Tag Archives: Vegetarian

Spring Has Sprung, Finals Have Finalized!

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Oh grad school. Someday you will stop getting in the way of my blog posts!  I know I go months without posting.  I feel ashamed.  But my grades are good, at least. :)  Anyway….

One of my favorite easy and cheap spring meals is asparagus, cut up into small rounds, sauteed with garlic, butter, salt & pepper.  I could eat a giant bowl of that by itself.  However, it’s also fantastic in pasta, with or without a cream sauce.  I shamelessly often omit the flower end of the asparagus and just eat the stalk because that’s what I like best.  Here’s a simple rendition.  If you use a bunch of asparagus, cook 2 cups of dry pasta, maybe a little less.  That would probably feed three.  Otherwise, just wing it.  Err on the side of more asparagus.  This recipe is forgiving, so don’t get caught up in the proportions. If it seems a bit dry, add extra butter…simple as that.

Tonight’s dinner: Conchiglie with Sauteed Asparagus and Basil in Garlic Butter.

This is sort of an organic recipe…more like guidance than a recipe.  This is an easy to make meal, so just adjust it to your tastes.  The combination of flavors is what is important, not the proportions, but don’t overcook things!

  1. Rinse the asparagus.  Cut asparagus into small rounds about 1/4″ or smaller wide.  Just slice it perpendicular to the stalk of the asparagus so that it becomes tiny coins.   Discard the tough ends where it becomes harder to cut through the stalk (often, the whiter/purpler parts are the toughest unless you’re using white asparagus).  You can also discard the flower end if you’re picky about that like me (but if you’re not, don’t waste just for the sake of this recipe!).  Mince garlic  I prefer lots.  I’d use at least 4 cloves to a bunch of asparagus.  Chiffonade (or just chop up fairly finely) at least 6 basil leaves (but, you can omit these if you don’t have them…it will still be delicious.)
  2. Cook pasta until al dente (the package probably has directions, if not…the internet does)…you want it not soft, just a little chewy…but not to where it tastes undercooked.  Shells, rotini, bowtie, or penne will work best (I’ve used conchiglie here, which is a medium sized, thick shell type.).  Drain and rinse pasta.  Let it dry in  a strainer while you do the next part.
  3. Sautee all of the other ingredients (asparagus, garlic, basil…you can add peas if you really want more veg for some reason.) in a hearty amount of butter (but an obscene amount) over medium to medium low heat.  I’d use a tablespoon at *least* for a bunch of asparagus.    Add fresh ground black pepper and salt while sauteeing.  Sautee just until the asparagus begins to yield a bit to your teeth and tastes sweeter.  It should still be green colored.  Taste it frequently to get it to your level of doneness, but do not cook it until it’s olive colored or I will cry!
  4. Add the pasta to the sauteed veggies and mix well until the butter coats the pasta.  Dump onto plates.
  5. Top with fresh grated parmesan and serve with a glass of a nicely oaked wine (red or white, your choice).  You’ll thank me.

The sauteed asparagus mixture is also fantastic in omelettes or under a poached egg with some crusty bread if you’re feeling breakfasty.  You can add or omit the Parmesan in that case as you’d like.

You only have a bit longer to try this…Asparagus season is almost gone!  Happy Spring, everyone!

A Random Vegan/Vegetarian Products Review

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Last weekend I decided to do it…to just try to go 99% vegetarian.  Meaning there are only exceptions for holidays and maybe sushi a few times a year. While I am generally a fabulous cook and can make some darn good vegetarian unprocessed stuff myself (lentil loaf, lentil meatballs, chili from dried beans, etc.), my grad student life style means I don’t have a ton of time to prepare food from scratch all the time.

As such, I’ve been buying more vegetarian fake meat products.  In order to not eat a metric buttload of calories, I need a lot of protein.  Soy products suffice.  I’ve also been curiously trying vegan things, just for the sake of trying them, knowing that a vegan lifestyle is generally most sustainable for the environment.  Here’s a review of what I’ve tried that was memorable from the past few years up to more recently:

Frozen Meals/Quick Food:

  • Kashi frozen meals -  Mayan harvest bake, Three Cheese Penne, Spicy Black Bean Enchiladas.  The first and the last are better than the middle.  Kashi’s frozen meals retain a good texture and taste wholesome and satisfying, with complex flavors you wouldn’t usually find in frozen meals.  Only downside is that the instructions for cooking are a bit more complicated than some other frozen meals (2 to 3 step rather than 1 step).
  • Sukhi’s Naanwiches, Garden Vegetable – Very good flavor, especially with the naan.  Probably best if toaster ovened though.  Not super filling.
  • Fortune Avenue Vegetarian Potstickers – presteamed, so they’re quick to cook.  You can microwave these in a minute and a half.  These are my favorite vegetarian potstickers.  They don’t taste like meat, but they have a nice rich flavor and good texture and chewy veggies in there!
  • Amy’s Tofu Scramble Breakfast Wrap – Avoid!  How can something taste so much like cardboard through the entire bite?  Bleh.
  • Trader Joe’s Black Bean and Cheese Taquitos – These are addictive and surprisingly fairly low calorie.  They make a great snack or meal when paired with some salsa to dip them in.  A bit dry, but good flavor.
  • Trader Joe’s Paneer Tikka Masala – While this has a great flavor and good texture, it’s just not enough to keep me full.  I like the green rice with it though, and the tikka masala sauce is good.
  • Trader Joe’s Eggplant Parmesan – Good flavor, but not enough in the meal to keep me full.  And definitely not enough cheese for an eggplant Parmesan!
  • Trader Joe’s Tarte d’Champignon – A flatbread pizza type thing with cheese and mushrooms.  Amazing and rich and so good.  Bring it to a foodie potluck and people will be amazed.  Wait no, bring me one please.

