Courtship Bolognese

Last January, when my buddy Judson and I went on the inaugural Bros In Snow ski trip, he asked me whether Shmi and I were dating. I told him we were. "I thought something was up when you brought home-made spaghetti sauce," he said, recalling an after-winter league dinner we had at Shmi's house. It's a recipe from my mom's mom, and it's actually super easy to make. And it's delicious! It lasts for days (or indefinitely in the freezer). In fact, it gets a bit better after a day or two--the flavors start to really develop. Here's how she made it:

Use a really big pot.
Fry 2 yellow onions in a couple lugs of olive oil.
After 5m or so, add half a head of chopped garlic.
Add 1 lb ground pork and 1 lb ground beef and cook until browned.
Add salt, basil (fresh and roughly chopped), pepper, oregano, marjoram, rosemary (a few branches from outside Stanley hall do the trick) and cook for a few more minutes.
Add 6 oz tomato paste and 1 quart of diced tomatoes, give it a stir, and allow to simmer for about 45m.

Something's Fishy Pasta

When I first invited Lakshmi over for dinner, before we started dating, I tried pretty hard to impress her. Did I give myself away with the smoked salmon and goat cheese pasta? Maybe she thought something fishy was going on.

Here's how I wooed her:
Cook some pasta. If you're really going for it (which I was), use fresh pasta.
Fry an onion and a few cloves of garlic.
Break the salmon into small chunks and add it to the pan with a handful of capers.
Turn the heat off and add the goat cheese so it warms but doesn't melt.
Put it on your pasta and eat right away!

Note: Some people have small stomachs, so don't pile too much on your guests' plates. They might feel obligated to eat all of it.

Goddess Dressing

Homemade goddess dressing is so good that we have magnet-attached the recipe to our refridgerator door. In fact, it's so good that it once got Lakshmi the Salad Monster out of a grave salad slump. It's delicious on any salad, though my favorite is a fresh fig salad with goat cheese, heaped with sunflower seeds. Here's how the dressing goes:

1/2 cup of tahini
1/2 cup of apple cider vinegar
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons parsley (preferably fresh)
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 tablespoons honey
1/2 cup olive oil

*Once we were all out of tahini and were scrambling to replace it. Peanut butter, it turns out, does the trick. Ever since we started adding a large spoonful or two.
**Makes for a really nice picnic food. Serve with a bottle of wine and some fancy Cheeseboard cheese, perhaps at the rose garden.

Fruit Soup

Fruit is delicious. So if you add a ton of fruit to a pool of fruit juice, it turns out pretty well. That was the line of reasoning a little mommy followed one morning in her kitchen when she dreamed up this banger of a recipe. Our favorite fruit soup is as follows:

Fruit:
2 large grapefruits
2 large peaches
2 fuji apples
1 pint of strawberries
1 pint of blueberries
a big bunch of grapes
*note: none of the individual ingredients are absolutely essential except grapes. They have the bomb texture.

Broth:
Bathe it all in mango juice. We usually use Odwalla, but whichever kind tastes fresh and has a thick and pulpy consistency.

Mozzarella Salad

This is the simplest salad in the world. You cut up some mozzarella, tomatoes and basil, mix them in a bowl, and pour a half olive oil half balsamic vinegar emulsion over the top. Voila! You're done!!

There is one tricky part though. You have to acquire a plot of land in a beautiful Mediterranean climate, turn your back yard into several wood-divided beds of rich and fertile soil, plant some heirloom tomatoes, wait until they're perfectly ripe, pick and serve them on the spot! If you don't have time for all that, you can visit the Narayan family farm (Fremont, CA) in the middle of September, and they'll have some waiting for you.

Midnight Charles Quesadilla

When I'm hungry in the middle of the night, and there's no leftovers, I get furiously creative. I pretty much put these things in a pan, one after another, as fast as I can. Cooking time: 5 minutes.

Tortilla
Grated sharp cheddar cheese
Whatever meat I can find in the fridge
Sliced avocado
Salsa (or the Patak's Indian pickle that Mel buys)
Garnish with lime

Kale Smoothie

Lakshmi likes kale. Thanks to her good influence, and the cutting flavor of orange juice, Charles does too!

1 head of kale (slice the leaves off the stems)
1 large apple
Lemon juice
2 tablespoons chia seeds (see Born to Run)
1-2 cups orange juice
4 ice cubes*

*Note: The ice cubes are optional. Charles thinks they add a crispness to the texture. But his acupuncturist, Dr. Peters, says that cold beverages block his spleen channels.

Uncle Rob's go-get-it cabbage salad

This is a Robbie special. In an email from Uncle: "Of course, a guy who can present good food is going to score points with the ladies!" Let me just say, this was an instant hit with Lakshmi. It's also super quick after you make it a couple times.

Dressing (make first):
¼ cup rice wine vinegar
1-2 tablespoons soy sauce(start with 1)
1-2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil
1-2 tablespoons honey or sugar
¼ cup olive oil (optional)

Salad:
Dry heat ¼ cup of sesame seeds and ¼ cup sliced almonds in a frypan.
Cut a fistful of mushrooms into flat sections
Fine slice, then chop a quarter red onion (fine=2-3mm)
Fine slice a whole red capsicum, into strips 2-3 inches in length.
Place all of these in the bottom of a curved bowl, and pour enough dressing to marinate the above.
Very finely slice a Chinese cabbage from its flower end into thin frills (3-4mm) until about 3 cups. Then from the lower stalk end, chop off the stalk, and less finely slice about 4 rounds of the crunchy white leaf bases. About 1 cup.
Throw the cabbage on top of the marinating veges, but don’t mix in as yet.
Throw the seeds and nuts over the top of the cabbage.
Throw about ¼ cup of dry fried noodle on top (Top Ramen does the trick too)
Just before eating, mix the dressing in from the bottom.