No Meat Meal: Quinoa and Roasted Pepper Chili

Today I tried making quinoa and roasted pepper chili, from Cooking Light. It was pretty good, but it took a long time, because I had to roast the peppers myself! Also, I got pepper on my hand when I was cutting the veggies (I thought poblano peppers were not supposed to be that hot), and now two of my fingers are swollen and hurting. Damn you, peppers.

I didn't post a picture of the chili. I took one, but it looked awful. Ben said not to post it because it would scare/disgust everyone. So if you want to take a look you can click the link above and look at Cooking Light's pretty picture!

We added a little brown sugar and also rice vinegar (just a tiny bit of each) to try to perfect the taste. It worked out pretty well. Garnished with cheese, sour cream, and chives. Yum! 

-Kristin

I liked this chili a lot! Kristin kindly made a vegetarian one so that I could enjoy it. And this time I finally had my soup crackers to make it great.  Chili just isn't chili without those special crackers (even though New Yorkers seem to shun them). Steak 'n Shake taught me this.

- Megan Leigh

No Meat Meal: Veggie Pasta Bake

Tonight I made a Veggie Pasta Bake. I thought it was decent, although it could have used a little more flavor somehow. Kristin says, "add salt!" I say salt is for schmucks. The recipe did call for Cayenne Pepper, but I forgot to add it. That could have really changed the recipe. I also would have added another box of spinach, and maybe even another can of tomatoes. You can never have enough veggies!

- Megan Leigh

I really liked the recipe. Nothing beats roasted red peppers! I think Megan's idea about adding more veggies could be good. I also don't see what she has against salt. She won't use it, and then she complains things are bland! It's a good recipe, though. I would definitely like to eat this again.

-Kristin

Recipe: S'more Krispy Treats

I've been very terrible at cooking lately, but this week I've decided to turn that around. I started off with a recipe for S'more Krispy Treats. They turned out yummy, because where can you go wrong? So maybe they aren't beautiful. Maybe they look like a dog pooed then threw up on it. It doesn't matter, as long as you eat them with your eyes closed. I think next time I would try letting them cool a bit more before adding the chocolate chips?

Kristin wants to make a Christmas version where we dye the marshmallow green and add Christmas M&Ms instead of the chocolate chips. Will they end up any prettier?

- Megan Leigh

No Meat Meal: Pumpkin Oatmeal

I'm not actually a big oatmeal fan, but I do get excited about this kind of oatmeal. Steel cut oats are kind of a pain to make since they take longer, but they are so much more satisfying than rolled oats, in my opinion.

4 c. water
1 c. uncooked steel cut oats
milk
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 heaping tsp pumpkin pie spice (or 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp ground ginger, 1/8 tsp ground allspice or cloves, 1/8 tsp nutmeg)
2-3 tbsp brown sugar
1 c. fresh or canned pumpkin
toppings (dried fruit, nuts, etc.)

Bring the 4 c of water to boil over highish heat. Stir in the oats and keep boiling on high until the water starts to get a little murky and it looks like the oats are starting to soften. Then turn the heat down low, and simmer for about half an hour, or until the consistency is right and the oats are soft. Stir in milk to add extra liquid as needed. Once the oats are getting pretty near to done, add the vanilla, spices, and pumpkin, and stir in. That's it! I like to top mine with dried cranberries and walnut pieces.

You can also make this recipe in the slow cooker if you want. It's a little easier in that you don't have to keep stirring it. A few stirs is fine. But it does take hours, and I don't typically think ahead that far!

-Kristin

No Meat Meal: Veggie Stir Fry with Peanut Curry Sauce

I have been trying to get a good peanut sauce down for a while now. So far I have not had great success. Today I tried a new recipe, from the Blazing Hot Wok website. It has turned out better than anything else! It is still not exactly what I'm after though... which is recreating the peanut curry sauce they used to serve at one of my favorite restaurants, Bangkok Kitchen, in Portland, Oregon. So rich, so curry-tastic, so perfect. I can't remember the first time I ate at that restaurant, but their peanut curry chicken accounted for like 50% of what I ate the last couple years of college. You might be wondering what the other 50% was. That would be Pepperidge Farm Nantucket Cookies and milk! Anyway, I heard that this restaurant closed it doors a few years ago, and that breaks my heart. You can never go home again. But I will labor away at recreating their peanut curry sauce.

