The Taste of Tomatillo Success

Guess what......

My hard work has finally paid off because last weekend I made the most delicious enchiladas with tomatillo salsa ever.  Like seriously, I got mad at Nick because he pretty much inhaled them, and I wanted him to savor them since I have been growing the damn things since the beginning of the year!  How delicious do they look though... 

Ok a little messy I'll admit but I think I could eat homemade enchiladas every day of my life.

Here's the recipe I concocted for the Enchilada Sauce : 

Ingredients

• 1 can of crushed tomatoes.
• Diced fresh tomatoes, (equal to about a cans worth)
• I'm sure you could use two cans instead, but I had fresh on hand.
• 1/4 cup of diced onion
• 1 garlic clove, smashed
• 4 tablespoons olive oil 
• Chipotle powder
• onion and garlic spice blend

Add tomatoes, onion, garlic, and oil to a wide skillet, and simmer until the water has boiled off and it's begun to thicken, about a half hour.  Let it cool a bit and pour into a blender, puree until smooth and season with Chipotle powder, salt, pepper, and extra onion and garlic spice blends.  The chipotle powder really adds an amazing smokiness to the sauce.  I highly recommend not skipping that step!

Meanwhile while my enchilada sauce was simmering away, I made this simple tomatillo salsa:

Ingredients : 

• 1 pound of tomatillos
• 1 onion diced
• salt

I boiled my tomatillos for about 10 minutes, then popped them in the blender to puree with the onion and salt to taste.  This recipe was definitely simple and effective, which I think is good for tasting your produce, but I think with my next harvest (which is currently waiting for me in the fridge) I will roast the tomatillos rather than boiling.  But either way the salsa was still delicious!

Next I sauteed a bunch of mushrooms and peppers to fill my generic Old El Paso corn tortillas with (hey I can't make everything from scratch!).  I smothered these with my smokey enchilada sauce and grated a heart attack inducing amount of cheddar cheese on the top, and popped in a hot oven to melt and get nice and crusty while I made a simple guacamole.  (2 ripe avacados, some lime juice and salt.).  And before I knew it I had this in front of me...

It was absolute perfection.  

Best meal of the year.  

Go make these for yourself.  

You'll thank me later.  

I love gardening.

Do you love gardening?

Are my garden posts the most boring ever?

Actually I love gardening so much I have been thinking a lot about screwing vet school and starting an Organic Farm / Vegetarian cooking school.  

Where fabulous people could come and cook for a week at a time.  

Like a relaxing cooking vacation.  We could do yoga and ride horses in the morning and then pick our food and then cook.  Would you come?

Bread Dumplings with Mushroom Cream Sauce

For my family's first day in Sheffield we decided to keep things low key and we had dinner at our house. 

I saw this recipe for bread dumplings in mushroom cream sauce

 on Design*Sponge and I needed an excuse to make them.

See I usually try to avoid eating bread and cream for dinner,

 but my parents arrival was just the justification I needed...

I followed this recipe pretty well...

 except I doubled it and fried the dumplings in butter.

Judge me, whatever.

I'm starting a juice detox on Wednesday if you must know.

Anyways, then we smothered them in this white wine mushroom cream sauce...

Now thats what I call a double whammy!

If you're trying to serve a meat and potatoes kind of guy (my dad) vegetarian food, 

I would recommend this stodgy deliciousness.

Cheers to that!

Then Nick and I took Lizzie out on the town to "analyze European culture."

Somehow we ended up buying her a lot of drinks. 

(In typical youngest child fashion, everything gets handed to her.) 

This college girl can definitely drink me under the table.  

I'm such a lightweight now that I'm an old married woman.

Eeeeeek!

Hope you had a good Monday!

Quinoa Pesto and Asparagus Salad

I adapted this recipe from one posted on Closet Cooking, an amazing food blog which I stalk regularly.  This guy seems to whip up more food posts than there are meals in a day, everything always looks delicious and he often features veggie friendly recipes.  Score!

Ingredients

• 1 cup quinoa
• 2 cups water
• 1 bunch of asparagus
• 1 can of artichoke hearts
• 1/2 cup of pesto, I used store bought 
• a little olive oil

Cook quinoa according to instructions.  We used one cup uncooked quinoa, and simmered it in about 2 cups of water for 15-20 minutes until it was fully cooked.  Meanwhile, in a grill pan, heat a tablespoon or two of olive oil over medium high heat and place artichoke hearts in the pan, so they get nice grill marks on both sides.  Blanche your asparagus until tender.  When quinoa is finished, mix in half a cup of pesto and your asparagus and artichoke hearts.  Serve with a little fresh lemon juice on the side.

