The Whole Dish: Southern Oregon Food Blog

Just as there’s good reason to prepare chili for Super Bowl, guacamole is practically a must-have.

Maybe it’s the quantity (Mexico is in the midst of its Hass harvest) or the marketing (what could go better with chili and chips?), but Americans eat millions of pounds of avocados over Super Bowl weekend alone.

I’m just as partial to guacamole made with ripe, buttery avocados as the next person, but my definition of good isn’t necessarily everyone else’s. I prefer my guacamole fairly chunky and nearly unadulterated with lime juice, salt and a bit of chili or garlic powder.

My husband likes more of a puree mixed with salsa and has even been known to add sour cream and sweet Thai chili sauce. Like so many other things, we often resort to splitting up the avocados and pleasing ourselves.

Fans of chunky-style guacamole may find favor with this relish. The addition of radish is reminiscent of garnishes that come with roach-coach plates of tacos while cucumber is a bit more unconventional. But I’m betting this could score big with the Super Bowl crowds.

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Chipotle Chicken Tacos With Avocado-Cucumber Relish

1 tablespoon olive oil

2 tablespoons finely chopped red onion

1 garlic clove, peeled and finely chopped

2 to 4 chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, finely chopped

2 tablespoons honey

2 medium vine-ripened tomatoes, cored, seeded and diced

2 green onions, finely sliced

3 cups coarsely shredded roasted chicken breast

Salt and pepper, to taste

8 small corn tortillas

Avocado-Cucumber Relish (recipe follows)

Cilantro leaves, for garnish

Lime slices, for serving

Heat a medium saute pan over medium-high heat. Add the oil and onion to pan and cook for 2 minutes, stirring often. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute, then stir in the peppers, honey and tomatoes. Cook for 3 to 4 minutes or until most liquid from tomatoes has evaporated and mixture begins to thicken.

Add the green onions and chicken and mix well. Season with the salt and pepper to taste and remove from heat.

Heat the tortillas in a separate, small saute pan over medium-high heat for about 15 seconds on each side to warm through. Or warm in microwave.

Divide and spoon chicken mixture among tortillas, top each taco with the avocado relish and garnish with the cilantro leaves and serve with the lime slices.

Makes 4 servings of 2 tacos each.

AVOCADO-CUCUMBER RELISH: Peel, seed and dice 1 large, ripe avocado. Combine in a large mixing bowl with 1/4 cup seeded and finely chopped English cucumber; 3 tablespoons finely diced, red onion; 1 large, red radish, diced; 2 tablespoons finely chopped, fresh parsley or cilantro; and 1 tablespoon red-wine vinegar. Slowly drizzle in 2 teaspoons olive oil until combined and season to taste with salt. Cover, pressing plastic wrap firmly on relish and refrigerate until use.

— Recipe adapted by the Detroit Free Press from www.avocadocentral.com.

Football doesn’t exactly put me in the mood for fine food, not that I haven’t given it my best shot.

Last year, my husband uncharacteristically decided to watch the Super Bowl from the comfort of his own couch with only me to complete the cheering section. Because televised football can’t hold my attention for more than 10 minutes at a time — and because I’d be in the comfort of my own kitchen — I offered Will a four-course menu for the afternoon, a dish to go with each quarter.

I started with spiced, stove-top popcorn and chili-glazed cashews then moved on to sweet-potato wontons with a cilantro salad. My Asian-style, sweet-hot wings came next. Will was so stuffed that I had to save his banana-peanut butter milkshake for later.

Maybe it was because he fell asleep, but I didn’t hear much feedback on the spread — until this football season when Will started hinting around at multicourse Sunday lunches. I’ve been holding my breath against the suggestion that I repeat the exercise on a grander scale to host friends for this year’s NFL finale. But Will has come to realize that when required to feed a crowd, I’m all about make-ahead dishes that can be heated up and served buffet-style.

Meatballs are a popular item that can be made a couple of weeks ahead of time, frozen and then thawed in whatever sauce they’re to be served in. Chili, of course, is a classic dish that can be stretched with big bowls of tortilla chips and a vat of homemade guacamole.

