Simple chili, carrot soup and roasted veggies

There are probably a few meals I am leaving out in trying to maintain this blog, but I guess its the ones that were memorable that count anyway...

The other day I had a hankering for a good old-fashioned vegetarian chili, but I guess when I say old-fashioned I mean this based on my memory of chili the way my aunt used to cook it when I was a child. Her way, atleast the way I remember it started with cans of various kinds of beans (I used Northern white, Kidney and chili beans), stewed tomatoes and onions. So, I recreated a memory and boy was it yummy! I also added green chilies because I thought that sounded good.

Now, the Carrot soup was indeed from Katzen's Moosewood book! The recipe seemed pretty predictable...now that I am a well seasoned cook :) I could even predict the unpredictable, yet characteristic Katzen-esque ingredients which included yogurt and nuts. I brought this soup over to a girl-friend's house for a lunch date and I believe it was a hit, so thanks again to Katzen for a healthy twist to an otherwise ordinary carrot soup.

Lastly, tonight's dinner-fare was envisioned from a combination of my hungry belly and the vegetables in my refrigerator & was orchestrated with help from the world-wide web. Roasted veggies! The veggies that I used were Brussel sprouts (I had frozen on-hand), carrots (left-over from the purchasing of ingredients for carrot soup) and yams. I tossed these veggies in olive oil, canola oil, balsamic vinegar, salt, pepper and spices. Baked for 1 hr at 425 degrees. It was delicious!

Branching out

Well, I have to explain the long gap in time between posts this time...

I have branched out from Katzen cook-books and I have begun to look online and experiment in the kitchen.

Since my last post, I have made:

Mushroom Risotto: Here is the link to the recipe I found click here

I enjoyed this recipe very much...I didn't use the white wine, as we did not have any at home

Sopa de Espinacas: Here is the link I found click here

I loved this recipe!

Using preparation steps #1, 3, 4 and 5, I have found that you can create so many different kinds of delicious blended soups! Using these steps I have made many soups and it will be the base for many soups to come. So far, I have made a soups with french beans, carrots and cabbage, another soup with kale another with collards and another with chard.

For the Holidays I made Carrot-Orange cookies click here and Rum balls click here

So instead of abandoning this blog I have decided to continue sharing my adventure...even if it is no longer strictly cooking with Katzen!

Recipe #10, 11, 12 and #13 Thanksgiving!

As I said in my last post, I was going to have recipe #9 for dinner. Well, recipe #10 was Pesto Polenta Spoonbread and I ate it with Cabbage soup leftovers the next night. The spoonbread was very delicious! It was a sort of souffle I guess and it was best right when it was finished. The leftovers were so-so.

Recipe #11 was #1 of Katzen's "Variations on a cream of tomato" soup section in the Enchanted Broccoli Forrest. This cream of tomato soup was nothing to write home about but I had been craving tomato soup on a chilly Fall day and one always seems to have all the fixings for tomato soup in the cupboards so I didn't need to make a trip to the grocery store.

Recipe #12 was sooooooooooooo good and in my opinion was NOT pudding, it was more like moose! I made Katzen's Chocolate pudding one day when I had been craving something sweet. Even my friend who was quite the skeptic tasted this "pudding" and thought it was wonderful.

Recipe #13 was a repeat as I wanted to make a "stuffing-like" dish for Thanksgiving...so I borrowed my step-mom's Moosewood cookbook and cooked the Vegetable Almond Medley to share tonight. Originally we were going to travel to my husband's family but since the roads are iced over I will be bringing this dish over to share with my dad again, well good thing they liked it!

OK, until next time....Happy Thanksgiving!

A more personal approach

At a party the other night, a friend recommended taking a more personal approach to this blog.

If you are following this blog and saw my sad postings of recipes (as my friend says, "everyone can just pick up Katzen's books if they wanted the recipe") I do apologize, but I am new to this blogging thing...I mean besides our India blog which didn't take much effort as traveling presents one with a multitude of intriguing blog-worthy things to write about. (Please note that I tried to add a personal touch with brief commentary mixed in with the recipes)

Anyway, I don't think I could keep up with the blog if I were to sit down and write recipes in between my cooking adventure, so this change is all for the better I suppose...so thanks "anonymous friend" who gave me some good blogging advice. I am writing this posting as recipe #9 is cooking on the stove and I have only posted two things that I have cooked, so as you can see I am still enjoying my new-found passion for cooking with Katzen!

I am just going to list the last seven recipes and a few things I've learned so that I can feel caught-up and continue to cook some more tasty things.

