Spring, Snow, Sun, Sausages, Tofu and Lentils.

The calendar says it's spring, which makes me think of sitting out on our deck and enjoying a glass of wine with the neighbors. Unfortunately the Minnesota weatherman has other ideas. I mean where else does it go from 60 to snow in the space of a week – not too many places.

We've been trying a few commercial vegetarian products lately – back from our Whole Foods shopping trip a month or so ago. I've come to really like the Field Roast products; they have some very tasty "sausages" chipotle (which are good but not my favorite), Italian (they have an eggplant base and are my favorite) and an apple sage (which I also really like).  To date we've only cooked them in a pan and they are a bit fragile so I'm not sure how they'll do on the grill but I'm certainly willing to give them a try.

We also went out to dinner at a local Asian restaurant and had the BEST tofu I've ever had. First I'm kind of picky about my tofu; if it's not crispy it's not good. To me there is nothing worse than tofu that is simply warmed up – it's slimy, it's soggy, it's….. well you get the picture. When Dan suggested we go to the Asian restaurant I was luke warm to the idea. We'd been there before and the service was horrible and I didn't recall the food being amazing either, but I was willing to give it a second try.

The service was again horrible but the food was wonderful. We ordered a spicy seared tofu dish and a garlic eggplant both were amazing. The tofu was crispy on the outside and had a spicy sauce that was not overpowering but had just the right amount of heat and the flavor was like nothing I'd had on my tofu before – I'd order it again in heart beat; although I'd do takeout.

Last night I was browsing through the fridge and realized there were some peppers I needed to use up so I decided to make lentil stuffed peppers with a spicy oil to drizzle over them. I started by having Dan chop an onion (he's my main chopper) and cook it until it started to soften. To that I added 2 cloves of minced garlic and a half-teaspoon of ground cumin and sautéed for a minute. 

I then added 1 cup of vegetable broth 2/3 cup of red lentils, 1 ½ tsp. of tomato paste, ¼ tsp. salt, 1/8 tsp. of cayenne, bay leaf and 1/8 tsp. of paprika, covered it and cooked it until the lentils were mushy.

While the lentils were cooking I cut 2 peppers in half and cleaned out the ribs and then microwaved them for about 4 minutes to soften them. I then transferred them to a baking dish. When the lentils were done, I removed the bay leaf and added 1 ½ tsp. of fresh lemon juice, ½ cup chopped tomato, ½ spinach and divided the lentil mixture between the pepper halves, topped with feta cheese and baked them for about 20 minutes at 350 degrees until heated through. 

When they were done, I drizzled them with a combination of 1T olive oil, ½ tsp. paprika and ½ tsp. cayenne pepper.  Served with a nice fruit salad and a crisp glass of white wine. It was delicious if I do say so myself.

Happy Spring – let's hope that Mother Nature is done making it snow, I'm ready for some sunshine and warmth and wine on the deck with our friends.

Emergency Room, St. Paddy's Day and Avocado Fries

For those of you who know my husband Dan, you know he really enjoys LED lights and arduino's – when you put them together – well let's just say he's a happy camper .. or he was anyway.

The day before St Paddy's day he was working to get the color and patterns just right for the occasion. I was in the living room reading and he came in with his hand over his eye and said; "I hurt myself." As it turned out he was bending over to put up the newly programmed St. Patrick's Day lights and got poked in the eye with a branch – Yikes!

After trying to convince him to go to the emergency room (and I was unsuccessful) he spent a painful night and then conceded at 7am so off we went.  It was long and painful but in the end resulted in 3 prescriptions and no more pain, which was the goal.

So it's St. Paddy's Day (and I'm Irish) but we couldn't really go out to dinner (because Dan was doped up on Percocet) so I pulled out the recipes from our vegetarian cooking class and decided to make the black eyed pea, cabbage and cheese dish since it kind of reminded me of corned beef and cabbage (btw I would never eat corned beef).

The recipe is pretty simple, 1 head of cabbage 1 cup of black-eyed peas (uncooked, cooked equals 3 cups), tamari, salt, pepper and cheese (I used almond cheese). I didn't have any tamari or soy sauce so I opted to leave it out – don't do that it really adds a flavor that you need. While healthy our dish was bland, but we did include some Field Roast Italian sausages (made of eggplant and other delicious things) on the side and carrot cake cupcakes – they saved the day!

To make the dish cook 1 cup of black eyed peas in a pan of water for about an hour and at the same time steam 1 small head of cabbage. When the beans are done, combine them with the steamed cabbage, tamari (between 1 – 2 T), salt and pepper to taste and then add cheese. The recipe calls for cheddar, since we don't do cow cheese here I used almond cheddar which is pretty flavorless – so aside from binding it all together it really didn't do much for the dish.  Bake it for about 25 – 30 minutes. 

