Red Lentil Soup

One of the most popular dishes in the New York Times cooking database, with over 40,000 5-star ratings (the highest), is red lentil soup.  We've seen it mentioned and featured periodically in the paper and finally decide to make it.  The dish is based on a Turkish lentil soup, mercimek corbasi, and is light and spicy, with  bold red color.

Gathering the ingredients

We first sauté onion and garlic in olive oil until golden, then stir in tomato paste, cumin, chili powder, salt, and pepper, sautéing for an additional two minutes.

Sautéing

We next add chicken broth, water, red lentils, and diced carrot, bringing the mixture to a simmer and cooking until the lentils are soft, about 30 minutes.

Simmering

We remove half the soup, purée it in a food processor, return it to the pot, reheat the soup, and stir in lemon juice and cilantro.  We served drizzled with olive oil and dusted with chili powder.

Finishing up

Serving

We accompany the soup with a salad of arugula (topped with olive oil, salt, and pepper), mozzarella, tomato jam, and prosciutto, with a little drizzle of balsamic vinegar.

Salad

Dinner is served

What a simple, tasty dish.  Now that we've made in once, we're thinking about tweaking the recipe for the next time (less cumin and cilantro, perhaps some crunch such as bacon, pancetta, or croutons).

Spaghetti Aglio e Olio

The classic Italian dish of spaghetti aglio e olio is a simple meal made from spaghetti, olive oil, and garlic, often with Parmesan cheese, red pepper flakes for heat and parsley for freshness, using starchy pasta water to create a light sauce.

We make the dish with spaghetti that was given to us at the Monaco Open Tennis Tournament (upcoming blog) earlier this year as a gift for attendees.

Free spaghetti

We bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and add the pasta, cooking to just before al dente and saving 1½ cups of the pasta cooking water.

We add thin-sliced garlic to olive oil at medium heat and cook for two minutes, until the garlic turns gold on the edges.  We add red pepper flakes and cook for 30 more seconds, then the reserved pasta-cooking water, bringing it all to a boil.  We lower the heat, add one teaspoon of salt, and simmer for about five minutes, until the liquid is reduced by about a third.

Preparing ingredients

Starting with the garlic, adding red pepper flakes

We introduce the drained pasta to the garlic sauce and mix.  Off the heat, we add minced parsley and grated Parmesan cheese and toss well.  We allow the pasta to rest off heat for five minutes for the sauce to be absorbed, taste for seasoning, and serve warm with extra Parmesan on the side.

Adding the pasta

To accompany the pasta, we prepare a salad of romaine lettuce, grape tomatoes, radish, avocado, green onion, and mushrooms, with a dressing of  olive oil, lemon juice, mustard, shallot, salt, and pepper.

Dinner is ready

Simple, elegant, quick, and delicious.  Really good!

Garlicky Shrimp Tacos

We're thinking of shrimp for dinner and spot a recipe for garlicky shrimp tacos that sounds really tasty and we give it a try.  We start by making pico de gallo to accompany the dish, using a recipe that is fairly traditional, with the addition of chili peppers (jalapeño this time, although the recipe suggests both jalapeño and serrano).

We gently toss chopped tomatoes, cilantro, white onion, jalapeño, and garlic with lime juice, seasoning with salt and more lime juice as needed.  We then let the pico de gallo sit for a few minutes as the flavors meld

Pico de galla

For the tacos, we sear the shrimp in olive oil infused with garlic and smoked paprika.  We then add the shrimp to warm corn tortillas and dress the dish with crisp sliced radishes, guacamole, cilantro, and the pico de gallo.  After a final squeeze of lime, we are ready to serve.

Accoutrements

Shrimp ready to cook in garlic/smoked paprika olive oil

Shrimp are ready to go

Dinner is served

Make your own taco

What a great dish!  We'll make this again soon - simple, quick, and delicious!
 

Spring Color on Fox Island, Washington

Spring has arrived on Fox Island, Washington, and the trees and flowers are in full bloom.  We wander around our neighborhood and enjoy the colors.

Around the neighborhood

And, of course, towering over it all is Mount Rainier, 14,410 feet (4,392 meters) high and about 72 miles (116 km) away, topped with snow the entire year, currently in the spring covered in snow down to about 5,000 feet (1,524 meters).

Glimpses of Mount Rainier

And, while we're mentioning Mount Rainier, we'll share a photo of sunrise behind the mountain, viewed from Fox Island.

Sunrise at Mount Rainier

The colors of the trees and plants are starting to fade as we move toward summer, but enough remains to remind us how beautiful it is here in the PNW (Pacific Northwest).