Quesadillas with Osaka pink kale and rainbow chard

Our car now fixed, (Neil changing the fuel pump himself - the brave lad), we were able to visit our favourite vegetable market on the weekend. As usual, I bought too much, our bounty costing double what it usually does through my sheer delight and unfettered giddiness at having access to all this produce again. (Some women get excited in clothes shops, I do too, especially in the UK, but you should see me at farmer's markets - sad really). 

Now, the usual dilemma, not a single item must go to waste. Cue a vegetable heavy lunch,  fried and sandwiched between two crispy tortillas, glued together with some molten melted cheese and accompanied by a tangy tomatillo salsa dip.

 

After much research, I have discovered that this is Osaka pink hybrid kale, an incredibly beautiful vegetable of brightest pink with frilly green edges. Despite it's good looks, it is chewy when fried, making me feel like a cow chewing the cud, on and on....a little extra care is needed to make it soft and palatable, but then most kale needs a little extra cooking time compared to one of it's cousins, like spinach. I have a cookbook by an Irish vegetarian chef who cooks kale and cabbage for as long as an hour in chicken stock, to ensure it's tenderness and flavour. I especially love using the stems of rainbow chard, more for the splash of colour they impart than any discernible taste, but, they too need a little extra cooking time, generally boiled or steamed separately to the leaves. In this case they were thrown into the pan first to sizzle and pop in the hot oil and butter before the leaves were added.

 

After many failed attempts and quesadillas that fall apart, I have learned that the secret to a really good quesadilla lies in the amount of cheese used. Considering you want the thing to stick together like a portable sandwich and not drip filling all over your jeans, you must use a lot of grated cheese both on the bottom and top. This will melt into long molten strands, encasing the filling within and acting like glue. I am, as yet, unable to create this perfect scenario, maybe through the lack of cheese I use or too heavy a hand with the fillings. The image below may look like a perfect example, but as soon as I cut it, it ejected it's filling out of all sides which meant I had to eat it with a knife and fork. Not good.

Recipe : Quesadilla with pink kale and rainbow chard

2 small tortillas

1 tsp oil and 1 tsp butter

2 rashers back bacon, sliced

1 small green chili pepper, seeded and finely sliced

1 medium orange chili pepper, seeded and sliced finely

4 mushrooms, finely sliced

a handful of mixed greens (I used pink kale and Swiss chard)

4 chives, finely sliced

juice of half a lemon

a good pinch each of salt and pepper

1/2 cup grated cheese

 salsa to serve

Heat the oil and butter in a pan over medium heat and add the bacon. Fry until almost crispy then add the peppers, mushrooms and greens. 

Stir fry together until soft and wilted, then season with the juice, salt and pepper and add the chives.

Grill (broil) the tortillas on one side until crispy then remove from the grill.

Spread half the cheese over one tortilla, pushing out to the edges, top with the vegetables and then the rest of the cheese, again spreading out well. 

Place the second tortilla on top and pop back under the grill until crispy with brown patches. 

Flip the quesadilla over very carefully and grill the other side until brown and crispy also. 

Remove, slice into quarters and eat with salsa and some sour cream.

Vancouver comes alive in the Summer, festival after festival being held outside underneath the unpredictable elements. The jazz festival has been running for many years, the neighbourhood of Gastown coming alive like a thoroughfare in New Orleans with musicians and stages set up for all to enjoy. Meandering our way down the streets on Sunday, with the chaotic rhythms of spontaneous jazz floating in the air around us, we noticed this sight outside a local restaurant. 

Excited by this new venture and upset that I had just eaten a very disappointing burger and was no longer hungry, I took a photo of the little suckling pig. Showing our friend the image when we met him later, he responded with "ahh, bless it". It is with a very heavy heart that I put this picture on the blog as every time I now look at this piglet, I see a small pink squealer running around happily in a pen, just like Babe.