Basically, in the recipe I tried today, you heat up curry paste, the thick part of the coconut milk, and peanut butter.... then you add the thin part of the coconut milk, lime juice, fish sauce, and sugar. We drizzled over stirfried veggies and rice. Not too hard, pretty fast, and I thought it was tasty but nothing standout. Ben thought it was delicious but wanted to add a little soy sauce and vinegar next time. Megan thought it was just OK and said she couldn't get her veggies saucy enough. I might try to make it a little tangier next time, but I'm not sure how.

-Kristin

Good Food: Eggplant Mykonos

I am putting this one under the good food category defiantly, since Megan didn't like this recipe. But I did, a lot!

It is from the Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home cookbook. It is full of eggplant, tomatoes, bell peppers, spinach, and dill, and it's topped with yummy feta cheese. What's not to like? I would recommend it to anyone. It is easy to make and delicious! It is vegetarian, and it could be vegan if you left off the cheese. But I don't recommend that.

Megan maintains that the eggplant tasted weird (it was some special kind called "neon" eggplant that is light purple and very pretty) and that dill is gross. But then she wanted me to make some kind of dill dip in a rye bread bowl. And everybody knows that rye bread is gross...

-Kristin

Eggplant is my favorite vegetable. I could eat it everyday! I tell you these things because I want you to know that I know my eggplant and this was no good. HAD the eggplant been normal and HAD there been no dill I could get on board with this recipe. However, things happened as they did and I could only say BLARGH.

- Megan Leigh

Good Food: Popovers Take 3

Finally, success! This time I used the recipe that Michelle posted on this blog earlier (it's her mom's). A big thank you to Michelle and her mom. This recipe was so easy, and it worked so well! The popovers popped BIG TIME. After taking them out of the oven, they fell a bit, but they were still light, airy and delicious. Kind of custardy, or dutch baby-ish. The other popovers we had made were very dense. These ones were more or less hollow inside (perfect for filling up with butter, Elliot said, and then declared that we should call them buttercups). I'm including a picture inside the oven, to show just how much they popped, and then one after they had been taken out. Yum!


Ben cooked up a "rustic applesauce" to eat with our popovers, and that was a pretty great pairing.

Mrs. Ferris's Popovers
4 large eggs (room temperature)
3/4 cup milk (room temperature)
2 tbsp butter, melted
3/4 cup unsifted all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt

Heat oven to 375 degrees.

Grease muffin/popover cups- this should make about 8/6 popovers depending on size of tins.

Beat eggs til frothy.

Beat in milk and butter.

Add flour and salt to egg mixture- beat at low speed til smooth.

Divide into prepared cups.

Bake 35- 40 minutes or until puffed and firm on top.

-Kristin

Good Food: The Best Pancakes

The last time I made pancakes, I used the recipe from How to Cook Everything. They did not turn out well. I had been dreaming of fluffy pancakes with a little crispness. What I got was thin and rubbery frisbees, a big disappointment! Now, I am not blaming Mark Bittman--I think there is a good chance that the problem had something to do with yours truly. But ever since then, I have been wondering how you make good pancakes from scratch. I mean, pancakes are supposed to be easy, right?

Well, I did a little research and found a wonderful pancake recipe. These pancakes were SO good. I adapted a recipe I found on the msnbc website, in an article on making perfect pancakes. It is worth a read if you long to make restaurant-style pancakes at home! I think one of the big revelations for me was that it's better to brush the skillet with vegetable oil, rather than throw in some butter before you cook each pancake. Anyway, here is the recipe:

