What the %()&$#! is that: Chayote Edition

These little guys were in my produce basket this week. I was glad I arrived before the produce truck and helped distribute on Saturday because I got to see the boxes they came in and write down the name. They are most commonly called chayotes, but there are some regional names for them that are too good not to post. In les pays francophone, one might call them christophenes. Throughout Central America, a chayote is a choko. In Brazil, it's a chuchu, and in India it's a chow chow. If you happen to live in the swamps of Louisiana, you will recognize this vegetable as an alligator pear.

An urban legend circulates Australia claiming that the McDonald's restaurants there use chayote rather than apples in their apple pies because they maintain attractive color and firmness when cooked. I told my husband. He said he doesn't care what's in a McDonald's apple pie because they are delicious no matter what.

The other vaguely interesting factoid I found researching the alligator pear (see, it is the best name), is that many people report allergic reactions after contact with the squash's skin. I didn't notice any reactions at the distribution because each chayote was individually wrapped in small plastic baggies, but when I started to peel the chayotes to cook them, my hands and arms went all itchy and blotchy. Fortunately, the flesh of the squash does not cause the same problems.

Since Julia Child didn't include any christophene recipes in MtAoFC, and I couldn't find any recipes for chayotes in any of my other cookbooks, I turned to the internet for recipe ideas. Unsurprisingly, most of what I found was for Mexican or Central American style cuisine. This worked out well. The produce co-op planners are prudent, so I also had several Anaheim peppers on hand. I searched, compiled and tweaked and came up with a few promising ideas.  Pack my knives and call me Kenny 'cause I'm about to make chayote two ways.
 
Tuesday's Dish - Rice with Chayote

I'm told this dish is called a Fritanga and is a staple in Guatemala, but searches for the word just yield Nicaraguan restaurants, so I'm not sure I believe it. It's basically a saute of chayote, tomatoes and onions with cooked rice and seasoning. I realized too late that I might have had better results if I had used uncooked rice and made it as a paella. My aunt gave me a beautiful paella pan for my birthday in March, but so far I have only used it as a roasting pan for chicken. It's exactly the right size.

the cutest tomatoes

1. Peel, slice and sautee 1 chayote along with 1 medium onion (diced) and 2-3 chopped garlic cloves.
2. Add about 1/3 cup cooking liquid (I used chicken stock, but vegetable stock or water would work just fine I'm sure) and chili powder, cumin, paprika and a pinch of cayenne pepper.
3. Stir in 2 cups of cooked rice and a coarsely chopped tomato. Cook until heated through.

 

Chayote stays firm through cooking and has a mild taste similar to cucumbers. They're family, after all. The real star of this dish was the cherry tomatoes I quartered and sauteed until just done. I served this with cheese-and-Anaheim-pepper enchiladas. Yum!



Wednesday's Dish - Chayote with Tomato, Green Chile and Cheese

tomato/chile puree

1. Peel 1-2 chayotes and slice into julienned strips. The core of the chayote is edible and a bit nutty so go ahead and leave it in.
2. Roast whole tomatoes (I used more of the super cute cherry tomatoes) under the broiler until they begin to pop, then process (leave the skin on) with 1-2 roasted green chile peppers (peeled and seeded) and 2-3 garlic cloves until smooth.
3. Dice and saute half a yellow onion, once the onion becomes translucent, add your tomato/pepper puree and a pinch of red pepper flakes.
4. Stir in the chayote and 1/4 cup water or stock. Cook 15 minutes.
5. Remove from heat and stir in 1-2 tbsp chopped cilantro and 1/4 cup shredded Monterrey Jack cheese.   

I didn't have any cilantro on hand, but I didn't have to go to the store because my husband is a genius. Last time we had bunches of cilantro, he froze chopped cilantro with a little water in an ice cube tray like little cilantrocicles. I just had to grab a cube and let it thaw.



I liked this dish a lot better than the previous one. Nathan and I both decided that chayote is okay. I will probably never buy a chayote in the store, but I wouldn't refuse it if served. The roasted tomato and chile sauce tasted good and cheese makes everything better. I have a coworker who often says she'd eat a shoe if it had melted cheese on it. Well, I'd eat a chayote if it had melted cheese on it.

Chayote Squash with tomato peppers and cheese served with pollo asada.

The March 5th Haul

Saturday School has ended and I can finally go back to my normal Saturday routine. Most (childless) people would balk at the idea of willingly getting up at 7 on a Saturday morning after a full work week just to go get produce, but I love it. It feels like Christmas, "What will I get?" So, I woke up at 7 and gleefully got my big gulp, drove to Sunny Springs Park, and picked up a giant box of fresh surprises.

butter gold potatoes, turnips, green beans, spinach, tomatoes, yellow squash, acorn squash, bananas, mineola oranges, braeburn apples, mangoes, and a pineapple

So I get home from the park around 8:15, turn NPR on the radio in the living room (because Weekend Edition, Car Talk and Wait Wait Don't Tell Me are awesome), and wash all the fruits and veggies, put them away where they belong, clean my kitchen and sit down and plan what I'll cook during the week. I flip through 5 or 6 of my favorite cookbooks and browse Recipe Zaar to try and use as much as possible from my basket while buying as little as possible from the grocery store. I wonder what the people at the store must think of me every time I buy nothing but meat, butter, cheese and spices from them.

