Kitchen Renovation Cooking Extravaganza!

It is SUCH a relief to be able to use all of our house after having kitchen renovations done.  That very essential room was cut off for three or four days, and I for one missed being able to work in it.

My very fancy tofu in a very fancy bowl.

But now... now it's much, much nicer.  The first day of full operations was Saturday, and to celebrate the occasion, I made a variation of the Seared Tofu with Sugar Snap Peas that appeared in the NYT.

I didn't have fish sauce or sesame oil, so I filled in those amounts with soy and peanut oil, and omitted the sesame seeds (same reason).  Otherwise, pretty much the same thing.

Last night's dinner was a variation of that variation, which turned out to be Orange Chicken (recipe follows).  Tonight was the very easy + tasty Fresh Pasta Sauce with a little sauteed chicken and sausage added, and WOW was that good over egg fettuccine.

Living in a household with someone who is dieting to lose weight (to increase the success chances of surgery) is challenging in a lot of ways.  I have a very long history of not really feeding myself unless I'm feeding others, and I spend most of my day (ergo eating time) out of the house.  With dinners being generally low-calorie (and I've never eaten much dinner anyway), I've been having to really take my personal nutritional needs into account, to make sure that I'm not starving myself.

So besides cooking AWESOME food at home, I've also been schlepping granola, yogurt, fresh fruit, and other tasty nibbles with me to work, to make sure I eat enough.  I'm doing a bang-up job, if I do say so.

But!  Here's the recipe I promised.  Enjoy!

Orange Chicken with Stir Fry Vegetables

My very fancy stir fry in the same very fancy bowl! The kitchen may be usable,
but we have certainly not unpacked all the stuff that used to live in it!

Using the sauce from Seared Tofu with Sugar Snap Peas as a base, I created an orange chicken recipe.  We usually have TONS of greens in our CSA, so this is a good use for that baby bok choy that is so often neglected at our house.


8 ounces boneless, skinless chicken breasts, about 2 single breasts
1/2 cup chopped onion
Canola oil cooking spray
1 Tbsp peanut oil, divided
3 heads baby bok choy
3 medium carrots, peeled and sliced with a vegetable parer
1 cup snow peas
2 Tbsp soy sauce
3 gloves of garlic, minced
1 tsp grated ginger
1/2 cup orange juice
2 tsp sugar (or to taste)
1-1/2 tsp sriracha
4 cups brown and wild rice
1/2 Tbsp butter (for cooking rice, optional)

Cook rice in rice cooker according to directions, adding butter if desired.
While you're waiting on the rice, chop bok choy and slice carrots lengthwise with vegetable parer, making long thin strips; set aside in a bowl.
In a separate bowl, combine 1 tsp peanut oil, soy sauce, garlic, ginger, sriracha, sugar and orange juice.  Cover and shake or mix until blended.
When rice is done, heat pan over very high heat, and spray with canola oil spray, adding 1 tsp peanut oil, if desired.  Add onion and chicken, and brown over high heat; when chicken is brown and mostly cooked, add bok choy and carrots.  Add additional 1 tsp peanut oil if the pan is dry.  Stir fry until bok choy begins to wilt, about 3 minutes.  Add sauce mixture and let simmer until sauce thickens slightly, about 5 minutes.  Add snow peas and stir, letting cook 1 or 2 minutes more.

Serve over brown and wild rice.  Makes 4 servings.

Bonus: Fresh Pasta Sauce

I could have sworn I'd posted this before.  Well!  Now I will!

This is a highly customizable sauce.  Saute onion and/or meat, throw in veggies, saute until sauce-like, throw over pasta.  You can season it however you like, but I like it best when the flavors of the vegetables are allowed to shine through - I do very little more than a sprinkle of salt on top after cooking, although I may throw in some oregano or basil if I have it handy.

1/2 cup chopped onion
Olive oil or butter, as desired
Garlic, minced or smashed (to taste)
Boneless skinless chicken (optional)
Italian sausage (optional)
1 cup chopped tomato or whole cherry or grape tomatoes
2 to 4 cups chopped fresh vegetables (chopped zucchini or yellow squash, bell peppers, hardy greens, julienned carrots, thinly sliced celery, sliced mushrooms, spinach - you name it!)
fresh or dried herbs (to taste)
salt and/or pepper (to taste)

Heat a pan over medium to medium-high heat, add oil or butter and onion.  Saute until tender, then add meat if desired.  Saute meat until browned (or continue sauteing onion until browned).  Add tomatoes and other vegetables and saute until veggies are tender and tomatoes (whole) split or (chopped) start to fall apart.  Season as desired, letting simmer for a few minutes to incorporate the flavors of any herbs you use.

