Isabel's Cilantro Sauce

I can garnish my heart out and still not get through a whole bunch of cilantro before it starts spoiling. Pesky cilantro and its short shelf life! I find myself composting bunches far more often than such a flavorful herb deserves. But since discovering this zesty and delicious cilantro sauce (which uses a substantial half cup of the stuff) I no longer have an excuse to be such a wastrel.

The recipe comes from a cookbook called Isabel's Cantina that I bought as a souvenir when I moved away from San Diego. The author wrote the recipes for the restaurant where I used to work, and while my motivations for purchase were sentimental, the book has become quite practical in the kitchen.

I altered Isabel's recipe a little by doubling the garlic and using a mellower apple cider vinegar in place of the red wine vinegar she calls for. The sauce turned out SO good this way, rich yet bright and spicy all at once.

I drizzled the sauce around a plate of brown rice, black beans and cheese with some fresh cherry tomatoes for a meal of exactly ten ingredients. Totally Killer.

Isabel's 4-Ingredient Cilantro Sauce
Total Kitchen Time: 5 minutes. Makes 1 cup.

1/2 cup packed cilantro leaves
2 garlic cloves, grated
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

Free Spice Blend
1/4 tsp. salt

Combine all ingredients and salt in a food processor or blender and puree until mostly smooth.

Ratatouille

French cooking is not usually my forte or my favorite, but I'm really into stewing my own tomatoes. Canned tomatoes contain more BPA than any other canned good and, predictably, homemade just tastes better anyway. Summer is the best time to stew, while big juicy organic tomatoes are cheap cheap cheap. This ratatouille made a yummy main course comprised entirely of fresh vegetables.

I also had fun dabbling with eggplant, a vegetable that normally kind of scares me. All those tales of bitter seeds, salting and rinsing and tough skin make me balk at baba ghanoush. I suppose I'll tackle it sometime for that very reason. At any rate, I used two small Italian eggplants with tender skin for this ratatouille so as not to necessitate the salting and hullabaloo.

This meal had a total of ten ingredients, including brown rice, a plum and some almonds.

7-Ingredient Ratatouille
Total Kitchen Time: 30 Minutes. Serves 4.

1 onion
1 green bell pepper
1 zucchini
1 small to medium eggplant
2 large tomatoes
3 cloves garlic, grated
2 Tbls. butter or extra virgin olive oil

Free Spice Blend
1 tsp. herbs de Provence
salt and pepper to taste


Chop all vegetables into bite-sized pieces and place in a pot with spices and butter.

Stew covered on med-high heat 20 minutes or until vegetables are tender.

Black And Blue Nachos

When you use fresh produce, real cheese and whole-corn tortilla chips, nachos make for a surprisingly balanced meal. These black and blue nachos beat the crap out of nachos that rely on jarred salsa and gluey "cheeze sauce" for flavor. The bruise hues indicate plentiful antioxidants, with black beans leading the pack compared with other legumes.

I also love that these nachos are ready to eat in fifteen minutes, and if you're reasonably dexterous, you can broil them on aluminum foil and save yourself from dish-duty later. Who says you can't embrace your inner lazy person and still eat well?

10-Ingredient Black and Blue Nachos
Total Kitchen Time: 15 minutes. Serves 2.

2 large handfuls blue corn chips (corn, sunflower oil)
1/2 a can black beans, drained
1/3 cup hand-shredded jack or cheddar cheese (milk, cultures, enzymes)
2 roma tomatoes, chopped
1/2 an avocado, sliced
1/2 a jalapeno pepper, diced
1 Tbls. fresh cilantro

Arrange chips on aluminum foil and top with tomato, pepper, beans and cheese.

Broil 5 minutes or until cheese has melted and tomatoes are soft.

Transfer nachos to plate (or don't!) and top with avocado and torn cilantro.

TIP is now on Facebook!

Greetings TIPers! Your friendly neighborhood techno-challenged food blogger has just set up a Ten Ingredient Project Faceboook Page! Stop by and show your support for the project by "liking" it and receive updated feeds and photos from new posts, plus perhaps occasional whimsical remarks from yours truly.

Also, if you are a Facebook aficionado with tips on taming the unwieldy beast of social networking, please don't hesitate to share them with me! I'm still learning. Thanks and be well.

Sweet Balsamic Brussels

I bow down to these Brussels sprouts! They have everything I love in a recipe: ample veggies, ease of preparation, and uncommonly good flavor. I plucked these beautiful Brussels out of the bargain bin at my local grocer, not yet knowing they were destined for marinated, caramelized greatness.

I sliced a pink lady apple and made a pot of lightly curried brown rice and lentils to have on the side of these sprouts. Only seven ingredients to this perfect meal!

I modified the recipe from the original found here. Enjoy!

4-Ingredient Sweet Balsamic Brussels
Prep Time: 5 minutes. Cook Time: 20 minutes. Serves 2.

~15 Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved
1 Tbls. extra virgin olive oil
1 Tbls. balsamic vinegar.
5-10 whole peeled garlic cloves.

Free Spice Blend
dash of paprika (optional)
black pepper to taste


Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl and marinate at room temperature at least 15 minutes.

Spread cloves and sprouts cut side down onto a lightly oiled baking tray and bake for 15 minutes or until marinade has caramelized and sprouts are fork tender.

The Five Minute Plate

In this uber-tasty installment of the five minute plate, I tossed the remains of yesterday's chili lime corn (sans cilantro) with black beans, then added sliced avocado and red grapes on the side for a total of eight ingredients.

With it's whole grains (corn), protein (beans), heart-healthy fats (avocado), antioxidants (grapes) and fiber (everything), this is one hard-working five minute plate. My kind of fast food!

Chili Lime Corn

I have a problem with this corn: I like it so much that I never make any other corn recipes. I know I should branch out, but every time I shuck an ear in the kitchen, it's like I enter into some kind of fugue. By the time I come to my senses, I've got corn silk in my hair and yet another batch of chili lime corn to eat.

There's an interesting article in the current issue of Vegetarian Times claiming that the sweet corn we eat by the earful is unrelated to the "field corn" responsible for the various corn-born evils we hear about like genetic modification, corn syrup refining and mono crop agriculture. I should still probably work on my corn problem, for personal if not environmental reasons. In the meantime, I'm passing my affliction on to you with this recipe. Beware/enjoy.

I ate a spinach salad on the side with shredded carrots and cucumber for a total of nine ingredients.

6-Ingredient Chili Lime Corn
Total Kitchen Time: 15 minutes. Serves 2.

2 ears fresh corn
1/2 red bell pepper
1/2 sweet onion
1 Tbls. butter
chopped cilantro to garnish
juice from 1/2 a lime or more.

Free Spice Blend
1/2 tsp. chili powder
black pepper

Fry onions in butter on med-high heat until just translucent. Add corn and bell pepper and fry few more minutes, stirring regularly.

Add chili powder; fry one minute more.

Plate with a squeeze of lime and chopped cilantro for garnish.