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.

She's My Tomato Pie

I'm not usually a huge fan of Emeril. His recipes are nice enough, but the whole cooking in front of a cheering live audience thing kind of turns me off. Why do you need an audience, Emeril? Crap, why do I need an audience? Now I'm disturbed.

Roma Ro-Ma-Ma

My aunt Sherrie gave me this beautiful cookbook for Christmas though, and I was immediately tantalized by the recipe for "Cheesy Creole Tomato Pie." There were Roma tomatoes in my Bountiful Basket (which Nathan picked up for us since I have Saturday School for the next 5 weeks - thanks honey!), and I didn't want to make more soup or sauces.

Cheesy Tomato Pie

•  pie crust (I used a frozen pie crust from the grocery store.  Pie crust is pretty easy to make, but meh, I didn't feel like it and my kitchen is too small for extra messes)
• 1 egg, separated

• 2 lbs ripe tomatoes (Creole, Beefsteak and Heirloom were all specified as acceptable by Emeril himself)
• salt and pepper
• 4 tbsp mayo
• 1/3 cup bread crumbs
• 1/4 cup thinly sliced sweet onions
• 1 tbsp fresh thyme leaves
• 2 tbsp chopped fresh basil leaves
• about 1/2 cup grated fontina cheese (according to wikipedia, Gruyere, Gouda and Edam are all fine substitutes)
• about 1/2 cup grated mozzarella cheese
• 2 tbsp olive oil (fo drizzle)
• 2 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese

1. Roll out the pie dough and fit into a 9 or 10 inch deep dish pie plate.
2. Preheat the oven to 375.
3. Line pie shell with aluminum foil and bake for 13 minutes.
4. Remove foil and bake 3 minutes more; let cool.
5. Lightly beat the egg white and use a pastry brush to coat the surface of the pie shell with egg white.
6. Slice tomatoes into 1/4 inch rounds.  Season with salt and pepper.
7. Combine the egg yolk with the mayonnaise.
8. Sprinkle 1/3 of the bread crumbs in the bottom of the pie shell. Layer half the sliced tomatoes to cover the bottom of the dish and top with half the onions and fresh herbs. Drizzle half the mayo mixture over the vegetables and top with half of the fontina, mozzarella, and half the remaining bread crumbs.
9. Make a second layer with remaining tomatoes, onions, herbs, mayo, cheese and remaining breadcrumbs.
10. Drizzle olive oil over the top and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.
11. Bake the pie for 50 minutes to 1 hour.  Be sure to cover the edges with foil.  Allow to cool for at least 30 minutes before slicing and serving.

Some notes:

I thought I had bread crumbs, but I did not.  What I did have was a bag of croutons and a food processor.  Voila, bread crumbs!  I think they taste better than the bread crumbs in an oatmeal can anyway.  Cheesy!

This pie is delicious. We loved it. Even though the recipe didn't specify them, Roma tomatoes were perfect for it, firm and juicy, and I picked up an 8oz wedge of fontina cheese for about $4.  This is the kind of food that makes me feel like a fancy cook.

According to research, images of meat are soothing to men so this picture of the steak Nathan and I shared with our tomato pie is for all the boys. Let it calm you.

Something Spicy

Pretty much every week, my bountiful basket offers me something that makes me pause and wonder, "What do I do with this?"  This week, that something was 6 Anaheim peppers.  I thought for a minute of gourmet burgers with roasted peppers and of home made green chili sauce, but decided to go for the obvious and make chile rellenos.  Too bad I've never made chile rellenos before.

I teach at a school with a heavily Hispanic/Latino population, and I've had chile rellenos made by my students and their families.  They are, basically, the greatest thing imaginable: roasted peppers stuffed with gooey melted cheese and fried to a golden crisp.  I felt a strange pressure to get this right.  When I told Nathan that I was going to try it, he got really excited which just added to the pressure.  "I must be a good cook.  I must be a good cook."


Step one is to roast the peppers.  Just put them on a baking sheet and pop them in the oven at 450.  Turn them once in a while until the skin is dark brown and blistery all over.  I was afraid of burning them (silly me) and did not let them get nearly brown enough.  Ah well, next time.

Once the peppers are blackened, put them in a paper bag and fold the top down to seal them in.  This allows the peppers to steam as they cool and is supposed to make them easier to peel.  I have a feeling cooking them more would have also made them easier to peel, so do better than I did and really roast those peppers.  I couldn't find a paper bag around anywhere, so I just put them in a bowl and stuck a plate on top.  Same thing.   Ashley, if you are reading this, you left some of your plates at the house on Ravenna.

split pepper, still good!

After the chili's have cooled enough to handle, peel the blackened skin off so you are left with slimy, but intact green peppers.  Cut a slit near the top of each pepper and slide in slices of monterey jack cheese.  Try to do this without splitting the peppers if you can.  I split one pretty badly, but held it together with toothpicks while I breaded it.  I pulled the toothpicks out before frying and it stayed together pretty well.

