I had never really been exposed to any kind of Indian cuisine until I worked in a very international environment and found myself cubemates with  an Indian woman in a department that was fond of having group lunches at a local Indian buffet restaurant.

If you’ve never been to an Indian buffet, I highly suggest it and I highly suggest wearing your pants with the elastic waistband.  The variety of meats, vegetables, spices and levels of heat you’ll find is dizzying but after one or two trips, you’ll know which dishes you want to back for for seconds.  And, if you’re lucky, the buffet near you will project Bollywood music videos on one wall for your viewing pleasure.  One word of caution–every time we go, the women in our group gripe about how beautiful the Bollywood women and how skeevy the guys look.  Don’t expect any eye candy, ladies.

Back to the food.  One of my favorite is the chana masala.  It’s a spiced chickpea stew that I like to have served over rice.  The broth/sauce is thick and fully spiced with cinnamon, pepper, cardamom and a host of others, including a mild heat.

The buffet serves a wonderful version, my cubemate shared her version and I’ve had yet other versions at other restaurants and still other versions live in the frozen foods sections of certain grocery store (cough, Trader Joes, cough cough).  The dish is easy to prepare at home but the problem is making a version I absolutely love.

This was my first attempt–a recipe exalted by Deb of Smitten Kitchen.  Lest you think I’m dumb for choosing an American blogger over a more authentic sounding source, there was a method to my choice–lots of Indian cuisine calls for specialty ingredients that I would need to order online or find in a specialty market.  I thought I’d first try a version I could make with mostly stuff out of my own pantry.  I’ll branch into the world of true authenticity once I’ve tried this one.

The result was pretty good.  I didn’t stray much from the Smitten Kitchen recipe except to add some cinnamon–I find it gives a very distinctly rich flavor that is irresistible, transforming a pretty humble dish into a complex comfort food.  The result was a well-spiced, healthful chana masala that was packed a tomato based sauce with Indian flavor.

But I don’t think I’m done.  One of the things I realized after having this for lunch and dinner (I made a lot–it freezes!) is that perhaps there is no perfect chana masala.  It’s kinda like mac and cheese–sometimes you want the baked kind, sometimes creamy stovetop; sometimes you want it unadulterated with just cheese and pasta and other times you want 4 cheese with broccoli and peppers.  I think this recipe will satisfy sometimes but I’ll need another one for a different type of chana masala craving.

And once you’ve tasted it, you’ll know what I mean by a chana masala craving.

Here’s the thing about me and coleslaw: I kind of hate it.  Look, I’ll eat it if you tell me it’s your great aunt’s recipe or your grandmother made it but if it doesn’t involve an old lady I’m trying to respect, I’m probably going to pass.

The problem isn’t coleslaw itself, it’s the dizzying array of varieties out there.  The cabbage can be finely shredded or barely chopped, the dressing can be thick or thin, creamy or watery, sweet as sugar or sharp as vinegar and you can add an amazing number of vegetables, herbs and spices as supporting cast.  There are very few combination I like which means, odds are, I’m not going to like what’s on your cookout buffet table.

There are, however, the select few I like and those get elevated to blog-worthy status.  My favorite is a Tyler Florence recipe, introduced to me by my mother-in-law, that has the fabulous additions of chipotle powder, Granny Smith apples and scallions to keep things interesting.   Recently, I had the serendipitous situation of needing a coleslaw for fish tacos, being deep into The Cook’s Illustrated Cookbook and having a half carton of buttermilk in the fridge needing to be used up.

This recipe toes the line between too thin and too thick and has a creamy base but with that tangy zip brought on by the buttermilk and lemon juice combination.  And the array of veggies makes for a much more colorful and pleasing presentation than green cabbage alone.

We enjoyed this most on fish tacos but it was also pretty good all by itself.  As it’s own side dish, it should be salted to taste–it runs a little bland as is which was great for the tacos but slightly lackluster on it’s own.  A pinch of salt to the dressing should solve that nicely.

So, with two recipes I enjoy, I think I’m making progress on my coleslaw hate.  Which is just in time for cookout season.

This week, we saw a few new-comers to the pavilion.  We scored a huge swath of Swiss chard for $2.50–that’s getting chopped up and tossed in with pasta, sauce and cheese for a version of this baked penne that I previously posted using kale.

Then, one of my favorite lettuce farmers had this GIANT head of butter lettuce–one of the most gorgeous heads of lettuce I’ve ever seen (sorry, it’s hiding in the back in this photo).  That’s going to be enough to putt double duty as a salad for lunch and as cups for a southwestern chicken salad you can looked forward to seeing later.

I also bagged some broccoli, one of the veggies I was sadly missing when we subscribed to our CSA, which you’ll see is getting pan-roasted with lemon browned butter and served alongside slabs of grilled steak (I offered gentleman’s choice of meat to go with the broccoli).

Finally, you’ll notice our third quart of strawberries in as many weeks.  These have already gone into some double berry muffins and fresh strawberry lemonade (the perfect thirst quencher for a pregnant lady missing her Cinco de Mayo margaritas) and I have plans for more shortcakes for Mothers’ Day.

