Really Good Raw Granola Bars

One of my oldest and dearest friends, Dellie, is now very, very pregnant. Back when she was just very pregnant, she and I spent a day cooking up a storm, filling a freezer with healthy, delicious meals in anticipation of a now not-so-little peanut that may or may not occupy most of her waking hours.

By now you know that I'm a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of cook. I shop without a clear agenda, and I frequently figure out what's for dinner by poking my head in the fridge when I get home from work and seeing what looks best. Not so with Dellie; she is the planner's planner. And in advance of our big cooking day, she had made a master spreadsheet listing every recipe we had chosen and the quantities of every ingredient they called for. She had visited three grocery stores to procure the items we needed. She'd even prepped a few key elements of dishes in advance, so we could hit the ground running as soon as I arrived. That woman, I tell you: she is a force.

For those of you who are curious as to what we made, I'm sharing the list here. I think it's a fantastic starter list for folks looking to stockpile meals before the birth of a child or another big event. We picked things that freeze and reheat well, things that won't be too fussy to pop in the oven at the end of a busy day.

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We certainly weren't the first to fill up the freezer; Merrill Stubbs from Food 52 did the same thing before she had her beautiful daughter, Clara. She cooked a mix of one-pot meals and freezable components (like taco filling) that could be assembled with relative ease later on. We stuck mostly with the former, to make things as stress-free as possible.

Here's our master list:

• Chicken Tikka Masala (Food 52)
• Knishes with lentil-lamb-raisin filling instead of potatoes (Smitten Kitchen)
• Pulled jerk chicken (NDP)
• Tuxedo chili from The Runaway Spoon, using turkey and adding some kale (Food 52)
• Baked ziti with bison-tomato sauce (mostly riffed)
• Quinoa salad with mirepoix, ground turkey, kale, and tomatoes (again, riffed)

And in case you were curious about our space-estimating skills, we filled the freezer precisely to its capacity:

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I left Dellie and Jeremy's house smelling intensely of meat (just ask the folks who picked me up - sorry guys!), but knowing that D and J had at least a month's worth of meals, ready to go.

Since no meal is complete without at least a little something sweet - and since parenthood means many late nights - we also made two trays of these granola bars to stow away.

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Yes, these granola bars are raw -- in the sense that you don't bake the bars - not in the sense that nothing has been heated. You actually toast most of the ingredients before mixing them, to amp up their flavor. Raw or cooked, they're the best granola bars I've ever made (and I've made my fair share).

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Dell and I agreed that these granola bars were lighter and crunchier than others we'd made; puffed rice is the key. They also hold up to travel and time much better than my beloved raspberry bars or my other favorite granola bars. After licking the bowl at Dellie's, I got home and promptly made a pan for us. When my heavy travel kicked in, I packed up about 10 bars into a zip-top bag and tossed them into the bottom of my purse, where -- despite lots of banging around -- they stayed intact and delicious for two full weeks. I can't think of a better travel snack.

Really Good Raw Granola Bars Adapted slightly from Sara's Granola Bars on Food52

I took out the sunflower seeds, which I don't really enjoy, and added more of everything else. I also swapped cranberries out for dried cherries, because dried cherries are just better. Other than that, it's all the same. It's all really good. -R

1 1/2 cups old fashioned rolled oats 1 1/3 cups raw sliced almonds 1 1/3 cups raw pumpkin seeds 3 1/3 cups brown rice crispies (you can substitute regular rice crispies or puffed rice) 1 cup dried apricots, sliced thinly 1 cup dried cherries 1 cup almond butter 1 cup honey 1 tablespoon sea salt 2 teaspoons cinnamon

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Toast the oats, almonds, and pumpkin seeds. It's fine to put them all on the same pan, but make sure you separate them on the pan, so that when one is done, you can remove it and leave the others to continue toasting. The pumpkin seeds took about 7 minutes, the oats and almonds about 10 (though almonds will depend on how thinly they're sliced).

When all the items are sufficiently toasted, toss them with the brown rice crispies, apricots, and cherries in a large bowl.

In a small saucepan, heat the almond butter and honey just to get melty, not cooked. (This is your glue and if it boils or even comes close, it gets hard and impossible to stir once it cools.) Stir in the salt and cinnamon, then pour over the granola mixture and stir. You want to get everything mixed together and sticky without crushing the crispies.

