Mushy Monday

We're back!

Chicago was a variety of things: crazy, fun, awesome, tiring,  and green.

Luckily all that time on the bus gave me time to think of all the delicious food I could cook when we returned.

Way back when we were in Napa in December we ate at a lovely restaurant called Celadon.   Really great food.  While there, I had the Polenta Napoleon, and have been dreaming of cooking polenta since.

Spicy Polenta

1 1/2 cups polenta
2 cups vegetable stock
2 1/2 cups water
1/4 tsp ground chipotle pepper
1/4 cup shredded cheese

15 oz black beans
1 cup salsa
1 red pepper, diced
1 tsp olive oil

Matthew was convinced that polenta is the exact same thing as yellow cornmeal, and that I didn't need to go buy polenta.  I usually do the opposite of what he says, so I went to buy polenta.

It looks identical to yellow cornmeal.  I have no clue if it is the same as yellow cornmeal.  For the moment we will keep these thoughts a secret from Matthew.

I brought the stock and water to a boil, and turned the heat down.  I slowly added the polenta and stirred constantly.  I folded in the cheese and seasonings.

What do you do when you have too much polenta for a square pan and not enough for a rectangular one?

You make it work.

I mushed this polenta down into a greased baking pan.

In the meantime I cooked the peppers in some olive oil and added the beans and salsa.

I poured the bean mixture over the polenta and served.

Ok, first I played around with my camera and the light in the kitchen for awhile.

I love Daylight Savings!

More adventures in polenta to come!

Spaghetti Sunday

Matthew and I are headed to Chicago at the end of this week, which should explain any absences in my blogging.

It doesn't however explain why I purchased to fresh bunches of kale this weekend.

I think I have a problem.

Regardless, it needed to be used.

I mean...isn't it pretty?

Can you call kale pretty?

Spaghetti with Braised Kale

1/2 bunch Kale
1 tbsp olive oil
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tbsp reserved pasta water
Salt
Pepper

Whole Wheat Spaghetti

1) Heat olive oil in pan until glistening

2) Add garlic

3) Add kale and cook until dark green

4) Toss with cooked pasta, water, lemon juice, salt and pepper

5) Easy

Now, I just have to use the rest of the kale before Thursday at 4:15 AM (that's when we're leaving).

I don't think that will be a problem.

See you from Chicago!

Snappy Saturday

Last night was concert night, which generally means we need to eat dinner at about 4:45 PM.  At approximately 4:08 PM I opened our cupboards to find an abundance of...guess what?  BEANS!

We have soooo many varietals of beans.

I literally pulled out the first can I saw: chickpeas, and found some inspiration(s) from a few of my favorite blogs.

Chickpea Burgers in a hurry with Seasoned Sour Cream

15 oz chickpeas, drained
1 clove garlic
1 carrot, peeled and chopped
1 tbsp tahini(!)
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp olive oil
2 tbsp sunflower seeds, hulled
1/3 cup whole wheat flour (don't use this much, it's too much)

Pop the garlic and carrot in the food processor and process until chopped finely.  Add in the rest of it and process until combined.

I over-processed mine, but when has this blog ever been about perfection?

Place rounded balls of mixture on greased baking sheet and flatten with a spoon.

Bake at 425 for 7 minutes, then flip 'em.

While those babies are cooking, make the sour cream.

1/4 cup sour cream
1 tsp garlic salt
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp chopped chives

Stir.

Take those burgers out of the oven and lather them up with sour cream.

I like sour cream.

A lot.

Pretty good for dinner in a hurry if I do say so myself!

Subtle? Saturday

As our country (and Oprah) have been going through a vegan craze, Matthew and I have often walked down the baking aisle, passing the flax seed, as I wonder "what would it taste like if I took out the egg and threw in some flax?"

Yesterday, while Matthew was busy playing "Minute to Win It" games with middle school confirmation students, I was bored.  So I decided to conduct a little experiment.  Make a vegan baked good, don't tell Matthew it's vegan, and then see if he can tell.

Seemed simple enough.

Because this whole "flax egg" thing is new to me, I decided not to experiment with my own recipe, and found one from Oh She Glows.  Check it out.

First I needed to venture down to the corner store for some flax.

For those of you not familiar with vegan baking (like me), when you mix ground flax seed with water and let it sit, you get a gel-like egg substitute.

