Creamy Carrot Soup with Coconut, Cardamom, and Cashews

I used to think cold soups were gross, but looking over the posts of the past month, I must have come around in a big way.  I made this tongue-twister of a soup to go with that Grilled Eggplant and Mango Noodle Salad.  Richly creamy (coconut milk AND cashews!), yet not overly heavy, and brightened up slightly by ginger, this dish was a great complement to the much more acidic noodle salad.

Pureed soups are creamy anyway, like this carrot ginger soup I made last year.  Adding both coconut milk and cashews seemed extravagant, but it's really not too much of either, especially considering how large of a batch this recipe makes.  Simple and delicious, I will definitely be making this soup again (misplaced modifiers be damned).

As we were sitting down to eat this soup, I realized how pretty it would look garnished with additional coconut milk!  But alas, none remained.

Creamy Carrot Soup with Coconut, Cardamom, and Cashews

(from vegalicious)

Ingredients

2 TB olive oil

1 onion, diced

10 carrots, diced

3 garlic cloves, diced

1 TB fresh ginger, minced

1 tsp ground cardamom

1/4 tsp cayenne

4 c of vegetable stock

1 c coconut milk

1 c cashews

salt and pepper

Instructions

1. In a medium to large sauce pan, heat the olive oil over medium high heat and add the onion and carrots.  Cook about 10 minutes.
2. Add garlic, ginger, cardamom, and cayenne.  Cook a few minutes more.
3. Add stock and cashews, bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes, or until the carrots are very soft.
4. Turn off heat and allow soup to cool, then puree, adding coconut milk, until very smooth.
5. Season to taste with salt and more cayenne, keeping in mind that the stock already had salt in it.  Serve hot or chilled, garnished with additional coconut milk, minced scallions, a few cashews, etc.  Serves 4-6.

Beet Coconut Soup

Beets are like the perfect vegetable from outer space, and mixing them with coconut milk only further brightened up their crazy color.

Devon and I made this soup going off a recipe from the ppk, but we used regular ol' beets (not golden ones), omitted the sweetener, added a TON of lime juice, and made a half batch.  Warm or chilled, it's pretty nice.  

Beet-Coconut-Ginger Soup

(from the ppk)

Ingredients

2 lbs beets (about 6-8 beets?), trimmed and scrubbed

1 15 oz can lite coconut milk

3 TB fresh lime juice (more to taste)

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp olive oil

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 TB fresh minced ginger

1 1/2 to 2 c vegetable broth

*

thinly sliced scallions and/or chopped cilantro--you could probably pull off mint, too

Instructions

1. The hardest part of this recipe is roasting the beets, and that’s not even hard, it just takes a while. Look for beets that are somewhere between the size of a golfball and a tennis ball, so that they roast quickly and evenly.
2. Preheat oven to 350 F. Wrap the scrubbed beets individually in tin foil. Place on a baking sheet and bake for about an hour, turning once about halfway through. Beets are ready when very easily pierced with a steak knife.
3. Let them cool (still in the tinfoil) for about an hour.  They’ll keep softening as they cool, and that is good! Place in the fridge to cool completely.
4. Once cool, unwrap the beets, slide off the peel, and place in a blender or food processor. Add the coconut milk, lime juice and salt and puree until relatively smooth.
5. Preheat a small pan over medium-low heat, and saute the ginger and garlic for no more than a minute, being careful not to burn. Add 1 1/2 cups vegetable broth to deglaze the pan, and turn off the heat.
6. Transfer the garlic/ginger/veg broth mixture to the food processor, and puree until very smooth and velvetty. Taste for salt and seasonings, and add a tiny bit of agave or maple syrup if you’d like it a tad sweeter.
7. Place in the fridge (while still in the blender) and chill for at least an hour. It should be cold all the way through. If it’s too thick, add up to another 1/2 cup vegetable broth and blend again.
8. Serve topped with scallions and/or cilantro.  Serves 8.

*

I also recently tried to make this peach jam I saw on akshayapaatram.  Crystallized ginger?!  Lemon zest?!  Why, yes!  But the nectarines I tried to use just weren't up to the task; no amount of sugar or spices was going to fix them.

Summer Sweet Corn Soup w/Basil Oil

There's something comforting about the fact that even in Southern California in 2011, when you can really get anything at any time of the year, the end of summer inevitably brings with it a slew of seasonal tastes and recipes.  It's all the more comforting given that they're the same here as they are in the Midwest where I grew up.  August comes, and suddenly tomatoes, basil, squash, sweet corn, and beets are everywhere.  These simple foods taste of weeks and weeks of sunlight and humidity; they come at the most fertile moment of the year... and yet for that very same reason, they're always tinged with a bittersweet belatedness.  This was especially true last August; behind all those tomato squash basil dishes is the fact that two of the most important people in my LA life were moving to the Bay Area and my little brother was moving to Egypt.

August is not the cruellest month, but it is a strange month.

This soup, which takes advantage of fresh sweet corn and basil, can be served hot or cold, depending on what form August is taking where you are.  It paired nicely with the 11-Spice Lentil Salad with Capers and Dates and some salad greens (at left).  I reduced the amount of carrot and increased that of corn; I also fully pureed the soup to make it prettier.  I did, for the first time in my life, feel that there was too much thyme--start low, and remember you can always add more to taste later.  I was going to call this post "Too much thyme on my hands," but I couldn't figure out how to make it work with the fall/belatedness stuff.

