Avocado Grilled with Goat Cheese--Easy and Delicious

There is always a right moment to share a good recipe and today's is one of my favorite.

This dish, with avocado in the main role, became one of my most popular dinner starters, when I have friends over. It is easy and can be prepared all year long as avocados are one of the most common vegetables, available in any season.

So I always have avocados in my kitchen since my whole family loves them. They are very nutritious; rich in healthy monounsaturated fats, proteins, as well as vitamins A, E, C, and B.

The only trick with avocados is to catch them at the right moment. I buy them still hard and let them ripen at home. It is said that if you put avocados among apples it speeds up the process. When they get to the right point of softness they can be refrigerated for a couple of days to preserve that perfect point.

In one of the French magazines a saw a recipe for a grilled avocado and goat cheese. Right away this combination seemed to me very interesting. I could imagine how a salted, well defined goat cheese can complement a rather mild and oily avocado. And the idea of grilling it seems very intriguing.

But instead serving it plain just with salad I also prepared a fresh tomato sauce to serve with the avocado and lighten a bit the whole dish. With a little bit of mache or arugula it became instantly a huge culinary hit among my guests. So today, I finally share this recipe.

Avocados Grilled with Goat Cheese
(Serves four>

Ingredients:
2 medium avocados (have at least extra one in case they are not perfectly greenish inside)
about 4 oz log (four 1/2-inch thick slices) of goat cheese,
2 medium tomatoes, blanched, peeled off, and chopped,
1 small shallot,
1 tbsp olive oil,
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar,
a few grape or cocktail tomatoes,
arugula or mache leaves to decorate,
2 tbsp chopped chives,
salt and pepper to taste

Preparation:
1. Cut avocados in half and remove gently the stone without destroying the flesh.
2. Place chopped tomatoes in a high wall container, add shallot, olive oil, and vinegar and, using a hand blender, make a smooth pure.
3. Prepare serving plates and divide the tomato sauce among the plates.
4. Preheat boiler to 400 F. Place avocados on a small baking form. On each half put a slice of goat cheese and put the form close to the broiler. Grill for about three minutes until the cheese melts and turns slightly gold.
5. Take the avocados from the oven and place on top of the tomato sauce. Season generously with salt and pepper, and sprinkle with chives. Decorate with grape tomato halves and salad leaves.
Serve with baguette.

Spicy Sweet Potato and Goat Cheese Cream or Soup

So far, I knew only one way of serving sweet potatoes the way I like them--roasted. I cut them in wedges, add a few garlic cloves, drizzle with a very good olive oil, sprinkle with coarse sea salt and fresh rosemary, and bake until slightly brown. Roasted, they become attractively crispy and lose some of the sweetness that, otherwise, I find overwhelming.

But since sweet potatoes are very healthy (rich in Beta-carotene and Vitamin A) I have always been looking for more good ideas on how to prepare them.

When I recently saw in a French magazine a recipe for a spicy sweet potato cream (velouté), I instantly decided to give it a try. Moreover, the recipe included goat cheese and in my refrigerator there was a log of goat cheese waiting to be used. I made some changes to the original recipe to make it less sweet and even more spicy. I think it worked very well--the cream was definitely savory and almost not sweet at all.

I admit this dish is very rich, not only owing to the sweet potatoes but also the generous amount of goat cheese. But, probably because of that, it is also so good. Served in small, testing dishes it can be a nice Thanksgiving party snack that I am sure everyone would enjoy. By adding extra broth you can turn it into a cream soup.

Spicy Sweet Potato and Goat Cheese Cream

Ingredients:
1 lb sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into cubes,

2 medium shallots,
3 oz goat cheese, at room temperature,
2-3 cups of vegetable or beef broth,
1 tsp harissa or cayenne pepper,
salt and black pepper,
1/4 cup chopped chives,
2 tbsp olive oil.

Preparation:
1. Heat the oil in a large heavy duty pot. Add chopped shallots and fry until transparent. Add potatoes cubes, mix and fry them for about 3 minutes.
2. Pour in 2-3 cups of broth, enough to cover the potatoes, and cook on low heat for about 30 minutes, until potatoes become soft.
3. Take the pot off the heat and using a hand blender make a smooth purée. Put the pot back on the medium heat, add half of the goat cheese and, stirring often, let the cheese melt in the purée.

4. Bring it to boil, let simmer for a minute, and turn off the heat. Let it stand for 5 minutes.
5. Put the other half of the goat cheese in a small bowl, add harissa or cayenne pepper and, using a fork, make a smooth paste.

6. Divide the potato cream among small serving dishes, top with a bit of goat cheese paste and chives. Serve warm.

Cold Cannelloni Stuffed with Goat Cheese

Some time ago, I saw in one of the French magazines a recipe for cold cheese-stuffed cannelloni. They were to be served more as a starter rather than a main dish. The whole thing looked very interesting and I always wanted to try this recipe one day.

This past Saturday I was invited for a lunch at our neighbors' place, later my son had a party for his basketball team, and just right after that we were having friends over for dinner. A very busy day and not much time for cooking, so I decided to prepare at least one dish that could be made ahead and served without any last-minute preparation. These cannelloni seemed a perfect idea, as something easy, yet original.