I wish the photo of this did it a little justice because this dish was seriously delicious!  Unfortunately we were hungry so I didn't bother fiddling around with it and making it tastespotting/foodgawker worthy.  But even Nick was loving it (which is a HUGE accomplishment when the dish doesn't have copious amounts of dairy).  You should have seen his face when I told him it was actually VEGAN!!  OH the HORROR!  But after he got over the shock he managed to scarf the whole thing down.  Perfect week night meal.  This one is a keeper!

Purple Broccoli with Orange Ginger Dressing

Look at this pretty purple broccoli we got from Riverford last week.  I've never even seen purple broccoli before so I really had no idea what to do with it.  But I wanted something light and springy for dinner tonight so I whipped up an orange ginger dressing for the broccoli and served it over cous cous. 

I used two big handfuls of purple sprouting broccoli, threw them into a pot of boiling water for about 3 minutes, and plunged them into ice water to stop them from cooking.  

Ingredients for Orange Ginger Dressing

• Freshly squeezed juice from two oranges
• Zest from 1 orange
• 1 shallot
• 1 inch piece of ginger
• 2 tablespoons of sour cream
• 1 teaspoon sugar

Mix all the ingredients for the dressing together.  

I made some couscous, cooking it with apple juice instead of water to make it extra fruity and flavorful. 

Put the broccoli on top of the couscous and then pour the dressing over the dish.

This dish felt totally fresh and clean and healthy.  The orange was the overwhelming flavor, but the ginger added a little something extra.  The only disappointing thing about this was the broccoli lost its vibrant purple color when it was cooked.  

Cool As a Cucumber

Spring has finally sprung here in England, and along with the house, I think my body can use a little spring cleaning too.  All of winters stodgy meals have taken it's toll on me, so for now, I'm trying to go back to the basics, (and back to my thighs NOT touching) by eating mostly fruit and veggie based dishes.  I will admit that the sugar in this recipe probably isn't the best for my spring cleaning regime, but give me a break will ya?

Ingredients

• 1 cucumber, sliced as thinly as possible
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp rice vinegar
• 4 1/2 tsp sugar
• 2 tsp red chili flakes
• 1 tbsp sesame seeds

Mix salt, vinegar, sugar, chili flakes, and sesame seeds in a small bowl to make a dressing.  Pour over cucumber.  

Bingo, bango, bongo - DONE!

This cucumber salad hit all the right notes.  It's an excellent combination of sweet, sour, and spicy - though it was pretty fiery so you may want to use less chili flakes to tone it down a bit if you're not a real spice lover.  

Sweet Potato Hash Browns

I haven't been cooking anything fancy lately.  We've been too busy with the move for me to do much experimenting in the kitchen.  I'm just trying to keep my cooking short and sweet and move along to the next task.

One thing that has been reoccurring a lot lately is sweet potato hash browns.  Sweet potatoes are nutritious and delicious, and by cooking sweet potatoes this way instead of baking them in the oven, it saves a lot of time.  This dish is pretty versatile so nothing is exact and don't get yourself worked about about anything.  It'll turn out.  I didn't add any onions or leeks this time, but sometimes I do, so you could try that if you wanted.

Ingredients

• A handful of mushrooms
• 1-2 sweet potatoes, (grated - done in a few seconds with a food processor)
• a Paula Deen sized knob of butter
• Salt and pepper to taste.

 In a pan, brown your mushrooms in a bit of butter.  When they are tender, add your grated sweet potato.  Cook the sweet potatoes and mushrooms stirring frequently until everything is tender, adding seasoning. Depending on your preferences you may want them to brown a little to add that extra crunch, or add some more butter if you're channeling your inner Paula and if they're not getting soft enough.  Obviously its up to you!

Serve with some eggs, sunny side up.

Its pretty much the perfect dish at any time of the day.  Its sweet enough for breakfast, but not overly sweet for dinner, and obviously lunch is no problemo.  If you grate extra sweet potato, it keeps perfectly well in the fridge and makes whipping this up even quicker and easier.