Meat Substitutes:

  • Gardein Beefless Tips – The *best* beef substitute.  Hands down.  I’ve used them for many things, from stew to sliced and browned in vegetarian pho.
  • Gardein Chick’n Scallopini – a decent chicken substitute.  It has a good texture, but the flavor is a bit celery-like.  Browns nicely.
  • Trader Joe’s Soy Chorizo – uh-maaaay-zing.  Same flavor profile as the meaty version but with less fat.  Great scrambled with eggs.
  • Tofurky Peppered Deli Slices – skip these.  Go for the Hickory Smoked and add your own fresh ground pepper.
  • Tofurky Hickory Smoked Deli Slices – the best fake meat lunch meat.  It has the best texture and a rich flavor and a slight hint of smokiness. Enough protein to be satisfying.  I make my sandwiches that I eat on the train out of these!
  • Trader Joe’s Chickenless Strips – I didn’t let myself eat chicken strips before.  Now I do.  These are healthier but also tasty.  They also make great sandwiches.
  • Gardein Chipotle Lime Chick’n Fingers – yuck.  It tasted someone dipped chicken fingers in lemon cleanser.  No taste of Chipotle at all.  Gardein should retire these or reformulate them.  They have a nice texture of crust on the chick’n though.
  • Morningstar Farms Bacon Strips – eh.  They’ll work in something (like deviled eggs) if you really have a hankering for bacon, but they’re not that great by themselves.  Salty for sure.  Texture is kind of crunchy, vaguely cardboardy, but none of the chew of meat bacon.
  • Morningstar Farms Grillers Veggie Crumbles – these are fine.  Nothing to rave about really.  They add the meaty texture to whatever you’re cooking (chili, shephard’s pie, veggie sloppy joes) but wouldn’t stand by themselves as much.  You could just as soon just get TVP and do the same thing for cheaper.
  • Morningstar Farms veggie sausage products – Skip the links and go for the patties.  The links don’t have a great texture.The spicy patties are hard to find but particularly good.  Better than the fake bacon.
  • Whole Foods 365 Brand Veggie Sausage Patties – good flavor, but not low on calorie.  Nice spices and seasonings, good texture.  A little spicy but not too much for me!

“Dairy”:

  • Trader Joe’s Soy Mozzarella – Trader Joe’s does it again.  This soy cheese has a great texture and melts well, without the soy flavor of some vegan cheese substitutes.  However, it does contain casein (a milk protein) so it’s not truly vegan.  However, it didn’t bother my lactose intolerant tummy.
  • Trader Joe’s Soy Creamery Chocolate Chip and Cherry – Love Ben & Jerry’s Cherry Garcia?  Lactose intolerant or vegan?  This is like crack.  No overwhelming soy flavor.  You will have to stop yourself from eating the whole dang tub.
  • Trader Joe’s Coconut Strawberry frozen dessert – Pretty good.  Tangy strawberry flavor, slight hint of coconut, good mouth feel and moderately rich flavor.  Different from strawberry ice cream, but in a good way.  It’d probably make some good summer cocktails if blended with rum!
  • Daiya Vegan Mozzarella/Cheddar Shreds – tastes like processed cheese product.  If you like Kraft singles, you’ll probably like this.  It melts well, but the Mozzarella and Cheddar kind of taste the same just with different colors.  However, works ironically well in scrambled eggs… (I can see some vegans face-palming right now!)
  • Pacific Organic Plain Unsweetened Almond Milk – almond milk generally works much better in coffee than soy or rice milk.  The latter curdle. Yuck!
  • Follow Your Heart Vegan Gourmet Cream Cheese – Bleh.  Can the Daiya people make some cream cheese substitute?  It’d definitely be better than this.  This faux cream cheese has that cardboardy overwhelming soy flavor and texture that I dislike. This will probably sit in my fridge for a long while…maybe better in desserts though.

