Too Much Swiss Chard? Make Pesto!

This week I got to do one of my favorite activities -- teach at Olivewood Gardens. And, the dish I decided to make with the kids, who are in the fourth and fifth grades in National City, was a lavash pizza with garden veggies and Swiss chard pesto.

See, we have several criteria for our recipes -- they need to be nutritious, they need to be able to be made and eaten in 25 minutes, they should be something the kids can help prepare, and the ingredients should include produce grown in the gardens. Well, it's November and the pickins are a little slim right now. What did they have in abundance? Swiss chard. So, I played around with the pesto idea and came up with a recipe that tasted good but also would be fun for the kids to squirt out of a bottle and decorate their pizzas. Sort of a cooking/art project.

The kids, of course, were completely unfamiliar with lavash (and we discovered they also need help with geography since they had no clue about what countries make up the Middle East), but they were open to trying it. First came a layer of shredded mozzarella. Then they each added a rainbow of veggies that could include mushrooms, broccoli, cherry tomatoes, red onions, red peppers, jalapenos, grated carrots, sliced black olives, zucchini, and chopped tomatillos. Then a little more cheese followed by squirts of the pesto.

Each square went into a 375-degree oven for about 13 minutes. I have to say they were delicious and the kids loved them. I have photos to prove it, but we didn't get permissions for publishing them so they'll stay in my computer...

Now, here's the kicker. By the third class I was looking to change things up so when we were making the pesto I asked the kids if they wanted to add any other ingredients and see what would happen. They decided on a handful of chopped tomatillo and a few tablespoons of chopped chives. And, it was delicious! Even better than the original, plus the kids were thrilled that they had created a recipe.

Swiss Chard Pesto
Makes 2 cups

1 pound Swiss chard (or kale, spinach, or other leafy green)
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon lemon juice
½ teaspoon honey
¼ cup grated parmesan cheese
3/4 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground pepper
½ cup or more olive oil
(feel free to add about 1/2 a cup of chopped raw tomatillo and 3 tablespoons of chopped chives)


Carefully wash the Swiss chard leaves. Remove the tough central ribs, then tear into smaller pieces.

Puree all the ingredients in the food processor or blender to form a smooth paste. Taste and adjust seasonings.

Store in the refrigerator in a glass jar, covered with a thin layer of oil, where it will keep for a week or more. It also freezes well.

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The Strange Experience of Cooking for Kids -- Who Aren't Your Own

Parents reading this will surely snicker at me, but what the heck. I spent last week in Tempe staying with my nieces while their parents were enjoying a little holiday in New York. The girls are amazingly self-sufficient so there was little for me to do but be transportation and security. I, of course, also wanted to be cook.

The challenge was that these pre-teen kids are on the run. They're in school early in the morning and then come afternoon and evening activities (each night the younger one had to leave at 5:30 for soccer practice that wouldn't bring her home until 8:30 and the older one had tennis lessons and other obligations on a couple of nights). And they're not big eaters. They're not fussy so much as disinterested for the most part. Oh, and, they claim to be vegetarians. Sort of. But it's more along the lines of not eating meat as opposed to choosing to eat vegetables. In other words, they like baked potatoes stuffed with cheese.

Night number one was a surrender to frozen dinner: manicotti. But, my older niece made a nice salad to go with it and let's just say we were fed while discussing options for subsequent dinners. They both like pesto, so the following night I made that with pappardelle from Trader Joe's, along with roasted eggplant with garlic-infused olive oil and parmesan cheese melted on top. I liked the eggplant. They weren't so keen on it. Thursday's meal was something I'd started making years and years before when their cousins were little: chicken legs dipped in a mixture of Italian spiced bread crumbs, garlic, olive oil, and grated parmesan cheese. Bake it at 400 for about an hour and you get a nice crisp coating and moist chicken meat inside. That went over pretty well and the younger one got to make her favorite baked potato filled with grated cheddar and jack cheeses.

By Friday, the girls were over home cooking so we picked up dinner at Pei Wei. And that was it. They made their own breakfasts and lunches for school. They had snacks their mom had left for them. No muss, no fuss.

But still. I cook all the time and yet felt I didn't have a clue for these kids who aren't keen on a lot of vegetables and limit their protein to chicken and shrimp.

