Monday, March 10, 2008

Wild Rice and Artichoke Salad



This is the recipe that originally made me realize that I didn't hate wild rice, artichokes, or capers like I thought I did. Wild rice always smelled swampy to me, and my few attempts at artichokes had left me un-enamored. This recipe seems to bring together these ingredients in such a way that lets them really shine. The original recipe was more involved and called for fresh artichokes, but generally that just seems too time consuming. By using canned artichoke hearts in this recipe, all of the ingredients except for the parsley and red onion are shelf stable, so this can be a quick and easy pantry meal.

ingredients:

3/4 cup uncooked wild rice
1/2 tsp salt
2 bay leaves
1 can artichoke hearts
1/2 red onion, very thinly sliced

dressing:
1/4 c veg broth
2 T lemon juice
1 T apple cider vinegar
1 clove garlic
1 tsp dried oregano
1/4 tsp salt
several grinds of black pepper
3 T of your good olive oil
2 T capers, minced

finally:
1 generous bunch of fresh parsley, minced

Wash your wild rice by rubbing between your fingers in a bowl of water, strain and rinse in a fine mesh strainer. Cook the wild rice with the 2 bay leaves and 1/2 tsp salt in about 1-3/4 to 2 c water. If there is water leftover after almost all the grains have split and popped, then drain off the rest of the liquid and remove the bay leaves.

While the wild rice is cooking, chop the onion thinly, and quarter the artichoke hearts lengthwise. Once the wild rice is finished cooking put it in a large bowl to cool. I usually add the onion at this point, since the heat of the rice partially cooks them and takes the edge off their bite. If you really like raw onion, feel free to keep them aside until the wild rice is cooled.

Next mix up the dressing. I find the easiest way to do this is to measure the ingredients for the dressing into a small tightly sealing container and shake. Once the dressing is emulsified, you can combine everything. Don't forget to add lots of fresh parsley, as much as you can stand, it really brightens it. I think this salad is best at room temperature because the flavors are dulled too much by cold. It's okay to prep ahead and refrigerate though, just give it a chance to come up to room temperature before serving.

Easy Big Bread



I've been sick for almost a week now, but life carries on, and we were running out of baked goods, so I decided to try out this recipe for bread that's faster than the overnight rise needed for the No Knead Bread recipe. Since the rise time was low for this bread I decided to try to compensate by increasing the gluten. I replaced 3 tablespoons of the flour with vital wheat gluten. Unfortunately I don't think that the kneading time was sufficient to thoroughly activate the gluten. The result is a very light, soft bread with a delicate crumb. It's really best toasted. It's a bit like what our local grocery store bakery sells as peasant bread or portuguese bread. It was a nice change of pace from the No Knead Bread, but I'm not sure that it really qualifies as spectacular. I think the No Knead Bread has a lot of flavor from the slow rise that is easy to overlook, until it's not there as with this bread. This bread is perfectly good toasted around a simple sandwich, but it isn't really the sort of bread that I would sit down and eat a slice of plain, and sometimes that's just what I like to do.

Friday, March 07, 2008

Veganomicon: Chickpea Noodle Soup


*cough*, *cough*, *snif*, *snif*
I've been under the weather for the better part of the week. We've had pizza that I fully intended to blog, but then lost the will to photograph, and Chinese food from the local restaurant that was gloriously greasy, spicy, and comforting. Finally yesterday I decided it was time to nourish myself with something home-cooked.

I decided it was time to try out the highly acclaimed Chickpea Noodle Soup. It was warm and rich and comforting. My first impression was that the noodles soaked up far more of the liquid than I thought they would, to the point where it was almost a very saucy pasta dish rather than a soup. It was very good and highly addictive though. My only quibble is that I couldn't finish the whole pot in one sitting (even my stomach has limitations) and the second day it just wasn't the same. Miso doesn't reheat well and the mushroom flavor seemed to take over the dish. I ended up adding enough seitan cooking broth to thin it out and frozen corn and peas to brighten the flavor. I think I might try this again, but without the mushrooms, and maybe adding something green...

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

Seitan Pot Pie with Brussels Sprouts and Biscuits



Seitan Pot Pie is one of our favorites. It's usually the first menu suggestion out of Paul's mouth whenever we have seitan in the house. I've even blogged a recipe here before. Tonight's version included brussels sprouts and was made using the Simple Seitan from Veganomicon. I'm really pleased with the way it turned out. The broth turned out very flavorful, even without any added salt.

Ingredients
2 tsp olive oil
2 med carrots, diced
2 med celery stalks, diced
1 large onion, diced (tonight I used red onion, it lent a nice sweet flavor)
approximately 1 lb seitan, either home-made or store bought
4 cups seitan broth or a light chicken-flavored broth (I like No-Chicken broth by Imagine Foods)
1/2 lb brussels sprouts quartered
2 cloves of garlic, pressed or minced finely
2 bay leaves
1-2 tsp dried thyme
1/4 tsp dried basil
1/4 tsp dried sage
1/4 tsp dried rosemary, crushed
1 cup frozen corn
1 cup frozen peas
2-4 tsp corn starch and cold water (we like our potpie soupy, but if you like yours more of a gravy consistency, then add more cornstarch and/or use less broth)

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

Saute the onion, celery, and carrots in the olive oil until softened. Add the seitan and brussels sprouts and stir to coat everything with oil, saute for another minute or two, it's ok if things start to stick to the bottom a bit because they'll release when you add the broth. Add the garlic, herbs, and broth. Raise the heat to high until the broth boils, add the cornstarch mixed with a small amount of cold water (just enough to dissolve it), and then simmer on low while you prepare your favorite biscuit dough and the oven finishes preheating.

For this, I made the biscuits from the Leek and Bean Cassoulet, making sure to stir and combine everything more thoroughly this time. I used regular all-purpose flour this time and the biscuit dough was much softer and stickier. Instead of working it with my hands I used 2 spoons to form drop biscuits on the top of the potpie.

Just before adding the biscuits, I added the frozen corn and peas to the pot and stirred to combine. Remove the 2 bay leaves. Taste the broth now and make any adjustments for seasoning before you top with the biscuits. Then the entire thing goes into the preheated oven and bake for 15 to 20 minutes until the biscuits are cooked through and slightly browned.

Sunday, March 02, 2008

FatFreeVegan: North African Chickpea and Kale Soup


I know I said last time that Paul doesn't like kale, but I had to use up the rest of the bunch that I had bought because it was starting to go wilty. I also had chickpeas and I always have carrots so this soup made a lot of sense. This recipe was our second win for kale!

Veganomicon: Braised Seitan with Brussels, Kale, and Sundried Tomatoes



We love seitan and brussels sprouts. Unfortunately Paul isn't so fond of kale, so I served it over linguini to sweeten the deal. The recipe called for 2 Tbs of oil with a note to add more if necessary and I was pretty much ready to cut way back on the oil because the only sundried tomatoes I could get were the kind packed in oil. But I went with the recipe for the sake of the whole staying-faithful-to-recipes-as-they-are-written experiment, and it didn't turn out oily in the least. The seitan soaked up a lot of the oil, but without seeming greasy. It also left a lot of fond on the bottom of the pan to be deglazed by the broth and wine. Everything was cooked just right, the flavor was spot on. The only problem was that I overcompensated for the saltiness of the seitan and stock based on the the last recipe and didn't add the salt called for in the recipe. I wanted to get this dish plated up before the kale went beyond done, but I should have taken the extra time to really taste and adjust the salt. The result was that the dish wasn't quite seasoned enough.