More treasures from BA July '11

 The grilling issue of Bon Appetit this year continues to shine -

Yesterday was about the 4th time we've made the Tuscan kale caesar "slaw", it is SO good.  If you like caesar salad and kale, try it!  Don't be put off by the raw-ness of the kale, it has a bit more texture than you might be used to in a raw salad green, but it isn't bitter at all, super delicious!

(The full amount of kale makes about 6 servings. For me and husbeast, I make the full amount and refrigerate the dressing and cut kale separately and then eat it for a couple of meals)

• 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
• 8 anchovy fillets packed in oil, drained
• 1 garlic clove
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 3/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 1/2 cup finely grated Parmesan, divided
• Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 hard-boiled egg, peeled
• 14 ounces Tuscan kale (also called Lacinato or Dinosaur kale) or other kale, center stalks removed, thinly sliced crosswise (about 8 cups) 

Preparation

Combine the first 4 ingredients in a blender; purée until smooth. With machine running, slowly add oil, drop by drop, to make a creamy dressing. Transfer dressing to a bowl and stir in 1/4 cup Parmesan. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Cover and chill. DO AHEAD Dressing can be made 2 days ahead. Keep chilled. 

  

Separate egg white from yolk. Place egg white in a coarse-mesh strainer set over a bowl. Press egg white through strainer with the back of a spoon; scrape egg white from bottom of strainer. Repeat with egg yolk, using a clean strainer and bowl (I never clean the strainer between white and yolk... you can also just chop an egg, but putting it through the strainer looks neat and fancy). DO AHEAD Can be made 6 hours ahead. Cover bowls separately and chill.  

Toss kale and dressing in a large bowl to coat. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Top with remaining 1/4 cup Parmesan and sieved eggs.

• 

  Sliced-up kale

  

  Blending up the dressing

This weekend we also decided to try giving some pork chops a bath in the mojo marinade from the same issue.  It turned out really nice... we only marinated for about 3 hours, I think it'd be even better if we'd let it go overnight, but I rarely plan that far in advance :)
Next time I'd also reserve some of the marinade to use as a sauce on the finished meat.  The recipe did in fact say to do this, but I was hesitant to make another dirty dish that we'd have to wash, so I just used all of it on the marinade.  Next time, next time...

Chops in the bath

• 1 1/2 cups fresh orange juice
• 1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
• 1/2 cup fresh lime juice
• 1/2 cup fresh oregano, coarsely chopped
• 1/3 cup corn or vegetable oil (Edit: I actually used olive oil here, vegetable oils that need much more coaxing to actually become oils than olive oil creep me out more and more... olive oil isn't the best to heat to high temperatures, but for a liquid-at-room-temp fat, I feel like it's not the worst (I still haven't found any avocado oil))  
• 10 garlic cloves, minced
• 3 jalapenños, sliced into rounds
• 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt

Preparation

Combine all ingredients in a medium bowl and whisk until salt is dissolved. 

Remove pork or seafood from marinade, pat dry, and grill.

Spoon reserved sauce over meat or fish just before serving.

We finished off our dinner spread last night with the epitome of summer foods, the Caprese salad (with delicious Buffalo mozzarella from Costco!  Great deal!) -

In case you're unfamiliar, this is just sliced tomatoes, sliced fresh mozzarella (the kind packed in a tub of water) (Buffalo really is more delicious, but it can be expensive and/or hard to find, so cow's milk mozz works just fine), sliced fresh basil, salt, pepper, and olive oil drizzled over.  It is not traditional, but we also like to put some balsamic vinegar over it as well, esp. here in the northwest where the awesome tomato season is about 5 minutes long.  The vinegar helps perk up lackluster tomatoes.