This is lovely

Salad Parador

I confess that I’m not sure about the concept of a warm salad. Why not just call it a vegetable side dish? Be that as it may, this was absolutely delicious. Part of that no doubt due to the fresh chard from my garden. I adapted this recipe from All Around the World Cookbook, by Sheila Lukins.

My changes: I used frozen haricots verts, a vine-ripened tomato (since I didn’t have any cherry tomatoes), and oil-marinated olives instead of brine-marinated.

Technically, the salad is supposed to be assembled on each individual plate, with greens first, then chard stems and beans, then tomatoes and shrimp and topped off by the olives. But since I live in a household of two and a half, I quartered the recipe and just ended up tossing everything together at the end and – yes – serving it as a side dish.

½ pound Swiss chard
extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp minced garlic (about 1 clove)
2 oz. haricots verts (frozen)
kosher salt and course ground black pepper to taste
1 ripe tomato, seeds removed and roughly chopped
¼ pound medium shrimp, peeled and deveined
½ tsp dried thyme
2 ½ tsp balsamic vinegar
2 tbsp black olives (oil marinated, pitted and sliced into slivers)

Cut the stems from the leaves of Swiss chard. Slice the stems on the diagonal ½ inch thick. Cut the leaves into ¼-inch-thick slivers.

Heat a small amount of olive oil (1 tsp or so) in a non-stick skillet over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook about 1 minute. Add the Swiss chard stems and sauté to soften slightly, about 3 minutes. Transfer to a bowl and set aside.

Heat some more olive oil in the skillet and add the haricots verts. Cook over medium heat until crisp-tender, shaking the pan occasionally for even cooking, about 4 minutes. Add the beans to the Swiss chard stems and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Heat some more olive oil in the skillet and add the tomatoes, shrimp, thyme, and salt and pepper to taste. Cook over medium heat, shaking the skilled and turning the shrimp once or twice, until the shrimp are cooked through, about 3 minutes. Transfer to bowl and set aside.

Heat a little more oil in the skilled and add the Swiss chard leaves. Sauté, stirring constantly, until nicely wilted but still slightly crunchy, about 2 minutes. Transfer to a bowl. Toss the leaves with the balsamic vinegar and season with salt and pepper.

Combine chard leaves with stems, beans, tomatoes, shrimp and olives.

Leftover Fishcakes

from The Illustrated Kitchen Bible
10 oz. leftover snapper, flaked
1 cup mashed potatoes
2 scallions, minced
2 tbsp chopped parsley
grated zest and juice of ½ lemon
½ tsp Dijon mustard
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1 large egg, beaten
¾ cup dried bread crumbs
½ cup vegetable oil

Mix flaked fish, mashed potato, scallions, parsley, lemon zest and juice, and mustard together in a bowl. Season with salt and pepper.

Divide the mixture into 12 cakes. Place the flour in a small dish, the beaten egg in another, and the bread crumbs in a third dish. Roll each fishcake in the flour, then dip into the egg, and coat with the bread crumbs.

Heat the oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. In batches, add the cakes and cook about 5 minutes, turning once, until golden brown. Transfer to paper towels to drain. Serve hot.

Comments: Not bad, but a little bland. I used snapper instead of the smoked haddock called for in the recipe. Also didn’t have scallions or fresh parsley on hand so I had to make do with dried.

Shrimp Jambalaya

2 tbsp vegetable oil
3 oz. smoked sausage, sliced
1 tsp. paprika
4 garlic cloves, chopped
1/2 onion, chopped
1 Anaheim chili, seeded and chopped*
2 celery stalks, chopped
1/2 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into 1-inch pieces**
1/2 lb. peeled, raw medium shrimp
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp. thyme
1/2 tsp. oregano
1 1/3 cup long-grain rice
2 1/3 cups chicken stock***
2 green onions, trimmed and thinly sliced
Salt and cayenne pepper

Heat the oil in a large, deep frying pan. Add the sausage and fry until lightly browned. Stir in the paprika.
Add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds, then add the onion, chili, and celery. Cook over medium heat until lightly browned.

Add the chicken, shrimp, bay leaf, thyme, and oregano and fry over medium heat for 5 minutes.

Add the rice and stir for 2 minutes. Add the chicken stock and ½ teaspoon of salt and bring to a boil, then cover and simmer for about 15 minutes, until the rice has absorbed all the liquid and is tender.****

Stir in the green onions and some cayenne pepper to taste. Serves 3-4 people.

*Recipe calls for green bell pepper and red chili pepper. I used an Anaheim because I didn’t like the look of the bell peppers and red chilies in the store today and I also didn’t want it to be too spicy.

**I sprinkled the chicken with kosher salt for some extra seasoning and also to compensate for the fact that I used salt-free chicken stock.

***I used a little too much chicken stock and ended up cooking the jambalaya longer than the recipe calls for.

****More like 20 minutes plus additional time to sit with the lid on.

Romesco sauce

From A New Way to Cook, by Sally Schneider

2 ancho chiles
20 blanched whole almonds
1 thick slice white peasant bread, crusts removed
¼ cup fruity extra virgin olive oil
3 garlic cloves, peeled
About ½ teaspoon kosher salt
Roasted Garlic Puree [Basically 3 whole heads garlic, roasted at 400 for about 40 minutes, then squeeze roasted garlic out of the skins and mash with a fork]
1 medium tomato
2 to 3 teaspoons red wine vinegar or balsamic vinegar
Pinch of cayenne pepper
Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Remove stems and seeds from ancho chiles and break into pieces. In a large heavy skillet, toast the chiles over moderate heat, turning occasionally with a spatula to prevent them from burning, until they begin to darken and smell pungent, about 3 minutes. Transfer to a medium bowl and cover with about 1 cup boiling water. Let soak for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, spread the almonds on a baking sheet and roast, rearranging occasionally, until golden and fragrant, about 10 minutes. Set aside.