Turn the mixture into a 9x13 baking dish lined with parchment and press the mixture evenly and firmly, trying not crush the crispies too much. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for several hours. Cut into 2-inch squares before serving.

Asparagus-Sweet Potato Hash

On a business trip last week, I drove back, forth, and back again (don't ask) through the farmlands of the Fingerlakes. Upstate New York was still sort of chilly, and spring hadn't quite sprung yet. At least, not the way it had in DC, where it feels like we're teetering on the last little edge of asparagus, peas, and chives, about to tip over into full-fledged tomato season. Don't mistake me for complaining about red orbs and stone fruit. I'm excited, really, I am. They make the hot, sticky weather bearable! But I'm not quite through with my beloved asparagus for the year, and sadly, DC is almost done with the 'gus growing season.

Fortunately for me and a saving grace of an otherwise ho-hum business trip, upstate NY had as many strawberry patches as could fit on a one-lane stretch of interstate, and one roadside farm actually had asparagus for sale. Yeah, you know me too well. I tucked a bundle in my suitcase.

Truth is, I've made this asparagus hash more than once this spring. It's an easy breakfast or brunch, and with a little practice and a grill pan, you can make it for company. I've made it with potatoes, because that's the obvious choice. But -- don't judge me -- on a recent Sunday, I discovered a single sweet potato languishing at the bottom of my vegetable bowl, probably leftover from like three days before, when it was still really cold out. Fresh out of potatoes, I used the sweet 'tater instead, and you guys, it was something of a revelation, that strange mix of winter and spring. The hash was sweeter and softer, but with a little patience the cubes of potatoes still got plenty of exterior crust. It's a simple recipe and with a little gumption, you can shape it to suit your mood and whims. I see it as a celebration of spring, and as such, I trick it out with the works: scallions, chives, ramps, et cetera. If you've got other stuff you feel like using, please be my guest. Before you know it, summer will be here. Maybe it's already here. Let's enjoy the last remnants of spring while we can.

Asparagus-Sweet Potato Hash Serves 4 4 tablespoons butter, olive oil, or half and half 2 sweet potatoes (or substitute yukon gold potatoes), cut into a half-inch dice 1 lb. asparagus, diced 2 ramps or spring onions salt and pepper to taste 4 eggs

Heat 2 tablespoons of butter in a cast-iron skillet. When the butter is foamy and nice and hot, add the potatoes in a single layer (or as close as you can get) and leave them alone. Let them brown and crisp for at least 3 minutes before starting to fuss at all. From there, you want to start turning the cubes on their other sides, to give pale, raw parts a chance to brown and cook through. The whole process should take around 8-10 minutes. Not every side will be browned; that's okay. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

After the potatoes are mostly browned, push them to the side of the pan and add the asparagus with half a tablespoon of butter or olive oil. Give them a chance to brown a bit themselves; cook them for about 3 minutes. Then add the scallions, cook 2 minutes more, and toss them together with the now-browned-and-toasty potatoes. Remove the hash to a plate (though if you're using a different pan to cook the eggs, you can leave the hash where it is).

If you've got a grill pan, preheat it and add the remaining butter. Otherwise, you'll have to fry your eggs one at a time. Add a generous tab of butter to the cast-iron pan you used to make the hash, and then proceed to make your perfect version of the fried egg. In my house, here's how that goes: I turn the stove to medium, crack an egg into a bowl, and separate the yolk from the white. When the tab of butter in my pan is sizzling, I add the white and let it form a complete base before setting the yolk on top. I find that just those five seconds help prevent the yolk from overcooking on the bottom. Two minutes uncovered, 2 minutes covered, a sprinkle of salt and a few grinds of pepper, and my egg is perfect. You'll have to play around a bit to find your ideal version.

A flat-top grill pan makes eggs for company easy, but I don't have one, so I just fry them up one by one -- or, if I'm feeling more hurried, I'll set two pans up and fry two at a time. This hash is good enough that folks will be willing to wait.

Garlic Scape Pesto and Three Ways to Use It

If ever there were a habit of mine that were problematic enough to warrant an intervention, it would be this: I have a jar problem.

