02.03.09
Red Beans
Lent is coming soon and this is the time to start collecting some bean recipes. I came up with this recipe because I thought the family was a little tired of New England style baked beans, and I was out of navy beans, so I picked up a package of red beans at the market. Red beans have a mild taste, not too beany.
Ingredients: 1 lb. of red beans, about 1 cup of tomato paste, 1 vegetable bouillion cube, one carrot, diced, one medium onion, diced fine, one stalk of celery, diced. (For use outside Lent, about 1 tablespoon olive oil.) Oil for sauteing, if wanted. One and a half cups hot water.
Soak the red beans overnight, drain in the morning, rinse, cover with water, bring to a boil, and cook abut ten minutes. Drain and rinse again. Meanwhile, saute the diced vegetables in a little oil or in water if entirely Lenten, until softened a bit.
Put the beans and vegetables in a crockpot or a 2-3 quart covered pot. Dissolve the vegetable cube in the hot water, add the tomato paste, and pour over the bean mixture. Cook on high in the crockpot for about 4 hours, then turn down to low until time to serve. If using a stovetop pot, simmer about three hours. Keep the liquid just at the top level of the beans, adding hot water.
If you want a non-vegetarian version, crisp fry a couple of slices of bacon and lay on top of the beans. Or add a few slices of cooked Italian sausage.
I served this with pasta mixed with Parmesan cheese (use minced herbs in Lent) and steamed rapini.
11.28.08
What to do with leftover cranberry sauce
Eat it with a spoon, standing at the refrigerator, when no one is looking.
Works with turkey stuffing, too.
10.27.08
Magdalena’s Italian Wedding Soup
I’m not Italian, but this is sort of like a famous chain coffee shop’s version, only homemade. And you can eat as much as you like, not just the dinky little portion they serve. It’s one way of using up leftover spaghetti sauce, preferably home-made, but you can use a commercial vegetarian kind.
Equipment: soup pot, pot of boiling pasta.
Ingredients: 1 cup leftover spaghetti sauce, 2 small onions, 1 large carrot, about 6 napa cabbage leaves, 1 sweet pepper, 1 small hot pepper, 1 garlic clove, peeled, 1 cup mixed soup beans, or leftover cooked beans, 1/2 cup green beans,8 cups water (Add more if the beans take up a lot), about 1 cup cheese tortellini or pasta (uncooked), fresh or dried herbs: rosemary, oregano, parsley, thyme, summer savory.
Peel and chop the onions and carrots, not too small; you want pieces, not tiny dice. Stack the napa cabbage leaves, fold in half and slice crosswise into narrow strips. Seed and slice the peppers. Put the spaghetti sauce, water and uncooked beans into the soup kettle and bring to a boil. If using leftover cooked beans or canned beans, rinse and drain. Add the vegetables except the green beans. Add the herbs and garlic, leaving the garlic clove whole (you’ll remove it later.) Cook the soup until the beans are tender, or if using cooked beans, until the vegetables are just tender. Remove the garlic clove, add the green beans, cut into pieces, or use frozen. Simmer while you cook the pasta or tortellini (tortellini is best, but sometimes expensive.) Put pasta in bowl, pour soup over. Serve with garlic bread, fresh Italian bread and grated Parmesan, if you like.
10.21.08
Beef Supper Dish
I’m not very creative in naming recipes; best a description so you’re not wondering just what “Luau Moonlight Delight” is. We were given a beef roast, and this is what I’m doing with the leftovers. You could use any kind of leftover beef, or use ground beef. If you use ground beef (or turkey, or chicken, or soy) make the gravy with a canned broth or vegetable boullion.
Equipment: Small soup pot for making broth, cutting board and knife, pot for boiling potatoes, potato masher, casserole dish.
Ingredients: Left over beef (if not much, add chunks of potato, onion, or turnip, which has been parboiled for ten minutes), 4 cups water, 2-3 tablespoons flour, 2 medium potatoes, peeled and boiled until soft, 1/2 cup milk, 2 tablespoons butter, four carrots, scraped and sliced, or 2 carrots and 2 parsnips.