Seasonings/other:

  • Better than Bullion Vegetarian Beef Bullion: kind of flat and honestly doesn’t taste much different than their vegetable bullion (which is still a nice bullion substitute).  Salty like a good beef bullion with a fair amount of umami, but adding it to vegetable broth and adding some mushrooms (crimini or porcini) will make the flavor better.
  • Nuoc Mam Chay/Vegetarian Fish Sauce – similar funk to fish sauce, similar saltiness, but not fish sauce.  But it will do in a pinch for Thai and Vietnamese cooking.  Find it at Vietnamese grocery stores.
  • Vegetarian Oyster Sauce – oysterless, but still great on broccoli.  Stir fry with Gardein’s Beefless Tips and some chopped broccoli and satisfy your broccoli beef craving in no time!
  • Amoy-D Curry Paste: Most Thai curry pastes are not vegetarian (most of them contain some shrimp product).  However, Amoy-D is.  It lacks a bit in the umami depth of the shrimpy curry pastes, but it works fine to make a good curry at home.
  • Hummus: Trader Joe’s is the best.  Sabra (sold at Costco and Safeway) is okay.  It’s easy to make your own though if you have a food processor or blender and some canned garbanzos.

I hope you enjoyed those reviews above and avoid the things I’ve advised you to avoid!  Unless you’re desperate, I guess.

As a side note, my mom (one of my greatest inspirations and person who I have to thank for my cooking capabilities) may be making a guest post sometime in the near future, so keep your eyes open for that!

Springy Nettle and Green Garlic Soup

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As you may remember from my previous post on nettles, I very much like them and find them a refreshing and more springy alternative to spinach.  I have a fond memory of picking them with my dad.  Being back in the urban jungle, nettles aren’t really something you see and can harvest yourself.  However, I happened upon some at the farmer’s market yesterday and was excited.  It means that winter, that mopey and dark season overrun with cabbage and root vegetables, is almost gone…and the cheerful vegetables and fruits of spring and summer are almost here!  Just the thought of tasting them made me feel happier.

Photo by James Bowe.

The guy at the stand asked me “What do you do with your nettles?” and I said “eat them like spinach”.  Which is true, but this time I decided I wanted to do something different.  I also impulse-bought some green garlic because it also tastes cheerful and like spring.  I could just imagine in my head how these would go great together but didn’t really solidify my idea until I Googled  a few recipes and came upon this recipe for nasslesopa — a Scandanavian nettle soup.

Photo by Andrea Nguyen

I thought to myself– chives and garlic eh?  Green garlic is a fantastic substitute for both those things with a cheerful, slightly sweet springy flavor when sauteed in butter.  Huzzah!  Thus the idea for this soup was born.  I just had a bowl and it is hearty and cheerful, great on a cold spring afternoon.

Springy Nettle and Green Garlic Soup
Makes about two big servings.

Ingredients

  • 2 tbsp butter
  • 3 stems green garlic, the younger the better (if they have a purpleish hue on the outside, they’re a bit old)
  • 1 tsp nutmeg
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • 1 tbsp flour (Or less, depending on how thick you want the soup…the potatoes will already thicken it.  You could also exclude it and use a bigger potato if you want the soup to be gluten free.)
  • 1 medium sized potato, peeled (the starchier the better: red or yukon gold will give you the smoothest texture)
  • ~ 3 cups milk (the higher fat content, the richer the soup.  I used fat free and it was still delicious)
  • ~ 5 cups fresh nettle leaves
  • 1/2 cup grated parmesan

(I used lactaid milk…I’m admittedly fairly lactose intolerant, but parmesan and butter don’t bother me much because they don’t contain much (if any) lactose.  So if you’re lactose intolerant too, using lactaid milk should make this creamy soup not bother you much.  )

Chop your potato into very small chunks (no more than 1/2″ cube in size) so it will cook quickly.  Rinse and chop the green garlic (removing the root end and leaving some of the tough tips out).

Sautee the green garlic with the nutmeg, salt and pepper in a pan until the green garlic softens.  Don’t let the butter burn– keep it over a medium low heat.

Add the flour mix it all around so it absorbs the butter and coats the green garlic.

Add the milk and potatoes and simmer it until the potatoes just become a bit soft.

Gradually add the nettles to the soup, stirring.  You can see here I used nettles with stems– don’t do it! The tips of the nettle plant are best and you don’t want ones that are flowering.

When all the nettles are added and wilted like cooked spinach, add your 1/2 cup grated parmesan.  Your potatoes should be fully cooked.  Now, if you want a chunky soup where all the ingredients are separate, you can stop here as long as you used just nettle leaves.  However, if you want a pureed soup a la vichyssoise, you can proceed on to the next step.

Turn off the heat and let the soup cool for a minute.  Add everything to a blender and blend until smooth.

Garnish with a little finely grated parmesan, nutmeg, and black pepper.  Enjoy!

 

(P.S. Thanks to the folks who posted their great photos on Flickr with a creative commons license so you can get a better look at the raw ingredients! )

http://scandinavianfood.about.com/od/souprecipes/r/nettlesoup.htm

The Spice of Life

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I suspect until December, you’re going to keep hearing about how busy my life is.  Rest assured I have been cooking delicious things and not just subsisting off of only instant  ramen.  The garden is still going, with peppers and carrots and herbs currently and beets and daikon in the works.  However, my slow cooker has become one of my best friends.  I can throw stuff in there and leave it alone while I study and have delicious food for the week.

