My Therapist Cooks

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side dishes

Baked Mushroom Rice

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For Thanksgiving! With it being so early this year, I'm pushing hard to be sure we get all the recipes in this week and next for planning purposes, and then we have recipes to use up all the leftovers, YUM. 

First, though, thank you for all the sweet words about Will! I am totally healed and acclimated to having two children, and everyone is sleeping wonderfully, and the time change was obviously no issue for anyone.

HAHAHAHAHA no what I meant to say was we need a lot of carbs to get through this. So let's start here! This was actually Jay's idea based on something he ate growing up, one of those cup of broth/stick of butter types of recipes that involves a few cans of consome and maybe a packet of French onion soup mix or similar. Now, to be very clear, I LOVE recipes like that. They're nostalgic, easy, delicious, all of the things. I also like re-imagining them with, say, less packaged sodium and a few more veggies, but with similar comfort factors. In this version we definitely have some butter and beef flavor but we also have tons of extra flavor from mushrooms - I went for the blends that aren't a million dollars but ARE a step up from regular white mushrooms. The onions and mushrooms get roasted on top of the rice, everything bakes together in the oven (so no simmering!), and this works PERFECTLY made in advance for Thanksgiving or another holiday party.

Let's not waste time.

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Broccoli Cauliflower Salad with Greek Yogurt and Bacon

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Because obviously bacon.  

I'm in full summertime side dish swing right now, do you do that?  Dinners are random leftovers from parties with some grilled chicken and a side salad, done and done.  I'm always looking for new + healthyish side dishes because potato salad from the grocery store is great BUT, you know?  You know.  The but(t) gets big sometimes.  Heh.  My grandmother makes a version of this salad and brings it to family functions a few times per year, and we all love it.  She switches up the nuts she uses, whether or not there is bacon in it, etc, but the base is the same:  broccoli, cauliflower, onion, and a creamy-but-light Greek yogurt dressing.  

The yogurt is cut with mayo for flavor, so you can definitely use fat free yogurt or anything else you have around - even regular yogurt!  The broccoli and cauliflower are totally raw so you can even make this the night before so the veg starts to soften somewhat, or you can make it right before you serve.  It's delicious even after a few days in the fridge!  

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Carrot Top Pesto + Roasted Carrots

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It almost feels canibalistic, you know?  Like how people don't like to eat eggs with chicken, except for not at all.  

Because carrot top pesto.  We're using the whole plant!

I've seen sauces and drizzles using carrot leaves in several recipes, but they have been more thin and acidic, like a chimichurri.  The benefit of a pesto is that you use a LOT of the tops, which is important to me because there is essentially more top than bottom to a carrot when you think of using the carrot itself as the food and the greens as a topping.  I've also seen carrot greens wilted down like spinach, but I wanted to keep them raw for their lovely barely-there-carrot flavor.  

So.  Pesto!  The first time I made this I used pecans because I already had them, and I wanted the flavor of this pesto to be different than a regular basil pesto.  I did use parsley, lemon, garlic, and parm - all the usual suspects.  We've used this over fish, with pasta, and on toast as crostini, but my favorite way to use this is to have it almost as a dip for roasted carrots.  These came straight out of our yard, but any carrot bunch with the leaves still attached will do!  

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Broiled Meyer Lemon Green Beans with Basil

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Spring is here!  

I know, I know, it has sprung, but that's just the dumbest thing ever in all of the land to say, right?  Spring has been springing for a few weeks here already with this crazy weather, and some of our daisies and tulips have already done their thing and are gone until next year.  Sad because it feels like time is going way too fast, you know?

This time of year I like cooking with a main ingredient and supplementing with salad or proteins that need to be used up.  Kind of like spring cleaning for my fridge, no more languishing food, I say to myself every year.  It's a noble pursuit.  These broiled green beans are definitely flavorful enough to be the absolute star of a dinner with some sliced tomatoes and grilled chicken or similar.  They're coated in butter and spices, to start, and the broiler action leaves you with some nice flavorful dark bits and beans that are tender but not sad/mushy.  No one likes those guys.  

And the Meyer lemon!  Tastes like a Cutie + a lemon, but sub regular lemon if you have that instead of a Meyer.  It is slightly sweeter than a regular lemon, but either variety would work perfectly.  The lemon chars just a little bit and the juice mixes with the butter to make a nice little sauce.  

You should probably serve these broiled green beans over rice for sauce-mopping purposes.  

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Sauteed Spaghetti Squash with Roasted Tomatoes

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Ok, I know this is kind of like 2 pasta recipes in one week, but I figure we need to counteract a mac recipe with a side dish that is alllll veg, right?  You've done spaghetti squash before, tell me you have.  It isn't pasta-like like some people like to claim, but it shreds up beautifully and is a great alternative to a starchy side while being obviously way healthier than pasta.  A few weeks ago Jay and I had a daydate to see some comedy and we ate at Roost after.  One of their new veg entrees is sauteed spag squash, so we got it to split.  It was GREAT, much more flavorful than we're used to.  The server told us that the secret was roasting the spaghetti squash THEN sauteeing it with the rest of the stuff, so that's exactly what I did.  IMG_9517

You can add whatever you'd like to this, but I went super simple with garlic + herbs + parm + tomatoes.  We loved it so much, I could honestly eat this every day all summer.  Which I've said about approximately 9,837 dishes recently.  SORRY about that.  

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