Collard Greens with Fingerling Potatoes cooked in Macadamia Nut Oil, Marinated White Beans, Italian Hand-Rolled Rosemary Crackers

Tonight I decided to use up the collard greens that I had found that my wife had recently purchased. Not long ago, I had picked up a bottle of an organic macadamia nut oil (by Jungle Products).

I sauteed in the macadamia nut oil maybe ten small fingerling potatoes that I had cut in half; a few minutes into the saute, I added a medium red onion, cut into thin 1" or so slices. Once the potato was nicely browning, I added some lavender bell pepper slices and cooked for another minute or two, then added some cumin seeds. I removed this all from the heat a minute later.

In the meantime, I hand tore the leaves from the stems of a bunch of collard greens, and cut the greens into roughly 1 1/2" squares (the stems are destined for my compost pile). I started about a half or 3/4 cup of water boiling; I would have dissolved in a vegan bouillon cube, but was out of them. I added the greens and cooked, covered, reducing the heat to a simmer. After about 7-10 minutes, when the leaves were nice and dark green and tasted done, I poured out the cooking liquid into a cup that I served my wife to enjoy with dinner.

Into the pan of greens, I now mixed in the potato-onion mixture, as well as maybe a dozen small oregano leaves, a little salt and paprika, and a pinch or two of dill weed, as well as between 1/8 and 1/4 cup organic Baja lime marinade. It turned out to be quite good!

I also served some marinated white beans that I had purchased from the olive bar at Whole Foods. I often shy away from beans as they can upset my stomach, but recently I've not had so many problems, so thought I'd try it. They were also good. I also served a salad and imported Italian Mulini Reali organic hand-rolled rosemary crackers.

I have not used macadamia oil before, but have heard of its benefits in having a high percent of possibly cholesterol-lowering mono-unsaturated fats and a high smoke point. (I've bicycled to and around the big Mauno Loa macadamia nut factory near Hilo, Hawaii several times.) I enjoyed trying this oil - it was much smoother than olive oil and the food seemed to cook with less sticking to my cast iron pan than with olive oil. (Incidentally, we didn't have cooking class tonight because the facility was closed in honor of the Yom Kippur holiday.)