I then prepared two apples (quite familiar to me) two different ways.

The apples went into a pot with some syrup and lemon juice.

In the meantime I busted out a vegan ingredient I actually already had.

Oh, and my "oil substitute"....

Mashed up banana.

I was pretty dubious by this point.

My "oil", milk, and vanilla went in a bowl.

I threw in the apples.

Oh, and for goodness sake don't forget the flax egg.

Here they are ready to head into the oven.

All done!

Results of my super scientific experiment:

Matthew: "Is this one of your vegan things?"

Me: "Maybe, can you tell?"

Matthew: "Yes!"

Experiment: fail.

They tasted ok, but more like the banana "oil" than the apple for sure.  Now, to figure out what to do with all this flax before it goes bad.

That tastes like meat! Thursday

I've been on a new mission to convince Matthew that tofu can taste JUST like meat.  So I sent him out on a little mission of his own.  Matthew is a huge barbecue fan, and I told him that if he selected his favorite barbecue sauce, I would make barbecue-ed tofu.

My how my taste buds have evolved since the days of spaghettios.

Barbecue Tofu

1 block extra firm tofu
1/4 cup barbecue sauce of your choice
Oil for frying

Kale Side

1/2 bunch kale
1 tbsp olive oil
1 clove garlic, minced
Juice of 1/2 a lemon
Salt
Pepper

First I made my makeshift tofu press again.  I know you remember.

I fried up the tofu until it was golden brown.

(browner than this)

Remove from heat and mix in barbecue sauce.  The more pressed and fried your tofu is, the less likely it is to crumble in the sauce.

To make the kale:  sauté kale and garlic in glistening oil until kale is dark, dark green.  Squeeze on lemon juice and season.

Eat.

Remind your husband he is eating tofu.

Not meat.

Whomp, Whomp, Wednesday.

As my students would say, "epic fail".

A bag of cubed squash has been lingering in our freezer since my latest squash craze, and I thought it was the perfect time to try out a butternut squash soup recipe.

1 medium butternut squash, cubed and cooked
3 granny smith apples, chopped
3 cups vegetable stock
4 tbsp flour
2 tbsp butter
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
Salt
Pepper

Cook the squash using your method *note--this is probably where I screwed up, so don't take my word for it*.  I steamed it.

More on that later.

Chop apples.

Sauté apples, squash and spices in butter.

After a few minutes and in flour and stir constantly.

Slowly add in stock.

Mmmmm....baby food.

What was the problem, you ask?

The apples were delicious.  The spicing was right.  The squash...well it tasted...funky.  It had a weird texture and an even weirded taste.

Here's my question readers:  should I have cooked it before I froze it,  should I have cooked it a different way post-freezing, or should I have just tossed it?

Making up for lost time, on Monday

Look out kale, move over squash, get out of the way sweet potato.  I have a new weird food obsession.

Duh-duh-duh! Tofu!

After several wise suggestions from my readers, I determined one of two things needed to happen:  I needed to squeeze out the excess water from the tofu with a towel, or buy a tofu press.

Well neither of those things happened, because I'm too lazy.  Stay tuned for my own makeshift tofu press.

Tofu Stir Fry

1 block extra firm tofu
2 tbsp oil of your choice (I used my MISTO can...duh)
1 red pepper
1/2 head broccoli
1/2 cup orange juice
1/4 cup soy sauce
1 tbsp honey
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes

Things you will need for your own at-home tofu press:


*A baking sheet
*Tin foil
*A heavy (cast iron works) skillet
*A barely used (albeit expensive) jar of tahini

Place the tofu on the baking sheet and lay foil over the top.  Put skillet on top, and then place jar on top to complete the pyramid.  Keep it this way for 30 minutes.

Laziness occasionally pays off.

Dice tofu and mix together juice, soy sauce, honey, and seasonings.  Marinate tofu in mixture for about 2 hours.

Oil the heck out of your pan, and fry up that tofu.  Reserve the excess marinade.

The brown flecks are good.  It means the texture is more like meat.

In the meantime steam up some veggies, or you can fry them too.

Toss the tofu, veggies, and remaining marinade with some soba noodles, brown rice, or whole wheat pasta.  We were low on soba noodles so I used a little combination.

Voila! I'm a tofu-believer!