove toasted nuts from saute pan.
Add 1 TB of sugar per cup of nuts.
Allow sugar to melt,
aprox 4 minutes on low to medium heat
Sea salt can be added at this stage, as well as citrus zest (shown), fresh ginger zest (shown), ground Cinnamon, Vanilla bean or extract, , cardamom, or any herb, spice or extract.
When sugar is melted,
add 1TB of honey and 2TB of water,
cook 1 minute
Add nuts to bubbling sugar/honey syrup,
turn off heat,
and stir to coat nuts thoroughly.
Allow to cool, and store in a covered container.
Glass canning jars or perfect, but last weeks pasta sauce jar works equally well.
All nuts shown here are available at the Resnik family owned and operated for over 50 years,
Somis Nut House.
An excellent source of nuts, dried fruit and edible seeds...
mail order is available, but a day trip is more fun, and it's only about 90 minutes from Los Angeles
serve with brown rice. shown: curry roasted cauliflower and ginger carrots
And the perfect use of all those yummy farmers market veggies broiled and roasted a few days ago..brushed with a little Balsamic vinegar and olive oil, placed under the broiler with a slice of provolone and served on a grilled La Boulangerie baguette
La Boulangerie's excellent breads are available at the Friday farmers market at the Bank of America Plaza in downtown Los Angeles
Pink lentils, shown above, cook in only 10 minutes, and are beautiful summer salad when gently tossed with nastursiams, marigolds and rose petals, and lightly dressed with a drizzle of hazelnut or almond oil and lemon juice
Lentils are an excellent source of protein, ultra easy to cook,
and are delicious warmed up and dressed with fresh herbs or curry,
or as a simple but perfect compliment to cooked whole grains such as brown rice...
..for the more carnivorous appetite serve lentils with grilled salmon or a broiled lamb kabob
Lentils come in a variety of colors and sizes,
they have an affinity for rice partly
due to the similar cooking times.
Shown here is a green unpeeled lentil available at
your local market with a cooking time of 30 minutes.
Herbs and spices to play up your lentils include, but are not limited to:
bay leaf, black pepper, black or green cardamom, cilantro, cinnamon, cloves, coriander, cumin, curry pwder, fresh ginger, mint, parsley, oregano, thyme, and turmeric
Turtle beans, aka black beans are ultra easy, cooking in just 2-3 hours they are the perfect bean for Mexican inspired meals. Cook with one or two carrots, a little chopped onion and during the last hour of cooking add generous dash of cumin and sea salt. Serve hot with fresh salsa and a cooked whole grain (shown with brown Basmati rice ), and/or fresh hot corn tortillas with shredded cheese........black beans pair well with beef, pork or chicken
Herbs and spices for black beans: assorted frsh/dried or ground chile peppers, bay leaf, cilantro, coriander, cumin, epazote, garlic, ginger, oregano, parsley, savory, thyme
The mighty mung bean may not be pretty, but it's amazingly yummy and gentle to even the most
sensitive tummys.
Shown here are split mung beans cooked with curry.
Also available whole, these require a longer cooking time,
and the whole mung (or moong) bean
can also be sprouted for your next stir fry calling for bean sprouts.
Mung beans luv ginger, cumin, cilantro, and whole or ground coriander
btw: Mung beans are really a pea
Dried black eyed peas cook in 90 minutes with nothing more than a little sea salt.
Black eyed peas luv the following herbs and spices: bay leaf, cayenne, chile peppers, cinnamon, cloves, coriander, cumin, ginger, and turmeric.
Cooked black eyed peas are delicious straight from the fridge topped with avocado and roasted tomato, as shown, or warm up the peas and serve with any whole grain. For the more carnivorous appetite, serve the peas as a side to meat, black eyed peas pair especially well with pork.
Why cook your own beans? Variety, flavor, choice of organic, much less sodium, and for some the number one reason, the dreaded 'gas'...home cooked beans are not nearly as gassy as store bought canned.
Cooked beans, peas and lentils can be stored 3-5 days in the refrigerator.
Storage containers shown are heavy glass by Pyrex. Glass containers are superior to the various plastic containers available as you have no worries about chemicals from the plastic leaching into the food. Pyrex glass containers are also very convenient, going from refrigerator to the oven or microwave with equal ease.
A well made salad does not need the bottled, high in fat, calories, sodium, high fructose corn syrup, and preservative loaded dressings from Kraft...this is a sample of ingredients for a fab salad, the only limit is your imagination. A thoughtful blend of crisp and soft, crunchy and creamy, dry and juicy, sweet and savory, bitter and sour, and gently held together with a splash of olive oil and a double splash of complimentary vinegar, makes store bought salad dressings completely unnecessary.
Using a colorful mix of raw, cooked, semi-cooked, and pickled veggies, fruits, cooked and/or sprouted grains, beans and/or peas, nuts, and cheese provides a an exciting, never boring way to eat fresh and healthy.
All of the above mentioned ingredients can be cleaned, chopped, sprouted, pickled and/or cooked two or three days ahead and stored separately in the refrigerator. Ingredients may be used for a quick salad, heated and served with cooked whole grains such as brown rice, quinoa, wheat berry, or barley, or add some of these fab, and prepared ahead ingredients to a simmering broth for an instant and delectable soup.
Composing a beautiful meal of the tastes your body is craving is ultra easy and delicious with a little advance preparation. This is one of the secrets of optimum health, having delicious and good for you options ready to go when hunger strikes.