My favorite you-pick farm opens in less than 2 weeks–can I handle more strawberries??

I think strawberries are the quintessential local, seasonal food.  Some people would argue that tomatoes better represent the kind of quality you can only get locally but I think the difference between a May strawberry from a farm near your house and a December strawberry from somewhere else in the world that ends up in one of those plastic shells in the grocery is vast.  The color is different, the sweetness is different, the acidity is different, the aroma is different, even the texture is different.  I try to avoid buying store strawberries at all costs because I will only be disappointed when I compare it to my knowledge of the “real” version.

The best part about local fresh strawberries is how they serve as the early representative of all the seasonal goodness to come.  Strawberries are often the first fruits to appear at the markets and the opening of you-pick farms is often tied to strawberry ripening.  Nothing against lettuce or spring onions but strawberries are the first vibrant burst of color and flavor that tell us an extended season of deliciousness is now upon us.

So, you better find a way to enjoy these berries in all their glory.

Alright, I know nothing beats that first perfect bite into a good one but if you want to make something really special to showcase them, give the classic strawberry shortcake a try.  Once you make the biscuits, they are easy to put together and, if you make enough for a few nights’ worth of desserts, you’ll find yourself dreaming about these before you even know what you’re making for dinner.

The combination of tender, buttery biscuit topped with amazing juicy berries and sweet cream is absolutely irresistible. I was so sad when we finished ours that I decided to make them again in mini version for this upcoming Mothers Day.  There really is no sweeter way to celebrate the arrival of these harbingers of seasonal eating.

To anyone who lives or has lived in a more rural area, these cookies should look somewhat familiar.  Versions of this recipe can be found on bake sales, at church socials, holiday gatherings and those compilation cookbooks firehouses sell.  Maybe they have chocolate chips instead of white chocolate or maybe they don’t include the oatmeal or, quite often, they’ll include pecans, but the same basic flavors are pretty much ubiquitous.

And that’s probably because these are just such perfect cookies.  They are everything you want in a cookie.

They are sweet enough for one or two to be plenty to silence that sweet tooth and the chewiness is super satisfying. They are somewhat crispy but if you bake them right, you’ll have a nice chewy center and the cookie won’t be hard all the way through.  Pay careful attention to how long you bake them–they can easily go from perfect to crispy and nearly burnt.  Watch the first few batches like a hawk and tailor your times based on what you learn.

I made a whole big batch and they were gone within a few days.  You just can’t help but walk by and pick one up–which is probably why they end up on so many bake sale tables!

I have to confess that just about a week ago, Greg and I had the pleasure of dining at the fine eating establishment that is Applebee’s.  That’s right, we were eatin’ good in the neighborhood (should I mention a trademark here so I don’t get sued?) and it was a PLEASURE.  Not just our wonderful friends and dining companions but the meal was really pretty enjoyable.

I had it in my head that I wanted a nice big salad–you know, the kind they always have at casual restaurants like Applebee’s–but the one I chose ended up being a delicious chopped salad.  It was chock full of chicken, beans and veggies all chopped small and the other-stuff-to-lettuce proportion was far higher than in one of typical big salads.  All those flavors and textures made me one happy casual diner.

So, when it came time to use up more of that roasted chicken in a salad, I was delighted to re-interpret Cook’s Illustrated’s Thai-style Chicken Dinner Salad into a chopped salad.  The elements were all there–chicken, several veggies and a super flavorful dressing but instead of serving in a lump on top of greens, I finely chopped everything, including a bit of farmers’ market romaine, and drizzled with dressing.

The dressing on this salad is insanely flavorful.  The Thai-style combination of peanut, chili, garlic, ginger and lots of lime give an outstanding burst of sweet/spicy/tart/nutty that just coats all those little pieces of healthy goodness.  Packing lettuce, cukes, carrots, onions and chicken all in little pieces makes for big hearty spoonfuls of a little bit of everything–much more satisfying as a dinner than stuff on top of a big mound of lettuce.

Yet another round of dining bliss, only this time from my own kitchen and with local ingredients.  And I didn’t have to pay $10 plus tip for it either!

In my mind, there is no better way to eat well and still save money than to cook a whole chicken.  You can get whole roasters at the grocery store for $10-$12 or get a free-range organic bird from your butcher for $18-$20.  Two adults can eat the roasted meat on Day 1 then pick the rest of meat and add to salads, wraps, quesadillas, burritos, sandwiches, pastas, soups or casseroles for at least 3-4 more meals for 2.  That’s about $1-$2 per serving for lean protein, making it easy to generate 4-5 meals for 2 for $1-$3 per serving, once you add in veggies and other ingredients.  If you pick mostly salads and sandwiches for your leftovers, you have the added benefit of only having to fire up the stove once for the whole week.

I used Cook’s Illustrated recipe for the perfect roast chicken on Sunday (served with that luscious strawberry salad and homemade rolls) then Greg picked the meat and we repurposed all week.  I’ll share a Thai-style dinner salad next Monday but the first iteration of chicken leftovers took the form of curried chicken salad sandwiches.