I tend to make chili out of whatever I have on hand and usually include beans (Texans don’t have to tell me that’s not authentic). I’ve always been partial to green chili sauce and green salsas with Mexican dishes and think the following beanless recipe would elevate a Super Bowl spread. The key green ingredient, tomatillos, is a summer commodity but still should be readily available at many local grocers.

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Green Chili (aka Mean Green Pig)

3 1⁄2 pounds tomatillos, husked, rinsed and halved

1⁄4 cup olive oil, divided

1⁄2 teaspoon salt, divided

2 1⁄2 pounds boneless pork shoulder, cut into 1-inch pieces

Freshly ground pepper, to taste

2 medium yellow onions, peeled and chopped

2 jalapenos, diced

3 garlic cloves, peeled and minced

2 poblano chilies, roasted and diced small

2 cups chicken stock

Heat oven to 400 F. Toss half of the tomatillos with 2 tablespoons of the olive oil and 1⁄4 teaspoon salt; place on a rimmed baking sheet. Roast for 45 minutes. Meanwhile, puree remaining tomatillos in food processor and reserve 11⁄2 cups puree in a bowl. Add roasted tomatillos to processor and pulse until slightly chunky.

Season the pork with remaining salt and the pepper to taste. Heat remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil over medium-high heat in a large skillet and brown pork in batches. Transfer to a slow cooker. Add the onions and jalapenos to skillet and cook until softened. Add garlic and cook for 1 minute.

Put onions, jalapenos, garlic, poblanos, roasted tomatillos and the chicken stock in slow cooker. Cook on low until pork is falling-apart tender, about 6 hours. Add reserved tomatillo puree to pot; stir to incorporate. (Alternately, cook chili in a Dutch oven on low until meat is tender, for 2 hours or longer.)

Serve with fresh cilantro and queso fresco.

Makes 8 to 10 servings.

— Recipe adapted by the Chicago Tribune from Everyday Food magazine.

It’s time for slaws, at least if you ascribe to the philosophy of seasonal eating.

Cabbage, as one of my first Season to Taste columns noted, is available from local farmers even in the depths of winter. That column suggested using cabbage in pad thai, but slaw would not be put off another year, particularly with little but cilantro for inspiration in my sad winter garden.

Out of deference to my husband’s tastes, I skipped curry in a slaw to serve with salmon burgers earlier this week. Instead, I saved a few seasoning steps and sweetened the dish by combining a bit of mayonnaise and the apple vinaigrette featured with a recent column by Jan Roberts-Dominguez. Of course, I couldn’t help but adapt the vinaigrette recipe a bit, substituting fresh sage for the rosemary and onion and garlic for the shallot. I loved the result, though, and even stirred it into a wild-rice pilaf for richness.

To the cabbage slaw, I added chopped cilantro and green onion, as well as some powdered, dried chilies from the garden of HomeLife editor Dave Smigelski. The apple flavor wasn’t pronounced but could be alongside the celery root, celery and bell pepper in the recipe accompanying last week’s A la Carte story on Fuji apples. Lacking mayonnaise, that slaw also would lack creaminess, which some of Jan’s vinaigrette could remedy.

With a small pile of apples from the tree in my yard withering away, I tripled the recipe and plan on freezing it in portions, so I can drizzle it on salads throughout the winter and early spring. It also doubles as a sauce for meats, as Jan explained. I used it as spread on a grilled-cheese sandwich, too.

I can attest to the deliciousness of the andouille sausage sandwich pictured on the front page of this week’s A la Carte.

But as someone who doesn’t want to eat meat — even poultry or fish — all the time, I appreciate the efforts of establishments like Figgy’s Food Truck to provide tasty vegetarian options. According to local cooks, including Figgy’s proprietor Melissa Jones-Hanscom, more diners are asking for their meals without meat.

I’ve blogged about this concept before — known to some as “flexitarianism” — and am pleased to see that in the past few years, it’s caught on, apparently for reasons of health and economy, not ideology. No longer should a meatless meal be considered a compromise.

It comes as no surprise to vegetarians that mushrooms are a great way to add savoriness and substance to dishes lacking meat. Amid the divergence of my husband’s food preferences from mine, I’ve always been grateful that we both at least love mushrooms, so they’re a staple at our house and often the basis for a meal when I feel we’ve had meat a bit too often.