To make them, I used fresh lasagna sheets that my Giant recently started to carry. That was the most challenging part as the sheets should be soft but still keep their shape. For that reason you need to use a large pot to cook the pasta sheets in a large amount of water. If fresh lasagna pastry is not available in your shopping area, I believe that it can be made from the Barilla pasta sheets. Cooked sheets are cooled and stuffed with goat cheese, drizzled with walnut oil and balsamic vinegar, and served with baby lettuce leaves.

It was my kind of dish. I loved it! Simple but well defined thanks to the goat cheese, walnuts, and vinegar. Because of its true simplicity to make this dish right it is important to use best quality ingredients--aged balsamic glaze (or vinegar) of Modena and roasted walnut oil.

I think that no one, especially those who like me love all kind of pasta and Italian cuisine, would resist these cold cannelloni.

Cold Goat Cheese-Stuffed Cannelloni
(Serves six)

Ingredients:
12 lasagna sheets, about 2 inches by 4 inches in size,
6 oz goat cheese at room temperature,
1 shallot, very finely chopped,
1/4 cup roasted walnuts, crushed,
12 tsp aged balsamic vinegar of Modena (about one tsp per serving) or if you have available the glaze made with the vinegar of Modena,
12 tsp roasted walnut oil,
freshly coarsely ground black pepper,
3 cups of baby lettuce

Preparation:
1. In a large pot boil water with one tbsp of salt. Put in pasta sheets and cook them making sure that they do not stick to one another. That will take probably about 5 minutes--pasta should be soft but in perfect shape. Drain the cooked pasta sheets and rinse them with cold water. Spread each piece on a large plate to dry.
2. In a medium bowl place the soft goat cheese. Add chopped shallots and using a fork mix it together to create a soft spread.
3. Divide the cheese equally among the cooked sheets, spread it thinly on them and roll them up.

4. On individual plates put a handful of baby lettuce leaves and two cannelloni. Drizzle each portion with balsamic vinegar and walnut oil. Sprinkle with chopped walnuts and finish with ground pepper.

Cannelloni taste best in room temperature, so if you prepared them earlier, take them out of the refrigerator two hours prior to serving and add the lettuce at the last moment.

Bell Pepper Rolls--For Party Dinners

Bell peppers, like tomatoes, can be turned almost into any dish. I have always liked their strong aroma and taste, but I love them even more since I learned years ago that they can be roasted and peeled off. Bulgarians use so much of pepper prepared this way that they invented a special clay pot to make the process of peeling easier. I just broil them in my oven and then peel them off easily.

Pepper-based dishes can enrich any menu, as starters, side dishes, or main dishes by themselves. In the past years I have been cooking and experimenting with roasted peppers a lot. I stuffed, fried, marinated, and pureed them. I also made many roasted pepper-based dishes--a soup, pasta, a tart, and preserves.

Some time ago, inspired by the Bulgarian cuisine where pepper is often paired with Feta cheese, I made slices of pepper rolled with goat cheese and prosciutto. It was an experiment based on the idea "whatever you have in your fridge" when I had unexpected guests coming and no time to do additional shopping. This combination happened to be excellent--the softness and sweetness of roasted peppers, delicate sourness of the goat cheese, and and the smoky taste of prosciutto turned this simple dish into an attractive dinner starter.

It became one of my most popular starters, I prepared it already several times for many of my guests. It tastes and looks great taste and also can be made a day or two ahead. Two of my French friends, ladies who are excellent cooks themselves, asked me to share this recipe. Since a party season is approaching, I thought this was a good time to post this recipe, as some may want to look it up searching for an idea to make a dinner more festive.

I served those pepper rolls with caper fruits, fresh parsley sauce, and a freshly baked ficelle.

Bell Pepper Rolls
(Serves six)

Ingredients:
4 red peppers,
8-10 slices slices prosciutto or Serrano ham,
a log of goat cheese, about 8 oz, room temperature (this is important, as it can be spread more easily without tearing the soft peppers),
marinated caper fruits or capers to decorate,

For the parsley sauce:
1/2 cup of fresh, chopped parsley (can be either Italian or curly),
2 tbsp lemon juice,
1/4 cup olive oil,
salt and pepper to taste.

Preparation:
1. Put whole or half peppers on a cookie sheet in an oven (on the highest rack) and set it for broiling at 400F. Let them broil until the skin on top is blackened and even partially charred. If you broil whole peppers, they should be turned once upside down.

2. Remove the peppers from the oven and place them all in a large container. Cover it with a lid and let the peppers cool down completely.
3. Take the peppers out of the container, remove seeds, and (using a small pairing knife) peel off the skin.
4. Cut each pepper in four and lay on the cutting board.

5. First, spread a slice of goat cheese on each piece evenly, season with ground black pepper, and put a slice of prosciutto on top and roll up.

6. Put pepper rolls in a refrigerator and let them chill for at least half an hour to set.

7. To make a parsley sauce put all the ingredients in a food processor and blend until they make a smooth sauce.

Drizzle the rolls gently with the parsley sauce, decorate with caper fruits, and serve.