The basil oil recipe that follows is great!  I used it not only on this soup, but also as a salad dressing and on this week's ravioli.  I think it would also be pretty incredible on some really fresh tomatoes.

Summer Sweet Corn Soup w/Basil Oil Drizzle

(from an opera singer in the kitchen)

Ingredients

4 sweet corn ears, husked

2 TB olive oil

3 garlic cloves, minced

2 celery stalks, finely diced

2 carrots, peeled and finely diced

1 c yellow onions, finely diced

3 c vegetable stock

2 bay leaves

fresh thyme leaves (if substituting dried thyme, don't overdo it!--maybe 1/2 tsp?)

salt and pepper

1 recipe fresh basil oil (below)

Instructions

1. Cut the corn from the cobs and discard the cobs. Heat olive oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add the corn, garlic, celery, carrots, and onions and cook until slightly caramelized, 4-5 minutes.
2. Add the broth, bay leaves, and thyme. Season lightly with salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer for 12-15 minutes or until vegetables are tender.
3. Remove the bay leaves and discard. Using an immersion blender, puree 2/3 of the soup. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
4. Serve hot or cold with a drizzle of basil oil.  Serves about 6.

*

Basil Oil Drizzle

(from an opera singer in the kitchen)

Ingredients

1/3 c olive oil

3 TB fresh basil, chopped

Instructions

In a small saucepan add the ingredients and cook over low heat for 5 minutes.  Strain basil and drizzle 1-2 teaspoons of oil over each bowl of soup.

Green Pea Soup

This soup is so easy and simple, but it's also very delicious and refreshing.  I could almost see myself eating it cold (and I really am not into cold savory soups).  Ginger, lemon juice, and mint all "cool down" this ever-so-slightly-spicy soup.  If you wanted a more intense version, I think this soup would also be a great vehicle for harissa, in the style of that split pea harissa soup.

Green extravaganza!  Salad with avocado, pea soup with mint

Green Pea Soup Recipe

(from 101 cookbooks)

 

Ingredients

3 TB fresh ginger, well chopped

10 sm-med cloves garlic, smashed and peeled

2 serrano chiles, stemmed and chopped

1/4 tsp ground cumin, plus more to serve

3 TB veg oil

2 bay leaves

1 medium onion, chopped

4 1/2 cups good-tasting vegetable stock or water

3 1/2 cups shelled fresh or frozen peas

1 tsp sea salt, or to taste

a squeeze of fresh lemon juice

8 fresh mint leaves

pan-fried paneed, queso fresco, or haloumi, cut into tiny cubes - optional

harissa (optional)

Instructions

1. Use a food processor to puree the ginger, garlic, chiles, cumin and three tablespoons of water into a paste. You could also use a mortar and pestle. Set aside.
2. Place a large saucepan over medium-high heat and add the oil. When hot, add the bay leaves and saute for 30 seconds. Stir in the onion and cook for a few minutes, until it begins to take on a bit of color. At this point, stir in the garlic-ginger paste, and cook for another minute. Carefully add the stock, stir well, and bring to a boil. Then add the peas. Simmer just until the peas are bright, and cooked through - just a couple minutes.
3. Remove from heat, fish out the bay leaves, add the salt, and puree well with a hand blender. Taste, and add more salt if needed. Also, if you need to thin out the soup at all, you can add more stock at this point. Serve hot (or chilled?) topped with a bit of lemon juice, a pinch of cumin, mint leaves, and perhaps harissa? pan-fried paneer or cheese.  Serves 4-6.

Two One-Offs

I recently made a faster version of the green curry broth soup.  I didn't simmer the broth for all that long before straining it, and then I added stir-fried tofu, mushrooms, carrots, shredded collards, and udon noodles.  I garnished it with lime juice, scallions, cilantro, and sesame seeds... really, though, the possibilities for this soup are endless.

*

Secondly.  Sometimes I want to make something savory for breakfast in the morning, but the sausagey recipes require sooo much measuring that I'm just not down.  But I've gotten around this problem by quadrupling the spices from the oats and rice sausage recipe so that you have a mixture of:

2 tsp red pepper flakes
1/2-1 tsp ground black pepper
4 tsp ground sage
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp dried thyme
4 tsp fennel seeds

You'd then use about a heaping tablespoon for the original recipe, or less for smaller batches of stuff.

In this case, I then referred to this tempeh sausage squares recipe.  I mixed 1 TB tamari, 1/4 tsp liquid smoke, and about 1/4-1/2 c water with a heaping teaspoon of the above mixture.  Then I fried triangles of tempeh on both sides before pouring this mixture over the top, letting it cook off, etc., etc.

Then, because I happened to have some lying around, we topped off the tempeh with some mushroom gravy. Not the best photo, but this is one of the best (and fastest) homemade sausage things I've made yet.

Spicy Harissa Split Pea Soup

This soup is just the thing if you are not feeling good.  Or... if you just want to eat something delicious.  I think I found this recipe for Spicy Harissa Split Pea Soup when I was looking for more ways to use harissa.  I ended up making a rather stripped-down version of the original recipe.  As a result, mushroom and split peas are the dominant flavors.  It's a delicious, hearty, thick soup... but one that looks not so great, which may have been due to my using yellow mung beans instead of green split peas.  The second time (yes, this soup was so good that I made it twice this week), I decided to just go with the yellow theme, subbing in red lentils for some of the split peas and adding a bit of turmeric for good measure.  Significantly prettier (the photo below, however, is from the first batch).  I pureed the soup before adding green peas, which looks a little silly but produces a really fun texture, reminiscent of the orbitz soft drinks that were so popular back when I was in middle school.