This week, I based a lasagna around mushrooms with winter squash in a bechamel sauce. Because I only had fresh button mushrooms on hand, I dipped into a frozen cache of dried morel mushrooms picked last spring by the newspaper’s outdoors editor. Reconstituting the morels, I was left with a handy, flavored liquid to thin my sauce in the absence of a good stock. My husband, Will, commented that it tasted like gravy, which could be no higher compliment coming from him.

I assembled the dish the night before using egg roll wrappers for the pasta sheets (they’re basically the same), a mixture of ricotta and lemon-flavored goat cheese, the sauteed mushroom-onion-garlic mixture and raw acorn squash, sliced very thinly so it would cook through. I topped the whole thing with fresh mozzarella and baked it the next day for 45 minutes at 350 F.

Usually, a quicker pasta dish is part of my weekly repertoire. The following, courtesy of the Detroit Free Press, is another way to maximize the flavor of dried mushrooms by infusing them into stock.

Remember to use a damp paper towel to wipe away any dirt on mushrooms. Soaking them in water is a good way to dilute their flavor and prolong their cooking, as mushrooms are like sponges. For very soiled mushrooms, rinse them quickly under cool water and immediately wipe them dry.

If possible, purchase loose mushrooms and store them in a paper bag. Storing them in plastic or another type of enclosed container traps condensation and causes them to spoil quicker. For that reason, I avoid purchasing mushrooms packaged in foam and plastic.

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Mushroom and Marsala Fettuccine

2 cups vegetable stock

1 ounce dried mushrooms, such as porcini

Salt, to taste

3⁄4 to 1 pound fettuccine or pappardelle pasta

3 tablespoons butter

3⁄4 pound cremini or mini portobello mushrooms, thinly sliced

1 small bunch Tuscan (lacinato) kale or Swiss chard, stemmed and thinly sliced

4 shallots, peeled and chopped

2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped

Black pepper, to taste

Freshly grated nutmeg, to taste

3⁄4 cup Marsala wine

1 cup heavy whipping cream (or a mix of heavy cream and or half-and-half)

A few sprigs fresh sage, very thinly sliced

Grated Parmesan cheese for serving (about 1⁄2 cup)

In a small saucepan, place the stock and dried mushrooms. Bring to a low boil. Reduce heat and simmer about 15 minutes to reconstitute mushrooms. Strain mushrooms from stock and chop. Reserve stock.

Bring a large pot of water to boil, salt it, add the pasta and cook until al dente. Drain, reserving a little cooking water.

While pasta is cooking, in a large skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the fresh mushrooms and increase heat to medium-high. Cook, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms darken, about 7 to 8 minutes. Add the kale, shallots and garlic; season with salt, pepper and nutmeg to taste.

Cook for about 7 minutes longer, then stir in the wine. Add chopped, reconstituted mushrooms and all but 1⁄4 cup of mushroom-infused stock.

Stir in the cream and cook to reduce and thicken. Toss pasta with sauce, adding reserved pasta cooking water if sauce is too thick to coat pasta nicely. Garnish with the sage and serve with the cheese on the side.

Makes 4 generous servings.

— Recipe adapted by the Detroit Free Press from Rachel Ray magazine’s February 2011 issue.

This blog’s last post about slow-cooker meals got a few kudos on Facebook. So I figured I’d keep going on the topic, particularly since receiving a recipe today that I’ve never seen touted for a slow-cooker.

Bouillabaise is the quintessential French seafood stew, not unlike American cioppino, the topic of Jan Roberts-Dominguez’s latest column. I prefer the former for its fennel, leek and saffron, but when you’ve got a variety of seafood in your bowl, it’s hard to go wrong, provided it isn’t overcooked.

Fresh seafood, of course, is ideal. But I typically say the freshest seafood most people are going to find at Rogue Valley grocers actually is in the freezer cases.

I blogged before about how frozen seafood has a poor reputation, undeserved in recent decades that have seen major advances in freezing technology. Today’s flash-frozen and vacuum-sealed seafood — usually on a boat mere hours after it’s been plucked from the ocean — is preferable to the vast majority of seafood that appears fresh in refrigerator cases but actually was previously frozen and then thawed for who knows how many days.

