Almost vegan, a little African

Today's dinner was completely an inspired blur. Let's hope I can record it because I think it was really yummy.

It started with noticing a package of Saffron Road harissa simmer sauce in the cupboard, with a can of chick peas right above it.

Stew!

Into the big old Le Creuset pot went:

• one package Saffron Road Harrissa Simmer Sauce

• a more or less equal amount water

• about 3/4 cup homemade chicken stock (if I hadn't added this, the stew would have been vegan; I added it to keep the stew from getting too spicy)

• about one cup great northern white beans. I make them from dry beans, unsalted, and freeze them in individual portions

• one can garbanzo beans, rinsed

Now the vegetables... 1/2 to 1 cup each, based on personal preferences:

• three color peppers

• baby carrots

• zucchini

• butternut squash

• peas

• Brussel sprouts (which I chopped)

And meanwhile, I started couscous in the steamer. I started with a normal portion of 2/3 cup couscous to 1 cup water but I had this odd 1/4 cup or so of uncooked couscous left so I tossed that in, too. I added a generous amount if ras el hanout and a drizzle of cold pressed extra virgin olive oil.

I was concerned about protein. I wanted to keep the low proportion of animal products therefore I made Morningstar veggie patties. 

Which ended up in the stew.

And I can't believe how delicious it was.

Sweet potato fry snack

Child has a 2-hour delay today and like mom's everywhere I'm screaming "My routine is off!" And it's Monday, which makes it even more difficult. Honestly, I'd rather keep her home for the day!

So at 10:20 a.m., they have a healthy snack from home.

For own snack I made sweet potato fries, sprinkled them with cinnamon and serving with a dipping sauce of 1 part blackstrap molasses to 3 parts pure maple syrup.

Best. Snack. Ever.

Brussel sprout broccoli dish

I wanted to make this:

http://www.katiekdid.com/2012/03/05/pistachio-cranberry-and-bacon-brussel-sprout-salad/

But ran out of Brussel sprouts, didn't have tarragon or pistachios and doubled the bacon.

I used 3 tablespoons of coconut oil since broccoli loves to suck up cooking fats...

But here we go:

In my cast iron skillet, sauté 12 ounces broccoli and about six ounces Brussel sprouts in 2 tablespoons coconut oil.

Sprinkle with generous garlic pepper, fresh ground black pepper and parsley. Add bacon broken into bits and another tablespoon coconut oil. Toss to coat.

Bake about 30 minutes at 375 adding cranberries in the last five or so minutes.

Venison vegetable pie

I browned one portion of ground venison and added one can vegetarian vegetable soup and the leftover carrot cashew soup. A touch of pepper. About 1/2 cup water. Extra greenbeans, peas, and California blend.

Pour into pie crust, top with another.

Bake until golden and crisp.

Soup and Matzo

My husband came home the other day with a box of Matzo. Today for lunch, I took a can of cheapo vegetable soup and dressed it up. Added a cup or so of soup vegetables, about 1/2 cup peas, 1 cup french cut green beans. Diluted with the requisite can of water AND added about a cup of beef vegetable stock from the roast last week. Yes, I freeze everything.

The original soup came from Aldi.

Roasted Red Pepper veggies

So my daughter requested leftover chicken shawarma for lunch, part of the birthday feast we had from Forks Mediterranean Deli. Last night's feast was a near vegetarian delight, chicken shawarma being the only meat on the menu.

We had that seasoned bread that my former boss loved, hummus, cucumber yogurt salad, roasted red pepper dip, mini pitas, mango nectar and four different mediterrannean sandwiches: the falafel, tabouleh and feta, feta with black olive and cucumber (my new fav) and the shawarma.

I took some frozen cauliflower, carrots and broccoli and melted the following in a skillet to use the roasted red pepper dip as a sauce:
- one tablespoon butter
- one tablespoon olive oil
added:
-one heaping teaspoon red pepper dip
let that simmer and broke it apart so the flavors could get into the oil and butter
added:
- one heaping tablespoon fresh parsley from the garden
- one half teaspoon chives from the garden

added about two cups vegetables

Italian Style Veggie and Rice skillet

One more day and my husband gets paid. The cupboards are getting bare, but yet are older stocked with items like eggs, flour and butter.