It totally depends on what your harissa is like, but next time I'll use more (though you can adjust this in the garnishing stages); it wasn't very spicy, and harissa tastes soo good!  It's very different than hot sauce; I think it's the caraway, the mint, and the chipotle peppers.  If it wasn't so spicy, I'd just eat the stuff like ice cream.  Luckily, this soup is a great vehicle for it.

Spicy Harissa Split Pea Soup

(from healthy happy life)

Ingredients

olive oil

2 TB chopped garlic

1 1/2 c carrots, diced

1 c mushrooms, sliced (I think I used significantly more than this both times)
2 bay leaves

*

2 c dried split peas and/or red lentils, rinsed

4 c veg broth

2 TB spicy harissa (MORE!)
1/4 tsp turmeric (optional)

1 TB black pepper

*

salt to taste

1 c frozen green peas, thawed

Instructions

1. In a large pot, heat olive oil.  Add garlic, carrots, mushrooms, and bay leaves and and saute for a few minutes.
2. Add in the remaining ingredients (excepting green peas) and bring soup to a boil.
3. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer at very low heat, until the legumes are tender.
4. Puree soup.  Thin with water or stock, if desired.
5. Serve with green peas on top, as well as harissa and an extra drizzle of olive oil.  Serves 6-8.

Green Curry Noodle Soup

How many green things are in this soup?

• serrano peppers
• scallions
• limes
• squash
• mustard greens
• collard greens
• turnip greens
• spinach
• cilantro
• mint
• basil
• (note to self: next time, garnish with diced avocado and make the lime-cilantro-avocado trifecta complete!)

Yes, friends, this is a very green soup.  It is also ABSOLUTELY AMAZING.

Fragrant, tangy, savory, interesting, filling, a complete meal, yet light-tasting... this goes in the soup hall of fame.

It's also a very flexible recipe.  You make the broth, adjust it to your taste, then strain it and add whatever you want.  This time, I omitted the lemongrass and the corn, reduced the chilies, subbed onion for shallot and mixed greens for spinach.  Then I added squash, heart of palm, and cooked soba noodles.  You know... you're not going to mess it up.

I also made some changes in the method: I toasted and ground the spices before adding them to the cooking oil, and I sauteed the tofu, squash, and heart of palm separately before adding them to the soup.

Green Curry Noodle Soup

(adapted from 101 cookbooks)

Ingredients

1 TB coriander seeds

1 1/2 tsp whole cumin seeds

*

2 TB olive oil

1/2 onion, chopped

4 medium garlic cloves, finely chopped

2+ small serrano chile peppers, thinly sliced

a 1 1/2-inch piece of ginger, peeled then grated

8 green onions, trimmed, thinly sliced

1/8 tsp turmeric powder

*

1/4 c lime juice and a bit of zest

6-7 c vegetable broth

*

1 block tofu, cut into tiny cubes

3-4 long pieces heart of palm, cut into little bits

squash (I used 3 small Mexican squash but you could also use 1-2 zucchini), cut into half-moon slices

*

4 handfuls of chopped greens (I used the Trader Joe's bagged variety of mustard greens, collards, etc)

*

1-2 servings soba noodles, cooked

a small handful of each of the following: fresh mint, fresh cilantro, fresh basil, chopped

lime juice, salt, and cayenne to taste
optional diced avocado as a garnish

Instructions

1. Lightly toast cumin and coriander.  Grind.
2. In a large pot, heat olive oil, then add toasted spices.  Cook 30 seconds, then add onion, garlic, chilies, ginger, scallions, and turmeric.  Cook over medium high heat 5+ minutes.
3. Add lime juice, zest, and broth.  Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer 5+ minutes.
4. In a frying pan, lightly saute tofu, heart of palm, and squash.  I first browned the tofu on its own before adding the other veggies, which I left still crisp.
5. Strain broth and discard onion etc.  Return broth to pot and bring back to a simmer.  Add saute mixture and chopped greens.  Simmer about 5 minutes (til squash is tender but not mush), then add cooked noodles and herbs.  Adjust flavors to taste and serve.  Perhaps garnish with avocado.  Serves about 6.

Lemony Legume Soup!

While I was sifting through google reader, Janet's red lentil and lemon soup caught my eye.  Simple, nutritious, hearty yet fresh-tasting, and of course delicious.  The tomato paste gives the soup a slightly different flavor, but the lemon and cilantro dominate, balancing out the cumin.  Perfect for a cool, cloudy day like today.

When I went to write this post, however, I wondered... how many lentil soups have I blogged about?  Is lentil soup a vegan cliche?  I've got coconut red lentil soup, soup of greens and lentils, and spite soup... and that's not to mention the countless stewier dishes, which include a coconut-lentil stew, eggplant-lentil stew, Ethiopian lentil stew, a sambar, sausage-spiked lentil-apple stew, tamarind lentils, lentil chili with coconut milk, and red lentil coconut curry.  And salads, including apple, lentil, and wild rice salad, spanish lentil and mushroom warm salad, marinated broccoli lentil salad, and warm savory lentil salad.  Which is not to mention some other dishes in which lentils play a large role, such as kushari, spicy eggplant squash lentil stew (dhansak), and lentil loaf.  Or dishes which use other legumes that could easily be lentils, like chickpea-eggplant stew with kale and harissa, dal with ginger and lime, ginger-sesame dal, and matar tofu paneer dal.

