Minestrone

Before I go into tonight's dinner, I should go back about a month in time and provide an accounting of my fast.  In a nutshell, I broke down on day 3.  It was just too hard, even with a 3-day weekend, to do stuff around the house on a juice-only diet after five days of eating fruits and vegetables only.  I just felt too deprived, so on days 3 and 4 of the juice fast, I broke the fast in the evening by eating cashews, chips and salsa and the like, and on day 5 I finished up whatever premade juice was on hand and then called it quits.  I wouldn't categorically say that it was a bad idea or that I wouldn't try something like it again.  However, I will say that it probably would have been more prudent to start out small - say, with a 3-day juice fast with no pre- or post-fast dietary restrictions - and then worked my way up to the 15-day deal over time.

One cool thing about the reboot is that I had a reason to save a bunch of veggie juice pulp and make my own veggie broth.  The latest batch was made with pulp from butternut squash and a couple of green veggies I could no longer identify after a month of them being pulped and stored in the freezer, and it saved me having to heat water for veggie base.

So...here's one of the many things I've eaten over the past month!  My main objective here was to hurry up and use the broth I made a few days ago, but it worked out especially well with today's cooler weather and clouds.

Minestrone:
1 lb. dried red kidney beans, soaked
5 cups veggie broth plus 3 cups water
2 tbsp olive oil
1 zucchini, quartered lengthwise and sliced 1/4" thick
1 medium onion, diced
4 cloves garlic
1 can organic fire-roasted chopped tomatoes with their juice
1 cup frozen green beans, thawed
1/2 cup orzo pasta
salt and pepper to taste
1 tsp ground sage
50 leaves fresh oregano, whole

Quick soak: in a 2-quart pot, cover dry beans in water by one inch.  Bring to a boil, boil one minute, then remove from heat, cover and soak one hour.

In a 6-8 quart pot, bring broth and water to a boil, add kidney beans and simmer until they're nearly done, stirring occasionally (lest the beans start sticking to the bottom of the pot), about 30-45 minutes. 

In a separate saucepan, heat olive oil over medium heat.  Add zucchini, onion and garlic, stir well and saute until softened, about 3-5 minutes.  Add mixture to kidney beans and broth along with tomatoes, green beans, salt, pepper, oregano and sage.  Cook until green beans have heated through, about another 5 minutes.  Add orzo, cover and simmer, stirring occasionally (to keep pasta from sticking to the bottom), until soup is bubbling.
***
I've actually made this a bunch of times over the years - usually with canned kidney beans and maybe also some chickpeas - and it never gets old.  Normally I don't like to dredge the pot (as Steve does) when I serve myself a bowl of soup, but I do with soups containing pasta because the pasta will keep plumping up in the fridge and it can be annoying to run out of broth because the pasta has absorbed it all and then have to add water and salt to the leftovers to restore the soup consistency.  (Run-on?  Oh, well.)  Speaking of which...this coming weekend I'm off, and I now have leftovers to get me through one more workday!

Have a good weekend, and maybe I'll see a few of you at the Moe's Burrito Dash 5K on Saturday!

My first stab at chili

I mildly regret not having tried my hand at chili back when I was still doing a lot with ground turkey.  It would be nice to be able to say I did that at least once, even though I wasn't the world's biggest chili fan.  I like to think that if I've had something once, or even many times, and found that it wasn't that great or was only really good some of the time, I can improve upon it at home.  Many's the time I've eaten gumbo that looked and acted suspiciously like canned tomato soup with a few random pieces of rice, okra and/or shrimp.  (I'm looking at you, Wild Wing Cafe.)  But every time I made it myself, it was great.  Not to toot my own horn, but it was.  And now that I no longer eat any of the meats that were the cornerstone of my homemade version, I can at least look back fondly upon the days when I made it and it kicked ass.

Alas, my first attempt at chili was meat-free.  Having also never eaten veggie chili before, I had to stop and think about what goes into chili besides ground meat, beans and tomatoes.  As it happened, a couple of bell peppers in the backyard were due to be picked and we had half an onion and a couple of jalapenos left over from the last time Steve made guacamole, so we had enough on hand to make a truly veggie chili.  I never thought about adding corn, although I'm sure that would have been good.  Basically, I used the above fresh veggies plus a bunch of cans of beans and one can of tomatoes, added some spices and stirred it up until I had something remarkably like chili.