Frozen clams and mussels are precooked and therefore less flavorful but very easy to use — no scrubbing required. And I’ve been very impressed with wild Gulf shrimp I’ve recently purchased frozen at Food 4 Less in Medford. The difference in flavor between farmed shrimp (the vast majority of which are) is evident. 

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Slow-Cooker Bouillabaise

2 cups chopped, peeled and seeded fresh tomatoes or chopped canned tomatoes

3 medium carrots, peeled and chopped

2 ribs celery, chopped

1 large fennel bulb, chopped, green tops trimmed and feathery leaves chopped and reserved

1 medium leek, trimmed, well-washed and sliced

3 tablespoons tomato paste

1 teaspoon herbes de Provence

1⁄4 teaspoon hot smoked paprika or ground red (cayenne) pepper

1 pinch saffron threads, crumbled

Salt, to taste

1 cup dry white wine

1 cup bottled clam juice

1 pound boneless, skinless fish fillets, such as halibut, grouper or monkfish

8 ounces sea scallops

8 ounces medium shrimp, peeled and deveined

6 small hardshell clams, soaked and scrubbed (optional)

1 small loaf French bread, sliced and toasted

Combine tomatoes, carrots, celery, fennel and leek in a large slow cooker. Add the tomato paste, herbes de Provence, paprika, saffron and salt to taste. Add 4 cups water, the wine and clam juice. Cover and cook on high for 4 to 5 hours or until vegetables are tender.

Cut the fish into bite-sized chunks and stir into soup with the sea scallops, shrimp and clams (if using). Cover and cook for 30 minutes more. Taste and adjust seasonings if necessary.

Place a slice of bread into each soup dish. Add the bouillabaise and sprinkle with fennel fronds. Pass remaining bread at the table. Makes 6 servings.

— Recipe adapted by the Saint Louis Post-Dispatch from “The French Slow Cooker,” by Michele Scicolone (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012).

With wintertime temperatures lower than last year’s and energy costs among the year’s highest (at least according to my power bill), the house is cold. Almost cold enough to discourage me from cooking dinner on these dark, dreary evenings.

But a hearty dinner is the ultimate winter warmer with the one-pot meal a strategy for keeping prep to a minimum and extending the food’s usefulness over several days. Slow cookers are a classic and much-loved way to go about shortening the time it takes to get dinner on the table by stretching cooking time over the whole day. Slow cookers, energy-sipping appliances that they are, also are a way to cut down on energy use.

While they would seem foolproof, there are a few points to ponder on the slow cooker, aka Crock-Pot. An October story in A la Carte covered some. Here are a few more courtesy of the Detroit Free Press:

Always make sure the insert is half-full, but no more than two-thirds full, to avoid spillovers once the liquids heat up.

Allow enough time. Slow cookers take a while to warm up and, of course, take a while to cook.

Don’t peek. Try not to lift the lid. You lose at least 20 minutes of cooking time when you do so.

Don’t cook frozen meat or poultry in the slow cooker because it will not reach a safe temperature in time to halt bacterial growth.

Add tender vegetables like zucchini, bell peppers and peas during the last 30 minutes or so. Cooking them longer could make them mushy.

Most slow cookers have two settings: low and high. Typically, low is around 200 F, and high is 300 F. But you should not simply translate the recipe to oven temperature following those settings. The slow cooker uses a wrap-around type of heat, and the food is closer to the heat source than it is in the oven.

When converting recipes to a slow cooker, the amount of liquid may need to be reduced because liquid does not evaporate in a slow cooker like it does on the stovetop.

There are other routes, of course, to a one-pot meal using one’s stovetop or oven. Using my Dutch oven Saturday, I braised a leg of lamb in red wine and stock with some vegetables and dried mushrooms. What we couldn’t eat that night became a pasta sauce, taco filling and contribution to lentil stew.

If I had wanted to roast the lamb, I could have used my ceramic tagine, a Christmas gift two years ago from my mother-in-law. The distinctive, conical lid of this traditional North African cooking vessel collects moisture and condenses it back onto the food. One-pot dishes cooked in it, which often contain couscous and dried fruit, also are known as tagines.