While the almonds are roasting, brush the bread with 1 teaspoon of the olive oil. Place on a small baking sheet and toast till dry and golden. Slice one of the [raw] garlic cloves lengthwise in half and rub both sides of the bread with the cut sides of the garlic. Sprinkle with salt. Set aside; reserve the garlic. Drain the chiles and pat dry on paper towels.

In a food processor, finely chop the almonds, scraping the sides down occasionally. Break the bread into 1-inch pieces, add to the work bowl, and process to fine crumbs. Add the ancho chiles and garlic puree.

Slice the tomato crosswise in half. Squeeze out the juice and seeds and discard. Working directly over the work bowl, rub the cut sides across the large holes of a metal grater so that the flesh is coarsely grated but the skin remains intact in your hand. Discard the skin.

With the motor running, drizzle in all but 1 tablespoon of the remaining olive oil. Add the vinegar, cayenne, and pepper to taste, and transfer to a bowl.

In a mortar, mash the fresh garlic, including the cut clove, and ½ teaspoon salt to a paste. Stir into the sauce.

Just before serving, stir in the reserved 1 tablespoon oil, without totally incorporating it.

The guy who invented the Fifties works right down the hall from me. Apparently, nostalgia toward the Fifties as a Happy Time (along with the invention of the Greaser as the quintessential Fifties rebel) can be dated to 1969 with the advent of Sha Na Na. And who invented Sha Na Na? The guy who works down the hall from me. Small world. I’ve never met him, by the way. I’ve never spoken with most of the people who work down the hall from me.

Pioche, Nev.

Another relic I dug up. This one was a piece I wrote after a family reunion near Pioche, Nevada in 1996, I believe. I don’t know why I never shopped it around, but here it is, complete with sidebar.

You can't visit Pioche, Nevada, without thinking that this must be what the west was really like a hundred years ago.

Pioche is often called a living ghost town, and there is something about the place that justifies that reputation. The air is clear and the food is good. The beef tastes like it was walking the range only yesterday, and the antique pump organs in the local museum look like they would still be at home in somebody’s front parlor off Main Street.

Few people visit the sleepy high desert town that claims to have once been the roughest, toughest mining camp in the west. Those who do make the two-hour trek up the two-lane Highway 93 from Las Vegas do not expect perks. This is Pioche, after all, where vigilantes once ruled the streets and the only law came out of the business end of a six‑shooter. Or so goes the legend.

Today there are no gunfights on Main Street. Most of the action has moved indoors to the Overland Hotel and Saloon, where folks gather on a weekend night to party and shoot some pool. The town’s a quiet place now, basking in the glow of its evil past and content with being a remote burg unable to conjure up a major flow of tourists.

It's a town where steak costs $12.95, and does not come with an all‑you‑can‑eat salad bar. Breakfast buffets are unheard of, and if you asked for one, you’d be laughed out of town. But there’s no better place to get a taste of old Nevada without the intrusive kookiness of the big casino culture found elsewhere in the state.

Which is the point. Tourist attractions are fun, but there's nothing like the thrill of discovering a place that's a little off the beaten track, where the people are real, the color is local and the food is solid and good without being pretentious.

If that means suffering through low-rent museums and higher food prices, so much the better. Because never do you doubt that you’re among people who are really doing what they do, instead of putting on a show.

Driving into town from the business loop off state highway 93 is like driving into another time period. The road winds through acres of stark evergreens, then turns the corner and jolts you with a genuine antique, an abandoned wooden tramway that once transported ore from Treasure Hill to the processing plant a few miles away.

Abandoned mine shafts riddle the terrain in and around Pioche, cordoned off with barbed wire and bright red signs warning “stay out, stay alive.” Pale‑pink tailings (mounded refuse from years of mining) dot half the mountainside above Pioche, mute testimony to what was once the town’s bread and butter.

During the boom years of 1870-1877, Pioche acquired a reputation as the roughest, most violent town in the west. Mining companies imported gunfighters to protect their claims, and the more than $20 million in ore they extracted. The law wasn't much use in Pioche, and legend has it that more than 70 men died violent deaths before even one died of natural causes.

Along with the boom years came exuberant graft and corruption, a seedy fact the town seems almost proud of. The old county courthouse is mute testament to that sordid fact of frontier life. Originally planned at a cost of a little over $16,000, mismanagement and old-fashioned corruption brought the total price of the courthouse to $1 million before the town finally paid it off more than 50 years after it was built.

The courthouse and “boot hill” both serve as reminders of a time when law didn't have much meaning, even to the people who supposedly upheld it. Town literature, in fact, claims the sheriff's office was such a lucrative source of bribes that it brought in $40,000 per year to the lucky occupant.

But though it's a living relic of another time, that isn't to say things have not changed. Pioche today is far from the wild mining camp of the boom years. Though the area still supports some mining, Pioche survived where other mining camps failed partly because it was designated the Lincoln County seat in 1871. Mining has been revived through the years, with new developments currently being investigated in the mountains around Pioche.

And there’s no getting around the most obvious change. During the boom years of the 1870s Pioche claimed up to 10,000 residents. Now it has 600. At its most prosperous, Pioche had 72 saloons and two daily newspapers. It now has three restaurants (one former restaurateur told us she switched to selling antiques when she realized Pioche just didn't need four restaurants) and the weekly Lincoln County News is located down the highway at Caliente.

No more boisterous minors paint the town red on Saturday night. Now the crime and corruption that once demanded and tolerated a $40,000 per year sheriff is just a memory among the shadows on Main Street.