It’s Friday. The day for cleaning the house and cooking not only tonight’s festive Shabbat meal, but food that will take us into tomorrow (I do no food prep on Saturday) and have lots of leftovers for the week. As usual, jets are strafing the sky overhead and we’ve been told by the home front Minister of Defense to expect major escalation in the North. Batten down the hatches. Like Scarlett O’Hara I, too, will say “Oh Fiddlesticks! I’ll worry about that tomorrow.”

We took Max back up to his base early this week for a day of training. John & I decided to make a day of it, despite the cold and spotty weather, and beer off into the Golan Heights. We’d make it a day trip. It was just what we needed to clear our heads.

Of course, I took the opportunity to buy fresh picked farm stand produce!!! I picked up a huge bag of apples as well as gourds, citrus, peppers and other things to supplement what I’m pulling from the winter garden. The next day I made apple butter (12 jars) because we can’t find that here. John picked the mandarins off our tree and I put up 8 half pints for my China Coast Chicken Salad (because we don’t have canned mandarins).

In case you haven’t figured out… enough of bad news – it’s recipe day!!!

Our garden is doing well with all the rain. Beets (golden and chioggia), carrots, radishes and lettuces are at peak and I’m still getting tomatoes, beans and broccolini.

Is this gorgeous or what???? Look at all those colors!!!

So I gathered up my beets, including white beets and bull’s blood (deep crimson heritage variety- no blood, I promise) and roasted them in foil with rosemary, olive oil, sea salt and thyme sprigs). Wrapped them up in a cozy foil blanket and roasted them on a sheet pan on 400*F/200*C for about an hour. They came out tender and earthy!

We ate some straight for dinner, but then I blended the rest with a chicken stock to make the most decadent and delicious riff on a hot borscht soup. Simple simple simple recipe (I freeze chicken, beef and vegetables stock for later use. I use all my scraps and don’t let anything go to waste). if you want to keep it vegan, use veggie broth. It works just as well, and if you keep kosher, you can then add a dollop of sour cream or yogurt to your hot soup.

While 2 large packets of beets were in the oven, I also roasted a tray of gourds. We get all kinds of funky gourds I’ve never seen before. These were small grapefruit sized gray pumpkins; something that looked like an enormous acorn squash on steroids, and an orangey-grey lumpy thing that was smaller than a pumpkin but way to big for any other kind of squash. I just cut them up and sprinkled olive oil, coarse sea salt, garlic powder and rosemary and sage on top. Covered the jelly roll pan tightly with foil and let the heat do its magic-

Gourd Salad With Techineh Drizzle

So on a bed of fresh picked lettuce, I put some of the sliced of roasted gourd, half a red onion, sliced, 1/4 cup dried cranberries (no sugar or preservatives), 3 chopped pitted dates, about 1/4 cup chopped almonds aand chopped walnuts (altogether), you can sprinkle fresh pomegranate arils on top.

For the dressing, I mixed 1/4 cup techineh (tahini!?!?), with the juice of 1/2 lemon (about 2 TBSP) and about 2 TBSP honey… I don’t measure. Drizzle on top of the salad. It’s really really delicious!

Usually, this time of year John and I like to go foraging… the Northern forested hills and meadows fill up with wild asparagus and celery and all sorts of greens after the rain. However, most of the roads have been blocked by the army and with Hizbulla launching UAVs and missiles right and left, it’s just not safe, so we’ve found other places closer to home. We take small hikes into the southern hill country.

For Shabbat, I just finished making the most amazing, gluten free, vegan brownies Israeli style. They are rich and chewy and use… techineh!!! For this, if you can find the all natural, unbleached brown Techineh (Ethiopian), it adds another layer of awesomeness.

Gluten Free Israeli Brownies

Prep Time:15 minutes Cook time:25 minutes

Pareve

Ingredients:

• 1 cup Techineh (unbleached, natural with sesame hills, if possible)
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup coconut sugar (or brown sugar)
• 1/4 cup maple syrup
• 1/4 cup freshly squeezed orange juice… sweet navel or Valencia
• 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder, good quality
• 1/3 cup coconut OR almond flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/3 cup dairy-free semisweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 360*F/170*C. Grease a 9X9 baking dish. Wash orange well. Cut in half. Remove the peel from one half (eat slices of orange). Juice the other half, removing any seeds. In large bowl, add Techineh, eggs, syrup and sugars, orange juice and combine well (I use a simple wire whisk) until smooth and glossy. Gently fold in cocoa, flor, baking soda and salt. Combine until dry incorporated into wet ingredients. Fold in chocolate chips. Pour into pan and smooth out. Bake for 25 minutes until top is set but brownies are not dried out. Remove from over and let cool 10 minutes. Cut into squares. Cut up orange rind into thin thin sliver bits. Reserve about 3-4 TBSP. For a festive look…edible and delicious…. I scattered the Orange rind along with some dried edible rose petals and chopped pistachios.

Have a lovely Shabbat-weekend. And remember to pray for peace-