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Showing posts with label carrot. Show all posts
Showing posts with label carrot. Show all posts

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Oat Groat and Lentil Salad with Raisins, Carrot, and Spring Onion

For Sunday dinner a few weeks ago, with E and two of our friends, I wanted something that would 1) be cool(ish) since it's been pretty warm outside and 2) use up some of the pantry staples I've got on hand. This led to a quick evaluation of my pantry and noticing that I had half a bag of lentils and a lot of oat groats. I've written about oat groats before, but in case you're new to the blog and to groats, they're the unprocessed oat and cook up similar to barley or brown rice, texture wise.

In my local grocery stores, groats have also been cheaper than brown rice of late and although they don't combine with lentils or beans to create a complete protein, for most people that's not really a problem -- most of us get plenty of protein (granted with vegetarians and vegans, this can be a bit of a problem). Lately, I'm not concerned about it, because I've been making my many smoothies with vanilla soy milk (great grocery store special) and so I'm getting a fair amount of protein there, and in other places.

I baked the groats, despite the extra heat that would cause, because it meant I could also go walk the dog. You can cook them on the stove top, but this might result in them breaking up a bit more (and looking more like normal oatmeal). Aside from cooking the groats and lentils, this salad comes together quickly and can be eaten warm -- I do recommend allowing it to chill overnight though, if you've got the spare time, because it allows the flavors to blend. Do not reheat it!

This recipe was inspired by a different grain-and-lentil salad I used to make frequently just after moving to Iowa, and a salad I recently tried, from a grocery store near the coast.

The raisins add a nice sweet bite from time to time, the carrot some extra crunch, and the onion really draws the whole salad together. If you're garlic-squeamish, you can leave it out (scape season, after all, is really short), but I like the complexity it adds. The chipotle adds a slight smokey note without really adding spice.

Oat Groat and Lentil Salad with Raisins, Carrot, and Spring Onion
1 cup uncooked oat groats
2 1/2 cups water
1/2 teaspoon salt
Pinch red pepper flakes

1 cup uncooked whole lentils
2 cups water
1 tablespoon dried oregano (preferably Mexican)
1 tablespoon chipotle paste*
1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup raisins
1 large carrot, diced
1/2 cup spring (or green) onion, chopped (greens only)
1 teaspoon garlic scape, slivered (or 1/2 teaspoon fresh garlic, minced)
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Place the oat groats, 2 1/2 cups water, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and red pepper flakes into an oven-safe baking dish that can be covered. Cover and bake at 400 degrees for 30-45 minutes, or until groats are "to the tooth."

Meanwhile, on the stovetop, add 1 cup lentils, 2 cups water, and dried oregano to a small pot. Simmer over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until lentils are tender and most of the water has been absorbed. Stir in the chipotle paste and salt. Remove from heat.

In a medium-sized bowl, combine raisins, carrot, onion, garlic scape, and lemon juice. Add the cooked, and slightly cooled, groats and lentils, and stir to combine. Refrigerate at least 30 minutes, preferably overnight, before serving.

*Chipotle paste: I take tinned chipotles and blender them all at once, then store in an air-tight container in the refrigerator to use as needed.

(sorry for no picture this time)


Monday, June 18, 2012

Eating Carrot Tops, plus (another) smoothie recipe

In my CSA box, I got carrots. I love carrots. But when you don't buy them in a pre-packaged bag, they come with greens which most people throw away. There's really no need for this. Any of you who read this moderately regularly will know how much I hate throwing things away (part of the reason I want a few chickens, eventually) if they could be composted or otherwise recycled. Since I don't have a compost heap, this means a lot of creative uses of the parts of veggies a lot of us throw away -- from bases to broths, to things like this lightly sweet recipe for...you guessed it! Another smoothie!