Serve over the pasta of your choice, and dig in!  Makes about 4-6 servings of sauce.

Summer soup & salad (and wine)

I had a new coworker over for dinner last night. It's been hot (the start of a long summer, I'm told) so I decided to make something cool and refreshing. My new friend said she would eat anything I made but that she doesn't usually eat meat, so I decided to do a cucumber dill soup and roasted beet salad with goat cheese, which we paired with some Torrontes, an Argentinian white wine. The downside to having a guest was that I felt silly snapping photos of the rather beautiful plates, so my only picture is of the leftover soup my husband gobbled up later in the evening.

This only took 5 min of active work (and 30 min letting the cucumbers sweat) so it will be a summer staple for me. The recipe is here.

The salad, Roasted Beet and Goat Cheese with Sherry-Walnut Vinaigrette was a little more work but I made the full 8 servings of dressing and toasted nuts even though we only used 2 so it will be easy to throw together again. I used prepared baby beets but I've roasted beets before and it's not difficult, just a little messy.

 

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Five minute dinner

Scrambled eggs, wilted spinach with garlic, and leftover focaccia. Yum!

 

Posted with Blogsy

Clean-out-the-cabinets Vegetarian Night

Feeling dirt-ass poor tonight, so it was "how do I use what I've got and make a whole meal?"

There were red lentils in the cupboard, and a little rice left in the canister, a couple cloves of garlic, some onion, and about a third of the kale from the CSA this week.  Veggie stock I made last night.  That was dinner, and in this combination:

Rice-Cooker Rice and Lentils

• Equal parts brown rice and red lentils*
• Twice that amount of veggie stock* or water
• Two cloves of garlic, crushed or minced or whatever
• A pat of butter or a dribble of oil
• Salt

Throw all that in a rice cooker.   Turn it on cook and let it go until it clicks off.

Cut thin slices off the onion so that they form rings.  Saute these briefly in a skillet, in either oil or butter.  Once they're clear/browned/caramelized, remove from pan and set aside.

Top lentil mixture with onions and eat up!

Skillet Greens

• 1-2 T butter or oil
• 1 clove garlic (or the remains from pressed garlic, which I used
• about 1/2 cup water
• fresh greens (kale, chard, collards, mustard, spinach, or whatever)
• lemon juice or vinegar of your choice

Rince greens in cold water.  Heat the skillet (I used the same one I'd just cooked the onions in) and tear up the greens, still slightly wet, into the pan.  (For tender greens like spinach and chard, the stems can be chopped and added before the leaves.  For kale, the stems went into the veggie bag.) Cover and let steam slightly, adding the 1/2 of water if they start to sear.  Cover again and let steam until greens are tender (about 5-6 minutes for kale) and add butter/oil and garlic.

Saute just a bit, then remove from heat before they greens get scorched.  Sprinkle with lemon/vinegar and salt, if desired.

-----------------------------
*Lentils:  Any kind of lentils will work.  Red lentils turn this into a stew/casserole, depending on how much liquid is left.  They fall apart, seriously.  Brown lentils retain a slightly crunchy beaniness if not cooked a bit beforehand, so if you want them soft, they'll have to go in at least partially pre-cooked.  Haven't done this with green or black lentils.

*Vegetable Stock: I save all my veggie scraps in the freezer in a much-reused gallon-sized plastic bag, until the bag gets full.  Then I dump the contents into a stock pot, cover with water, salt lightly, and boil the stuffing out of it.  When all the veggie scraps are looking like all the life is out of them, I remove the solids, run the liquid through a strainer-inside-a-funnel into a jar, and there you have it.  (By the way, my "funnel" is the cut off top of a gallon milk jug.)

Vegetarian Shepherd's Pie

So we had a TON of veggies to use, some from this week's CSA, and some from the previous (two weeks ago), and I just wanted to do something... different.

So: The potatoes from the last CSA went on to boil, and the rest of the veggies got diced and sauteed, and I threw in seasonings. Into a pan, cover with potatoes (mashed with butter and chunks of cheese thrown in) and it's PIE.

