Bacalhau à Vasca

Warm spring weather gives me an itch to eat the beautiful green veggies showing up at the market. It is a temporary but powerful urge, driven by both the beautiful look of the produce and the knowledge that I will have to wear fewer layers of clothing very soon. A great opportunity to make a greens-filled, springlike bacalhau recipe to welcome the new season, wouldn't you think?

Yes and no. The typical bacalhau dish in Portugal only has one green component: parsley on top. The rest of the dish is nearly always beige: onion, garlic, olive oil, and potato. Sure there are green olives sometimes, spinach or a green pepper here or there. But on the whole, bacalhau recipes suffer from a lack of color.

So just imagine my excitement when I came across this recipe for Bacalhau à Vasca. Asparagus and peas and bacalhau? It may as well be called Bacalhau á Springtime!

Healthy Chicken Feijoada

I was a confirmed carboholic for most of my pregnancy. No regrets there-- I will always have the fond memory of leveraging my son's metabolism to eat ice cream and french fries with abandon. I kept my weight healthy and on track for all 9 months, which is the first time in my life I have been able to say that. I was a lucky gal.

Continuing the carb-fest for three months afterwards? Errr, my pre-baby wardrobe is seeming more unlikely with each passing day. So unless I want to embrace my maternity pants for another year or two, it is time to stop the madness and put down the fried potatoes.

Enter this dish, an easy, nutritious, and homey meal with no potatoes or refined carbs.  It takes the delicious Portuguese feijoada and spins it into a healthy weekday meal which could even help me lose some of my baby padding.

Louisiana Bacalhau Cakes with Corn Relish

If there were a book about my eating life in Portugal, the first chapter would undoubtedly be called, "Jen versus Fish Bones."  

In the US, I had only ever eaten fresh fish in fillets.  They were every bit as fresh as the fish I get here, but they were prepared.  As in, let the fishmonger do his job and make the fishes all pretty and easy to cook at home.  As in, let the restaurant fillet your fish so that they do not risk provoking a lawsuit when you swallow a rogue bone.  As in, why let the fish stare at you with that fishy head and eyes if you don't have to?

I have since made peace with the espinas of the peixes here in Lisbon, and can now eat a grilled whole fish more or less neatly in a restaurant setting.  Because BB is a huge fan of grilled whole sea bream I cook that for him whenever I am feeling particularly sweet.  But at my core, I am always more comfortable when I can enjoy a fish dish without picking through bones.

In other words: it is not accidental that these Louisiana Bacalhau Cakes are the second fish patty recipe I have posted.

Macho Linguini Caprese

Summer in Portugal hearkens back to a time I... really don't remember.  Ever.  For the first decade of my working life, I counted myself lucky that while I didn't exactly have time for "vacation", I got to travel quite a bit for my job.  That counts, right?

As I pass through my third summer in Portugal, I am finally learning how to blend into Southern Europe in August.  Basically, it is best not to plan on getting anything done.  If you are not off to the beach for the month (why aren't you?), then everyone else is.

Our butcher shop and one of the local groceries are closed until... who knows?  They each forgot to put up a sign.  The bakery that delivers our bread twice a week was closed down for the whole month.  Cafes throughout the tourist district are shuttered up.

And since my main client is a university which (you guessed it) completely shut down their administrative offices for August, I have had an enforced vacation the likes of which I have never experienced.  Even in my high school and college days I had full-time summer jobs.  This was utterly disorienting to someone raised with an American work(aholic) ethic.

So when I wasn't busy feeling guilty about my own sloth, I had time for the summer things I always wanted to do.  One of those things?  Growing balcony vegetables.

Peas with Eggs and Chorizo

Whatever finicky tendencies I had as a child (ketchup on mac and cheese, anyone?), I left them all behind once I hit college in New York City.  There is a whole world of food on that little island: sushi, burritos, bagels and lox, spanakopita, sesame chicken, kim chi, soul food, falafels, and on and on.  I became an enthusiastic believer in trying new things.

This characteristic has served me well in Portugal.