Carrot-top Smoothie
This is one of my favorite smoothies of late, in part because it has such a fresh flavor and because it's a brilliant, bright green. It's not particularly sweet, so if you like sweeter smoothies, add a tablespoon or so of agave, honey, or other sweetener of your choice. Personally, I think the apple juice adds enough sweetness, without adding much flavor -- unlike the vanilla soy milk, which also adds some sweetness, in addition to protein. The oats help thicken it.

Ready to try it? Yes? Carrot fronds (not the stem, that can be woody) work best for this recipe. If you're still wondering why eat carrot tops, here are just a few reasons:
  • a good source of potassium, chlorophyll, and vitamin K
  • brightens flavors in everything from salads to a garlicky pot of beans
  • Americans throw away a ridiculous amount of food waste
Carrot-Top Smoothie
1 cup carrot fronds, lightly packed
1/4 cup frozen apple juice concentrate
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup vanilla soy milk
1/4 cup oats

Add all ingredients to blender and puree until smooth. Add more liquid, to reach the desired consistency, if necessary. Serve.

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Winter Veggie Cobbler (gluten-free)

Gluten-free friends, rejoice! A gluten-free recipe that actually browns beautifully. Okay, so it's not really that exciting for most people, but if you're used to eating GF, then you're also used to things that are slow to brown, or which don't brown at all -- which for bread recipes, can be rather frustrating.

I've had a version of this recipe on my fridge for a while, courtesy of a food co-op, but hadn't gotten around to trying it. I didn't have what I needed. Or I didn't have the time. Or I didn't have the creative energies for making it. Or...well, there were lots of excuses. And that's the thing. There are always excuses about why we should make something simple, or even why we should just go grab food to go, or have it delivered. 

I finally did make it when I had a lazy weekend, and E and I were going to go swimming in the evening after she got off work. I wanted something that would be pretty much ready for us when we got home -- and this can certainly be easily prepared up to a point and then left in the oven for an hour or so and quickly rewarmed, which is exactly what we did. That's nice, really nice, because let's face it, most of us are pretty busy. That being said, this recipe does take a fair amount of prep time before it actually goes in the oven, but it's pretty low-key prep. Chopping, sauteeing, stirring the topping mix. 

Chopped Turnip and Celery Root
I used the winter veggies I had on hand. The original recipe, for instance, called for parsnip (not turnip), among other things, and I suspect the recipe would be fairly forgiving in general of changes. My word of caution with that would be to use caution when thinking about how much you want to include of strongly flavored veggies, such as turnip.

It was a lovely dish to come home to on a day off that had been filled with wandering around town in the pale sunshine of late December. If you're vegan, I imagine this would be pretty easy to convert to a vegan recipe using a vegan margarine or shortening in place of the butter and coconut milk (or another non-dairy milk of your choice) in place of the whole milk in the dumplings. In this case, I'd probably add some lemon juice to create a vegan buttermilk and 1/2 teaspoon baking soda . 

Because this used red wine, and because we were feeling cozy, E and I mulled wine to go with this dish. Just a suggestion, but it was pretty fantastic.

Winter Veggie Cobbler
Topping
1 cup brown rice flour
1/2 cup white rice flour
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1 teaspoon guar gum
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 tablespoon and 1 teaspoon baking powder
3 tablespoons unsalted butter cut into small cubes
1 ½ cups whole milk or half butter milk and milk
2 tablespoons mixed fresh herbs like thyme, marjoram or parsley, finely chopped (I used about a teaspoon dried instead and it worked fine. Who has this many fresh herbs in winter?)

Veggies
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 large yellow onion , chopped
4 large carrots cut into ½ inch rounds then quarters
1 medium size celery root peeled and cut into 1 inch pieces
1 medium turnip peeled and cut into ½ inch rounds
1/2 medium size sweet potato cut into 1 inch dice
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup dry red wine
3 tablespoons tomato paste
2 ½ cups veggie stock or water
2 tablespoons fresh herbs like thyme, marjoram or parsley chopped fine (again, I used dried herbs)
1 teaspoon sea salt
Black Pepper

 Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Make topping first and let rest in the fridge while you make the veggie filling.

