Mother’s Day Quesadillas

We made these for Mother’s Day along with the Spicy Orange Salad and Garlicky Black Beans. I like this recipe because it is easy, involves caramelized onions, and has lots of flavor while still being mellow enough to allow for a bolder side dish.

I’m used to Gouda being a mild, smoky, buttery cheese with a texture close to Monterey Jack’s, but for this recipe I used some “1000-day Gouda” from Trader Joe’s, and this stuff was really good — a bit more smoky and tangy, with a texture closer to good Parmesan, but still soft enough to cut easily.

You can use normal oil, but the tortillas will want to soak it up, and in this situation you may want to preheat the oven to 300 and toast the quesadillas up a bit after you make them so the outsides are a bit more crispy than floppy.

To make them all together, start the black beans, then get the onions going. Make the salad and set aside. Finish the onions and tortillas, keeping an eye on the beans. Serve it all.

Dutch Cheese, Barbecue, and Caramelized Onion Quesadillas
Recipe adapted from the <a href=”http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Bbq-Onion-and-Smoked-Gouda-Quesadillas-with-Pea-Shoot-Mini-Salad-242488&#8243; target=”_blank”>Bon Appetit recipe here</a>.

Makes: about 4

Ingredients:

• 3 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 pound yellow onions (about 2 large), peeled, halved, and thinly sliced
• 1/3 cup purchased barbecue sauce
• 2 tablespoons water
• 1 tsp hot sauce
• 1/4 c chopped fresh cilantro
• ~6 ounces coarsely grated smoked Gouda cheese (about 1 1/2 to 2 cups loose) I used about 1 c lowfat “soft dutch” smoked cheese from Trader Joe’s, and about 1/2 c “1000 Day Gouda”
• ~3oz Parmesan Reggiano, grated (optional)
• 8 8-inch-diameter flour tortillas
• Atomizer full of oil, or cooking-oil spray

Method:

• Slice onions and put in nonstick pan with oil in skillet. Saute on med about 10min, or until very soft and brownish (some of them should be completely caramelized). If they are getting black on the edges before then, you have the heat too high. Meanwhile, grate the cheeses
• Add BBQ sauce, water, and hot sauce. Stir until sauce coats onions. Remove from heat. Stir in cilantro now for a milder flavor (or, for a stronger cilantro flavor, wait on the cilantro and add it with the cheese to the individual quesadillas).
• Bring a large skillet or saucepan to medium heat and spray with oil. Place 1 tortilla on the skillet, top with 1/4 cheese, 1/4 onion mixture, and 1/4 cilantro (if that’s not already in the onions). Focus on 1/3 of the way in, rather than dumping it all in the middle; leave about 1/2″ around edge. Use a spatula to press down. When bottom tortilla develops dark brown toasted spots, turn over. Put on serving plate. Repeat with the other tortillas
• As the next tortilla is done, use kitchen scissors to cut the previous one into 6. Alternatively, you can make folded-over calzone style half-quesadillas, each using 1/8 of the mix each (results in more tortilla per quesadilla).
• Serve

Black Beans with Garlic, Cumin and Cilantro

I love black beans, but mainly when I cook them, since sometimes other people don’t cook them well enough and they annoy my stomach, and horseradishsauce tells me if they’re cooked incorrectly on too low a heat, the toxin levels in them go nuts and they make you sick. Wikipedia agrees.

So, this recipe requires you to cook the shit out of these so they will be delicious and gentler on your tummy. Adapted (and doubled) from this recipe. We made these for Mother’s Day along with gouda-red-onion quesadillas and spicy orange salad.

