I bought about six or seven oranges, not knowing how much juice I would get out of them, and that was about right. I followed the recipe again, using the juice, and when I tasted the finished product, I was amazed. This worked a treat. The orange juice made the hotness of the pepper less hot, but still spicy.

So, this was going to be one of the meals I made for my sweetie and my mother when they came to town.

I ended up eating it the full week, for both lunch and dinner. I ran out of brown rice, and found that sushi rice worked just as well.

It was good both cold and hot.

the veggies

The veggies always look so good when I first start cooking with them, before I cut them up. The only problem with this recipe, from the Julia Child Mastering the Art of French Cooking, is that she doens’t always say how much in cups the veggies are, or how many veggies should be used. I suppose it is easier to just say how many pounds, but I don’t have scale, so that doesn’t help me.

cooking the veggies

Like the Indian version, things get cooked seperatly before they are mixed together.

I have skilled tomatoes before, but this recipe called for seeing and juicing them as well. You send up with pulp, which I did. The goal appeared to be as to get as much juice out of the tomato as possible. Not only before it went into the mix, but after it was in the mix. The recipe kept calling for all the juice to be absorbed.

The Indian version was very soupy, while this one seemed drier.

the finished product

Also,unless I missed something, there were no spices added other than salt and pepper.

Perhaps, if I had tried this one first, I would have found the Indian version odd, now I find this one odd.

All the veggies cut up

I don’t always manage to cook all the veggies I get in my basket from my CSA before the next week comes about. This week, I was bound and determined to do so. I looked at what I had, and found a recipe that would work, and spend the day, every time I went into the kitchen, gathering up the supplies, so they would all be there, and ready when it was time to cook.

The recipe, Indian Ratatouille, is from the Moosewood Restaurant New Classics. I was surprised, and delighted that not only did I have all the veggies, but I had almost all the spices. Now, granted, I didn’t have as much of all the ingredients as were called for, but I felt it was close enough.

Here is what was called for:

• 2 cups diced onions
• 2 tablespoons veggie oil
• 2 large garlic cloves (I usually use much more than that)
• 1 fresh chile (I used dried chile)
• 1 tablespoon fresh ginger root (I used dried)
• 1 tspn ground cumin
• 1 tspn ground coriander
• 1/2 tspn turmeric
• 1/2 tspn ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tspn ground cardamon
• 1 tspn salt
• pinch of saffron (which I didn’t have at all)
• 1 cup of orange juice ( I used water)
• 5 cups cubed eggplant (I had about 2 cups worth)
• 4 cups cubed zucchini, squash, or pattypan (this I had, all of them)
• 1 1/2 cups bell peppers (I had about a cup)
• 3 cups fresh tomatoes
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh basil

cooking the veggies

As it is with onions, you cook those first, and then add the garlic, chile giner and spices. The eggplant and juice were added last, and then the squash bell peppers, tomatoes and basil.

It was amazing. I served it on rice, I had made earlier. I knew I had to make it again. Not sure how it will turn out with the orange juice, as this was great.  I’m sure the saffron will ad something to it.

And eating it all

This dish has lasted me for a few days now, and it great reheated.

So, now I got curious. What would the more traditional ratatouille taste like. I decided to make the Julia Child version next.

Veggie pie number 2

Looking back, I don’t think I added the thyme, but I did everything else.

Then I added cheese on top and shoved it into the oven.

It came out, and looked as though it would taste good, but it was dry, and lacking something. I have since reheated it, and had it for lunch, and I think that if I were to do this again, it would have the veggies cooked in the pie, rather than roasted ahead of time, so that all the juices stay with it.

I think what this needs is more juices, and something else, but I will have to make it again to figure out what the final missing ingredient is. The carrots and beets are great together, as are the potatoes.

cutting up the root veggies

Wow, still more carrots. I had to figure out something cool to do with them, and then I came across a recipe for Savory Autumn Leaf Pies in the Vegan Lunch Box book, by Jennifer McCann. It was actually for little individual pies, but it also had a variation where you could make it into one big pie, so I thought, great, and off I went.

