Pasta with a White Wine Cream Sauce

From Foodsies!

When my artichoke and olives mix overpowered my tortellini, I thought of making a white wine reduction sauce instead. I finished all the tortellini, however, so I just paired this with some basic pasta. And now that I have, I think it's probably best that way. It's a subtle (but delicious) sauce that I wouldn't want to have to fight for attention with tortellini. I think it's best with plain pasta - angel hair, linguine, or penne in particular.

The sauce contains no butter but captures a lot of the creamy, buttery taste of a Beurre Blanc (and without all that fat). A dab on your finger might not convince you, but pour some over a bit of pasta and the flavors will really shine. I do believe this is my favorite pasta sauce, and it's pretty easy (albeit time consuming) to make.


White Wine Cream Sauce with Roasted Garlic

Ingredients

1 Head of Garlic
5 Shallots, diced*
1 TBSP Olive Oil
1 Cup White Wine
1.5 Cups Soymilk
1/4 Cup Soymilk mixed with 1 TBSP Cornstarch
Salt and Pepper

* You can use a medium onion instead if you don't have shallots

Instructions

Take your head of garlic and cut off about 1/4 inch from the top (the pointy end). Wrap in aluminum foil, drizzling a bit of olive oil on top of the garlic first.
Bake at 400 for 40 minutes.

In the meantime, dice your shallots or onion.

When the garlic is done, remove from the foil and squeeze out the cloves into a small bowl. Mash the garlic.

Add a TBSP of olive oil to a saucepan over high heat and add the shallots and garlic. Saute for a minute or two and then add the cup of white wine.

Bring it to a boil and reduce by 3/4. This means you let it boil rapidly until evaporation leaves you with 1/4 of the liquid you had before. As the liquid boils down, you may have to periodically turn down the heat as well. And of course, it will thicken as the ratio of shallots and garlic to wine changes. Be warned that to do this properly will take a while. You can go to the next step before it's fully reduced but then you'll be missing the point of reduction (as the wine reduces, the flavor becomes concentrated and the alcohol burns off. Then whatever liquid you add to the reduction will suck up all those amazing flavors. It's worth being patient for).

Once reduced, lower the heat and add the plain soymilk. Stir. Add the soymilk and cornstarch mixture.

Simmer and stir for a few minutes until it thickens a little. It may get weirdly poofy but that's fine. Mine didn't even thicken much, but you can thicken to your preference. If it does not thicken enough, you can add more cornstarch (dissolved in a TBSP or two of soymilk) or whisk in a TBSP or two of flour. Regardless, allow it to continue to simmer (stirring occasionally) for another 10 minutes or so. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Remove from heat and puree in a blender.

Serve over pasta. Can be refrigerated for 2 days or so, although you may have to give it a stir or two after it's settled in the fridge.

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Tortellini From Scratch

From Foodsies!

I love home made tortellini. I love forming them, and I love eating them. It might take a little time, but it's easy and (to me) fun. Plus, they freeze so easily that you could spend an afternoon or evening making a ton of them, and then be set. It hadn't occurred to me before, but the same can be done with dumplings/momo. I'm totally on a mission to provide my own 2am junk food ;)

Once I had cooked the tortellini I served them with a mix of artichokes, olives, and grape tomatoes. I think that was a bit of a mistake, because while that mixture was good, it overwhelmed the flavor of the tortellini themselves. When I make it for my parents (or anytime in the future) i'll probably stick with a basic white wine sauce (like a vegan Beurre Blanc) instead. I bet a good oily pesto would be tasty as well.

For the filling I just made a nice, fairly mild tofu filling. Some diced mushrooms or spinach would have been nice in there as well.

Now that i'm making myself hungry, here's the recipe and process (the tortellini-forming is the best part!)...


Hand Made Vegan Tortellini

Ingredients

Tortellini Dough

3 Cups Flour*
2 TBSP Nutritional Yeast
2 tsp Salt
1 TBSP Olive Oil
1 Cup Water

Tofu Filling

1 Package Firm Tofu, drained and pressed
2 TBSP Lemon Juice
1 TBSP Olive Oil
3 TBSP Nutritional Yeast
2 TBSP Yellow or White Miso**
2 tsp Sage
1 tsp Salt
1/2 tsp Pepper (or to taste)

* You can use All Purpose Flour or an equal mix of All Purpose and Whole Wheat. I used half All Purpose and half White Whole Wheat.

** If you don't have Miso, you can use a teaspoon of red wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar, or skip it altogether. The miso just gives it a slightly fermented flavor like cheese has.

Instructions

Drain and press the tofu by placing the tofu on a plate, with another plate face down on top of the tofu. Put a heavy book or two on top of the upper plate so that it's pressing down on the tofu.
In a mixing bowl, mix together the Flour, Nutritional Yeast, and Salt. Add Olive Oil and then slowly add water until you have a dough that is not sticky but is also not too dry and stiff. Knead 3-5 minutes. Roll in a tsp of oil in the bowl and cover with a damp cloth.

Let the dough rest in the bowl for 30 minutes.

In the meantime, make the filling:

Remove the tofu from between the plates. The bottom plate should have accumulated a few spoonfuls of water. Dump these off. Carefully press the tofu between your hands over the sink to squeeze out a touch more water if possible.

Place the tofu in a medium mixing bowl and mash up with your hands and/or a fork until it has a crumbly ricotta-like texture (if it's too watery the texture will be more mushy than crumbly but frankly that is just fine also).

Add all of the other filling ingredients to the tofu and mix well with a fork. Taste and adjust seasonings or ingredients accordingly.

You will probably still have some time left before the dough is ready. I would not suggest starting an attention-needing sauce at this time, because forming the tortellini once the dough is ready is fairly attention-needing itself. But hey, you only live once.