One of my favorite recipes I made recently in the slow cooker was slow cooker lasagne.  Here’s the original recipe.  I’ll admit, I did use jarred spaghetti sauce because I was short on time.  However, I mixed zucchini, poblano peppers, mushrooms, onions, garlic, and fresh basil into the ricotta mixture and that made it quite tasty and special.  Easy as pie, except that it’s sort of hard to fit lasagne noodles into an oval shaped slow cooker.

Another favorite recipe I tried was lentil meatballs . I substituted laughing cow cheese for ricotta and add a ton more fresh herbs, but they came out fantastic and were freezable in individual ziplocs for whenever I heated up jarred sauce.

I’ll admit that on the part time vegetarian front as of late, I’ve been a little slackery.  Making the kind of vegetarian food I like takes time, which can be lacking.  I’ll keep trying, though, because there are too many reasons and benefits to not at least reduce my meat consumption.

Along that line, I recently discovered a brand of Thai curry paste that doesn’t contain shrimp paste (like most curry pastes do): Amoy-D. My only beef with it is that I always have to add sugar to the curry because the curry paste itself is more savory than the ones I’m used to.  Today I made panang curry with fried tofu, butternut squash, apples and mango.  This time the fruit helped sweeten it up so I didn’t need to add sugar.

Curry is so versatile…you can put just about anything in it really, sort of like fried rice.  Why fried tofu? Because frying gives it a better texture and allows it to soak up more sauce/curry/whatever.

I made a big batch for my lunches for this week, because that’s what I do nowadays…make huge batches of something tasty and force myself to eat it for 3-5 days.

  • 1 cup of extra firm tofu cut into dice-sized cubes
  • 1-2 cups of vegetable or peanut oil for frying
  • 1 can coconut milk
  • 1/4 cup panang curry paste (more or less, depending on your tastes)
  • 1 butternut squash, peeled with seeds removed and cut into large chunks (3″ or so)
  • 2 carrots, cut into half coins
  • 3 lime leaves (preferably kaffir, but if you have regular lime leaves it’s better than nothing)
  • 3 coins ginger or galangal
  • 2 small red peppers, cut into rings
  • 1 bunch green onions
  • 1 apple, cut into cubes
  • 1/2 cup frozen mango chunks (or fresh)
  • 1/2 cup frozen peas
  • 2/3 cup Thai basil leaves (substitute regular basil if you have to I guess)
  • 2/3 cup cilantro leaves

First, dry the tofu and cut it into the dice sized cubes.  Drying it is important!  This way it won’t splatter quite as much when you fry it.  If you want to be extra careful, you can squeeze as much water out of the tofu as possible and then dry it after you cut it into dice cubes too.

Heat the oil in a pot or wok until a drop of water added to the pan splatters.  Add tofu, stir constantly until tofu is golden brown and looks sort of like little sponges.  Remove and drain on paper towels.  Set aside.

Add the coconut milk to a good sized soup pot and add water to thin it to the consistency somewhere between paste and milk.  Heat on medium. Add the curry paste and blend it in with a spoon or spatula.

Add in the harder vegetables: butternut and carrot.  Also add the lime leaves and ginger coins.  If using non-kaffir lime leaves, smoosh them up a bit in your hands before adding to the pot to release more of the essential oils.

Let this simmer until the butternut squash starts to get a bit soft, then add the peppers, apple, green onion, mango, and peas.

Let this cook for a couple of minutes at a low simmer, until the butternut is cooked to where it is soft enough to be cut with a fork.  Then add in the herbs (basil, cilantro) at the last minute.  Turn off the heat and mix well.

It doesn’t look glamorous, but it tastes fantastic.

A thank you to whoever actually reads this blog.  May all your tasty dreams come true!

 

Plottin’ au Gratin

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My mom has been hearing me talk about my plans for a gratin for almost a week now.  The idea came up when a coworker who has gone gluten free due to health reasons graciously paid for my dinner one night, and I offered to repay with something delicious and gluten free.  I got to thinking, of course.

…Who doesn’t like anything with cheese on it?

So I decided on a riff on scalloped potatoes, adding in butternut squash into the mix because I had both lying around and needing to be used.  With plenty of cheese.

The other day on my way to grab ramen with my friend Janette, I stopped at The Milk Pail, a family owned business in Mountain View, CA and home of my greatest weakness: an abundance of amazing and reasonably-priced cheese.   I hadn’t quite decided on which type of cheese I was going to use for said gratin. Needless to say I walked away with 5 different types, including: Wisconsin gruyere (almost holds up to the authentic stuff), English sharp cheddar, Wisconsin gouda, laughing cow light swiss, pecorino romano (for a separate dish), and a french soft ripened chevre (for general munching).  I decided eventually on the gouda for the gratin, with a bit of the gruyere on top.