A Plethora of Polenta

So the other day at the market I told you we bought all these mushrooms, but I forgot to tell you what I did with them.... They became two very easy polenta dishes.  Forgive me for the lack of a clear and precise recipe, but this isn't really the type of thing you can eff up and I was just throwing stuff together.

Ok, first you need to make your polenta.  I used about 2 cups of cornmeal to about 4 cups of boiling water.  Pour in the cornmeal very slowly and whisk as you go breaking up all the clumps.  You'll probably want to turn the heat down a bit because it tends to go a bit like a bubbling volcano if you don't.  You may also choose to add more water if its getting too thick, I added a veggie stock cube as well just for a little extra flavor.  When it's ready, pour it into a baking dish, and place in the fridge so it will get solid.

It will take awhile, so give it an hour for best results.  Then you can make up a little sauce.  OK I made this up for Nick who thinks dairy is God's gift to mankind.  Please don't judge.  I took a handful of chantrelles, and a couple handfuls of basic button mushrooms, (sliced of course) and browned them with a white onion in some butter.  I then added a cup of cream, and a few tablespoons of blue cheese and flavored with salt and pepper.  Meanwhile, I had the polenta on a grill pan to get nice and crispy on the bottom and voila....

It was good, but a few minutes after eating it I got the Victoria's Secret swim suit advertisements in my email (probably my ultimate thinspiration) and I started to regret my decision to be so accommodating to my husband's dairy desires.

The next day we had left over polenta, and all those fabulous oyster mushrooms from the market.  I sliced the mushrooms lengthwise, sauteed them in a bit of butter until they were nice and brown, added some carmelized onions to the mix, and topped the whole thing off with store bought pesto (I'm a fraud I know).

This polenta dish was much tastier and probably much healthier than the last.  It was my first experience with oyster mushrooms, and they went down a treat!  A bit on the chewy side of things, but that was good because sometimes my carnivorous husband likes food he can sink his teeth into.  The pesto brought it all together and finished the dish off very nicely.

Egg-cetera!

Dear Friends,

  

It looks like Easter came early this year.  I am writing to you to seek your advice.  I know I usually post recipes for you, but today I need your help.  You see, since we don't have a car in London, we have our grocercies delivered.  We received an order today, and instead of getting a dozen eggs, we got 7 packs of half a dozen eggs.  They didn't charge us for them, so we decided to keep them.  However, now we have 42 eggs!

Do you have any fabulous recipe ideas involving huge numbers of eggs?  What's your favorite way to eat eggs?  Do you like them over easy or sunny side up?  Hard or soft boiled?!  Please do share!

We eat poached eggs all the time.  And I have a feeling we'll go through a few for omelets.  Maybe we'll make eggsalad... But do you have any better ideas?  This seems like a great opportunity for eggs-perimentation.  hahaha get it?.... well I think I'm funny. 

Thanks for your help!

Cheers!

Kelly

Leek and Potato Soup

Our Riverford organic veggie box was full of leeks this week and I had lots of potatoes  leftover from last week.  I don't know why, but I never really cook with potatoes.  I like eating them, but I guess I always feel like they're not healthy.  But the potatoes have been accumulating so I desperately needed to get rid of them.

I found this simple recipe in Deborah Madison's book, Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone.  Gawd, I feel like her PR rep.  Have I made anything not from this book lately?  Well, I really like it!  It's just chock full of simple recipes without a bunch of pretentious ingredients.

This soup is very simple, and clean, but hearty enough for a good winter meal.

Ingredients

• 3 large or 6 medium leeks, white parts only, finely chopped
• 1.5 pounds potatoes
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 7 cups of water
• salt

Chop your leeks and set them in a bowl of water.  Meanwhile, quarter your potatoes lengthwise and thinly slice them.  

In a large (really large - we didn't have one big enough so I had to use two) pot melt the butter and then add the leeks and potatoes, cooking covered over low heat for about 10 minutes.  Add 7 cups of water and 1.5 tsp salt to the pot and bring to a boil.  Lower the heat and simmer until the potatoes are falling apart, about half an hour.  Use a potato masher to break the potatoes apart and give the soup a thicker texture.  

I added a spoonful of capers just for a little extra bite and served with fresh whole wheat bread.  Enjoy!

