teacher by day - chef by night
Garlic Pesto Snow Pea Tortellini… a long title, but worthy of every bit of it. Sometimes the simplest dishes are the best ones. I threw together this tortellini on a whim when Sister Chef saw a package of fresh tortellini at Aldi and told me …
I know that beets continue to be a contriversal subject, you are probably in the LOVE IT or in the LEAVE IT school of thought. If you are of the LEAVE IT mindset, not matter how much I try to convince you otherwise, you aren’t …
Every year, when we turn the Calendar to January it seems that everyone makes a pretty serious effort to make healthier choices! Unfortunately, but the time we make it to February many of us fall back into our old habits. I am going to state right here, right now – that this is going to be the year that we stick with those healthy choices!!
Now, don’t get me wrong – sticking with healthy choices doesn’t mean we are cutting out cupcakes or cookies or bacon or cheese or all the other rich & amazing (and not always healthy) food you come here to see, it just means that we are going to be adding (and keeping) a lot more healthy rich greens and nutrient-filled foods to our daily lives.
If I could bottle a smell – it would be the amazing smell of roasted vegetables wafting from the oven (you know, when you are roasting vegetables mixed with garlic & olive oil)! When there are yummy delicious vegetables on sale (especially eggplants and mushrooms) …
We went to Easton’s Garlic Festival last weekend & enjoyed many tastings of local goodies. We enjoyed taking part of a tasting in which we enjoyed 8 different raw garlics (chopped up) in order to vote for our favorite (we both really like “Music” – a garlic …
After getting a bag of Snap Peas a few weeks ago from our CSA I was wondering what to do with them, since I did not thinkI liked Snap (or Snow) Peas. The most interesting thing happened as I started to clean and work with the peas though… I started to taste them and realized that these things are awesome!!
Even though I found out that I liked the flavor of them raw, I already had my heart set of making Whitney’s version of Pickled Snap Peas. I always seem to have my heart set on pickles, so I knew I would not be disappointed! (The rest of the peas which escaped pickling, made their way into my Sesame Snow Peas with Asian Crab Cakes)
I tasted these a day later and they were good enough to eat, but resisted temptation and let them sit another week or so and they were worth the wait! These are nice and crunchy still with all the taste you would expect from something pickled. So get your harvest of peas (or go ahead and make this with the green beans that are currently in abundance) and make up a jar of these to enjoy in a few days – YUM!
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Pickled Sugar Snap Peas
Adapted from The Joy of Pickling via Epicurious
1 1/4 cups white distilled vinegar
1 1/4 cups cold water
1 tablespoon kosher or pickling salt
1 tablespoon sugar
1 pound sugar snap peas, stems trimmed and strings removed
4 garlic cloves, sliced
at least 3 -4 dashes dried red pepper flakes
In a nonreactive saucepan, heat the vinegar with the salt and sugar until they are dissolved. Remove from the heat, and add the cold water. (This gives you a leg up on getting the liquid to cooling the liquid.)
When the vinegar mixture is cool, pack the sugar snaps, garlic and chile peppers or flakes into a 1-quart jar or bowl, and pour the brine over it. Cover with a non-reactive cap, or, er, plastic wrap.
The original recipe suggests you store the jar in the refrigerator for two weeks before eating the pickled peas, but good luck with that. They’re quite delicious and already lightly pickled by 24 hours later.
And I leave you with a Question… What is YOUR favorite pickled food (and do you have an easy recipe on how to make it)!?