Once the dough has rested for 30 minutes, flour a large cutting board or other surface. Tear off about 1/3 or 1/4 of the dough and roll out on the floured board until it is very thin, but not see-through, and you don't want it so thin that it rips. Hopefully you can get an idea of the thinness/thickness from my pictures.

From Foodsies!

Once rolled out, you can either cut out squares (about 2x2 inches) which is slow and dumb and is what I did, or you can use a cookie cutter to cut out circles which you will be folding over the same way as the squares (smart, and what I will do next time).

Once you have some cut out, place a small teaspoon of filling in the middle and fold one "corner" over to the other, to form a triangle or half-moon. Smoosh the edges down.

Fold the center "corner" up and then fold the ends around. Pinch them together to seal them to each other.

I know it doesn't make much sense. This link might help, since it has step by step pictures. It's the same as my directions, only they fold over the center corner at the end, and I do it earlier. Doesn't matter which way.

Soon you will have an army of tortellini!

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At this point you can either freeze them or cook them.

To cook them, you can either boil some water and then add the tortellinis to boil for 3-5 minutes, or if you are worried they are too delicate for boiling, you can steam them in a steamer for 10 minutes or so.

I went with the steaming to be on the safe side, but they'll be more tender if you boil them.

To freeze them, coat a cookie sheet or other flat tray/dish with flour and add a layer of tortellini. Place in the freezer for 1 hour - overnight, until frozen solid. Then you can throw them in a freezer bag or tupperware and put them back in the freezer.

To cook after they're frozen, you can boil them straight from the freezer (no defrosting needed). Just boil for 6-7 minutes instead of 3-5 like you would if they were fresh.

I can't wait til I have some frozen batches that I can just cook at a moment's notice. Can't beat home-made food that can be boiled for a few minutes and then served just like the store-bought kind :)

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Spring Asparagus Tart

From Foodsies!

I recently came across some images and recipes for Asparagus Tarts, of which i'd previously never heard, and I was immediately drawn to the simple yet elegant presentation, and the prospect of dining on mouthwatering asparagus, which is a vegetable I love but have never tried cooking myself.

If you followed any of the links in the above paragraph, you will notice that a typical Asparagus Tart: a) Includes lots of cheese of one kind or another, and b) Is based upon frozen puff pastry dough.

Boo to both of those things. I mean, I am not volunteering to make my own puff pastry dough, but on the other hand, I want more control over my dough ingredients. So I figured why not just make a nice and flaky savory pie dough and use that instead? I used more shortening than I normally would and handled the dough as little as possible, to get a nice flaky crust. I also added a liberal amount of dill and thyme to the dough for flavor (turned out great - I could eat the dough all day long by itself).

For the cheese, I had to think about what kinds of cheese were typically being used in these things. Most often it was Gruyere or Ricotta. If i'm not mistaken (it's been a while, I admit), Gruyere is sort of mild and nutty and ricotta is a little sharper and tangy. So instead of using cheese (duh), I whipped up creamy spread based in tofu, almonds, lemon juice, and red wine vinegar. The idea was to create something creamy with a bit of tang and a bit of nuttiness.

As you can see from the picture at the top, I also took the liberty of adding some mushrooms and tomato. Don't want the asparagus to get lonely.

It was a surprisingly easy dish to make, and didn't take too long either. It's at the top of the list now for Easter, particularly since it's versatile and can be brunch, lunch, or dinner.


Spring Asparagus Tart

Ingredients

Crust

2 1/4 Cups All Purpose Flour
1/2 Cup Earth Balance Shortening (or just regular Earth Balance)
1/4 - 1/2 Cup Ice Water
1-2 tsp Dill
1-2 tsp Thyme

Tofu/Almond Filling

1/4 Cup Silken Tofu
1/4 Cup Almonds*
1/4 Cup Nutritional Yeast
2 TBSP Lemon Juice
3 TBSP Veggie Broth (or Soy Milk)
1 TBSP Olive Oil
1/2 tsp Salt

* You can also use Cashews. If you don't have a VitaMix you may want to chop the nuts in a food processor or something before blending them.

Veggies

1 Bunch Asparagus
1 Tomato (or 2 small tomatoes)
4 Mushrooms (any kind)

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 375. Do it now. Don't be like me and totally forget and then have to stand around waiting for like 10 minutes.

First you want to make the dough, because it will need to chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes (although 15 will do) before being rolled out.

Dump the flour, dill, and thyme into a mixing bowl and add the shortening (or butter) in small pieces. Cut the shortening into the flour with a cutter or by using your hand to squeeze and mix, until the flour and shortening are mixed and it looks like cornmeal or something instead of teeny flour grains.

Slowly add half the water and mix. Add water a teeny bit at a time until the dough is just wet enough to stay together like dough. It should be a little bit flaky. If you want, tear off a small piece and flatten it out. Pull the edges - you want it to stretch a little, but without breaking, and you want it to more or less keep its form after being stretched (rather than sucking back into whatever shape it was in before). You're basically making a pie crust here, so just go with it. You don't want dough that is really wet, but it has to be wet enough to hold together and be rolled out and all that. If the dough is falling apart while you're handing it, then add some more water.

Cover the mixing bowl with a slightly damp cloth and place in the fridge.

Now on to the filling. Dump all of your filling ingredients into a blender and blend. Note that you may want to chop the nuts a little in a food processor first. Even my Vitamix was a bit huffy about the whole unsoaked almonds. Add half of each of the liquid amounts. Blend until the mix is smooth. Check the consistency. You will probably want to add the other half of the liquid ingredients. It should be creamy but not too runny. Taste and adjust any seasonings as you wish. Just make it taste good, basically. Pour into a bowl or container of some kind and place in the fridge for now.