Learn more tricks for one-pot meals and sample five dishes that freeze well from chef Sandy Dowling, who has a couple of spots left in her “One Pot Meals Redux” class Wednesday evening at The Willows Cooking School in Central Point. Call 541-665-3020 to register.

Or consider the Jan. 24 “Stovetop Braising” class at The Right Plan in Medford. In the meantime, try this Free Press recipe, a faux tagine of sorts meant for the Crock-Pot.

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Slow-Cooker Garlic Chicken

3 pounds chicken pieces, bone in and skin on, patted dry

Coarse salt and ground black pepper, to taste

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 large onion, peeled, halved and thinly sliced

6 garlic cloves, peeled and halved

2 teaspoons dried thyme

1 cup dry white wine, such as sauvignon blanc

1⁄3 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup pearl couscous

Chopped fresh parsley, for garnish

Season the chicken with the salt and pepper. In a large skillet, heat the oil over medium-high. In batches, cook chicken, skin-side down, until skin is golden-brown, about 10 minutes. Turn and brown on second side about 5 minutes.

Combine the onion, garlic and thyme in a 5- to 6- quart slow cooker and season with salt and pepper. Top with chicken, skin-side up, in a tight layer.

In a small bowl, whisk together the wine and flour until smooth and add to slow cooker. Cover and cook on high until chicken is tender, about 3 1⁄2 hours (or 7 hours on low). Cook couscous according to package instructions. Serve chicken and sauce over couscous, sprinkled with the parsley.

Makes 4 servings.

— Recipe adapted by the Detroit Free Press from Everyday Food magazine’s December 2011 issue.

It’s always gratifying to hear when A la Carte inspires a reader to get in the kitchen.

Sue Webb, an adventurer in most arenas except the kitchen, had great success with this week’s step-by-step for caramelizing onions. Then she made the onions into a meal with the additions of broth and wine for the quintessential French-style soup.

With freezing soups a recent topic on this blog, it’s worth pointing out that French Onion also freezes really well, without the addition of bread and cheese, of course. Then when the craving strikes, it’s all ready to thaw out and throw in the oven with the classic toppings.

My husband rates this dish very high on his dinnertime wish list, so I’ve been caught off guard by his request for it when I don’t have the ingredients on hand. It takes no fewer than three onions, preferably four or five, to make a pot of soup. And I’ve never really seen a way to stretch the sparse ingredients until The Associated Press moved the following recipe last fall.

Garlic I add to my French Onion, but leeks and shallots also are part of the same family of ingredients. The former I typically have in winter, along with dried mushrooms. Adding their soaking liquid is another method of ramping up the flavor in the broth.

And the longer the onions caramelize, the better their flavor, which is why I would exercise all my patience at the stove and double the cooking time listed here. I’d probably add the leeks several minutes before the shallots, garlic and herbs, too.

I like the idea of using a cheese other than Swiss, although I find fontina a bit bland. I would venture that the smoked Gouda Webb considered could hit the mark here.

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Onion and Mushroom Soup

2 ounces dried porcini or similar mushrooms

5 tablespoons butter, divided

3 large sweet onions, peeled and thinly sliced

1⁄4 cup white wine

2 leeks, white parts only, cleaned and sliced

2 shallots, peeled and chopped

2 garlic cloves, peeled and minced

2 tablespoons each chopped fresh thyme and rosemary

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 cups each chicken and beef broth

Salt and ground black pepper, to taste

4 slices stale, crusty bread

4 slices fontina cheese

Chopped fresh chives, for garnish

Cut or break the dried mushrooms into small pieces and place in heat-safe bowl. Pour 1 cup boiling water over mushroom pieces and set aside.

In large saucepan over medium heat, melt 3 tablespoons of the butter. Add the onions and cook slowly until well-browned, stirring regularly, about 15 to 20 minutes. If onions begin to get too browned, add a couple teaspoons of water. When onions are browned and caramelized, add the wine and stir to deglaze pan. Add the leeks, shallots, garlic, thyme, rosemary and remaining butter.

