Zen and the Art of Roasted Peppers

If I didn't have my kitchen, I'm pretty sure I would be a Tibetan monk by now. I get more and more breathless as I age.  Enter my breath again as I lean over my kitchen counter in one of my favorite yoga di cucina positions: reaching for the eggplant with one hand while extending my fingers to grasp the cutting board with the other. I'm pretty sure this is because I feel the need for school to start again.  Routines are good.  They can lead to enlightenment. 


And so for now, I'm practicing deep breathing in my Kundalini Kitchen.  Here, I am one with the Universe without even trying. Other favorite kitchen yoga positions: dropping handfuls of pasta into boiling water after I've mindlessly stirred my sauce one more time, or nursing a morning frittata til it's fluffy and just done. Without those rituals keeping my chakras open, it's Tibet here I come. And I won't be stopping to pack my prayer shawl either.

This week, I maintained Universal Consciousness by canning a bushel of roasted red peppers, though I admit I was out of breath by the time I had finished.  Still,  it was worth it as was the trip to our local farm, a place I love to visit this time of year.  We will go often from now til the end of Tomato High Holy Season in September. It is Zen at its finest for me.


Before I share my red pepper recipe with you, here are a few pictures of my favorite farm stand, about half an hour's drive from our house. 

I took one of these bellezze home with me this week. Aren't they beautiful?

I'll be going back for these soon and some fagiolini and melanzane 

Peppers tempting visitors to preserve even more 

You know you're aging when you're more interested in the arrival of vegetable preserving season than the high-healed pumps you fell in love with at the mall!  And now...how to roast and preserve red peppers: clean your jars thoroughly, ensure you have the proper amount of jar lids and rims and prepare all your canning equipment. Wash and dry peppers. Rub with a little olive oil and place in a roasting pan or heavy baking tin. Grill on your BBQ or broil in your oven until blackened on one side; turn and repeat. When peppers are mostly blackened, place them in a large bowl and cover with a plate.  Let them sit for about 20 to 30 minutes while they steam in their own juices. Using a large bowl covered with a plate will help you catch and preserve all the pepper juices.

When cool enough to handle comfortably, remove the stem, skins and seeds.  Resist the temptation to run the peppers under water.  Those seeds are malandrini...harder to remove than bread crumbs in butter...but if you run your peppers under water all your efforts will be undone.  Keep the flavor and run your hands under running water from time to time instead to eliminate seeds. Remove as many of them as possible. The work you put in now will result in a better tomato and red pepper sauce or pizza topping down the road.

When each pepper is cleaned up, cut into half-inch by four-inch strips and drop them into another bowl. After you've cleaned and cut up your last pepper, drizzle the juices from your tin and first bowl to this bowl.  Season with salt, olive oil, a little red wine vinegar, chopped up garlic and mix thoroughly. I use roughly three to four cloves of garlic, two tablespoons of oil to one tablespoon of vinegar for each 10-12 pepper batch.  Preserve in Mason Jars following proper canning instructions. If you've never preserved food in Mason Jars before, this is a good web site to begin with:  http://canning-food-recipes.com  

I boil the jars for 10 minutes.  Once cool, I keep them on my counter undisturbed for 24 hours so I can check the seal one last time before placing them in my cantina, another place where I am well, happy, calm and peaceful.