I took a bag of steam in bag Italian vegetables, with some sort of mildly seasoned sauce, and the last Boca burger. I threw the veggies in the microwave and fried the veggie burger in olive oil and butter and a dash of soy sauce. I chopped it up, added the veggies, a pinch of four-color pepper, and the leftover two cups of cooked white rice. Added some garlic powder and a little over a tablespoon of butter to keep the rice from sticking to the skillet and...

Voilà.

Far from fabulous. But a fairly healthy lunch.

Seitan wraps

I used my homemade seitan last night to make wraps with Aldi steam-in-bag Season's Choice Italian blend vegetables.

I fried the seitan over medium low heat in olive oil and sesame oil to make it crisper and give it some extra flavor.

This morning, we had frosted mini-wheats. For lunch I'm anticipating half tuna sandwiches on store-bought wheat and tortilla chips with mango salsa.

For dinner, I want to try and make pizza in my Le Creuset skillet. Using it like a pizza stone...

Italian Veggie "Pizza"

I took some of my homemade bread out of the freezer, plain today which means 50% wheat and 50% white. I made some Aldi Steam-in-bag Italian blend vegetables with herb sauce and I plan on making "French bread pizzas" out of them... probably with some garlic bread as the base and parmesan and cheddar on top. All broiled in the oven until bubbly.

Update and Tator Tot Casserole.

I don't even know how I could have not updated this since Tuesday... Last night we had a 50% off coupon for our favorite Mexican restaurant, so today we had leftovers for lunch and fruity fred for breakfast. Somewhere on my camera, I have photos of Wednesday night's dinner which was Light Life Vegetarian stir-fry beef, sautéed in olive oil and soy sauce, sprinkled with oriental five spice and rolled into a warm wrap. With a side of fresh vegetables with dippings...

Now, I'm cooking some tator tots and I'm going to place them in a greased bread pan. I'm going to layer some thawed French cut green beans on top, with a hint of four-color pepper, and pour some Aldi brand Italian blend steam-in-bag vegetables with herb sauce.

Debating whether to add corn for sweetness...

I will probably add some crumbled boca burger for protein and cook it like a casserole. My family will love it.

Midnight snack

I didn't get dinner tonight so I survived on a Special K breakfast bar, a die of cheese, two pieces of salami and a quarter-sized peanut butter cookie at a special writer's meeting.

But afterwards, I stopped at Wegmans.

Figured I'd get some of those vegetable egg rolls I adore and some mint chocolate milk. They didn't have my milk. So I got Pomme Lambric (Belgian Apple Beer).

Now, when I originally got the 2 egg rolls and the milk before class one night, it was $4.03 or something similar.

Five egg rolls were $5.99 and the 750 ml of lambric... $10.99. Not cheap. But so tasty.

Tuesday morning

Nothing exciting on the menu yet... I'm contemplating some sort of broccoli potato pot pie for dinner...

For breakfast, the daughter had Stoneyfield Yo Kids Strawberry yogurt with graham crackers, bananas, and chocolate soy milk. (I had a banana yogurt.)

I started stressing about lunch, and I do mean stressing, because I spend way too much time thinking about if my kid eats enough fruits/vegetables/colors every day. And her father made pasta with red sauce and Morningstar vegetarian sausage last night so my brain screams, "Have red. Need orange and green. Green for dinner."

Seriously.

So, for lunch I served three Morningstar Vegetarian Chik*n Nuggets with ketchup AND ranch, plus a side of commercial Swiss-style trail mix with a ton of extra raisins and some whole cashews.