Gouda gruyere gratin.  Oh Gee!

Anyway, so after gaining like 15 lbs in the past week from eating all the other cheese (kidding), I finally got around to making the gratin.  The (pretty successful) recipe is below.  I did try to make it a little lower-fat by using fat free milk and laughing cow wedges for some of the cheese sauce, but you could go Paula Deen style and use cream and all full-fat cheese if you want.

Butternut Squash and Potato Gratin with Caramelized Onions


Ingredients

  • 1 medium butternut squash (peeled, seeds removed, cut into thin 1/4″ thick slices)
  • 4 medium gold potatoes (skins on, cut into 1/4″ slices)
  • 1 tbsp cornstarch
  • 3 cups cold fat-free milk (2 c for sauce, 1 c for finishing)
  • 1 tbsp butter
  • 1/2 red onion, minced
  • 2 cups grated gouda cheese
  • 4 laughing cow light swiss wedges  (or substitute another soft cheese like brie if not calorie-conscious)
  • salt to taste
  • pepper to taste
  • cayenne pepper to taste
  • 1/2 cup grated gruyere cheese (or more gouda)

(Bake in a 9×9″ pan.)

1.  If you haven’t already, prep your potatoes and squash. Preheat the oven to 350.

2.  Place them on a large plate as shown above.  Dampen two large paper towels and cover the plate.  Place in microwave and microwave on high for 10-15 minutes, or until slightly soft.  (This cuts down on the baking time.)

3.  If you haven’t prepped the cheese yet, do that while the squash/potatoes are microwaving. Also mince the onion and slice a tablespoon of butter.

4.  Whisk the tablespoon of cornstarch into 2 cups of the cold milk.

5.  If your potatoes/squash are done, you should probably take them out of the microwave to let them cool for a bit.  Next, add 1 tbsp butter and the onion to a pot.

6.  Stirring frequently, caramelize the onions in the butter on a medium high heat until nicely golden brown and translucent.  Reduce the heat to medium-low.

6.  Add the cornstarch/milk mixture to the caramelized onions.  Stir well and bring it to slightly bubbling.

7.  Add the cheese (gouda, laughing cow).  Mix well, breaking up the laughing cow wedges.  Keep mixing until gouda is melted.  Make sure it stays just below a simmer, not bubbling in the pot too much.

8.  Add the salt, pepper, and cayenne to taste.  At this point, you may want to use a whisk to break up any chunks of the laughing cow cheese.

9.  Turn off the heat to the pot and let the sauce cool and thicken for a minute or two.  Then ladle a bit of the sauce into the baking pan, spreading it in a thin layer on the bottom.

10.  Layer the thinly sliced potatoes and squash in the pan.  I did a layer of potatoes, a layer of squash, then a layer of cheese sauce, then a layer of potatoes, then another layer of cheese sauce, but you can probably do it however you want.  Just watch the amount of cheese sauce you have left, because there’s not much extra to spare.

11.  The last layer should be cheese sauce, and then sprinkle the gruyere (or more gouda) over the top.

12.  Bake in 350 F oven for 20-30 minutes.  Then raise the heat and broil it for a couple of minutes, until the top is crispy golden brown cheesy goodness.

13.   Let it cool 10 minutes before digging in, otherwise you might burn your face on the molten cheese.  And everyone knows a burnt tongue is a major party pooper.

So after writing all this, I was thinking about how this isn’t only great as a main dish or side, it’d probably also be awesome as a contribution to a potluck brunch!  Mmm..

Veggie Mushu – My best version yet!

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Now that the holidays are over it’s back to eating less meat, which means more vegetarian meals.  I’ve always loved mushu anything, and was very impressed with the addictive veggie mushu made at a great vegan Chinese restaurant in Mountain View.  I hoped that I could vaguely recreate it at home, and I think was fairly successful.

I can’t say this recipe is super quick.  It’s easy to eat, but it takes quite a bit of prep to cook. The main reason is that the way to integrate the tofu in this recipe the best, texture-wise, is to marinate and fry it in oil.  You could, however, save yourself some time by using precut carrots and cabbage.  Also, I find it’s best to put each of the ingredients into a bowl after you’ve prepped them, because wok cooking requires you to add things quickly and keep everything moving.

Luckily Chinese food is great leftover and this recipe makes a lot!

Vegetarian Mushu

Serves at least 3 hungry individuals!

Ingredients

  • 1/2 block Trader Joe’s Extra Firm High Protein Tofu (or probably 1/3 of a larger container of another brand of extra firm tofu)
  • 5-6 dried shiitake mushrooms
  • 1/2-1 cup dried wood ear mushroom/black fungus (optional, but present in most mushu recipes in restaurants)
  • soy sauce
  • five spice powder (optional, not pictured)
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/2″ chunk of fresh ginger
  • 5 cloves garlic
  • 1 small green cabbage
  • 2 small carrots
  • 3 green onions
  • peanut oil (or another high smoke point oil) for frying (not pictured)
  • rice wine
  • (optional: serve with rice or mushu pancakes and hoisin sauce.)

