Lunch - February 4, 2010

This morning I made chili and cornbread for our lunches. The night before we had some prepared soup and bread along side a big green salad for dinner. All of those ingredients were delivered by our new grocery service, Farm Fresh Delivery. It was great to have an easy, healthy, and tasty meal. Next time I will have to order enough for leftovers.

I am working on developing my own chili recipe. Below is a quick rundown on the ingredients.

Kristen's Chili - Try 1
1 onion chopped
2 shallots chopped
1 tbsp olive oil
1 jalapeño chopped
3 mini peppers chopped
1/4 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp oregano
1 tbsp cumin
8 oz seitan ground in food processor
2 tbsp tomato paste
12 oz chopped fire roasted tomatoes
1 14 oz can black beans rinsed
1 14 oz can chickpeas rinsed
1 cup vegetable broth
1/2 cup frozen corn
1 tbsp lime juice
1/3 cup cilantro
Salt

Vegetable broth
Onion trimmings
Shallot trimmings
Carrot tops
Celery
Olive oil
Water

I made the broth as I was making the chili.

We both thought the chili was quite good. I had planned on developing a chili with pinto beans but I was pretty happy with the texture of the chickpeas today. I am not sure which way to go next.

Lunch - January 30, 2010

I created a make do lunch. I am going to call it Quick Tomato Pantry Soup.

1 large shallot finely chopped
2 tbsp olive oil
1 28oz can chopped tomatoes
1/2 cup chickpeas, rinsed
1/2 cup frozen corn
1 tsp balsamic vinegar
salt
pepper
2 tbsp basil chopped

Saute the shallots in the olive oil in a chef's pot. Add the tomatoes and bring to a low boil. Mash tomatoes with a tomato masher. Add the chick peas and corn and heat through. Add the balsamic and salt and pepper. Stir in the basil and serve.

I am going to say this was 3 servings and tasted pretty good.

Dinner - Sepember 26, 2009

I am now recalling that the ratatouille that I made the day before had jalapenos in it that were very spicy resulting in a lot of left overs. Here I served it with some rice, re-fried beans, sauteed corn, and fresh salsa to mellow it out a bit. I believe we thought this was great. The roasted vegetables added that fajita flavor to the meal.

Dinner - September 8, 2009

I tried the Three Sisters' Stew with Okra and Leeks from Berley's Fresh Food Fast again. This time I backed off on the jalapeno to about a half of a large one. I also made my own pinto beans.

The result was a stew where the spice just added to the flavor of the dish. I could have gone for a little more spice. Since the pepper is the first thing in the pot it is hard to gauge.

Matt rounded out the meal for us this time with some corn chips.

I made the recipe from gathering the ingredients to ready to serve in under an hour. It is a nice one pot meal where you can chop the veggies as you go.

Dinner - September 3, 2009

Again, I revisited a favorite. This recipe is Three Sisters Stew with Okra and Leeks from Berley's Fresh Food Fast. Have I mentioned how much I love cookbooks organized by season?

I used purple okra and tomatillos. I had no cilantro for garnish and of course I skipped the sour cream for garnish. I also used olive oil in place of the butter. Besides this full oil try, I have made this recipe with half the oil and with none of the oil and have enjoyed all.

My notes say start to finish in under an hour and that you can chop the vegetables as you go.

I think that you can consider this a complete meal because of the beans. If I were going to serve this to a guests I would probably add some cornbread or some other starch on the side. I will stick with the taste rating of 4 that I gave it before but this is really good and I hope everyone tries it.

You can find a previous post here.

Dinner - August 30, 2009

One more go on a favorite. This is from the recipe Chilled Tomato Soup, with Shallots, Cucumbers, and Corn from Berleys' Fresh Food Fast. I took this over to Kevin's to share for dinner.

I say taste your cucumber and if it is strong, reduce it. I think the corn can be upped a bit. I used red onion in place of the shallot because that is all I found at the market. The shallot adds a little complexity.

I made a double recipe and that served the three of us along side some grilled food with one serving left for lunch. The recipe says it serves 4 but that would be just a small cup.

Previous posts:
cold-soup-for-hot-weather
dinner-without-photos

Dinner - August 5, 2009

Here is one of my favorites again. This is from Berley's The Flexitarian Table. The recipe is called "Quinoa Salad with Green Beans, Corn, and Tomatoes." You can see it with a post of the full meal here.

I finally spotted some red quinoa at Bigg's this week. I will have to try this again.

I am giving it a week night rating for preparation but please see the caveats in previous post noted above.

Dinner - September 3, 2009

I found my high rating of this recipe from two years ago and thought I had better try it again. You can find the old post here.

I believe the recipe still deserves high praise. This time I had the okra. My only substitution was 2 tbsp of olive oil for the butter. I guess we also left off the sour cream garnish.

This turned out quite spicy. The jalapeno I had was quite large.

This recipe is called "Three Sisters Stew with Okra and Leeks" and can be found in Berley's Fresh Food Fast. Berley pairs it with a corn cake that had too much butter and cheese for me to try.

With the beans this stew can be the whole meal but the spice and volume one needs to eat make it a bit challenging. Next time I may try a little bread or cornbread with this to make it an easier meal to eat.

Matt said we should eat this every week. It is the season for this recipe so I may try.

This was quick to make. There is chopping but not very fine and it can all be done as the recipe progresses.