At first, it was just tomato sauce. At the height of the season (which, get excited friends, is so near it's basically here), I spend two long afternoons with a pot of tomato mush on the stove, bubbling and simmering until it breaks down and thickens into sauce. Then I pack it into jars and tuck it away until fall. These days, I use a big pot to process my jars for shelf storage, but back in the day, I just tossed them into the back of the fridge.

Then it was jam. The strawberries, the sour cherries -- how could I resist? I always buy too many; add a little sugar, and I've made January breakfast taste like summer. And while I was already bothering, I put up some brine and started pickling cucumbers, asparagus, beets and cauliflower.

At this point I should note that our fridge is smaller than regulation size. It's small. It's not equipped to serve as a pantry for my experiments. Things have calmed down a bit since I started properly canning food, but still -- the extra egg yolks from meringue, the leftover chicken broth from last week's dinner, the five blanched asparagus waiting for tomorrow's lunch -- it's all in there. These days, I'm trying to be better about using the stuff up.

Pesto is almost always in (at least) one of the jars in our fridge. Just last week, I made one batch with the first basil of the season, and another -- the topic of today's post --  using garlic scapes.

The pesto recipe I'm sharing is the product of two wonderful recipes from Food52 and a kind hattip from my friend Josh (and I think this makes three Josh mentions in the course of 1 week. He's becoming my sensei!) Josh mentioned an outrageously good duck carbonara pizza that he'd made with a few modifications. No surprise the recipe came from my friend Cathy, she of Mrs. Wheelbarrow fame on Food52 and beyond. Josh was especially excited about the pesto that went on the pizza, which Cathy made with green garlic but I think Josh made with ramps instead. I loved the idea and decided to follow in his footsteps, except I found beautiful garlic scapes at the market, so I decided to use those instead.

(What are garlic scapes? They're the tops of the garlic plant. Good ones are taut, vivid green, and smell grassy and fresh, not nearly as pungent as garlic bulbs.)

That's when my absentmindedness kicked in. I remembered Josh saying he made ramp pesto, so I searched for a ramp pesto recipe on Food52 and found a beautiful one that won the ramps contest a while back. I followed the instructions there, subbing in pistachios for the walnuts (which, incidentally, Cathy's recipe calls for), and wound up with a fantastic little spread that looks pretty similar to the recipe Cathy wrote and Josh used.

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Lesson? Pesto is flexible. Please don't feel restricted to garlic scapes! You can swap in ramps, green garlic, basil, or any other green and have a different but equally delicious mixture, to be used in all the same places.

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What places, you ask? Here are five good ones. If you've got other favorite ways to use pesto, share'em in the comments. Let's get this thread going, folks. When you're ready to cook, the pesto recipe is below.

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1. Pizza

If you're feeling adventurous, make Cathy's beautiful duck carbonara pizza. It looks out of this world.

I've now made similar pizzas twice: once, I spread a thick layer of pesto on the dough and sprinkled chopped asparagus, chive blossoms, fresh mozzarella, and a bit of parmesan on top. I put an egg on top, but it overcooked in my smokin' hot oven. Follow Cathy's directions and you won't have that problem. So, so delicious.

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The second time, I went for the meat, again at Josh's suggestion. We had some lamb bacon in the freezer, which I fried up. I used the rendered fat to cook the asparagus, which I again put on the pizza, and this time, I left the cheese off and went for just an egg instead. Topped the whole thing with a squeeze of lemon, and it was dynamite.

2.  In Marinades

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Summer is time for grilling. For sides to accompany your burgers and grilled fish, you really can't do better than pesto-marinated vegetables. Right now, asparagus are the logical choice. When they're done for the year, try brushing tomatoes with pesto that's mixed with a bit of water and a squeeze of lemon, then grilling them, using the method in this Saveur piece. When the weather gets cool again, coat green beans with pesto for one of my favorite side dishes of all time.

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3. In a Frittata

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Frittata: world's easiest last-minute dinner. Kenzi did a great step-by-step post on how to make frittata on Food52. Follow that and you'll be golden. You can add the pesto either when you're beating the eggs, to get a more uniform taste of pesto throughout, or you can do as I prefer, and dot spoonfuls of pesto into the frittata after you've poured in the egg.

While we're talking about frittatas, here's my favorite frittata of all time. I can't think of a more perfect place to add garlic scape pesto. And here's a recipe for pesto frittata bites. You really can't go wrong.

