Creamy Basil Pasta Sauce

This sauce is inspired by Ottolenghi's pasta with yogurt, peas, and chile from Jerusalem, but simpler for those days when you have, say, a newborn at home.  The sauce takes less than 5 minutes to make, so all you need to do is cook the pasta!

Creamy Basil Pasta Sauce

1 cup plain lowfat yogurt
4 oz crumbled feta cheese
big handful of fresh basil, about 1/3 cup (from your garden, obviously!)
three glugs of olive oil
handful of walnuts (optional)
1/2 tsp garlic powder (or if you don't have a newborn, 2 garlic cloves sizzled in olive oil)
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/4 tsp salt
Red pepper flakes, for serving

Combine all ingredients except red pepper flakes in a food processor (mini size works best) and process until relatively smooth.  Add to hot pasta the moment you drain it, so it's still very hot, and mix to coat the pasta or serve immediately to be mixed at the table as pictured.  Serve with plenty of red pepper flakes on top!

Makes 3 very generous servings or 4 smaller ones.

Beet, Radish, and Cucumber Salad

When I started alisoncooks, I wouldn't have eaten any of these vegetables. Now, I love them!

Beet, Radish and Cucumber Salad

2 large beets, cooked and sliced, or one can sliced beets
6 or so medium radishes
1/2 large cucumber
3 tbsp plain nonfat Greek yogurt
1 tsp ground cumin
2 medium cloves garlic, minced, about 1 tsp
2 tsp olive oil
1/2 tsp red wine vinegar
salt & pepper
1 large sprig fresh mint (I used chocolate mint)

 Thinly slice radishes.  Peel and dice cucumber.  Mince mint.

Cook the minced garlic and cumin in the olive oil over medium heat just 20 seconds past when they begin to sizzle.  Remove from the heat and allow to cool until just warm.  Combine with yogurt, 1 tsp water, and vinegar; mix well.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

Arrange the beet slices in concentric rings on your plate. Arrange radish slices in concentric circles on top, and top with diced cucumber.  Drizzle dressing over the top.  Sprinkle with mint.

Serves at least 2, or 1 as a main dish.  Excellent eaten with white bean dip (recipe astoundingly not on alisoncooks yet!)

on small rounds of multigrain baguette.

Chickpea Salad with Herbs and Yogurt Dressing

This makes good use of the herbs that are going absolutely crazy on the sunny side of our house.  Loosely inspired by butternut-squash-and-chickpea salads like this one.
Serve with roasted potatoes with rosemary.

Chickpea Salad with Herbs and Yogurt Dressing

 3 cans low-sodium chickpeas, drained and rinsed
5 tbsp olive oil, divided
several sprigs of lemon thyme, leaves picked off stems
several large or many small sage leaves
2 oz feta cheese, crumbled
1/2 container plain yogurt
1 tsp minced garlic


Heat 3 tbsp olive oil over medium heat. Meanwhile, julienne the sage leaves.  Fry them until crisp, just a few minutes, watching the heat closely.

Combine chickpeas, feta, lemon thyme, and fried sage leaves; toss to mix well.  NB: lemon thyme is strong, so start with less than you might think.  Separately, mix together the yogurt, garlic, and remaining 2 tbsp olive oil.  Before serving, spoon the yogurt dressing over the chickpeas.

Lebanese-Inspired Slow-Cooked Eggplant

This is a really delicious way to cook eggplant: the eggplant ends up with such a luxurious texture, with a wonderful, nutty flavor, and the tomato sauce is delicious enough that I will probably try using three cans of tomatoes, next time, to have more sauce.  A complete meal served with rice and cucumber-yogurt salad.  Bonus is that the slow-cooker doesn't heat up the apartment the way the stove would... 90s and humid here recently.

I added dried chickpeas for bulk, but had never cooked them in the slow cooker before.  Since regular beans take 8 hours, I figured they'd be done -- but they weren't.  So only add them if you have time to cook for more than 8 hours.


