Why Tempeh = Cotton Candy Sangria

Who knew I'd love soy so much? 

Google is great. You probably already knew that but let me tell you why:

"Vegan restaurant nyc cotton candy sangria" 

That's what I searched for, and my first hit (thankfully!) was  Sacred Chow the great vegan restaurant in NYC where I first tasted tempeh. My quick-witted, wonderfully hilarious, life-saver friend from my previous life* Swati took me there for brunch one weekend before I took the plunge back to school. I got some tasty vegan waffles, which were great, but one bite of her dish and I was smitten. Savory yet sweet, whatever it was she got, I wanted more of it. The problem was that weeks later, once relocated, I could not for the life of me remember what her dish was called. All I could remember was that Swati, who always envelops herself in the sweet scent of cotton candy, loves Sacred Chow's cotton candy sangria. The rest is Google history.

Tempeh's great because it has a TON of protein (a frequent must for 'Chefski), it's vegetarian, and unlike tofu, it's a got an earthy, whole-grain taste to it (at least the kind I get). Best of all, this is a one-pot/pan meal, all the better for clean up.

Here's to Swati: hugs, emoticons, and Barnum and Bailey's. Twice.

* my previous life as a full-time working woman in the business world.

Indonesian Curried Tempeh

Adapted from this recipe I googled.

Serves: 4

Ingredients

2 Tablespoons vegetable oil

250 g Tempeh (1 package of the stuff you kind find at Whole Foods)

1 bell pepper (any color) sliced

1 large sweet potato, diced

1 clove of garlic, minced

1/4 cup light coconut milk

1 chopped onion (I love the red ones)

1 Tablespoon curry powder

2 Tablespoons Tamari or Soy Sauce

Variations I like: A bag of frozen veggies, a splash of pomegranate molasses

Directions

1. Even though I listed the ingredients above in their chopped stages, I really do think step 1 is the slicing and dicing. I do all of this in one go.

2. Heat the oil in a large casserole or other stove-ready pan. Add the garlic and onion and toss around until fragrant. Or, as a Hungarian friend once told me "until the onions look like glass."

3. Add the tempeh, sweet potato, and bell pepper to the mix. If you're using frozen veggies, hold off 5-ish minutes so the rest of your food is a little cooked. All in all, this phase should last about 10 minutes.

4. Add coconut milk, curry powder, tamari sauce and/or pomegranate molasses and cook for an additional 10 minutes, tossing around the mix to coat everything well with your sauces.

5. Enjoy alone, with rice, or as a side to anything you like :)

Sourdough Starter, Notes to Self

 Starter, Phase 2: Bubbly, and doubled in size in a matter of hours

My bubbly beast

Mother Starter

Notes to Self -- that is one of the purposes of this blog, after all ;):

 To feed starter: Bring refrigerated starter to room temp for an hour or so. Mix as follows to feed:  1/4 cup starter, 1/3 cup flour 1 Tablespoon + 2 teaspoons water. Stir, leave at room temp overnight, put back in fridge. Good to go.

Chicken Chili

A few weekends ago 'Chefski and I finally made it out to Ben's Chili Bowl, which inspired me to try and make my own spicy, meaty dish. At the time I felt a little bit of red meat guilt (have you ever had a chili-covered beef burger with a chili-drenched hot dog and a side of chili cheese fries? Yeah... 'Chefski and I did, and we felt it), so I went with chicken to lighten it up a bit. Next time I'll try ground turkey for a nice compromise, along with some extra cayenne so make it just right :)

Chicken Chili 

Adapted from Ina Garten's recipe on Foodtv.com

Ingredients

1/2 lb red beans (if using dry, be sure to cook these according to the instructions ahead of time)

1 medium onion, chopped

2 cloves of garlic, minced

2 chicken breasts, still on the bone

1/2 yellow bell pepper 

1/2 of a 28 oz can of whole peeled tomatoes

1 teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1/4 teaspoon dried pepper flakes, or to taste

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper, or to taste

salt and pepper to taste

olive oil

Directions 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2. Rub a little olive oil onto your chicken and lay on an aluminum foil-covered baking sheet. Sprinkle with salt and pepper -- be generous!

3. Roast the chicken for 30-40 minutes, until cooked through. While this is cookin', work on the rest of your chili.

4. In a medium pot, heat a bit of olive oil. Saute your onions for 5-10 minutes on medium-low heat until translucent. Add the minced garlic and cook for an extra minute. 

