Roasted Herb Chicken with Pistachio Salsa

By Zoe McLaughlin
A new video for Video Friday

Roasted chicken thighs are easy to make, but ordinary. Dress them up by rubbing an herb paste under the skin to season the meat and create a ton of flavor without a lot of work. It’s important to use fresh herbs when making the paste because fresh herbs have a brighter, cleaner flavor than dried ones.

Use a mortar and pestle or finely chop the herbs together to release the oils, intensifying the fragrance. This recipe uses chicken thighs but you could use skin-on chicken breast or even a whole chicken. The key is to separate the chicken skin from the flesh, leaving the sides of the skin attached, creating a pocket for the herbs, to seal in the flavor.

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Turn Veggies into “Cream” Soups

By Sandy Hu

With the bounty of fresh vegetables now coming to market, it’s easy to overbuy. When I find my enthusiasm has overtaken my cooking capacity, I turn the extra vegetables into “cream” soups. There’s no actual cream in these soups but the soup turns wonderfully thick and satiny when the veggies and potato are pureed.

This recipe is a formula: You can use 3 cups of any vegetable you’d normally cook, such as broccoli, carrots, asparagus or cauliflower. Just don’t combine vegetables in one soup because you could end up with an unattractive, muddy-looking broth. And don’t skip the potato. It provides the body and creamy quality to the soup.

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Hallowed be thy Grains

By Katie Barreira

Curses to every germ, every cold-carrying microbe, every virus, bug and bacteria that has plagued us this flu season. The Center for Disease Control says that flu activity in the U.S. usually peaks around February, but can continue to occur as late as May. Well, it’s April 17th and I’m over it. After a brutal span of sick spells, and with the knowledge that what we put into our bodies directly affects our health, I’m on a mission to eat myself well.

As a result, I’ve rediscovered the delights of grain salads. Protein-rich grains make a meaty base for vegetarian salads that, on their own, are satisfying meals. The day I concocted this version, I knew it would become a staple in my diet. Packed with fresh green herbs, dried fruit and nuts, the addictive mixture would call to me even it didn’t get an A+ on the good-for-you test.

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Walnut Pesto and Basil Envy

By Sandy Hu

I have low expectations of the herbs growing in my garden. It’s not their fault. We coddle them when they’re first planted; then we get busy and forget all about them and they’re left to their own devices.

So Steve bought a new crop of herbs over the weekend from the Alemany Farmers’ Market. Flat-leaf parsley, French tarragon, French thyme, sage and Moroccan mint – they’re sitting on our wall until he gets them into the garden beds. I hope these are the independent types that can fend for themselves.

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