--Crack 2 large eggs into a large bowl and whisk them until they foam up, and you see lots of bubbles.
--Whisk in 1 1/2 c. buttermilk, 3 T melted butter, and 1/2 t vanilla.
--Stir together 1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour, 3 T sugar, 2 t baking powder, 1/2 t salt, and 1/2 t baking soda in a separate medium-sized bowl.
--Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, whisking them together briefly after each addition. Mix until just smooth--don't overmix!
--Heat up your skillet--medium heat works for me. If it is the perfect temperature, when you flick a little water into the pan, small droplets will bead up and bounce around. If the water evaporates immediately, that means the pan is too hot.
--When the pan is ready, brush it with vegetable or canola oil. Do this before every new pancake!
--Pour 1/3 cup of the pancake mix onto the griddle.
--Turn the pancake when the edges look dry and there are a few dry-edged bubbles visible on top. The underside should be honey-colored.
--After your first pancake, correct the mixture so that the consistency is just right. Is it too thick to spread out in the pan? I had to add about 1/4 cup of milk to mine.
--I garnished ours with powdered sugar (an excuse to use my new sugar shaker) and sliced strawberries.

Enjoy!

-Kristin

PS I realize I need to work on my food photography. Maybe another goal should be to learn how to take a good picture!

Recipe in Progress: Peanut Soup, Senegalese Style

We got this recipe out of Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian cookbook. It was decent! There is another peanut-y stew with greens that I love from The Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home cookbook, so I think I was secretly hoping this soup would be a lot like that one, but even better. My expectations may have been a little unfair. I would have liked this soup to be a little richer and more peanut-y, like that one is. So next time, I think I will add more peanut butter and also some coconut milk. I like the addition of tomatoes and yams in this recipe though! All in all, it was quite good. The soup ended up both tasty and hearty, nice for a Fall night.

I garnished with a scoop of rice, crushed peanuts, and lime wedges. Yum.

-Kristin

Good Food: Strawberry and Nutella Crepes

We started the morning with strawberry and nutella crepes. This counts as both good food and something new for me, since I have never made crepes before! I'm not sure why I have never given crepes a try before, since they are one of my favorite foods. I guess I thought they would be difficult to make. They weren't at all, though--not so different from making plain old pancakes. I adapted a recipe from The Grand Central Baking Book: Breakfast Pastries, Cookies, Pies, and Satisfying Savories from the Pacific Northwest's Celebrated Bakery.

Preheat the oven to 200.

Whisk together 3 eggs, 1-3/4 cups whole milk, 1-1/4 cups flour, 1 tbsp sugar, and 1/2 tsp. salt, until the batter is smooth.

Heat a small (10 in.) skillet over medium-high heat. Before each crepe, rub a stick of butter on the skillet--start on the outer rim of the pan and work your way in, in a spiral, so all of the inside of the pan gets covered. Then immediately pour in enough batter to cover about 3/4 of the bottom of the pan. Quickly swirl around the pan so that the batter covers the entire bottom, then cook for about 30 or 45 seconds on the first side, flip, and about 15 seconds on the second side. Be careful not to cook too long! The first side gets a little golden, the second side will be pretty pale.

Stick the crepe in the oven to stay warm while you finish the others. Remember--new butter for each crepe!

When you are all done cooking the crepes, take them out of the oven and cover each with a thin layer of nutella. Fold over the left and right sides of the crepe just a little bit, then roll up the crepe like a cigar from the bottom. Cover with sliced strawberries and dust on a little powdered sugar. That's all!

-Kristin

Good Food: Tomato, Basil, and Mozzarella Salad

Good food for summer, and it's so simple! Heirloom tomatoes, purple basil, and real mozzarella, with olive oil and balsamic vinegar drizzled on top. The buffalo mozzarella really is a lot richer, and has a distinctive taste that is very nice. Mmmmm. I wish you could tell from the picture how pretty the purple basil looked.

-Kristin

No Meat Meals: Black Bean Soup

Today I made Black Bean Soup inspired by a recipe from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Simple Meatless Recipes for Great Food. Not only was it delicious, but really easy to make as well. AND vegan if you leave out the sour cream!