But you know what?  There are many reasons for the ubiquity of lentil soups.  Deliciousness, easiness, cheapness, nutritiousness, versatility, ultimate comfort-foodiness!  And each of those recipes is different from the others (I think..).

As it turned out, I didn't have any red lentils, so I used yellow split peas, which I thought would more closely replicate the creaminess of red lentils than would brown lentils.

Lemony Legume Soup

(from "Red Lentil and Lemon Soup" from taste space)

Ingredients

3 TB olive oil, more for drizzling

1 large onion, chopped

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 tsp ground cumin

1/4 tsp kosher salt, more to taste

cayenne to taste

1 TB tomato paste

4 c vegetable broth

1 c red lentils or yellow split peas

1 large carrot, peeled and diced

juice of 1/2 lemon, more to taste

3 TB chopped fresh cilantro

Instructions

1. In a large pot, heat olive oil.  Saute onion several minutes, then add garlic and continue cooking.  Add cumin, salt, and cayenne, and continue cooking.
2. Add tomato paste, stock, split peas, and carrot.  Simmer until peas are very soft (more than 30 minutes). 
3. Allow to cool, then puree.
4. Reheat soup and add lemon juice and cilantro.  Serves 4.

Wheatberry "Paella" with Chickpeas

Umm this has a very tenuous relationship to 'real' paella, but I'm going to go with it anyway.  Peppers, capers, and lemon juice give this stew a more tangy flavor than your average tomato-oregano thing.  I added some more veggies to Isa's recipe for a complete meal.

Let's see... I had no leeks, so I just used an onion... and I threw in some zucchini and carrot as well.  Otherwise, I mostly followed the recipe.  I'm not sure I liked how sour it was, but it was super saffrony! which was aromatic, not to mention indulgent.

Wheatberry "Paella" with Chickpeas

(from the post punk kitchen)

Ingredients

1/2 tsp saffron threads
1/2 c boiling water
*
1 c wheatberries

1 bay leaf
*
olive oil
1/2 onion
6 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1 c dry white wine (Chardonnay is great)
1/2 tsp salt
1 c vegetable broth
1 TB tomato paste
1 carrot, diced

2 small zucchinis, diced

2 roasted red peppers, jarred or homemade, finely chopped

2 bay leaves

1-2 c drained, cooked chickpeas (one 15 oz can should work)

4 tsp capers (too much?)

2 TB fresh lemon juice

lots of fresh black pepper

Instructions

1. Pour boiling water over saffron and let sit. 
2. In a small saucepan, bring to boil wheatberries and water.  Boil 2 minutes, then turn off heat, cover, and let sit.
3. In a larger saucepan, heat oil and saute onion, then add garlic and cook some more.  Add spices, wine, and salt, and cook some more.  Add broth, tomato paste, veggies, and bay leaves, and reduce heat and simmer for 30+ minutes.  Add wheatberries (drained) and saffron water.  Late in the game, add chickpeas.  Just before serving, add capers, lemon juice, and salt and pepper to taste.   Serves about 4-5.

Vegan Bouillabaisse

Or, Manhattan Clam Chowder by way of France and Barbados... and without clams.

A few years ago when I was tearing across western Europe before moving away from London and returning to the US, I got stranded by a rail strike in Marseille.  This gave me plenty of time to explore, and it ended up being my favorite city in France.  The coastal setting, the colonial-era architecture, the state of disrepair, the people from West Africa and the Maghreb, all made it feel strangely familiar--as much like St. Louis (Senegal), Dakar, or New Orleans as like the rest of France.

I don't think I've ever had bouillabaisse, but it apparently comes from Marseille.  Although this recipe sort of reverses the process, making the broth and "seafood" separately and combining them at the end rather than cooking it all together and separating the broth from the fish at the end, I was still really impressed by how innovative it was.  As any reader of this blog knows, to me, fake processed "meats" are unappealing at best and offensive at worst.  But in this recipe, Taymer Mason marinates heart of palm, tofu cubes, and rolled up eggplant in a mixture of nori, fennel, and herbs to get a slightly fishy taste.  The texture of the heart of palm, in particular, is eerily seafoodish.

This was also my first time cooking with a bouquet garni (at right).  Oh, French cooking is so complicated!

But this soup was amazing.  It tasted a lot like the Manhattan clam chowder my parents used to make when I was little.  The hearts of palm fall apart in the soup, and the little pieces of them are dead ringers for chunks of clam.  The flavor of the soup is not only lightly seafoody, but also (thanks to the herbs, spices, and orange rind) spicy and complex.

Ok, it's kind of a lot of work, but it's easy to make the stock and the marinating "seafood" ahead of time, and the next day when you're ready for soup, there's not that much left to do.  My only problem was that since I only had plastic toothpicks I didn't feel comfortable sauteeing the eggplant rolls with the other "seafood."  So I steamed them separately.

This went really well with the also-fennel-inflected Brussels sprouts and mushrooms I recently posted about.

