Carrot Osso Bucco, Zucchini Chips, Orange Cake and more

Carrot Osso Bucco
This vegan play on the classic braised lamb shanks recipe, is the brain-child of Richard Blais, former Top Chef contestant and winner of the Top Chef All-Stars competition.  I special ordered "giant" veggies from our Southwest Florida Produce Co-op, and they really came through with the goods!

I've tweaked Richard's recipe slightly by braising not just giant carrots but also giant parsnips.  For our WW friends, this is a 3-point dinner when served with 1/3 cup of rice!  The following serves 4.

1/2 pound of Pearl Onions, or a large-diced Sweet Onion
3 giant Carrots
3 giant Parsnips
1 tsp Curry Powder
1-1/2 cups dry Red Wine
2 cups Mushroom Broth
1 Tbsp Porcini mushroom Powder
Salt & Pepper to taste
optional garnish -- flat-leaf parsley tossed with a splash of EVOO and lemon juice.

If using pearl onions, blanch them in boiling water and then peel.  Otherwise peel and large-dice a sweet onion or red onion.  Peel, then cut the carrots and parsnips into 3" lengths.

To give you an idea of how big those carrots and parsnips are -- the blade on my Nakiri bōchō vegetable cleaver is 7" long!!

Pre-heat oven to 350F. Rather than the oven and an oven-proof cooking vessel, I used my electric skillet set to 350F to do the actual braising.

In a splash of EVOO, in a hot skillet, season and brown the carrots and parsnips about 5 minutes per side.  

Add the onion and curry powder and continue cooking a minute or two.  Then add the wine, porcini powder and mushroom broth, bring to a boil.  

At this point, if braising in the oven, transfer to your oven-safe container and cook for 1 hour and 15 minutes.  In my electric skillet, I reduced the temperature in stages to 225F and continued cooking for about an hour until the veg was just fork tender.  

Garnish, if desired, and serve.  I served with 1/3 cup of mixed white & brown rice as you see above.

WOW!!  This is a killer recipe!  One of the very best veggie-vegan recipes I've ever prepared.  That mushroom/red wine gravy with onion!  The carrots and parsnips were just like slicing a rich hunk of steak.    Of course you don't need giant carrots and parsnips, but they sure make an imposing plate of food.

Baked Zucchini Chips
This recipe does work best with Giant (large diameter) veg.  One of the nicer things you can do to this vegetable!

Zucchini
Breading Mix -- half Panko and Half grated Parmesan from a can.  I used 1/4 cup each here.
Paprika and other spices
EVOO

Slice the zucchini into 1/4" or thinner rounds.  I used our Saladmastertm slicer, but a mandolin or good knife skills will work too, of course.  Pat them dry with paper towels

Preheat the oven to 400F.  Lay the chips out on parchment-covered baking trays and spritz them with EVOO.  Dust with your favorite spice blend.  

Bake for 15-20 minutes until browning nicely.   

Here the zucchini chips are the side veg for baked salmon.

If you have racks that fit your baking trays your chips will be even better -- crisper because they'll cook on both sides.   

Orange Cake
This was my Thanksgiving dessert (others brought apple pie and cheesecake).  I followed a recipe from the Season 2 Great British Bake Off cook book for Blood Orange Sponge Cake.  I wrote about it three years ago, here:

https://foodingaround-kiltedcook.blogspot.com/2016/11/chicken-leeks-feta-blood-orange-cake.html

It's too early just now for Blood Oranges (they won't be ripe until mid-January or thereabouts) so I used frozen concentrated orange juice, as well as local Navel Oranges (zest and juice) for this year's cake.

Even though the sponge collapsed a bit too much, the cake was so popular at Thanksgiving that I didn't even get a chance to take a photo of a slice by itself!

Honey Broiled Oranges Here's another "giant" application.  We got these huge locally grown Navel Oranges in our produce box this week.  So big, I thought they were grapefruit!!   Halved, segmented, drizzled with honey and broiled for a few minutes, they made a sweet dessert.