thoughtful consumption

“The Minimalist” column in The New York Times has been one of my favorites for years. Like in his cookbook How To Cook Everything, Bittman proposes general notions that encourage understanding and experimentation rather than the rigid perfectionism of set recipes. Now after more than thirteen years, “The Minimalist” is coming to an end.

To celebrate all those great years, here’s a post from 2008 – My favorite recipe of all time. The recipe comes from “The Minimalist” column Summer Express: 101 Simple Meals Ready in 10 Minutes or Less. I’m not sure if it’s still my favorite recipe of all time, but it’s definitely way up there and I am grateful for it and many others.

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Today we had ramen noodles with two eggs and some veggie parts:

Tuscan kale stems, Shiitake stems, and garlic

I sauteed the veggies in a little peanut oil before adding them to the soup. During the last minute of cooking, I stirred in the two eggs, beaten.

Here’s the fairly good-looking result.

Sadly, it’s not as good as it looks. Shiitake stems I’ve used in stir-fries with heavy sauce, and the sauce covers the bitterness of the stems. Not so with ramen soup.  Other mushroom stems are fine, but Shiitakes are too bitter. Next time, they’ll join the compost pile, and I’ll use some of the dried oyster mushrooms from the freezer instead.

Other than that, the soup was okay, although I wish I’d chopped the kale finer. It was hot soup on a cold winter afternoon, and we ate all of it.

I plan on doing more ramen soup experiments. Usually when I think of vegetable soup, I think of an afternoon’s undertaking making a whole stockpotful. This is a nice way to have a bowl or two of vegetable soup with some random vegetable pieces.

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So storing the basil in water on the counter hasn’t  worked so well for me.

My leaves never perked up as this site suggested they would. Explanations for failure include 1) I didn’t trim the stems the first time before putting them in water, and 2) it’s chilly in my house because we’ve held off turning on the heat.

The bad news is I have to use up the basil in the next few days. The good news is I have to use up the basil in the next few days.

About half of the basil, we had in tomato-basil pasta for lunch. Here’s the basic recipe for two.

Tomato-basil-Parmesan pasta

• Start water for pasta.
• Heat 2 or 3 tablespoons of olive oil on medium low. Add a crushed clove of garlic and cook for about 15 minutes. When the clove is a little brown around the edges, remove it.
• Add pasta to the boiling water.
• Carefully add a cup of roughly chopped tomatoes to the oil. If you just toss them in, you might get spit on. Add a dash or two of salt.
• While the tomatoes cook, chop a handful of fresh basil leaves.
• Drain the pasta and dump it in a bowl. Pour the tomatoes and oil on top of the pasta and mix well. Then add the basil and top with grated Parmesan.
• Serve immediately to hungry campers.

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