Hot! Pink! Noodles!

Hot Pink Noodles
(or Noodles with Beet Greens and Tofu or Garbanzos)

Ingredients
1 package of noodles (quick cooking Asian noodles are best for this recipe)
1 bunch beet greens (2 cups chopped) [any greens will work, but the beet greens will make the noodles PINK!]
1/2 - 2 cups cooked garbanzos or 1 package of tofu
canola oil
1/4 cup natural peanut butter
2 T organic sugar

1/3 cup lime juice

1/4 cup Bragg's or other soy sauce

pinch red pepper flakes

To make

Fill a large pot with water, and place it over high heat to boil.  Wash, then chop or tear the beet greens into bite-sized pieces. 

Heat canola oil in a skillet over medium heat.  Dice the tofu and toss it into the pan.  Saute it until the pieces are golden and crispy.  If using garbanzos, just saute for a few minutes, then set aside.

To make the sauce, combine the peanut butter, sugar, lime juice, Bragg's, and red pepper flakes in a bowl.

By now your water should be boiling.  Add the noodles and greens -- you may need to stagger depending on the type of greens and noodles.  You want them to be finished cooking at the same time.  For the noodles I generally use, they take 5-6 minutes, which is about the same time that I use for the beet greens. 

Once they are cooked, drain the greens and noodles in a strainer, and return to the pot.  Add the sauce, and toss to coat the greens and noodles.  Add the tofu or garbanzos, and gently toss.  Serve the hot pink noodles immediately, and refrigerate any left-overs.

Enjoy!

Applesauce, Garbanzo Lentil Soup, and Wild Rice Bread

Happy New Year!

We finally returned home to Brooklyn Saturday night and I made a few things for eating Sunday. The new thing: applesauce! The old thing: a version of my garbanzo/lentil soup. Yum. Oh, and one more new thing: wild rice bread.

Applesauce
We had a bunch of apples that were near the end of their lives, so I made them into applesauce. It was much easier than I had expected, and quite tasty. The recipe is easy: take the apples you have, peel, core, and chop them. Add them to a big pot (I had Aji do this step) and then add water, some vegan sugar, and cinnamon. For eight apples, we added approximately two cups of water, 1/4 cup natural sugar, and 1 tsp ground cinnamon. Cook, covered, until the apples are soft. Then, puree with a handheld blender or mash with a fork. Et viola, applesauce!

Wild rice bread
I've been on a bread making kick lately. I dug out the breadmaker from storage and I've been making loaves at least once a week. I have a rye bread that I really like (but Jacqui doesn't). As soon as I figure out the water content for it, I will post that recipe. I've also been making a teff bread at my mom's that Jacqui loves. It keeps inverting though, so I need to work on it a bit. :) This bread turned out lovely and was relatively easy to make. Enjoy it sliced, with applesauce, with butter, with jam. :)

Ingredients
1 1/3 cups cold water
3 T canola oil
3 T agave nectar
2 tsp sea salt (finally got iodized sea salt!)
1/3 cup rye flour
1/3 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
3 cups bread flour (+4 T)
2 tsp bread yeast
1/2 cup wild rice
little bit of soy milk
4 T sunflower seeds

What to do
I made the dough in the breadmaker and then shaped the bread and baked it in the oven.
To make the dough, out the water, oil, agave in the bread maker. Then add the salt, rye flour, oats, whole wheat flour, and bread flour. Make two indentations for the yeast. Put it on the dough cycle. When it beeps to add ingredients, add the wild rice.
When the dough is finished in the breadmaker, if it is still wet, add the extra bread flour one Tablespoon at a time (I needed to add 4T) and knead. Shape the bread into a round or oblong loaf (or you could get fancy and make three strands and braid it together, but I didn't!).
Cover with a cloth and place in a warm spot to rise. Preheat the oven to 375F. (I put the bread on top of the stove to rise using the heat of the oven as it warmed up.)
When the bread has doubled in size, brush the top with the milk and sprinkle the sunflower seeds on top.
Bake it for 25-30 minutes (or longer, as needed) until it is golden, a knife or skewer stuck in the middle comes out dry and not sticky, and the bread sounds hollow if you knock it on the bottom. My bread took about 45 minutes because my oven never made it to 375. But it was delicious once it came out! :)

Garbanzo Lentil Soup
This is a version of this soup and this soup, made on the stove (instead of the crock pot) and with orange sweet potatoes and white/yellow yams. I love this soup.

