How to keep lettuce fresh and crisp

picture courtesy of thekitchn.com

Usually, I grocery shop once a week. I think it's cheaper this way. I plan the menu ahead and don't buy more foods than I need. Okay, hardly any more... Most foods are kept fresh easily in the pantry, fridge or freezer, but I always had a problem with lettuce. I eat lots of salads and usually buy two or three heads of different kinds of lettuce at once. But even when I kept them in the crisper drawer in the fridge, they would still go limp after two or three days. A friend of mine, who's a restaurant chef, knew a solution.

Tallow

Tallow is one of the best fats to cook with. In the olden days, it was easily available, but thanks to the low fat maffia, I can't find it in supermarkets anymore. Big bummer, but I know my way around a kitchen, so I decided to make the stuff myself.

Cottage Pie

When thinking about comfort foods, one of the first things that come to my mind, is cottage or shepherd's pie. I used to love a soft creamy layer of mashed potatoes and the savory filling of meat and vegetables. I personally can't do potato anymore, because I found out that it produces a serious spike in my blood sugar, so I replaced it with cauliflower. But not just cauliflower...creamy cauliflower! This veg really replaces potatoes very well, as is well known in the paleo/primal world.

Autumn

 

The leaves in my garden are turning bright red and are telling me that autumn has really arrived. Not that I needed red leaves to tell me this, because the horrible rainstorms were a great clue. I love summer, but we didn't have quite the summer I hoped we would have. I don't really know about the rest of the world, but in Holland, I think we just had the crappiest summer of my adult life. I honestly can't recall that we ever had that much rain before.

But now autumn is here, and as much as I love summer, I think autumn definitely has it's charm. The wind howling around the house, rain against the windows, and me snuggled up in a big chair with some hot tea or a bowl of hot food. Speaking of food...it's the ultimate season for comfort food: stews, meat pies, soups...to name a few. I will be posting some of that lovely comfort food this season. As much as I will miss summer, I will be looking forward to make, eat and share my collection of autumn recipes!

"Spaghetti" and herbed meatballs

The boyfriend and I used to love spaghetti and meatballs. A nice full flavored tomato sauce, gorgeous herbed meatballs, a litlle crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, on top of a pile of al dente spaghetti. Lovely! But, of course these days there's no more spaghetti for us. I can't really say that I miss it, but just some sauce coverd meatballs seems a little, oh I don't know, unsatisfying I guess. Of course the best part of the spaghetti and meatballs, really where the meatballs. And the sauce. So we needed a pile of something different underneath it.