Five-bean veggie chili:
2 tbsp canola oil
1 green bell pepper, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
2 jalapeno peppers, finely diced
1/2 medium-large onion, finely diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups water
2 Knorr brand cilantro cubes
1 can dark red kidney beans, drained
1 can navy beans, drained
1 can black beans, drained
1 can pinto beans, drained
1 can diced tomatoes with their juice
1 can fat-free refried beans
2 tsp dried Mexican oregano
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp cayenne pepper or to taste

Heat the oil in a 4-quart saucepan over medium heat.  Add diced peppers, onion and garlic and stir well.  Add water and bring to a boil.  Add cilantro cubes, stir well and reduce heat.  Add next four cans of beans and tomatoes; stir well.  Add refried beans and stir well to blend with liquids and thicken soup.  Add spices and raise heat to boil off excess liquid, stirring often for 10-15 minutes or as needed.  Serve alone or with rice, cornbread, tortilla chips, etc.
***
Not bad!  Although next time I'll probably use less water - maybe one cup or less, since the undrained tomatoes add quite a bit.  I'm really not sure how much time I spent on this, but it seemed like at least half of that time I was boiling off the excess liquid until it was thick enough to call chili.  Flavorwise, I give myself an A!  Next time (and I'm sure there will be one, since flexible recipes like these are right up my alley) I'll probably add a bit more spice, possibly in the form of the dried red chilies I get from the Indian grocery store on Two Notch Rd.  I'm sure I'll try it with corn at least once and maybe also experiment with different hot peppers from the produce section.

So, that was my lunch hour today.  Tonight we'll be going out someplace where I can load up on pasta for the big race tomorrow.  If any of you in the Columbia area are doing the Ray Tanner Home Run, hopefully we'll run into each other - and good luck!

Blackened Tofu with Cajun Rice

Finally - a few spare minutes yesterday in which to cook! 

So, I'm trying this vegan thing on for size.  I've done it for a day or two at a time before and I'm not making any commitments right now, but I figured I'd do the 21-Day Vegan Kickstart for however many days I can stand it and then resume eating cheese.  If you've never heard of it before, check it out - they have some yummy recipes on their website as well.

Last night's dinner was a take on a jambalaya recipe I used to make that involved chicken broth, smoked sausage and whole pieces of chicken.  Since I no longer consume any of those and I happened to have a block of tofu and some fresh peppers, onions and tomatoes in the fridge, I decided to try my hand at a vegan alternative.

Blackened Tofu:
7-8 oz. firm tofu, pressed and cut into four slices
2 tbsp olive or canola oil
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
3 tsp paprika
2 tsp turmeric

Combine the spices and spread out across a small plate.  Coat the tofu pieces in oil, then coat both sides of each slice with the spice mix.  Place in the refrigerator for at least 20 min or up to 2 hours.  (Further instructions below)

Cajun Rice:
3 tbsp olive or canola oil
3 small green and/or red bell peppers
2 small yellow onions
3-4 cloves garlic
2 large tomatoes, peeled and diced (I peeled them using the boiling water for the broth)
2 cups jasmine rice
3 cups veggie broth
2 tsp garam masala
1 tsp turmeric
2 tsp dried oregano
black or cayenne pepper to taste

In a saucepan with a tight-fitting lid (don't put the lid on yet), heat oil over medium heat.  Add peppers, onions and garlic and saute until slightly softened, about 3-5 minutes.  Add tomatoes and cook for another 3 minutes.  Add rice, stir well and bring mixture to a boil.  Add broth and spices, reduce heat to low, cover with tight-fitting lid and cook until rice has absorbed all liquid, about 15-20 minutes.

Meanwhile, turn on medium heat under a nonstick saute pan (or heat 1-2 tbsp oil in regular saute pan), add marinated tofu slices and cook on each side until slightly crisp on the surface (some of the seasoning may come off), about 5-6 minutes per side.  Fluff rice and serve with tofu.

***
Gotta toot my own horn - this was so good I didn't even mind the absence of chicken, sausage or shrimp!  I had to wing it with the spices for the tofu since I don't have a Cajun or Creole seasoning mix, but this turned out really well!  The right spice mix makes a huge difference.  If you have any garlic or onion powder in your pantry (I don't), they would probably work well in this mix too.

Just one thing- next time I think I'll either make half the rice or use a whole block of tofu and double the spice mix.  Steve and I ate all four slices (two per plate with the rice, as shown) and there was plenty of rice left over.  But then, another simple solution to the problem of lopsided leftovers would be to throw in a can or two of beans and maybe some more cayenne...?  We shall see...

