Mmmm...Tomatoes

If you're a gardener (or a good friend of a gardener) or have a CSA share, you've got to have that recipe. You know, the one that makes you say "Yay, 11 pounds of veggies!" instead of "Oh. My. Goodness. What will I ever do with 11 pounds of veggies?"

We've figured out that recipe for just about everything. (Okra and eggplant being the current exceptions, but thanks to Nupur, we're working on it.) The only other stumper was tomatoes -- we'd get them super-ripe on Saturday, and they'd be squishy and inedible by Sunday. I peeled, seeded, and froze several of them, hoping to figure out a use for them later. But they kept coming, and I wasn't ready to admit defeat. I found this recipe on Nupur's A to Z of Indian Vegetables, and I've made it twice in two days. The first time I followed the recipe almost-exactly, and the second time I omitted the cumin and mustard seeds, adding purchased spicy sev just before serving to add a little heat. Needless to say, this has become a keeper!

Niftiness!

I'm gonna be a copycat, just because I'm enamored with the idea. As REL explains here, Johari windows are a tool that lets you see how other people see you. I've picked adjectives that describe me, and I'd like other people to pick adjectives that describe me too! (And no, self-centered is not an option.) I'll be happy to pick adjectives for you too, should you create a profile.

Here is mine.

Bek 1, Cilantro 0

Or shall I say, Bek 10, Cilantro 0. It's been Cilantro Central here for the past week, as I bought a huge bunch of the stuff and have been trying to use it up before it went bad. I don't understand why you can't just buy herbs by weight like everything else :(

Anyhow, I made spring rolls, cilantro-lime rice, several lunches worth of peanut noodle salad, a fridge-cleaning version of okonomiyaki (or faux-konomiyaki, since it bears little resemblance to the original) based on this recipe, and still had cilantro in my fridge. Then I stumbled across this post (OK, it was intentional -- I was searching Google Reader for cilantro recipes). I got Veganomicon from the library, and lo and behold, the Black Bean Burger recipe called for cilantro! I made the recipe almost-as-written (just substituted 1/2 tsp Sriracha for the garlic and chile powder, and used the liquid from the canned beans in place of half the water) and voila, no more cilantro. Well...almost no more cilantro. I had just about 1/4 cup left, so I mixed it with some lettuce and cabbage, and tossed it with peanut sauce to make a salad to accompany my burger. Yay!

Vietnamexican food

No, thankfully it's not fusion cuisine. I'm just too lazy to make 2 separate posts.

First off, spring rolls. A friend of mine is following a gluten-free vegan diet and I wanted to bring food to the potluck that she could actually eat :) I followed Nupur's instructions, as much as I ever follow instructions...

My filling ingredients were Melissa's baked tofu (prepackaged), thinly sliced; rice vermicelli noodles; thinly sliced carrots; thinly sliced yellow bell pepper; bean sprouts; cilantro; basil; green onion, and leaf lettuce. For the dipping sauce, I used Sriracha, chunky peanut butter, agave nectar, soy sauce, water, and fresh lime juice. And because my soy sauce contains wheat and I couldn't pin down whether Sriracha is gluten free, I also brought Taste of Thai peanut sauce. (Everyone else liked it, but I'm not a huge fan of coconut in savory things.) And if you don't feel like actually making spring rolls, you can mix the sauce with the filling ingredients and call it peanut noodle salad :)
And because I had tons of leftover cilantro, I decided to make black bean stew with cilantro lime rice. The rice was easy: I just added fresh lime juice, salt, and a couple of handfuls of cilantro to hot rice. And the stew wasn't much harder: I sauteed chopped butternut squash with chopped onion, added frozen corn, a can of black beans, a teaspoon of tomato paste, and ground cumin and cayenne pepper.

I still have a ton of cilantro. I'll probably try C&Z's poicamole, and I welcome any other cilantro-using recipes!