Now for the veggies! By the way, this my favorite part, possibly my favorite Thing To Do With a Vegetable (other than feed them to the dog when he begs and watch him look betrayed): Removing the 'wooden' ends of the asparagus.

Why is this so fun? It's easy, it's tactile, and it makes a great little popping noise! Take a piece of asparagus in your hand so that the spiky end is towards your wrist. Bend the other end down with your fingers (like brace on one finger and press down with another). The end will break and snap off with a satisfying little pop. And no worries about where to break it - the asparagus automagically breaks right where the 'wooden' part meets the yummy part (it's stiffer, thus 'wooden' and so it breaks instead of bends). Toss/compost/feed to the dog those wooden ends and set the rest of the spears aside.

Rinse and slice your mushrooms. Slice your tomato(es).

Place the asparagus in a pot and cover with water and a pinch of salt. Heat to boiling and let boil lightly for 2-4 minutes (2 if you like crispy asparagus, 4 if you like limp chewy asparagus).

Toss the mushrooms in a skillet and saute for a minute or two in a dab of oil until they're just a little brown and soft, but not fully cooked. If you're feeling lazy, you can probably just skip this step but they won't be as tender in the end.

Now that you've got the veggies done, it should be about time to take out the dough.

Roll the dough out on a well floured surface (important!). You want to roll it out in a generally rectangular shape (have fun with that) about 18 inches long and 10 inches across (give or take an inch or two either way). Now roll the sides in towards the middle a little bit to form a raised edge all the way 'round. It should look a bit like a cookie sheet made of dough. Speaking of baking sheets, you now want to (carefully!) lift and transfer the dough over to a greased baking sheet. To make this as easy as possible, place the baking sheet as close to the dough as possible, and when you move the dough, do it decisively and quickly.

Brush the dough with a little olive oil and bake it (by itself, no spread or veggies yet) for about 10 minutes.

Remove the dough from the oven.

Now take out your tofu/almond spread and spread it all over the main part of the dough (the low part). You want to spread it on fairly thick, maybe 1/4 to 1/2 inch. Then take your asparagus and trim the ends so that it will fit on the dough and lay it down, pressing gently into the tofu/almond spread. Do the same with the tomato and mushroom slices. Sprinkle the whole thing with a bit of salt and pepper, and brush some oil across the top of everything.

Bake for about 20-30 minutes or until the dough is hard and um, looks done. I took mine out at 25 minutes and I think it probably would have been fine if i'd left it in there another 5 (and might even have been ok had I taken it out 5 minutes earlier).

Now doesn't that look and taste fancy?

From Foodsies!

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Savory Summer Pie

From Foodsies!

This recipe was inspired by one found here for a savory tomato-pesto pie (with lots and lots of cheese). When I read it, I instantly thought of summer, of warm summer flavors and a carefree day with friends, of sharing light conversation and juicy tomatoes. And as we had weather in the 50's (practically summer for Boston!), I had a hankering to veganize this dish. So, with a Saturday free for experimentation, that's just what I did. And boy howdy did it turn out near perfect!

I think from now on, this is going to be one of my staple dishes to bring to a small potluck or dinner-at-a-friend's. It's easy and doesn't take much longer than most casseroles, but has a warm and cozy day-spent-cooking sort of look and feel to it. And everyone loves pies, amiright?



The primary hurdle was to think of how to replace the cheese while still maintaining the light and juicy essence of the pie (simply omitting the cheese would leave a pie consisting of nothing but tomato and pesto, which would be a bit... dull). I think in the original recipe, the cheese probably provides a mild flavor and a juicy chewiness (via the mozzerella), maybe a bit of tang as well (from the romano).

I decided to use summer squash and zucchini to provide the mild flavor (to contrast with the bright flavor of the tomato and the zip of the pesto) and creamy texture. Plus it sticks with the summer theme (like the tomato and basil). And as luck would have it, I had some squash and zucchini already in my fridge.

To provide a little additional creaminess and tang, I added some silken tofu, cashews, and a bit of nutritional yeast to my pesto recipe.

All combined, this turned out wonderfully. The squash filled its role perfectly, and the pesto turned out nicely both in the pie and eaten as a dip for chips.

Savory Summer Pie (Vegan)

Ingredients

Pesto*

2/3 Cup Pine Nuts or Raw Almonds (if you want to save some cash)
1/4 Cup Cashews (optional - you can replace with more pine nuts)
3 TBSP Olive Oil
4 Cups Fresh Basil
3 TBSP Lemon Juice
2 Cloves Garlic
1 Container Silken Tofu
1/4 Cup Nutritional Yeast (optional)
1/2 tsp Salt
2 Tomatoes, diced

Filling

1 Summer Squash
1 Zucchini**
6 Plum Tomatoes***
Salt and Pepper to taste

Crust

3 Cups Flour****
3 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Salt
1/4 Cup Earth Balance
1 Cup Soymilk

* If you wish, you can sub in your favorite pesto recipe here. You can then add tofu or not, depending on how creamy you want it. It will work just fine with just regular pesto (no tofu).

** You could just use 2 Summer Squashes (or even 2 Zucchini) if you prefer.

*** Plum Tomatoes are meatier than regular tomatoes, so there's more tomato and less juice. I agree with the author of the original recipe - plum tomatoes probably work better than regular ones for this recipe (although use whatever you have, i'm sure it'll be tasty).

**** You can use half (or even all) Whole Wheat Flour or just use All Purpose Flour.

Instructions

First, make your Pesto. To do this, toss all of the pesto ingredients minus oil in your food processor and process until combined. Then slowly drizzle in the olive oil while processing, and pause to scrape down the sides when necessary. If you find that it isn't as smooth as you want it, you can remove at this point and blend it some in a blender.