Topping: Sift the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Cut in the cold butter until the mixture resembles a coarse meal. Add herbs and the milk. Mix very lightly with a spoon until the batter just holds together (it comes out pretty liquidy, so make sure all the lumps are gone). Let rest in the fridge until you make the veggie filling.

Filling: Heat half of the butter and half of the oil in a large sauté skillet. Add the onion, stir for a minute, then all the carrot, celery root, and sweet potato. Brown well on several sides. In the last 3 minutes of cooking, add the minced garlic. Transfer veggies to a 9x13 baking pan.

Return skillet to high heat and add the tomato paste, toasting until fragrant. Add the wine and veggie stock. Bring to a boil, scraping up all the browned bits in the skillet. Simmer at a lowered heat for a few minutes.

Pour the liquid into the baking pan. Sprinkle with the herbs, sea salt and pepper.

Use a spoon to dot the surface of the vegetables with golf-ball sized dollops of the topping.

Just after removing the foil to bake longer
Cover baking pan with foil and bake 25 minutes at 400 degrees. Remove foil, return dish to the oven and bake uncovered until the topping is browned, about 25 minutes. Serve warm.

Beautifully browned veggie casserole




Sunday, December 25, 2011

Chocolate Roasted Potato Cake

E and I recently hosted a double-birthday/holiday potluck. My friend whose birthday was approaching said she wanted something "chocolate," when I asked her what I could bake her -- not terribly helpful, but she's also super laid back, so I wasn't too concerned either.

I, however, don't like chocolate cake and even though I wasn't planning to eat any of it (even if I'd made it gluten-free, using my standby chocolate gluten-free cake recipe), I wanted to at least try to make something that wouldn't, well, be dry and tasteless. And, I told myself, I'm not on a budget that really lets me try multiple variations of things. So, whatever I did with a chocolate cake, I needed to make sure that it was something that I wouldn't mess up--or that I'd have alternate ingredients for if I did mess it up.

E suggested the brownies I posted in November. Doable, definitely. Even if I messed up the cake. But, this was an opportunity to try making something new and how could I pass that up? In recent weeks, I've felt barely able to write--or even think about writing--much less do anything more than put rather routine (for me) food in my mouth. I haven't wanted to be creative. My friend's birthday though, seemed like a good opportunity to spark some of that kitchen-creativity again. So, I thought: chocolate. And I thought: birthday. To me, this surely equals some sort of cake.

I remembered my friend Kim, a talented writer and generally wonderful person, had a potato party while I lived in the Midwest. She'd bid on a bushel of potatoes during an auction and won--and wanted help eating them all. One of the things she made: chocolate potato cake. And, I remembered seeing recipes for potato cakes (and sauerkraut cakes) in my parents' German cookbook.

I remember trying Kim's chocolate potato cake--before I went GF--and thinking that it was surprisingly good--and delightfully moist. And this, I decided, was what I wanted to make. But, most of the recipes I looked at called for unseasoned mashed potatoes. I understood that, to some extent. The process of creating mashed potatoes necessarily creates a little additional moistness. But I know how to make things more moist. I wanted to subtly up the flavor a little. I'm in favor of roasting things--especially in the winter, when I can also use it to warm up the house (though I pan roasted the potato for this, so not applicable). And because I didn't have enough potato for any of the recipes I looked at, I added a couple of carrots to the roasting process. I always have carrots on hand.

I also thought about making this cake into a Mexican chocolate cake, with cayenne and cinnamon. But I couldn't bring myself to do that either--at least not to the whole cake. It can surprise come as a surprise if you're not expecting all those extra flavors in your cake.

Chocolate Roasted Potato Cake

1 cup unseasoned mashed potato/carrot mixture (for me, this was one medium potato and two large carrots all finely diced which I pan-roasted for about 45 minutes before processing in my food processor until nearly smooth)
1 cup buttermilk
1 ¾ cups sifted all purpose flour
1 cup unsweeted dutch cocoa powder
2 1/4 teaspoons of baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
½ cup salted butter (softened)
1 ¾ cups granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1/3 cup mayonnaise
Confectioners’ sugar for garnish

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour two 9-inch round baking pans and set aside.