For the filling you needed:

• 2 large carrots peeled, diced into 1/4 inch pieces (about a cup)
• 1 golden beat, peeled and diced (about 1/2 cup)
• 2 new potatoes, peeled and diced (about 2 cups)
• 2 garlic cloves (whole and unpeeled) -I actually used about 4 and peeled and cut them up
• 4 sprigs of fresh thyme
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin oil
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt.

I then took all that, and roasted it in the oven for 30 minutes.

Then I made the pie shell. I used

• 3 cups of gluten free flour (it called for 2 cups all purpose flour and 1 cup of barley)
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon poppy seeds
• 1/2 cup chilled canola oil
• 1/2 cup ice water
• 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

Needless to say, the crust was all crumbly and didn’t hold together at all, but I shoved it into the pie shell, and dumped the veggies in, and cooked it.

Finished pie number 1

When I got it out, the shell was undercooked, and flaky and crumbly, and although the veggies tasted good, the pie itself did not, so I ate the veggies, and threw the res tof the pie out.

But then I got to thinking, perhaps I could do it slightly differently an d it would come out better.

leeks and assorted veggies

First let me say that this is what I burned my hand on. More on that later, but my hand still stings, and I am rather annoyed that this was the cause of it.

So, one of the cookbooks I picked up was The Moosewood Restaurant New classics.  I hadn’t made anything from it, but I had a fennel bulb that was looking to be cooked, and figured that their fennel leek soup would fit the bill.  It helped, too, that I had some leeks. I was missing other things, such as the potatoes and used chard instead of spinach, but figured it would all work out.

• 1 fresh fennel bulb
• 10 cups of water
• 3 leeks
• 1 1/2 cups of coarsely chopped carrots
• 4 cups coarsely chopped potatoes (I had only one potato, so made do with that)
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme (I used fresh thyme)
• 1 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 1/2 teaspoon of fennel seeds (I used fresh)
• 2 cups spinach (I used chard)
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill (I used dried dill)
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice (that I had)

This was interesting, because the stuff was put in in bits. First all the fennel except the  fennel bulb went into the pot, then the leek leaves, then the carrots and potatoes.

veggies in the pot

While that was all simmering, I put the fennel bulb and leeks into a pan and cooked them, then added them to the stock.

I threw in some garlic, as I think garlic makes everything taste better.

I cooked it all for about 45 minutes, and even tasted it. I could see where the potatoes would have helped, but it didn’t taste bad, just thin.

finished soup

And here is how I burned my hand. The next step was to pour the soup, a little bit at a time, into the food processor. While I was transferring, I poured it on my hand.

Then it was so hot that the top of the food processor got soft, and the top fell in while I was running it, so the first batch had bits of chopped up lid in it, and I didn’t think that would taste right.

Once that was all cleaned up, I finally got the soup together, and tasted it. It wasn’t bad, but, as I said, it could have done with the extra potatoes.

Putting the mix in the tins

A while ago, when Cartoonist started middle school, I thought I would help her with ideas for her lunch, and bought a book called “The Healthy Lunchbox.” I had forgotten that we even had the book, until I started looking through the cookbook shelves to see what I could come up with for her to make for lunch.

I handed it to Cartoonist and said, find some stuff to make for your lunch. She picked out the Carrot or Zucchini Muffin mix.

Well, which is it going to be? I asked her, as we had plenty of both. She looked at the recipe and said “Both”.

So I grated up the carrots and the zucchini, and she mixed up the other ingredients.

• 1/2 cup of olive oil (they called for canola oil)
• 1/2 cup honey
• 2 eggs (or 4 egg whites, which she would have done)
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups grated zucchini and carrots
• 2 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup flax meal
• 1 cup brown rice flour
• 1/3 cup buckwheat flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• Bake for 25 minutes at 350F

What was amazing was that we actually didn’t have to make any substitutes, we had all the ingredients. What a novel idea.