Lebanese-Inspired Slow-Cooked Eggplant

1-2 large eggplants (I used one large and two small, narrow eggplants)
1 large onion, sliced
2 cloves garlic, roughly choppped
2 cans diced tomatoes
1 small red bell pepper, diced
1-3 dried, medium-spicy chiles, such as chiles cascabeles, seeded (or chile flakes, or hot sauce)
1 tsp neutral vegetable oil
1 tbsp olive oil
1 rounded tsp powdered allspice
1 rounded tsp cumin
(1 cup dried chickpeas, optional)
(2/3 cup water, if using chickpeas)
5 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 tsp sugar
Mint or parsley, for garnish

Cook the onion in the vegetable oil over high heat until it begins to color, then over medium or medium-low heat until uniformly light brown.  Add the balsamic vinegar and sugar; cook two or three minutes more, and remove from heat.

Slice the eggplants lengthwise into eighths.  (If using small, narrow eggplants, halve.) If using chickpeas, place them in slowcooker. Place eggplants in slow cooker, over chickpeas if using.  Top with onions, garlic, and diced red peppers.

Using a stick blender or food processor, roughly puree the diced tomatoes with the allspice and cumin.  Add to the slow cooker, taking care to cover the eggplant as well as possible.  Add the water, if using chickpeas. Push the chiles into the liquid. Drizzle the olive oil on top.

Cook on high for two hours, and then on low for six hours.  (I imagine that low for eight hours would probably be fine.)  Serve with rice and cucumber-yogurt salad, garnished with fresh herbs.

Serves 4.

Spicy Lima Bean Dip

Pureed lima beans with Mexican seasonings make a very good dip not unlike hummus or white-bean dip. This also works well as a filling for enchiladas. In fact, it was inspired by a recipe for guacamole-filled enchiladas with adobo sauce. (We didn't have any avocados, and I also wanted a higher-protein, higher-fiber filling.)

Spicy Lima Bean Dip

1 1-lb bag frozen lima beans
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and diced
2 cloves of garlic
1 tbsp olive oil
juice of 1 lemon
1/2 tsp chili powder
1 cup water

Bring lima beans, jalapeno, garlic, and water to a boil. Cook until the lima beans are very soft, about 10 minutes. Drain. Using a food processor (regular or mini), process beans, jalapeno, garlic, oil, lemon and chili powder until mostly smooth - some texture is nice. Add water by the tablespoonful if needed for processing. Garnish with additional chili powder.

Makes dip for a party, or enchilada filling for 3.

Spicy Peanut-Sweet Potato Soup

Sweet potatoes make such a plush-textured soup, good for cold weather. This vaguely African-inspired soup is very filling and, if you use two unseeded chiles de arbol, aggressively spicy. You might consider using 1 chile, or seeding them. The rice helps create a smooth texture - but it will continue to absorb liquid, so add a little more water if you are reheating leftovers the next day.

Spicy Peanut-Sweet Potato Soup

2 large orange sweet potatoes, peeled
1/3 cup smooth peanut butter
1 large garlic clove, minced
2 heaping tbsp white rice
2 tbsp soy sauce
1-2 dried chiles de arbol, seeded if you like less heat
1/4 tsp smoked paprika

Dice the sweet potatoes. Add them to a large saucepan or soup pot along with the chiles, rice, and garlic, and add about eight to ten cups of water and the chiles. Bring to a boil, and boil until the sweet potatoes are very tender, about 15-20 minutes. Add the soy sauce and smoked paprika. Remove from heat and puree thoroughly (easiest with an immersion blender). Return to low heat and stir in the peanut butter until well combined and creamy.

Garnish with nuts if desired.

Serves 4-5.

Pumpkin Muffins

Yum! I cut the sugar from the recipe I was adapting, but would try cutting it further and might try using a bit more pumpkin and 1 fewer egg. However, these were very well received.

Pumpkin Muffins

1 cup pumpkin puree, canned or otherwise
3/4 cup white flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/3 cup white sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar [I would try 1/4 cup each next time]
2 eggs [I would try 1 next time with a bit more pumpkin]
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
1/8 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp baking soda

Preheat oven to 350 and line muffin tin. Using a whisk, gently mix together all ingredients just until blended. Spoon into muffin tins, filling about 2/3 full -- should make exactly 12 if you scrape the bowl well. (I recommend that you don't forget to add the sugar and baking soda until after you've started to spoon it into the muffin tins, as I did.) Bake 25-30 minutes.

Makes 12