Ratatouille

This one makes itself. Tonight I used zucchini, yellow squash, canned tomato, onion, mushrooms, red and green peppers, nicoise olives, and garlic. A nice addition was orange juice, lemon juice and plenty of olive oil.

Gnocchi with Mushrooms and Peas

For the gnocchi:

three small potatoes, riced
one cup flour
one egg
drizzle truffle oil
salt

For the sauce:

eight ounce package mushrooms, coarsely chopped
half an onion
3/4 cup peas
butter
dollop of sour cream
drizzle of truffle oil
salt and pepper

Rice the potatoes onto a floured surface. Dust flour over the potatoes. Make a well for the egg, salt, and truffle oil, and knead until just combined. (Overmixing makes tough dough.) Roll dough into ropes and cut into inch shapes. Make into gnocchi shapes with a fork and set aside on floured pan. Gnocci cooks in about two or three minutes.

Cook mushrooms in very hot olive oil. Set aside when cooked, and reduce heat to medium. Sautee the onion until well softened, then add back the mushrooms. Add peas, butter, cooked gnocchi, truffle oil. When sauce comes together a bit, turn off heat and add the cream.

This was my adaptation of this recipe:

http://www.saveur.com/article/Recipes/Truffled-Gnocchi-with-Peas-and-Chanterelles

Pancakes:

(modified from my brother's recipe)

1 1/4 cup flour
heaping tblsp baking powder
heaping tblsp sugar
pinch of salt
2 tblsp melted butter
tsp or so of oil
one egg, seperated
1 1/4 cup buttermilk
pinch yeast

Mix together dry ingredients. Whip egg white into a light froth, then add buttermilk, butter, oil, egg yolk, and yeast. Mix all ingredients together and stir until combined. Leave aside for thirty minutes to an hour, them make em.

Soft Boiled Egg Salad:

Three eggs
Tblsp mayonaise
Tblsp mustard
Tblsp chopped pickles
salt and pepper

Soft-boil the eggs; approximately seven minutes. Mix in a small bowl with all other ingredients, mashing or chopping the eggs into small pieces.

Surprisingly creamy and nice without being too mayonaisy

Minestrone:

(ingredients listed in order of appearance)

half red onion
one large carrot
two stalks celery
two tired looking mushrooms out my fridge
crushed red pepper
five cloves garlic
water enough to make soup
tblsp or so tomato paste
dash of balsamic vinegar
dash of red wine vinegar
three or four parmesan rinds
pinch each of dried basil, thyme, and oregano
can of cannellini beans
half cup or so elbow macaroni
juice from half a lemon
tblsp or so fresh oregano
half of one medium potato, cooked
salt and pepper to taste

Sautee onion, celery, and carrot until soft. Add garlic. Add water, tomato paste, vinegar, parmesan rinds, herbs, beans. Boil then simmer. Add pasta and simmer until cooked. Turn of heat and add lemon juice. Mash the potato well and add to thicken the soup a little.

This soup needs a lot of salt. I don't even want to guess how much, but it will probably just taste like water with stuff in it unless salt is added at every stage. Zucchini would make this minestrone really good, but I didn't have it. Probably any little bit of old veggie in the fridge could be disposed of here. We happened to have some leftover pesto; a spoonful of this in the bottom of the bowl made the soup taste extra good.