Vegan Bouillabaisse

(from caribbean vegan)

Ingredients

Vegan Fishless Fish Stock

1/2 onion chopped in half

1 garlic clove

2 sheets roasted seaweed crumbled

3 c water

1 tsp salt

1 tsp oil

1 bouquet garni (fennel, bay leaf, parsley and thyme)

*

Eggplant Seafood,Heart of Palm and Tofish Marinade

2 sheets of nori

6 green onions, minced

1/2 small onion chopped

1 tsp salt

pinch of cayenne

2 sprigs fennel

2 c of water

3 TB oil

1 tsp black pepper

*

1/2 medium eggplant deseeded and cut into strips

1/2 can hearts of palm

6 oz tofu cut into small flat rectangular pieces

1 recipe for marinade

3 TB oil

*

Bouillabaisse Stock

3 TB olive oil

1/2 fennel bulb thinly sliced

3 tomatoes blanched with the skin removed

2 leeks thinly sliced

1 carrot chopped finely

1/2 zucchini chopped finely

2 medium potatoes peeled and sliced thinly

1 bouquet garni

6 cloves garlic crushed

4 pieces of orange rind

1 recipe vegan fish stock  (I ended up adding several more cups of water as well)

1 heaping TB tomato paste

1 tsp white pepper

1/2 tsp turmeric

pinch cayenne pepper

salt to taste

Instructions

1. Add all the ingredients of the fish stock into a pot and leave it to simmer for 20 minutes over medium heat. Set aside and let the flavor meld together. When cooled strain and set aside in the fridge until ready to use. This can keep for up to 1 week in the fridge.
2. In the meantime salt the eggplant and leave for 30 minutes to wilt and turn brown. Roll eggplant strips into a ball as shown in the photo. Add all the ingredients for the marinade together in a food processor and process until fairly smooth. The mixture will appear a little slimy. Pour over prepared seafood bits and leave to marinate overnight or a fast marinade of 1 hour.
3. Heat olive oil to medium heat and add fennel bulb, tomatoes,leeks,carrot,zuchinni, potatoes, 1 bouquet garni, and 4-6 cloves garlic. Add orange rind, fish stock, tomato paste, white pepper, turmeric, and cayenne.  (I ended up adding several more cups of water at this point to cover all the veggies).  Cover and cook in a medium saucepan over medium-low heat for  40 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Heat 3 tablespoons of olive oil and cook vegan seafood pieces. Add to the bouillabaisse and serve hot.   Serves about 6.

Shorbat Rumman

I've had shorbat rumman, or Iraqi "pomegranate soup," in my recipe queue for quite a while now, and I finally got around to making it.  It interests me for several reasons: I don't think I'd ever had Iraqi food.  I'd never put pomegranate molasses in a savory soup before (though it did go in these Syrian chickpeas with chard).  The recipe seemed to rely equally on herbs and on spices.  It's practically a complete meal in one dish: protein, starch, greens, beets.  And, googling this dish, I was surprised to see how incredibly consistent the recipe is (at least on the internet).  Almost every recipe was the same, plus or minus some lamb.

This is a really unique dish that combines textures (the diced beets are great!) and tastes (pomegranate molasses, cinnamon, and mint!).  (oh hey, beets and pomegranates are also happy together in this salad I made last month). However, if I make it again, I might change a few things.  First, since it looks like the recipe often has lamb in it, too, I found myself wanting more split peas both to bulk up the soup and cut the intensity of the beets, sugar, and pomegranate molasses.  You might think that two tablespoons of pomegranate molasses for six servings isn't very much, but it's a very strong, concentrated flavor.  Next time I'd skip the sugar altogether and just use the pomegranate molasses.

I think you can choose where on the stew-to-soup spectrum you want this dish.  For stew, see top photo.

Shorbat Rumman

(from vegetarian recipes and cooking via vegan treats and eats)

Ingredients

olive oil

1/2 onion, chopped

1/4 c split peas (or more)

4 c vegetable stock

*

1-2 red beets, peeled and diced, tops reserved and chopped

1/4 cup rice (or more)

*

1/2 c scallions, sliced

1 TB sugar (omit this?)

1 1/2 TB lime juice

1 TB pomegranate molasses

1/4 c parsley, chopped

*

1 c spinach, chopped

*

2 TB cilantro, chopped

salt, to taste

1/2 TB dried mint, 1/8 tsp cinnamon, 1/8 tsp black pepper mixed for garnish

Instructions

1. Saute onions in a large sauce pan.  Add split peas, stir, then add stock and simmer one hour.
2. Add beets and rice, cook 30 minutes more.
3. Add scallions, sugar, lime juice, pomolasses, a pinch of salt, and parsley.  Simmer 15 more minutes.
4. Bring to a boil and add spinach and beet greens.  Reduce heat, simmer a few more minutes.  Stir in cilantro, adjust seasonings to taste, then serve, garnishing with the dried mint mixture.  Serves 3-4.

Pho

It's sort of been a day of frustrated plans.  Of course the day I'd planned to go to the zoo with Amanda and then take someone else to a biergarten would be the one rainy day in weeks.  But more than with my own frivolity being thwarted, my thoughts are with my brother, who today made the decision to leave Cairo, where he's been living and studying Arabic.  Although I cannot WAIT to hear that he's made it out of the country (his apartment is within a mile of some of the most intense protesting), I know it's got to be disappointing, having moved out of his apartment in the US, sold his car, paid for his tuition and living expenses in Egypt, etc., to be coming back to the US, at least temporarily.  (edit 1/31: Now he's considering staying...)