Guess what? Pepper butt!

Handmade Awesomeness

But not handmade by me! Because while I can knit well and crochet enough to get by, I cannot sew. At all. However, Kabs can, and I am the very lucky beneficiary of her considerable talent. Behold the needle kimono:

Closed:

Open, with the awesome needles that I also received (all 8" DPNs: 4 sets of size 3s, 1 set of size 4s, 1 set of size 5s, 1 set of size 6s, and 5 sets of size 8s):And the best part: it's monogrammed!


I am obviously beyond excited! And inspired to someday learn to sew. (Although seriously, I imagine that I'd end up with a needle in my hand, so maybe I should stick to knitting.)

Couscous Salad

Potlucks tend to be the bane of a vegetarian's existence. Sometimes there's nothing to eat but what you brought; sometimes you find yourself holding up the line to ask about ingredients in the unlabeled, yummy-looking mystery dish. And sometimes you're lucky -- at work, we had a lettuce-free salad potluck, and I could eat almost everything!

My contribution was a curried couscous salad. I started with this recipe and made the following changes. First, I cooked the couscous using the instructions here. (Note that pouring boiling water over toasting couscous will give you a volcano of steam and flying super-hot couscous bits. They don't tell you that part in the instructions.) I used a little oil to toast the couscous, and a little to saute the onions, and I mixed a little in with the lemon juice and spices -- all told, I probably used about 1/4 cup instead of 1/2 cup. I sauteed about 2 cups of chopped butternut squash (about 1/2" cubes) with the onion. I skipped the currants and used only 1 bunch of scallions (including the green part). And I went a little nutso with the seasoning: increased the lemon juice by about 2 tsp, doubled the cilantro, increased the coriander to 1 tsp, added a tsp of dried ginger, 1/2 tsp of cardamom, and about 1/4 tsp of cayenne pepper. I cut the nutmeg to about 1/8 tsp and didn't use curry powder. Even after that, it was still pretty mild, but tasty. (And it makes a LOT...easily enough for 10 people. Or lunch for a few days.)

I think that it would be good with kidney beans, or lentils. And I'll be making some raita to go with it :)

Soup!

Soup = perfect food; there's really nothing more to it than that. So, courtesy of a snow day, here are 2 of my favorites. They're variations on a theme: celery, carrots, onions, starch, other stuff, simmer. And be happy and full and warm :)

Lentil Soup

2 T oil
1 cup dry brown lentils
1/3 cup barley
1 large onion, minced
2 stalks of celery, minced
3 cloves of garlic, sliced
3 carrots, sliced
6 cups water
2 tsp tomato paste

Heat the oil in a medium pot. Add the lentils and barley and cook over high heat for about 3 minutes, stirring occasionally, until lightly browned. Add the onion, celery, and garlic and cook for about 5 minutes. Add the carrots, tomato paste, and water. Cover and simmer for about 30 to 40 minutes until the lentils and barley are tender. Add salt and pepper to taste.

I often use 2 potatoes, peeled and chopped, in place of the barley, and it's also good with sweet potatoes. You can also mix in finely chopped kale near the end of the cooking time.

Mushroom Barley Soup

2 T oil
1 cup barley
1 large onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
3 carrots, sliced
8 oz fresh mushrooms, sliced
1/2 oz dried mushrooms
4 cups water

Heat the oil in a medium pot. Add the barley and cook over high heat for about 3 minutes, stirring occasionally, until lightly browned. Add the onion and celery and cook for about 5 minutes. Add the carrots, both types of mushrooms and water. Cover and simmer for about 30 to 40 minutes until the barley is tender. Add salt and pepper to taste.

I've added a little bit of dill to this in the past, but I really like it better "unseasoned" to let the flavor of the mushrooms shine. (The dried mushrooms are key, although I suppose you could leave them out and substitute mushroom broth for the water.) It's really good served with a little sour cream or plain yogurt.