Golden Beet, Oyster Mushroom, and Leek Risotto by Aquarius

3 medium (approximately Major League Baseball-sized) golden beets, tops removed
2 shallots (1 minced finely, 1 whole)
4 sprigs fresh thyme, divided
1 Tbsp. chopped fresh parsley
3 Tbsp. butter, divided
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 lb. oyster mushrooms, chopped
1/2 tsp. white pepper
1 leek (white and light green part), minced finely
1 clove garlic, pressed or minced very finely
1 cup Arborio or Carnaroli rice
1/2 c dry white wine (Sauvignon Blanc recommended)
3 1/2 c vegetable broth
1/3 c grated parmesan cheese
Salt & black pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 450°. In a double layer of tinfoil, place the beets with the whole shallot and 1 sprig of thyme in the center, and drizzle with olive oil. Fold the foil over and place in the oven to roast.

Heat vegetable broth in a saucepan; keep at a bare simmer over low heat.

Melt 2 T butter with 2 T olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. When foaming, add the mushrooms, the white pepper, and the remaining thyme (stripped from its sprigs and chopped), and cook until golden brown, approximately 5 minutes. Add the leek, minced shallot, and garlic, and cook until translucent, approximately another 5 minutes. Add the rice and toast until the grains are translucent with white spots visible in the center, approximately 1 minute.

Add the wine to the pan and stir until it is absorbed. After that, drop the heat to medium, and it's just basic risotto technique with the vegetable broth: Add a ladleful, stir, let it absorb, add another ladleful.

When the risotto is almost done, pull the beets from the oven, peel them, discard the shallot and thyme sprig, and cube the roasted beets.

When the risotto is finished, remove it from the heat, stir in the remaining Tbsp. of butter, and then add the beets. Gently stir in the parmesan cheese, then season to taste with salt and pepper and add the parsley. Serve immediately.

You should have quite a bit of Sauvignon Blanc left, and I recommend drinking it alongside the risotto. The Sauv Blanc was really stellar with it; because of the mushrooms and leeks, the risotto has kind of a savory, almost Thanksgiving-y richness about it, and the bright acidity of the Sauv cuts through it like a hot knife through butter - and picks up the crispy sweetness of the beets, while it's up.

Next time, I might use a slightly more assertive mushroom - oysters are mild. I actually wanted chanterelles, but they weren't in stock at my grocer this time around. Also, I didn't like the look of the greens on this particular bunch of beets, but julienning them and throwing them in might make for an interesting variation.

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Roasted Beets by Verbal Remedy

Beets are also delish wrapped individually in foil, roasted on a grill (45 minutes or so), cooled/peeled/chunked, then mixed up with basil, olive oil, citrus, garlic, and the aforementioned feta.

Cucumber Salad by falalalala

I like cucumbers peeled and thinly sliced with salt, lime juice, and chopped cilantro, especially if you add a small amount of hot pepper (like some of the juice from a jar of them) with it. Makes a nice side dish to go along with tacos or similar.

Cold Cucumber Soup by bookseller

Peel the cukes, seed them if necessary, and salt and de-water them. Mix with yogurt or buttermilk (yogurt more delish, frankly, particularly good Greek yogurt), walnuts, garlic, fresh dill, and chicken broth in proportions that taste good. Chuck briefly in the blender -- there will be some small chunks, but that's fine. Eat.

[Go fairly easy on the garlic; it gains strength over time. And if you leave out the chicken broth and walnuts, you have a fair approximation of Greek cucumber salad which is also Hungarian and Swedish cucumber salad, in which case the addition of some sliced radishes and/or sliced (raw) mushrooms would not go amiss. But I'd make the soup.]

Zucchini with Orzo and Feta by Tonstant Weader

...a suggestion for your 3 pounds of zucchini. Grate it as you would cheese (I'd do probably 2 large or 3 smaller squash for a single batch of this), then saute the grated squash with garlic and olive oil for about 5-7 minutes, until it's nearly translucent. Then toss it with orzo, as much feta cheese as you like (for me, this means "a lot"), and whatever tomatoes (diced) you likely also have sitting around this time of year; and serve it warm.

I've found the grated-and-sauted squash also stores well and makes a good addition to pasta sauce, casseroles, etc, so I sometimes make more than I need for this recipe alone. The basic idea of the recipe came from Barbara Kingsolver's book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, but I've made it many times with whatever cheese/pasta/other veggies I have handy.

Fake Chinese Food by bookseller

I stir-fried some rough-chopped onion and blanched string beans in a little peanut oil until the beans got a little wrinkled and speckled with brown. I picked the meat off a soy-poached chicken leg, threw that into the pan to heat up, added a couple of tablespoons of spicy peanut sauce with a couple tablespoons of soy-poaching liquid to thin it down, brought it all to the boil and cooked until the sauce just glazed the chicken and veg, and dumped it all over some three-week-old leftover CHinese takeout rice that I nuked in the microwave.

Vaguely Chinese Chicken Heaped on Salad Greens by pagan Mama

. I poach chicken breasts, shred them, add chopped scallions, cukes, radishes, and red pepper, and toss it all with a dressing including sesame oil, soy sauce, a little mirin, a few drops of chili oil, and rice vinegar.