Recipe #3...(I already listed two recipes)

Rugelach

This is a delicious dessert I prepared, as I had the sweet-tooth. I ended up taking some to share at a Buddhist dedication ceremony I was invited too. I did look it up on Wikipedia, as I was curious about the origin of a dessert with such a funny name. I actually remember having this before...I think out of a package from Trader Joes at some point. So, the dessert is actually a Jewish pastry made in the shape of a crescent after rolling a triangle of dough around filling. Katzen's recipe called for a filling of semi-sweet chocolate, sugar, cinnamon and nuts. They were a hit with the lovely Buddhist crowd and I enjoyed a batch at home as well :)

Recipe #4 (This one is actually from The Moosewood cookbook. I cooked this dish for my dad and step family after the Buddhist ceremony and this is the Katzen book they own)

Vegetable Almond Medley

This dish might be my favorite one yet! It was pleasantly light, tasty and satisfying. The almonds-made into a milk in a blender and then poured over the top acted as a cheesy-like texture and really pulled this casserole together and then the crunch of the bread crumbs and almond mixture on top made it crunchy and "stuffing"like...yum yum...who doesn't like stuffing? Even my little brothers liked it.

Recipe #5 (I made this for my friends birthday and I think it was a hit as by the end of the evening it was almost all gone)

Humble Vegetable Casserole

This called for Caraway Seeds and mushrooms but I didn't have either. It had eggs. pickles and paprika and reminded me of deviled eggs. It was tasty, but would have been better with the mushrooms. I have yet to use Caraway seeds. Katzen seems to like these seeds and I've skipped them too many times (I skipped them in this dish and Recipe # 6 the Dill pickle potatoes which I didn't like all that much and I'm wondering if the caraway seeds really would have made that much of a difference)

Recipe #7

Simple Tomato salad (I found this recipe online CLICK HERE TO SEE at Mollie Katzen online. My mother-in-law had given us tomatoes from her plants and I wanted to make something out of them before they went bad. This was a simple straight-forward dish and really brought out the flavor of the tomatoes)

Recipe #8

Carrot cake (My husband put in a request for carrot cake for his birthday. I found this recipe by searching for Mollie Katzen and carrot cake online...I guess she has a dessert book! The cake turned out pretty good but was more of a loaf or heavier sweet-bread. I also thought a carrot cake needed cream cheese frosting and she didn't have a recipe for frosting for this cake so I used her Orange-cream cheese frosting in the Enchanted Broccoli Forrest book that was supposed to go with the Carob Fudge Torte. Not really the type of carrot cake we were looking for, but good with coffee in the morning.)

Recipe #9...and my dinner tonight was:

Swedish Cabbage Soup

I finally used caraway seeds and I am glad I did! Those little seeds add a lot of flavor. The soup was very good, but tomorrow I will put yogurt on top like it suggested.

What I've learned so far...

#1 Most every recipe calls for onions and potatoes

#2 One of the recipes called for "a scant 2 cups water"...I called my lovely knowledgeable husband who told me that means to put a bit less than.

Recipe #2

The second recipe I tried: (pg. 187) Enchanted Broccoli Forrest

Tofu, Spinach & Walnut Loaf

a little oil for the pan

1 Tbs peanut or canola oil (I used canola)

2 cups minced onion

1/2 lb mushrooms, minced

6 large cloves garlic, minced (I discovered my love for the garlic press!)

1 cup ground walnuts

2 lbs fresh spinach, minced-or 2 10-oz packages frozen chopped spinach, defrosted, and thoroughly drained ( I used fresh spinach...but not the whole 2 lbs that seemed like too much, plus I was sick of mincing :) )

(Ashby told me after I could have used the food processor, but I sort of like the idea of using minimal machinery)

optional: 1/3 cup dry sherry (I did not use this as I did not have it)

1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce (this does have anchovies in it, in case you do not eat fish...sorry Ashley who I shared this dish with..I did not know that it had anchovies :( )

1 tsp salt

1 Tbs soy sauce

1/2 lb firm tofu, mashed

1 1/2 cup cooked brown rice

fresh black pepper to taste

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

Dilled Horseradish sauce (p. 108)

paprika for the top

Recipe #1

The first dish I cooked from Enchanted Broccoli Forrest (pg. 226):

Brazilian stuffed peppers

Ingredients:

4 large able-to-stand bell peppers

1 Tbs olive oil

1 cup onion

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup minced green olives

minced black olives

1/2 cup uncooked cream of wheat cereal (crazy!)

1/4 cup water

3 hard-boiled eggs, minced (yolks optional) (I included yolks)

1/2 cup raisins or currants (I used black raisins because I couldn't find currants at Albertsons. Ashby said that golden raisins would be better)

freshly ground black pepper

3 cups stewed tomatoes, fresh or canned (I used canned...If you use fresh WOW you rock!)