1.  Prepare the tofu. Cut the tofu into thin strips, about 3″ long and 1/4″ wide (as shown in the picture).  Place in a bowl and marinate in a mixture of soy sauce and five spice powder.  Set aside, but stir occasionally to make sure the tofu marinates evenly.

2. Prepare the mushrooms. Remove the stems from the dried shiitake mushrooms (I forgot to do that, but it’s easier to do when they’re dried). Rehydrate the shiitake mushrooms and the black fungus by placing them in two separate bowls of water and microwaving them for 1-2 minutes then letting them sit for a minute or two.  Drain off the water.  Slice the shiitake mushrooms into strips like the tofu, then stir them into the tofu mixture.

3.  Mince the garlic and ginger.

4.  Prepare the vegetables.  Shred the cabbage into shreds about 1/2″ wide.  Cut the carrots into thin strips, about 3″ in length.  Chop the green onions crosswise (after removing the ends), about 1/2″ thick.

5.  Crack the two eggs into a bowl and beat them well.

6.  Drain the liquid off of the tofu/mushroom mixture.

7.  Set a plate near your stove with some paper towels on it.  You’ll drain the tofu on this.  You want it ready beforehand so you can quickly take things out of the oil!

8.  Add about 1-2″ of peanut oil to the wok and turn up the heat to high.  When a drop of water pops when dropped into the oil, your oil is ready.  Add the tofu/mushroom mixture and stir frequently.  The oil should be sizzling and bubbling around the tofu.

9.  When the tofu/mushroom strips look nicely browned and kind of crispy, carefully remove it from the oil and allow it to drain on the paper towel, spreading the mixture out. You want the tofu to be pretty browned and crispy looking, but not black!

10.  Turn off the heat.  Remove some of the oil from the wok (carefully and safely!)  Leave just a little splash in the bottom.  Turn the heat back on high.  Add the beaten eggs.  Let them sit for a few seconds so they start cooking on the bottom, then keep the moving around.  They should be scrambled, but try to make the scrambles small chunks.  Ideally, they’ll be strip-like, like the tofu and mushrooms.  When cooked, remove to a bowl. (A little underdone is better than overdone.)

11.  Add another splash of oil to the wok.  Add your ginger and green onions.  Keep them moving around, and only sautee them for a few seconds.  Then quickly add in all the vegetables and the wood ear/black fungus mushrooms EXCEPT the green onions.  Stir it all up and make sure the garlic and ginger is mixed in well.

12.  Add a splash of rice wine.  Mix it in. This liquid helps cook the veggies, but evaporates quickly because it’s alcohol leaving no extra liquid.  Stir frequently, making sure everything keeps moving and nothing sticks to the bottom, and keep cooking the veggies until the cabbage just starts to turn translucent, just a few minutes at most if your wok is hot enough.

13.  Add in the tofu/mushroom strips mixture.  Mix in well.  Keep everything moving so nothing gets too burnt!  Let cook until the carrots start to get soft, probably just a minute or so.

14.  Add the eggs and green onions.  Stir in.  Add a dash of soy sauce if you’re a salt lover and a sprinkle of MSG if you’re an MSG lover.  Keep it moving.  Once the carrots are no longer crunchy, it’s done!  Turn off the heat!

15.  Serve with a squeeze of hoisin sauce and brown rice or mushu pancakes, whatever your heart desires.  Or just eat it as is!

A Highly Inadvisable Cooking Technique

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Today’s epic (and possibly somewhat manic) cooking journey was the result of being done with midterms and hoping to cook a nice big batch of something delicious for the week. I first decided on Indian spiced butternut squash in the slow cooker, then some lentils, and then….  To find out what I wound up with and why this story is titled as such, follow me down the rabbit hole of my version of Indian cooking.

I had this butternut squash sitting around from my CSA that I really felt like cooking for some reason.  I went through a list of ideas on my head and then finally decided I wanted something spicy/salty/sweet– something Indian.  After a quick Googling, I came across this recipe over at The Perfect Pantry that looked simple and delicious enough.

I had all the ingredients but fenugreek, so I whipped it up sans that and plus half a habanero from my garden.  I set that going before I left for the gym with my friend, and when we came back the house had started to smell delicious.

…but what was I going to eat it with?!  I didn’t have any basmati rice. I needed some protein if I was going vegetarian this week, and something savory would balance out the squash well.  Well, I thought to myself, lentils are simple enough.  So I pulled together a batch of my favorite yellow lentil recipe, one I made up myself.

My favorite lentils aren’t entirely Indian.  First I put oil or ghee in a pot and heat it up, then I add black mustard seeds and cover the pot quickly, swishing it around and letting the mustard seeds pop.  Then I add in the lentils and stir them, then add at least double the amount in water of the lentils I’m cooking, a few star anise flowers, salt, and maybe some dried chili peppers.  I let that simmer, stirring constantly and adding water as necessary until it becomes a delicious yellow mush.

