Avocado Flash Recipes for Summer

I think we have established that I love avocados. Growing up in Puerto Rico, I often thought that no meal was complete without avocado. Over the years, I have shared some of my favorite avocado recipes (here, here, and in the Amapola Press Pinterest board). And there is no avocado recipe that doesn’t get my attention!

A summer staple now, we keep flash frozen shrimp in the freezer—always good for a quick meal. Whether boiled with a dash of Old Bay or quickly sautéed with a sprinkling of garlic powder and some sort of crushed pepper, the warm shrimp served with diced avocado and topped with lemon (or lime juice) is the perfect centerpiece to a big salad. And prep and cooking time will never exceed 10 minutes.

The combination of salty and sweet in a creamy marriage is absolutely enchanting! It’s also filling.

And just as easily as you used to make a big salad, you can use the mix for tacos, for a rice bowl with black beans, or as a dollop to dress up a clear broth or a gazpacho.

This is similar but less minimalist

I love ceviche with avocado, and fried fish with avocado, and fish stew with avocado. Avocados are very accommodating that way: they’ll be just as delicious in a tuna salad as in a topping for lobster rolls.

Our latest obsession has been adapting this Venezuelan Avocado Chicken Salad to our taste (though we admit the recipe as written is pretty darn great!). We’ve been making enough so that after a salad we can also have sandwiches the next day. We’ve been adding marinated jalapeño slices to it, Sriracha, a lemon pepper mix Mom loves… We doubled the garlic, of course. And it has been too hot to make arepas, but that’s next (come on autumn!!!).

Our next tasting joy will be trying out a dairy free avocado pesto, which I believe will be the perfect sauce for zoodles and grape tomatoes.

SOURCE: Wikipedia Commons

For the record, avocado goes well with red meat too – though we are trying to limit our consumption of it. We use an avocado crema as a spread for steak sandwiches instead of mayo. I generally whip the avocado with a little lemon juice, pepper, a dash of salt and olive oil, but I love this recipe too.

We’ve moved to a heart healthy menu but we have not sacrificed taste—just added a little less salt to our dishes and relied far more on our little grill to cook our meals. Through it all, I get to continue my love affair with the avocado.

Cookin' Under Pressure: Ground Meats as Staples

It was the perfect storm of details that need no rehashing -- psychotic weather, ailments, grieving, March Madness, and hyperactivity leading to the holiday... 

We found ourselves running out of food and awaiting a springtime snow shower that may leave in its wake anything between a few inches to quite a few. Neither one of us was feeling our best, so the question became what we’d do about dinner. 

Image from https://www.livestrong.com

Mom had bought some ground turkey and ground pork to make a different kind of meatloaf—but for any number of reasons we didn’t get around to it.

On Sunday, I divided the turkey in half and the pork in thirds. I broke up the meats, lightly seasoned with salt and pepper and garlic powder, and mixed in a bowl. I julienned a small onion and sautéed first the onions and then the meats as I boiled water for pasta. The noodles and my bastardized and tomato-less Bolognese were ready at the same time and I let it bind with prepared pesto sauce.

The turkey is pretty neutral and takes on other more dominant flavors. The sauce is relatively light but it takes well to the pesto (the pork does not dominate the basil sauce). You can add the pesto to the meat before mixing with the noodles, and the turkey will absorb some of it. It’s a comfort taste for a meal that can be prepped in less than 10 minutes and cooked in less than 15!

After a week of insane Easter Bunny duty making cookies and candies, Mom's bum knee declared war and my own body was fighting demonic germs. I thought we should have a soup. Of course, chicken soup is the standard health aid but the only chicken we have is frozen solid.

I still had half the turkey and 2/3 of the pork.

I julienned my remaining small onion, minced the remnant pieces of garlic. I put aside a couple of tablespoons of capers in some brine and about a teaspoon of lemon juice. I used about a third of the pork (somewhere between 6-8 ounces or the amount you’d use for a decent sized burger). I seasoned the meat generously with pepper and Worcestershire sauce.

As I prepped, I started boiling water. Once it started bubbling, I added chicken bouillon. You can use meat or even vegetable stock, but I like the chicken to start. To it, I added a ¼ cup of rice. This is going to seem redundant in a minute, but do it anyway. The rice adds a velvety touch to the soup, and it will make for great leftovers.

Simmer the soup and rice on medium low flame for at least 20 minutes.

Sweat the onions in extra virgin olive oil, over a medium low flame. Once translucent, add the garlic and when it cooks through add the capers (3-5 minutes). Mix well and add the meat. Sauté meat until fully cooked, breaking up further with spatula, for approximately 5-8 minutes. 

At this point the rice is about halfway cooked. Add meat to soup pot and also add pork dumplings. They’ll rise in about 5 fives and finish cooking in another 5 minutes. Taste the liquid and adjust seasonings, if necessary. Needless to say, it is better to under season and rectify at the end than to over season and be left with something inedible.

