Pear avocado salad

While a pear salad with chicken could be served as a main dish, one with avocado and nuts does much better as a side.  In this case, make the dressing first.  In a food processor, combine:

• Apple cider vinegar
• 1/2 avocado (mostly for the oil)
• Olive oil (because an avocado won't yield enough)
• Ground coriander
• Just a dash of cinnamon
• 2 cloves garlic
• ~ 3/4 inch of jalapeno

Pulse until that is well combined.  For the salad itself, simply combine:

• 1/3 bunch of spinach, hand torn
• 2 pears (bosc and anjou work here as well), cubed small
• 1 avocado plus the remaining half, sliced or cubed
• Scant half cup of almond, rough chopped

Dress, toss, serve immediately.  The mild heat from the jalapeno brings out the pears' sweetness, which is further enhanced by the coriander and cinnamon.

Pear chicken salad

Pears are a great compliment to greens.  Not too sweet, they take dressings well and their grainy structure provides a texture that compliments greens without overwhelming them.  They also seem to be available both during their natural peak season and, say, in winter.

This first variation of the theme is a chicken salad.  To pull off the thin slicing required to keep the chicken manageable, freeze two breasts thoroughly, then place them into the refrigerator overnight to thaw just enough to slice.  In the morning, do just that, then add them to a marinate of:

• Olive oil
• White wine vinegar
• Honey (not too much)
• Red pepper flake
• Black pepper

Let that sit for around four hours, preferably near room temperature to let the chicken continue to thaw and absorb the flavors.  When that's done, pour the whole mixture into a covered pan and poach the chicken in the marinate, which will become the dressing.  Obviously you'll want to cook it all the way through as it's now quite contaminated with raw chicken.

While that is cooking, slice 3 pears thinly and place them in a large pyrex mixing bowl.  I used anjou on my first run; bosc seem to work very nicely.  When the chicken is cooked, pour the entire mixture over the pears and toss.  Once it has cooled enough not to wilt greens, add spinach or another lettuce of choice and toss again.  Serve chilled or at room temperature.

Actually good vegetarian tacos

Vegetarian tacos are boring.  There, I said it.  A rice/bean mixture in a corn tortilla just isn't the most exciting thing in the world even if you've managed to throw together some really tasty rice and some time-tested beans. As it turns out, those do much better in a flour tortilla together, but that's another discussion for another day.

So you get creative.  And maybe you have to throw in an under-appreciated starchy vegetable.  And maybe, just maybe, you've been playing with some of the more esoteric uses of a food processor.  You might come up with something like this.

Part the first: a bean salad.

In a large bowl, combine 2 cans or 1lb of (soaked, cooked, etc) black beans, well-drained.  Throw in a a can of corn.  Perhaps pull out a can of olives, slice that up, and add.  While you're on knife work, dice a red onion finely -- and half a medium jicama, a bit less fine.

Set that aside; it won't need dressing for these purposes and you'll have plenty of leftovers that you can dress as you go.

Part the second: purée.  In a food processor, combine the following:

• 1 avocado
• a modest amount of corn or olive oil
• a dash or two of red wine vinegar
• juice (and pulp; why not) of 1 lime
• red pepper flake to taste
• small amounts of garlic (powder is fine here)
• a pinch of salt

Blend that puppy until smooth.  If you need a bit more liquid, add either oil or vinegar based on taste and overall texture.  Oh, and if you're making ahead or in a large batch, be sure to retain an avocado pit to keep from browning before serving.

And that's it.  Toast yourself up some corn tortillas, layer on the purée, bean mixture, and whatever loose greens you have around.  You might note that this is not just vegetarian at this point, but also vegan.  Feel free to keep it that way -- or sneak in cheese and yogurt.  And there you go: interesting tacos that don't depend on all the usual ingredients.

Cilatro-lime rice

For the longest time, Chipotle owned the ciltro-lime rice game. In fact, their white rice is still to die for. The problem? They never quite hit home with their brown rice. But there is a way to do it. This is how. All ratios are normalized for a single cup of rice. Add olive or corn oil to a decent sized pot. Add:

• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• Zest from 1/2 lime
• Whole cumin

Toast that to extract the flavors into the oil.  Bring to high heat and add the rice.

Shortly after, add juice of whatever limes you used plus water to equal 1.75 cups.  Let the boil down to level, then turn the heat all the way down and steam for 35 minutes (at altitude; 30 might be enough at lower elevations).

Fluff the hot rice, then toss with 1/2 bunch of chopped cilantro and salt to taste.

A Return: Thai Curry

It's been a full year away.  Kind of amazing, but it was a pretty crappy year so go figure.  All that is fading into the past now, and it's back to cooking.

This is an attempt at a rich yellow Thai curry -- and it worked beautifully.  The flavors could probably be enriched by using tamarind over lime and a Thai basil over Italian, but all that just creates trouble getting it done with a visit to the local store.  And it's actually quite good enough as is.

In a dutch oven, melt 4 tablespoons of butter and immediately begin sauteing 1.5 medium red onions.  Add to that 4 sliced jalapenos, seeds and all.  You could moderate the heat here, but it's Thai -- so don't.  (Also note that these jalapenos are the only source of heat, so don't skimp.)  Dash on both raw sugar and salt here.

As the onions cook through, chunk up 4 or 5 potatoes -- russets worked fine and added to the overall sweet notes to the dish.  Also slice 4 or 5 large carrots.  When the onion is mostly translucent, add those and toss to coat.

While that is cooking down a bit, mince 4 (large) cloves of garlic and an equivalent amount of ginger.  Add those as you can with perhaps a bit more sugar.

When all that is combined, add 1 quart chicken stock and 3 stalks lemongrass (if using dried).  Juice 1 lime into the pot and heat to a simmer.  Keep cooking until the potatoes are done and have acquired plenty of spicy-sweet flavor.

To finish, add 1 can of coconut milk (just go for full fat) and a very generous amount of rough chopped basil.  Serve over rice.