Ingredients
2 tsp extra virgin olive oil
1 medium sweet onion, chopped
6-8 tiny sweet potatoes, peeled and chopped
1 large white/yellow yam, peeled and chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 tsp ground ginger
3/4 tsp tumeric
3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 cup dried green lentils, picked over
1 15 oz can of diced tomatoes, with juice
2 1/2 - 3 cups cooked organic garbanzos (with liquid)
6 cups warm or hot water
2 low-salt vegan bouillon squares

What To Do
Heat the oil in the soup pot while chopping the onion. Saute the onion for 5-10 minutes, letting it brown a little. Chop the garlic, and add it for one - two minutes. Then, add a bit of water to de-glaze the pan (get all the good brown stuff off the pan). Let this simmer while you put all the other ingredients in the soup pot.
Add the water and bouillon. Add the cooked garbanzos, chopped sweet potatoes and yam, and green lentils. Add the ginger, tumeric, cinnamon, cumin, and cardamon. Stir everything well.
Cook and cook over medium-high heat; let everything come to a boil. Reduce the heat, and let the soup cook for 45-60 minutes, stirring every so often.
Serve warm with slices of bread (you can use the bread I made or any other bread). It's also good with rice or couscous.

Happy New Year!

Smoothies and Farmers Market Lunch

Saturday is my day with the girls. Dave was out at kung fu all day long.

Breakfast
For breakfast, we made strawberry banana smoothies. Jacqui has been asking for smoothies for breakfast every day lately. I think it's the heat. We had been making banana smoothies with whatever type of juice we had around for a few days because we didn't have any other frozen fruit. But Friday, we made a special trip to the store to pick up some frozen strawberries, blueberries, and raspberries, so yesterday we were prepared for yummy smoothie goodness.

Ingredients
5 pieces (1/2 banana each) frozen banana
1 cup oatmilk
1 cup orange-pineapple juice
two heaping scoops soy protein
3/4 avocado
1 1/2 cup frozen strawberries

What to do
Place the milk and juice in the blender first, then the remaining ingredients. Blend until smooth and serve in glasses (plastic for the little girls). Enjoy!

Lunch
After breakfast, we took our regular Saturday trip to the market. (When I ask Jacqui where we should bike to, the market is always her first-choice destination, every day of the week. Too bad our market is only on Saturdays.) The organic woman-run farm we love (Evolutionary Organics) had the cutest selection of fresh, small zucchini and summer squash. I made the mistake of letting the girls pick some, and ended up spending $10 on squash. We also picked up a napa cabbage head and some vitamin greens. At another farmer's stand, we got lots of fresh berries (raspberries and blackberries) -- on special for 4 boxes for $10. Adrianna and Jacqui stuffed their faces with the berries before we even bought any. For the rest of our trip around the market, Adrianna's face was stained black and red (as were her hands) from all the berry goodness.
After purchasing the delicious berries, we went to play in the park for a bit. And eat more berries. And play. After playing for a while, we walked back through the market, picking up two humongous heads of white cauliflower (they barely fit in the fridge last night), a peach for lunch, two greenhouse tomatoes, and a large bunch of fresh basil. Homeward!


Farmers Market Lunch
Ingredients
4-5 small summer squash, sliced into rounds
1 large fresh tomato, chopped
1 T extra virgin olive oil
sea salt
black pepper
1 small red spicy pepper (from our window garden!)
1 cup cooked garbanzos

What to do
heat the oil and then saute the sliced squash. Add the red pepper, tomato, salt, and black pepper. Then add the garbanzos. Saute and cook until the squash is soft. Serve!

