Tzatziki with Swiss Chard

Soon, the days of buying swiss chard and other greens at the farmers’ market here in Edmonton will be gone. We’re gearing up for the winter version of the market: root vegetables and not much else.

There might be a few more weeks left of greens, though, and this is a recipe that uses them up nicely. I found this recipe on Tea and Cookies, a wonderful blog with simple, honest recipes and beautiful essays and photos.

I’ve never even made regular tzatziki before, the kind with cucumbers. But this one was easy and delicious. I’m sure it would also work with spinach. I used goat’s milk yogurt from Fairwinds Fair, which makes it extra tangy. We ate it on toasted whole-wheat bread, but it would also be great with pita chips and raw vegetable, and on sandwiches. Make it now while you can still buy local greens.

Hallowe’en Pasta

I know Hallowe’en is over, but kids are still eating candy all over town, so I figure this post is still valid.

We're not really Hallowe'en people. In fact, for the past few years we haven’t bothered with it at all. I'm sure once we have kids we'll get into it again, but for now we're fine with simply observing the holiday. The fact that we live in an apartment building with no trick-or-treaters also helps.

I was cooking this pasta recipe for a late supper last night and I realized it could qualify as Halowe'en-y. I thought of it as soon as I dumped the red kale into the boiling water and it turned the water a dark shade of green/purple, edging on black. Spooky. It's interesting that the kale (though sold as red kale at the market, it's actually purple when raw) turns dark green when it hits the water. Then, when I added the spaghetti to the same water it took on a very slight purplish hue. All mixed up it doesn't look too scary, but given that I wasn't planning a Hallowe'en recipe I thought it was quite the coincidence.

 

Doesn't it look a a little bit like a pot of something creepy bubbling away?

And as for the taste of the recipe? Very yummy. With tiny French green lentils and caramelized onions, the final dish is earthy and satisfying. Especially with a fine grating of Parmesan on top. It is rather labour-intensive to make, with each ingredient requiring its own cooking, but it's definitely worth it if you have the time. Next time I think I would make even more caramelized onions. Can you really have too many? The recipe also calls for short pasta, which may work better than spaghetti because it would be easier to mix together, and match better with the chunky kale.

Just one more note, I found this recipe on epicurious when I was looking for something to make with the big bunch of kale. I really like how you can search for almost anything on that site, and it often yields good results.