Baked chicken with lemon basil sauce

http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1939,148187-237202,00.html BAKED CHICKEN IN LEMON SAUCE

Bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes. Makes 6 servings. 4 whole, boneless chicken breasts (about 12 oz. each) 1 tsp. onion powder 1/2 tsp. garlic powder 1/2 tsp. leaf basil, crumbled 1/2 tsp. leaf tarragon, crumbled 1/4 tsp. lemon pepper 1/4 c. (1/2 stick) butter 1/2 c. chopped shallots or green onion 1 1/2 c. heavy cream 1 c. dry white wine 1/2 c. lemon juice 2 tsp. lemon rind 1 tbsp. sugar 1/2 tsp. salt 1/2 tsp. white pepper 3 tbsp. cornstarch Lemon slices Cooked French green beans (optional) Preheat oven to moderate (375 degrees). Pour oil into large casserole or baking dish. Turn chicken in oil to coat, rubbing all sides; arrange skin-side up. Sprinkle with onion powder, garlic powder, basil, tarragon, and lemon pepper. Bake in preheated moderate oven (375 degrees) for 30 minutes or until chicken is tender and browned on top. Meanwhile, melt butter in medium-size heavy saucepan. Saute shallots in butter 1 minute or until softened. Pour in heavy cream, 1/2 cup of the wine, the lemon juice, lemon rind, sugar, and salt and pepper. Bring to boiling; boil for 15 minutes or until reduced by half. Dissolve cornstarch in the remaining 1/2 cup wine in small cup. Stir into sauce. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly, for 5 minutes or until sauce thickens. Keep warm. Overlap chicken breasts on warmed serving platter. Place lemon slices between chicken breasts. Pour some of the sauce over the chicken; pass the remainder. Serve with cooked French green beans, if you wish or browned mushrooms. I promised my family I'd make chicken for dinner so I started with this basic recipe. I used chives instead of shallots and herbs from my garden instead of tarragon. I used white grape juice instead of wine, and soymilk instead of heavy cream. (Which meant I reduced the amount of soymilk used from 1.5 cups of cream to less than 1 cup milk.) It smells fabulous. My husband made his famous vegetable-heaped baked potatoes with sour cream, cheese and broccoli. (Which after I ate all the goodies off mine, I then topped it with the incredible sauce from the chicken. Tomorrow we'll each be taking chicken with some leftover mac and cheese with peas and probably Thursday I'll use the sauce leftover to make some sort of pasta dish.

Lunch Thursday: Omelettes

Mixed Vegetable omelettes with vegetarian bacon and the end of the homemade oatmeal bars. This lunch had to stick to their ribs...

Mozzerella Sticks with veggies

While I was gone, Daddy made mozzerella sticks with mixed vegetables and some type of garlic sauce...

Foccaccia

To use the ripe tomatoes my mother brought us from her garden, I opted to make a homemade herb foccaccia. As usual, there's the 'real' recipe and my modified version.

We're serving this for dinner with farm-fresh corn-on-the-cob and hopefully the last of the greenbeans from my garden.

I've had the original recipe for more than a decade. My notes say it originated with the VegList, a veg*n email recipe exchange list I belonged to when I first decided to learn to cook. I seem to remember a similar recipe from Vegetarian Times, but I guess I'll have to trust my memory.

Rosemary Foccaccia
from VegList
For the dough

• 1/4 ounce active dry yeast
• 1 1/2 cups water, lukewarm
• 3 1/2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 1/2 to 4 cups flour
• 1/4 cup fresh rosemary leaves, minced

Topping

• 4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 2 pounds onions, sliced thin
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• fresh rosemary sprigs
  

Garden Foccaccia
Angel's version

For the dough:

• 1 teaspoon yeast
• 1 1/2 cups warm water (maybe a little less)
• 2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
• 3 cups unbleached white flour
• 1 cup rye flour
• 1 pinch salt
• 2 teaspoons fresh ground pasta and pizza seasoning

For the topping:
combine in food processor:

• close to 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 1/4 cup pine nuts
• 1/4 cup fresh basil
• 2 tablespoons fresh oregano
• 2 tablespoons fresh parsley
• 2 teaspoons fresh chives

1 to 2 tomatoes, sliced
parmesan cheese

INSTRUCTIONS:
1. Combine water and yeast in bowl. Stir with non-metal spoon and set aside for 15 minutes.

2. If you're making Angel's version, prepare the pesto topping and refrigerate to give flavors time to meld.

3. Once the yeast is activated, add the salt and 2 teaspoons olive oil to the yeast and stir with the non-metal spoon. Add 2 cups of flour (if using wheat or rye, use one cup of wheat/rye and one cup white) and the herbs-- fresh rosemary for the rosemary foccaccia and the pasta seasoning for the garden foccaccia. Stir with a heavy wooden spoon.