Once your peppers are skinned and stuffed, dredge them in some flower and prepare the egg wash.  In order to get a crust that was both substantial and airy, I separated 3 eggs and beat the whites until they were stiff, then folded the yolks back in.  Julia Child (I just noticed her initials - hee) would tell you to whisk the egg whites until they form the ribbon, but I still am not sure what that means.  It takes a while to get those egg whites nice and stiff, so this step is a good place to prepare your frying oil.  I am lucky enough to have married a man who owned a deep fryer, so preparing my frying oil involves having my husband get the fryer off the top of the fridge and set the temperature.  If you are not as lucky as I am, use a cast iron or heavy skillet and heat some peanut oil until flour browns when you sprinkle it in.

Dip your skinned, flour dredged, cheese filled chilis in your whipped eggs and immediately place them in frying oil.  Leave them for about 3 minutes or until golden brown.  Eat them while they're still hot.

mmm diet coke

The chilis I made weren't the best I've ever had, but they weren't the worst either, so I am considering this one a win.  I served them with some enchilada sauce and carne asada.  Don't ask me for an asada recipe - I bought it from the butcher's counter at my grocery store.  You can have an enchilada sauce recipe though, made with all fresh ingredients.

All Purpose Red Sauce for Mexican Foods

• combine 2-4 peeled, quartered tomatoes, 1 onion roughly chopped, and 2 cloves of garlic in a food processor and pulse until liquefied.
• heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a sauce pan and add the tomato mixture, simmer for 10 minutes
• add 1/2 cup chicken broth, 3 diced jalapenos (or other small chilis), a dash of cinnamon and salt to taste and continue to simmer until ready to serve 

Full Stop

This morning I learned something that rocked my world: I have been typing incorrectly my entire life. I read in this article that even though my keyboarding teacher in elementary school told me to, it is incorrect to use two spaces after a period. I am practicing using full stops and the space bar correctly now, but it's going to take me some time to get used to this strange new world.

Anyhow, today is Saturday which means it's Bountiful Baskets day. If you're reading my first blog post, you most likely know me so you have no doubt heard me go on (and on and on) about how amazing Bonutiful Baskets Food Co-op is. Just in case you've missed the good word, BBFC is a co-op operating out of Arizona with sites in several western states including Utah, Nevada, Wyoming, Idaho, Oregon and Washington. Each week, contributors log in at the website and pre-pay $15 for a half fruit, half veggie produce basket. There are also addons available every week like 9 grain bread, tortillas, honey, and 24-36lb boxes of whatever's in season. You can also sign up to get a guaranteed organic basket each week, but I don't. It's smaller, more expensive, and the regular baskets often include organic produce anyway.

Saturdays are now my favorite day of the week. I am the kind of person that finds a lot of comfort in routine, so the weekly trek to Sunny Springs Park to pick up my produce followed by unpacking, cleaning, menu planning and cooking is soothing. It restores my sanity. I am a barefoot zen master making refrigerator pickles each week. The sangria I usually make with whatever fruits I have leftover from the previous week helps too.

This week, the baskets had lettuce, spinach, asparagus, butternut squash, Anaheim peppers, cherry tomatoes, tangelos, apples, Asian pears, regular pears, kiwis, and a pineapple. I bought everything to make chili rellenos, and if I can find some pre-made ravioli or won-ton wrappers, I'll try my hand at butternut squash raviolis as well. Today, though, I am going to make stuffed shells because I still have tomatoes left from last week's basket that need to be used.

Since I guess this is mostly going to be a cooking blog, I should share my favorite recipe for marinara sauce. I try to use nothing from a can or a packet if I want something to taste really good, and this recipe only uses a few tablespoons of canned tomato paste for color since whenever I try to make sauce with fresh tomatoes it turns out sort of pinkish and not the robust, appetizing red one expects.

May Not Be Actual Marina Sauce Better Just Call It Tomato

• Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 1 mediumish yellow onion
• 4+ garlic cloves (I use at least 6. No matter what the liberal Forks media tells us, vampires are scary, not sexy, and garlic is your first and best line of defense.)
• a palm full of fresh chopped basil or 1tbsp dried.
• a smaller palm full of fresh chopped oregano or 2 tsp dried
• 1/2-1 tsp crushed red pepper flakes (I like it spicy)
• 1 6oz can tomato paste (though I use a few spoonfuls, not the whole can)
• 4-6 tomatoes or 1 28oz can whole tomatoes
• 1/2 cup dry red wine
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp (or more) salt

1. Saute diced onion and garlic in olive oil until soft, add herbs, red pepper flakes, and tomato paste.
2. Stir in tomatoes (to prepare fresh tomatoes, I just core them and run them through a few pulses in my food processor), wine, sugar and salt
3. simmer as long as humanly possible

Today along with the garlic and onion, I diced up and added some mushrooms and yellow squash I had, but then I found the sauce a little too chunky, so I hit it with my stick blender until it was smoother. While it simmers, I am going to go back through this post and make sure I only used one space after each full stop.