HALF-ASSED RECIPE: Veggie Raid

Being that my weekly farmers’ market trip takes place on Mondays, I desperately raid the fridge all weekend trying to use up whatever produce I have failed to consume. Here’s what I found this week:

1 Stalk of broccoli
½ red bell pepper
¼ head of red cabbage
½ English cucumber
4 shitake mushrooms
1 tomato
some mixed greens


Using these ingredients, I made a sandwich and a salad. But first I made a dressing/marinade that I used for both dishes:

¼ cup of Shoyu (or Tamari, soy sauce, Braggs, etc.)
½ cup of sesame oil
1 teaspoon of agave nectar
1 healthy squirt of Siracha chili sauce
Ground black pepper to taste

I whisked all of it together and separated it equally between two bowls.

On to the sandwich:

I Carefully pulled off the stems of the shitakes, discarded them, and dunked the caps in one of the marinade bowls. I Placed them brown side down in a hot pan with a little vegetable oil, and let them sear. I thinly sliced the cucumber, dropping about 8 of the slices in the same bowl where I marinated the shrooms, and stirred them to coat.

After 2-3 minutes, the shitakes were nice and browned, so I gave them a flip, and cooked ‘em for another minute. As they were off to the side cooling, I thinly sliced my tomato and toasted up a couple slices of whole grain bread. I assembled the ‘wich in the following order: Cucumbers, shrooms, mixed greens, tomato. The cucumber dressing seeped down into the bottom slice of bread, doing that awesome bread + dressing thing. Now that I think about it, I could have brushed both slices of bread with the dressing. Ahh, just another of many oversights chalked up to the haste of a hungry fat guy.

...and the salad:

The only cooking involved with the salad was blanching (drop in boiling water for 15 seconds, then cool immediately in a bowl of ice water), and draining the broccoli that I cut into bite size pieces. I thinly sliced the bell pepper, shredded the cabbage and tossed it all in a bowl with the remaining dressing and cucumbers, then garnished with sesame seeds. Now that I think about it, I could have stretched this salad out, and tossed it with some cold noodles...but I, of course failed at awesoming yet another dish.

FYI: I’m a little under the weather, so I typed this entire post from my bed. No, I don’t have a laptop, I have, well…



Yeah, it's a little computer cart with wheels that I pull up to the edge of my bed. Useful in soooo many ways. Just, my neck’s all fucked up, now, from laying on my side...a banner day, really.