The Live-Nimble Way

It's Summer!! Roast Nectarines! 0

Ahhh, Memorial Day! The unofficial beginning of summer, camping, fun, sun and shouts of school’s almost over!!!

It is also the time of year that people love to take their cooking outside, to grill, let smoke fill the air, and savor the winning flavor of primal needs. I have always loved to grill meat, it seemed like the only thing that belonged on the grill when I was growing up. In the last few decades, however, I am enjoying my discoveries of vegetables and fruits that are roasted on the BBQ.



Until about ten years ago, I had never thought to grill lettuces or greens! Now I find them so delicious I cannot imagine a summer without them. Gone is the boring tossed green salad, and here to stay are the fresher green salads with roasted veggies, and the occasional grilled greens salad.


As we have transitioned over the last few decades to a more vegetable and fruit based diet, we have also taken it to the grill. Desserts are focused on grilled fruits, and meals include grilled vegetables. This Memorial Day, in addition to an amazing burger, we also had grilled vegetables. For dessert we had grilled nectarines with raspberries as well as grilled pineapple spears.

When using our rack on the BBQ, it is critical to keep a number of things in mind.
NEVER use the rack unless you are familiar enough with your grill to be confident that the temperature will not go over 500°F. Although safe to 575°F, we recommend that you keep the temperature lower to allow for fluctuations in temperature. Closing the BBQ lid can raise the temperature, so be careful to monitor the temperature. I would also recommend using a gas grill as opposed to a charcoal burner as gas can be easier to control for the non-expert grill master.

For our super simple but delicious dessert on Memorial Day, I used nectarines, but you can use peaches, apricots, pears, or whatever your favorite stone fruit is. Rings or spears of pineapple are also delicious. The fruit is cut in half, the stone removed, and placed on a rack.

Brush each half with Aloha’s Tangerine Marmalade which is sold on Live-Nimble.com,


Place the rack on the BBQ, and watch the temperature very closely, as you do not want it to go over 400 degrees F.

When soft and slightly browned, remove from BBQ.

Since peaches and nectarines are such lovely companions to raspberries, i mash some up and sweeten slightly if they need. Here, I did not, as they were the most perfectly sweet raspberries ever.

Spoon some of the sauce on the fruit half, then top with a few fresh berries.


Serve warm or room temperature, or even do ahead and serve chilled. This delicious dessert is equally amazing topped with strawberries, sour cream, flavored yogurt, whipped cream cheese, or whipped cream. Served with ice cream, it makes for a very beautiful and elegant dessert. We prefer it simple, and topped with raspberries so that the flavors stay more distinct.

Tangerine Marmalade gives a delicious, sweet/tangy flavor to the fruit, but you can use Orange Marmalade, or some of the other flavors of jam offered on our website, such as Mango pepper, or Mango-Habanero which gives a big kick of heat to whatever it goes on. Although I have not tried it, I think that the Marionberry jam we offer would be incredible roasted on the grilled fruit. Brown sugar, honey, or other sweetener will give the fruit a slightly different but equally delicious outcome. The star here, is the fruit, which becomes deeply flavored and sweet during the grilling.

A very simple, delicious, healthy and impressive dessert, making your life more nimble!

Live-Nimble!!

Roasted Veggie Breakfast Sandwich 0

Ahhhhh! The week before Memorial Day!! I can’t believe it has been a month since I was in China looking for great products.  It is sunny,raining, the occasional thunderstorm passing through the night, and a new beginning for our family. As you may have read in our ‘about us’ section on our website, we are a large family, with professional interests in cooking, quality, and productivity-and that’s not just describing our children! 

It has been quite an adventure sourcing products in China, testing recipes, writing cookbooks and getting our business started. So much to learn, so much to do. We have launched our first main product, along with a few other smaller items, and are busy sourcing some exciting new products that we can hopefully put up in a few months. We would invite you to return to our website and follow our blog for some exciting new products, video demonstrations, applications, tips and up to date information on food, health and safety.