4. Add another cup flour and stir as dough begins to form a ball. Turn onto floured surface and knead until soft and elastic. Add more flour as dough becomes sticky and difficult to work with. Knead for about ten minutes.

5. Oil a large bowl (with olive oil, cooking spray or butter). Place dough in bowl and flip to coat. Cover bowl with clean, damp cloth and place somewhere warm and free of drafts to allow to rise. It needs to double in volume. Should take about 90 minutes.

6. When it's done, punch down. Oil a 12 x 18 baking pan, including the edges. Place dough in center of pan and spread across the surface evenly. Cover with damp cloth again and let rise for 45 minutes.

7. While dough is rising, if making the rosemary version, heat two tablespoons olive oil in a large skillet and sauté the onions in the oil, turning to coat as they begin cooking. Cook about 15 minutes until soft but not burned. The oil should be absorbed. (I hate onions so I have never done this.)

8. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. When dough is done rising, make indentations with your fingers in the surface of the dough. Lightly brush olive oil (for the rosemary version) or pesto (for Angel's version) across the bread. Sprinkle with salt if desired. (I don't)

9. If using the onions, spread them evenly across the dough now. I use fresh tomato instead, sliced thin. Raw. I brush the remaining oil/sauce over them as I place them. I also sprinkle parmesan cheese.

10. Bake for 30 minutes until dough is lightly browned. If using fresh rosemary as part of the topping, add in the last five minutes of cooking.

Homemade pasties?

This morning we had farm-fresh strawberries and bananas (obviously not local bananas) for a first round of food.

At ten a.m. my daughter and I had my first and her second breakfast. I got two of my wheat biscuits from the freezer. Then I mixed one egg, some garlic pepper and some fresh milk from Klein Farm and fried it up. I added a slice of cheddar cheese and placed on the biscuit. We had some strawberry-banana drinkable yogurt, also from Klein Farm.

For lunch, I plan on using the leftover strawberry syrup and local strawberries to make crêpes again. Of course, the milk and eggs for the crêpe batter will be from Klein Farm.

For dinner, I hope to use a store-bought pie crust to whip up some vegetable beef pasties. I'm going to fry some hamburger from Klein Farm and use vegetable soup as a sauce.

****
Later that afternoon...
I only have one pie crust so I'm going to put it in a bread pan and make a giant pastie or a small pot pie...

I fried some hamburger and added some peas as it cooked. Then I added a can of condensed vegetarian vegetable soup, garlic pepper, four-peppercorn blend. and a half can of milk from the farm. When that simmers for a while and gets a little thicker, I'll pour it into my crust and then cover my concoction will foil before baking. About 15-20 minutes before it's done I'll remove the foil.

Contributed Recipe: Cauliflower

One of the members of my writers group sent me this today. Thanks, Janet!

VEGGIES – Balsamic and Parmesan Grilled Cauliflower

1 lg head cauliflower, florets cut into 1” thick slices

1 T olive oil

1 t dried marjoram (optional)

¼ t salt

Black pepper to taste

2 T balsamic vinegar

½ cup grated parmesan cheese

450 degrees. In large plastic bag, toss cauliflower with oil, marjoram, salt and pepper. Pour into a large rimmed baking sheet lined with non stick foil. Bake 15-20 minutes or until cauliflower starts to soften and brown.

Remove from oven and toss cauliflower with vinegar and cheese. Return to oven 5 – 10 minutes or until cheese melts and moisture evaporates. 6 servings. Per serving: 88 calories.

Popcorn Cauliflower

This is a recipe we clipped from a Parade magazine several years ago... It's a slow-cooker that requires regular attention, but well-worth the effort. I have never met someone who didn't like it. It's a recipe from Bob Blumer, the surrealist gourmet.

This is my simplified version:

1. Cut a head of cauliflower into golf ball sized pieces.

2. Brush each lightly with olive oil.

3. Arrange on cookie sheet. They can't touch.

4. Sprinkle lightly with salt.

5. Roast in oven at 450 for about an hour, turning every fifteen minutes.