If rainy weather is good for anything, it's for soup.  I will avoid the seemingly inevitable puns that LA restaurants seem to require, and simply say that I made pho.  Pho the first time ever (oops).

Also, I got to go to the Natural History Museum instead, and then the sun came out and I got to go to the biergarten after all. 

Pho (pre-condiment), with sesame kale in the background

Apparently, some of the appeal of pho, which is a bit lost when you're cooking for one, is that there are all these condiments-- you can kind of make it whatever you want!  Pictured below: mint, cilantro, epazote (still masquerading as basil), lime, tamari, chili-garlic paste, jalapenos.

The broth is really unique-- cinnamon, cardamom, and fennel/anise add new dimensions.  I was worried about my broth being flavorful enough, especially skipping the dried mushrooms, so I also used a little stock paste.

And the finished product looks really pretty.

 

Pho

(from Cake Maker to the Stars)

 Ingredients

1 onion, peeled and quartered

2" piece ginger, thickly sliced

4 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed

12 c water (I subbed in a bit of stock)

4 pods cardamon, crushed or 1/4 tsp ground

1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

5 whole star anise pods (I used 2 tsp fennel seed instead)

6 whole cloves

2 tsp sugar

1 tsp salt, plus more to taste

    2 carrots, coarsely chopped

large handful dried shiitake mushrooms, optional (I skipped this)

1 1/2-2 cups fresh shiitake or portobello mushrooms, sliced (I used cremini)

protein--about 1/3 cup per bowl, bite sized (I used firm tofu, fried)

2-3 cups fresh mung bean sprouts (I omitted this)

bunch fresh basil (I substituted epazote)

bunch fresh mint

1 jalapeno, thinly sliced

small bunch fresh cilantro

2 limes, cut in half and quartered

hoisin sauce, optional (omitted)

sriracha or red chili paste

tamari

*

13 oz package rice noodles

Instructions

1. Place the onion, garlic and ginger on a cookie sheet and broil under direct heat until lightly charred.

2. In a large pot, bring the water to a boil over high heat. Add the charred ingredients, the spices, sugar, salt, carrots and dried mushrooms, if using. Cover the pot and let the broth cook over medium high heat(rolling boil) for 30-45 minutes.
3. While the broth is cooking, prepare the noodles as directed on your package, rinse 'em well with cold water and set aside.
4. Prepare the herbs by giving 'em a good bath and drying them well. The fun part of eating pho is each diner gets to assemble and season their own bowls. So, you can pile "the accessories" onto one platter to be shared by the table, or arrange 'em into individual bowls for each person. Make neat but separate piles of the sprouts, basil, mint, cilantro and limes. Leave the leaves on the herbs, and let folks rip them off into their own bowls at the table.
5. Strain the broth to remove all solids, rinse out the pot and return the broth. Bring back to a soft boil and add the fresh mushrooms. Cook until the mushrooms are soft, about 5 minutes, then remove from heat. Season to taste lightly with salt.

6. To serve: divide the noodles evenly between 4 deep bowls. Top with your protein choice, then fill up with broth. Let each person season their bowls to taste with freshly torn herbs, sprouts, lime juice, jalapenos, wheat-free tamari, Sriracha and hoisin sauce.  Serves at least 4.

When dill is ok: Chickpea Rice Soup

"...Southern California was pounded by a sixth straight day of heavy rains -- with another storm on the way."
       -LA Times

I've been making lots of soup and cookies, drinking lots of tea, burning lots of incense, trying to maximize the novelty of coziness... but enough is enough.  It has not stopped raining for almost a week, and I'm ready for sun again.  Even in the bitter cold winters of Minnesota and Wisconsin there is a lot of deathly brilliant sun, because it's too cold to be cloudy.

On a brighter note, though (ha), I had forgotten how some music sounds so much better when it's dark and rainy outside.  Historical performances of Celtic music (not the cheesy kind) -- anything by Ralph Vaughan Williams -- CocoRosie -- Portishead -- Kate Bush -- Tori Amos's Boys for Pele.

Anyway, the other day I came across this recipe on the Post Punk Kitchen blog, and it seemed like serendipity: it called for all the things that were lurking in my fridge as rain and the fact of leaving town in a few days kept me from grocery shopping.  Even things I never buy: baby carrots, bequeathed to me by a friend who has gone home for the holidays, and fresh dill, which I had bought for borscht before I went all fusion on my beet soup.  Oh, and this recipe is stupidly easy: you only have to chop an onion and some dill!  Open a bag of carrots and a can of beans... yes!

I don't usually like dill, but it really went perfectly in this soup, humorously described by recipe author Isa: "There’s something seductively subtle about Eastern European flavors. No one is going to knock you over your head with cumin or turn the garlic up to 11."

This soup reminds me of soups we used to eat when I was growing up (they probably had chicken in them, though).  I think it's the inclusion of rice, and maybe actually of dill, that makes it seem familiar.  It's very comforting and balanced, perfect for yet. another. dark. rainy. day... 

