Kitchen Tips

Since meatless cooking requires a few different techniques than we may have been used to before making the switch, I thought it would be great to have a post for collecting the wisdom we've found from research, trial and error, and serious kitchen disasters.  Are you ready?  Share away!

Selecting Produce (How does one pick a watermelon?)

Sourcing Ingredients (Which stores here sell what best?)

Storing Ingredients (How do I keep my parsley looking sharp?)

• Peel fresh ginger root and cut it up into pieces roughly 1"x1" and pop them into a freezer bag to freeze.  Simply grate each frozen chunk as needed for your cooking.
• Garlic cloves can also be peeled and frozen and grated for use.
• Leftover coconut milk, buttermilk, cream, etc. can be frozen in ice cube trays and then moved to ziplocs for later use.
• Tomato paste can also be frozen in ice cubes or as tablespoon-sized dollops for use in  soups or suaces later.

Tools (Convince me that I NEED that Vitamix...)

General Cooking Techniques (You can steam what?)

Red Curry Lentils

This is a meal I made last night for no other reason than that I was out of fresh ingredients and didn't have time to head to the store.  I needed a great pantry meal, and for us this is it!  The recipe comes from Pinch of Yum, which is not a strictly vegetarian blog but does have a large collection of vegetarian recipes.

http://pinchofyum.com/red-curry-lentils

INGREDIENTS

• 1½ cups lentils, rinsed and picked over
• ½ large onion, diced
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons red curry paste
• ½ tablespoon garam masala
• 1 teaspoon curry powder
• ½ teaspoon turmeric
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic
• 1 teaspoon minced ginger
• a few good shakes of cayenne pepper
• 1 14 ounce can tomato puree
• ¼ cup coconut milk or cream
• cilantro for garnishing
• rice for serving

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Cook the lentils according to directions. Drain and set aside.
2. Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium high heat. Add the onion and saute for a few minutes until fragrant and golden. Add all the spices (curry paste, garam masala, curry powder, turmeric, cayenne, sugar, garlic, ginger) and stir fry for 1-2 minutes. Add the tomato sauce; stir and simmer until smooth.
3. Add the lentils and the cream. Stir to combine and simmer for another 15-20 minutes (the longer, the better)! Serve over rice and garnish with cilantro.

Spiced Lentil Sweet Potato Kale Pockets

After Sam's great post about tortillas, I thought I would follow it up with a fun recipe to fill up those delicious tortillas. I mostly just borrowed it from another blog so I am strait up copying the URL here because the credit for this recipe is hers. From what I remember she is a college student studying cuisine and the culinary arts. I recommended reading her post, it's interesting and helpful.

http://www.thekitchn.com/recipe-spiced-lentil-sweet-potato-and-kale-whole-wheat-pockets-181100

Ok, now I'll tell you how I tweaked it. Instead of whole wheat calzones, which are more healthy and portable as she describes, I used tortillas for the convenience and (in my opinion) better taste. The kale and lentils and sweet potatoes are enough flavor on their own and just needed a little bit of "bad" with all that "good" for my palate. What I love about this recipe is that it is wholesome and unabashedly good for you and totally unique. So when you're feeling like you've had the "same old same old" for a while, this might be just the thing.

Here's the basics:


For the filling:
3 small sweet potatoes, scrubbed clean
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided, plus more for brushing
1 onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 cup French green (Puy) lentils, picked over and rinsed
2 cups water
1 bunch kale, tough ribs and stems removed
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Prick the sweet potatoes in several places with a fork and place on a baking sheet. Bake 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until very soft to the touch. Set aside to cool.
 

Cut the onion in half. Thinly slice one half and set aside. Dice the other half. Warm 1 tablespoon of oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat and saute the diced onion and garlic until onion is translucent. Add the cumin, cinnamon and allspice and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the lentils and water. Bring to a boil over high heat, then lower heat and simmer uncovered for 10 minutes. Cut the kale into bite-size pieces. Add kale and salt to the lentils. Cover and simmer for 5-10 minutes more, until lentils are soft but not mushy. Taste and adjust seasoning. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the lentil and kale mixture to a bowl, leaving most of the cooking liquid in the pot.
Meanwhile, warm 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a heavy skillet over low heat. Add the thinly sliced onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until onions are caramelized, about 20-25 minutes.


Peel the sweet potatoes and cut into 1-inch chunks. Mash with a fork until smooth and add a sprinkle of salt, if needed.

Spread about 1/4 cup mashed sweet potato over bottom half the tortilla. Cover with about 1/3 cup of the lentils and kale. Top with a small amount of caramelized onions.Voila!


Additional Notes:
• Brown lentils can be substituted for the French green lentils, but begin checking for doneness a little earlier.