Increase heat to medium-high and cook until leeks are tender, about 6 to 8 minutes. Add the flour and stir to coat vegetables. Pour in the chicken and beef broths, stir well and bring to boiling. Add steeped mushrooms (including liquid), then reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes. Season with the salt and pepper.

Preheat broiler.

Ladle soup into 4 oven-safe crocks. Top each with a slice of the bread, then a slice of the cheese. Arrange crocks on rimmed baking sheet and broil until cheese is melted and begins to brown, 1 to 2 minutes. Serve topped with the fresh chives.

Makes 4 servings.

After a year of writing a monthly column on seasonal eating and cooking for the newspaper’s HomeLife magazine, I’m almost painfully aware of which foods are freshest, most cost-effective and environmentally sound at any given time throughout the year.

Occasional wintertime trips to Southern California always remind of the natural cycle of citrus, which isn’t observed too readily in the Rogue Valley. Just about any decades-old home in Los Angeles has a lemon tree in the yard, and even office buildings may have dwarf lime trees in pots outside the front doors. It took all my sense of propriety not to help myself.

Happily, citrus travels well to our grocery stores and is best enjoyed for the next couple of months. I’ll confess to buying lemons and limes year-round for cooking but perish the thought of purchasing dried-out tangerines and grapefruits in summertime.

But there’s some good news for Rogue Valley locavores striving to eat in season. Ashland Food Co-op has a supplier of citrus in Northern California that fits into the locavore’s range, provided it’s 200 miles, not 100. But logic says that Rogue Valley locavores purchasing foods from Portland should include Northern California on the opposite end of their radius.

It’s most tempting, of course, to throw the whole eat-local concept out the window in the depth of winter, when little fresh produce is available that wasn’t stored or shipped very long distances. Anything bright, fresh and juicy in the perfect counterpoint to starchy roots and bitter greens.

Knowing its shoppers need a little pick-me-up, the Co-op kicks off more than a week of citrus tastings at its store, with recipes for oranges available for sampling at 4 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays and at 11 a.m. Saturdays through Jan. 21. The first dish, which also uses grapefruit and avocados, sounds similar to one of my favorite wintertime salads. The following recipe is one rendition. I also love the combination of grapefruit and avocado with grilled haloumi cheese as the protein and toasted pine nuts instead of sunflower seeds.

Seared Scallops and Butter Lettuce Salad With Grapefruit Vinaigrette

3⁄4 pound medium sea scallops

Kosher salt and ground black pepper, as needed

1 cup Wondra or all-purpose flour, for dredging

1⁄2 cup vegetable oil, divided

1⁄3 cup grapefruit juice

1 small shallot, finely chopped

1 tablespoon unseasoned rice vinegar

1⁄8 teaspoon sugar

2 small heads butter lettuce, torn into bite size pieces

1 ripe avocado, pitted and sliced

1 small pink grapefruit, peeled and sectioned, each section halved.

1 medium scallion, green part only, thinly sliced crosswise

1⁄4 cup sunflower seeds

Season the scallops to taste with the salt and pepper. Spread the Wondra or flour on a plate and dredge scallops in it, shaking off any excess.

In a large skillet over medium, heat 2 tablespoons of the oil. Add scallops to skillet and saute for 2 to 3 minutes per side or until cooked through. Transfer scallops to a plate and let stand until they are at room temperature.

In a small saucepan, simmer the grapefruit juice until it reduces to 2 tablespoons. Transfer to a small bowl. Add the shallot, rice vinegar, sugar and 1⁄4 teaspoon salt. Whisk until sugar and salt have dissolved. Slowly whisk in remaining oil, then whisk in juices that have accumulated on scallop plate until dressing reaches desired consistency.

Toss the lettuce with 1⁄3 cup dressing. Mound lettuce over 4 plates and divide scallops, the avocado and grapefruit over each salad. Sprinkle each plate with some of the scallions and sunflower seeds and drizzle with remaining dressing.

Makes 4 servings.

The lapse in entries to this blog isn’t for lack of desire to start the new year with some new menus, preferably ones that leave off the butter and cream cheese of the previous month’s.

It’s lack of food that’s left me short on inspiration. I’m closing in on three weeks without a visit to the grocery store since a Christmas Eve sojourn on the coast, followed by a reprieve from cooking for family in the Rogue Valley, a week of my mother-in-law’s Christmas dinner leftovers and then a trip to the Rose Bowl.

