Vegetarian Gumbo

I modeled this gumbo after one that is made every tuesday at Food Front Co-op here in Portland.

Cooked brown rice for serving

2-3 tablespoons of roux (recipe below)
2 tbsp olive oil
3-4 cups vegetable broth
1 whole medium yellow onion, roughly chopped
3 ribs celery, chopped
1 red bell pepper, chopped

1-1/2 cups fresh or frozen okra, sliced
1 14.5oz can diced tomatoes with their liquid
1 dried chipotle chili (or less, depending on your spice tolerance), rehydrated, drained, and
chopped
a few shakes of tabasco sauce
1-1/2 tsp gumbo filé powder (ground sassafras leaves)
1/2 tsp fresh thyme leaves

2 links Field Roast Mexican Chipotle "sausage"
1 package seitan, sliced

Make the roux: Melt 4 tbsp butter in a saucepan. When fully melted, gradually incorporate 4 tbsp flour. Stir until thick and golden, adding flour as you see fit.

In a large pot, heat olive oil. Add onion, celery, and bell pepper. Cook 5-7 minutes until soft.

Add tomatoes, okra, seitan, "sausage," thyme, filé powder, tabasco, and vegetable broth. Let simmer for 30-40 minutes.

When the chipotle chili is fully rehydrated, chopped into little pieces and add. Take out the seeds for less heat. 1 chili + tabasco gave my gumbo a very strong kick.

Serve over brown rice. Serves 7-9

homemade sun-dried tomatoes

courtesy of ms. Lauren Baker who showed me how to make these the other night.
suuuuper easy and so good.

ingredients:
beautiful tomatoes - heirloom preferably, since they are prettier and taste good. long slices.
salt = joy of my life. lots (within reason)
olive oil. some
oven.

place tomatoes on a baking stone or tray. drizzle and sprinkle respectively, a healthy amount of olive oil and salt.
roast them for about 1.5 hours at 300F. They caramelize and get chewy and a bit syrupy. they are amazing.

put on salads. with pasta. on pizzas.

Pumpkin, Fennel and Mozzarella Calzones

I made calzones for the first time last night, and they turned out very well. I followed a basic crust recipe that I found online, and it worked pretty well. I'd definitely be interested in hearing about other calzone dough ideas though, since I think there was room for improvement. The filling I made up myself.

Makes 4 calzones

Dough:

1 package yeast
1 cup lukewarm water
1/2 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt (might be good with 1.5 tsp or 2 tsp)
1 T olive oil

Put yeast in bowl w/ water, sugar and salt - let sit for 15 minutes. Add flour, and mix with hand. The dough should seem almost too dry at first. Kneed for 10 minutes, until the dough becomes elastic and flour is completely incorporated. Put olive oil in a bowl and roll the dough in it so it becomes covered in oil. Let rise for 1 hour in a warm place, until doubled in size. Divide into 4 pieces, and let rise another 15 minutes.


Filling - this can be altered depending on what you have in the house:

1 medium onion
1 cup kabocha squash (or pumpkin), peeled and sliced very thin (I used a grater).
6 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 tomato, chopped
1/2 cup sun dried tomatoes
1 small fennel bulb
dash of wine
dash of balsamic vinegar
dash of salt
dash of pepper
dash of marjoram
dash of basil
dash of sage
olive oil
grated mozzarella cheese

In a saucepan, cook onions, garlic and fennel in olive oil. Once onions start getting soft, add the thinly sliced squash. Cook for a few minutes, then add tomatoes and sun dried tomatoes. Add wine, vinegar, salt, pepper, marjoram, basil, sage. Cook until the squash is tender. Set aside.

Optional: Sautee some Italian sausage (we used fully cooked chicken sausage) in a pan, and have that ready to add to the calzones as well.

TO FILL:

Take a ball of dough and roll it out with a rolling pin into a circle. Scoop in some of the squash mixture, and a generous amount of mozzarella cheese onto one half of the circle. Add sausage (if desired). Fold the dough over, and pinch the folds together. Make sure that they are completely sealed. Set calzone onto a greased baking sheet, brush with a mixture of egg and water, and cut two slits in the dough to allow release of air.