Octopus, blood sausage, pig trotters, tripe, snails, and fried sardines-- they all require a bit of fearless tasting for me, whereas they are second nature to Bacalhau Boy and his clan.  When my family came to visit last year, my sister-in-law won the prize for most culinarily adventurous by tucking into a pig snout from the elaborate platter of meats my father-in-law proudly presented for lunch.

Now, to be fair, Bacalhau Boy is no grand fan of offal or entrails. We rarely eat snout.  But this past week I craved the taste of summer-- the kind of summer which my inner child's tastebuds would recognize.  I made pulled pork sandwiches with homemade cole slaw on top.  I made a chilled sriracha macaroni salad that left my mouth tingling with delicious spiciness.  I grilled cheeseburgers American style-- WITH the bun, eaten by hand.

But oh, how the pendulum of married life swings.

I filled my belly with familiar deliciousness.  Also, I watched my dear BB good-naturedly eat the mayonnaise-laced cole slaw and the vinegar-based barbecue sauce and the spicy sriracha salad despite his hatred of mayonnaise, vinegar, and spicy foods.  I felt a teensy bit bad for him, even though I couldn't understand his weirdo tastebuds.

Finally, once my inner child was appeased, I figured it was time to take pity. The next night I made my honey some real Portuguese comfort food.

TV in Portugal (and Carrot Pataniscas)

In the past two years, I have managed to learn a bit of Portuguese.  This is helpful for lots of reasons.
1. I can go grocery shopping and know what I am looking for.
2. I can talk with Pedro's family.
3. I can understand what our "mulher a dias" (equal parts cleaning lady and grumpy grandma) says when she criticizes my messy dresser drawers.
4. I can eavesdrop on public transportation. (Hey, it's good practice!)

But the BEST reason I have for learning Portuguese is Portuguese television. If eyes are the windows to the soul, then television must be the eyes of a nation.  (Yeah, that's right, I was an English major, yo...)

Anyhow, since I can't offer plane tickets to Lisbon for all my family and friends, I had to at least share a few of my very favorite Portuguese shows with you.*

(And yes, there is a recipe at the end. So hang in there.)

*Note: I loved these shows long before I spoke Portuguese, TV being a visual thing and all.  So I hope even if you don't know your obrigada from your chouriço, you will give these gems a try.

1. Home Makeover Show: Querido, Mudei a Casa!

"Honey, I Changed the House" is similar to the TLC show While You Were Out. There is a two-day makeover which is kept secret from one member of a household while professionals transform one room.  Genius in any language!

There are certain hallmarks of this genre which are all here:

• The Before/After Room Scan, complete with music which maximizes the chance you will oooo and ahhhh.
• The BlahbittyBlah when the designer talks with the host about how awesome the room is while as a viewer you just want to get to...
• The BIG REVEAL for the homeowner. 

BUT-- watch the clip below and tell me if you do not notice one very glaring difference at around 5'45".  Go ahead, I'll wait.

Spicy Yogurt Chicken and Zucchini Gratin

I feel like I need to confess something.  Looking at the title of the blog and the recipes I've posted, one might imagine I am exploring Portuguese cooking with every meal we eat.  Errrr...

Yes, we are in Portugal. Yes, I have a Portuguese husband who likes to be fed, and yes, I try to make him things he finds comforting, familiar, and appetizing.  Sometimes.

But most of the time?  Bacalhau Boy survives on American cooking.

Luckily for him, that encompasses, oh, every type of cuisine the world has to offer. Spaghetti bolognese, and pierogies, and sushi, and burritos, and sesame noodles, and beef stroganoff, and falafel, and chicken vindaloo... and yes, some darn good burgers and fries, too. I'm not sure whether America is more of a "melting pot" or a "tossed salad", but either way, can it be coincidence that the metaphors for our multi-ethnicity are related to food??

So, to the (constant) surprise of Bacalhau Boy, we tend to eat from a grab bag of ethnic flavors.  Last weekend was one such meal: Greek-Thai Spicy Yogurt Chicken and French Zucchini Gratin.