Black Bean Soup

2 tbsp vegetable oil
1 large onion, chopped
1 tbsp minced garlic
1 tbsp chili powder
1 tbsp ground cumin
2 tbsp sherry
2 cans black beans, rinsed and drained
1 quart of vegetable stock
salt and pepper, to taste
4 tsp lime juice
sour cream and cilantro for garnish

1) Put the oil in a deep skillet or medium saucepan over medium heat. When hot, add the onion and cook, stirring, until softened, about 5 minutes. Stir in the garlic, chili powder, and cumin and cook, stirring, for another minute.

2) Stir in the sherry then cook for a minute and add the beans, stock, and some salt and pepper. Turn the heat up to medium-high and bring the soup to a boil, then turn the heat down to medium-low and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 10 minutes. Turn off the heat.

3) Use an immersion blender to purée some of the soup in the pan. Or cool the mixture slightly, pour about half of the soup into a blender, and carefully purée.

4) Add the lime juice and stir; taste and adjust the seasoning. Serve garnished with sour cream and cilantro.

- Megan Leigh

Dutch Baby!

Luckily, when we woke up today we still had power. It was raining a little, but other than that... no sign of Irene. So I made a Dutch Baby from scratch for the first time today. Before, I had been using this mix from Williams Sonoma... but then I figured out I was spending an insane amount on what was basically flour and a little salt. Surely I can make these on my own, I thought!

I tried the recipe in The Grand Central Baking Book: Breakfast Pastries, Cookies, Pies, and Satisfying Savories from the Pacific Northwest's Celebrated Bakery. This book was another present from the wonderful Kygers, when they came to visit a few years ago. I was a little suspicious of the recipe at first, because it doesn't contain any sugar. But I think our Dutch Baby turned out even better than the mix--it was more buttery and custardy, and it rose up really high. Beautiful! No, it may not be super healthy. But I definitely believe it fits in the Good Food category. Tasty things being good for the soul and all.

-Kristin

Hurricane Irene Ruined My Jog/Cauliflower Paprikash

Well I set off with a sulking Elliot for the track this morning. I was feeling bright and bushytailed, and figured I would do my sixth day of Couch To 5K before the hurricane struck. Megan stayed at home, nursing her hangover. Evidently not EVERYONE is so committed to running that they will brave a hurricane just to get their jog in.

About ten minutes into my workout, it started drizzling. "Mom, let's go home!" Elliot pleaded. "It'll stop," I told him. "You'll see. It's not supposed to start raining until 2." A minute later, it started pouring. There was a mass exodus from the track--even the big group practicing their flashmob dance gave up and went home. We joined the herd and headed for the park exit. Damn you, Irene!

But I did get in some good food. For dinner, I made cauliflower paprikash, a recipe from one of my favorite cookbooks ever, Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home: Fast and Easy Recipes for Any Day. That book was a gift from my aunt and uncle, years ago, and I use it all the time. This recipe is kind of like a beef stroganoff, with cauliflower and mushrooms instead of beef. Anyway, it turned out great, although the picture doesn't look super appetizing! But I could not talk Megan into trying it, because she hates mushrooms. Maybe one of my goals for this year will be to make her reconsider. I just love them so much.

-Kristin

No Meat Meals: Vegan Paella

Although Kristin and I both share the goal to eat healthier, I want to go a step further and eat meatless. I think it would be a huge boost to my happiness if, with every bite of a meal I take, I don't have to imagine a scared cow right before it (hopefully) gets a bolt shot through its brain. Or a baby chick getting the tip of his beak snipped off. Or a poor pig who has been so genetically altered that he can no longer go in the sun. Recently Kristin put veal in her meatballs and I'm pretty sure a little piece of my soul turned black and withered away after eating them.

So this week I made Fannie Farmer's Veggie Paella found on this blog. Although the general consensus of the family was that is was 'very good', I thought it wasn't the best, but it also wasn't the worst. It was definitely not an easy recipe as it included a ton of vegetables that needed to be chopped. Luckily I had a sister to put to work. Had she not been here to help chop up a storm I don't believe the end product would have justified all of the time and effort. I must say, however, that it was one pretty bowl of food and there were a ton of leftovers.

- Megan Leigh