Cooking Light Recipe Test: Nor-Cal Veggie Sandwich with Hazelnut Butter

Here's another food I saw on Instagram and instantly wanted.  It's a vegetarian sandwich.  While I'm not vegetarian, I appreciate a meatless meal.  I usually feel less weighed down and in need of a nap without the meat.

How amazingly fresh does this look?  I was suckered in by the pretty picture.

As it turns out, this should be called the $30.00 PITA sandwich.  Whether it was worth it is certainly debatable for me.  The ingredients sent me on a scavenger hunt around Indianapolis.  The sandwich was a considerable amount of work and it was very expensive to make.  I may be a foodie at heart, but by the time I finished all this, I think I just wanted a meatball sandwich from Subway.

Nevertheless, here's the original recipe:
http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/nor-cal-veggie-sandwich

And here's the journey it took to get to the finished sandwich.

It all started with finding hazelnut butter.  While I was in the grocery section at Target, I checked just in case.  They had almond and peanut butter, but no hazelnut butter.  I wasn't surprised though, so I called Fresh Market (no, and was hung up on in the process) and Whole Foods (also no).  I could order it on Amazon for about $14.00, but then I'd have to pay that much and wait for it to be shipped.  I decided to follow the instructions in the recipe to make my own.

The next time I was at Marsh, I tried to buy hazelnuts.  They didn't have them.  So off to Fresh Market.  I purchased .7 lbs of pre-packed hazelnuts and artichokes for about $14.00.  But Fresh Market didn't have sprouts.  So off to Whole Foods for the rest of the ingredients--another $15.00.  And a fun adventure through pillaged aisles since there was snow coming that night.

Evidently the first thing they run out of at Whole Foods before a blizzard isn't milk, bread, or eggs...it's bagged salad!

I also ended up swapping sweet pea shoots for the radish sprouts since my husband isn't a big fan of sprouts--he thinks they feel like hair in his food.  The stems are slightly wider than radish sprouts.

Four stores later, I had the ingredients (finally), it was time to begin.  A little online reading turned up a useful nugget of info: if you're not used to natural nut butters, leaving the skins on hazelnuts can make the final butter too bitter for your palate.  And toasting the hazelnuts imparts a nice flavor.  With that info, I started to peel the hazelnuts.  It was impossible.  The skins refused to move.  More online reading turned up this tip: boil the hazelnuts for a few minutes with a few tablespoons of baking soda.  This worked well.  The skins released easily afterwards.

If you use the boiling water with baking soda method to remove your hazelnut skins, don't be concerned when the water, your pot, and your utensils turn black.  It left ashy residue on everything.  Here are some of my hazelnuts taking a bath in boiling baking soda water so I could peel them.

After peeling the hazelnuts, I toasted them for about 15 minutes at 350.  They had a nice golden color.

After they cooled, I added them to my blender and proceeded.  The final product using a blender was not as smooth of a butter as I prefer.  It wasn't a terrible texture, but it wasn't creamy.  It definitely tasted more "natural."  The flavor itself was fine.  If I do this again, I'll use less mayo,  I'll either use a tiny bit, or perhaps just a drizzle of oil.  I noticed the mayo too much for my taste.  Definitely don't forget to salt the butter.  I tasted before and after, and liked it much better after some salt.

The final product using .7 lbs. of hazelnuts was a softball-sized glob of hazelnut butter.

I let the hazelnut butter sit overnight--at that point I'd done enough work!  I also used the artichokes for double duty--made Moroccan chicken with charmoula that night and served the artichoke as the vegetable.  My husband had never eaten artichoke petals before, so it was an adventure for him.  I kept the hearts for the next day.

Double duty artichokes: dinner the night before included the petals.

The next day was sandwich day.  I began by pan frying slices of the artichoke hearts in the olive oil as instructed.  I ate one slice and really liked it--I never realized how yummy artichoke hearts become with some crispy, golden brown edges!  Then I assembled the sandwiches--the hazelnut butter, golden artichoke heart, dressed arugula, avocado, and pea shoots subbed for the sprouts--on Silver Farms Squirrelly sprouted bread.  I served with a side of veggie chips since sandwiches and chips just go together.

My sandwich, served with veggie chips.

Close up of the side of the sandwich.

The final product was alright.  I would've liked this sandwich a lot more open faced.  The delicate veggies got a little lost with that much bread.  I figured this out halfway in.  Beyond this too much bread issue, the sandwich was nutty and fresh but nothing special.  I think I probably enjoy a sandwich or wrap with cucumbers, sprouts, some bell peppers, olives, and some pesto or chipotle mayo more because there's more crunch and moisture.  I'm glad I tried this...and now I have leftover hazelnut butter for breakfast, sprouted bread for toast, arugula for salad, and pea shoots for something yet to be determined.  But overall, it was a lot of work for a sandwich that was just okay.

If I make it again and do some modifications, I'll update this review.  But for now, I think my next sandwich will be something more straightforward.

Insider tip: buy the hazelnut butter.  And call your grocery to make sure it has all the ingredients, or you'll be on a grocery scavenger hunt for awhile.