Black Bean and Squash Casserole with Cilantro Rice

As promised, I did dispense with the large amount of spinach mentioned in my last post by replaying the spinach kootu from a couple of weeks ago.  It came out great, as always, but my plan to make it into a vegetarian alternative to the tuna/bacon/spinach pasta went up in smoke when I realized that I was all pasta'd out after my last big batch of pasta salad.  So, I just made some brown rice to go with it and that was just as good.

Tuesday was a day off, so I addressed my anxiety about the three yellow squashes that had been in the fridge for at least a week by making this casserole. 

Black Bean and Squash Casserole with Cilantro Rice:
2 cups water
2 Knorr cilantro cubes
1.5 cups basmati rice (jasmine or another long-grain works too), rinsed
3 yellow squash, halved lengthwise and thinly sliced
3 jalapeno peppers, seeded and chopped
2 tbsp canola or olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
2 cans black beans, drained
cayenne pepper to taste
1/2 tsp cumin
1 tsp dried oregano
2 cloves garlic
8 oz. cheddar cheese, shredded

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.

Bring the water to a boil and add the cilantro cubes. 

Toss the squash and jalapenos in a mixing bowl with the oil, salt and pepper.

In a separate bowl, combine the black beans with the next four ingredients.

In a 10 x 13" baking dish, spread the uncooked rice evenly across the bottom of the pan.  Layer the squash and jalapenos evenly across the rice, then pour the cilantro broth over both.  Layer the black beans evenly over the squash.

Bake, covered, for 45 minutes or until rice has absorbed all liquid.  Remove from oven (heat may be turned off at this point), cover evenly with cheddar cheese and put the dish back in the oven uncovered until the cheese has melted, about 3 to 5 minutes.  Serve warm.

***
I don't normally experiment with casserole dishes without having a recipe to tweak, but this came out okay all things considered.  My only regret is that the rice didn't really make itself a part of the casserole because of the barrier formed by the squash.  It would have been nice for some of the cheese to reach down and mix with the rice, but alas...maybe someday I'll try it again. 

Here's what it looked like on Steve's plate:

As for the squash, it neither helped nor hindered, but it was nice to have a veggie figure prominently in the mix, unlike the standard rice-and-beans plate you can get at any of the Mexican restaurants around here.  And I normally use a 1.5 to 1 ratio of water to uncooked rice, but I made it 4:3 this time figuring that any liquid coming out of the squash would make up the difference.  I was right, and the rice came out perfectly!  So the moral of the story is...maybe don't bother making this as a casserole, and just cook everything, put it on a heatproof plate and put that in the oven just long enough for the cheese to melt over the rice?...
 
Except for some tomatoes that Steve picked from the plant yesterday, we really don't have anything that needs to be used up right now.  If I had to guess, my next recipe will involve pesto made from parsley, basil and/or lemon balm.  Another pizza?  Stay tuned...

Soup and salad night

I'm a couple of days late with this post but very happy to report that nearly half of the veggies and herbs in Thursday night's soup and salad dinner came from the backyard!  From the store, a big handful of baby spinach, an onion, a tomato and about eight red baby potatoes.  Oh, and feta cheese and lemon juice.  From the garden, a bunch of radish tops, three radishes, two cucumbers, about fifteen oregano leaves, seven or eight basil leaves and another seven or eight lemon balm leaves. 

I'd been looking forward to making this radish greens soup for a while but wanted to wait until I already had the potato and onion before pulling up the one bunch of radish greens remaining.  The radishes were mostly non-performers this time due to overwatering (go figure - they got as much water as the first bunch that did fine), but the greens were all perfectly usable.  So, when Steve brought home the potatoes and onion one day this week, I decided that the moment had arrived and I went to it, substituting veggie broth for the chicken broth.  Also, earlier in the week he had picked a cucumber or two along with the squash and zucchini that are going off gangbusters in the garden, so I figured that a tomato and some fresh herbs and a homemade Greek lemon-oil dressing were all that I'd need to complete a Greek cucumber salad like the one featured here.

I used said handful of spinach because the recipe called for two bunches of radish greens and I only had the one.  Plus, the spinach in the fridge wasn't getting any younger, and I knew that I wanted to use up all eight of the baby red potatoes because I didn't have any other ideas for them and I wanted to soup to be equally potato-y and green or slightly in favor of the greens, which necessitated supplementation of the radish greens. 

The end result  A nice, light dinner for a hot evening!

It's going to be another hot one.  Please do a rain dance for veggie gardens across the Southeast today!

Vegan Spinach Lasagna

Like the title says, it's vegan.  You've been warned...

