Cooking Seasonally

I always love to cook fresh from the seasons best ingredients. In our area, asparagus is in season, and absolutely delicious. Here is a great, somewhat fancy looking, and easy recipe that I made for dinner guests this weekend. It can be served hot or cold.

Asparagus and Mushroom Salad

1 bunch asparagus
one pint mushrooms (I use baby portobello)
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar, or more to taste
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 clove garlic, crushed
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/8 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
1/2 cup loosely packed chopped basil
Parmesan cheese
salt, to taste

Cut asparagus into 1 inch pieces (trim off rough fibrous parts on bottom) and thinly slice the mushrooms.

Simmer the mushrooms with a small amount of olive oil until tender, remove from heat, set aside, then simmer the asparagus just covered with water, with a pinch of salt, until tender.

While the asparagus is cooking, whisk the lemon juice, vinegar, Dijon mustard, garlic, olive oil, and black pepper together.

Once you have drained the asparagus and the mushrooms, gently toss them with the dressing and basil, add salt to taste. Top with Parmesan cheese.

Egg Nog Help!

Anyone have a good recipe for homemade egg nog? I have a bit of an aversion to thick drinks, so I don't drink the stuff myself. Mr. Red, however, starts thinking about egg nog in October and one of his few cooking adventures involved an attempt at homemade egg nog. The taste was good, but it turned out very lumpy. He has requested tips and a new recipe. Your advice is most appreciated.

Granola Recipe

In response to your requests, below is my granola recipe. What I love about granola is that you can really add anything to it (alright, not anything, but a lot of things). I have found that experimenting and omitting or adding things that I know my family likes makes the best granola for us. Here are the basics of what I use:

6 cups old fashioned rolled oats

1 cup natural wheat or barley cereal

1-2 cups sliced/crushed pecans/almonds (I like to use pecans b/c they are sweeter)

1/2 cup raw sugar or brown sugar (can omit or use less)

1 teaspoon salt

1-2 teaspoons cinnamon

1/2-3/4 cup apple juice or water (more water = more clusters, but you have to bake longer)

4 tablespoons of butter/safflower/coconut oil

1/2 cup honey

1-1.5 teaspoons vanilla

1/4-1/2 cup flaxseeds

zest of one orange

Can also add: dried pitted cherries, seedless raisins, dates, dried rasberries, dried blueberries, dried peaches, etc.

Mix all ingredients together, oats should start to stick together in clumps. You should taste granola for right amount of sugar/honey. Spread on cookie sheets and bake at 300, stirring every 15 minutes until golden and slightly crunchy--about 1 hour. Stir in dried fruit after it has cooled. Enjoy!

Salsa Recipe

Tomatoes are almost in season, so here is my very simple fresh salsa recipe, you can either blend these ingredients in a food processor, or my preference is to dice them up:

2 ripe farm fresh tomatoes
1/4-1/2 of an onion (preferably sweet or red onion)
2T cilantro (fresh)
1 clove garlic
1 jalepeno (more or less for spice)
salt to taste
juice of 1/2 a lime (optional)

You can make this salsa sweet by adding a mango (delicious as a sauce on fresh fish (like Tilapia)

If anyone has added tips or other great salsa recipes, feel free to leave them in the comments.