Blood Orange and Hazelnut Salad and Dolmas

This is another one of those meals that was midway between an everyday fridge cleaner and a what-the-hell-are-we-doing-cooking-like-this-when-we-don't-have-company-coming meal.

Tis the season of bountiful citrus, and the co-op lately has been running specials on these gorgeous looking blood oranges. We first started buying blood oranges at the Dekalb Farmer's Market, and I only realized recently, after reading everyone's favorite food book from last year that their flesh has a flavor in between oranges and raspberries. Our standard salad recipe lately has been: lettuce (usually green or red leaf), possibly sliced carrots, some form of nut (thanks to Trader Joe's our freezer is generally stocked with an an assortment), and, at least for Julie, some form of citrus. These blood oranges seemed to call out quietly, but insistently, for hazelnuts, so we toasted some, rubbed the skins off and sprinkled them over the top. After sectioning the blood oranges, I made a quick vinaigrette with some zest and the juice of the remaining fruit. Such a nice combination textures and of bitter, sweet and sour flavors.

I don't remember the first time I made dolmas. My parents' time living in Chicago meant that they were well acquainted with the deliciousness of Greek food long before we could afford to go to the few Greek restaurants in the Twin Cities, and I know that they made dolmades once or twice in my childhood. It was probably sometime after becoming a vegetarian in high school that my mom and I first made their vegetarian, middle eastern cousins, dolmas, for some holiday gathering.
Julie and I made dolmas for a pot luck dinner that we hosted recently with folks from the History Center, and they were a big hit (or as much as anything can be when you're trying a little bit of everything from seven or eight tasty dishes). However, the big jar of grape leaves from Bill's costs about the same as the small jar of grape leaves, and so it seems wasteful not to buy the big jar and then wasteful not to make more within a couple of weeks so that the remaining grape leave don't get forgotten in the fridge and eventually turn moldy, like they did the last time. Anyway, once you get the hang of rolling them, it's really not that much work, and we put them in the oven to cook while we went to the gym for an hour. We used this recipe, without the green onions, and we baked them in the oven uncovered at 375 for an hour (This gives a chance for the dolmas to cook to tenderness and most of the water to steam away, so they're not soggy). Serve with some form of tzatziki or yogurt sauce. Wonderful lemony, pine nutty, oniony, ricey goodness.