We had lots of leftovers – initially boring leftovers but we revived them the next day by sautéing an onion, peppers, mushrooms and adding cayenne pepper the result was delicious. Next time these things will be added upfront, I mean really, onions make everything taste amazing right?

And speaking of amazing, have you tried avocado fries? I was browsing Pinterest a while ago and saw a recipe for them and pinned it but I never got around to actually making them. When I got my first paycheck from my new job I took Dan out for dinner to celebrate and the restaurant had avocado fries as an appetizer – I had to try them, they were so delicious, I was not disappointed. They had a crunchy outside and a creamy, velvety inside that definitely made my taste buds do a happy dance.

If you like avocado you need to and I do mean NEED to try these. You cut an avocado in like 6 or 8 pieces, dip it in egg white and then roll them in panko bread crumbs with some cayenne pepper, salt and any other spice you like and bake them at about 400 degrees until crispy on the outside. Serve them with a chipotle mayo and well just do it – you'll be glad you did.

A few lessons about this week; don't poke yourself in the eye, don't refuse to go to the emergency room and be in pain for an entire evening, don't leave out key ingredients in the recipe and DO order avocado fries – all good advise.

Cooking Classes, New Venues, Good Friends and Spiralized Lo Mein

It's been a fun week! Second week of the new job and I'm still thrilled with the decision (ok the fact that it was payday on Friday might have something to do with that.)  The weather in Minnesota has been beautiful – today it was 70 degrees.  I've been expanding my walking from 3 to closer to 4 miles each day. The trail is filled with walkers, bikers, roller bladers and a skateboarder here and there.  All signs of Spring.

Last week Dan and I took a vegetarian cooking class – we made 7 dishes in 3 hours – we were busy! There were 5 students in the class and somehow Dan and I each ended up making 2 dishes – maybe we are crazy cooks or over achievers?  I made a Dahl and a Quinoa salad and Dan made a black eyed pea and cabbage bake (which we're planning to recreate for St Paddy's Day on Tuesday) and a mushroom risotto.

We got some great new dinner ideas and lots of containers of leftovers. This week I'm taking an African cooking class which I'm really looking forward to because we're cooking with collard greens; one of my favorites veggies.

Last night we met a friend from L.A. he was in town attending a conference (which he was one of the Keynote speakers.) We tried a new local venue called Saffron – the food was delicious. We started out with hummus dressed with a spicy oil and warm pita bread . The menu had a nice range, our friend is a meat and potatoes kind of guy and we well aren't, but the menu accommodated all of our needs. I had a delicious vegetable tangine with chickpeas, carrots, squash, onions, sweet potatoes, tomatoes and spices – I was not disappointed.

Today I was hungry for something fresh – so I logged into the Inspiralized site and found an Asian lo mein recipe:

http://www.inspiralized.com/2015/03/03/daikon-noodle-vegetable-lo-mein/

I headed off to the local Asian grocery store to get some baby bok choy, green scallions and a few other things I couldn't live without. I changed the recipe up a bit (of course) and spiralized 2 carrots and one zucchini in addition to the daikon radish to add some depth to the "noodles." I elimianted the baby corn and mushrooms (only because I didn't have any) and I added some edamame for protein. 

The result was a keeper - here is picture of it in the pan as it was cooking:

And once it got to our plates we added some dark brown gain bread as a side, we're still debating over who gets the leftovers for lunch tomorrow!

Whether you're Irish or just pretending to be, have a Happy St Paddy's day and don't forget to search for the pot of gold.

So Much to do, So Little Time

Last week was a busy one; I started a new job, my stepdaughter converted to Judaism, my mother-in-law celebrated her 80^th birthday and it seems spring will be joining us in Minnesota soon – all good things!

Most of my cooking lately has been what I'll refer to as foraging. I have a rule that we can't put more things in our overflowing freezer(s) until we eat some of the things already in them, which means we've been doing a lot of soups, and stews that we froze a while ago. 

To celebrate my MIL birthday, the family gathered at a little bowling spot housed in the basement of an old church (the lanes were built in the 30's). We bowled and enjoyed a potluck celebration complete with poems and songs. Since I'm not a poet or a songwriter I opted to cook, which is something I can do.

I started with the recipe Moroccan Roasted Carrot and Chickpea Quinoa from the Closet Cooking website (see link below) and of course made a few changes.

http://www.closetcooking.com/2010/03/moroccan-roasted-carrot-and-chickpea.html

I tripled the recipe, and I roasted carrots, parsnips and rutabagas because I was looking for more than just carrots. I used tri colored quinoa (which I found at Whole Foods) and I backed the spice down a bit. I used 2/3rds of what was called for in the broth for the quinoa and when roasting the veggies and even less in the dressing to accommodate the range of palettes in the family.  Finally, I substituted pumpkin spice pumpkin seeds that were in the freezer (remember the foraging thing from above right?) from Trader Joe's. The result, well you be the judge see the picture below. 

As luck would have it we have some leftovers so guess what's for dinner?