Playing catch-up; Abbie actually cooked these for our Thanksgiving feast! They were delicious — asparagus is rolled in phyllo dough, baked, and smothered with butter. Sounds healthy, right? C’mon, it’s veggies!

Abbie says:

Don’t forget to brush more butter on the top! Mmmm… butter…

Chris says:

These are awesome, but I can’t wait until later! You know what they say about asparagus…

Lisa says:

DON’T say it.

Chris says:

Don’t have to; linked it.

Rolls:
1 pkg phyllo pastry, thawed
4 tablespoons melted butter
16 young asparagus spears, trimmed (not cooked!)

Sauce:
2 shallots, finely chopped
1 bay leaf
2/3 cup dry white wine
12 tablespoons (1.5 sticks) butter, softened
1 tablespoon chopped fresh herbs (whatever you like - I used thyme, parsley, garlic and dill)
salt & pepper
chopped chives for garnish

Preheat oven to 400. Lay out phyllo 4 sheets thick, then cut in half (one half for each roll). Brush the sheet facing up with melted butter. Fold one corner of the sheet down to the bottom edge to give it a wedge shape.
Lay 4 asparagus spears on top at the longest edge and roll up toward the shortest edge. Repeat for each roll.
Put the rolls on a greased baking sheet. Brush with the remaining melted butter. Bake for 8 minutes or until golden brown.
Meanwhile, put the shallots, bay leaf and wine in a pan. Cover and cook over high heat until the wine is reduced to 3 - 4 tablespoons.
Strain the wine mixture into a bowl. Whisk in the butter a little at a time until sauce is smooth and glossy. Stir in the herbs and salt & pepper to taste. Keep sauce warm until rolls are out of the oven. Serve with sauce on the side or drizzled over the rolls. Or both! Mmm, butter.

Tonight I made another recipe from The Olive and The Caper, and this time it featured both of those ingredients. Swordfish marinated in lemon and olive oil is skewered with onions and bay leaves, grilled, and served with an olive and caper tapenade. I followed the recipe as listed below, except that I used less oil than called for. We had asparagus and broccoli cheese couscous on the side.

Lisa says:

Everything’s salty — this is my dream dinner! I usually don’t like olives, but that tapenade is really good. The marinade on the swordfish is so flavorful!

Chris says:

Wow, this rules. I didn’t think bay leaves were used in anything but stews and sauces for flavoring. You can really taste the flavor of them on the onions. Yeah, the tapenade is pretty salty, and so is the couscous — actually that couscous is pretty vile.

Lisa says:

Yeah, I can’t tell if I like it, or if it tastes like vomit.

Chris says:

There’s a winning endorsement… I’m just glad we also had the asparagus. Let’s definitely make that swordfish again, it was delicious.

Swordfish Kebabs with Olive and Caper Tapenade
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1 cup lemon and oil marinade (Recipe Follows)
8 to 10 bay leaves, cut into 1-inch pieces
2 1/2 pound swordfish, cut into 1 1/2 inch chunks
1 large onion, quartered, layers separated
2 cups Olive and Caper Tapenade (Recipe Follows)

Marinade:
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon chopped rosemary
Stir all the ingredients together in a small bowl.

Olive and Caper Tapenade:
3/4 cup pitted Kalamata or other Greek black olives
4 large cloves garlic
4 anchovy fillets, preferably salt-packed
3/4 cup capers, drained
1/2 packed cup fresh basil leaves
2/3 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
Place all the ingredients in a food processor and process until chopped as fine as possible.

Place the marinade and the bay leaves in a dish that is large enough to hold all the swordfish chunks in one layer. Add the swordfish and onion and turn to coat it in the marinade. Marinate for 20 to 30 minutes at room temperature, or cover and refrigerate for up to 2 hours. Turn the fish once or twice while it is marinating. When you are ready to cook swordfish, heat a grill to medium-hot. String an onion section, a piece of bay leaf, and then a swordfish chunk in a skewer. Repeat, in that order, until the skewer is filled, ending with a piece of onion. Fill all the skewers in this fashion. If there are extra onion sections left over, thread them on a separate skewer and cook them along with the others. Place the skewers on the grill and cook, turning once, just until white curds form on top of the fish and the centers are still a bit pink, 7 to 8 minutes. Transfer the skewers to a platter and let them sit for the juices to settle, 5 minutes. Arrange the skewers on a platter and serve right away, accompanied by the tapenade.

Tonight Lisa made this recipe, the first from a new cookbook we recently spotted in the Bargain Books section: Fitness Food. This cookbook presents recipes that have been “specially developed for active people”; to us it just looks like a nice collection of well-balanced, healthy recipes. I’m sure we’ll be making more from this book over the next few weeks. We used a little less asparagus than the recipe called for, and next time we’ll use a few more cherry tomatoes. We both really enjoyed this one.

Warm Chicken and Pasta Salad
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1 lb 10 oz orange sweet potatoes, cut into 3/4″ cubes
9 oz cherry tomatoes, halved
cooking spray
2 7-oz boneless skinless chicken breast fillets
2 bunches slender asparagus, trimmed and cut into thirds
13 oz macaroni (we used whole-wheat rigatoni)
14 oz can cannellini beans, rinsed and drained
3 handfuls arugula leaves
3 tbs fat-free french dressing

Preheat an oven to 400. Place the sweet potato at one end of a large nonstick baking dish and the tomatoes at the other end, cut-side down. Lightly spray with oil and bake for 45 minutes, turning halfway through. Remove the tomatoes after 30 minutes.
Preheat a grill over high heat. Cook the chicken for 5 minutes on each side or until cooked through.
Bring a large saucepan of water to a boil, add the asparagus and cook for one minute. Remove with a slotted spoon and plunge into ice water. Drain. Return the water to a boil and cook the pasta for 10 minutes or until tender. Drain and keep warm.
Slice the chicken into 1/2″ thick strips and place in a large bowl with the vegetables, beans, pasta, and arugula and toss until combined. Add the dressing to the salad and toss until well combined. Season to taste and serve.

6 Servings.

This Lime-Chipotle sauce that we used both to marinate and then serve over the flank steak was just divine — spicy, sweet, and citrusy! We also grilled up some asparagus (brushed with a touch of olive oil and seasoned with salt and pepper) and cooked potatoes with garlic and some fresh rosemary from our yard. Everything was perfect together — and of course, that sauce somehow ended up on the potatoes as well!

Lime-Chipotle Sauce
——————-
1/2 cup honey
2 tbsp chipotle chiles in adobo, minced
3 tbsp Dijon mustard
1/2 cup lime juice
3 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 tsp allspice
1 tsp cumin
1/2 cup chopped cilantro
salt and pepper
–
1/2 lb flank steak
1 lime

1. Mix all ingredients together and marinate flank steak for an hour or more
2. Remove steak from marinade (save it!) and grill to desired doneness, flipping once
3. In small sauce pan, let the marinade simmer over low heat
4. Slice steak diagonally across the grain; top with the marinade/sauce

Serve with a lime wedge to squeeze over steak.

Although you’ll really want to, it is not advised to pour the remainder of the sauce directly into your mouth.