Spinach Turkey Wraps

June. Summer arriving with the particular Alaskan urgency of a season that has three months to accomplish what other places take six months to do. The fireweed is blooming — the pink wildflower that tracks Alaskan summer the way a clock tracks hours, blooming from the bottom of the stalk in June and reaching the top in August, the natural timer that tells Alaskans exactly where they are in the summer and how much summer is left. The fireweed is at the bottom. The summer is new. There is time.

The blog has been asked to participate in a food writers' panel — a virtual event, a national food publication's discussion of regional American cuisine. I'll be representing Filipino-Alaskan food, which is a category that didn't exist in the national food consciousness before I started writing about it and now exists because I wrote about it. The existence is the point. The representation is the work. The moose adobo and the salmon sinigang are on the map because I put them there, word by word, post by post, the slow cartography of an immigrant kitchen that was always there but hadn't been named.

I made king crab lumpia for the occasion — Reynaldo's invention, the fusion that horrifies purists and delights everyone else. King crab from Joseph's Kodiak catch, shredded and mixed with the standard lumpia filling, wrapped in the standard wrapper, fried in the standard oil. The result: extraordinary. The crab adding its sweetness to the pork's savoriness, the ocean meeting the land in a wrapper, the Alaska meeting the Philippines in a pan. Reynaldo's genius. My inheritance. The recipe that couldn't exist anywhere else.

I can’t always share Reynaldo’s king crab lumpia with everyone who asks—king crab from a Kodiak catch is not exactly a pantry staple for most of the country—but the philosophy behind it is something I can pass along: take what you have, wrap it in something that holds it together, and trust that the combination will be greater than its parts. These spinach turkey wraps live in that same spirit. They’re what I make on the days between the extraordinary ones, the roll I pull together when the panel is over and the fireweed is still blooming and all I need is something simple that still feels like it was made with intention.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 0 minutes | Total Time: 10 minutes | Servings: 2

Ingredients

2 large flour tortillas (10-inch)
4 oz thinly sliced deli turkey
2 cups fresh baby spinach, loosely packed
3 tablespoons cream cheese, softened
1 tablespoon mayonnaise
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1/2 cup shredded carrots
1/4 cup thinly sliced cucumber
1/4 cup thinly sliced red bell pepper
2 tablespoons thinly sliced red onion
Salt and black pepper to taste

Instructions

Make the spread. In a small bowl, stir together the cream cheese, mayonnaise, and Dijon mustard until smooth. Season lightly with salt and black pepper.
Prep the tortillas. Lay both tortillas flat on a clean work surface. Spread the cream cheese mixture evenly across each tortilla, leaving a 1-inch border around the edges.
Layer the fillings. Distribute the spinach leaves across the center of each tortilla. Layer the turkey slices on top of the spinach, then add the shredded carrots, cucumber slices, red bell pepper, and red onion.
Roll tightly. Fold in the left and right sides of the tortilla about 1 inch, then roll from the bottom up, keeping the filling snug as you go. The fold-in sides will help contain the filling as you roll.
Slice and serve. Cut each wrap diagonally in half with a sharp knife. Serve immediately, or wrap tightly in parchment and refrigerate for up to 4 hours.

Nutrition (per serving)

Spinach Turkey Wraps — The Everyday Roll That Carries the Same Spirit