Carrots in Winterland

Welcome Minnesota winter I knew you would show up eventually in spite of global warming. Last weekend Dan and I headed down to Madison to visit his daughter Mary, step-daughter Sasha and niece Helen. The drive down on Friday afternoon was lovely. It was a cool crisp day, the roads were clear and the sun shining. 

On Friday, we had a great dinner at a lovely Italian/Mediterranean restaurant; the eggplant was delicious, the appetizer, a roasted red pepper spread, was to die for and the company was awesome. We spent Saturday touring the Mustard Museum - I know, I know it doesn’t sound glamorous but to be honest it was a lot of fun and we got a wine and chocolate mustard that was delicious. 

The museum boasts over 250 mustards, all which you can taste, some great history - did you know that 80% of mustard comes from Canada - I didn’t? The museum is a great mix of fun facts, history, artifacts and things you can purchase. 

After the museum we headed to a great bookstore called the Frugal Muse where I found some great holiday gifts. My favorite gifts to receive for the holidays are books and photos and I’m always looking for new authors to read. And then it began to snow - the forecast was like 10 inches and while we didn’t get 10 we got a lot - like a scary lot (for me that is). Never fear tho, Dan piled all of us in his SUV and we headed over to the University to pick up Sasha and Helen and we went to a great Afghani restaurant where I had a delicious veggie couscous - a spicy veggie couscous that is.  

Fast forward to Sunday morning - we braved the snow and headed back to Minneapolis slowly and steadily. The roads had good and bad spots; I think it depends on which county is plowing the highway; some have more funds than others and are more diligent. But for the most part is wasn’t awful and it only took us an extra hour to get home, which overall wasn’t bad based on the situation. 

And what does all of this have to do with this weeks blog? Well after all that stressful driving I wasn’t in the mood to go to the grocery store so I decided that dinner needed to come from whatever we had in the fridge. So I did a quick inventory and decided on a carrot and carmelized onion soup with rye bread; sounds good right? It was delicious if I do say so myself and who knew one could create a delicious, vegetarian meal out of so few ingredients. 

I started with a very basic recipe;

Ingredients:

2 large onions thinly sliced

2 stalks of celery chopped

1 sweet potato cubed

2 1/2 lbs carrots sliced into rounds

32 ounces of veggie broth 

Then I added spices (sorry I am not a measurer) which I shook, shook and shook again so these measurements are very rough:

1 tsp Cumin

1 - 2 Tbsp curry powder

5 - 6 grinds of sea salt

5 - 6 grinds of black pepper

3 - 4 shakes of red pepper flakes 

1 - 2 shakes of ground ginger

I began by caramelizing the thinly sliced onions in olive oil on a medium heat; stirring infrequently. To the onions I added the spices and other veggies and cooked them for an additional 10 - 15 minutes. Then add the broth stir and simmer for 25 - 30 minutes until carrots are tender. Place in a blender (we used the Vitamix) and puree, return to the pot, taste and adjust the seasoning to taste. 

Keep in mind the spice measurements are rough. I start with the best of intentions (to record my spicing) but I get carried away in my desire to make things tasty but in the end, the soup was delicious. And as the soup aged (over the next 3 days) the flavors became more intense. Actually we finished up the last of the batch tonight and I have to say today was the best version. 

The rye bread came from the Breadsmith - rye bread is my favorite. One night we paired the soup with a spinach salad with peppers, scallions, cranberries, cucumber, avocado and a balsamic dressing and tonight we added some baby crab cakes (yes every once in a while I indulge). The soup was good in all it’s iterations. 

Next up; finishing up my holiday shopping, making some cookies, cleaning and getting ready for the BIG event - gatherings with both families - I can’t wait to see everyone.

Thanks for stopping by!

Cold Weather, Spiralizing and Spaghetti - Comfort Food for the Minnesota Soul

The holidays are just a few short weeks away; actually 18 days - if you are counting. If you’ve been outside the past few days you are most likely pondering hibernation and the upcoming Minnesota winter, if you live in the area that is. For me winter always signals robust, hearty dishes like chili, bean soups and spaghetti. Some of my favorite dishes. 

When I was young my mom made the best chill and chicken and dumplings. I’ve mastered the chili (vegan and meat eaters alike) but I never got the hang of the chicken and dumplings. I was successful with the chicken and the sauce but my dumplings, well let’s say that one could either use them for trap shooting or toss them in the trash - not sure what my issues are but I’ve given up making them; some things are not meant to be. 