It's so easy and Jacqui and Adrianna loved it! So much fun picking your own lunch at the market and helping mom make it up.

Moroccan Garbanzo and Lentil Soup

I love garbanzo beans. ♥ Love love love. ♥ And lentils. ♥ Love love love. ♥

Jacqui loves sweet potatoes. She asks for them all the time, and tells me that she ♥ LOVES ♥ sweet potatoes.

So it was no surprise that this morning, when I asked her what she wanted in today's soup, that she asked for sweet potatoes. She choose sweet potatoes over white potatoes, yellow potatoes, green peppers, and green beans -- all vegetables she truly enjoys.

This soup is a sweet potato version of a soup I made back in April. The recipe is a mix up of several recipes -- one from my mom and sister and a few lentil and garbanzo bean soup recipes that I've found over the years. I used ground ginger this morning because I didn't have any fresh ginger in the apartment.

Ingredients
2 tsp extra virgin olive oil
1 medium sweet onion, chopped
1 large sweet potato, chopped
4 garlic cloves, chopped
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp tumeric
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 cup dried lentils, picked over
1 15 oz can of diced tomatoes, with juice
2 1/2 - 3 cups cooked organic garbanzos
6 cups warm or hot water
2 low-salt vegan bouillon squares

What To Do
Heat the oil while chopping the onion. Saute the onion for 5-10 minutes, letting it brown a little. Chop the garlic, and add it for one - two minutes. Then, add a bit of water to de-glaze the pan (get all the good brown stuff off the pan). Let this simmer while you put all the other ingredients in the soup pot.
Jacqui unwrapped the bouillon and put the 2 cubes into the pot, then helped me put in the 6 cups of water. Jacqui and Adrianna then helped me add the cooked garbanzos (cooked last night with 2 bay leaves), chopped sweet potatoes, and green lentils.
Add the ginger, tumeric, cinnamon, cumin, and cardamon. Add the onion, garlic, and whatever water is still there with them. Stir everything well.
Place over medium-high heat and let everything come to a boil. Reduce the heat, and let the soup cook for 45-60 minutes, stirring every so often.

Beans and Tomatoes Soup (what else?)

After a week of not being home much because I was working until 2am almost every night, I made soup on Sunday night/Monday morning for the girls. Dave had admonished me to leave him with food that they would eat, nothing new. (I left beets for them last week. Jacqui loves beets and ate hers. Adrianna was trying them for the first time. She threw them across the kitchen. Hence the admonition.)

We got home from MD at 2:30 in the morning. After unloading the car and getting the girls back to bed, I made this soup up. Finished it in the morning as I left for work. The girls ate it for lunch and dinner yesterday. Jacqui really liked it and was excited to tell me that she ate it for lunch and dinner. Adrianna ate it; she's not much for talking, so I'm not sure how much she liked it. But she ate it and didn't throw it across the kitchen, so score one for SOUP!

Slow cooker, I love you.

Ingredients
1 T extra virgin olive oil
1 sweet, yellow onion, diced
1 1/2 - 2 cups of cooked garbanzos (I used cooked because I had them in the fridge, but you could also use one 15 oz can, drained)
1 can organic diced tomatoes with juices
2 cans of water, plus extra if needed
1 vegan low-salt bouillon square
1 cup sliced zucchini
black pepper and sea salt to taste
1 tsp dried thyme
2 bay leaves
two handfuls green lentils (~1/2 cup)
2 handfuls brown Jasmine rice (~1/2 cup)

What to do
At night, plug in and heat up the slow cooker while you are dicing the onion. Put the olive oil in and let it warm up. Add the onion, and let it cook for a few minutes before adding the other ingredients.
Add the garbanzos, tomatoes, water, bouillon square, zucchini, pepper, salt, thyme, and bay leaves. Cook on low.
In the morning (5-6 hours), add the lentils and rice. Season with salt and/or pepper as needed.
At lunchtime, enjoy the hot soup!