Make beef gravy by simmering some of the leftover beef in a pot with four cups of water. Thicken with flour beaten into a 1/2 cup cold water, stir until smooth. (Season with salt and pepper or Gravy flavouring from a bottle.) Slice the beef or cut into chunks. Put in a lightly greased casserole, cover with the gravy and the carrot and/or parsnip slices. Make the mashed potatoes by draining then mashing the potatoes in the pot, adding the milk and butter. Spoon the mashed potatoes on top of the carrots/parsnips. Bake the whole thing until the carrots are cooked, about 30-45 minutes, in a 350 degree (F) oven.
To make it a little more special, grate some cheddar cheese on top in the last ten minutes of baking.
10.20.08
Mediterranean Lentil Soup
There are times you need a really good, cheap, filling soup that will get you through a couple of days. Maybe the kids are sick or you have a thesis to finish, and there should be something in the refrigerator that can be quickly heated with a little liquid added, and is both nourishing and comforting.
When I am under stress I do not want heavy meats or cheeses or anything overseasoned. I want a mild, vegetarian soup. This one does the trick, and it keeps well for several days. After reheating it may be a bit mushy, but that doesn’t affect the flavour or goodness.
Lentils are cheap and cook fast. There are several kinds, brown, yellow, green and red. The red ones are sometimes called “Esau’s pottage” because supposedly the savoury stew that Jacob used to entice the birthright from his older twin was made of red lentils.
Equipment: cutting board and knife, soup pot, spoon.
Ingredients: 2 cups lentils, 2 onions, diced, 1 carrot, scraped and diced, 3 whole cloves garlic, peeled, a handful of fresh herbs such as parsley and thyme or oregano (or use dried herbs if that’s all you have, just a spoonful or so), 2 tablespoons olive oil, 1 cup tomato juice or a whole diced raw tomato, 10-12 cups water, a lemon.
Rinse the lentils under cold water in a colander.
Saute the onion and carrot in the olive oil in the soup pot. Add the water and the lentils. Bring to a boil, lower the heat, and add the garlic, herbs and tomato. Simmer for about one and a half hours until the lentils are soft. Just before serving, squeeze the juice from a slice of fresh lemon onto each serving. If you feel creative, you can grate some fresh lemon zest (the yellow peel) into the soup in the last few few minutes of cooking. Remove the whole garlic cloves.
If you don’t have a fresh lemon, but you have some really nice cider, malt, fruit or balsamic vinegar, add that instead.
10.16.08
What to do with Eggs
Right now we can get eggs at a good price at the grocery store. They aren’t the best of all eggs, but the good eggs are at the farmers’ market and it is beyond busline range. Eggs are not strictly vegetarian, but unfertilized eggs, as most are, do not ever become chicks. (You need a rooster in with the hens to get fertilized eggs that will hatch.)
We used to have our own chickens. Some chickens are lots of fun. We had three at one time who were real pets and followed us around like dogs. They liked to come in the cellar door and watch Nicholas stoke the wood furnace. If we didn’t pay attention, they would try to get upstairs into the house and that just drove the dogs crazy. These chickens had names – Jet, Ginger and Penny. My chicken-raising friend rolled her eyes and said, “You don’t name the chickens!” I did, and they were great. Other chickens have been just chickens and sometimes a little nasty.
The big pay-off is that if the chickens are fed right they produce eggs. We got about five eggs a week from each chicken for about nine months out of the year. (They sometimes don’t lay when the days are short and when they are moulting – growing new feathers.)
But even grocery store eggs are a good source of protein (free-range eggs are lower in cholesterol.) So here are a few ways to cook eggs that aren’t expensive or time-consuming.