5. Add the spices, and the bell pepper and cook for another minutes.

6. Add the tomatoes and crush a bit with a large spoon (I like chunky chili -- if you prefer a smoother texture, just pop the tomatoes into the blender before adding).

7. Bring the mix to a boil and then simmer until the chicken is done (about 30 minutes).

8. When the chicken is cooked, set aside to cool for a few minutes (so the juice doesn't drip right out!), then pull it off the bone and chop into 3/4-inch chunks. 

9. Add to the chicken to the chili and simmer for another 20 minutes so the chicken absorbs the chili's flavors.
10. Eat out of a bowl or in a tortilla. 

Blueberry Sourdough Bread

Craggy n Crunchy

Feed your sourdough, make something new!

I made this for a potluck, poolside cookout last weekend. Boy, was there sun! And the humidity! And this Dennis-the-Menace-of-a-kid who squirted us all with his little water gun!

At least the water was refreshing, and the company was great.

And the food! Burgers and beverages and blueberry bread!

The pros of of this latest sourdough creation: crispy, crunchy crust. And hearty, too, since I used a bit of whole wheat flour. No real cons, though next time I'll add in some yogurt or apple sauce for the moisture lost from subbing out bananas.

To make, simply throw in 1 cup blueberries instead of banana into this recipe, and for extra heartiness, use half whole wheat flour, half all-purpose.

Mongolian Beef... or Chicken; or, Our Favourite Sauce

Like spicy? This is the sauce for you.

Pictured: Spicy chicken atop brown rice, accompanied by some sassy veggies.

I know I've done something right whenever I hear 'Chefski request "that pepper flake sauce you make." Here's one of the first "fast food" recipes I tried straight from a food blog; the resulting spicy-sweet sauce has become a go-to around here. Use it on beef, chicken, tofu, or a mountain of veggies.

Follow the full recipe and you'll have made your own, home-made "Chinese" food at a fraction of the cost  (with some oil and fat savings as well!). After you've made it once, though, you'll have the basic idea:

soy sauce+sugar+cold water+corn starch+ red pepper flakes = the quick, spicy sauce you'll love.

And to think, I used to not like spicy food! What a difference a 'Chefski makes :)

Mongolian Chicken/Beef
Adapted from Elly Says Opa!

2/3 lb. flank steak, sliced across the grain, or 2 skinless chicken breasts, cubed
3 Tablespoons corn starch
3 teaspoons canola oil, divided
1/2 tablespoon ginger, minced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/3 cup low-sodium soy sauce
1/3 cup cold water
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes (or more!)
veggies

1. Dry your protein with a paper towel to make sure it is completely dry. In a bowl, toss together your protein and cornstarch. You want the pieces to be coated, but dust off any excess.
2. In a small bowl or a mug, combine soy sauce, water, brown sugar, and red pepper flakes. Set aside until it's time to add to the protein.
3. In a medium saute pan, heat about 1.5 Tablespoons over medium-high heat. Add the garlic and ginger and cook for about 1 minute, until fragrant.
4. Add beef or chicken and cook, stirring until brown. If your chicken is thick, make sure to keep going until fully cooked. 
5. Add the soy sauce mix and allow the sauce to thicken. If your sauce isn't thickening (it's happened to me!), just mix together some cold water and cornstarch in a mug, then slowly add a bit to the pan. That should do the trick.
6. Add veggies (thawed and drained, if using frozen), toss around to coat, and you've got yourself a meal.

Banana Bread, Powered by Sourdough

A sweet treat made with starter

Whenever you feed your sourdough starter you're usually called upon to discard a portion of it. You don't technically have to throw it away, but you probably want to get rid of it somehow, since feeding results in growth, and there's only so much starter you want to have on hand at any given moment.

Herein lies one of my new-found quests: to uncover recipes for that chunk of starter I want to get rid of when I feed my cultures.

Using sourdough starter instead of baker's yeast in this version of banana bread resulted in some lovely bubbles inside the finished bread, along with an every-so-slight tanginess that kept this treat from being overly sweet or dense, yet still very moist. It's still very much banana bread; not a rustic loaf, but a dessert or breakfast treat -- the starter simply acts as a leavening agent.