While my freezer is stocked with meat and the pantry with a few root vegetables and squashes, a month’s worth of deadlines crammed into a week have left me short on time for meal-planning. So in instances like these, I’m always grateful for a few quarts of homemade soup in the freezer.

Hardly an original concept — and one of the first topics of this blog — freezing several servings of soup here and there is so simple for the home cook yet feels so clever and virtuous when other food is in short supply. Beyond its warmth and nourishment, soup can also be a connection to seasons past.

Tonight, we’re down to our final quart of minestrone, made from the last zucchini, green beans and eggplants of early fall paired with some of the year’s harvest of fingerling potatoes. All that I need to do to bulk it up is boil a bit of pasta or add a can of cannelini beans.

Most of us have a repertoire of soups suited to the seasons and our families’ tastes. But it never hurts to shake it up in ways that might not be visually apparent but can boost favorite flavors to the next level. Here are a couple of ideas from Ellise Pierce aka the Cowgirl Chef, author of a Tex-Mex blog and new cookbook.

Pierce pumps up the classic butternut squash soup with chipotles in adobo and, more innovative, roasted red bell pepper soup with tequila. Talk about a salve for the sniffles! In both cases, freeze unneeded portions after blending but before adding the cream and garnishes.

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Butternut Squash-Chipotle Soup

Olive oil, as needed

2 garlic cloves, peeled and minced

1 chipotle chile (in adobo), finely chopped

1 1/2 pounds butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cut into 1-inch cubes

1 cup chicken stock

Sea salt, to taste

About 8 pieces thinly sliced chorizo (or any other spicy cured sausage)

1/4 cup cream

Drizzle a little olive oil into a stockpot and toss in the minced garlic and chopped chipotle. Turn heat to medium-low and cook for a minute or two, or just until you can smell garlic. Watch this carefully — you don’t want garlic to burn.

Add the butternut squash, chicken stock and a pinch of salt. Cover and turn heat down to low. Cook for 15 to 20 minutes or just until squash is soft.

While squash is cooking, fry the chorizo. Cut each piece into skinny strips (about 6 1/4 inch), toss them into a skillet and turn heat to medium-low. They’ll crisp up in less than 5 minutes. Let them drain on a paper towel.

Carefully pour squash mixture into a blender, add the cream and blend until smooth and creamy. Taste for seasonings and serve immediately with crispy chorizo strips.

Makes 4 first-course servings.

Roasted Red Bell Pepper-Tequila Soup

2 pounds red bell peppers

Olive oil, as needed

2 garlic cloves, peeled and minced

2 cups vegetable or chicken stock

Sea salt and pepper, to taste

2 tablespoons of tequila (blanco)

1/3 cup cream

Chopped, fresh cilantro, for garnish

Preheat oven to broil. Roast the red peppers by putting them on a foil-lined cookie sheet, cutting a few slits in them (so they don’t explode) and sliding them into oven. Watch them carefully and turn them over as they char, so all sides get evenly blackened. Put cooked peppers in a bowl of ice water and let them cool for 10 minutes or so; skins should come right off. Be sure and remove membranes and seeds, too.

Put a little olive oil in a saucepan, along with the minced garlic, and turn heat to medium-low. Let this cook just until you can smell garlic; add peppers and the vegetable or chicken stock, a pinch of salt and pepper and give it a stir.

Using a hand blender, puree pepper-stock mixture and let this come to a boil. Turn heat to low and let it cook for 15 minutes or so. Add the tequila and cream and taste for seasonings. Serve immediately with the chopped cilantro.

Makes 4 first-course servings.

Elegant doesn’t have to mean expensive. You can still ring in the new year with a bit of panache if you’re smart about where to part with a few bucks and where to save your pennies.

Lower-end sparkling wines put the fizz in your festive cocktails for just a few dollars, as explained in this week’s A la Carte. When you mix in fruit juices and a splash of liqueur, the swill’s sweetness just adds to the enjoyment.

Partying on a budget, perhaps predictably, was the topic of a recent Newsday story. Writer Lauren Chattman offered a few savvy strategies for maximizing flavors of some inexpensive ingredients.