This post had to wait a day because it took longer than I expected for this thing to come together.  I'm never, ever hungry past 7:30 p.m., and I realized when this went in the oven that it wouldn't be done until almost 8:00.  So, I let it do its thing and ate hummus and tortilla chips again while a computer handed his competitors' asses to them on Jeopardy.

I was a bit skeptical as to how a tweaked version of this recipe would turn out, but I was curious to see exactly what flavor combination would be produced by the ingredients for the tofu ricotta cheese.  Plus I still have a bunch of lasagna noodles left over from the two or three times I've made it over the past year (in a bread loaf pan, which only takes four or five noodles for three layers), I'm not a fan of ricotta cheese, and I was intrigued by the notion that the marinara sauce didn't have to be cooked down for over an hour and the lasagna noodles didn't have to already be cooked as long as the steam was held in.  Suddenly, lasagna seemed to have gotten easier.

Well, the sauce part was easier, and I just used frozen spinach and fresh baby bella mushrooms instead of the more complicated vegetable layer described in the original recipe.  Still, the time got away from me while I was blending the ingredients for the "cheese," thawing packages of frozen spinach, draining them, mixing in a little salt and pepper, then thinly slicing mushrooms and having the time of my life stirring the contents of a brand new can of tahini until I achieved an even consistency.  Think of stirring all the oil back into a deep jar of all-natural peanut butter and multiply that times 5.  No, make that 10.  So, despite having started this thing just after 5:00, it didn't go into the oven until 6:30.  So, tonight was the first opportunity I had to taste the end result while I had any appetite.

The result?...To be honest, I was expecting the "cheese" to be a little funky, but it actually wasn't!  Steve even finished his helping before I finished mine.

I do think that if I use my 9 x 13-inch baking pan again instead of the usual bread loaf pan, I'll make more sauce.  Maybe not the half-gallon used in the original recipe, but more than I did for this lasagna.  I only had two 15-ounce cans of diced tomatoes on hand; one I pureed, the other I left diced because the dice were small.  However, since it took more sauce than usual to cover each layer of veggies, etc., I hardly had any left to cover the top layer of noodles and half expected them to come out uncooked.  Thankfully, the sauce and everything else produced just enough steam (held in by foil) to keep that from happening, but next time I'll at least go up to three 15-ounce cans' worth of tomatoes so that I can have an equal layer of tomato sauce on top to swirl with the cheese mixture.

Off to watch three humans compete in tonight's Jeopardy teen tournament and to enjoy a nice long weekend.  Good night!

Zucchini and kidney beans with brown rice

I keep thinking the next dish I make will be mattar paneer, and it keeps not happening.  Not because I don't want any, but because I've felt too zapped to cook at all these last couple of nights.  (Well, except the stuffed peppers, but that was pretty quick and easy.)  Tonight I made myself cook just so I'd have leftovers for lunch tomorrow, but I went for something much simpler. 

I asked Steve last week to curtail his shopping for fresh or frozen produce so as to make room in the freezer for a Thanksgiving turkey (the idea being that we'll make a dent in our freezer stores as soon as the fresh stuff's all gone).  For the most part he's honored my request, but a bag of fresh spinach and a wrapped package of 3 zucchini did turn up the other day (along with a bag of apples that I asked him to pick up).  That seemed as good a reason to make something simple that would take care of a zucchini.

1 cup Yoga Organics brown rice, rinsed
2 tbsp canola oil
1 whole zucchini, cut in half lengthwise and thinly sliced
1 tsp chopped garlic
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp ground oregano
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 can dark red kidney beans, drained


Bring 13 oz. of salted water to a boil.  Add rice, stir well, cover with a tight-fitting lid and cook until all water is absorbed, about 25-30 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat canola oil in a 2-quart saucepan over medium heat.  Add zucchini, garlic, salt, cumin, oregano and cayenne and stir well.  Cook for about 5 minutes or until zucchini has begun to soften.  Add beans, stir well and cook until zucchini is fully cooked and beans are heated.

This also turned out well, but I have to admit to being brown rice-retarded.  I know it's better for you, but I never set the timer for as long as it needs and always have to check it and then give it another 5 minutes.  White rice is SO much more reliable and makes these dishes much quicker and easier.  Oh, well - one day I'll get the hang of it.  And I got what I wanted - leftovers for tomorrow!

Hope everyone out there is doing well on what turned out to be a nice, warm Veteran's Day!