If you have a sweet Cylon Blender like I do, then instead you need to start with just the nuts and olive oil and blend. Then add all of the other ingredients and blend til smooth and delicious.

Set aside.

Now you want to get the squash going. Get a large skillet going on Medium heat with a little bit of olive oil or spray. Slice your squash and/or zucchini into thin slices (about 1/4 inch) and toss into the skillet. Add a pinch of salt and pepper and saute until the squash is very tender and kinda see-through. It'll take several minutes at least. Be sure to give it a stir once in a while so it all cooks evenly.

While that's going, slice your tomatoes into 1/4 inch slices as well and set aside.

When your squash is done, remove from heat and set aside.

Preheat the oven to 400.

Now to make your dough. Pour the flour into a large mixing bowl. Add the Earth Balance in tiny pieces and then cut into the flour, and/or just use your hands to thoroughly mix in the Earth Balance. The flour should become coarser. Now add your other dry ingredients and mix.

Slowly add the milk (as you may not need all of it) and mix until you have a good dough that isn't too sticky but is wet enough to stay in a cohesive ball when you tell it to.

Split the dough into two pieces, one just a little bit smaller than the other (see below).

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Cover the smaller ball with saran wrap and set aside.

On a well-floured surface, roll out the first ball into a circle about 12 inches in diameter (see picture). It is better to err on the side of larger than smaller. You want the dough to be about 1/4 inch thick, maybe a little thinner. It depends on how thick or thin you like your crust, really (taking into account that it will thicken a smidge when cooking). I made mine very thin, and in the end I wished it had been a bit thicker.

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Now lay the dough down in a 9" pie pan and cut any extreme excess dough from the edges. Keep in mind you want it to have a wee bit extra beyond the lip of the pan, but not much. In the picture below, you can see that I actually did a terrible job and had areas with too much edge and edges with not enough. In this case you can cut off the excess and use it to patch up the areas with not enough. Same thing if the dough tears - just stick it back together and patch with a little extra dough if you need to.

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Now take your pesto and a spoon and spoon it onto the crust. Use the back of the spoon to spread it out. You don't need a really thick layer, but don't skimp either.

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Next, lay down your squash slices on the pesto so that they cover the whole bottom.

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Top with a layer of tomato. Then top that layer of tomato with more pesto (no skimping!) and then another layer of squash, another layer of tomato, and a final layer of pesto. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

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Now the fun part! Set that aside and get out your other ball of dough. Roll it out on a floured surface until it is about 9" in diameter and about 1/4 inch thick, or a bit thinner.

Carefully lay it down over the top of the pie - it should ideally fit right inside and be the same diameter as the pie pan. If it's a little large, just snip it down a little.

Now take that little bit of dough from the bottom crust which extends just beyond the rim of the pan and fold it over towards the middle overtop of the edge of the top dough layer. Basically you want to seal the pie by connecting the bottom dough with the top dough.
If you want to be fancy (which I was not), you can crimp around the edges with your fingers. Actually I would have done this, but my bottom layer didn't extend high enough to fold back atop the upper crust very well, so I had to work pretty hard just to seal it, much less to make fancy crimps.

Using a knife to cut a few slits in the top of the dough so that steam can escape during baking. This is important.

If you want to be cute, you can use the knife to cut a quarter-size hole from the middle of the crust. Then cut out a similar size (but every so slightly bigger) slice of tomato and place it in the hole. Tuck it just under the dough.

As the pie bakes, the tomato slice will cook a bit and darken, and it will look really pretty. Most importantly, this will indicate that it is a savory pie, and not a fruit pie (lest someone be surprised and disappointed upon cutting into the pie).

Now you're all set to bake!

Throw the pie in the oven at 400. Bake for 30 minutes. Check the pie. If the crust is getting too dark, remove from the oven and cover the edge of the pie with a strip of aluminum foil. Replace and bake for another 10 minutes. Check the pie again. If the crust is nice and browned (or if you used whole wheat flour, you'll just have to guess a bit at this point) and firm and feels cooked through, remove from the oven. If it needs a few minutes, feel free to give it another 5-10 minutes and then remove.

You should have this:

From Foodsies!

Serve and enjoy! I bet it would be great with some sweet iced tea and the company of good friends.

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There is Peach Cobbler in Heaven

From Foodsies!

I believe I have a new favorite dessert. Vegan Peach Cobbler. Sounds so simple, no? Yes well, it is simple. But the peaches, slurping around in their own spiced sweet syrupy juices, taste like nectar (and like summer). And the biscuity crumbles are hearty and satisfying.
It's comfort food. Or comfort fruit, if you will.

I don't know what i'm doing making such things when i'm "dieting," but I did minimize the sugar and butter, used whole wheat flour and oats instead of regular flour. Next time I think I can cut the sugar down from 1/4 cup sugar to 1 TBSP of Agave Nectar. And I might throw in some soy flour or almond meal in place of some of the whole wheat flour, to make it lower carb. Still not diet food exactly, but better than some other desserts.

And it's a super easy to gobble up a serving or two of fruit.

Also, technically it's Peach Apple Cobbler, but only because I didn't have enough frozen peach. It's good with the apple, but I think it's probably better with just peach (or maybe i'm just appled out at the moment?).