Pumpkin Patties with Goat Cheese on Mixed Greens

OK, OK, I know I cook pumpkin A LOT... but bear with me for awhile here.  I only have one left after this recipe.  And before we know it spring will be here and squash will be out of season, out of sight, and I'll have to start cooking food that maybe you'll appreciate more than pumpkin.  However, until that time comes I am going to shove this pumpkin recipe down your throat in hopes that maybe someone out there will decide to make something pumpkin inspired (that isn't dessert) and will fall in love with this winter vegetable in the same way I have.  

Without further ado, I bring you my very own recipe for Pumpkin Patties!

Ingredients

• half a medium sized pumpkin, rind cut off, and grated (with food processor unless you're working on your guns in the new year)
• 4 apples, 2 grated and 2 chopped
• 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 egg, beaten
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon 
• 1/4 tsp all spice

Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and mix well.  Form them into hamburger sized patties.  In a pan, melt a bit of butter and heat your patty until it's golden on both sides.  You'll be able to fit four or five in at once.  At this point, you may want to place your patties on a baking sheet and put them into the oven to keep warm while you finish cooking the rest of them.  It should make about 15 patties - hooray for left overs!

Place patties on a bed of mixed greens, sprinkle with goat cheese and toasted pine nuts, and dress with a simple balsamic vinaigrette.  And thank me, because I think this is on your diet plan.

Carrots Make a Comeback

After the carrot salad disaster I last posted, I thought I should post something in which carrots really shine.  To be honest, in the best of times I'm not really a fan of carrots.  As a kid I never had a problem with brussel sprouts or broccoli, but carrots.. yuck.  They made me want to vom.  How do you even swallow a raw carrot?  I mean its so difficult because it never reaches a point of mushy swallow-ability.  I only ever took carrots out of the fridge if I was attempting to catch baby bunnies with them in the back yard.  Yes I was that kid.  (Note : These attempts almost always failed, with the exception of once when the bunnies were too young to even move - I don't think their mom was very happy about me playing with them though.  oops...)  

Anyways enough of that.  I discovered the other day that carrots can actually taste good!  The problem is no one knows how to cook them, except maybe Jesse Ziff Cool, because I got this recipe for Honey-Glazed Carrots from her cookbook, Simply Organic.

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
• 1 leek (sliced)
• 1 pound carrots (sliced)
• 1 cup apple juice
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 2 teaspoons chopped fresh mint
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Slice up your leeks and carrots.  I peeled mine because they were really dirty.

Then melt the butter over medium high heat.  Add the leek and cook until its tender.  Then add the carrots and cook until they're lightly browned, about 2 minutes or so.  Then just throw in the rest of the ingredients... Apple juice, honey, cinnamon, cumin mint and salt.  

Reduce the heat to low, cover the pan and simmer it for about 15 minutes - until the carrots are soft.  You should probably remove the cinnamon stick at this point too.  Unless you want to eat it.  Then you'll have a tasty little pile of carrots and you can say to yourself, "Oh my!  How healthy I am!"

And you can eat them and if I'm not mistaken, you'll actually enjoy them!  They're as perfect as carrots could possibly be.  They're tender, and they're sweet like honey, with a bit of tartness from the apple juice.  All of the ingredients are mingling perfectly and the spices just give it a little extra va-va-va-voom to keep you going back for more.  

Infact, they're kinda like this music video, a tantalizing collaboration from Mariah, Mase, and Diddy. 

Christmas Eve in Cincinnati

Nick and I flew home to Cincinnati for Christmas this year and I was so busy doing nati things I really didn't do much blogging.  So I wanted to back track a bit and share our Christmas festivities with the world.  This year Christmas lasted 3 days and my waistline isn't too happy about that right now.  Here are the culprits from Christmas Eve.

Nick made mojitos for everyone and unsurprisingly they went down like a treat!

Next we have Skyline Dip - sour cream, chili, and cheddar cheese (for you non-Cincinnatians....) Made by my mom.

Shrimp and crab with dips made by my Aunt Niki....

I forget the name of these but they were preserved lemons and cheese wrapped in pastry with a yogurt dipping sauce.  Also compliments of Niki.  They were vegetarian and salty deliciousness which means I ate A LOT of them.

Then we were on to the main course, which for some reason in my family is always Indian themed.  I have no idea where this tradition comes from, but every time I suggest we eat something different I'm told thats absolutely impossible because "It's a tradition."  Specifically, my mom makes Lamb Curry and my Aunt Suzy makes a Saag Paneer type dish.  We also got nan, rice, and mint chutney from Baba India, our favorite Indian Place in Cincinnati.