To keep myself from pigging out on it I sliced it up before storing in Ziplock bags in the freezer -- all the better to microwave a slice or two as a snack. Even then, it tasted as if it were fresh from the oven :)

Sourdough Banana Bread

Adapted from The Fresh Loaf

Ingredients 

a scant 1/3 cup of canola oil (you could use butter here)

1 cup sugar (or, in my case, 1/2 cup sugar, 1/2 cup Splenda)

1 egg

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup mashed banana (2-3 bananas)

1 cup sourdough starter

3/4 cups chopped walnuts

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

1. In a medium-sized bowl, cream together the sugar, egg, and oil using a hand mixer.

2. Stir in bananas and sourdough starter, but don't overmix. Add the vanilla extract.

3. In a separate bowl, combine flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder. Add walnuts.

4. Add flour mixture to the liquid ingredients and stir together until just combined.  Pour into your loaf pan.

5. Bake in an oven preheated to 350 degrees F for an hour, until a knife or toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean :)

Moro de Habichuelas Negras (Rice and Black Beans)

Just like Mami's

As far as I'm concerned, you really can't go wrong with rice and beans. It's funny: it wasn't until I was eight or nine that I became a real fan of beans, despite their being a staple in Dominican cuisine, but what can I say? I love 'em now.

Apparently a traditional Cuban dish, Moro de habichuelas negras is black beans and rice all mixed together in one pot to cook. The word "Moro" means "Moor" (think: Othello) and thus refers to the black beans. Moros y Cristianos -- Moors and Christians -- is another name for this dish I'm come across, cristianos referring to the white rice. What these names intimate is the history behind the Muslim-Christian encounters in Spain and North Africa, a history transported to the Caribbean and commemorated by food. In my interpretation, though, this isn't just a story of conflict, but of ultimately merging together. Moro needs both elements to be this tasty, and as a product of the US and the Dominican Republic (a blend in its own right), I'm all for mixing.

The recipe I adapted this from says it yields four servings... maybe four HUGE servings, but I decided to keep this proportion of ingredients because this dish keeps well both in the fridge and in the freezer It microwaves really well (just sprinkle a little water on top beforehand), and is perfect for a quick lunch, part of dinner, or in a burrito. 

It also doesn't hurt that The New York Times considers it one of its "Recipes for Health."

Moro de Habichuelas Negras (Black beans and Rice)

Adapted from Dominican Cooking (with several changes based on years of tasting my mom's)

Ingredients
4 cups white rice
2 cups cooked black beans (going with a can of Goya makes this faster, but you can also follow my own Dominican bean recipe)
6 cups water
1 Tablespoon tomato paste
a few slices of green bell pepper
pinch of oregano
1/2 teaspoon garlic, minced
1 teaspoon parsley, finely chopped
1 teaspoon cilantro, finely chopped
1/2 Tablespoon salt (to taste)
Canola oil

Directions
1. If you aren't using a can of beans, cook them a la Dominicana. I usually try and make a big batch and freeze whatever I'm not going to use since it does take a while. Skip step 2 if you use the recipe I linked to.
2. In a large pot, heat about 1 Tablespoon of canola oil on medium heat. Add bell pepper, oregano, parsley, cilantro and garlic, saute for a minute. Add cooked beans and tomato paste, and stir to combine all the flavors.
3. Add water and rice to your pot, as well as the salt. Stir to combine and let it all come to a boil. Stir occasionally to keep from sticking. When the surface water has evaporated, stir once more and cover with a tight fitting lid.
4. Set the heat to low, and simmer for about 20 minutes.  Uncover, stir, and then cover your pot again. Turn off the heat and wait an additional 5 minutes -- the steam will unstick the rice from the pot!
5. Eat alone, as a side dish, or in a burrito for lunch :)

"Berkeley" Sourdough... District-Style

Not too shabby for loaf #1!

Since cultivating my own sourdough starter I've learned a lot about starters in general. For one thing, "starter" is a term used pretty loosely to refer to a fermented mix used to make bread, so the actual texture of the thing itself can be quite liquid or more on the stiff side, like mine. Yet again, here is proof that words come to mean different things when spoken by different people, and this is why I try to take the most relaxed approach to cooking and baking. I'm a big proponent of food-making being fun and uncomplicated, and that anyone who wants to can and should do it. I'm not trying to sell food, just enjoy the process of making it as well as the process of eating it!