Peach Cobbler

Ingredients

3/4 Cup Whole Wheat Flour
1/4 Cup Rolled Oats*
1 TBSP Earth Balance
3/4 Cup Soy Milk
2 tsp Baking Powder
2 tsp Sugar
1/2 tsp Salt

4-6 Cups Sliced Peaches**
1/4 Cup Sugar***
1 TBSP Brown Sugar
1 tsp Cinnamon
1 tsp Nutmeg
1 tsp Ginger Powder
1 tsp Vanilla
1 TBSP Lemon Juice

* You don't have to use these. You can just use more flour (for a total of 1 cup) instead. You can also substitute graham cracker crumbles or anything else you want.

** This is about 6-8 peaches, or 2 small bags of frozen peaches (or about 20oz). Don't use canned peaches, cuz that's gross. Frozen is always better (less preservatives, less or no added sugar, etc). You can also use apples, cherries, blueberries, whatever. You might want to adjust the spices and sugar a little because tarter fruits need more sugar, sweet fruits less. If you're using a really juicy kind of fruit (particularly if it isn't frozen) then you may want to increase the cornstarch to 3 TBSP.

*** I think you can just use 1 TBSP of Agave instead if you are so inclined

Instructions

Preheat oven to 400.

Thaw your peaches in the microwave (if using frozen peaches, obvs) by nuking at 50% power for about 2 minutes, then stirring, then again for another 3 minutes.

Dump peaches in a saucepan that looks big enough to hold all of your peaches. Add the sugar/agave, brown sugar, cornstarch, spices, vanilla, and lemon juice.

Stir thoroughly. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture begins to boil. Let it boil for a minute, still stirring. The mix should be thick and syrupy around the peaches. Remove from heat and set aside. It should look sorta like this:

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Dump the flour, oats, salt, baking powder, and the 2 tsp of sugar into a mixing bowl. Mix gently. Add the Earth Balance a little pinch at a time, and then cut it into the mix. Or you can do what I did, and just use one of your hands to grab and mush and mix it all together (you can also use two butter knives and slice them in opposite directions repeatedly). The main thing is that you want the Earth Balance to get broken up and mix with the flour to form something like small crumbs. If this doesn't make sense, then just mix everything up as best you can and say to hell with it. It doesn't make a big difference in the end, to be honest.

Now add the milk slowly (like 1/4 cup at a time) and stir. What you wind up with may resemble this:

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Or it might not. Who cares? It will turn out great anyway, that's the beauty of this recipe.

Dump your peach mixture into a 2QT casserole dish, or any casserole dish that you think will hold it well. I recommend a round casserole dish because you will have more fruit than topping, so a deeper dish works better than a larger, shallow dish.

Now pinch off little globs of dough and drop them (or carefully place them, if you're anal) onto the peaches. I figure the globs should be about the size of a marble. It should wind up looking something like this:

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Now bake in the oven (which is at 400) for 30-35 minutes.

Remove from the oven, let cool as long as you can stand, then devour.

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Amazing Momos (Tibetan Steamed Dumplings)

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My absolute favorite restaurant in Boston has to be Rangzen. It is a small Tibetan restaurant and their food is great. My favorite dish there is Momo Thukpa which is a dumpling soup. The dumplings are stuffed with tofu and veggies, and although the soup comes with egg as standard, they are happy to produce it without the egg. In fact, one time when I ordered it, they said it always came without egg. But I still ask for it without, just in case.

But Rangzen (which I refer to simply as Momo, because that is what I order there and it's easier and more fun to say than Rangzen) is all the way in Cambridge. And it costs money. But last night I was delirious in my desire for Momo. So I just went ahead and made my own!

It was surprisingly easy, although a little time consuming I guess. But Wednesday is a night that there isn't much on TV or anything, and it was snowing out, so it seemed like a good night to just relax in the kitchen.

I'm going to share two recipes, one for what I actually made last night, and one for a version that I think will more closely replicate the Momo that Rangzen makes. I was constrained by being unable to find fresh cilantro at the local co-op, and by having some veggie-beef crumbles I needed to use up. Next time i'll make the 2nd recipe.

Both recipes are low fat, low calorie (and Scott - for low-sodium, just use less soy sauce and/or low-sodium soy sauce). I don't really count veggies towards that stuff, and that's about all that is in here. Almost no oil is used at all (only the tiniest bit rubbed on the bottom of the Momo so that they don't stick to the steamer). So they taste divine, and you can eat as many of them as you want!
Um, unless you are watching your carbs, in which case I guess the flour screws you. Sorry!



Tibetan Momo

Ingredients:

3 Cups Flour
1 Cup Water
1 Onion
1/2 Cup Baby Bok Choy
1/2 Cup Spring Onion/Scallions
1 Cup Cabbage
(the whitish-green kind, not the reddish-purple kind, although I guess you could use either)
1 Cup Mushrooms
(dark asian mushrooms would be best, but you can use regular button also)
1/2 Cup Veggie-Beef Crumbles
(I had to use it up. You can use tofu instead)
2 TBSP Fresh Ginger
(grated/minced - you can use one of these or these or mortle/pestle, or just chop it really fine with a knife)
1/2 Cup Fresh Cilantro
(if available - if not, use about 1/4 cup dried cilantro)
3 Cloves Garlic (minced)
1 TBSP Soy Sauce
1 TBSP Veggie Broth (or No-Chicken Broth, Veggie Boillon, etc)

If you don't have fresh ginger, then sub in 1/2 TBSP of Ginger Powder. If you like ginger, you may wish to add this anyway.
You will also want some extra flour on hand for rolling the dough later, as well as a small dish of water. You will also need a teeny dish holding about 1/2 tsp of Canola Oil.

Instructions:

First you will make the dough. Dump 3 cups of flour into a large mixing bowl. Now gradually add water as you mix (by hand, not with a bread mixer) until the dough is moist and a bit sticky. You want to be able to shape it into a ball and be able to stretch it out a little before it breaks apart. Don't sweat it if you aren't sure if it's too dry or too wet. It's such a basic dough that you don't need to do anything perfectly.
Now wrap the dough in plastic wrap and set aside, or to be more ecofriendly, place the dough ball in a non-stick pot and put the lid on. You don't want the dough to dry out.