So, on behalf of childless aunts and uncles who are sometimes asked to cook for their nieces and nephews, I'd love for you to share some of your kids's favorite meals that we could prepare when called on.

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Weird and Wonderful: Three Spring Treats

I always like a good surprise and this past weekend I found three in the form of produce. Two of them you may have heard of or even tried. I'm pretty sure that the third is something completely new to anyone but the growers and sellers and a few chefs in the area.

First up is a rare treat if you're a garlic lover: garlic scapes. These thick, curly cues of deliciousness are hard to find in San Diego. Last year I found them at First Korean Market on Convoy near Jasmine in Kearny Mesa. They were there just a brief time in the spring and that was it. On Sunday I found them at the Hillcrest farmers market at Sage Mountain Farm's stand and immediately snatched up a bunch, along with some first-of-the-season heirloom tomatoes, elephant garlic and a bunch of lovely multi-colored carrots.

Garlic scapes are the flower stalks that grow out of the garlic bulb. As they grow they begin to curl, and ultimately develop a little bud. They have just a brief season so get them while you can.


Some say they are milder than garlic bulbs, but they can be pretty potent while raw. Once cooked, however -- at least in my experience -- they lose a lot of that garlic flavor. So, my favorite way to use them is to make pesto. Simply chop them into smallish pieces and drop in the food processor. Add grated parmesan cheese, toasted pine or walnuts, salt and pepper and slowly drizzle in really good extra virgin olive oil until the mixture becomes creamy. In this batch above, I also added fresh thyme from my garden and about a tablespoon of fresh lemon zest.

The pesto is terrific on baked chicken, fish, grilled beef and pork. Add it to an omelet or roasted vegetables -- especially roasted potatoes, eggplant, tomatoes or summer squash. And, of course, it's a no brainer with pasta. I chopped some heirloom tomatoes and sea beans (see below for the big surprise), and roasted a couple of Japanese eggplants I bought at the City Heights farmers market.


The result was a wonderful vegetarian pasta dish that made two meals. And it was just as good cold as warm.


Okay, I mentioned the sea beans here and on Twitter. They're definitely a curiosity. I learned about them at Specialty Produce with L.A. food writer Erika Kerekes, who was visiting for the day. Specialty's Kelly Orange was showing us around and we walked by a large plastic bag of these greens on a shelf. They look like little twigs, but have a crispy texture and very salty, really briny, flavor straight out of the sea. Sea beans, also known as glasswort, grow wild on beaches and marshes, including estuaries in San Diego.


Part of the charm of these vegetables is their crispiness so I would use them fresh or maybe pickle them. But, certainly, you can saute or steam them or use them however you would any other vegetable. Make a salty pesto with them. Or just use them as a very interesting garnish. I added them to my pasta and looking forward to experimenting with them further.

While I was at Specialty Produce, I noticed they had pink lemons -- something I'd never seen. So I took home several to try. They're a variety unique to the average Eureka lemon. They start out with a very pretty yellow-and-green variegated skin but the flesh inside is pink and so they're often used to make pink lemonade. As the fruit matures, the skin starts to flush, as you can just see in the photo below. This is the result of lycopene, which also colors pink grapefruit.


Use these lemons just as you would a regular Eureka lemon. I thought they were too pretty to just squeeze and toss, so I made another jar of preserved lemons. If you haven't done this yet, give it a try. All you need are lemons, sea salt and a wide-mouth sterile jar.

First, cut the lemons vertically half-way down on one side, then flip the lemon over, do a half turn and make another cut. Then, stuff the inside of the lemon with the salt on each side.


Fill the jar as you stuff each lemon with the salt and press down to release the juice and make room for the next lemons. By the time you fill the jar, you should have no room for more lemons and they should be sitting in juice. If they don't release enough juice, squeeze more lemons and fill the jar with the juice to the top. Then, all you do is secure the lid and let the jar sit on your kitchen counter for a month to six weeks. Periodically turn the jar over and back upright to remix any salt that's settled at the bottom. If the lemons begin to collapse, you can add more split and salted lemons so the jar remains full.



At the end of a month to six weeks, you'll have a wonderful condiment to include in pastas, sauces, salads and sautes. Keep the jar refrigerated and pull out what you need. Trim away the flesh, rinse the peel and chop it. It adds a wonderful salty, sour flavor. But, remember, a little goes a long way for the best effect.

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