Purchase cheeses like Brie from Costco, rather than a gourmet grocer, and bake it to intensify the aroma and taste.

Unwrap a 1-pound wheel of Brie and trim the rind away from one end. Return it to the bottom of its box, rind side down, place on a baking sheet and bake in a 300-degree oven until just melted, about 30 minutes. Let your guests scoop the melted Brie, right from the box, onto slices of baguette. For added appeal, serve with chutney or marmalade, even leftover cranberry sauce if it was part of your Christmas feast.

Wild mushrooms come at a premium, with truffles the ultimate luxury. But a tablespoon or two of truffle-flavored oil can add luxurious flavor to inexpensive appetizers. Try drizzling 2 tablespoons of truffle oil over 2 quarts of salted popcorn (sprinkle 1⁄2 cup of grated Parmesan cheese on as well, if you’d like). Or drizzle 2 tablespoons of truffle oil over a pizza topped with sauteed button mushrooms and ricotta cheese.

Don’t forget about eggs. They’re cheap, versatile and make perfect, little bites. Deviled eggs can be flavored with just about any seasoning (curry powder, pesto, anchovy paste). I’ve been stocking wasabi as a pantry staple for several years now and use it to jazz up tuna salads and even mashed potatoes, which had Thanksgiving guests raving.

Chattman suggests topping wasabi-spiked eggs with salmon roe instead of caviar. If you can’t find fish eggs in the Rogue Valley, consider substituting a few salad shrimp.

If you want to get really frugal, reach for beans. Cooked garbanzo beans, drained, roasted and tossed with salt and a mixture of spices (try cumin, coriander and chili powder) are as tasty as salted cashews for a fraction of the price. And, of course, homemade hummus costs just a few cents compared with several dollars, even at Costco. Plus it’s tastier.

When I found myself short on supplies to create a dish to share at a chef’s birthday party last year, I made dip from white beans and homegrown, roasted garlic and served it topped with za’atar, an unusual spice blend from the Middle East. For my minimal effort, I got a bunch of kudos from the crowd.

Here are some recipes from Newsday in the same vein. 

MCT photo

Lemony White Bean Dip With Pita Chips

6 (6-inch) pita breads, split and cut into 8 wedges each

Nonstick cooking spray, as needed

2 teaspoons paprika

Salt, to taste

2 (15-ounce) cans white beans, drained and rinsed

2 garlic cloves, peeled coarsely chopped

1 cup tightly packed fresh parsley leaves

1⁄4 cup lemon juice

1⁄4 cup olive oil

Preheat oven to 350 F. Spread the pita wedges on baking sheets in a single layer and spray with some of the nonstick cooking spray. Sprinkle with the paprika and salt and bake until crisp and golden, about 15 minutes. Cool completely on baking sheets and store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.

Place the beans, garlic, parsley, lemon juice, oil and 2 tablespoons water in work bowl of a food processor and process until smooth, scraping down sides of bowl once or twice, as necessary. Scrape mixture into a small bowl and season with salt. Refrigerate until ready to serve, up to 1 day. Makes 2 cups.

Let dip come to room temperature and serve with pita chips and raw vegetables for dipping.

MCT photo

Wasabi Deviled Eggs With Salmon Roe

8 large eggs

1⁄3 cup mayonnaise

2 teaspoons wasabi powder

2 scallions, white and light green parts, finely chopped

Salt, to taste

2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons salmon roe (available in refrigerator case near fish at most supermarkets and fish markets)

Place the eggs in a pan in a single layer and cover with 1 inch of water. Bring water to a boil over high heat, cover pan, remove from heat and let stand 10 minutes. Use a slotted spoon to transfer eggs to a bowl of ice water to chill for 5 minutes.

Peel eggs and halve lengthwise. Scoop yolks into small bowl and mash with a fork until smooth. Stir in the mayonnaise, wasabi powder and scallions. Season to taste with the salt.

Spoon yolk mixture back into whites. (At this point, eggs can be placed on a platter, covered with plastic wrap and refrigerated for up to 1 day). Top each egg with 1⁄2 teaspoon salmon roe just before serving.

Makes 16 servings.