Now for the filling. You can do this two different ways. You can chop all of your veggies by hand, into fairly small pieces, or you can dump them all in a food processor and chop them up. I used the food processor and wound up with a mix that was chopped very fine as a result. In hindsight, I think it may have been better for the ingredients to have not been so finely chopped, but just because of how I like my dumplings. I like a bite with big chunks in it, not teeny chunks. So, personal preference - but get the veggies chopped up somehow.

Dump your chopped up veggies into a mixing bowl and add your garlic, ginger, cilantro, soy sauce, and veggie broth. Stir and mix well. The result should be moist and wet, but not like, sitting in a puddle of juices. If for some reason you wind up with a huge puddle of juices, just pour a little of it out, or squeeze some of it out from the mixture. We're going for juicy dumpling filling, not soup.

At this point you should go ahead and get your water boiling in your steamer. WTF is a steamer? A steamer can be many things. You can use a standard pot and then place a steamer basket in it. You can use one made from bamboo, or from metal. There are also special steamer pots, which have special steamer inserts. You can get a similar insert for your standard pot (like a fancier version of the bamboo or metal steamers above). Also, even the cheapest rice cookers usually come with a little steamer tray. It allows you to load up the rice as normal, then put the steamer tray in place, and then cover. As the rice cooks, the veggies (or dumplings in this case), get steamed.

If you are using the rice cooker, you don't need to start the water boiling, because the rice cooker will take care of that step automagically for you.

NOTE: You want the water to reach just below the steamer. So pay attention when filling your pot. Also, you do not want your pot to run out of water to boil (won't steam very well then will it). To avoid this, place a penny or small pebble in the water. It will rattle when the water boils, so if it stops rattling you will know you are out of water. It will suck to have to open everything up (releasing precious steam) and refill it with water, but you do what you gotta do.

Now that you've got the water going, set up your Dumpling Making (Makling!) Station. You will want a rolling pin, rolling pin cover (if you have one), cutting board or dough mat (unless you want to roll it out direct on your counter? eww?), a dish of extra flour, the teeny dish of oil, and your steamer tray.

There are a few different ways to roll out the dough and form your dumplings. Here is my method:

1. Pull of a small amount of dough, about the size of a ping pong or golf ball.

2. Dust some flour between your fingers and roll the dough around in your hands to form a ball and to pick up some of the flour from your hands.

3. Plop the ball onto the cutting board and pat down into a thick round pad. Use the rolling pin to roll it out as evenenly as possible in every direction. You want to get the dough very thin, although not so thing that it rips.

4. Now pick up the circle of dough (or oddly m ishapen geometric shape of dough) and place it in your left palm. Use a spoon (I like using an ice cream scoop) and grab about a tablespoon or a little more of dough and place it in the center of the dough on your palm.

5. Use your right hand to pull up two sides of the dough to meet in the middle above the filling, sort of forming a basket. Rotate the dough in your palm and pull up a bit of dough from the side to meet at the top also. Continue this until you have a little round sack with a pinched up top. Make sure it's all sealed pretty well, because you don't want any of the juices escaping when it steams.

Another method is the same as the above, except in step 5 you simply pinch up all the dough together in a line, like forming a taco with the top sealed. Conversely, you can do this on the cutting board rather than in your palm, and simply fold over one side of the dough over the other to form a half-moon and pinch the edges down.

Finally, you can use a different method to get the dough circles by rolling out all of the dough at once and then using a round cookie cutter or a highball glass to cut it into dough circles. I don't like this method as much because I find it to be a pain to roll out so much dough, and also you have to do it a few times to use up all the dough. But to each their own.

Now, as each dumpling is finished, dip your fingertip into the bit of Canola Oil and rub on the bottom of the dumpling. Place it on the steamer rack.

Once your steamer rack is full, check to see if your water is boiling. If it is, place the steamer rack in place and cover. Let steam for about 10 minutes. Or if you are using a rice cooker, place the rack into the rice cooker and turn it on. The rice cooker should tell you itself when it is finished (you may want to check your rice cooker's instruction booklet to be sure how the steamer part of it works).

After 10 minutes you should have sweaty delicious Momo! Like a Momo fresh from the sauna! Despite the sweaty appearance, if you pick one up, it should be surprisingly firm. At least, that's how I like them, because I like to eat them with my hands. But be careful! The filling will be wet which means even when the outside of the momo has cooled down some, the inside could still be very hot! And burning your tongue sucks, so consider yourself warned.

You may need to make two or more batches. Make the 2nd batch while the first batch steams.
Then just turn off the heat to the steamer, remove the momo's and wrap them in plastic wrap or place in a pot with a lid so they don't dry out. Put the new batch in the steamer and go.
Feel free to clean the kitchen while the 2nd batch steams ;)

Mmmm Mmmm Momo!

From Foodsies!

Didn't I say that I want to change the recipe for the future?

Oh yeah, I did say that. I think my Momo turned out lovely and very, very tasty! But I feel like the Momo at Rangzen have a sort of lighter, fresher flavor. Part of this is no doubt due to fresh cilantro (which is like a drug or love potion to me), but may also be a reflection of other ingredients as well. As a result, here is what I plan to try next time:

Ingredients:

3 Cups Flour
1 Cup Water
2 Cups Cabbage
1/2 Cup Spring Onion/Scallions
1 Cup Mushrooms
(or maybe Bok Choy instead, for a lighter flavor)
1 Box Firm Tofu (non-silken)
1 Ton Fresh Cilantro ;)
(in reality, probably a good size handful or two chopped)
2 Cloves Garlic, minced
2 TBSP Fresh Ginger, minced
1/2 TBSP Soy Sauce
1/2 TBSP Veggie Broth
1 TBSP Water

Directions being the same.