Vegan Sprouted Spelt Lentil and Garbanzo Stew

This will be dinner (or lunch) for the girls tomorrow. It's supposed to be a cold day tomorrow, so I thought a good hearty soup/stew would be welcome. This is made in a slow cooker.


I bought whole spelt on our last trip to Maryland. On Saturday night, I soaked a cup of it, draining the spelt on Sunday, and left it in the pot. Today (Monday), I left it out for the whole day, and the spelt sprouted! I was planning on using it to make spelt minestrone, so the soup is now sprouted spelt minestrone.

Ingredients
1 cup whole spelt grain
2 T extra virgin olive oil
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 large yellow onion, chopped
4 carrots, sliced
3 ribs celery, chopped
1 green (or yellow) zucchini, sliced and quartered
1 cup frozen green beans
1 can diced tomatoes with liquid
2 squares vegan low-sodium bouillon
water
3/4 cup dried green lentils
3/4-1 cup dried garbanzos -- 2 cups cooked (*updated)
2 handfuls pine nuts

What to do
Sprout the grain (or don't, but at least soak it overnight).
Put the slow cooker on high. Add the olive oil, onion, garlic, carrots, celery, zucchini, beans, tomatoes and tomato liquid, bouillon, and enough water to cover. Mix together. Pick through the lentils, rinse, and add. Toss in two handfuls of pine nuts. Cook for 2-3 hours on high, then switch to low and cook overnight. In the morning, turn the slow cooker to warm.
Meanwhile, soak the garbanzos overnight. Cook in a pressure cooker in the morning, and add 1 to 1 1/2 cups garbanzos to the slow cooker. (This is my tomorrow-morning-step.)
(I'm actually soaking 1 1/2 cups dried garbanzos to make extra to freeze for future meals. 1 1/2 cups dried garbanzos should cook up to at least 4 1/2 cups garbanzos, maybe more.)

More tomorrow on this soup.

Update: This is not a soup. It is a stew. A thick and hearty stew. I also updated the amount of garbanzos -- Jacqui and I decided to add two cups of cooked beans this morning after I pressured cooked the beans. We both thought that the stew needed more of these super delish beans!

I renamed this stew. It's not really a minestrone anymore. It's a pure stew. I brought some for lunch, so a blackberry photo will be added shortly. :)

Update: photos up. As usual, my blackberry photos aren't too good. The soup tastes better than it looks. It's a little tangy, and quite filling. This thermos filled me up for lunch.

Vegan Lentil Soups

I made these two soups last week. Both were big hits with the girls -- and with me! Both are lentil-based soups, made in the slow cooker. Perfect for days when you need a home-cooked meal, but just don't have the time (or won't be home) to make it when you want/need to eat.

Lentil Soup with Kale Ribbons
Ingredients
olive oil
1 large yellow onion, chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped
3 large yellow carrots, peeled and chopped
1 1/2 cups dried green lentils, picked over and rinsed
6 cups warm or hot water
3 low-salt vegan boullion squares
1 T Bragg's sauce
remains of a bunch of kale, stemmed

What To Do
Before going to work on Sunday afternoon, heat a saute pan over medium heat. When warm, add the olive oil. When the oil is warm, add the chopped onion, celery, and carrots. Saute unil soft, adding water if needed, approximately 8-10 minutes.
Add the water and vegetable boullion to the slow cooker, mix to break up/in the boullion. Add the sauteed veggies to slow cooker. Add the lentils and Bragg's. Cook on low for 6-8 hours.
Meanwhile, roll the kale and cut thin strips. Boil a salted pot of water, add the kale when it is boiling, and cook the kale for 5-6 minutes. Drain in a colander.
Leave the kale next to the slow cooker for Dave to mix into the soup before feeding it to the girls for dinner.