On a visit to Israel a few years ago, I enjoyed shakshuka.  It is a breakfast dish, with roasted tomato, red pepper and other vegetables with  the eggs poached in the veggie like stew.  It is delicious with a nice crusty bread to dip in it, so why not do something with a similar flavor profile on a sandwich?  So here it is, a shakshuka inspired breakfast sandwich.

Israeli Breakfast Sandwich

For this blog, I thought I would start out with a simple recipe using our rack, of course, and shake up our breakfast.  So, using last nights leftover veggies, I am cooking up a roasted veggie    breakfast sandwich. No one is going to get up early enough to roast veggies and then make breakfast with them, but how great is it if you made extras from the night before, and just add eggs?

I cut zucchini and tomatoes to about 1/4 inch thickness and then roasted them. Tomatoes first at about 325 for an hour, then up the temperature to 425 degrees and finish the zucchini, about 15 minutes. Watch the tomatoes that they don’t burn. Using the bottoms cuts of the tomato makes it a bit more sturdy.

First, a tutorial on roasting red peppers……

Red peppers are fabulous roasted on the rack, over a foil lined pan, so I like to cook those ahead and keep them in the fridge for a week or so. Wash and dry them, then remove tops, ribs, and seeds, smash flat, brush lightly with oil, and place under preheated broiler or in very hot oven…450-500. Roast until blackened to your preference, I like them quite black.

Remove and place in small bowl covered with foil or glass plate, or wrap them in the foil that lined the pan you put the rack on. Allow them to cool, this will steam them and will help the skins to be removed quite easily if you want.  I like using Italian sweets and leave the skin on as the flesh is thinner…SOOOOO delicious. Rinsing under water will remove flavor. Leave some of the black skin bits on. Yum!! 

Store Roasted peppers in a jar, cover them with olive oil (you can add basil or rosemary if you like)and keep refrigerated. How long?  I have seen recommendations for a few days up to 10. They are so delicious they usually don’t last more than a day or two anyway.  Freeze them, covered in oil if you have a lot of them. They freeze very well. You can also vacuum pack and freeze, or do in a pressure cooker as gifts at the Holidays. Do not have garlic in the canned oil/pepper, as you risk botulism poisoning. There are a number of recipes in my (free) recipe books that use them, but they are great just about anywhere alone, in sauces, sandwiches, eggs, etc.

Tomatoes take a longer time on a lower heat, and onions benefit from a longer roast, so I started them both a bit earlier, about an hour or two at 300 degrees. Let them get a bit wrinkly and a little bit brown for more flavor.

After they obtain a gentle softness, lose some of their moisture, but before they start to brown,  I add slightly oiled zucchini to the mix on the rack. Remove rack, and while the oven is coming up to 450 degrees, add the zucchini to the rack. The zucchini will brown quickly, probably about 10-15 minutes-watch the tomatoes so they do not burn.

 

 

So, you will have done all of this the night or two before.  All you need to do is pop a nice piece of artisan bread into the toaster, start the egg, and get ready to enjoy.

 

 

Click here to see Nancy's YouTube video.

 

Ingredients

leftover roasted veggies including but not limited to, zucchini, tomatoes, onions, red bell pepper,

feta cheese, crumbled

egg, gently fried, firm yolk

artisan bread toasted-ciabbata, sourdough baguette, sub sandwich roll, challah, English Muffin?

mayonnaise of choice-aioli, avocado mayo, or not at all

meat such as prosciutto, ham, etc. optional

Place toasted roll on cutting board, put tomatoes on first, pressing down gently so some of the juice is absorbed into the bread. layer vegetable on top of the tomato, sprinkle with some feta, then put hot egg on top. put mayonnaise on top piece and place on top of your crowning glory, pressing down gently to meld the pieces together a little. 

 

Using an English Muffin you can layer all the ingredients as per the directions for a delicious and somewhat smaller sandwich, and definitely less messy.

This is a bit messy, but so worth it, so lean over the plate or cover your shirt when you eat this for breakfast so you don't drip on it!

 

 

Enjoy!!