Ingredients:

• 2 16-ounce cans black beans
• 3 1/2 to 4 large garlic cloves, crushed thoroughly and minced, or pressed through a garlic press
• 2 generous teaspoons ground cumin (I like cumin)
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/3 cup tomato juice or water
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

Method:

• Put the beans from the can in a medium saucepan, with about 2 c of their beanwater, plus tomato juice if using. Bring to a boil, stirring about every 4 min to scrape the bottom.
• Continue to keep beans at a low boil for 1 hours. Keep adding water as necessary.
• Separately, fry the cumin and garlic in the oil over med-low in a pan until fragrant. Add into the beans.
• Continue up to 3 hours at the low boil, adding water as necessary, until the beans get to be the mash-y texture of refried beans or slightly softer.
• Remove from heat, stir in the cilantro and salt, top with extra cheese from the Quesadillas, and serve.

Mexican Black Bean Soup

My favorite roommate from college was Kaitlin D. For over half of the semester, we ate little other than her Mexican Black Bean Soup. She’d make a big pot of it and we’d just stand over the stove, eating it out of the ladle. It’s fucking amazing. If we were eating it out of bowls, we’d add a dollop of sour cream and mix it in. So tasty.

So this is her exact recipe. There are some notes of mine below it:

Kaitlin’s Black Bean Magic

• ¼ cup olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic minced/smashed
• 1 medium onion chopped
• 2-3 tomatoes chopped
• 2 med potatoes chopped
• 1 jalapeno pepper minced
• 2 cans black beans
• 1 can corn (optional but makes it hella bomb)
• as much cilantro as you want
• 1-2 tablespoons cumin
• 6 cups water or broth
• 2 tablespoons lime juice or to taste

1.    Heat olive oil in soup pot, add onions, garlic and jalapeno pepper and fry a couple minutes. Add tomatoes and potatoes and continue to fry until the mixture becomes saucy (not sassy).
2.    Dump in beans, corn and water/broth and bring to a boil. Simmer for 10-15 minutes. Add cumin, lime juice, salt and pepper, and cilantro. Simmer for another 10 minutes. Remove from heat and add cheese, sour cream and chips.
Enjoy!

Isabelle’s Notes:

• If you use dry beans, soak them the night before then boil them either in the soup or before using them for a good 4-5 hours, until they soften. I like to make the entire soup then leave it on Low to simmer while I go climb trees or go to the gym or whatever. If you live in an apartment where the management comes in ALL THE FUCKING TIME to spray for bugs and change the filters and make sure you don’t have pets and shit, then don’t leave it simmering while you’re at work all day because they’ll think you’re trying to burn the place down or something. I haven’t done this yet, but this is why I can only make this soup on the weekends. Or I could use canned beans, whatever. This is a long note.
• This recipe is meant for a big soup tureen. I’m talking like 3-4 days’ worth of soup for two people. If you’re making it in a small pot, use common sense and cut it down to half or so.
• I like to add a chopped carrot and two sticks of celery or all the tops from a bunch of celery plus one celery stick. And a sliced zucchini.
• Chicken works well in this, too.
• It’s a soup; adjust it as you please.
• It’s twice as good the next day.

5-Ingredient tortilla soup

(makes about 3 bowls).
You can cut corners and make it faster, but the flavor is better if you give the chilies the full 15min soak and the soup the full 20min simmer.

• 1/2 white onion, chopped
• 1 Tbsp olive oil

• 1 guajillo and 1 ancho chili, seeded and de-stemmed

• 1 can chopped tomatoes salsa-style (or normal ones plus some salsa)
• 4 c chicken / veg stock
• 1/4 tsp oregano

Stir-fry onions in oil until soft. Meanwhile, in a pan on medium heat, toast chilies by pressing flat with a spatula on each side until they soften up a little bit (I wait until they get toasted-looking). Microwave or heat up some boiling water, enough to cover the chilies. Let them soak, completely covered by water (put a lid on top), until softened, 15-25 min. Dump everything but the chilies into a food processor or blender, slowly adding in chilies to taste. Dump the whole mix in a pot, boil, then simmer for 20min.

Pour in bowl over tortilla chips. Optional toppings: guacamole, shredded cheese, olives. ** In case you’re thinking I can’t count, I didn’t count the olive oil as an “ingredient” since it’s there just to help the onions along…

Adapted from this