There’s a cafe near us that makes a terrific curried chicken salad with cranberries and they serve it on croissants.  Eager to replicate it, I used a recipe from Nicole at Prevention RD, tweaked the fruit to include cranberries and heaped the whole mixture onto flaky store-bought croissants.  Not only did I get 2 dinners and 2 lunches out of it (we’re being frugal, remember!) but the flavor was just remarkable.  That Cook’s Illustrated recipe (along with digital temperature probes) gave an amazingly moist and tender chicken, the cranberries added tartness while the apple gave a terrific crunch and that aromatic curry flavor running all the way through was just perfect.  The dressing of this version is quite creamier than the cafe’s version but the croissant held up well against it.  It was the kind of sandwich that was hearty enough for dinner but I was looking forward to it all for lunch as well.

And, since each one cost less than $2 compared to the $8 the cafe charges, I’d say we made out just as well on the budget as we did on the flavor.

This salad may seem harmless–sweet and charming, in fact.  But the truth is, this salad has caused some in-fighting in our family in the past.

See, this salad approximates the salad we served at our wedding 3 years ago.  Greg’s family and I got to taste this salad months beforehand at our menu tasting where his stepfather proclaimed this as one of the best salads he’d ever had (as well as the crab dip being one of the best he’s ever had).  To Greg’s mother, a great maker of both salads and crab dip, this was highly insulting.  Things only got worse when she relayed this conversation to her sister, another great maker of salads and crab dip.

To this day, we have holidays where someone will take a bite of homemade salad and say “This salad is delicious!  Not quite ‘the best I’ve ever had’ but pretty close!”

The funny thing is, this salad isn’t all that complicated, it just uses amazing ingredients.  Don’t try to make it in January with sad little half-red strawberries.  Don’t try to make it in August with tough, bitter last-leg-of-the-season lettuce.  Don’t try to make it with off-tasting bottled salad dressing.  To truly make this one of the best starter salads you’ve ever had, you have to use the best around.

Lucky for you, strawberry season is just beginning and it’s cool enough that you should be able to find an abundance of tender romaine or leaf lettuce.  The dressing comes together in a snap and the walnuts can be toasted while you assemble everything else.  Your reward is a sweet salad backed by fruity, nutty and spicy ingredients swathed in a tangy-sweet dressing.

Hopefully it will remind you more of a lovely garden wedding in May than a 3-year long family joke about who really makes the best salads.

There were several vendors with some good-looking spring produce.  Lots of tender lettuces, kale, chard, turnips, spring onions and radishes as well as few little sprigs of herbs were available for purchase.  Greg and I picked up a big bag with 4 heads of mixed lettuces (2 red leaf, 1 green leaf and 1 romaine) for $3 as well as a loaf of apple pie breakfast bread for $6.  Not pictured is the chocolate cherry muffin and cinnamon roll we devoured for breakfast.

On the way to the market, I had spied a big sign proclaiming there were “Fresh Local Strawberries” available.  We just had to stop on the way back and I pored over a table full of quart containers of plump, perfect berries.  Really, I wanted to take everyone of them home with me but I settled for one for $4.  For now.

The first bite of fresh strawberry in the late spring early summer is practically transcendent and this one did not disappoint–sweet and fragrant, juicy and bursting with flavor.  I can’t think of a better way to to kick off off the season.

I know you’ve seen them and you’ve probably bought them once or twice–those pillowy sugar cookies with technicolor frosting sold in the plastic clamshells in the bakery section of the grocery store.  They are full of sugar and artificial ingredients but when you really want something indulgent and sweet, those little babies are just the ticket.

Well, let me tell you, a few weeks ago, I not only wanted something indulgent, these cookies are nearly all I wanted.  See, Greg and I have a little announcement–we’re expecting our first child in October!!  For those who have been through the first trimester before, it all makes sense–the drop off in posting recently is really a result of being unable to stomach even the tastiest of meals.  If I can’t smell it or eat it or look at it without queasiness, I certainly can’t write about it.  At one point, I thought Our Share of the Harvest was going to have to feature only recipes for smoothies and peanut butter sandwiches from then on.

Then, Greg brought home some of those grocery store cookies.  Now, I didn’t make meals out of them but it was heavenly to taste something and not need to go lie down to avoid throwing up.  I remembered that a few of my favorite bloggers had copycat recipes in their repertoire and I missed flexing my baking skills.

These copycat cookies are similarly as soft and delicious as the grocery store version but they taste more…real.  They are sweeter and more buttery with an authentic homemade cookie taste.  They really are little sugar bombs though–I found the “scant quarter cup” given in the directions made giant cookies so I scaled down to about 2 tablespoons dropped on the cookie sheet which was a more manageable cookie size.  Greg wolfed down two of the giant cookies after work one day and ended up with a wicked sugar buzz.

I’m back to normal now that I’ve moved into the second trimester so I’m back to cooking, baking and posting regularly.  But I’ll be keeping these cookies in my own repertoire–but only as an indulgence.

Oh, and don’t read anything into the pink frosting–we still have no idea if this little one is a boy or girl