Tag Archives: chive

Smoked Salmon and Cream Cheese Omelette

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A little smoked salmon, cream cheese and chive in an omelette adds a little variety and just plain delicious. Thank you Tyler Florence.

Recipe courtesy Tyler Florence, 2008

Ingredients

  • 2 eggs
  • 1/16 cup heavy cream
  • 1/2 tablespoon unsalted butter
  • 1/8 pound smoked salmon, torn into large piece
  • 1/4 cup cream cheese, room temperature
  • 1 T chives
  • Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Whisk eggs and heavy cream together in a large mixing bowl.

Take a large nonstick pan and set over medium heat. When the pan is heated add the butter and spread out evenly over the surface of the pan. Once it starts to foam turn the heat down and add eggs. Using a spatula swirl the eggs quickly in a circular motion as you gently shake the pan back and forth to cook evenly, you don’t want any color.

Once the eggs begin to set, drop the pieces of salmon, small spoonfuls of cream cheese, and green onions over the top. Season with salt and pepper, then as you slide it out onto your cutting board, roll 1 side over the top as you go to form an omelette.

Twice Baked Potatoes – Two Ways

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Roasted potatoes in the oven always fills the house with great smell that gives me a calming effect. I serve these crispy potato skins two ways, the traditional way- cheddar cheese, smooth sour cream and scallions. Then the other way- filled with a lighter veggie filling, cheesy sauce and chopped broccoli.

Adapted from Nigella Lawson

Prep: 20 minutes
Cook: 1 hour 40 minutes
Yield: Serves 4

  • 4 or 5 small Russet or Idaho potatoes
  • 1 glove garlic or garlic powder
  • Olive oil
  • 1/2 cup low-fat sour cream or greek yogurt
  • 1 cups shredded light cheddar cheese, save a sprinkling for top and garnish
  • 4 scallions, both white and green chopped
  • dry freeze chives for garnish
  • Kosher salt and black pepper to taste
  • optional (crumbled bacon or soy bacon)

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Wash and scrub the potatoes clean under running water. Dry the potatoes, and poke each potato, in several places, with the tines of a fork. This will prevent the potatoes from exploding. Rub the potatoes with a little of the olive oil. Place the potatoes on a baking sheet, and bake for 1 hour 20 minutes. Remove the potatoes, and allow them to cool. Cut the potatoes in half, lengthwise. Use a spoon and scoop out most of the inside of the potatoes – you want to leave a thin layer of potato on the skin. Scoop all of the potato meat into a large mixing bowl. Sprinkle each empty potato shell with a little salt, pepper, cheddar, and chopped scallion. Combine the sour cream, cheddar cheese, and remaining scallions with the potato meat. Mash the ingredients together with a potato masher, but do not over beat the potato meat. Spoon the mashed potatoes into each potato shell. Top with any remaining cheddar cheese. Bake the potatoes at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes, or until the potatoes are heated-through.

Roasted potato

Scooped out potato skins

Cheddar cheese, scallions, potatoes and sour creamFilling added into the skinsTwice baked potato

Twice baked potato

I wanted a lightened up version of a potato skin. Instead of sour cream and starch. I thought some vegetables and cheese filling would be a nice change.

Adapted from Whole Foods Market

  • 3 cups broccoli florets
  • 1 tablespoons butter
  • 1 tablespoons flour
  • Sea salt, to taste
  • 1/2 cup low fat milk
  • 3/4 cups sharp cheddar cheese, grated

Steam broccoli until crisp tender, about 4 to 5 minutes. Meanwhile, melt butter in a medium saucepan. Whisk in flour and salt to taste. Gradually stir in milk, whisking over med-low heat until thickened. Add cheese, stirring until completely melted. Season to taste with white pepper. Pour over steamed broccoli and serve at once by placing scoops into the potato skin shells.

Steamed broccoli and cheese sauce

Broccoli and cheese sauce potato skin

Bagel, Lox and Chive and Scallion Cream Cheese

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Friends offer exposure to new ideas, adventures and various cuisine. My own immediate family did not eat smoked salmon, however once I learned about bagels with lox and cream cheese, I could not imagine my life without it.

Mildly smoked Coho salmon gently lay on bits of scallions, whipped cheese, all over a toasted tender bagel. So good. The deep hue of the salmon is gorgeous and glistens on the open-faced bagel.