But there wasn’t anything green! Or tangy/salty!  I’m such a color fiend when it comes to food.  I’d want the whole rainbow on my plate if I could naturally get it.  And I did have that okra sitting in the fridge…time for some bhindi masala!

That was simple enough to cook.  But still, no starch.  How was I supposed to sop up all these delicious juices?

…and this is where it all took a turn for the “way more than was necessary” side.

…I wanted naan.  I’d never cooked naan at home before, other than premade stuff.  I wanted warm, fluffy, slightly garlicky naan.  How hard could it be?

Once again, I dug around the internet.  It seemed to be a little more labor-intensive than I thought, because it’s actually a yeasted bread…but I wanted it, dammit.  I found a recipe on Allrecipes (one of my go-to recipe sites) that seems to be delicious and reasonably simple, albeit time consuming.  I knew that with yeast, you had to proof it first (which that recipe didn’t do), so I had to add a little sugar to the yeast/water mixture, but soon enough I was off!

Mix, let proof.  Add flour, egg, milk (lactose free worked fine), salt, (I also added a little baking soda), and mix.  Knead into a smooth ball.  Let rise in a oiled bowl, covered with a damp towel.  Punch down, add minced garlic. Form into littler balls. Let rest to rise again on a baking sheet covered with a towel.  Stretch it out…and?

Well, that’s where I got stuck for a bit.  Naan is a grilled bread.  My oven is pretty dicey (it melts my refrigerator because of poor forethought by the designer of this place, among other things), so broiling it wouldn’t work.  I could pan fry it, but it wouldn’t taste the same and I wasn’t sure it’d get the right color going on.  I really wanted to grill it, but I didn’t have any charcoal for my Weber grill.

And this is where things turned for the highly inadvisable. I don’t really recommend trying this, though I seem luckily to be alive and have not set anything on fire.

I took my wok ring, inverted it, and set it on top of my gas stove (on top of the existing gas burner square cover things) to get things away from the direct heat. Then I put the grill part of the weber on top of that… and turned it on at a very, very low heat.  Nothing caught on fire, there was no excessive smoke, so I figured I’d give it a shot.

I turned up the heat a little, let the grill get warm, then stretched out one of the balls of naan.  I gently brushed just a little ghee on one side (barely any because a drip of hot ghee onto the flame would’ve been bad news), and placed that side down on the grill.   I hovered over it with my tongs and spatula, ready to pull it off at any second if things went south.

…but they didn’t.  It seemed to firm up enough to turn it, so I did, making sure that the different corners got some heat.  When it seemed firm enough, I brushed the other uncooked side with a little ghee and flipped it.  It had perfect golden grill marks on it.  I hovered over it and watched the other side, curious if the whole thing would firm up enough.  Sure enough, it did.

It's not chicken.

So I pulled that one off and ate it.  Hot damn, it was delicious!!

Then I proceeded to cook the rest of my dough balls, to great success.  None of the dough stuck to the grill in my experiment (probably because I made sure to put ghee on it and carefully lay it down on the grill, making sure none got stuck between the grill bars), and there was only a negligible amount of smoke– less than when I cook meat in a pan.

I would NOT NOT NOT NOT DEFINITELY NOT use this method for anything greasy or drippy or juicy.  NO meat. NO veggies. NO grilled cheese or quesadillas.  That’s just asking for a really, really sad disaster.  The bread seemed to work out okay because I elevated it enough, the bread had enough structural integrity (my dough wasn’t too thin or gooey), and I made sure to very, very carefully lightly oil the bread with ghee (which has a high smoke point).  Also, the heat could be turned off immediately at any point in time.

So in short, I think I got lucky.  I wouldn’t advise this.  There are so many factors that could lead to big problems.  You’d have better luck if you used a grill outside and had a fire extinguisher nearby.  A George Foreman might be great, and a toaster oven might work okay if you’re really careful. (Unfortunately, because my place is so freaking tiny, I have no room for any of these gadgets!)

…but at least I got my naan fix, have a fantastic spread for lunches next week, and have an interesting story to tell for it!  I do recommend giving the butternut squash recipe a shot, that was pretty tasty and dealt well with being ignored while it was in the slow cooker.  And the naan recipe is pretty solid if you want to try cooking it in a more safe manner.

P.S. I’m not sure when my next post will be because I have to find my camera battery charger.  I’m not willing to subject you all to posts without pictures!

Gratuitous Garlic

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I’m not one who typically just reblogs things that I find interesting….but I really have to share this with you all.  I’m a huge garlic fan (luckily I don’t care much about going on dates and impressing people nowadays), but I’ve always been frustrated by those pesky peels.  I’ve tried smashing, peeling underwater, and using the microwave but all those methods were time consuming and irritating.