Black beans and rice

What a busy week.  I actually made this on Friday for lunch and haven't been able to stop long enough to write about it.  This is a very simple vegan take on Cuban black beans and rice that I like to whip together when I don't have a lot of free time to spend in the kitchen:





3 cup basmati rice, rinsed
2 tbsp canola oil
1 green bell pepper, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp ground Mexican oregano
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 can black beans, drained

Bring 1.5 cups of salted water to a boil.  Reduce heat to medium-low, add rice, stir well and cover with a tight-fitting lid and cook for 13-15 minutes or until all water has been absorbed.

Meanwhile, heat canola oil in a small saucepan over medium heat.  Add bell peppers and stir well.  Add garlic, cumin, oregano, salt and cayenne and cook until peppers have softened, about 5 minutes.  Add beans, stir well and cook until beans are warm, another 5 minutes.

Remove lid from rice, rake all of it with a fork and spoon desired amount onto plates.  Mix desired quantity of beans and peppers into rice on plates (or just top the rice with the beans).

I'm hungry again just writing about it, and I haven't been able to cook much since then.  Hopefully that will change tonight...

Ratatouille

So, I caught some sort of bug over the weekend and didn’t realize it until Monday morning at work, by which time I'd already made this and the Frogmore Stew. (Steve's still not sick - knock on wood.) Luckily, I had made this in the meantime, which has been just as good to eat while sick as anything else. To my great surprise, there were no squash or zucchini in this week’s Pinckney’s stash, but there was an eggplant and a green pepper in the swap box at my pickup location and a largish zucchini growing in the backyard, so I decided to make the ratatouille. This is great by itself or as a type of primavera sauce over pasta and topped with shredded parmesan.

3 tbsp olive oil
1 eggplant, diced into 1-inch cubes
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 large zucchini, diced into 1-inch cubes
1 green bell pepper, cut into 1-inch pieces
4 medium-large tomatoes, peeled and diced
1 branch fresh oregano
1 branch fresh rosemary
salt and pepper to taste

In a pot at least 4 inches deep, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the eggplant and garlic, stir and saute until eggplant is slightly softened, about 5 minutes. (Note: to hold as much steam as possible, keep the lid on between veggie additions.) Add the zucchini, stir and saute for another 5 minutes. Add the bell pepper, stir and saute for another 5 minutes. Add the tomatoes and fresh herbs, pressing down the herbs so they are fully submerged. Cover and simmer for another 20-30 minutes or until all veggies are tender. Add salt and pepper to taste and serve.

I usually make a batch at least twice this size when I plan ahead, but with what I had on hand, I figured that a smaller batch would do as well and would cut down on the amount of leftovers that would have to go in the freezer.

It's Thursday once again, I have more produce to pick up from Pinckney's and I'm fairly certain I still won't be up for cooking or eating much of anything tonight, but I can at least be glad that I'm making good use of what I have as I get it.

Frogmore Stew!

Made this Sunday night.  It seemed like an obvious choice because of the potatoes and corn that came in last week’s Pinckney's stash along with the packages of shrimp and (turkey) smoked sausage in the freezer and my never-ending supply of spices and fresh herbs. The red potatoes, corn, smoked sausage and shrimp are all standard across the recipes that I found online. I sort-of went with this recipe because of its flexibility and used the following:



6 cloves garlic, chopped
4 red cayenne peppers, cut in half lengthwise
2 tsp ground Mexican oregano
2 tsp ground cumin
2 tsp salt
6 small new potatoes, washed (larger ones cut in half)
3 ears of corn, husked and cut in half
1 lb. turkey smoked sausage, sliced every 2 inches
1 lb. frozen shrimp

Bring 5-6 quarts of water to boil, add spices and potatoes and boil for 20 minutes or until potatoes are fork-tender. Add smoked sausage and corn and boil another 10 minutes. Add shrimp, turn off heat, cover until shrimp have cooked through or warmed up, about 5-8 minutes. Drain and serve.

Traditionally, you’re supposed to pour the contents of the pot onto a table top covered with newspaper and let everyone eat with their hands. I wasn’t about to disgrace the antique dining table we inherited last year from

Steve’s aunt in that manner, but I did spread out a few pages from the Free Times for the photo. (Yep, it’s the article about Alvin Greene, “The Manning-Churian Candidate.”)

The cayennes were from a co-worker whose definition of “hot” differs dramatically from mine. Had I known that they would taste more like red poblanos, I would have added some cayenne or Yucateco green habanero sauce to the mix. Also, there are different spice preferences along the coastal areas of the Southeast. If I ever make this again, I think that, rather than make up my own seasoning blend (although this wasn’t bad), I’ll go with a sachet of Old Bay crab boil. I’ve made some of my best gumbo with it before and would expect it to do just as well in a Frogmore Stew. Enjoy!