Dinner - July 7, 2009

This was a meal we shared with my sister and our friend Chuck. It is from Peter Berley's The Flexitarian Table. It is Summer Menu 5: Tofu with Lemon, Soy, White Wine, and Butter Sauce; Striped Bass with Lemon, White Wine, and Butter Sauce; Quinoa Salad with Green Beans, Corn, and Tomatoes.

The tofu and quinoa were excellent. The fish was limited by the quality of the fish. We have made this fish with good fish in the past and it was excellent too.

We don't make this tofu a regular dish because of the butter but pull it out for company. The quinoa is a summer regular here. The quinoa is also a good dish for sharing at picnics.

The pumpkin seeds are listed as optional on the quinoa but I think they should not be skipped. I have never found red quinoa and have always used regular. I used half yellow wax beans. I also used to two 12 oz blocks of tofu instead of the pound that is called for and was glad to have the extra tofu. I believe I slightly upped the sauce.

The meal as a whole needs to be saved for weekends. The quinoa can be a meal or lunch itself and I would say you could pull that off for a weeknight. The thing that makes it hard for a weeknight meal is the cooling time on the quinoa and the coordination of the separate cooking for the ingredients. I have a bit of practice now and would not hesitate to make it for a weeknight.

For taste I will give it a 5 as we have gone back to this one for guests and even had our caterer for our wedding do a version of the tofu.

Dinner without Photos

The camera battery needed charged and I was too hungry to wait.

I tried the Chilled Tomato Soup with Shallots, Cucumbers, and Corn again from Berley's Fresh Food Fast (page 100). This time I made a half recipe and tried to just use a food mill. This didn't work and I had to dump the mess into the blender and then back to the food mill. So if you are making a whole recipe I suggest blending in two batches.

The soup was still good. I used a whole ear of corn for a half recipe and liked that. Again I didn't peel the cucumber but this one probably should have been.

I also made a side of pan grilled zucchini and summer squash. I cooked about 1.5 lbs sliced in long slabs lightly salted in 3 or 4 batches. In a separate pan I nearly caramelized a small red onion. I then returned all the squash to the pan with the onion and heated through. At the end I tossed in a small handful of chopped basil. The onion really helped this one out.

I had visions of staking these grilled slabs of squash into some sort of sculpture in the middle of my plate but I was hungry so I went for a pile next to the soup. It would have been a waste anyway since the camera was charging.

We indulged and had a little bit of bread with this meal which helped it feel more like a meal. I also had a glass of Moulin-a-Vent which while not really going with the meal is not a bad generic choice for food in general.

I finally wanted some Okra and I couldn't find it

I made the Three Sisters Stew with Okra and Leeks from Berley's Fresh Food Fast without the okra (page 105). I have never gone looking for okra so I didn't know it was hard to find. Berley notes in the intro to the recipe that you should make the recipe even if you can't find okra and I agree.


While this was cooking I made up some Spicy Summer Bean and Chickpea Salad with Harissa Vinaigrette from the same cookbook (page 125). I was planning for this to be for lunch the next day but it was so good we decided to have some with dinner. We were glad to have it also to have some variety of texture to the meal.

On the stew I left out the butter and the olive oil in the cooking and the sour cream in the garnish. This means we ate a soup of nothing but vegetables, water, and salt. It was excellent. I am going to guess it is the leeks that create the decent broth but the ripeness of the vegetables that carry it the rest of the way. If you can get the vegetables, I suggest making it tonight. In a month you may have missed your opportunity. The chopping on this is not to bad since most of the items remain large. I chopped as I cooked to save time.

On the beans I used 2 Tbsp of lemon juice instead of the 3 since I left out the olive oil. I also only used 1/4 tsp of cayenne pepper. Maybe I will try a little more next time. We found that the chickpeas could use a little salt. Trimming the beans is the biggest time on this recipe.

Cold Soup for Hot Weather

This week I went to an indoor produce market for most of my vegetables on Monday night called Pipkins. I had been up to Findlay Market on Saturday but it was too hot to do all my shopping. The meal we made last night was enough to tell me that Pipkins has some excellent vegetables.

We started the meal with Chilled Tomato Soup with Shallots, Cucumbers, and Corn from Berley's Fresh Food Fast (page 100). I actually used all the ingredients as listed since there was no oil and grains to try and weed out. In the herb options we went with all basil. I didn't peel the cucumber since we were using a thin skinned style.

As far as the procedure went we found that the tomatoes were too much to do in the food processor in one round. This we discovered after trying one round and getting tomato liquid all over the counter. We also found that a mesh strainer just held everything. We quickly reached for the food mill with good results. (The next time I did just try the food mill and found that you still needed some puree action prior. I was making a half recipe the second time so it fit in the blender then back through the food mill to remove the seeds.)

The results are a very tasty gazpacho like soup. The base showed off some excellent in season tomatoes and each bite was a pleasing mix of corn and basil. You really shouldn't make this soup any other time of year. I would say taste is a five and ease is a three.

We finished out the meal with some straight ahead bok choy. Started with Bishop's recipe for Braised Bok Choy with Plenty of Garlic from Vegetables Every Day (page 35). I only had 1.5 pounds from two small head so reduced the recipe accordingly. Also left out the oil and used water in place of the broth. We were quite happy to eat the bok choy but I won't be serving this simple preparation to guests. This particular batch of bok choy was low on greens. I will say taste two and prep three.

It took an hour and 25 minutes from start to table. This included some time in the middle to look up a bok choy recipe, clean up the kitchen, and enjoy some beer. We ate all the soup and all of the bok choy.