What to do with all the stuff in the Fridge

Recipe: Vegetable Fritters with Scallion Sour Cream and Sautéed Purple Kale

It's an old tale. You go to the store with the intention of buying a few fresh vegetables. The recipe you're following calls for half of whatever you bought. You swear to yourself that you'll use the rest of the veggies in a fritatta or something, but you end up going out to eat and ordering takeout and eating leftovers and then two weeks later you find a moldy tomato (cabbage, kale, carrots...) sitting at the bottom of your fridge. From then on you swear to eat frozen dinners and dried pasta, because that sort of stuff won't stink up your house. Six months later you've gained five pounds of frozen pizza weight and find the produce aisle at the grocery store and the whole cycle starts again.

The cycle can stop, my friends! The trick is to either throw all the veggies into whatever recipe you were making in the first place and screw the amount the recipe calls for, because the more vegetables the better, OR! finally make that fritatta (or salad, or whatever) that you've sworn to make but never did because you've gotten sidetracked during the week. If you're having trouble figuring out what to do with all the random assortment of vegetables just sitting there in you're fridge, try out this veggie fritter dish. Don't focus on what vegetables are in the recipe, you can substitute with what you've got on hand. Follow the recipe in the pancake batter and throw in what you have. The veggies I've included in this recipe are just what I happened to have that day. Pair the dish with some sauteed kale and a simple salad for a full meal.

Vegetable Fritters

1 TBS olive oil

1/2 onion, small diced

1 carrot, small diced

1/2 red pepper, small diced

1/2 green pepper, small diced

2 tsp garlic, minced

1 TBS fresh thyme, finely chopped

1 TBS lemon zest

pinch cayenne pepper

1 cup flour

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp black pepper

1 egg

3/4 cup milk

1/2 cup oil

1. Preheat oven to 350.

2. Heat canola oil in a large frying pan. Saute onion, peppers, carrot, and garlic for 3-4 minutes. Add thyme and saute one minute longer. Remove from heat and cool while putting together the batter.

3. Mix the flour, baking powder, salt and pepper together in a large bowl. Whist together the egg and the milk in a seperate bowl. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and pour eggs and milk in the center. Whisk together until batter is smooth.

4. Mix together sauted vegetables and batter. Heat 1/2 cup oil in deep saute pan. When oil is almost at the smoking point, ladle about 2 oz of batter into the oil and cook for 3 minutes on each side. Place fritter on greased baking pan. Once all the fritters are cooked off, place in the oven and cook for 10 to 12 more minuter or until the fritters are cooked through.

Scallion Sour Cream

1 pint sour cream

1 bunch scallions, thinly sliced on a bias

1 tsp garlic, minced

salt and pepper, to taste

1. Mix all ingredients together. Season with salt and pepper.

Oven Roasted Tomatoes

Sauteed Purple Kale

1/2 tsp sesame oil

1 bunch purple kale, cleaned and coarsely chopped, stems removed

1 tsp garlic, minced

1 TBS soy sauce

1/2 lemon

1. Heat sesame oil in a large saute pan or wok. Add garlic and kale. Cook until kale is wilted, about 5 to 10 minutes. Season with soy sauce and juice from lemon.