Veggies from downtown Los Angeles 7th and Figueroa Farmers Market, every Thursday from 10-3
On the second day split and broil a french loaf with the ends removed, top with reheated ragu, a slice of provolone and/or mozzarella, place under broiler until cheese is melted.
Split pea soup is a natural for curry spice blend. Peas and all legumes are low in fat, cholesterol free, high in folate, potassium, iron and magnesium and an excellent source of protein and fiber.
The turmeric in the curry has medicinal qualities, most recently shown to fight Alzheimer's disease.
Start with 2 TB curry powder gently cooked in a little clarified butter (ghee) or olive oil, add the onions and cook on low until onions are translucent, about 10minutes, garlic may be added at this point, but don't let it brown or the soup will be bitter. You may wish to spice up your curry spice powder with a little extra ground fennel seed, cumin, ginger, nutmeg or cinnamon. Curry powder is a blend of spices and can be, and is really best made fresh by the cook....but the store bought is wonderfully convenient, and is easily embellished. Add 6 cups vegetable broth or water, and peas to the sauteed onions and simmer for approximately 45 minutes. Half way through the cooking add chopped celery and half of the shredded carrots. More curry powder may be added to taste while the peas are simmering. The remaining shredded carrots are added during the last 2 or 3 minutes of cooking. Chopped flat leaf parsely is added after the soup has been removed from the heat, this will help keep its bright green color. Finely chopped kale can be used in place of the parley, but should be added 7-10 minutes before end of cooking.
Pictured here is a yellow spit pea, their color works better with the color of the yellow (turmeric) curry. Split peas love carrots, 6 have been shredded and will be added throughout the cooking process for a variety of textures. The finished soup is topped with fresh yogurt and a generous squeeze of lemon.
Curry powder is available in the spice section of the supermarket, avoid the Spice Islands Brand, try a few, and for the real curry powder lovers shop online, locals head over to Artesia's little India and stock up on an amazing variety of incredible garam masalas.
All that fabulously fresh farmers market produce can be simply dressed in olive oil, whole garlic cloves, plenty of fresh herbs and roasted in a hot oven (450) for an awesome dinner tonight, and two or three more meals over the next several days.
After roasting, cool and refrigerate in sealed containers, ideally glass.
Roasted veggies turn simple mixed leaf lettuce in to a gourmet salad, sandwiched between artisan slices of bread with a few slices of chesses and grilled creates a superior hot sandwich, or gently rewarm the veggies and serve with a cooked whole grain such as kasha (buckwheat), brown rice or quinoa
Veggies shown here are from the 7th and Fig Farmers Market in downtown Los Angeles. Thursdays from 10-3
Eggplant and purple (red) onion may be grilled, broiled or oven roasted at 400 degrees, remove any charred skin, rough chop, add sea salt and coarse pepper.
Serve with a squeeze of Lemon, Meyers if possible
No need to add olive oil, who needs the extra calories?
Ready to eat as shown or mix in tahini, garlic, olive oil and lemon juice for a fresh and fab babaganoush.
Grill several eggplant, and other veggies, store in refrigerator for fast, and easy dinners for days. Brown rice is great made ahead, and the perfect accompaniment to grilled or roasted veggies
Originating in India, eggplant is a berry from the nightshade family, and has been on the menu longer than history has been written. Eggplant comes in a magical array of sizes and shapes, and colors from lavenders, purples and blues, to ivory, ecru and gold. And eggplant contains an equally powerful assortment of vitamins, nutrients including copper, potassium, manganese, and thiamine (vitamin B1). Eggplant is also a good source of vitamin B6, folate, magnesium and niacin.
Eggplant is high in fiber and its low soluble carbohydrate content make them a super food for diabetics.
Most any vegetable can be roasted for a fast, and delicious meal with minimal preparation time. Shown above, rough chop carrots, pink, purple and gold fingerling potatoes, and garlic, simply glazed with a drizzle of olive oil, a generous squeeze of lemon, fresh rosemary, thyme, and a plenty of kosher salt, and fresh cracked pepper.
Heat oven to 450, this takes awhile, but ultra high heat is the secret to fab roasted vegetables.
Use an iron skillet if possible, heated with the oven, and roast veggies for 8-12 min, turn once during roasting time, and definitely toss the squeezed lemon in as well.
Serve hot or at room temp with salad
Make extra, roasted vegetables are even more delicious the next day! Serve last nights roasted vegetables thinly sliced, no need to reheat, with toasted, grainy bread, such as la brea whole grain, or mix vegies with leftover short grain brown rice, parmesan, minced garlic, and splash of olive oil with lemon.
Late night feast above: roasted carrots and broccoli with brown rice, salad of spicy greens with fresh raspberry and balsamic vinegrette, heirloom tomatos, cream cheese, and Ballard Lox, lox
Mom was right, breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
Om breakfast bread pudding is a delicious beginning to an awesome and energized day.
Whole grain bread, nuts, berries, milk, soy works fine, a few eggs, cinnamon or cardamom and a bit of honey
Pasillia chili, eggs -egg whites or eggbeaters are healthy upgrades, but eggs a few times a week offers exceptional omega 3's and a perfect protein -red onion and cilantro Frittatas are uber easy, and a fab way to use small amounts of odd ingredients languishing in the fridge...
Slice Japanese or Chinese eggplant lengthwise, 1/4" thick, spread with a thin layer of goat cheese, chopped shiitake mushroom, chopped walnuts, minced garlic and finely chopped flat leaf parley...gently roll up and secure with a toothpick, bake 30 minutes at 350 This is one of those delicacies that's even better the next day, hot or cold...make extra!
Serve with polenta and a simple salad