  • 1/2 cup whipped cream cheese, tofutti or chive cream cheese
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh chives or scallions (I prefer scallions)
  • 2 bagels, sliced in half
  • 4 ounces cured smoked salmon

Slice bagels in half and toast. Spread cream cheese on bagels and sprinkle scallions on top of cream cheese. Finally, top an ounce to two ounces of lox and serve immediately.

Cheddar Scallion Scones

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After two unreal scone experiences at Cha-An and Le Pain Quotidien, we were moved to make cheddar scallion scones at home. The additional cornmeal provided a great crunch and texture on the exterior and the interior had a nice crumb.

What I loved the most about this recipe was as the cheddar scallion scones were baking in the oven, the aroma that permeated the room reminded us of the smell of Chinese scallion pancakes.

We wanted to test half the recipe with scallions and the other half with chives. So we used 1/4 cup scallions and for the other half of the batch 1/8 cup freeze dried chives and 1/8 cup chives.

After taste testing both, we highly suggest using scallions in the entire recipe versus chives. Scallions provide a more savory, fuller flavor. The chives are more delicate.

Adapted from Flour Bakery and Gourmet

Makes 8 scones

  • 1 and 3/4 cup ap flour
  • 1/2 cup cornmeal (we used corn grits)
  • 1 and 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp kosher salt
  • 5 ounces extra sharp white cheddar cheese (approximately 3/4 cups)
  • 1/2 cup finely chopped fresh scallions (we did half the recipe 1/4 scallions and the other batch a combination of 1/4 cup freeze dried and fresh chives)
  • 1/2 cup  (1 stick) unsalted butter cut into 4 pieces
  • 3/4 cup of heavy cream
  • 1 cold egg

* If do not have buttermilk or creme fraiche use under a 1 cup heavy cream or whole milk

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Whisk together flour, cornmeal, baking powder, sugar, and salt and butter. Add chives and cheddar, tossing to combine. Stir in cream with a fork until a sticky dough forms.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead 8 times with floured hands. Halve dough and form each half into a 7-inch round. Brush tops of rounds with additional cream and cut each into 4 wedges.

Arrange wedges about 1/2 inch apart on an ungreased large baking sheet and bake in middle of oven until golden brown, about 40 to 50 minutes. Cool on a rack for 30 minutes and cut into prescored wedges (the cuts will be visible but will have baked together) and serve.

Myers + Chang, South End, Boston

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Myers + Chang restaurant is a co-venture with Joanne Chang of Flour Bakery and her husband, Chris Myers of Radius and Via Matta. Myers + Chang offers Pan-Asian fare, dim sum (bao and dumplings), stir-fried vegetables and creative desserts. The thoughtful menu is sensitive to those who have allergies and designates which items are shell-fish, gluten and nut free and which items are vegetarian.

The restaurant had an audible buzz and the patrons were well dressed and fashionable. We really enjoyed the Asian touches such as the lucky gold cats sculptures, Chinese newspapers lining the tables and the white and red plastic bowls (typically found in Asian supermarkets).

We tried the lychee soda with a marachino cherry and iced Vietnamese coffee. Our favorite of all the dishes we tried were the wok-charred brussels with caramelized onions. By far, these were some of the best brussel sprouts we have ever had, a bit of spicy, tangy, sweet and salty.

The Tiger’s Tears for $11 (bang bang & olufsen beef) grilled steak, thai basil, lime, khao koor was a bit salty. We also had to order Mama Chang’s pork and chive dumplings for $11, which had a nice chive scented filling.  The Taiwanese-style cool dan dan noodles with fresh peanut and chili sambal for $8 were really tasty and we loved the nutty flavor.

The tea-smoked pork spare ribs were positively delectable for $14. We have been to tea class with one of the few tea sommeliers in the world and she mentioned few chefs and home cooks are familiar with cooking with tea. These ribs had a light hint of tea and they were sublime. We may have to start cooking with tea this year.

We have been on the search for chicken and waffles and would love to go back and try Myers + Chang’s rendition of their chicken and ginger-sesame waffle for $17. Additionally, the hot & sweet sauce chocolate and cocoa nib terrine, Vietnamese coffee sauce for $7 will be tested in the near future.

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