Vegetarian Ukrainian Borscht
Alma likes beets, as do Derek and I, but I don’t actually make that many dishes with them. I make a beet and lentil salad pretty often, and I occasionally make a beet and potato walnut gratin. And sometimes we just have plain beets as a side. But other than that I don’t use beets that often. I was trying to think of other things to do with beets, and a friend suggested making borscht. Given that we are smack in the middle of winter, I liked the idea of adding another soup to the rotation, so I decided to give it a try. I don’t have a recipe for borscht so I started looking on the internet. Many of the recipes I found call for meat (like this one from Serious Eats). But I found a recipe for a Ukrainian Vegetarian Borscht that looked good to me. I served it for dinner tonight with extra white beans on the side and with dark 100% rye bread from our local farmer’s market. Read the rest of this entry »
Simple veggie fried rice
When I have leftover rice in the fridge and I want a quick lunch or dinner I often make veggie fried rice. Alma likes hers pretty plain, so sometimes I made a first batch pretty plain, with just carrots, tofu, peas, and red cabbage, then I make a second spicy batch with celery, garlic, ginger, chilies, scallions, basil, etc. Then we mix the two together in whatever proportion we prefer.
For the spicier fried rice, I usually start by mincing ginger and garlic, then dice celery and carrots. After that prep is done I start the celery and carrots sautéing in olive oil in my cast iron skillet. While the carrots and celery are cooking I finely cube some tofu and throw that in as well. When the tofu is lightly browned on all sides I add some thinly sliced red cabbage (or green, or napa), the garlic, and the ginger. I might throw in some roasted peanuts as well. After about a minute I add the brown rice and wait for it to brown a little. Once it’s a little bit browned I add frozen green peas until they are warmed through, then I add 2 eggs (beaten as below). Finally, I top the fried rice off with sliced scallions, julienned basil (thai basil if I have it) and chili sauce. That’s my go-to combination but if I don’t have celery or carrots or cabbage or scallions it’s not a problem, I just leave them out. If I have other veggies around (like zucchini, mushrooms, cauliflower, bok choy, bean sprouts, or broccoli) I might chop them finely and add them as well at the appropriate time.
I don’t usually measure anything, but if you want to see some possible amounts there is one more detailed recipe below. Read the rest of this entry »
Swiss chard and herb fritters
This is another recipe from the cookbook Jerusalem by Ottolenghi. The fritters are basically pureed swiss chard and herbs mixed with eggs and a little flour and feta cheese. You make them into little pancakes and pan-fry them. They are a great way to use up a random selection of leafy greens and herbs. Read the rest of this entry »
How to roast jerusalem artichokes
I’m adding a brief post here because I keep forgetting how I roast sunchokes, and then I have to do a search all over again.
I basically follow the directions from Brad Farmerie, chef at Public and Saxon + Parole in NYC. He says that there’s no need to peel them. You just need to rinse them and cut them into finger-sized pieces, then blanch them for four minutes in heavily salted water. Toss them in olive oil and roast them in a 450 F oven until they’re soft and gooey on the inside and roasted crisp on the outside.
I don’t quite understand why, but he says that blanching them actually makes them crispier? In any case, we’ve tried it this way, and always like it. And I agree that trying to peel jerusalem artichokes is torture.
Update Dec 2019: Derek and Alma (at almost 5 years old) both love jerusalem artichokes cooked this way. I made roasted vegetables this week with carrots, parsnips, rutabaga, sweet potatoes, and jerusalem artichokes, and the jerusalem artichokes were the first to go.
Chard parsnip patties
I chose this recipe for chard and parsnip patties because the author says her kids like them. They have some flour and cheese, but mostly the patties are just veggies. Alma (at 5 years old) likes them. She usually dips them in yogurt. I like to call them charsnip patties. Derek groans and Alma giggles at my bad joke. Read the rest of this entry »
Creamy millet porridge with baked, spiced pears
Derek is not a millet fan. I remember him happily digging into a millet pilaf I made many years ago, and then almost doing a spit-take. “What did you do to the rice?” he asked with a look of intense disgust on his face. “This is the worst rice you’ve ever made!” So as you can imagine, I don’t cook a lot of millet. But Alma likes porridge, and I’m not the biggest oatmeal fan. I wanted to make some alternative-grain porridges, and I came across a recipe from Cook’s Illustrated for creamy millet porridge. They say “slightly overcooking millet causes the seeds to burst and release starch, creating a creamy consistency that makes this grain ideal for breakfast porridge.” Sounds good! I think Derek’s main problem with millet is its somewhat dry, gritty texture, so I thought maybe he’d be willing to eat millet in a porridge. And he is! Alma likes it too, and for me it’s a nice change from oatmeal.
