I tried a new hair salon today, I think by now I went to almost all the hair salons in San Francisco and I haven’t found a stylist that knows how to cut short hair. I like my hair very short and it seems that most women in the US wear long hair, therefore most hair salons don’t know how to cut short hair. They know how to color and cut long hair, but as far as short is concerned, they just have one hair cut that they do on everyone. So I tried a new salon down town, and I got assigned to a hair stylist. I don’t know if this was me or her, but she did not talk at all, so I tried to make some conversation, nothing really philosophical, but to somehow tuer le temps as we say (kill time), and nothing really seemed to interest her, so I just kept quiet, thinking maybe she was having a bad day…everyone is allowed to have one. Anyway, my hair is short and I still don’t like the cut, nothing different than usual, but on top of it, the hair stylist was not pleasant.

Well, one good thing about today are my lovely rolls…

I love bittery greens, and the bitter the better! Doing my regular grocery shopping I found those gorgeous purple red mustard leaves, they seemed so young and tender, that it would have been silly not to buy them. I always have some spring roll wraps, that I buy thinking I will use them, but never do, which is a shame. So I promised to myself that no matter what, I will prepare something with those wraps. Of course, you can just imagine what happened to the wraps and red mustard leaves…they got married and that was a match from heaven.

The other highlight of this dish is really the beet vinaigrette. The sweetness of the beets was incredibly delicious combined with the bitterness of the greens and melting kasseri cheese. Kasseri cheese is Greek and is made out of sheep milk with a touch of goat milk. Its consistency is similar to mozzarella, and tends to melt easily. You can mix the cheese with the greens, I added the cheese at the end, that’s the reason why it’s barely noticeable on the picture, but you can mix it with the greens. This is a fairly quick dish to prepare and is delicious as a main dish with a salad or as an appetizer.

Ingredients for 6 rolls

• 1 bunch mustard leaves
• 6 spring roll wraps
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 1 tbs kalamata olives chopped
• zest of 1 lemon
• 1 tbs olive oil (+1 for the pan)
• 5 tbs kasseri cheese

For the beet vinaigrette

• 5 small baby beets
• 1/2 cup vegetable broth
• 1 tbs olive oil
• 1 tsp raspberry vinegar
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Wash mustard leaves thoroughly. Bring a large of salted pot of water to a boil, and cook mustard leaves for about 5 minutes or until tender. Drain, let cool and squeeze extra water using your hands. Chop finely. Heat olive oil in a pan, add garlic, stir for a few minutes, then add chopped mustard leaves. Adjust with salt and pepper (don’t add to much salt since the cheese and olives are already salted). Add lemon zest and stir for another minute or so. Remove from stove and set aside. Add olives. At this point, you can add cheese to the mixture or add it at then end, like I did.

Place on wrap on a flat surface and add greens and cheese. Roll like a cigar (not that I have ever rolled a cigar). Proceed the same way with all the rolls.

Heat olive oil in a pan, and add each rolls, watch them carefully, they burn easily, turn them around to brown all sides. Remove from the pan and drain extra oil in a paper towel. Serve with arugula leaves and beet vinaigrette on the side.

For the vinaigrette

Cook beets until tender in water. Peel and let cool. Blend in a mixer with the rest of the ingredients.

I consider those to be Mediterranean tapas, actually tapas don’t have to be Spanish, or do they? …a small bite can be a tapas in my opinion.  I am not too familiar with Spanish traditions but it seems like it. When I went to Madrid, what they called tapas were basically small portions of all different things.

One of my greatest pleasure is to entertain, so appetizers, hors d’oeuvres and small bites are my favorites. Those are so perfect because they are not too time consuming (a little but not too much) and taste delicious. You could also use filo dough instead of those egg roll wrappers, it would be a great substitute but I didn’t have any.

Purple being the color of the moment, anytime I got asked “what is your favorite color?”, I realized that it all depends on my mood. I had the red craziness phase last month, now it’s the purple. I buy anything purple, I got myself a pair of purple corduroy pants, purple scarf, t-shirt, etc.., and I have been wearing my purple pants for over a week, without an ounce of weariness.

Obviously as soon as I saw this purple pepper I bought it, I have never used purple peppers before, I fall in love with its color, not really knowing what to do with it. When a fruit of vegetable is too pretty, I usually don’t eat it, I just look at it, so I didn’t want to do the same thing with this beauty.

As pretty as this pepper is from the outside, the inside is shockingly ugly, it’s the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde pepper. As soon as it’s broiled, the skin turns brownish and its pulp whitish. So, if you buy a purple pepper, don’t expect a purple pulp, just buy it for its color while uncooked, not for its taste. This pepper has nothing to do with the regular red or green bell pepper and has somehow a flavorless side to it. I am glad I bought one, so now I know I will not buy it again! It’s just pretty, but when dealing with food, pretty isn’t enough!

As for the chards, I only used the leafy part, not the stem. The French throw away the leaves and make gratins out of the stems. Italians do the opposite, my mom always made those as a side dish everything combined stem and leaves. I think it’s a shame to throw away the stems, but they’re not really used in these rolls, so you can sauté them with garlic and serve them as a side dish.

Ingredients for 8 rolls

For the rolls

• 2 bunches chards
• 8 tsp goat cheese
• 1/2 red bell pepper
• 8 wrappers
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• chili oil
• 1 tbs olive oil
• Szechuan pepper
• salt

For the dipping sauce

• 3 yellow heirloom tomatoes, seedless and diced
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 1 sprig fresh oregano
• 1 tsp butter
• vegetable bouillon
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Wash chards, remove the stems, and place in boiling water for about 5 minutes. Drain well, squeeze extra liquid and chop them. In a pan, heat olive oil and add garlic, stir well to get the flavors out, then add chards and sauté them quickly. Add salt and stir. Set aside and let it cool.

Broil pepper under broiler. When the skin is charred, remove from broiler and let it cool. Peel and remove seeds. Cut in long strips.

Using a large egg roll wrap, place chards in the middle, add one bell pepper strip, pepper, red bell pepper, goat cheese and chili oil. Continue the wrapping process. From about 10 cm rolls.

Heat olive oil in a pan, and place rolls. Let them brown evenly all around. Cut them in half and serve with dipping sauce.

For the dipping sauce

Peel tomatoes and remove seeds and dice them finely. In a pot, melt butter, add garlic and oregano sprig. Stir for a few minutes to get the fllavors out. Add tomatoes, bouillon, salt and pepper. Reduce the tomato until it thickens. Remove oregano sprig and let it cool.