On Sunday, I noticed that my spiralizer was gathering dust in the hall closet so I decided we needed a spiralizer intervention and of course Dan agreed - actually he agrees to most things as long as they are not painful or disgusting, which by the way is really hard to do with him. 

Anyway, I grabbed some tomato sauce from the freezer, made a “meat sauce” of ground sunflower seeds, lentils, quinoa, rosemary, thyme, sage, salt and pepper. Actually truth be told the “meat” was suppose to be meatballs, and they started out really well as meatballs but then I added the tomato sauce into the pan and they turned to meat sauce - next time cook the sauce separate from the meatballs and pour it over the “noodles and meatballs”. Ah live and learn right?

Recipe:

Meatballs/meat sauce

1 cup green lentils, rinsed & drained

¼ cup quinoa, rinsed and drained

1 Tbsp olive oil for cooking onions + 2-3 Tbsp for sautéing lentil balls

1 yellow onion, minced

1 tsp garlic powder

Italian seasoning - rosemary, thyme, sage to taste

¼ cup sunflower seeds, ground to a fine powder

¼ cup fresh basil, thinly sliced + extra for garnish

Sea Salt and pepper to taste

Cooking:

Rinse and drain the lentils, cook according to package. Drain the excess water, transfer to a large bowl and mash with the back of a fork until you don't see anymore whole beans.

Rinse and drain quinoa. Cook according to package directions, add to the bowl with the mashed lentils.

Mince onion and sauté in olive oil in a large pan, over medium heat until translucent. Add onions to the bowl with lentils and quinoa. Don't wash or drain the pan because you're going to cook the lentil balls in the reserved onion infused olive oil.

Use a food processor to blend the sunflower seeds into a fine powder, add the powder to the bowl.

Add basil, Italian seasonings, garlic powder, salt and pepper to lentil mixture. Using your hands, mix until everything is completely combined.

Create medium sized balls, and add them to the pan with a little extra olive oil. Cook for 8 - 10 minutes, gently turning to brown on all sides - this is where things went wrong!

After cooking the “meatballs” I added some of my homemade tomato sauce and the meatballs simply fell apart, while it was still tasty it was not the look I was going for. 

Skip the starchy pasta and spiralize 2 medium sweet potatoes, toss them with a bit of olive oil and roast them in a 400 degree oven for approx. 10 minutes until tender. Place sweet potato noodles in a bowl and top with lentil meat sauce, serve with a salad and garlic bread.

It was delicious and we finished the leftovers for dinner tonight. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Thankful

I always think of Thanksgiving as the kick off to the holiday season. This year we spent Turkey day with my father, his wife and her family. There were all the traditional dishes, turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, a scalloped corn dish, rolls and of course pie; pumpkin, pecan and apple. 

After spending the afternoon with my family Dan and I headed over to the local movie theatre and saw Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them in the most luxurious recliners I’ve ever experienced a movie in - move over barcalounger this theater has you beat! I am an avid Harry Potter fan and while this movie is not about the Potter clan in any way, it is a great story and as I understand there will be 4 more installments - personally I can’t wait. 

We headed back to Minnesota early Friday morning to spend some time with Dan’s family and his daughter Mary who was visiting from Madison, WI - it had been a while since we saw her - it was so good to catch up and hear about what she’s been doing - she’s been busy. She was polite enough to oh and ah over the pottery we made in our last class - the girl is a gem. 

On Saturday we ventured with the thundering herd (aka Dan’s extended family) to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum to see the Bruce Munro light show. It was a creative mix of light and landscape and Dan’s mom dubbed it “Awesome”. I truly enjoyed wandering around with the family, most of our nieces and nephews were in town; we talked, we caught up with each other and we enjoyed the art. After the show we headed over to our favorite Indian restaurant (all 18 of us) and had a delicious meal complete with mango lassi’s, samosas, lamb, chicken, eggplant and a host of other dishes. 

Today has been a mix of cleaning, organizing, shopping (grocery and holiday), writing (nearly finished with my NaNoWriMo) and cooking. The freezer is now defrosted, the refrigerator cleaned, 3 holiday gifts purchased, and groceries in the house. The hot tub is ready for soaking and I tried out a new recipe. 