I guess it isn't so very different. I just want more cabbage/cilantro/scallion flavor along with the ginger and mushroom flavors, and the refreshing non-flavor break that the tofu gives to each bite. It's hard to explain. I just want something that tastes lighter and springier, less dark and meaty.

Anyway, Momo is always great!

From Foodsies!

My next Tibetan mission will have to be making Thukpa soup to go along with the Momo, so that I can make my own Momo Thukpa! And also to master the Momo dipping sauce, which is a sort of spicy green cilantro-y tomato-y chile-y sauce.

For the record, I didn't find my Momo to even need a dipping sauce. They were quite flavorful and juicy on their own. But the dipping sauce at Rangzen is to die for..



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Tomato and Chickpea Curry

Oh. My. God. I have finally made a perfect curry dish for myself! It may not be perfect for anyone else, but eff 'em. It's an Indian spiced dish that fulfills my Indian food desires just as well as the best Indian restaurant in our neighborhood.

See, I like Indian food, but i'm fairly picky about it. So far, I can only ever find Indian food the way I like it at actual Indian restaurants. Anytime I try to cook it myself, it turns out... wrong. Just doesn't capture the right flavors. Doesn't make my mouth water in the same beautiful way.

But no more! I have conquered my personal Indian food mountain!

From Foodsies!

I think the key was to stop using recipes. Only I know what Indian food I like, so I should be the one to decide what goes in it. Seems obvious, but I guess I wasn't confident enough in my own cooking skillz til now. But last night I got a wild hair up my arse and decided to just go for it.



Kat's Tomato and Chickpea Curry

1 Can Chickpeas
1 Can Diced Tomatoes (I used fire-roasted cuz it's all I had)
1 Onion
3 Cloves Garlic
1 tsp Fresh ground ginger (or just throw in 1/2 tsp of ginger powder with the other spices)
2 Cups Water
1 tsp Cardamom
1 tsp Coriander
1 tsp Cumin
1/2 tsp Chili Powder
1/2 tsp Cinnamon
1/4 tsp Cloves (in powder form)
1/4 tsp Mustard Powder
2 Bay Leaves

Chop up your onion, press your garlic (or dice if you lack a press), grate your ginger.
Heat up a dime of canola oil in a large skillet over medium heat
When the skillet is hot, throw in the onion, garlic, and ginger.
Saute for about 5 minutes, until the onions get clear and soft and are browning.
When they start to stick a bit, pour in about 1/2 cup of water and stir it around.
Turn the heat way down to simmering.
Add your spices, minus the bay leaf, and stir. Should smell amazing.

Pour in your chickpeas and tomatoes. Stir around. Make sure it's simmering but not boiling. I suck at that, btw. I tend to go back and forth between boiling and doing nothing. But my meals still turn out well, so I guess it must even out in the end ;)

If you drained the chickpeas and tomatoes, add in a cup and a half of water. If you didn't drain them, but dumped them in with their water, then you will probably only need a cup of water. Basically you want everything to be mixing about in a wet stewyness.

Cover and let simmer for about 20 minutes.
Check on it. Stir. Sample. Are the chickpeas soft? Do you like the spice level? If you don't like the spice level, stir in some more spices.
If the chickpeas are not really soft, and the tomatoes are not all a-mush, then it will need to cook longer. If almost all the water is gone, add in another 1/2 cup.
Cover and let simmer another 20 minutes.
Check again. Stir. Sample. Spice level good? If not, hit it up with some more.
Are the chickpeas soft yet? Are the tomatoes a-mush? Either way, how is the water content? If it's all a big of a stewy mushy mess, then you should be in good shape.
You want it to be goopy and saucy to an extent, but you want it to go over rice without a ton of water draining through the rice to the bottom of your bowl, dig?
Only you can know when it's truly done. I like my chickpeas super mushy but I also like the mix to be fairly saucy.
Some people like their chickpeas harder and/or prefer a less runny curry.
You can really go wrong as long as it looks and tastes like something you want to eat on your rice.

Serve with rice (you did make some brown rice to go with this, right??). Eat.
Enjoy your tummy making love to itself. mmmm mmmm.
Wake up drooling and dreaming of curry.
Make more curry.
Repeat.

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Cooking Backlog - Greek Eggplant Casserole

Before I went vegan, one of my favorite Greek dishes was Moussaka. If you aren't familiar, it's basically a Greek lasagna. It has eggplant, beef, tomato sauce, pasta, and cheese. Sometimes the pasta and cheese layer is mixed with egg and some other ingredients to form a sort of custard. Most importantly, the dish is flavored with cinnamon in addition to the spices you might normally expect. What a difference that makes! For years I couldn't put my finger on what that spice was, I just knew it tasted different and wonderful and I wanted more.

There is another similar Greek dish called Pastitsio. It also involves pasta, cheese/egg/custard, tomato sauce, and beef. It also uses cinnamon as a spice. I tell you, Greece knows what the eff they're doing when they spice their dishes.

So the other day I was really craving something similar. I didn't want to just use veggie beef or something, however, because I am trying to eat healthier and increase my veggie intake. I've also been interested in trying eggplant, which i've always avoided (with the occasional exception in Moussaka, although i'd normally pick around it).

After poking through a few recipes and brainstorming, I came up with my own Greek Eggplant Casserole. It uses a wonderful creamy sauce, so while it doesn't have the thick custard/pasta top layer that Moussaka and Pastitsio traditionally do, I think it mimics the flavor and spirit of those dishes pretty well.

