Kohlrabi with Romesco, The Hills Have Eyes (1977)

This is the other dish I decided to make during Sandy's visit. It was not quite as tasty as the borscht, but it was still enjoyable.

The kohlrabi was another Boston Organics gem, and I wasn't quite sure what to do with it. After googling a bit it turns out, I grew up in the kohlrabi capital of the world. Go figure it takes moving to MA to finally cook with it. Anyways, to me it kind of seems like a cross between a turnip and cabbage. Being clueless, I decided to research some sort of recipe as a guidance. This is what I came across.

I followed the recipe pretty closely and it didn't turn out looking like the picture in his blog. Reading the comments, it looks like adding tomatoes would do the trick. I would probably add about half of a can after cooking the pepper and heat them through. Let me know if you try it out and get it to work better! Once again, movie review is posted after the recipe.

Sorry I'm bad at pictures

Recipe: Mutant Kohlrabi with Radiated Romesco Sauce

Ingredients:

1 bulb kohlrabi

1 red pepper

2 cloves garlic

1/2 cup chopped almonds

dash of olive oil

1 tsp paprika

1 tbsp red wine vinegar

salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 350. Peel and chop kohlrabi into bite sized pieces. Spray with cooking spray. Throw in the oven for about 25 minutes, or until tender (this is all the cooking it's going to have, so make sure it's edible). You may need to stir a couple times to keep it from burning.

While the kohlrabi is doing its thing, cook the garlic and paprika in some olive oil over medium low heat until garlic is brown. Add the red pepper and cook until the pepper is done. (At this point, if you're going to add tomatoes, throw them in and heat them through, probably for about 5 minutes). Put this mixture in the food processor with the red wine vinegar. Process until smooth. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve with kohlrabi.

Step-by-Step Instructions

Preheat oven to 350. Peel the kohlrabi and dice into bite sized pieces. Spray with cooking spray and roast for 25-30 minutes, turning occasionally to keep from burning.

While kohlrabi is roasting, dice red pepper (into pieces smaller than this).

Over medium-low heat, cook garlic and paprika in a bit of olive oil.

Add red pepper and almonds and cook until red pepper is tender. Add the tomatoes after this if you are going to do that, and cook until heated through (probably about 5 minutes).

Throw it all in a food processor with the red wine vinegar and process until smooth. 

Plate with kohlrabi and serve! I was feeling fancy with the garnish this time. 

So like I said, didn't turn out quite as well as I hoped, but I ate it. And then again for dinner every night this past week. The hot sauce was definitely a welcome addition - I'm sure most would be as good as the Ugly Sauce.

This actually went really well with some hot sauce on top. I opted for the locally-made Alex's Ugly Sauce. I met the guy that makes these, and he's super cool.

Sometimes I listen to music when I cook. This was one of those days.

Pictured: Animal Collective, Zammuto, The Big Pink. Two truths and a lie: I've seen all of these bands. Can you guess which one doesn't belong?

Movie time.

Review: The Hills Have Eyes (1977)

I've seen the re-make and wasn't super impressed. I've heard good things about the original, so I decided to give it a try.

The plot is pretty straightforward - a typical American family is traveling through some deserted part of the desert on the way to a vacation in LA. They claim they are going through that part to look for silver or something, it doesn't really make much sense. They encounter the typical old man at the gas station who warns them not to go down that road..."there's nothing back in there but animals"...only to completely disregard him and get lost. There is some entertaining dialogue between the retired policeman father and the helpless housewife mother trying to navigate him through an unmarked road in the middle of nowhere. The car crashes into a bush. A deranged cannibalistic family finds them, including some guy that looks like this:

I'm sure he's actually quite nice

Overall, the movie was just OK. I probably won't go out and purchase it anytime soon. It was a shocking movie for its time, but it doesn't seem to have held up as well as Wes Craven's other classics. Actually, it would probably make a good double feature with Deep Red. Check it out next Halloween season. Trailer below.