Bake at 425 degrees for about 20 minutes, until the calzones are brown on the bottom and lightly browned on the top. Serve with marinara sauce on the side for dipping.

I think my friend might have taken pictures, so I will ask her and try to get them posted here. They were delicious :)

Refrigerator Pickles!

While Sandor Ellix Katz may snub his nose at these non-fermenting pickled cucumbers... I got the recipe from my CSA farm and they turned out to be delicious and super easy to make! and in only a couple of days.

Brine Solution:
1 quart vinegar (distilled or cider)
1 quart water
garlic cloves, peeled
3/4c sugar
1/2c salt
fresh dill or dill seed ( I suggest using some dill flowers if you can get them)

wash the cucumbers and place in a large container (must hold about 3 quarts of water) with the dill and garlic. make the brine solution by heating the water and dissolving the salt and sugar. Fill the container with the brine solution and add the vinegar. Put in the refrigerator for a 4 days.

enjoy!
xoxo
kareni

Anzac Cookies

from 101 Cookbooks

Anzac Cookie Recipe

1 cup flour (all-purpose or whole wheat pastry)
1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup finely shredded non-sweetened coconut
scant 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt

1/2 cup butter, cut into little cubes
2 tablespoons golden syrup or honey
zest of one medium orange

1 tablespoon boiling water
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon orange blossom water*

Preheat oven to 325F degrees. Combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl; flour, oats, sugars, and coconut. Mix well.

In a small saucepan over low heat combine the butter syrup (or honey), and orange zest. Stir until melted and remove from heat. In a small bowl whisk together the boiling water and baking soda. Stir it into the butter. Now pour the butter mixture over the big bowl of oats and stir. Add the orange blossom water and stir again. This is a dough I like to mix it with my hands to make sure the butter is evenly distributed and the dough is moist throughout. I baked this batch of cookies in a well-buttered, heart-shaped cast iron pan, but you can simply drop them by the tablespoonful onto parchment lined baking sheets. Make sure they aren't too flat or they will get crispy. Bake for about 12 minutes or until deeply golden.

Makes 18 - 24 medium cookies.

Pedro's Arroz A La Cubana Recipe

My Spanish housemate made this for me the other day and I took notes. (They were also serving it at the restaurant next to work.)

There are three parts to this dish: (rice, tomato sauce and egg) and they magically come together at the end.

Rice:

1. Heat olive oil in pot.
2. Throw in chunks of garlic, cook till brown.
3. Add in water (twice as much as the amount of rice, and then a bit more).
4. Add some salt.
5. When the water begins to boil, throw in the rice and add a couple of laurel leaves.
6. As the rice sits, cook the other stuff.
   

Mom's tomato sauce:

1. Take your mom-picked tomatoes and cut them into two.
2. Grate the tomatoes and take out the skin in the process.
3. Take a pot, heat olive oil in pot.
4. Optional step 1: Add meat in pot, cook until almost done.
5. Optional step 2: Add chopped onions, cook until almost done. (If you do both optional steps, do 1 first, then 2.)
6. Add grated tomatoes into pot as well as much salt and sugar as you like (mom likes lots of sugar!). Also add other spices here as desired.
7. Cook on low heat for about 45 minutes, remembering to stir regularly.

Egg:

1. Take another pan and heat some olive oil in it.
2. Break an egg or two in the new pan and lap up the olive oil (using the spatula) on top of the eggs (instead of flipping the eggs) to cook it. (There is, as you can guess, quite a bit of olive oil to do this.)

1, 2, 3, combine!

1. On a plate, add in rice, slop on tomato sauce and toss the egg on top.

Enjoy!

Almond Cookies

INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup ground almonds
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract

DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F°.
2. Spread and bake ground almonds on cookie sheet for 5 minutes till lightly browned.
3. In large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.
4. Beat in the egg, extracts, and toasted ground almonds.
5. Gradually mix in the flour until well blended.
6. Scoop ping-pong ball sized amounts on ungreased cookie sheets and flatten with spoon to desired shape. (the cookies will not flatten while baking, they hold the same shape)
7. Bake 10 to 12 minutes in the preheated oven, or until cookies are lightly colored.
8. Enjoy with a cold glass of milk =)