REALLY GOOD SCRAMBLED EGGS
This is too simple to believe. Forget milk, cream, or water. Forget herbs and seasonings. Melt a little butter/margarine in a nonstick or well-seasoned pan. (Use olive oil if you prefer.) Break four eggs into a bowl, gently scramble with a fork (not a whisk or some electric doodad.) I mean, really gently, so that you can still distinguish some white. Don’t beat until fluffy, keep it calm. Now pour the beaten eggs into the pan, and stir around lightly with a wooden spatula. The wooden implement means you aren’t overscrambling. Keep the heat medium-low until the eggs are mostly set, but still a little moist on top. You won’t believe how tender the eggs are cooked this way, treated with gentleness. Transfer to a warm serving dish. This is enough for two good eaters, or enough for one very good eater.
A SIMPLE OMELET WITHOUT FOLDING
Do you find omelets intimidating? Try this instead. Dice a small onion and a small green pepper finely, fry in a little oil or butter at medium-high. Reduce the heat to medium. Meanwhile, beat together four eggs until well-mixed. Use a fork, not a whisk. Pour the eggs into the vegetable mixture in the skillet. Have on hand some diced, grated or sliced cheese- real cheese, from a block, that is, like cheddar or gouda or whatever you like. Let the eggs start to set, then slide a spatula under the cooked rim and let the raw egg flow under. Do this all the way around until most of the raw egg has gone to the bottom and cooked. While the eggs are still moist on top, lay on the cheese evenly, then cover, reducing the heat to almost nothing. Peek in after a minute to see if the cheese is melted. Divide into portions and serve. Try other vegetables, cheese mixtures, or fresh herbs minced. Just sprinkle the herbs on top, don’t mix into the eggs. Again, keeping the heat low will keep the eggs from getting tough. (If you use a hot pepper and some cilantro, serve the omelet with salsa and tortillas.)
PICKLED EGGS
This takes some time and preparation, but is worth it. It is one way of dealing with surplus eggs. Get your equipment together: Pot for hardboiling eggs, kettle for heating vinegar, hotwater canner, canning jars (quart size is good), lids, jar lifter, extra towels, kitchen timer.
Ingredients: 2 dozen or more fresh, raw eggs; gallon of vinegar (I prefer cider); seasonings such as garlic cloves, bay leaf, pepper corns, mustard seed, one clove or leaf per jar, or a half dozen seeds/corns.
Hardboil the eggs and peel. I don’t have a fail-proof method for getting the shells off without the white splitting. The fresher the egg, the easier it peels. Meanwhile, heat the vinegar with an equal amount of water; you probably won’t need the whole gallon, but best to have extra to top up jars. Put the peeled eggs in the clean canning jars and add seasonings. (Note that raw garlic turns copperous green in vinegar! But isn’t harmful.) Pour in the hot vinegar mixture. I put a metal table knife or skewer in each jar as I fill it to avoid any cracking. Put the lids on properly, following the manufacturer’s directions for making the seal. Immediately lower into the boiling canner, cover the canner, and process for ten minutes. (Less than that will not give a good seal.) Lift out with the jar tongs (if you don’t have these, get some, since they will save you many burns.) Cool on the towels. Keep for about a week before serving. Open jars should go in the refrigerator.
10.11.08
Turkeys
I am so ambivalent about turkeys. I like turkey and I love turkey stuffing, as long as it’s made with bread cubes and lots of sage, but the whole turkey cooking thing is a bit over the top. I’ve cooked everything from generic supermarket turkeys to farm fresh free range turkeys, including the not-really-butter-oversized turkeys with the pop-up doodad, which tells me I left the turkey in too long. And the mess…
The mess puts me off. First there’s the turkey roaster, a monster pan that doesn’t fit anywhere but on a shelf in the garage, if you have a garage. It needs to be washed out and scrutinized for old turkey blah that is now dessicated and semi-permanent. I don’t like to clean something before I use it. My grandmother had the best possible use for the turkey roaster. She filled it with cookies and kept it in a low cupboard for grandchildren to help themselves.