On Cooking Duck by bookseller

cutting myriad little slits into the duck's (or goose's) skin, repeatedly pouring boiling water over it, and then drying it in front of a fan helps render a lot of the fat from under the skin, and also helps the skin crisp. The theory, at least, is that the boiling water opens up the pores. I'm not sure what the fan-drying is meant to do -- maybe you want the skin ultra-dry, so that when it hits the heat, all of the heat goes toward crispinating, without any having to be given over toward first drying out the skin?

Soy Sauce Chicken by bookseller

I made soy sauce chicken last night -- you know, poached a whole chicken in a brew of various kinds of soy and ginger and sherry and stuff, said brew to get defatted and then frozen, for use another time (at which point you just add some more glugs of soy and sherry, maybe some fresh ginger and scallions, etc., to bring it up to volume, the theory being that you keep using and reusing this stuff and it picks up flavor every time you cook with it, such that after a while you have a liquid of just staggering depths of flavor...though I mostly did it because I wanted some cold poached chicken.

GRIZZLED BUFFALO SQUIRREL AND BLUE CHEESE DRESSING by Grizzled Adams

GRIZZLED BUFFALO SQUIRREL AND BLUE CHEESE DRESSING

2 cups canola oil

squirrel quarters (lets say about 12 quarters for starters)

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

2 tablespoons butter

Hot Sauce (use whatever hot sauce you like, but the original recipe uses Durkee's Franks Original Red Hot Cayenne Pepper Sauce which can be found in many supermarkets or gourmet specialty stores)

2 teaspoon white wine vinegar

Blu Cheese dressing

1 cup mayonnaise

2 tablespoons finely chopped onion

1 tablespoon finely chopped garlic

1/3 cup chopped fresh parsley

1/2 cup sour cream

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon white wine vinegar

1/4 cup blue cheese, crumbled

Salt & pepper, to taste

The only real prep work is to preheat the oil in a deep skillet or deep-fat fryer if you own one. You want the oil to get to about 375 degrees F. While the oil is heating, Season the quarters with salt and pepper. This is a good time to preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

If you are going to make your own Blue Cheese dressing, chop the garlic, onion and parsley while you are waiting for the oil to heat up.

Fry the Squirrel in the oil until they are golden. Be careful when working around hot oil. The splatter hurts. You will want to move them around while they are frying so not to stick to the pan. Don't try to fry them all at once. Do them in batches. They should take about 6 to 8 minutes for each batch to fry. Remove them to a plate covered with a couple of layers of paper towels to drain the oil. Then place them in a large bowl.

In a small saucepan, heat the butter over medium heat. Add the hot sauce and vinegar. How much hot sauce you add depends on how hot you like your wings and the heat of the sauce. There is no way I can tell you how much to add. It is a personal preference. Always start with less and add more if it isn't hot enough.

For 2 tablespoons of butter, I would start with 2 tablespoons of hot sauce for mild and go from there. A 2 to 1 ration of hot sauce to butter is HOT, a 3 to 1 ratio is EXTREME in my opinion. But let your taste buds be the judge.

Add the sauce to the squirrel in the bowl and toss together with kitchen tongs. Here's where I differ from the original recipe. Remove them from the bowl with the tongs and place them on a baking pan. You can line the pan with foil to help with clean up. Just don't crowd the pieces or they will steam rather than bake. Bake the quarters for about 15 minutes.

How to make the Blue Cheese dressing:

In a small bowl, add all the ingredients together. Gently stir together until well mixed. At this point you can put cover and put the bowl in the refrigerator until the wings are ready. If you like to serve your wings with cold blue cheese dressing, make ahead of time and chill.

If you want to get fancy, spread the squirrel and celery out on a platter with the bowl of blue cheese dressing in the center.

If ya ain't got enough squirrel, throw some more peanuts in the backyard or ya can use chicken wings.

Grilled Calamari with Tomato Olive Salsa by January

INGREDIENTS:

Grilled Calamari
8 x pieces fresh calamari, cleaned, ends removed
1/4 cup olive oil(50mL)
Juice of one lemon
1/4 tsp chili flakes(1 mL)
1/2 tsp salt(2mL)
1/4 tsp pepper(1 mL)



Tomato Olive Salsa
6 x plum tomatoes, chopped
1 x red onion, finely diced
1/2 cup kalamata olives, pitted and chopped(125 mL)
2 tbsp capers(25mL)
1 bunch fresh basil, chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
1 tbsp lemon zest(15mL)
1/4 tsp each salt and pepper(1mL)




DIRECTIONS:
Grilled Calamari
Preheat grill or barbeque.
Make slits in each calamari, at 1 cm intervals, but do not cut right through into separate into rings. (This will prevent the calamari from curling up when it is grilled).
In a non-reactive bowl, mix olive oil, lemon juice, chili flakes, salt and pepper. Marinate calamari marinate for only 5-10 minutes.
Grill calamari, 3 minutes per side or until cooked through. Remove to a plate. Top calamari with salsa and serve.


Tomato Olive Salsa
In a non-reactive bowl, stir together tomatoes, onion, olives, capers, basil, garlic and lemon zest, salt and pepper.

nothing-much-in-the-house Salad by bookseller

I had nothing much in the house for dinner and was too buggery lazy to get my butt to the market, so I improvised a salad from a couple of nectarines, some chopped red onion, some fresh mint and some feta marinated in olive oil with chilies. And I have to tell you, this was FABULOUS.

Arugula would have made it perfect.