Egg Salad! (Beat the Heat recipe 4)

Ingredients:

5 hard boiled eggs
½ a Claussen dill deli pickle
1 tablespoon mayo
1 tablespoon yellow mustard

Directions:

Dice up the dill pickle
Use an egg slicer to slice the eggs
Add mustard and mayo
Mix- don’t mash.
Enjoy on wheat toast

You can get creative- try adding curry powder or chipotle!

Easy, delicious.

3 Bean and Shrimp Salad (Beat the Heat recipe 3)

Ingredients:

1 can green beans drained
1 can pinto beans drained
1 can red kidney beans drained
1 ½ cups cooked shrimp (peeled/de-veined and for less fuss buy pre-cooked frozen shrimp)
Your favorite vinaigrette

Directions:

Combine ingredients in a bowl.
Allow to chill for a few hours.
Enjoy.

A new Hanout and Saudi Arabian coffee

My other blog

No Sugar Necessary Frozen Yogurt Pops! (Beat the Heat recipe 2)

Ingredients:

*1 frozen kiwi
**1 Asian Pear
a drop of vanilla extract
a sprig of fresh mint
1/2 cup plain yogurt

Directions:

Put ingredients into a blender.

Pour mixture into either popsicle molds or into an ice cube tray with toothpicks.

After freezing the pops, enjoy!

* The consensus is that Kiwi seeds add a bit of grit which you may or may not like.

** Feel free to replace Kiwi and Asian Pear for your favorite fruit or fruits

Beat the Heat Recipe Series

It's summer in DC, which means humidity that justifies multiple showers in one day. The last thing you want to do is cook or eat something hot. The recipes that follow are a series of low to no-cook dishes perfect for summertime.

The first one of the series being Mango Lassi

Mango Lassi (Beat the Heat recipe I)

If I want to make something I've never made before, but have eaten, I usually read several recipes and then make up my own version. I try to approximate what I saw as the most common ingredients to all of the recipes I consulted. I adjust as need be (i.e. using sugar substitutes) and include what I like the best (cardamom).

Mango Lassi is a delicious drink from India which is very easy to prepare. Here are some of the recipes I consulted before preparing it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/mangolassi_74038

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lassi#Mango_lassi

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/jamie-oliver/mango-lassi-recipe/index.html

http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/mango_lassi/

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/mango-lassi-ii/Detail.aspx

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Mango-Lassi-107038

I put the mangoes in the refrigerator beforehand so I didn’t have to add ice.

It was basically 1 yellow/champagne mango, sugar or splenda to taste, and a ¼ cup of plain yogurt. I sprinkled cardamom on top. This made for a rather thick blend. I might add a bit of whole milk next time to thin the liquid.

Yum!

Something fishy

In a recent bout of pescetarianism, I have been preparing more and more fish dishes. Eating seafood is an important part of the Mediterranean Diet, to which I subscribe and it has several health benefits.

I. It’s rough to be an Orange Roughy.

I made this after an afternoon of outdoor lindy hop dancing at Dupont circle.

Ingredients:

1 onion
2-3 Roma tomatoes, sliced
a few tablespoons oil
3 large fresh cloves of garlic chopped
1-2 tablespoons fresh chopped ginger
1 tablespoon tamarind paste
1 large filet of Orange Roughy

Sea salt
Black pepper
Pinch of Indian red pepper

Directions.

Slice onions in to rounds and let them sizzle in the oil in a frying pan over medium to heat.

Place the tamarind paste in a small bowl with a ¼ cup of water. Separate out the seeds and fruit flesh so that the past dissolves and you get sort of a brown sauce.

Add the tomatoes, garlic, and ginger. Stir.

Add the tamarind liquid and let all the ingredients reduce for a minute.

Add the fish and cover it with what’s in the pan. Cover and reduce heat.

Add salt and pepper to taste.

On the plate, add the pinch of Indian red pepper to garnish and for a tiny bite.

Serve with rice or on its own.


The filet I bought at the supermarket was fished from the waters near New Zealand. It’s a firm, white fish with a very nice buttery flavor. However, after more research, I found that this species is severely over-fished and on Seafood Watch’s avoid list.



II. Mahi Mahi

They’re not singing about this fish.

This is similar to the previous recipe with the addition of water chestnuts and sesame oil.

Sauce: Grated garlic, fresh tomato, tamarind paste, S&P.

Cook Mahi in sesame oil and sauce with water chestnuts.



III. Perch Curry


Ingredients:

½ lb fresh perch filets
6 oz coconut milk
freshly grated garlic (1 clove elephant or 4 regular cloves)
2 medium tomatoes diced
1 tablespoon curry powder
*pinch red cayenne powder
salt to taste

Directions:

Let coconut milk, garlic, tomatoes, and spices simmer on medium-low until the sauce thickens.

Add perch filet-side-down (skin up) in the sauce, reduce heat and cover

Ready to eat when perch curls and flakes with the touch of a fork.

Can be serves alone or with rice.

I made this and shared it with my Japanese roommate who said, “I wish you could speak Japanese, because ‘delicious’ is English isn’t what I want to express”

* It depends on how hot you like your curry


VI. Crab-esque Salad

Surimi, Kanikama, Imitation Lobster, I like to call it “crab with a ‘k’”, whatever you call it, it’s mostly Alaska Pollock and it’s lovely on a bed of mixed spring greens.

Ingredients

Spring Mix
Crab with a “k”
Slivered or blanched almonds
Sliced bell pepper
Olive oil Vinaigrette