I was chatting with my brother-in-law Brian about gardening and he mentioned that they were a little disappointed they didn’t harvest all of their kale before the frost - oh but wait kale is frost resistant - which reminded me we still have a boat load of kale and collard greens waiting to be eaten!

I found a recipe a while ago, which had brown rice pasta, collard greens and shiitake mushrooms. I’m not a fan of pasta in any way shape or form, so I decided to use one of our butternut squash, spiralize it and use it for the pasta. The result was delicious. 

Ingredients:

1/4 cup of tamari or soy sauce

1/4 cup of maple syrup

1 Tbsp. of rice wine vinegar

2 - 3 T olive oil

1 lb of shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, sliced

3 large cloves of garlic, finely chopped

a large knob of ginger, finely chopped

1/2 lb of collard greens, stems removed, and thinly sliced (about 4 cups)

1/4 cup of finely chopped peanuts + more for garnish

1 small butternut squash spiralized on medium noodle

Instructions: 

Peel, seed and spiralize 1/2 of a small butternut squash, toss with olive oil and roast at 400 degrees until edges are slightly browned. 

Combine tamari/soy, maple syrup and rice wine vinegar; whisk to combine and set aside.

While squash is roasting, add 1 T of oil to the pan, stir fry shiitake mushrooms  for a few minutes and then remove from pan. Add 1T oil to pan with garlic and ginger stir fry approximately 1 minute until fragrant and then return mushrooms to the pan. Add soy/vinegar and maple syrup to pan, reduce heat to low, cover pan and cook for 2 - 3 minutes. 

To the mushroom mixture add collard greens and stir until wilted, remove from heat, cover and set aside. 

When squash noodles are done, put on serving platter and top with mushroom/collard mixture, sprinkle with chopped nuts and serve. 

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend - thanks for stopping by!

Holiday Countdown

Happy Thanksgiving week! I’ve been absent from my blogging for a few weeks. It doesn’t mean we haven’t been cooking up delicious food because we have. It’s actually been a couple of things first I’m doing NaNoWriMo again this year and second we’ve been busy with work, family going to pottery class, bookclub, and hanging out with a museum meet up I’ve joined; at the end of the day I’m beat. 

For those of you who do not know what NaNoWriMo is, simply its National Novel Writing Month, you write a 50,000 novel in 30 days. It has to be fiction, not published before and  you cannot write the first word before November 1st. You can ponder plot and characters beforehand but you cannot write. 

This week the holiday season kicks in and Dan and I are heading to Fargo to spend it with my Dad, his wife and her family. We’ll have a traditional turkey dinner with mashed potatoes, stuffing, sweet potatoes, home made rolls, and pie. Both Dan and I are looking forward to seeing everyone.

On Friday we’ll head back home and get ready to spend time with Dan’s family. We’re going to the Bruce Monroe light show at the Arboretum and out for dinner - it’s gotten very good reviews - it should be a great time. We’ll probably spend the rest of the weekend catching our breath and then move into a fully packed December. It seems like we don’t have a free weekend from now until January. With that being said, most of it is filled with family, good friends and fun activities so no complaints here. 

As far as food goes, we’ve been cooking up all of our favorites; soup, field roast vegan sausages, roasted root veggies (complete with parsnips and turnips), of course enjoying the squash from our garden. I’ve finally found a preparation for kale that Dan likes and it’s super simple. 

1 -2 T olive oil

8 cups shredded kale

2 - 4 cloves of fresh garlic (depends on how much you like garlic)

nutmeg - to taste

crushed red pepper flakes - to taste

salt 

Heat the olive oil in a large pan and add the kale. If it doesn’t all fit in the pan don’t worry  as it cooks down you can continue to add it. Toss in the garlic, nutmeg, salt and crushed red pepper and heat until it is all wilted. I usually take it off the stove, cover and let it sit for a few minutes. 

I’ve also been experimenting with single crust pies. I’m a big fan of fruit pie which generally comes with a top and bottom crust. While I do love my carbs I’m trying to eliminate them as much as possible; some days are more successful than others. 

I had some apples that I mixed up with the lemon, brown sugar, cinnamon, etc. in the freezer that I was originally planning to make into a pie for movie night but things got behind and I had to use plan B - which was chocolate so there were no complaints. 