Then again, i'm not Greek.

This is a pretty long recipe, because it involves cooking the pasta, making the eggplant, making the cheese sauce, prepping the pasta sauce, and then combining everything into a casserole dish and baking. But trust me, it's easy and doesn't take terribly long. Otherwise I would never make it myself.

From Foodsies!

Greek Eggplant Casserole

Master List of Ingredients (it will be broken down and re-iterated later, but this is so you can scan and make sure you have everything you need):

1 Eggplant
1 Bag Pasta
2-4 Cups Tomato Sauce (Pasta Sauce, whatever you want to call it)
2 Cups Flour
5 tsp Salt
2 tsp Oregeno
1 tsp Garlic Powder
2.5 Cups Soymilk
3 Cups Water
1 Package Silken Tofu
1 Cup Vegetable Broth
4 TBSP Tahini
1 TBSP Onion Powder
1/4 Cup Nutritional Yeast
1/2 tsp White Pepper
1/2 tsp Paprika
2 TBSP Corn Starch
1/4 tsp Mustard Powder

OK got it all? Now preheat the oven to 350 so you don't forget to do it later.

To prepare the Pasta:

Grab a bag of pasta. I used shells, but any non-spaghetti style pasta will do. Heck, you could probably even use spaghetti.

Get a pot of water going on the stove. You're going to need to cook your pasta, so get that water boiling now. Then get started on your Eggplant.

To prepare the Eggplant:

1 Eggplant
2 Cups Flour
1/2 tsp Salt
2 tsp Oregeno
1 tsp Garlic Powder
2 Cups Soymilk
3 Cups Water
2 tsp Salt (to go into the water)
1 tsp Salt (to be sprinkled on the eggplant)

Slice the eggplant into round sections. You can peel it if you're into that. Some people like their slices to be about 1/2 inch thick, but I prefer really thin slices so I get them as thin as I can.
Pour your 3 cups of water into a bowl.
Now drop about 2 tsp's of salt into the water and place the eggplant slices into the salt water. They'll float. Liberally sprinkle salt all over the exposed part of the eggplant slices. WTF?! you may be thinking. Well, eggplant is bitter and gross by nature, but if you salt it then the poor salt sucks up all the nastiness, leaving you with tasty eggplant.
So let the eggplant hang out in the salt water for about 20 minutes. During this time, you can make the cheeze sauce (skip down to the cheeze sauce section).

Also, your water should be boiling by now, so throw your pasta in.

Once the eggplant has finished soaking for its 20 minutes, mix up the flour, salt, oregeno, and garlic powder in a shallow bowl or pan.
Pour the soymilk into another shallow bowl.

Oil up a skillet and heat over medium to medium-high heat.

Dip each slice of eggplant into the soymilk and then dredge through the flour mix til its coated. If you want to be a good southern cook, dredge first into the flour mix, then into the soymilk, then back into the flour mix.
Throw the coated slices into the skillet and pan-fry til the outside is crispy and golden-brown.
If you run out of the flour mix, just make some more. You may have to do this in a couple of batches. Just set aside the finished slices on a cloth while you cook the others.

Is your pasta done yet? If so, strain it up and set aside.

To Prepare the Cheeze Sauce (you may have some of this leftover depending on how much you use on the casserole. If you don't want leftovers for dipping veggies etc. in, then please halve the ingredients below):

1 Package Silken Tofu
1/2 Cup Soy Milk
1 Cup Vegetable Broth (read: veggie bouillon in a cup of water)
4 TBSP Tahini
1 TBSP Onion Powder
1/4 Cup Nutritional Yeast
1/2 tsp Salt
1/2 tsp White Pepper
1/2 tsp Paprika
2 TBSP Corn Starch
1/4 tsp Mustard Powder (optional - just makes it a wee bit tangier)

If you're weird like me, put all ingredients in a mixing bowl and mix with an immersion blender until it is all mixed and thickens to a sauce-like consistency. If it's too thick, add in more soymilk.
If you're a normal cook, then just throw it all in a blender and blend to a sauce-like consistency, adding more soymilk if it's thicker than you imagine you'd want.

To Prepare the Tomato Sauce:

Pour about 2 cups into a bowl. Now add in about 1/2 tsp of Cinnamon. Taste.
Can you distinctly taste the cinnamon? If not, add in some more.
You want it to taste like tomato sauce with a distinct undercurrent of cinnamon. Or, just add in cinnamon until it tastes yummy to you.
You can also throw in a few shakes of nutmeg. Sorry, I put nutmeg in everything. And it's like the siamese twin of cinnamon. How dare you try and separate them.

To Assemble the Casserole:

You should now have the following:

Some pan-fried slices of eggplant
Some cooked pasta
Some Cheeze Sauce
Some tomato sauce with cinnamon (and nutmeg)

Spray an 11x7 casserole dish with oil or cooking spray.
Layer the bottom with the eggplant slices. You will probably want to overlap them some so that a) you don't have big gaps and b) so you use all or most of your eggplant.
If you sampled the cheeze sauce and really liked it, go ahead and pour a bit of it over the eggplant.
Pour the pasta over the eggplant.
Pour the tomato sauce mixture over the pasta. If you want more tomato sauce, just mix some more up and add. You will probably want to stir it around with the pasta so it all gets coated nicely.
Top with a liberal amount of the cheeze sauce. Feel free to mix it all in with the pasta. Whatever looks tasty to you.

Now bake in the oven at 350 for about 20 minutes, or until the cheese sauce looks like it's thickened up or is bubbling. Everything was already cooked beforehand, so you're mostly just heating it anyway.

Now eat!

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