Then there’s the turkey itself. The Russians say about the goose that as a meal, it’s too much for one and not enough for two, but most commercial turkeys are too much for six. So the cook has to wrestle the bird in from the car (note: we don’t have a car, and I cannot imagine carrying a turkey home on the bus) and then get into the refrigerator to defrost (if frozen), or worse, into the bathtub in cool water, checking it every hour like a premature lamb behind the woodstove. Before cooking, the turkey must be rinsed thoroughly. It really does. You are risking huge GI disaster if you don’t. And who wants to rinse the turkey in the bathtub? Yuck, and yikes, carry it through the house, dripping and slippery, with that dread pimply turkey skin clutched in both hands. So into the sink it goes, mostly. I end up rinsing it bit by bit.
Oh, and remember the giblets. They may be neatly body-bagged inside the turkey. The first time I roasted a turkey (I was eighteen) I left the giblets and the little plastic bag inside. My grandmother, who was visiting (the same one who used her roaster as a cookie jar) asked if I was making giblet gravy. “No giblets,” I said. She, former grocery store meat cutter, was skeptical, and in excavating the dressing, she also hauled out the gift-wrapped giblets. And laughed. Nana had a very meaningful laugh.
The turkey people come up with all kinds of “helpful” devices for turkey wrangling – slings and cradles and lassoes and big garden fork devices that don’t fit in the kitchen drawer. I no longer stuff turkeys so they’ll cook faster and get hotter inside, so I stick a strong wooden spoon in each end (not dignified for me or the turkey or any observer) and lift turkey into or out of the roaster, depending on which end of the cooking cycle we’re at.
I make the “stuffing” separately, the recipe depending on my mood, but the commercial bread crumb kind with supplemental butter, onion, and sage is fine, and that goes in a buttered casserole to be basted regularly with turkey drippings. I baste the turkey with butter or bacon fat (why not go all-out?) Despite all the things I read about cooking the bird at a lower temperature to keep it moist, I still follow whatever directions the turkey people give me. They are the experts and they should know.
I love gravy. Everyone loves gravy, except for vegetarians and compulsive dieters. I scrape the drippings off the pan, take out the big pieces of turkey skin, pour in some canned chicken broth (has better flavour than turkey broth) and transfer everything to a saucepan. I then heat the mixture to just boiling, add some (2-3 tablespoons) flour whisked into about a cup of water until smooth (corn starch gives a nicer colour and sheen, but we avoid corn products because of allergies) and add that slowly to the broth, whisking away until thickened and smooth. Have extra flour/water mixed and on hand in case you want it thicker, or get a helper to stir while you prepare the flour suspension.
I just don’t want to even think about the clean-up. You know the routine.
Turkey leftovers are best as cold turkey and dressing and gravy sandwiches. I don’t bother with anything else, and the carcass goes in the trash after three days. No, I don’t make turkey soup. By then I’m sick of turkey and how it smells, and there’s not much left clinging to the bones anyhow, so it gets wrapped up thickly and put in the trash outside. I don’t want the raccoons or skunks to find the remnants and drag it all over the yard, so it needs to get secured in a trash bin.
Don’t ever give turkey or turkey skin to the dogs! It can make them very sick.
Enjoy the turkey anyway.
10.09.08
Ful (Egyptian Beans)
This is my adaptation of a classic dish made by our friend Nadia. Nadia is one of the best cooks I know. She has a farmers’ market stall where she sells – or maybe ministers with – some of the best traditional food around. Nadia and her husband are from Egypt and are Coptic Orthodox Christians. They keep the Old Calendar, and she is faithfully serious about the fasts. We keep the fasts, too, but not on the level Nadia does! She was one of our sources for fasting foods, and although everything was meat, dairy and fat-free, it was still so good.
This dish is not strictly fasting, since it has oil in it.
Equipment: Medium sized kettle, skillet, knife and chopping board, metal spoons, serving dish.
Ingredients: About 2 cups dried beans: dried favas are traditional, but I use a combination of white and brown beans; 2 tablespoons or so olive oil, 1 onion, 1 large garlic clove, 1/2 cup tomato sauce, 1 fresh hot pepper, 1/2 lemon.
