A Nice Little Meal

First, if you'll indulge me, a bit of a rant: I absolutely cannot understand people who don't appreciate leftovers. I don't even want to try to understand them. We have some in our family; they're also the kind of people who say "If you have to ask the price, you can't afford it." Really? Maybe I can't - that is possible - but maybe I can and I just want to know what the seller thinks it's worth, and if we agree about that, or I'm curious how big a fool the seller thinks the consumer is. There. I feel better now.

      I absolutely love leftovers, and the little breakfast or brunch or supper on the plate below is an example of how lovely and delicious leftovers can be. Basically, everything here was left over except the egg.

     We usually have pasta on Sunday nights but I'd been craving polenta for a while so last week we had that, with some Italian sausage and red sauce, and it was fantastically satisfying. But two people can only eat so much polenta at one meal, so Joe (he was cooking that night) poured the rest into an 8" square glass dish and put it in the fridge.

      Now please don't say, "Don't you know you can buy precooked polenta in a tube and just slice off what you want" or "Isn't there instant polenta, so you can make just enough for one or two servings, super quick?" Yes, we could take those shortcuts, but . . . it just wouldn't be the same. So it takes a while to make polenta the traditional way; basically, you have to let the cornmeal and water (and some salt) simmer, and you have to stir it quite a bit. It won't kill you. Pour a glass of wine and relax, talk with whoever is around, or just put on some nice music, or read - you only need one hand to stir.

     A little more backstory: we've decided to shop as little as possible because our pantry and freezer are so full, and we've made it kind of a game to require that each meal has something from the freezer and/or pantry (long-term storage), or, ideally, both. In this case the dry polenta was from the pantry, and the sausage was a surprise from the freezer, something we'd forgotten we had.

     Then the meal that followed a couple of days later, on Tuesday, the one in the picture that you may be wondering if I've forgotten, used the leftover polenta, kale from the freezer, eggs, and some leftover chopped salad from Monday, which, since it had no lettuce in it to get icky and slimy, was just fine.

      The really cool part is that I was also able to put it together in just one pan - a nice, fairly heavy, nonstick pan really does make life so much easier.
     First I sprayed the pan, heated it on medium, and browned the polenta squares on one side. While the first side was browning I sprayed the second sides of the polenta squares so when I flipped them over they would be as well protected against sticking as the first. Be sure to use a plastic or wooden or bamboo spatula to avoid damaging the pan surface (you probably already know that - sorry). Also, polenta sets up pretty firmly, but do be careful turning the squares so you keep them in one piece - not cutting the squares too big helps. I get 9 squares from an 8" pan.
     After turning the polenta squares, I pushed them to the side of the pan and on the other side put in the thawed kale, which I'd drained and squeezed as much water out of as I could without getting weird and neurotic and excessively perfectionist about it. I used my fingers to create two little nests in the kale (you can use spinach or chard or whatever greens you have, so long as they're precooked to some degree) and then dropped an egg into each nest, reduced the heat to pretty low, and put the lid on the whole thing. By the time the eggs are cooked to your liking (I want the whites cooked but the yolks still liquid), the greens will be hot and the second side of the polenta will be browned.
     Then you just plate it up, in this case with a colorful chopped salad made up mostly of tomatoes, cucumber, red onions, and olives with a light vinaigrette. You could sprinkle a little grated Parmesan or Romano cheese over the polenta if you wish, and I like a light sprinkling of white balsamic vinegar on the greens; many people like some hot sauce on them, or on the eggs. However you choose to dress it up with condiments - or not - it's a tasty, simple, well-balanced meal with only one pan to wash. That works for me.
   

IN PRAISE OF ROOTS AND GREENS

Turnips are pretty much a perfect vegetable, delicious, easy to grow, and you can eat both the bottoms and the tops. I harvested the last of this year's crop yesterday after work and we had the greens for dinner, along with pasta with Joe's wonderful red sauce (and Italian sausage that for some reason had no fennel in it - it tasted good but not properly Italian). We'll have the turnip bulbs themselves in a few days.
      Some of the pak choi is about to go to seed, the broccoli rabe is over (but we loved it while it lasted), the kale is nearly ready for another cutting, as are the cut-and-come-again mesclun and arugula. The rainbow chard will go on for quite some time until it gets too hot, probably in June. I love greens. Everyone in the family loves greens except my daughter's seven-year-old, who's picked up some of his dad's unfortunate food preferences, but hopefully he'll outgrow them.

       It's a good year for root vegetables in general, except for the radishes, which were inexpicably disappointing, though I'm going to plant some more - there's still time before it gets too warm. I love the winter garden here in the desert southwest. The carrots and beets are good and the parsnips are nearly ready to begin harvesting them - it's the first time I've grown parsnips. I planted them in a wine barrel so they'd have good, soft, deep dirt. But right now I'm excited about rutabagas, another first for our garden!

Here are our first two rutabagas, with a kohlrabi in the middle - it's about the size of a softball! The first planting of kohlrabi didn't germinate very well so when I thinned the rutabagas I replanted the ones I thinned out into the kohlrabi row - we now have lots of rutabagas! And that's just fine.