This soup was a big hit with both Jacqui and Adrianna. Woo hoo! :)

Lentil and Garbanzo Soup
Ingredients
olive oil
1 medium red onion, chopped
2 yellow carrots, chopped
4 garlic cloves, chopped
1/2 inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and minced
1/2 tsp tumeric
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp groun cumin
1/4 tsp ground cardamon
1 cup dried lentils, picked over and rinsed
1/2 large can of diced tomatoes, without juice (save other half to make soup again)
1 can organic garbanzos, drained and rinsed
6 cups warm or hot water
3 low-salt vegan boullion sqaures

What To Do
When I get home late Sunday night from work, and know that I won't be getting a meal tomorrow unless I make it tonight...heat a saute pan over medium heat. When warm, add the olive oil. When the oil is warm, add the chopped onion, garlic, and carrots. Cover and cook unil soft, adding water if needed. Add the ginger, tumeric, cinnamon, cumin, and cardamon, stirring to coat the veggies. Add water if it gets too gummy.
Add the water and vegetable boullion to the slow cooker, mix to break up/in the boullion. Add the coated veggies to slow cooker. Add the lentils, garbanzos, and tomatoes. Cook on low overnight (for 6-8 hours).
Place the slow cooker to warm in the morning, spoon soup into a to-go thermos, and enjoy a piping hot container of soup at lunchtime on the go!

I meant to make couscous to serve with this soup, but didn't have the time to get it made Monday morning before I dashed out of the apartment at 7 am. So it was couscous-less the first day. It should be served with couscous or brown rice, or any other whole grain. Jacqui and Adrianna loved this soup too. Yay!

Mild Lentil Tomato Stew

It was Saturday, still in Vermont on vacation. Andy/Toly was planning a big, fancy non-vegan dinner for the group. So I needed a big, fancy vegan dinner for me and Jacqui. And lunch. It was morning, and I had to decide what to make for the rest of the day (morning meal was a delicious tofu scramble of tofu, tumeric, sweet potato, broccoli, onion, garlic, shallots, and olive oil).

Enter the red lentils, which Dave and Andy/Toly scored on Friday after searching several stores (who knew red lentils would be that hard to find in Vermont?). Enter the diced tomatoes I had bought earlier in the week (intended for a chili that was never made).

My stew might not have been big or fancy, but it was yummy, and brightly colored. Jacqui and I had it for lunch and again for dinner on Saturday. As with all the meals prepared in Stowe, I was limited in the spices that were available (what was at the house and what I had bought), so feel free to change them up if you make this stew yourself.

Ingredients
olive oil
2 cups (1 lb) red lentils (red lentils are really orange)
1 red onion, diced (red onions are really purple)
3 cloves garlic, diced (white garlic is really white)
4 large organic carrots, peeled and diced (carrots were orange this time around)
1 28-oz can organic diced fire roasted tomatoes (plus juices)
1 14-oz can organic garbanzos
water
ground cinnamon
ground tumeric
4 bay leaves
whole coriander
sea salt & freshly ground black pepper

What to do
After dicing the onion, garlic, and carrots, heat up a stew pot up on med-high heat (or high if you are using an electric stove, as I was, that only heats on high) and add the olive oil when warm. When the olive oil is warm, add the onion, garlic, and carrots, and saute until the onions are translucent.

Add the lentils, garbanzos, and enough water to cover. The amount of water you add with make this stew more or less soupy, so go with what you like. (If I had vegetable bouillon, and not the MSG-laden crap that was in the house's pantry, I would have used it here.)

Add the tomatoes, and season with ground cinnamon (in the pantry) and ground tumeric (I bought it to make tofu scramble). Use as much or as little as you'd like. Feel free to replace the ground cinnamon with one or two cinnamon sticks, if you have those around. Add the bay leaves (brought from home) and some whole coriander (because that's what is in the spice pantry). Again, if you have ground coriander, that would work too. Season with salt and pepper.