Look at the spread!

As if we hadn't had enough food at this point we then moved onto dessert.  My mom keeps asking me why I never cook for her, and this is the reason.  Does it look like we need more food?! I suggested I make dessert but she had already bought it from the Bonbonerie.  Their sugar cookies are to die for so I thought it best not to bother competing with them.

We also got some chocolate cupcakes and mint brownies.  Yum!

And of course what would any Cincinnati Christmas celebration be without a large selection of Graeter's Icecream?  If you don't know, Graeter's makes the best icecream in the world.  In Cincinnati no one bothers with those silly boys, Ben and Jerry, and when a Cincinnati girl breaks up with her bf she reaches for a pint of Graeters - not Haagen Dazs.  My cousin, Luc, and my sister, Dani, helped to dish it out in all sorts of flavors.

And that concludes our feast.  Needless to say we all waddled to bed before Santa came!

Back in Action with Pumpkin Gnocchi

Hello Friends.  I feel like it's been ages since I've posted but it's really only been 3 days.  I'm sure that is a long time for those of you who lust after vegetarian recipes and quirky London tidbits.  What have I been doing?  Well the truth is mostly just working.  Nick and I have been really bad at playing house lately which means our house is in the college dorm state and we spend most our days off remedying that fact and doing DIY.  (pictures will come when we finish!)  Anyways... I wonder when we'll really be adults and be able to keep our house in a state of mature cleanliness and not university student mess.  When does this change happen?

I have two days off in a row though (which hasn't been happening much lately) so that means I am house wifing hardcore.  You know this is almost an extreme sport.  I mean I'm carrying 3 loads of laundry up and down the stairs while hopping over various obstacles, doing the dishes while listening to Britney Spears only to find out our dishwasher is broke... (but I fixed it don't worry) lugging a vacuum that weighs 100 pounds because it was probably purchased back in the 1920s or so, painting our guest room so it no longer has a bright orange ceiling (Nick has GREAT taste) then of course the main event - making dinner in perfect time for the husband man's arrival home. Whew!

So here it is Pan Fried Pumpkin Gnocchi... which I stole entirely from Steamy Kitchen

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup ricotta
• 1/2 cup canned pumpkin
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan 
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 tsp lemon zest
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 cup all purpose flour sifted, and extra for dusting
• 3 Tbsp butter, divided
• 2 Tbsp olive oil, divided
• 2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 3 sprigs fresh sage

First off, preheat your oven to 150 C or 300 F.  Combine 1/2 cup ricotta, 1/2 cup pumpkin, 1/2 cup parmesan, egg yolk, tsp of lemon zest, 1/2 tsp salt, and half of your sifted flour in a large bowl.  Mix until ingredients just come together.  Then lightly flour your counter, dump the mixture onto the counter, and mix the remaining flour in.  Knead for a minute or so.

Then cut into four equal parts, and roll each into a log, about an inch in diameter.

Then use a knife to slice these into bite size pieces.

In a large pan, heat one tbsp of butter and 1 tbsp of olive oil over medium heat.  When this is hot, add your gnocchi to the pan, cooking for a minute or two on each side until golden brown.  You'll probably have to do 3 or 4 batches so when they're brown place on a baking sheet and pop em into the oven to keep warm.

When all the gnocchi is cooked, discard butter and clean pan with a paper towel.  Add 2 tablespoons of butter and one tablespoon of olive oil to your pan  and put it back on the heat.  When hot, add sage and cook for a few minutes until it's nice and crispy and smells delish!  You can remove the sage at this point or keep it in - depending on whether you like fried sage or not.  Then add 2 tbsp balsamic and whisk for a minute over low heat.  Pour this over your gnocchi and serve.

This is a pretty good dish and is easy to make, even though it looks pretty fancy.  I accidentally used salted butter and I think this added too much salt so I would be sure to use unsalted next time.  I really appreciated the crunchy outside and soft fluffy inside, as well as the bite the balsamic adds.  Something did taste a little too bitter though - perhaps I put in too much zest.  Oh and they say this recipe serves four - maybe we're just lardy but we ate the whole thing between two of us in one sitting.  Fattys.

