Local Ingredients: Caprese Egg White Omelette

On Saturday morning, I woke up feeling so relaxed.  For the first time in ages, Bret and I didn't have anything scheduled or planned for the day.  I let Bret sleep in and decided to get started on my day by making a healthy egg white omelette for breakfast.  While I usually make egg white omelettes with whatever frozen vegetables I have on hand, I had lots of fresh local ingredients to work with and I decided to make an egg white omelette using tomatoes, basil and mozzarella. 

I started out by chopping up some gorgeous yellow cherry tomatoes I had on hand.

I then washed and dried a handful of fresh basil from Atlas Farm.

I gave the basil a coarse shop and then put it aside.

I cubed a quarter of a ball of Fiore Di Nonno mozzarella cheese and also put that aside.

While I warmed up two skillets on the stove, I threw some leftover slices of bacon in the oven to cook while I prepared my omelettes.  To start on my omelettes, I added my cherry tomatoes to the pan and then poured in my egg whites.

I added some of the chopped basil, fresh cracked peppercorns, salt and oregano to the omelette and slowly let the omelette cook at medium heat. 

When the omelette was nearly ready, I added the cubed mozzarella to the omelette and then folded the omelette in half.  The omelettes slid off my non-stick pans so easily onto to the plate and I topped the omelettes with some fresh chopped basil.

Of course, no breakfast is complete without adding some bacon! 

When I woke Bret up, he told me that there is no better way to wake up than to the smell of bacon.  He was thrilled that I made this healthy and hearty breakfast.  The egg whites had a lot of nice flavor, especially from the sweet cherry tomatoes and the fresh chopped basil.  Since these three ingredients make up a Caprese salad, I decided to call this breakfast my Caprese egg white omelette, which is bound to make repeat appearances in my kitchen this summer!

What is your favorite kind of omelette?

Local Ingredients: Roasted Eggplant Pasta

Last week felt like an unbelievably long week.  By the time Friday rolled around, I was excited to head out of work and unwind with a kick-butt gym session and some time in the kitchen.  I was especially looking forward to cooking on Friday night because I had a lot of great fresh and local ingredients to work with, including some eggplants and a cucumber from my mom's garden!

While I love eggplant in any form, Bret isn't the biggest fan of its texture.  I decided to make a simple roasted eggplant pasta dish to utilize the eggplants in a way that that I thought Bret would enjoy.  I first started out by slicing my eggplant with the skin on and then eventually cubing it.

I tossed the cubed eggplant in a bowl with some extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper.

I spread the eggplant on a baking sheet and then got to work on my red Russian garlic from Siena Farms.  I have never worked with  this type of garlic before but I planned to do a simple roasted garlic preparation.  I cut off the top of the garlic bulb and found the most beautiful hints of red in the garlic cloves.

I drizzled the garlic bulb with olive oil and wrapped it in aluminum foil.  I put the garlic on the baking tray with the roasted eggplant and put it in the oven at 400 degrees for about twenty minutes. 

While the eggplant and garlic were in the oven, I put my pasta water on the stove and got to work on my pasta sauce.  Normally I would make my own sauce but I had a jar of Bertolli Marinara with Burgundy Wine open in the fridge from my beet green and bacon pizza.  Since I hate to let food go to waste, I decided to use this sauce as my base but doctor it up with some flavor. 

I added some fresh cracked peppercorns, salt, oregano, crushed red pepper flakes and onion powder.

After giving it a little taste, I also added a bit of olive oil and let the sauce simmer to infuse all of those great flavors.  I then got to work on my basil fresh from Atlas Farm.  I actually got way more basil than I expected so I suspect that there will be quite a bit of basil in my cooking this week!  I washed a bunch of leaves and finely chopped the basil.

When the garlic and eggplant were ready, I added both to my sauce, along with half of the chopped basil.  Both the eggplant and the garlic were so aromatic and added nice flavor and texture to the sauce.

