It's been chilly in Los Angeles these last several weeks but this weekend we had some magical mid-day warmth which meant I could serve lunch on the patio for my very special guest, Adelaide. It put me in a spring-y mood!
Was inspired by the fruits and vegetables I found plus my own cravings. The avocados and raspberries were particularly wonderful so they started and ended the meal to be properly celebrated.
Here's the menu put on my refrigerator so I didn't forget any of the elements at the last minute:
I started my year off with a five day Ayurvedic cleanse which entails eating pretty much only lentils, rice and some veggies, but instead of getting sick of these items I find myself addicted to them. I love roasted veggies of all kinds and have made a million different roasted cauliflowers but I particularly love this one (from Food & Wine, of course -- Spicy Roasted Cauliflower), served over perfect Basmati Rice and Green Lentils (I just added a bit of cumin, turmeric and salt to them). I didn't have time to swing by the store for cilantro and mint which would have taken the cauliflower up a notch but flat parsley did the cooling trick in a pinch. Also, 2 teaspoons of red pepper flakes that the recipe calls for was too much for my guest. Perfect for me, but if you have a guest who doesn't like spicy, you should probably only do 1 teaspoon. Also, I added the juice of an entire large lime over the entire dish for a little cooling as well.
Let's talk for a quick sec about rice. I have had a history of screwing up rice, but this recipe is an absolute no fail at making exquisite perfectly textured rice. It's super duper easy. Follow it exactly as it is written (scroll way down for the actual recipe). Guaranteed: Perfect Basmati Rice
Found a new Roasted Squash Soup recipe from a new blog I discovered when searching for new squash soup recipes so wanted to give it a go and loved it. Roasted Butternut Squash Soup. How can you not love a blog called COOKIE & Kate? Kate is the chef and Cookie is her faithful dog who licks up kitchen debris. This soup is lovely and quite easy. I will say it was a bit too sweet for me, but I'm very odd about sweetness of soups. So I added the juice of one very large lime to it AND added one more little squeeze upon serving. Don't do that unless you taste it first and happen to share my taste bud affliction.
This is how it looked on the plate when I served the salad and the Cauliflower/Lentil/Rice mixture. This shot doesn't do it justice and I forgot to take a picture of the salad before I served it. It was gorgeous with all those colors! Dark green, light green, white, deep red, deep orange, etc.
Recipes for the other things I made, i.e., no link provided above:
- First Course -- Slice heirloom tomato and ripe avocado. Sprinkle with good dose of lime juice a teensy bit (avocadoes give plenty of fat -- it's for the tomatoes) of extra virgin olive oil and a sprinkle of Maldon salt -- or some other delicious salt.
- Salad -- Arugula, butter lettuce, roasted squash (roasted in olive oil, salt -- and rosemary, if you have it, or whatever spice beckons you), pomegranate seeds, toasted pumpkin seeds, toasted almonds. Dressing is just lemon or lime juice (i did a combo for this), olive oil and good salt.
- Dessert -- Good vanilla ice cream, homemade caramel sauce (will post this later in the week), fresh raspberries, toasted pecans. Side of cookies.
All of these recipes are super duper easy. Seriously no joke easy-peasy. I need to post this over on the Lazy Woman blog because they are LAZY recipes but if you want to be superhero entertainer they come in handy too!
So Buon Lazy Superhero Appetito to all!
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