Kale with Apple and Onion, and Lime Butternut Squash

For the past two days at work they've been providing us with free pizza and french fries.  While every now and then I love pizza, this isn't my usual choice of food, and having it for two days running definitely made me crave a few good veggies.  I got home early tonight and whipped these two dishes up for dinner.

Lime Butternut Squash
Ingredients

• 1 small butternut squash, a little over a pound
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 2 teaspoons lime juice

Preheat the oven to 400 F.  Peel the squash, cut length wise and scoop out the seeds, then slice across to form 1/2 inch thick pieces.  Throw into a roasting pan.

Add in one tablespoon olive oil, one tablespoon of butter, and two teaspoons of lime juice.  Pop into the oven for about 40 minutes, stirring half way through.

Meanwhile, there's plenty of time for cooking something else, in my case Kale with Apple and Onion.

Ingredients

• 1/2 pound of kale tough stems removed
• one small white onion 
• two cooking apples
• 1/2 teaspoon Garam Masala 
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/4 cup water

Chop your onion into 1/4 inch wedges, and saute in a medium sized pot with 1 tablespoon of olive oil over medium high heat until the onion is golden brown.  Add your apples, chopped into wedges, as well as the garam masala to the onions.  Cook until the apples are tender and then add your kale.  To this add 1/4 cup of water and simmer until kale is tender.

Here are the two dishes side by side.  A healthy menage of sweet and tart flavors.

The butternut squash got nice and crispy on the outside, while the inside stayed soft and the lime added a bit of bite.  The kale dish also played on the same flavors because of the sweetness from the onions and tart of the apples.  Both dishes are healthy and tasty, though Nick found the kale a bit chewy.  I think this is a good meal to whip up when you need something easy and healthy.

Romanesco : The Alien Vegetable

Well that's what everyone says anyways.  When you look up romanesco online everyone says its alien.  It does look pretty funny don't you think?  I've never seen or heard of it before, but we got it in our Riverford Organic Veggie Box on Friday.  That's the great thing about this box program - its full of surprises and it introduces me to things I'd never even think about buying.

Unfortunately with Romanesco, judging by the amount of recipes using it as an ingredient, lots of people are scared to try it.  However, it tastes much more familiar than it looks - like a cross between cauliflower and broccoli.  To be honest the taste is almost disappointing.  I wanted it to taste as spectacular as it looked.  No such luck though.  It does taste good, if your not setting insurmountable standards for this little green veggie.

I started off using a recipe from Jamie Oliver - but it was pretty bland so I won't bother posting it.  Here's my recipe all doctored up!

Pasta with Romanesco and Spicy Tomato Sauce  

Ingredients

• 200 grams pasta - I used conchiglie
• 1 head of Romanesco cut into florets 
• 2 cloves garlic finely sliced
• Handful of Parmesan cheese
• Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 good pinch of chili flakes

Boil your pasta according to instructions and set aside.  In a wok or large pan, on low heat, add enough E.V.O.O. (ha I'm so Rachel Ray!) to coat the bottom of your pan.  Add garlic and chili flakes.  When the garlic is tender add your romanesco and heat it for about 2 minutes.  

Add salt and pepper, a dash of water and two tablespoons of tomato paste to the pan.  When the alien veggie is nice and tender add the pasta and Parmesan and heat through.  

  

This is a pretty decent weeknight meal.  Quick and easy to make.  Nothing you'd write home about, but a good way to try out this new crazy vegetable.  

My Veggie Burger is Bleeding!!!!!

Ok its not really bleeding, but it is pink and juicy.  All things a burger should be, if it has meat in it.  But this, my friend, is a pink and juicy veggie burger that you can really sink your teeth into.  Behold, "Best-Ever Veggie Burgers from Northstar Cafe".  I made a few alterations, if only because I was having a difficult day in the kitchen - I was out of a few things, forgot a few things and I was pretty much burning everything.  Even so these turned out really good, though they were a bit time consuming.  I was worried they might be too sweet because of the beets, but they weren't.  They were just plain delicious.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup basmati rice
• 1 white onion, diced small
• 1 pound of beets, diced small
• 2 tablespoons cider vinegar
• 1 can black beans, mashed with a fork
• juice from half a lemon
• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tbsp fresh parsley, minced
• 2 tbsp fresh mint, minced
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• 1/2 tsp thyme
• 2 tbsp all purpose flour
• salt and pepper to taste

