Category Archives: salad

summers winding down and my tomatoes are going bonkers! out of my five plants, i’m harvesting at least a half pint of cherry tomatoes, and at least 2-3 green zebras and brandywines a day. now believe me, i’m not complaining about the abundance, but a girl can only eat so much gazpacho, and the thought of applying heat to such beauties seems so cruel. i was thinking of caprese for dinner, but i didn’t have any tofu to marinate for a sub for feta, and pasta salad gets old…. a poke around the refrigerator turned up some leftover raw cashew “cheeze”, and a poke around the internet for tomato recipes turned up this lovely image: http://media.smithsonianmag.com/images/tomato-stack-thumb.jpg

this was still essentially layers of tomato and cheese, and i felt the need to replicate the stacking, but i had an idea to take place of the mozzarella; pasta! i decided to roll out sheets of whole wheat lasagna, cut circles, and after cooking  i would slather them with the cashew spread to add a little “heft” to the meal. ideally your tomatoes will be the same exact width as the pasta, (cut with a pint glass ,natch) and to achieve this you will have to discard the bottom and top ends of the fruit to have nice flat tops-leaving 2-3 perfect slices per tomato. use those “scraps” as decoration, or save for another use. however, i do not recommend trimming the outside skin of the tomato for sake of symmetry, it’ll get messy and take away some of the beautiful color-especially with heirlooms. to save time you can pre-make the pasta and the cheese up to a day in advance for fast assembly. you could also absolutely swap out the pasta for circular slabs of marinated tofu for a tasty, gluten free meal.

Fresh Heirloom Lasagna Stacks

serves 4

1/2 recipe pasta dough recipe here or, use egg-free wonton wrappers- 12 total

1 cup raw cashews

1/4 cup nutritional yeast

1 tbs mellow white miso

4-6 medium-large heirloom tomatoes, any color

2 skinny, long bell peppers, or annaheim peppers-i used chocolate bells

36 basil leaves

salt

pepper

olive oil

balsamic vinegar

first, start the cashew cheese. pour your raw cashews into a bowl and add enough water to cover. soak for one hour and drain, saving the soaking liquid. dump them into a food processor with the miso paste and nutritional yeast, and pulse to combine. now run the machine and slowly stream in the soaking water until the cashews are thick, pale, and fluffy like frosting. spoon into a container and chill while you get ready to assemble.

now, the pasta. if making your own, take your dough and divide it into 4 equal pieces. feed each piece into your roller, but only work up to the number 2 setting; this will keep the circles sturdy, and wonderfully chewy. move each sheet to a cutting board lightly dusted with semolina, and use a pint glass or equal sized biscuit cutter to make 3 circles. lay these out on some waxed paper to dry out for awhile. meanwhile, get some water on to boil.

tomatoes and peppers. take each tomato, and with a serrated knife cut them into 5 pieces-the top and bottom being thinner than the 3 middle pieces. depending on your size, you may only get 2 slices so have a few extra tomatoes on hand. trim the core from your scraps and set them aside for another use. layer your slices between some napkins to help absorb extra water. slice your bell peppers into 1/4″ thick slices and remove the seeds.

pasta part 2. drop your pasta, 6 at a time, into your boiling water. simmer until floating, and then for 30 seconds more. remove the pasta to a piece of waxed, or parchment paper to dry.

assemble! once the pasta has dried off, smear a generous layer of the cashew cheese onto one side (now the “top” of the pasta) and sprinkle with salt and pepper. on your plates, starting with the widest tomatoes and working to your smallest, layer in this order: tomato-pasta-3 basil leaves-3 bell pepper slices, repeat this 2 more times but omit the bell pepper from the last layer. dress up the top of the stack with extra black pepper, pieces of extra tomato or a pepper ring, and a drizzle each of olive oil and balsamic vinegar. serve asap!

the work station

sexay stacked heirloom lasagna