Bring to a low boil and cook for at least twenty minutes -- the lentils should be soft. You can cook it longer, it will become more stew-like. Check the water content as you cook and make sure it doesn't get too solid. Also, check to make sure that nothing burns (the pot I was using had a very thin bottom, and the heat had to be on high to cook, so I had to be extra vigilant in my stirring).

You can eat this alone, or with some couscous or pasta or rice, or anything else for that matter. It's a very mild, delicately spiced stew that is pretty filling. Adrianna even ate some. Yum yum.

Orange Stew

Today's stew is orange. Very orange. But not orange from oranges. Orange from sweet potatoes and squash. Beautifully orange!

Ingredients
1 cup dried garbanzos, soaked overnight (makes ~ 3 1/2 cups cooked beans)
2 sweet potatoes, scrubbed
1 long squash
1-2 T olive oil
1/2 very large onion
2 large cloves garlic
2 large parsnips
2 blue potatoes
2 T liquid vegetable bouillon
water
2 handfuls wild rice mix
3/4 cup red quinoa

What to do
Cook the beans, drain.
Chop the onion; dice the garlic.
Heat soup pot, when warm, add the olive oil. When the oil is warm, add the chopped onion and saute for 5 minutes. Add the garlic and saute for another 3 minutes.
Cut the sweet potatoes into 1/2 inch rounds, then into six pieces per round slice. Add to the pot with enough water to cover.
Add the vegetable bouillon. Stir to combine. Cover the pot.
Peel the squash, halve it, scoop out the insides, and cut out the stem. Then, slice it into 1/2 inch half rounds and cut those into 3-4 pieces each. Add to the pot. Add more water if needed. Stir. Cover the pot.
Peel the parsnips and chop. Add to the pot. Add more water if needed, to cover vegetables. Stir. Cover the pot.
Peel the potatoes and cut into 1/2 inch rounds, then into six pieces per round slice. Add to the pot. Add more water if needed, to cover vegetables. Stir. Cover the pot.
Take two large handfuls of the wild rice mix and add to the pot. Stir. Add more water if needed. Cover the pot.
Let it all cook for 35-45 minutes, stirring to keep the stew from sticking.
Add the quinoa (rinse if you remember to - I didn't last night/this morning when I added the quinoa at 1-something). Stir well. Cover the pot and let it cook for another 20-30 minutes.
When the cooking is finished, cover the pot until you are ready to serve it, reheating on the stove if needed.

Early Morning Stew

This morning, I put a stew together for my family to eat. We'll see (and taste) the results tonight when I get home.

Here's what I did:

Put the garbanzos to soak when I left for work on Wednesday, so they would be soaked by the time I got home that night. Stayed late at work, so by the time I got home, the beans had soaked up all the water and no one had added more. Added more water and let the beans soak another hour. Added one large piece of kombu to the beans, added water, and began cooking beans while I took a shower. Scooped off the foam. Again. And again. Let the beans cook until 12:45 last night/this morning, when I decided they had cooked enough and I wanted to go to bed, as I had to be at work really early this morning. Removed kombu, drained beans, and placed cooked beans into fridge.

Woke up, brushed teeth, chopped onion and sauteed in olive oil for five minutes. Chopped three heirloom tomatoes after cutting out the bad parts (should have made this soup yesterday). Sliced and quartered medium zuchinni. Added vegetables to sauteed onion. Added three cups cooked beans and four cups water. Or was it six? Added one drained can cut green beans and two Rapunzel vegan vegetable with sea salt bouillon cubes (well, really, rectangles). Added organic oregano. Put pot on my simmer burner. Remembered that the spinach on the table was supposed to go into the soup. Chopped the spinach, added it to the coup, and left the apartment at 7:30 for work, hoping the soup cooked and someone remembered it.

Ate soup for dinner tonight. Very beany and good. J had it for lunch and I think she liked it. Off to have another bowl now. Need to eat some grain with it; think I have cooked millet in the fridge.