Place mashed potatoes/carrots into medium bowl. With a small whisk, gradually beat in buttermilk to form smooth mixture.

Sift together flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

In a large bowl, use an electric mixer to combine the butter, sugar, and vanilla extract until well blended. .
Add eggs and blend well. Add mayonnaise and beat at medium speed for 2 minutes.

At lowest speed, alternate adding both the dry ingredients (from step 3) and smashed veggies (a little dry ingredients, a little smashed veggies, a little dry, a little smashed veggies etc.) until all are incorporated.

Turn equal amounts of batter into prepared baking pans. Bake in preheated oven 27 to 32 minutes (for a 10” cake pan; 15-18 minutes for cupcakes), rotating once about halfway during the baking process.

Cake is cooked when a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. When done remove to a cooling rack. Cool completely before removing from pans and cutting. If desired, frost or sift confectioners’ sugar over top of cake after the cake has cooled completely.




Note: The pictures you see of the iced cupcakes use just a basic buttercream.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Sweet Potato Orange Soup

I believe I've told you before that I first tried carrot soup, cold, at a French restaurant near Berkley when I was about 15. It was okay. I don't really remember it. I also had rabbit roulades that day -- Thumper. But something about that meal, that experience did convince me to try carrot soup again -- and to try several types of carrot soup until I found some I liked. Now, I love carrot soup. And I'm mostly vegetarian. Take from that what you will.

I had the pleasure of trying the inspiration for this soup at my local co-op, one afternoon when I decided I absolutely had to have something warm for lunch. The soup I tried was a beautiful orange color, lightly sweet, and gently spiced. It wasn't until after I'd finished the soup that I noticed the distinct taste of garlic. I tried it again another day, and this time paid attention to the taste of garlic. Sure enough, it was there all along. However, it's nicely softened by the cinnamon and orange juice.

The sweet potato makes this soup silky, the carrots boost the veggie content, and this is the perfect soup to make if you dislike onions, or have found that you've suddenly (gasp!) run out of onions. It doesn't use celery, which my friend Lauren would appreciate, and it doesn't use black pepper (which she would also appreciate).

I found it helpful to have an immersion blender, but you could certainly do this in a regular blender or food processor, in batches. This is an excellent soup for a cold day, makes enough to feed 5-6 people easily (especially served with bread and/or a salad), and is festive for the holidays! Even better, it makes use of things a lot of you probably have around for holiday meals anyway. I've tried this soup cold too, for breakfast, and while that definitely changes the flavor profile, I think it's pretty good eaten that way as well.

I wish I could have gotten better pictures of the soup -- but the lighting was not cooperating with an orange soup. If I get better pictures later, I'll update this post again. In the mean time, I'm off to eat some Sweet Potato Orange Soup!

Sweet Potato Orange Soup
2 teaspoons oil
1 large sweet potato, cubed
5-6 medium large carrots (about 1 pound), cut into coins
5 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 cup frozen orange juice concentrate
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
6-8 cups water
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon

Heat the oil in a soup pan over medium heat. Add the sweet potato and carrots. Saute 3-4 minutes. Add the garlic and cook another 2 minutes, stirring frequently. Add the orange juice concentrate, pepper flakes, and water (6 cups for thicker soup; 8 cups for thinner soup). Bring to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer. Simmer 25-30 minutes, or until carrots and sweet potatoes are very tender.

Stir in the salt and cinnamon. Puree using a blender (or, my preference is for an immersion blender) until smooth. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary. Serve hot.

Serves 4-6 as a main course

Friday, November 25, 2011

A Very Veggie Breakfast

A quick reminder: the follower drive is still going on. Follow this blog and tell your friends to do so too!