Since they were already thawed I needed to use them so I decided to make a single crust apple pie and to be honest I liked it better than the traditional 2 crust apple - more apple flavor - less crust I think it’s a winner. 

I’m thankful for all of the things in my life a loving family, talented and fun coworkers, friends and good health. Wishing everyone a happy and safe holiday weekend. 

Changing of the Guard

It’s officially November, I know this because I started writing my NaNoWriMo novel. For those of you who don’t know what that is - it’s National Novel Writing Month. It occurs every November and the goal is to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days, which translates to about 1700 words each day. This is my 5th attempt and I’ve finished 4 times; so far so good. Of the novels I’ve written there are 2 I’d like to go back and edit - who knows maybe publish but that is for another blog post. 

It’s also time to start prepping for winter, raking the leaves, cleaning out gutters, putting on storm windows (yes I know its an old house) and putting the gardens and flowers to bed. If you’ve been following this blog you know that 2016 will go down as one of our best harvests ever - actually I picked the last of the tomatoes off the vines last night and I noticed that I am still swimming in collard greens and kale, gotta do something about that this weekend. 

Yesterday was a beautiful fall day, not too crisp, clear blue sky and some of the trees are still sporting beautiful color. After work Dan and I took a walk around the park and then hurried home so we could start mulching the leaves - OK Dan got out the mower and mulched the leaves, which put me on kitchen detail. 

I had a block of tofu, which I bought a bit ago and I was going to use it to make sofritos but I never got around to it. I found a recipe while browsing through Pinterest and I realized I had all of the ingredients - plus some additional ones, which I wanted to add. Luckily for Dan it was a curry, which is his favorite. 

INGREDIENTS

1 tbsp coconut oil

1 large yellow onion, finely chopped

2 fairly large garlic cloves, center germ removed and crushed with a garlic crusher

2 tbsp ( or more! ) fresh ginger, grated

8 - 10 dried apricots, diced

4 tbsp curry powder

1 - 2 tsp numeric

2 cans coconut milk

2 cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed - for those of you who are purists - and you know who you are - you can cook your own from scratch.

1 package of tofu, patted dry and cut into cubes

3 cups packed baby spinach

2 tsp coarse sea salt

Heat the coconut oil in a wide pot on medium heat.

Add onion, garlic, ginger and apricots and sauté for a few minutes, until the onion is translucent and soft.

Add curry powder and mix it in well with the rest of the ingredients. Allow the spices to toast for a minute without letting them stick to the bottom of the pan. Add the coconut milk and season with sea salt, mixing well.

Add the rest of the ingredients (except for the spinach), let it come to a boil and reduce heat to a low simmer. Heat for 5 to 8 minutes to absorb the flavors and the coconut milk has become a creamy sauce. Turn off the heat and add the spinach one cup at a time until wilted. 

Serve with basmati rice and fruit. 

Thanks for stopping by

A Southwestern Squash Song

Believe it or not we are still harvesting things out of the garden; although we are almost to the end, which makes me happy and sad. I’m happy that we’ve had such an amazing harvest and sad because it’s over; well kind of. 

Last weekend Dan and I took a lovely trip down the Mississippi to Iowa. We stayed at two lovely B & B's -one in Dubuque and one in Muscatine. We did some hiking, a little site seeing, some shopping and ate breakfast at the same table Hillary had coffee at durning her campaign - it was a great get away. Dan was a bit under the weather during the trip; suffering from a cold, which he was kind enough to share with me - well actually not but it is what it is right? 

Now we are back home and dealing with the harvest. At last count we had 4 butternut squash, 15 acorn squash, tomatoes (red and green), kale, collards and a bit of swiss chard to contend with. Dan commented that we had enough squash so that we could have it once a week until the rest of the year. I had to correct him a bit because we'll actually get into Jan and beyond. I was planning to do something with them over the weekend, but the cold that Dan so kindly shared was in full force and I didn't have the energy to do anything but lay on the couch and binge watch Blue Bloods. 

If you’ve not seen it, Blue Bloods is your basic cop show, which normally I am not a huge fan of. What I like about this show is the characters and the relationships; actually the police work is almost incidental. And then there is Tom Selleck, who is the police commissioner - still nice to look at after all these years.