Friends, how do you use pesto? Garlic scape or otherwise? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Garlic Scape Pestoinspired by Cathy's recipe and SAENYC's recipe on Food52 Makes a scant pint

1 bunch garlic scapes, chopped (my bunch of 5 scapes made about 2 cups) 1/2 cup pistachios 2 tablespoons water 1/3 cup olive oil plus more if necessary 1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese salt and pepper to taste

Combine scapes and pistachios, cheese, and water in a blending or mixing apparatus; I've used a hand blender for this recipe and it works great, but of course the food processor also does the job, if you have one.

Blend until mixture starts to break down. With the motor running, drizzle in olive oil and continue blending until mixture looks like pesto. If things look too chunky, add a couple extra tablespoons of olive oil.

Taste, and add salt and pepper as needed.

Pack pesto into a jar. If you're hoping to keep it longer than a week, top with a healthy drizzle of olive oil, which will help preserve it for longer.

Use in everything. Except ice cream.

Cucumber-Gin Slushies

Here's one good thing about living in DC: this time of year. This time of year is usually a month or so long, but 2013 has decided to be obnoxious and stubborn about sending winter on its way, and so we find ourselves in late May -- it's almost June -- occasionally wearing scarves in office buildings that clearly didn't get the memo and insist on blasting the A/C to the max. But at last, the cold has passed. It's now that special time in DC where there's warm sun and cool breeze at the same time. Not one to let this fleeting time pass me by, I've been taking some long walks. A couple weeks ago,D and I strolled all the way from our corner of northwest all the way to Eastern Market for dinner. No better way to prep for a big night of pasta-eating and wine-drinking.

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DC also has some affordable (coughnot) housing with outdoor seating, and we're lucky enough to have a deck. Now is the season to brush off that patio furniture and settle in with a drink outside. Fortunately, the long weekend provided ample opportunity to bask in the sun and pretend to be sophisticated with some shmancy cocktails.

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But you know what DC does not have, like at all? Affordable alcohol. My friend Josh (he of Mutabbaq-making fame) alerted me to the fact that just a hop-skip north, in MoCo, my beloved Bulleit and Hendricks, and plenty of other stuff could be procured at a fraction of the price the robbers in DC charge. So this weekend, I put on my driving shoes and headed to liquor mecca. (Do you think prim and proper Montgomery County would like this nickname? Methinks not.) And there, I purchased what can only be called a full bar worth of product: two kinds of gin, a Haitian rum that Josh recommended, two vermouths, a vodka, and I probably could keep going but I will stop, to avoid total embarrassment. But people, it was like Christmas, it really was. By the time I'd left the store, I'd already decided which bottle to open and what to use it for. It was the right call, and this weekend, it can be yours.

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For what do beautiful, breezy, sunny, weekend days call for if not a clean, crisp, alcoholic, adult Slurpee? That's essentially what this is. It comes by way of Heidi's wonderful book, Super Natural Every Day, but with some detours and adjustments, as Heidi apparently wasn't as desperate for a non-mocktail as I was.

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Heidi's version is a cucumber cooler. Naturally, I added gin. I also upped the lime, subbed sugar for some of the honey (cheaper) and left it in the freezer because I never really liked it when my Slurpee melted. Some things never change.

Cucumber-Gin SlushiesAdapted from Heidi's recipe in Super Natural Every Day

Makes 1 big pitcher, which serves about 4 with a few dribbles left; might want to make a double batch

Notes: Heidi likes lemon cucumbers, which I've never encountered. She says 1 is about 10 oz. of cucumber, which is how much you need for this recipe. I used English cucumber, which she also blesses - but mine were the most monstrous of cucs; I needed only 2/3 of a cucumber for the recipe. If you can't weigh your ingredients, don't worry; this cocktail is supposed to relax you, not stress you out. Aim for a normal-sized English cucumber or 3-4 baby cucumbers.

10 oz. cucumber, partially peeled; see headnote 1/2 c. cold water 3 c. ice cubes (about 1½ trays) 1/3 c. mild honey or sugar Juice of 1 lime, more to taste 5 oz. gin (no need for the fancy stuff here) 1/4 tsp. fine-grain sea salt 5 leaves fresh mint, optional

Combine all the ingredients in a blender. Pulse until smooth, frosty, and free of ice chunks and honey globs. Pour into a pitcher, and store in the fridge or freezer for up to 1 hour before serving.