I'm still in my "I want to eat veggies. Lots of veggies. Lots and lots of veggies. Especially green veggies..." stage and I've been making sautes and stir-fries for breakfast because the idea of sweet breakfast turns my stomach a little. In particular, I've been making some variation of this for breakfast almost daily, either using kale, chard, collards, or cabbage, depending on what I have in my refrigerator (aka, depending on what I got cheap at the growers market or the grocery store).

This is nice for breakfast because it's simple. I can start it after I walk the dog, even on days I'm feeling somewhat more rushed than I'd like in the mornings. I can steep my coffee (French press) while my food caramelizes, perhaps get my lunch ready to go on my weekdays, and even turn on my computer to check email and other things, all the while, giving my food an occasional quick stir so it doesn't burn.

As a post-Thanksgiving day breakfast, this is fun, light, and doesn't involve leftovers--which there will be plenty of, for many people, in the coming days (and weeks! So glad that's not me this year.). Plus, if you pair it with a piece of whole grain toast or other whole grain, then you will have plenty of stamina for shopping, cleaning, decorating, or whatever it is you do with your Black Friday. Usually, I would make tamales. This year, I work. But as I said, I've been eating this, or some variation of this, for several weeks and I find it a lovely way to start my day in a veggie-intense way that doesn't involve a smoothie (kinda cool for that this time of year, and the blender noise is obnoxious first thing in the morning).

In the variation of this depicted by the picture, I'm using Lacinato kale, which (apparently) has a long tradition in Italian cuisine. I'll have to remember that next time I buy some -- I definitely want something with tomatoes and Italian flavoring soon, probably also for breakfast. Lacinato kale is the same thing as dinosaur kale (my personal favorite name for it), Tuscan kale, and black kale among many other names. This is simply the kale that's looked best at both the growers market and the grocery store.

Sometimes I add mushrooms, because I really like them. I don't always want mushrooms though and so I'm not including it in the list of ingredients. When I do add mushrooms, I usually add 4-6 sliced (depending on the size) a couple of minutes after I add the onions, but before I add my greens. They add a lot of extra flavor though, so if you like mushrooms and have them on hand, I highly encourage you to use them.

This makes a great main dish breakfast for one or two, or could be used as a side dish for several. You could also use it for lunch or dinner, if you're so inclined (and I've been doing some of that too, just changing up what specifically I add).

I've also been craving, recently, baked beans on toast with stewed tomatoes. Maybe all these British shows E and I have been watching are rubbing off. Fortunately, or unfortunately, I don't usually have baked beans or stewed tomatoes on hand. Maybe though, I'll make that happen.

It's Good to Be Green (and orange!) Breakfast (or dinner)
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 tablespoon chopped ginger
1/4 cup chopped onion
1 clove garlic, sliced
1 carrot, sliced in coins, or 1/4 cup chopped sweet potato
1 bunch kale, chopped
Salt (I use about 1/4 teaspoon, at most)
Red pepper flakes (I use about 1/4-1/2 teaspoon)
Red wine vinegar (if you don't have this on hand, use lemon juice)

One or more of the following:
1/4 cup raisins, optional
1 teaspoon curry powder, optional
2 tablespoons chopped or slivered, toasted almonds
2-4 tablespoons goat cheese
1/2 thinly sliced, firm apple such as Arkansas black or pink pearl 

Heat the olive oil in a saute pan over medium heat. Add ginger, onion, garlic, and carrot. Stir to coat with oil and then only stir occasionally (every 2-3 minutes, perhaps) until the onions and carrots just begin to caramelize (about 7-10 minutes total, depending on your pan).

Add the kale (or cabbage), salt, and red pepper flakes. Saute until the kale begins to wilt and then add the red wine vinegar.

Remove from heat when the kale is mostly wilted and stir in the raisins, curry powder, almonds, goat cheese, or apple (I wouldn't recommend using all of these at once--but perhaps two or three, with a specific flavor-idea in mind as you're doing it), if using. Serve hot.