I settled on a lamb stew to use some of the turnips and potatoes as well as carrots I still have in the fridge and some aloo saag to use more potatoes and the spinach. The recipes come from these beautiful cookbooks. I also want to dust off this recipe for stuffed acorn squash. There are some amazing sites for recipes and cooking online, but I love cookbooks. I love flipping through them and seeing gorgeous professional pictures, and I love having them on my book shelf.

2 Things with Butternut Squash

Huck, clearly impressed.

We got two butternut squash in our bountiful basket this week, and I'm a little souped out, so I decided to go huge and try making the most delicious of dishes: butternut squash ravioli.  I don't have any tools for rolling out pasta (besides a rolling pin), so I thought I couldn't do it on my own.  I planned on cheating and buying won-ton wrappers, but none of the grocery stores I went to had any.  The lady I asked at Trader Joe's said they didn't carry them anymore and that I should go down to any of the Asian markets on Spring Mountain.  It's something I like to do anyway, but I was so frustrated at that point that I decided to just do it myself.

 Since I've never made my own pasta before, I consulted my CIA contacts* for help.  Two young men involved with the CIA who will be known only as Boud and Pool to protect their identities explained the process.  "Flour and eggs," they told me.  "It's just flour and eggs."  They instructed me to create a basin of flour and crack eggs into it until it felt right (Pool said about four), mix it by hand, knead, and let it rest for 20 minutes.  I was instructed that the dough would be stiff, but that this was normal.

 While I fully trust my contacts, I did not trust myself to understand text-based instructions.  I am a visual learner, thankfully, I found this video on youtube.  Armed with instructions, I set out to create ravioli dough.  It turns out making pasta is messy and fun, and I love it.

The delightfully European man in the cooking video that refused embedding says to use egg yolks only or the dough will be stiff.  I chose to include the egg whites because I felt stiff dough would be easier to roll out by had without breaking.  When I get a pasta machine, because now I have to have one, I will switch to using just the yolks.

I managed to mix the flour and eggs into a firm dough and, after letting it sit for 20 minutes or so, rolled it out with a rolling pin.  I ended up with two very narrow ovals of dough which I tried filling in two different ways.  I placed spoonfuls of my butternut squash mixture along one side of the first oval and cut it into strips with a pizza cutter (fancy!)  Then I folded the strips in half with the filling in the middle sealing the edges.  This worked, but wasn't very pretty due to my imprecise dough.

I used a shot glass (fancy!) to cut the second sheet of dough into circles which were pressed together with a scoop of filling between.  These raviolis looked prettier, but wasted some dough.

The whole process was easier than I anticipated, and the raviolis tasted great but were a little thick.  Gotta get that pasta maker.

Butternut Squash Ravioli Filling

• 1 butternut squash, halved and seeded
• olive oil
• butter
• 1 large leek (white part only) halved and cut into small strips (be careful to wash between the layers of the leek; nobody likes sandy raviolis) 
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 10-12 fresh sage leaves

1. Preheat oven to 400, brush olive oil over the cut sides of the squash and season with salt and pepper. Place the squash cut side down in a baking dish and bake for about 40 minutes (until soft).  Scoop the cooked squash out of its skin and place in a food processor to puree.
2. While the squash is cooking, melt 2 tbsp butter and saute the leek until browned.  Add finely chopped sage leaves and Parmesan cheese when the leek is nearly done.
3. Add the leek mixture to the butternut squash in the food processor and puree until smooth.
4. Stuff ravioli dough or won-ton wrappers with the butternut squash mixture and boil 3-4 minutes (until they float to the top)

Tonight's adventure in squash is less ambitious, but equally delicious.  I made a gratin of  butternut squash (skinned, seeded, and sliced with a small mandolin - microwave the squash for about 3 minutes to make slicing easier) to be served with simple pork chops. 

Butternut Squash and Spinach Gratin

1. Skin, seed and slice a butternut squash.
2. Blanch, drain and chop 1 bunch spinach (or use about 1 cup frozen chopped spinach).
3. Saute half a cup of diced onion and two cloves of garlic in 2 tbsp butter. 
4. Add onion and garlic to spinach along with 1/4 tsp nutmeg, salt and pepper, and 1/2 c cream.
5. Layer sliced squash, spinach mixture, and grated Parmesan cheese in a buttered casserole and bake at 400 for about half an hour or until browned and bubbling. 

*Culinary Institute of America