Blatherings of Boredom

Spur of the moment dealio with the kohlrabi from our CSA share.

I had four small kohlrabi with greens, two green and two purple bulbs.

I cut off the greens and chopped them, setting them aside.

Cut the kohlrabi into chunks, tossed with olive oil and garlic. Stared for a bit at those on a half sheet while the oven preheated to 450F and reached for some new red potatoes, which I halved or quartered and tossed with more olive oil and garlic. I'm out of ghee and regular oil, so I used olive.

Those roasted for 20 minutes. Meanwhile I got some other stuff together. Some oil into a frying pan--generous amount. Ghee would work, too.

Heated up the oil, then tossed in about a teaspoon of black mustard seed. When that began to pop, I added about a half tsp of cumin seed, a teaspoon of some really fragrant curry powder, and one chopped up yellow onion. Stirred and tossed, added a bit more oil, a bit more curry powder. When the onions started to turn ever so translucent, I added a bowlful of chopped sweet peppers. I suppose I used 7-ish of the mini peppers, equivalent to one or two of the big long sweet italian peppers or one large bell pepper. After the pepper started to soften, I added the chopped greens, some salt, and a half cup of water. Stared a bit and added some aleppo pepper.

When the oven beeped, I added the potatoes and kohlrabi, stirred well to coat, then put a lid on/vented and cooked for another 5-10 minutes. That's exactly when the brown basmati rice was done. Perfect.

Ate with pappadums. Raita would've been nice, but I'm lazy.

This was beautiful. Sadly, I forgot to turn off the stove and burnt a bit of the leftover curry. It's still edible, but the super bright colors are now dull.

About 2lbs skinless chicken thighs, one jar of Dulcet's Tangy & Peppery Moroccan Sauce, half a yellow onion (chopped). Toss it in the crockpot. And a handful of dried apricots (quartered) and 2/3c brown jasmine rice. Stir. After an hour on high, pour in just enough hot water to make it look slightly soupy and push the rice down into the water. Cook on high until bubbles show up at the edges, then reduce to low.

When you get back from puddle stomping, turn off the heat. Drain and rinse a can of chickpeas, stir in. Let them sit to heat through, then eat.

I put this in the crockpot at 11, turned off the heat at 5:30.

Ronan and I just returned from a trip to Florida. We flew to Orlando, rented a car, and drove to Melbourne. We stayed with my brother for a few days, then returned to Orlando, dropped off the rental, and got on the Amtrak headed south.

At West Palm Beach, we transferred to the Tri Rail (regional rail) and went one station south to meet my MiL and her sister.

Tom's grandma Mary turned 90 Saturday. Her daughters decided the best surprise would be a visit from Ronan. They kept it secret until we walked in.

Anyhow, it was a lovely visit. The night before we left, I was up late and found myself paging through a random freebie booklet cookbook. I found a chicken with cranberries crockpot dish. It was pretty much this recipe, though it called for a quartered/skinned broiler (about 3.5lbs) and used a beurre manié instead of a slurry. I copied it out by hand (crampy, I rarely write these days) and brought it home.

I just made it today, using 3.5lbs of boneless skinless thighs.

Yum.

It's really good. I might up the cinnamon next time.

A miso maker I happen to like makes very small, very limited batches of miso tamari a couple times a year. It's frequently made from their chickpea miso or their adzuki bean miso, both of which are gluten-free and soy-free. So a couple times a year, I place an order for the tamari and a couple things of miso.

The trick has been finding ways to really *enjoy* this handcrafted tamari without wasting it. Meat recipes always use a ton of it in marinade and sauce. Teriyaki really blows through it.

We've found that the trick is to use it on veggies. Nothing with heavy sauces. Instead, we go for light dressings on raw or lightly steamed veggies. There are a few in Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian which work on green beans, asparagus, broccoli, etc.

I've been making a miso slaw. Shredded cabbage, sesame oil, ume plum vinegar, tamari, white pepper, adzuki miso (heavy and red), some water, ginger, and garlic. Our salted chilies looked scary, so I'm not using those. Today I added crushed red pepper, sometimes I don't. Or I use a random chili paste from the fridge. Need to make more salted chilies soon. Fortunately, peppers are in season. I pour the dressing over the cabbage, toss, and weigh it down. Every 10-15 minutes, I toss it again, and put the plate and bottles back on top. After half an hour or an hour, it's ready to eat, but the longer it sits, the better it tastes.