Start by dicing your onions and beets.  Maybe I'm not that good with a knife but dicing beets was a pain - just so you know.  Next add a bit of olive oil to a pot over medium heat, and throw in your onions, cooking them until they're soft.  Add your beets to this pot, covering it and cooking it until tender.  While this is happening throw your rice in a pot and boil it.  Basmati rice only takes 12 minutes so that's easy.  The beets take awhile to get tender - make sure you stir it every so often so they don't burn.  I got lazy and burnt mine a bit.  The recipe calls for 3-4 cloves of garlic at this point, however, I forgot to add garlic.  Silly me.  Then Deglaze your pan with 2 tbsp cider vinegar.

Combine your mashed beans, rice, and beets in a large bowl.  Add juice from half a lemon, 1 tbsp olive oil, 2 tbsp parsley, 2 tbsp mint, 1 tsp coriander, 1/2 tsp thyme, 2 tbsp flour, and salt and pepper to taste.  (Note : I forgot to add flour at first, and they totally fell apart when I tried to cook them!)

Next heat a skillet over high heat, and add enough olive oil to coat the bottom of the pan.  Form the mixture into small patties and place in pan.

It'll take about two minutes on each side.  After you flip it you may want to add some cheese so it'll get all gooey and melty.

Put it between two slices of bread, or preferably a bun if you have one.

Be ready for a veggie burger taste explosion in your mouth because this is not your average meat substitute.

Vegetarian 3-Way

Cincinnati Chili is an institution in the Queen City.  Most of us Cincinnatians grow up on this stuff.  Even my family of food snobs appreciates a coney or a 3 way (or both) from Skyline.  Cincinnatians like an occasion to gorge ourselves on this stuff, especially after sporting events.  It was always great fun to get some Skyline after a summer swim meet.  (Note: I refer to Cincinnati Chili as Skyline because that's the chain I'll go to bat for, many an argument has occured in the Nati due to allegiance to various chili restaurants) 

You may be wondering, however, how my vegetarian self can eat this bowl of ground beef atop spagetti?  Well first of all I have a confession.  I tell people I went vegetarian in the 3rd grade.  This is mostly true.  I continued to indulge in Skyline for about 2 years till 5th grade when my morals got the best of me.  Whew!  Glad that's off my chest!  I will have you know that skyline does do a black bean chili which is vegetarian.  It's good, but its not as good as the real deal.

I ate black bean chili for years, feeling disappointed that it just wasn't totally up to par.  Until one fateful day when I was driving my friends back to school in Chicago from Cincinnati.  Liza's family had given her bags full of Cincinnati chili related products.... and she forgot them in the back of my car.  I meant to give them back to her, but we were both really busy, honestly, and they sat in my car for a long, long time.  And then one day it dawned on me - I could use vegetarian ground beef with the skyline chili packets and make it vegetarian!  So I stole Liza's Cincinnati Chili packets and went to work in the kitchen - and wouldn't you know it - this vegetarian chili is totally up to par with Skyline!  My meat eating taste testers claim they actually can't tell the difference.

Since I'm not as fancy as other bloggers, who come up with their own concoctions of ingredients for Cincinnati Chili I just make my mom send me packets of Cincinnati Recipe Chili mix.  If you don't have a native Cincinnatian willing to send you these then you can also get them on Amazon, here.

When I make this at home I use half a packet.

Put this in a pot with 3 oz of tomato paste.

Then add 3 cups of water to the pot, give it a good stir and turn the heat all the way up.  Add your "ground beef" - In America I was a big fan of Boca's veggie ground beef, but in England we use Quorn mince.  We use the whole 300g package.

Bring your chili to a boil and then turn the heat down and let it simmer until its at the right consistency.  This can be a bit of a personal preference.  I think it perfect when the water's boiled down to just above the top of the chili, but thats just me.  Nick likes it dryer.  Either way it'll take about 45 minutes.

When your chili is almost done throw some spaghetti in a pot.  We use whole wheat so we can pretend we're eating healthy.  Grate some mild cheddar cheese.  A (large) handful per 3 way is best.

Then to assemble, place spaghetti on the bottom, then chili, then cheese.

This makes enough for three 3-ways.  Serve with Tobasco and enjoy your meat free skyline!  Trick the meat-lovers and whip this up during a Who Dey game and see if anyone notices its veggie.  Chances are they won't!