Put the dried beans in a kettle, add water to cover by a couple of inches above the level of the beans. Bring to a boil, then turn off the heat and let soak over night or all day. After soaking, drain the beans, rinse thoroughly, and put back in the kettle with water to cover. Boil gently until tender, maybe an hour or two, depending on the type and age of the beans. Skim the foam from the beans as they cook and add hot water to keep covered. The rinsing and skimming keep the gas-producing starch from settling back into the beans. When done, drain the beans and put back in the kettle.
Dice the onion and garlic very fine, and saute in the olive oil. Add to the beans along with the tomato sauce. De-seed and chop finely the hot pepper – I use the little hot cherry peppers from our garden. Squeeze in the juice of the 1/2 lemon – this is important to the flavour. You can add more hot pepper or chile flakes if you want it caliente.
Serve it hot off the stove or refrigerate as a salad. This is usually served with pitas or other flatbread, and is a traditional breakfast food in Egypt.
To make it a fasting food, simmer the onion and garlic in a little water to release their flavour before adding to the beans, and skip the oil.
10.07.08
Toad-in-the-Hole (this is British, don’t get too excited about the name)
Toad-in-the-Hole is basically sausages in Yorkshire pudding. This is much better than it sounds.
We are basically vegetarian right now. You could make this with veggie sausages. I haven’t tried that, but if they are adequately browned in a little oil, they can substitute for the pork sausage. This is not vegan. I really could not invent a vegan Yorkshire pudding.
Equipment: Mixing bowl and wooden spoon, skillet and fork, small roasting or baking pan – I use my 9X9 pan or a casserole dish.
Ingredients: 1 cup milk, 2 eggs, 1/2 teaspoon salt, about 1 cup all-purpose flour, butter or bacon drippings, (a pretty fair amount, 3-4 tablespoons), about 1 lb. of pork sausages, breakfast style or other mild flavouring.
NOTE: This is so not low-fat. It was designed for people who worked hard outdoors every day, and needed a lot of calories. It is a huge nostalgia dish for my husband, Nicholas (Dave) who grew up in an old-fashioned Cockney family. He often works hard outdoors, too.
Make the batter: Beat together the milk, eggs, salt and flour. Set aside. Don’t do this too far in advance.
Brown the pork (or veggie) sausages in a little fat, pricking with the fork to keep them from popping. In the meantime, put the butter or other fat into the baking dish, and preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. The preheating is very important. Put the dish with the fat into the hot oven until the fat melts and sizzles. Take the hot dish out, put in the sausages, and pour on the batter. Put it in the oven for about half an hour. the batter will puff up incredibly. The fresher the eggs, the more it rises. The top should be a bit crisp, the inside thick and creamy but not doughy. Test with a knife.
Serve right away. If there are leftovers (rarely) they can be fried in a little butter for breakfast.
10.02.08
Bigos (kielbasa with sauerkraut-kapusta)
We aren’t eating meat right now – too expensive. But this is a festive dish in Slavic Orthodox circles, and it is so good. I may serve it at Canadian Thanksgiving, Christmas, Epiphany, or Pascha.
Equipment: Sharp knife and cutting board, baking dish (small roasting pan works well, or stoneware casserole).
Ingredients: For every 4 persons, One pound of good quality kielbasa, kovbasa, or other spicy firm cooked sausage; one quart of sauerkraut per 4 persons. I prefer the Polish kind, but the regular jar or can works well if you rinse and drain it.
Is this too easy? Lightly grease the bottom of the pan, set the oven at 350 degrees F., spoon the ‘kraut into the pan evenly. Cut the kielbasa into thick slices and lay on top of the ‘kraut. Bake for about half an hour, or longer, if the meal is late, or people are still eating the pierogies.
You could add caraway to the sauerkraut if you like that. I don’t.
Serve with good brown mustard and dark rye bread, or other peasant style bread. It’s also good with whole-grain crackers.
This is a traditional after the feast meal, served in the evening or later, when the leftovers are still on the platters for nibbling and just the family remains. It is a real “fllling in the corners” kind of dish. If you want to serve it as a supper meal, put two raw sliced potatoes under the ‘kraut.