I sortof halved the recipe, omitted the cabbage, and used already-cooked brown rice (I had that on hand, too--weird).  I didn't really measure the seasonings, but it turned out great, except that it was too salty.  Next time if I'm going to use all broth again (and not a mixture of broth and water), I will not add any salt during the sauteeing at the beginning.

Chickpea Rice Soup

(adapted from the PPK blog)

Ingredients

1-2 TB olive oil

1/2 medium yellow onion,chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 teaspoon dry thyme

ground black pepper

a few cups of baby carrots

1 can chickpeas, drained and rinsed (about 1 1/2 c?)

3 c veg broth

1/2 cup brown rice, cooked

3 tablespoons fresh chopped dill, plus extra for garnish

Instructions

1. Heat olive oil in a largeish stock pot over medium heat.  Cook onions 5 minutes, then add garlic, thyme, and pepper, and cook another minute or two.
2. Add carrots, chickpeas, and broth; bring to a boil, then cover, reduce heat to very low, and simmer 30 minutes, or however long you feel like it.
3. Before serving, stir in rice and dill; maybe cook a few minutes more.  Adjust salt and pepper as necessary.  Serve garnished with a little more dill.  Serves about 3.

Creamy Coconut-Lime Turnip Soup

!

I bought turnips and parsnips last week because I realized I wasn't sure I'd ever had them.  Upon reflection, though, I think I did get a few turnips in CSA boxes my first year here in LA... And there was this co-op dinner one time that involved turnips that had been dyed blue (though I was not involved in the preparation of this Blokus cornbread)...

(also note the cafeteria pan, the mismatched dishes, the juice in random jars, and the "Presidents of the USA" placemat...)

Anyway, I was like, what am I supposed to do with this weird purple and white vegetable?  I went through the indexes of my cookbooks (oh yes, that's right... I had no google all week), and it was pretty slim pickings.  Seems like the turnip (and its interchangeable cousin, the rutabaga) isn't very popular these days.  I settled on a strange-sounding puree in Veganomicon, which zinged up the already zingy rutabaga with coconut milk and lime juice.  I mostly followed the recipe, but I think my iteration got a bit more liquid in it than was called for, so it turned out as a soup.  It's creamy, rich, and refreshing all at once, though I thought adding the scallions actually made it better--otherwise you're not sure if it's a savory thing or not.  Given the coconut and the lime, though, it seems like basil might make a pretty rad garnish, too... if it were at all in season.

Creamy Coconut-Lime Turnip Soup

(adapted from "Rutabaga Puree" in Veganomicon)

Ingredients

2 turnips or rutabagas, peeled and cubed
1/4 c coconut milk
juice of 1/2-1 lime
salt to taste
maple syrup to taste
water as needed
scallions, minced

Instructions

1. Boil turnips in a pot of water until soft; then drain.

2. In a blender or food processor, puree turnips with everything else except the scallions.  Add a little water if you desire a soupier consistency.

3. Serve warm, garnished with scallions.  Serves about 3.

Sesame Mushroom... Borscht ?!

Aw, this picture does not do this soup justice.  But... that's sort of to be expected!  For this is a stealthy soup, my friends.  I was inspired by the fusion of the ginger-scallion latkes to make a similarly-spun borscht.  And while it looks like pure beetiness, the flavors are not exactly what you'd expect.  Now, Mark Bittman has a recipe for a borscht that includes mushrooms, but his is still firmly in the Eastern European idiom.  I pushed a bit further, eschewing dill for garlic, tamari, and toasted sesame oil.  It is awesome.  It's like the apotheosis of umami.

...so much so, that I found myself wondering if it might be improved by a bit of rice vinegar or lemon juice to balance it out.

Update: Yes!  A sprinkle of seasoned rice vinegar made it taste better!

Sesame Mushroom Borscht

Ingredients

canola oil

1/2 yellow onion, chopped

4 cloves garlic, minced

1-2 c mushrooms, sliced or coarsely chopped

splash tamari

1 large potato, peeled, large dice

4 small beets (or 3 large), peeled and large-diced/quartered

?4 c water and/or stock

salt

small drizzle toasted sesame oil

Instructions

1. In a large saucepan or stock pot, heat oil over medium high heat.  Add onion and cook several minutes, then add mushrooms and continue cooking until everything is soft and fragrant.  Deglaze with a splash of tamari, then add potato, beets, and water/stock.  Bring to a boil, then cook about 30 minutes or until vegetables are quite soft.  Add salt if needed (keep in mind you've already used tamari and stock).
2. If desired, allow soup to cool, then puree and bring back to warm temp.
3. In any case, serve soup warm with a drizzle of toasted sesame oil.
Serves 4-6.

Three Sisters Soup

For this soup, I followed rather closely the recipe for "Three Sisters Soup with Cornmeal Dumplings" from the blog Strawberry Pepper.  It made a lot, but it's really hearty and delicious.  The flavors confused me a little bit: the predominant impression I got was of Cajun cooking (onion, bell pepper, thyme, chili seasoning, cornmeal), but then there's also squash, and there's cilantro and lime juice,  Leila, the author, explains that the soup uses "the three sister crops that were the Native American harvest staples: corn, squash, and beans"; I just did some googling and learned more about the history of the relationship between these three for some Native American groups (see wikipedia, for example).  The lime juice gave the soup a nice sour kick, but I wasn't sure that cilantro did much after having been simmered for twenty minutes.  Which reminds me, as much as I liked this soup, the greens and squash were really soft; I would have liked them a little less cooked.