Tortillas

I love, love, love tortillas.  Plain, nothing on them tortillas.  I get a little sick to my stomach just thinking about the kind you get in the store, though.  The texture is just awful and the ingredient list is scary.  No bueno.  So I've been making my own for years.  Recently though, I decided my old recipe wasn't quite doing it for me anymore and I discovered the holy grail of tortillas in the comments section of some blog where some other lady had posted a tortilla recipe.  Kind of round about, but worth it!  Here it is, plus some tips from my many failures and successes in the tortilleria:

6 C. flour ( more or less...most often, less)
1.5 tsp. salt
4 T. butter, cut into pieces
1 C. milk
1 C. water

1) Whisk together the salt and 2 C. flour in the mixing bowl of a stand mixer.
2)  Add the butter pieces on top.
3) In a small sauce pan, heat the milk and water until just below the boiling point (stir so you don't scorch it).
4) Pour the liquid into the flour mixture and stir until smooth and well blended.
5) Add two more cups of flour.  Again, blend well.
6) Begin adding the remaining flour one half cup at a time.  You may need to switch to your kneading hook at this point (or whatever you do with a Bosch...).  You are done adding flour when the dough has began pulling away from the sides and the bowl remains clean while kneading after the dough has been scraped down.  Your total kneading time should be about five minutes.
7) Form the dough into a smooth ball, cover, and let rest for 20 minutes (so the water all absorbs fully and the gluten has a chance to relax).
8) Cut the dough into 16 equal parts for fajita sized tortillas, fewer for larger tortillas. Cover the balls and again allow the dough to rest for about 20 minutes.
9) On a lightly floured surface, roll your balls out one by one.  You want them to be so thin that you can see the texture or color pattern in your work-surface beneath them.
10) Preheat your skillet or electric griddle (which is what I prefer to use) to about 400 degrees.  You want it to be so hot that it cooks the tortillas quickly and puffs them up instead of drying them out.
11) Cook each side for about a minute, or until it has developed nice brown spots and the dough appears fully cooked.  The dough should bubble and puff as it cooks.
12) As you cook the tortillas, stack them on a plate and cover the stack with tinfoil and a dish towel.  The key is to keep them warm.  A tortilla warmer works too, but I don't have one :)

Much like in bread baking, method trumps recipe in importance.  Accordingly, here are some method quirks I've discovered via research and painful experience:

• Kneading is crucial.  Do not under-knead these unless you want them to be dense and somewhat brittle.  Kneading develops the gluten, which is essential in giving your tortillas stretch and chewiness.  
• The rest periods are crucial.  You can skip them, but not if you want your tortillas to be springy and bendy and divine.  The gluten has to have a chance to relax or rolling them out thin enough just doesn't happen.
• Cutting the dough into sections to shape into balls is pretty important too.  You never want to tear bread or tortilla dough as a prime goal is to keep the invisible gluten strands long and aligned and tearing isn't conducive to that.  
• Sub whole wheat for up to half of the flour, but do so knowing you'll alter the flavor and texture accordingly.
• Make sure your cooking surface is sufficiently hot.  Quick cooking is essential to preserving moistness and flexibility.
• These are great to freeze and keep on hand.  A quick turn in the microwave brings them right back to awesome.
• You may well be able to use coconut oil in these and possibly some other milk to make them vegan. I don't know, as I'm too cheap to buy the stuff that doesn't taste like coconut and I don't worry about using dairy anyway.  I do know that the little bit of extra fat content from the milk is part of why these turn out so flexible and and hold it so well.  

I know this all sounds a bit fussy, but there really isn't a great deal of effort to making great tortillas.  You do have to pay attention to detail.  Practice is also pretty important for consistent results.  One last thing...my tortillas always look somewhat like amoebas...if yours do too, no one here is judging!

Blog List

I had a crazy idea that it would be handy to have a spot on this blog for links to blogs we scour for recipes.  Hence the Blog List now featured on the top right.  I added Oh My Veggies and Love and Lemons.  (I did not add Whole Food Mommies because their site wouldn't give a feed for updating.)  What sites do you love?  Add them to the list!  (Karissa, I'm not sure how familiar you are with blogger...let me know if you need any help with that.)

Happy cooking (and menu planning) friends!

Apple-Pear Salad with lemon poppyseed dressing

INGREDIENTS:
Dressing:
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice (about 3-4 lemons)
1 teaspoon Dijon-style prepared mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon poppy seeds

Salad:
1 head romaine lettuce, torn into bite-size
pieces
1 cup cashews (I like roasted and salted to balance the other flavors)
1 apple - peeled, cored and diced
1 pear - peeled, cored and sliced

DIRECTIONS:
1. In a blender or food processor, combine sugar, lemon juice, onion, mustard, and salt. Process until well blended. With machine still running, add oil in a slow, steady stream until mixture is thick and smooth. Add poppy seeds, and process just a few seconds more to mix.

2. In a large serving bowl, toss together the romaine lettuce, shredded Swiss cheese, cashews, dried cranberries, apple, and pear. Pour dressing over salad just before serving, and toss to coat.

Variation:
The original recipe called for 2 tsp diced onion, 1/2 c white sugar, and 2/3 c vegetable oil to make the dressing and added dried cranberries and 4 ounces shredded Swiss cheese in the salad. I felt like the pear and apple added enough sweetness (thus omitting the cranberries) and I wanted the tartness of the fresh lemon juice to take center stage.

Another variation I saw increased the dijon mustard to 1 Tb.