Was this loaf perfect? Maybe not, but it sure tasted way better than all the debates and comments posted on various sourdough-crazed websites led me to believe it would be! They were all "I've killed off so many starters" or "my first loaf didn't taste like anything." Well let me tell you, mine was just as tangy as I like my sourdough, the crust was crispy, and the crumb (that's the inside part of the bread) was just soft enough to soak up the right amount of butter. Next time I'll be braver and let the loaf bake until it takes on the lovely reddish-golden hue of classic sourdough. And I'll dip it in some salted olive oil.

FYI: Sourdough bread takes some planning in advance -- this will take about 3 days to make. Again, most of that time is just waiting... but it's worth it!

"Berkeley" Sourdough Bread, Made in the District 

Adapted from The Science of Cooking

Ingredients

To create the starter for this bread you need:

a tangerine-sized piece of your starter, kept at room temperature for 6-8 hours

2 cups warm water

2 cups unbleached flour 

For the dough: 

2.5 cups unbleached flour
1.5 teaspoons salt

3/4 cup starter that results from the above
3/4 cup cool water

Directions

1. In a medium-sized bowl, dilute the tangerine-sized starter in the the 2 cups of warm water, and add in the 2 cups of flour.  Cover loosely and leave in a warm spot for 18-24 hours, until very bubbly.
2. The next day: In a large bowl mix together 2.5 cups flour, the salt, and 3/4 cups of the starter from the previous step (you can save the remainder for other sourdough projects). Add the water and mix in the bowl with a wooden spoon until you form a ball.
3. Turn out onto a well-floured surface and knead the dough to combine and form into a ball.
4. Place your dough-ball in a lightly-oiled bowl and leave in the fridge, covered, for 12-15 hours to rise. Once risen, leave at room temperature for 2 hours to warm up.
5. Divide dough into two loaves, form into baguettes (in my case, I formed them into flatter, wider loaves as an experiment), and place on a baking tray to rise for 6-7 hours (it was getting late when I made mine, so I only waited 5 hours).
6. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Using a sharp, serrated knife, slash the tops of the loaves a few times to aid in expansion. Since I don't have a spray bottle, I used my pastry brush to sprinkle some water on the tops of the loaves.
7. Place loaves in oven and either spray them again (if you have a spray bottle) or mist them again using the brush. Splash a bit inside the oven as well (just a bit!) to create steam. It helps give a nice crust while allowing the bread to rise. Repeat about 5 minutes into baking.
8. Bake for 25-30 minutes, until completely golden. Schmear with butter or other goodness.

 Buttery sourdough. Mmmmm....

Ania's Fresh Tomato & Spinach Pasta Sauce

Handwritten notes are still irreplaceable in my book.

Recently, I've made a real effort to throw away a lot of the junk I've accumulated over the past few years. It's amazing to me how despite several moves -- from dorm to dorm in college, from Ma's apartment to my own places, I've somehow failed to detach myself from the clutter I've accumulated.
Until now. Now, don't get wrong, I was by no means a hoarder. Still, I had a few papers too many, and perhaps just a small excess of unnecessary mementos lying around. The great news is, for some reason, something just clicked for me in the past year and a half and I realized, as corny as it may sound, that I don't need to hold onto objects as if they formed some kind of security blanket.

My home no longer resides in things, but in people.

This doesn't mean I'm ready to start living out of a single suitcase; it's just gotten a lot easier for me to distinguish the trash from the treasures.

Pictured above and transcribed below is one such gem I discovered in a recent purge of my room. A few times during senior year, Ania made this simple yet incredibly tasty pasta dish which perfectly incorporated two of my favorite farmer's market staples: spinach and tomatoes. As always, she was generous enough to share both the dish and the recipe. Just like my aunt's flan recipe, this sheet of paper managed survived three moves, and that's a bit of a wonder to me, which is why I thought it high time to save here :)

Thanks again, Ania!  

Fresh Tomato and Spinach Pasta Sauce
- 1 lb fresh tomatoes, diced
- 10 ounces fresh spinach, washed & chopped
- 3 glove cloves garlic, minced
- 1 medium onion, diced
- salt & fresh ground pepper to taste
- 1 TB olive oil

1. Oil a frying pan & place over medium heat.
2. Add onions & garlic & stir until they begin to soften. Stir in spinach & cook until it begins to wilt.
3. Add tomatoes, basil [Caronote: hey! that's not in the ingredients! :)], salt & pepper & cook for several minutes, until tomatoes are heated through.
4. Serve over pasta.