I made only a few changes: first, instead of chili powder, I used paprika, cumin, and cayenne pepper.  Secondly, I only made a half batch of the dumplings, which filled the surface of the soup.  But, then I picked out all the dumplings and ate them, so I had to make more later to add back in.

Finally, I like how in her post on this recipe, Leila writes about the mindfulness that cooking can help cultivate--thinking about where your ingredients, skills, recipes, traditions come from.  The two tomatoes in this soup were a gift to me from my friend Alex's garden--at the time, they were the only two tomatoes to have come from said garden.

Three Sisters Soup with Cornmeal Dumplings

(from Strawberry Pepper)

Ingredients

Soup:

1 TB canola oil

1 large onion, diced

4 cloves garlic, minced

2 small or 1 large sweet pepper (e.g. bell pepper, banana, or cubanelle)

1 tsp oregano

1 tsp thyme

1/4 tsp paprika

1/4 tsp cumin

1/4 tsp cayenne

1/2 c beer

4-5 c water or vegetable stock (use at least mostly broth)

1-3 tsp salt (to taste, will depend on the broth you use–but don’t skimp!)

4 c butternut squash, peeled & chopped to 1/2 inch cubes

1 15-oz can pinto beans, drained and rinsed

1 bunch swiss chard, washed and chopped

2 tomatoes, diced

1/4 c cilantro, chopped

2 TB lime juice (or to taste)

*

Dumplings:

1 1/3 c all purpose flour

2/3 c cornmeal

4 tsp packed brown sugar

2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

2 TB margarine

1 c soy milk

Instructions

1. In the widest stock pot you have, heat the oil on medium-low heat. Soften the onions, garlic, and peppers for 15 minutes.
2. Add the oregano, thyme, paprika, cumin, and cayenne, and fry for 30 seconds. Add the beer to deglaze the pan.
3. Add the broth/water, salt, and the squash. Bring to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer for 10 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, mix together the dumplings: Add all of the dry ingredients to a large bowl. Use your fingers or a pastry cutter to blend in the margarine until there are no large chunks. Stir in the soy milk, and set the dumplings aside for 5-10 minutes.
5. Add the chopped swiss chard, beans, tomatoes, cilantro, and lime to the stew. Return the pot to a steady simmer over medium-low heat.
6. With wet hands, form the dumplings into ping-pong sized balls (or smaller), and drop each ball on top of the simmering stew. Cover the pot and let it cook undisturbed for 20 minutes, or until the dumplings are puffed up and cooked through. Ladle stew and dumplings into bowls and serve it hot.

Note: If your stock pot is not very wide, you may want to cut the dumpling recipe in half so that they do not crowd the pot. They puff up quite a bit as they steam. I really like the dumplings, so this makes a lot of dumpling as written.

Coconut-Lentil Stew

Unless you've been living under a rock, you've probably heard about the weather in LA recently.  It has been VERY HOT and NEARLY APOCALYPTIC.  I do not like it.  I bought an air conditioner.

Wednesday evening, you could feel the tension in the air.  Now, in Minnesota, this happens about every other week, but in CA, such a changement de temps is much rarer.  Out of nowhere, it started raining, for--literally--the first time in about seven months.  This rain didn't last very long, but it was nevertheless impressive.  Look what it did to the sky:

Anyway, a change of weather, no matter how small, can seem significant in relation to what you had before.  The Voracious Vegan (who lives in in Saudi Arabia) writes about how Pumpkin Spice Cookies suddenly appeal to her once the temperature drops below 100.  Well, just the same, once this front broke (even though it's really still far too hot for October), it became appropriate to make lentil stew--warm, thick, hearty lentil stew.  I used a recipe from 101cookbooks, but I simplified it according to the ingredients I didn't have.  The coconut milk and the raisins (don't worry, not too many!) make this a little more interesting than your typical lentil stew.  Then, at the end, I added mint (not pictured, unfortunately), which I think worked really well with the other flavors.  I should also note that the curry powder I used (from Mark Bittman's recipe) is not your typical curry powder--it's a bit more like garam masala than storebought curry powder.  I kept an eye on the liquid and didn't add so much that I had soup instead of a dryer, stewy dish... because it may be cool enough for lentils, but soup seemed a little less appealing, given that temperatures are still in the high 80s.  :(

Coconut Lentil Stew

(adapted from 101cookbooks)

Ingredients

1 cup lentils, rinsed
3.5 c water
1 medium carrot, cut into 1/2-inch dice
1 TB fresh peeled and minced ginger
1 TB curry powder
1 TB olive oil
1/2 yellow onion
2-3 TB raisins
2-3 TB tomato paste
1/2-1 c coconut milk
1/2-1 tsp fine grain sea salt
chopped fresh mint

Instructions

1. Put lentils, water, carrot, and ginger in a large pot, bring to a boil, then reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 30 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, in a smaller skillet or pot, toast the curry powder, dry, over medium low heat for a minute or two.  Set the curry powder aside.
3. Heat the oil; saute onion and raisins for 5-10 minutes, then add tomato paste and saute a few minutes more.
4. When lentils are soft, add toasted curry powder, saute mixture, coconut milk, and salt.  Simmer 20 minutes more.  Adjust seasonings to taste.  Serve hot, garnished with chopped mint.  Serves about 4-5.