Before I got sick I baked a stuffed squash that was pretty darn good. Dan topped his with Brie cheese but I left mine plain; well plain in the sense that there is no cheese or dairy in it. We’ve also subsisted on soup while blowing our noses and hacking throughout the weekend; some squash, french onion (from Panera) and a spicy black bean - which we made when we started to feel better. But back to the stuffed squash. 

I started with a medium sized acorn squash, which I put in the microwave for one minute to soften a bit. Then I cut in half, cleaned and put in a 350 degree oven to bake. 

While the squash was baking, I chopped an onion (have you ever noticed that most of our recipes start with that) and sautéed it in a bit of olive oil. I added chopped celery, shredded carrots, chopped red, yellow and green peppers (all from the garden), some finely chopped kale, some fresh tomatoes, a little frozen corn, black beans, garlic, cumin and red pepper flakes.

When the squash was done, I mashed it a little and filled the cavity with the veggie and bean mixture and then Dan added his cheese and put it back in the oven for 5 minutes until it melted. And that was dinner - and a delicious dinner it was. 

Now that we are feeling better my challenge is what to do with all those green tomatoes? Dan suggested making a chutney that could accompany the curries he so likes to make and eat. I found a recipe, which I think I give a try. I'm planning to save enough for at least one more batch of fried green tomatoes and a green tomato pie. 

If you have any favorite green tomato recipes send them my way, and as always, thanks for stopping by. 

The Cabbage Pot

Fall, my favorite time of year. The leaves are beginning to show a beautiful red, yellow and orange canopy, the morning air is crisp and cool and the mosquitos have finally left. It’s also a great time to dig out my favorite sweaters, and make soup and home made bread. 

The garden is winding down although we still have few tomatoes on the vine, about 8 squash, kale, collard greens and a couple heads of cabbage to pick. Friday was movie night with our friends Gerd and Maria and I’m always trying to find a new recipe to try on them since they are such gracious guinea pigs. To tag along to our weekend it was also the Flamingo Cup, which is an annual potluck and croquet tournament so I was looking for something that I could use for both events.

I’ll start by saying I like cabbage but it is not a go to vegetable and mainly because aside from a few things like cole slaw, marinated and curried I don’t know what to do with it. I’ve had it roasted and boiled and neither really hit the spot. Now I can see you shaking your head and saying so, why would you plant cabbage if you didn’t love it? In one word - husband.

Remember when I said we expanded the garden, well I was out of town one weekend with some girlfriends and I came home to cabbage - 4 purple heads, 4 green heads. When I inquired about the number of heads of cabbage the response was “I wanted both green and purple and they only came in 4 packs” - go figure. 

The purple got very large but the green were smaller most likely due to the amount of sun; the green got a bit overshadowed by the squash plants, which have taken over. But we did get 4 smaller cabbage; one of which I used in a soup for movie night. 

I started with a recipe on Pinterest but then noticed it had white potatoes in it and I’m not really a white potato fan - in any form. So I decided to use the recipe for proportions and cooking methods but use what I had in the fridge for ingredients. 

To a stock pot I added:

2 stalks of celery diced

4 carrots chopped 

1 large onion diced

2/3 head of green cabbage

1/2 cup brown rice

Fresh rosemary, oregano and thyme (sorry I did’t measure just tossed)

Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

6 cups of veggie broth

Cover, bring the soup to a boil and then simmer for about 45 - 50 minutes. When the rice is cooked and the veggies soft, add 2 cans of beans (I used navy beans), 14 ounces diced tomatoes and adjust seasonings. 

We served the soup with some fresh whole wheat bread and baked acorn squash (from the garden). The dinner got rave reviews. 

Fast forward to Saturday and the Flamingo Cup - what to make for the potluck - you guessed it more soup! We simply added more of everything to our left over soup pot, tossed in the crockpot and heated it until it was time to head to the park. 

Saturday was a beautiful Minnesota fall day; clear blue sky and warm with a tinge of crisp, it was a great day for croquet. Neither Dan nor I won one of the coveted Flamingo’s (gold, silver or bronze) but we had a great time with family and friends. And the food, as always, was awesome; calico beans, samosas, cauliflower salad soup, and dessert. The winning dessert for me this year was caramel popcorn balls - they were the best. 

We ended the day on the back deck enjoying a glass of wine and relaxing, it was a wonderful day.