VEGETABLE SHEPHERD'S PIE (Serves 4)

• 2 T or so olive oil (or butter, whatever) 
• 1/2 a medium onion, chopped 
• 1/2 cup chopped celery 
• 2 carrots, chopped 
• 1/2 a bell pepper, chopped 
• 1/2 cup fava or lima beans 
• 1 zucchini, chunked or chopped 
• 1 t dried thyme 
• 1 T Worcestershire sauce (or to taste) 
• 1 T balsamic vinegar 
• 1 T sweet-spicy mustard 
• 1/4 t garlic powder OR 1 clove garlic, chopped/minced 
• 4-5 medium potatoes, cut into 1/2" chunks (about 1 lb.) 
• salt, pepper, and any other seasonings to taste 
• 2 T butter 3 oz aged cheese, cubed (we had aged gouda on hand, but anything would work)  

DIRECTIONS:

Start potatoes to boil in a 3-qt. saucepan with enough water to cover. Salt as desired (I use a teaspoon or two). Let come to a rolling boil, then cook until fork-tender. Remove from heat; set aside.

Heat olive oil/butter in a skillet, adding onion, celery, bell pepper, carrots and fava beans. Saute until onion is clear; add zucchini. Toss lightly with Worcestershire, balsamic, garlic and thyme until coated, letting simmer briefly. Remove from heat and mix in mustard.

Lightly grease a 2-qt. baking dish, and layer bottom of pan with vegetable mixture. Mash potatoes with a little butter, seasoning to taste with salt and pepper as desired. Fold in cheese; cover vegetable layer with potatoes.

Heat oven to 350 degrees F (175 C); bake 15-20 minutes until vegetable mixture is bubbly and potatoes are lightly browned. You may put a few small bits of butter on top of the potatoes halfway through if you're feeling as luxurious as I was tonight. Let stand a bit maybe, or just dig in.

THE RESULT

THE VERDICT
It's pretty tasty. Good mix of flavors - savory without being either spicy or bland.

Sweet Potato Salad

So I'm finally getting in on the EWF fun! I should start off and introduce myself. I'm Bird, and I'm the resident paleo. No, that doesn't mean I go around in a fur bikini eating raw meat. It also doesn't mean I'm into low carb or weird evo-psych theories about gender roles.

I focus on eating whole foods, preferably from local, organic sources. This means a lot of vegetables (soon to be coming from the CSA we've joined), good eggs from chickens that get to scratch in the sunshine, and meats from a woman farmer friend of mine--yay for supporting feminist enterprises! Along with that I eat some fruit, some nuts, and sometimes a bit of good quality dairy. I have celiac disease, so I have been gluten free for about five years now, and going paleo wasn't a big shift. I feel healthier and happier eating this way, and I've also gained a closer connection to my food and local farming community.

So, on to the food! Today's recipe is a paleo sweet potato salad that's vegetarian-friendly too.

Sweet potato salad goodness

One of the tricky things about eating gluten and grain free is sharing a meal with vegetarian friends. Yesterday my partner and I were invited to dinner with friends, and I needed to bring a side dish to share. I knew other people were bringing green salads, so I wanted a starch dish that would be exciting and easy to transport to a potluck. I had some sweet potatoes in the pantry and some homemade mayo in the fridge, so I thought a sweet potato salad sounded like a great idea. I looked around online and found a lot of the recipes included bacon--not exactly a vegetarian option. So, how to get that umami taste without adding meat? Sundried tomatoes to the rescue! However, it still needed a little bit of...something...to balance it, so I also used a tablespoon of dijon mustard, which balanced nicely with the sweetness from the potatoes, and green onions added flavour and an appealing crunch.

Sundried tomatoes make me want to eat them like candy

Ingredients

2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and diced into 1/2" cubes
2 tbsp coconut oil
8 hardboiled eggs, peeled and chopped
1/4 cup homemade mayonnaise
6 sundried tomatoes (packed in olive oil), chopped
1 tbsp dijon mustard
4 green onions, chopped
sea salt

Sweet potatoes in the pan

Directions

Heat coconut oil in a deep cast iron skillet over medium heat. Add sweet potato chunks and cook until browned and soft. Transfer to large mixing bowl and set aside to cool.

Once potatoes have cooled, add eggs, mayo, tomatoes, mustard, and onions, and mix well. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Gorgeous eggs from Meadow Creek Farm