The salt, pepper, Worcestershire, lemon, capers and brine will give the meat a little smokiness that will lend the dish several layers of flavors. I recommend 4 dumplings and perhaps a serving spoon of the meat/rice mixture per bowl (which will helpfully settle in the bottom of the pot). This leaves you plenty of soupy rice with picadillo as leftovers.

In less than half an hour you’ll have something that has depth, and a little heft, that is far more sophisticated to the palate than it has the right to be! And the best part (for us) is that I left enough for a couple of bowls for the cold day we expect in two days.

And yes, you can have depth and complexity with ground beef, but I find the combination of meats--as with meatloafs--more interesting and satisfying. Pork brings taste and a little fat, turkey and chicken are neutral fillers, veal is lean and beef is more robust.

Staples should always go beyond what's in the spice rack or cupboard. I try to have dumplings in the freezer for quick meals or appetizers. It’d also be cool to have already divided ground meats for fast weekday meals. Most ground meats may be refrigerated for a few days plus a couple more days after cooked. It’s probably best to divide the meats, label, and freeze—it’ll keep between 3 to 4 months, and you can thaw overnight in the fridge.

I have enough turkey and pork for two burgers, which will be grilled and embraced in the gooey goodness of Muenster cheese. And I realize that is a lot of the same thing in the space of 7-10 days, but each dish is sufficiently different to keep the palate happy.

Click for a pretty good recipe for Mexicali Turkey Burger with Jalapeno Muenster

I can make picadillo and combine with black beans for a Cuban rice bowl (with a couple of lime wedges on the side and a couple slices of avocado). Or we could drain it and make savory turnovers (pasties). Or tiny meatballs! I work well under pressure, I don't need a menu—just send me to the kitchen, coach!

Click for a recipe for Cuban black bean yellow rice bowl

Recycling Trader Joe's Tapenade

We recycle. The sentiment extends to food.

We had a friend who'd proudly assert to anyone who’d listen that they hated leftovers and ate absolutely no leftovers, nope, not ever. This left us confused because we know something they apparently do not: Sometimes leftovers are tastier because ingredients get a chance to consummate the marriage, as it were.

This is true of pasta meat sauces as it is of soups, meatloaf and roast pork—let it sit a day or two and I swear to you it will taste better than the moment you first plated it after cooking it! Sometimes in winter we start a soup that morphs from chicken noodle into three different kinds of soup, if not more (leftovers serving as a base for a new batch of soup).

Our friend was not a cook, and perhaps that was part of the problem; though they did not seem to enjoy food in an epicurean way. There was shame and regret, like their religion, but not joy in eating—it filled no voids.

Mom and I start the year recycling elements of the New Year’s meal—leftover caviar becomes a topping to Mom’s birthday omelet. Somewhere between Boxing Day and the Epiphany, we combine leftover cheeses, mousses and pates and make a richly delicious quiche. These are meals made almost entirely out of leftovers but nothing to sneeze at proverbially. Funnily enough, the quiche tastes better as leftovers (so leftovers of leftovers).

This year we discovered a new reason to recycle: Trader Joe’s tapenade. Making your own tapenade is easy enough, but the Trader Joe’s version is pretty darn good. Tapenade can be made in less than 10 minutes, and can be a really satisfying snack/spread/appetizer--but you have to start by buying good quality olives. The beauty of Trader Joe’s is that you can have a variety.

Halkidiki olives (image credit: Olivellas S.A.)

Trader Joe’s carries two varieties of tapenade: the original (and mellower) spread is a blend of Kalamata, black and green olives; and the other includes Kalamata and Chalikidiki olives. Kalamata olives are the large, meaty Greek black or dark brown olives. Chalkidiki (or Halkidiki) olives are large green fruit that have all manner of magical lore attributed to them (including as a PMS cure). The tapenade keeps as long as it remains refrigerated, so you can enjoy it as a snack for as long as it lasts.

So far, my favorite quick meal involves tilapia fillets (2 per person). Spread a tablespoon of olive oil to cover the bottom of an oven pan, season the fish lightly with salt and pepper, top with a tablespoon or two of tapenade and add a sprinkling of grated Parmesan. Bake for 15-20 minutes (temperatures depend on how thin the fillets are -- 375 for thinner fillets up to 425-degrees for heftier pieces, or you can broil for no more than 10 minutes).

I put the fish in oven as water starts to boil for rice and finish both at the same time, but this dish will also go well over pasta or a variety of vegetable side dishes. I suggest finishing it off with some Sriracha—but you can also bake in chopped chilis over the fillets.

The fish will flake easily (and you can use cod, sole, flounder, snapper or any other white fish), and it will simply melt in your mouth, the spread will create a savory and soft crust over the fish. The simpler the better, but you can garnish with fresh parsley, cilantro or dill to taste. If you enjoy rice bowls, I can see adding a fried egg to it and taking it all to a whole new level. 

Next we may try game hens stuffed with tapenade. I’d also love to try some of the tapenade in black bean soup. We are going to recycle the heck out of this tapenade!