Thursday, November 24, 2011

Butternut Squash Soup with Three Types of Sweet Potato


Joyous thanksgiving. Let us use today as another reminder to focus on the things we are thankful for now (my friend Erica, over at Kinds of Honey is particularly good at finding small moments of beauty in the everyday and she reminds me, through her blog posts to be a more grateful and gracious person, something I am quite thankful for) and, at some future point, discuss the problems with celebrating Thanksgiving.

This dish was born out of a mini-dinner party, and a request for butternut squash stew. E wanted a chunky soup (more like a stew), with veggies--and I'm not one to stay no to veggies! When we went to the grocery store, we picked up sweet potatoes, three varieties, to add color, texture, and taste to the soup. We also decided to add carrots (because I always, always have carrots around). This is an easy, moderately low-fuss soup and could easily be made for Thanksgiving if you're prowling for a last minute idea!

At our grocery store, we actually had more than three types of sweet potato to choose from, plus yams. But we went with a white-fleshed, white-skinned sweet potato (O'Henry), a garnet sweet potato, and a Japanese sweet potato. For the soup, I cut these into moderately large bite-size chunks and scrubbed but didn't peel them, since all of the sweet potatoes were organic). If you can't find three types of sweet potato in your local markets, don't worry about it. Just buy three medium sized sweet potatoes and go with it. 
 
For the butternut squash: organic, canned butternut squash puree has been ridiculously inexpensive at my grocery store for several weeks now, so that's primarily what we used. But, I also had a butternut squash I wanted to roast up anyway, so we used about 1 pound of freshly oven-roasted butternut squash in the soup and I save the rest of the meat for another meal. I roasted the butternut squash while I cleaned, walked the dog, and was waiting for the bread to rise appropriately.

Pureeing about half the veggies you use lends to a thicker soup (you could also use less water, but with big chunky veggies, I think this looks weird and the flavor is pretty strongly "autumn" anyway). This is easier with an immersion blender, but could also work in a food processor or a regular blender. If you use one of these methods, please let the soup cool sufficiently so you don't scald yourself, or cause a lid to blow off from heat!

While I worked on the soup, E set a lovely table. She was excited about the opportunity to have a real dinner party, complete with a local wine, and a properly set table. And, truth be told, I felt excited about it too. She arranged my winter squashes and pie pumpkin around a piece of tableware from her family, and then we lit a lovely "holiday" scented candle.

The recipe I based this on actually uses shallot instead of onion, so if you've got easy access to that, I encourage you to use shallots . E and I didn't have shallots on hand and operate on a pretty limited grocery budget. If you wanted to make this vegan, you could use olive oil in place of butter, and coconut milk (perhaps 3/4 cup) in place of the whipping cream.

Butternut Squash Soup with Three Types of Sweet Potato
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 large onion, chopped fine

1 White sweet potato, with white skin (O'Henry), chopped
1 Garnet sweet potato, chopped
1 Japanese sweet potato (red skin with white flesh), chopped
3 medium carrots, sliced into coins
1 small apple (I used three large crab apples)

3 pounds butternut squash puree (see my notes above about this)

8 cups water
1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons dark brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon grated nutmeg
2 teaspoons lemon juice

½ cup heavy cream, scant

Melt the butter in a large soup pan, over medium heat. Add the onion and saute 1-2 minutes, until the onion begins to wilt. 
Stir in the chopped sweet potatoes and carrot coins. Cook 5-7 minutes, stirring infrequently, so the potatoes will begin to caramelize. Add the apple and cook another 3 minutes. 

Add the butternut squash puree and 4 cups of water. Bring to simmer and cook 5 minutes. Remove from the heat. Use an immersion blender to puree about 1/2 the chunky vegetables. Return to the heat and add remaining 4 cups of water. Bring to a simmer again. Stir in the salt, brown sugar, nutmeg, and lemon juice. Cook until all the vegetables are tender (to your liking; I like them with a little crunch the first day so they're not complete mush the second day).