Finished muffins

We must have done something wrong, because it said it would make 2 dozen, and it was more like 18 and they were very flat, but they were good, so we decided that we would make this one again.

carrots and coconut milk

Wow, this was a great recipe, and we loved how it came out. We discovered this one because Cartoonist has to make her lunches, this year, in high school, and we wanted a cook book that was made for lunches, and packable lunches. What we bought was “Vegan Lunch box” by Jennifer McCann. We figured it was a good place to start. (and I spend far too much on cookbooks, but oh well, we all have our vices)

pre mix

Cartoonist started leafing through the book, and found Coconut Carrot Rice Pudding. We had all the ingredients, so figured it was a good one to make. The only problem we ran into was that it called for 3 cups of brown basmati rice. Brown rice takes about 2 hours to cook, vs. white rice, which is 20 minutes. So, I put the rice in the rice cooker, and went on to do other things. Cartoonist kept saying, “Aren’t we going to make the rice pudding” and I kept saying, yes, when the rice is done.

Although the recipe called for grating the carrots, I ended up putting them into the food processor. Here is what was needed.

• 1 pound of carrots (peeled and grated (3 cups worth). I didn’t peel them.
• 1 can of light coconut milk (I just used the regular kind
• 1/2 cup of pure maple syrup (we used a quarter of a cup, as it is so sweet)
• 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cardamon
• 1/2 cup golden raisins (we used black raisins)

So, We took the carrots, coconut milk and maple syrup and put them on the stove and cooked until it was all soft. Then we put in the rest of the mix and kept cooking until it was thick.

finished

When it was all done, we tasted it, and thought it tasted quite good, even though it didn’t look too good. Once it was cool, it still looked odd, but tasted great.

A keeper.

Cartoonist took that as well as the chilled apple soup, to school for lunch.

Making the Tahini

We received eggplant in our basket this week, only one, but a trip to the farmer’s market fixed that, and we were able to make baba ganoush. I was all excited, as I had never made it before, and the first thing I noticed, once I got home, was that I had to make tahini.

I had tried making tahini before, but decided to try again. Found that it went a little better this time, because I wasn’t expecting a smooth sort of mix. In fact, the recipe I used said that it would turn out coarse, and not to worry about it. So I didn’t. I took 2 cups of white seasame seeds, and toasted them, then put them in the food processor with oil.

Roasted eggplant

The next step was to roast the eggplants.  The recipe I used called to prick each eggplant and char the outsides before baking them in the oven. Even though the recipe said to roast for 30 minutes, in ended up taking over an hour. Once the eggplants were coolish, I peeled and scooped the insides out.

Then I put them in the food processor with the lemon juice (3 tablespoons), 3 garlic cloves, 1/8 teaspoon chile powder and some parsley which I remembered to add at the last moment.

Finsihed Baba

Once it was done, I put it in a container and put it in the fridge to cool. Cartoonist tasted it, dipping first nan, then a carrot and decided that it was a good recipe we should make again.

soup in the blender

Once I got the mix off the pot, I had to blend it again, with the apple sauce I had made the other day.

Problem was that it was quite hot, so I couldn’t just reach my hand in and move things around, not that I didn’t try, and keep discovering how hot the mixture was. It was supposed to be soup like, but it never got much thinner, no matter how much I mixed it in the blender.

Finally, I decided it was as mixed and as blended as it was going to be, so I poured it into a bowl, and stuck it in the fridge for four hours, which is what the recipe called for.

Cartoonist said, what? Four hours? She was hoping to eat it that night, but we couldn’t do that. It was already late, and I didn’t want to stay up any longer.

Finished soup

The next day, when it came time to taste the soup, we finally added the sparkling cider, and we both said it didn’t taste like soup, but rather really reach apple sauce.

I let my book keeper taste it, and she said it tasted really good, and wrote down the recipe, but I explained what we had changed, and said she might find hers would turn out more soup like than ours did, especially if she used apple juice, rather than the apple mush like things we used.

So now, we can use this for apple sauce on the next thing we make.