While I drained the whole wheat angel hair pasta and tossed it in the sauce, Bret made a quick salad using the bag of mixed greens from Siena Farms, a cucumber from my mom's garden, and some delightful yellow cherry tomatoes.

I plated the pasta but decided something was missing.

So I topped it with a slice of Fiore Di Nonno mozzarella and some of the chopped basil.

I was really happy with this pasta sauce because it was full of flavor from the delicious Bertolli marinara base, the heat of the crushed red pepper flakes, the sweet roasted garlic and the hearty roasted eggplant.  Topping it off with the creamy mozzarella and chopped basil definitely added a fresh element to the dish.  Plus, the simple side salad was a cool refreshing contrast to this warm and hearty pasta dish.  Best of all, I absolutely love cooking with local ingredients from both local farms and from my mom's own garden!

What did you cook up this weekend?

Local Ingredients: Roasted Baby Carrots and Red Currant Wine Sauce

On Friday, we received our farmers market delivery from Go Greenologist.  Although we ordered some familiar produce, Bret and I are continuing to challenge ourselves by ordering at least one item a week that we have never cooked with before.  This week, our challenge item was a pint of red currants from Silverbrook Farms. 

In addition to the gorgeous red currants, we also had a bunch of beautiful baby carrots from Atlas Farm.

Since we had a jam-packed weekend, I didn't get a chance to work with these ingredients until last night.  We decided to use pork cutlets as our protein and make a red currant sauce with a side of roasted carrots.

To start, Bret removed the carrot fronds and washed the carrots.  We tried the carrot raw and it tasted so sweet and fresh.  You can really taste the difference when you eat fresh local ingredients.  Since the carrots tasted so great on its own, we didn't want to do too much to them to let the carrots' natural flavor shine.  Bret cut the carrots at a bias and I tossed it with some olive oil, herbs de Provence and fresh cracked black pepper.

When the oven was ready, we put the carrots on the top rack of the oven at 400 degrees.

While Bret had been washing and slicing the carrots, I rinsed the red currants and removed all of the currants from the vine.  I began by warming up a sauce pan with the red currants on medium heat.  For a liquid, I added about a cup of a delicious red wine - Casa Nuestra's 2007 Tinta St. Helena - that Bret's sister had given us as a gift from her favorite winery in Napa.

Since the red currants were tart, I added a few heaping spoonfuls of light brown sugar to sweeten the sauce up. 

I let the red currant wine sauce cook on medium high until the alcohol cooked down and the sauce began to thicken up.  While the red currant wine was cooking, we got to work on the pork cutlets.  Bret pat the cutlets dry and gave them a simple seasoning of fresh cracked salt and black pepper.  On a skillet, Bret browned both sides of the pork.

When the pork sufficiently seared, I moved the carrots to the bottom rack of the oven and placed the pork cutlets on the top rack for about ten minutes.  During this time, Bret and I had a glass of wine to unwind while everything was in the oven.

The end result was a very simple but delicious meal.  Since the pork cutlet was so big, Bret and I just split one between the two of us. 

The red currant wine sauce was thick and you could taste the sharp tartness of the red currants balanced by the slight sweetness of the brown sugar.  The roasted carrots had a natural sweetness and roasting it with the herbs helped keep the dish from becoming too sweet.  If I made this again, I'd add some rosemary to the red currant wine sauce but unfortunately I couldn't find any dried rosemary in my spice collection.

What have you made recently with local ingredients? 

I'd also like to announce the winner of my Olivia's Organics giveaway.  Using Random Integer, my winner is Christina Feeney, who would pair Olivia's Organics Baby Arugula salad with pears and Gorgonzola cheese.  Congratulations Christina!  Please email me by Wednesday 11:59 PM (EST) with your mailing address!

Thanks to everyone who participated and thanks to Olivia's Organics for offering this great giveaway to my readers!