If you’ve been buying that pre-peeled garlic, you’re going to feel pretty silly but pretty glad you can save money after watching this.  If you’ve been cursing the universe (like me) while pulling tiny shreds of peel off your garlic, you’re going to be pretty glad after watching this too.  I think one of my friends reposted this online and it may have come from Saveur’s Facebook page originally, but holy monkey babies is this the most useful thing ever for a garlic lover:

http://www.saveur.com/article/Kitchen/video-How-to-Peel-a-Head-of-Garlic-in-Less-Than-10-Seconds

All it requires is two bowls.  I was wondering if it needed to be metal bowls like in the video, but I got decent results even just using two soup bowl size ceramic ones (and a free tricep workout while I was at it):

Saveur, you’re such an enabler.  I plan to peel a head like this every week or so and keep it in the fridge in a ziploc.  Just in time to ward off any vampires for Halloween!

Snowflake Broccoli

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In this week’s CSA delivery, I ordered romanesco broccoli.  I’d never had it before, but I’m already in love with it!  The flavor is somewhere in between broccoli and cauliflower– a little mild.  The thing that’s the most amazing, though, is the shape.

It’s gorgeous and fractal-like, and then if you slice it horizontally into steaks, they have a snowflake design!  How perfect for winter time…and broccoli is a fall/winter crop. Think of the possibilities!

After my friends Janette & Marco spoiling me last night by taking me out to a super rich meal with fantastic wine at a French restaurant in Palo Alto, I decided I just wanted to eat the broccoli pretty plain tonight.   I just cut it into steaks and sauteed it in olive oil with some finely minced somewhat spicy chili peppers, onions, and a couple of small cherry tomatoes from my neighbor, adding some white wine and cooking it just until the broccoli stems started getting a tiny bit translucent.

I mostly used the chilis and tomatoes and onions to flavor the wine/olive oil that I cooked the broccoli in and for a little color.  It was quite good, actually.  The only drama was when I was trying to lightly brown the broccoli (before adding the wine and water to steam it as it boiled off), my pan started smoking like crazy setting off the smoke detector and nearly making my ears bleed with the shrill beeps.  Sigh.  The joys of living in a tiny studio…

What’s been cooking?

This week I cooked a few dishes.  During the rainy cold first portion of the week, I made tempura shrimp and vegetables (a great way to use up CSA overabundance) with hot soba.  Later, I made a spaghetti sauce and put it over some spaghetti squash.  Both were pretty satisfying for the cold weather!

Discoveries: yuzu koshō is really good in hot soba.  Rice flour does not work well for tempura (regular flour is better).  Briefly adding a dried chipotle chili to a spaghetti sauce adds a nice slight smoky flavor, but you have to make sure to remove it quickly.

Contemplating the Holidays

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Holidaydreams

Our first storm of the season is starting to roll in — it’s finally cooled down from the 90s for a few days, and now the trees are blowing around in a strong wind and there are some tall clouds off in the West.  This has gotten me thinking about the holidays.

Okay, to be fair…it’s not the only thing.  A sort of bizarre path has gotten me to where I’m thinking about what I’m going to give out as Christmas/holiday gifts to folks this year.  Last year it was homemade hot sauce, for which I bought bottles.  This year I can’t do something quite that extravagant because I’m distinctly poorer.  I was toying with all sorts of ideas like granola bars and whatnot (which are still a possibility).  Anyway, in the past few days I’ve gotten into making my own stomach tonic tea, which I realized is a lot like a version of chai – cardamom, fennel, anise, ginger, cloves, and a little orange peel.  It seems to help my stomach a bit, but also got me to thinking: why don’t I make my own tea blends for Christmas?

So then on a procrastination bout from studying, I got to looking around for ideas.  It seems pretty simple.  I could also make my own reusable tea bags pretty easily.   DIY Life has a great article on how all it takes is some muslin, thread, and string.  I’m thinking that this is a good possibility — making up a cute little packet for each person and I can just make a big batch and split it between everyone.

I guess I’ll have to experiment with finding the best blends!

What’s been cooking?

This week I decided to make a grilled cheese sandwich using eggplant as bread.  I’d like to report that this was absolutely excellent and I recommend you try it if you like eggplant.  If it’s a big tough eggplant, you might want to salt it a bit and then use the oven to brown it.  Mine was an Italian heirloom variety that isn’t so bitter or tough, so I was able to just brown it in olive oil in a pan and then put the cheese in between it with some sauteed peppers and onions.  I think I may make something like this again tonight for dinner…

I also had a vegetable backup going on in my fridge.  My CSA deliveries are certainly encouraging me to eat more vegetables, but I still get backlog.  I made a huge white people style stirfry (with generic seasonings that are generally deemed “Asian”: oyster sauce, ginger, garlic, soy sauce) and it was seriously one of the most colorful stirfries I’ve ever had.  Purple cabbage is awesome in stirfry!

Anyway, until next week unless I cook something post-worthy before then!