Stir in the heavy cream. Adjust seasoning if necessary. Serve hot. 

Serves 4-6

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Gingered Carrots with Honey


Lately, I've been on a serious veggies kick. As I've mentioned in recent posts, sweets haven't really appealed and this is about as sweet as I'd like, except really, really dark chocolates. I've also been on a bit of a ginger kick. It always adds a lovely flavor, but especially in the autumn and winter.

Carrots are a winter vegetable, which means I've seen plenty of organic carrots at my local markets, including the growers market. But, those of you who know me also know that I usually buy carrots 5+ pounds at a time. I happen to really love carrots.

I made this simple side dish while Rachael was visiting, on an evening that we had a veggie-rich dinner--we had these carrots, plus Rachael made collard greens sauteed with garlic and splashed with lemon, and fennel sauteed with just small amount of garlic and then tossed with goat cheese. Next to these, to help our meal last a little longer, we added some freshly made gluten-free bread*. The meal was filling and satisfying in that way that I find most veggie-rich meals to be--"I feel good about my life, about my body, about the things I just put into my body." It was the perfect meal for just-post the end of Daylight Savings Time, when darkness settled in too soon and for an afternoon filled by a long hike and baking (bread, vegan chocolate pie, granola).

Gingered Carrots with Honey
1 tablespoon fresh ginger, chopped
6-8 carrots, sliced into coins
Honey
Olive oil

Saute the ginger 1-2 minutes in olive oil, over medium heat. Add the carrot coins and cook 5-6 minutes. Add honey (I used about 1 tablespoon for 8 medium carrots) and saute another 2-3 minutes until the honey has formed a thick coating over the carrot slices. Serve hot.

*The bread, this time for those of you who are regular readers, didn't contain oats. Instead, we used both white and brown rice flour, and Bob's Red Mill GF mix.

Monday, September 28, 2009

Red Indian Stew for Just a Few

This dish can be as mild or spicy as you like--and if you prefer more spicy than someone you'll be eating it with, kick the spice up some and serve the stew with a dollop of yogurt, which can be mixed in to cut the heat for those people with more sensitive tongues.

One of the great things about this stew is that it is rather forgiving. If you don't have the exact ingredients listed below, substitute--especially when it comes to your choice of protein. I've used chickpeas, Quorn, TVP crumbles, lentils, navy beans, shrimp, squid, and kidney beans in this in the past. This particular incarnation calls for lentils, because that's what I had on hand, and the end of this summer's zuchinni.

Dad came up the original vegetarian version of this stew--it originally used chicken--and then modified it to suit our tastes.

Red Indian Stew for Just a Few
2 teaspoons Garam Masala
+/- ½ tablespoon crushed red pepper
1/2 teaspoon tres ochos pepper (optional, for additional heat)
1/2 tablespoon paprika
2 teaspoons vegetable oil
3/4 cup chopped onions
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1 large zuchinni, chopped
2 medium potatoes, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
2 ounces dried brown lentils
1 clove chopped garlic
1 cup canned tomatoes, chopped or diced
1 teaspoons grated fresh ginger
3 cups vegetable stock
1 cup chopped cabbage
Yogurt, optional

In a small bowl, combine the Garam Masala, crushed red pepper, and paprika. Mix well. Set aside.

Heat oil in a medium saute pan, over medium heat, When the oil is hot, add the onions to the pan, sauté until golden brown and season with salt and pepper. Add the zuchinni, potatoes, and carrot. Saute 3-5 minutes. Add the lentils, garlic, tomatoes and ginger. Continue to sauté for 1 – 3 minutes.

Add the stock and bring the liquid to a boil. Cover, reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer for about 15 minutes or until the potatoes and lentils tender. Add the cabbage and cook another 3-4 minutes, until the cabbage has just started to cook. Remove from the heat and serve with rice or naan, and a dollop of yogurt (optional). Serves 3-4, depending on your appetite!