Yum.

It needs sesame seeds, but I'm out.

Steamed in microwave two minutes:
one small vidalia, cut into chunks
a handful of garlic scapes, cut into small pieces
one yellow bell pepper, sliced

Add to a pan of hot oil (don't pour it in, reuse the liquid in a few minutes). Toss some cleaned snow peas into the steaming vessel--those get one minute in the microwave.

Stir the food around. Add about an inch of grated ginger and two chopped garlic cloves. Stir around some more.

Add the stems of baby broccoli, chopped. Add a half cup of beef broth and a few dashes of vinegar. (Actually, it was one beef stock concentrate packet in a half cup of water). Some white pepper. The blossoms of the baby broccoli and one bunch of yu choi, chopped into 1-2" lengths. Stir around. Add the snow peas and a handful of bean sprouts. Cover for one minute on pretty high heat.

Stir in about a half cup of cornstarch slurry and stir to thicken, take off heat. Season at the table with salt and sriracha. Bemoan the lack of sesame oil in the house. Eat over brown rice. Eat a second bowl over brown rice cake cooked in beef broth, because the rice was leftover and is all gone.

I'm putting my mother's three cheese lasagne recipe here so that I can memory market and keep it around. I generally use Muir Glen tomato sauce (organic) and Tinkyada brown rice noodles--cook them a little less than the package says. You can make the sauce thinner and let the dry noodles soak it up, but I never do. If mixed up before the noodles boil, the dried minced onion soaks up all the liquid, so I often add an extra small can of sauce or a 6oz can of tomato juice.

Cheese Lasagne

1 (15 oz.) can Hunts Tomato Sauce
½ C. minced onion
½ t. garlic powder
2 t. Italian herb seasoning
2 eggs, beaten
1 (16 oz.) carton ricotta cheese
1 (8 oz.) pkg. lasagna (I use 6 noodles)
1 lb. mozzarella cheese (thinly sliced)
½ C. grated Parmesan cheese

Combine sauce, onion, garlic powder and Italian seasoning. Blend eggs with ricotta cheese. Spoon a little sauce mixture into 9 x 13” baking dish to coat bottom. Arrange a layer of noodles, ricotta mixture, sauce and mozzarella. Repeat until finished. Sprinkle with Parmesan. Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. Let stand 10 minutes before cutting. Serves 6.

Sometimes the yummiest things are the simplest.

2.28lb chuck blade roast, boneless

Quickly brown roast on all sides in hot olive oil in pressure cooker. Add a large onion, minced. Bay leaf. Freshly ground sea salt & black pepper. One cup red wine, half cup water. Bring to pressure, rock gently for 35 minutes. Let cool naturally. Remove roast, thicken broth with cornstarch (dissolved in cold wate, natch).

We ate it over leftover brown rice. I'm sure it would've been great with celery, carrots, and potatoes, but we felt like eating immediately.

Notes: more salt, don't be afraid. Skip the water, go all wine.

It's the kind of food I grew up with, minus the wine. Simple, hearty, pressure cooked. Yum. I think I'll generally opt for the pressure cooker for pot roasts from now on. I'm really picky about my beef and can't stand toughness. The crockpot and slowcooking stovetop/oven methods haven't really made me happy. I think the pressure cooker wins.

Someone who shall remain unnamed likes to link lots of yummy recipes. It's very cruel to read such a list when pregnant.

This was one of those links.

I love lemon poppyseed breads. So I carried the laptop into the kitchen and got to work, chatting with baobh while I pulled out ingredients.

I did adapt, of course. Juiced a couple lemons, so just under two tablespoons of juice. Grated some of the zest, but got tired, so added in about a teaspoon of dried peel. Said, "oooh, crap" and added extra lemon flavoring (and then more, and then more). The soymilk (UGH!) was replaced with buttermilk (dry solids in with flours, water in with liquids).

Anyhow, I baked 'em. My flour mix is teff, brown rice, white sorghum, and tapioca. I filled the muffin tins and 15 minutes was perfect.

Interestingly, I should've waited. The remaining batter had time (20 minutes) to perk up (buttermilk, baking soda, etc). The remaining batter filled four slots in the tin. THOSE muffins peaked nicely--excellent muffin tops resulted. I'm used to flat muffins these days, but now that I know I can tweak recipes with buttermilk, I might just have to do that. I was taking a risk--they could've swelled and exploded, but risks are worth it with lemon poppyseed.