When I made this porridge for breakfast today, I served it with my Mom’s Ayurvedic baked, spiced pears. Alma isn’t normally a huge pear fan, but she likes these baked pears, which are seasoned with cinnamon, cardamom, and nutmeg. And unlike with baked apples, she doesn’t even complain about the skin. Read the rest of this entry »
Modern Succotash with Fennel and Scallions
So far Alma does not like fennel. I was looking for a recipe for fennel that she might possibly like, and I found this Cook’s Illustrated recipe for a modern succotash with corn, white beans, and (a little) fennel. She loves corn and generally likes white beans, so I figured it was worth a shot. Read the rest of this entry »
Curried cabbage, potatoes, and peas
This is a relatively straightforward recipe from the cookbook “660 Curries”. Both Derek and I really enjoyed it. It tasted authentically Indian, without being overwhelmingly rich. Read the rest of this entry »
Sautéed Cabbage with Fennel and Garlic
Back in March I made the Cook’s Illustrated recipe Sautéed Cabbage with Miso and Scallions, and we liked it, so I wanted to try some of the other variants. This week I tried the version with fennel and garlic, and we enjoyed it as well. It’s a relatively simple recipe, but tasty.
Alma, who is generally not a huge cabbage fan, really likes this recipe. So do I. Even though I screw up the browning step EVERY TIME. I always forget to not stir the cabbage at the start. It’s actually pretty tricky to get the cabbage to brown without burning. But even if you don’t really brown your cabbage, it’s still really tasty. The combination of the salt, the sweet cabbage, the acid from the lemon juice, and the umami from the parmesan–yum. I’ve added this recipe to our monthly menu plan, although I probably only make it once every couple of months. Read the rest of this entry »
Chickpeas chard sauté with caraway and cilantro
I got Yotam Ottolenghi’s Plenty cookbook from Derek’s father a few weeks ago, and Derek looked through it and chose a recipe for a swiss chard, chickpea and tamarind stew. The stew is seasoned with caraway seeds, cilantro, and yogurt among other things. But then when I went to make it I looked it up in the index and found a different recipe—also a chickpea and chard sauté, which is seasoned with caraway seeds, cilantro, and yogurt, among other things. We stuck with the tamarind stew, but then made the sauté a few days later. I haven’t made the tamarind stew a second time, but I have made the chickpea chard sauté several times now.
Bean, barley, cabbage stew with bear garlic pesto
I found some small red beans in the Turkish store near my house last week. I snapped them up, excited to add something a bit different to my usual rotation (black beans, cranberry beans, kidney beans, white beans, lentils, various kinds of dals, chickpeas, and split mung beans). I cooked up a big pot of red beans, then had to figure out how to make a full dinner out of them. I searched all my cookbooks for recipes for red beans (with the convenient eatyourbooks.com website) and found this 101cookbooks recipe for a farro and bean stew. Amazingly, I had (almost) all the ingredients.
The recipe looked pretty plain. It’s just veggies and beans and grains without any spices or herbs, not even garlic—the only seasoning is salt. So I decided to use the Bärlauch I had in the fridge to make a Bärlauch pesto. I tried to look up what Bärlauch is called in the states, and found a number of translations. Wikipedia says “Allium ursinum – known as ramsons, buckrams, wild garlic, broad-leaved garlic, wood garlic, bear leek or bear’s garlic – is a wild relative of chives native to Europe and Asia.” It’s a broad, bright green leaf that tastes strongly of garlic, and (as I discovered this week) lasts quite a long time in the fridge! I had it in a plastic bag in the fridge all week and it didn’t seem at all the worse for the waiting. Read the rest of this entry »
Escarole and beans in tomato sauce
Derek and I used to love the escarole and beans appetizer at Girasole in Pittsburgh. It consisted of braised escarole and white beans in a rich tomato sauce. It was hearty, warming, and satisfying. I hadn’t thought about it for years, until this week I saw a green that looked a lot like escarole at the farmer’s market. I asked the farmer what it was and he called it Endivien—the German word for endive. I asked him if you could cook with it and he said Germans only ever eat it raw in salads. But it looked similar enough that I decided to try making escarole and beans with it. There are tons of recipes online for escarole and white bean soup, and a few for escarole and bean dishes, but none seem to call for tomato sauce. So I decided not to try to follow a recipe. Nonetheless, my beans and greens came out quite well. This is a relatively simple, one-pot supper. It’s reasonably fast to make, hearty and satisfying. Read the rest of this entry »
The quest for the perfect skillet cornbread
I have tried many cornbread recipes over the years, but have not yet settled on my favorite recipe. Below I’ve recorded some of the many recipes I’ve tried. All recipes are designed to be made in a 9-inch cast iron skillet, and cut into 12 pieces. Typically, rather than making plain cornbread, I pour the cornbread batter over beans to make tamale pie. Read the rest of this entry »
Quick Cauliflower Curry
This is my mom’s lightening-fast cauliflower curry, which uses almost entirely pantry and freezer ingredients (e.g. no fresh ginger or garlic or onions). Despite its simplicity, it’s an excellent version of a traditional Americanized cauliflower curry. I like it for breakfast, lunch, or dinner, plain or served with dal or rice or yogurt. This recipe is quite forgiving, so if you’re missing a spice or vegetable, you can probably just leave it out without changing the flavor of the dish substantially. Read the rest of this entry »
The captious vegetarian 