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I thought it was weird at first, but now I am finding it positively endearing, the use-of-hyphens-in-nearly-every-recipe-title!
Coriander-Orange-Scented Red Lentil Soup
This isn't just orange-scented, it's got all sorts of orange tasting going on as well. And it isn't a bad thing, not at all.
This soup looked interesting because it contains all sorts of my favorite things: cilantro, red lentils, garlic, ginger, yum yum. And it did not disappoint.
This is very easy to make and uses the unique ingredient of cilantro stems.
First, wash a bunch of cilantro. Cut off the bottom 3-4" of stems and chop these fine. Set the rest of the cilantro aside for now.Next dice up 3 medium onions, setting aside about 1/3 of them.
Film a nice big soup pot with oil over medium to high heat. Stir in your 2/3's of onions along with salt and pepper. Saute until those onions start to brown. Add you cilantro stems, 4 cloves garlic- fine chopped (I used 6), 1/2" chunk of peeled ginger- fine chopped, 2 teas ground coriander, and zest of 1 orange. Stir that in for just about 20 seconds until nice and fragrant and scrape out entire contents of pot onto a plate for now.
Back into the now empty pot on the stove, add one 14 oz. can of chicken broth, 2 /2 cups water, 3/4 cups of lentils, and the uncooked onions you set aside. Bring that to a boil, ok, a gentle bubble (I call that a simmer), and cook, partially covered for about 10 minutes, no more.
Add back your cooked onion/cilantro stem mixture with more salt and pepper if you wish and then cover and simmer for an additional 15 minutes. Then add in the juice from the orange you zested plus the juice from 1 lemon and additional orange juice, up to one cup. Cook til warm and bubbly. Serve with some of the cilantro leaves you set aside. I also added a heaping tablespoon of lowfat yogurt to each bowl when I served it.
Melt some parmigiano on some whole grain bread and a fabulous feast you have. The orange wasn't as overwhelming as you might think, but I could definitely taste it as well as smell it. My husband couldn't even put his finger on it at first that it was orange because it is a little unexpected. I also loved how much onion was in the soup.
65 recipes down in How to Eat Supper.
Now don't go thinking that I am obsessed with meatballs just because there are two meatball recipes right in a row. I freely admit that I have cooked nothing from my cookbook project in the last three weeks. Our farm share produce was just not measuring up to what I needed ingredient-wise, so it took a back seat. But now I am on it again and I just happened to make the other meatball recipe.
Chinese-Ginger Scallion Meatballs and Sweet Yams in Ginger-Stick Curry
This is a variation on the Scandinavian Spiced Meatballs I made last month and just varies in a few key ingredients.
Start by blending in your food processor 1/2 piece of fresh peeled ginger, 3 whole scallions, 1 T soy sauce, 1 egg yolk, a little sugar, and 1/2 cup dry red wine. Once that is blended, you can either add your meats (1 lb lean ground beef, 1/2 lb ground chicken or turkey) to the processor and pulse 5 times or turn out processor into large bowl and blend your meats by hand. At this point also blend in 3 more chopped scallions and 10 diced water chestnuts. Form your meatballs, ad you should get at least 20 if you make them 1 1/4", but I make mine a little bigger.
Film a saute pan with oil and heat over medium-high heat. Add your meatballs and brown before turning them (about 3 or 4 minutes). Turn them over carefully and add 1/2 diced onion, 1 diced red bell pepper, and 1/2 cup thin-sliced bamboo shoots. Why they don't say add a whole can of bamboo shoots, I have no idea, but that is exactly what I did. Turn heat to medium, cover, and let cook 8-10 minutes, until centers are no longer pink.
Remove meatballs with a slotted spoon and put into your serving dish. Return heat to high and cook down onion-bell pepper sauce, stirring frequently. Once the juices are cooked down, add 1/3 cup rice or white wine and cook down before adding 1 cup chicken broth and 1 tablespoon hoisin sauce.
Like last time I made these, I just added the wine and the broth at the same time and it turned out great. (Especially the part when I added a little corn starch to thicken the sauce that I am sure would send a shudder through the authors' minds.)
Once broth is cooked down by half, pour over meatballs to serve. I served this over brown rice.
Alongside my meatballs, I made Sweet Yams in Ginger-Stick Curry. (I love how much hyphenating there is in this cookbook!)
Some people might call this recipe spicy. I put a whole, diced, jalapeno in it as called for, but I think I should have put 2 jalapenos in it.
Start by peeling 2 large Garnet or Jewel Yams. I prefer sweet potatoes, so I compromised with 2 medium yams and 1 sweet potato. Cut your sweet root veggies of preference in half lengthwise and then cut into 1/4 inch thick half rounds.
Boil yams in fiercely boiling water. (Do they watch Project Runway?) Yes, they use the word fiercely quite frequently when describing boiling water. Cook at a hard bubble for 10 minutes. (I love these descriptions.) I cooked my potatoes for 10 minutes and they came out a little mushy. Yummy, but mushy as you will see in the photo. So I would start testing for doneness around 7 minutes or make your potato chunks a little bigger. Drain your yams and place in your preferred serving dish.For the curry part, the authors have been extremely explicit about how to prepare the ingredients, that it is a "Chinese cooking" thing and every little bit is important and I completely agree with them. Not only is it fun to slice ginger into little matchsticks, but it actually does taste different on your tongue. I wish more cookbooks had such specifics.
Reuse the same pot you cooked the yams in and generously film it with oil and set over medium-high heat.Add the following: 1 inch peeled ginger, peeled and sliced into paper-thin matchsticks
4 large garlic cloves, sliced paper-thin
1 jalapeno, sliced very thin 2 whole scallions, cut into 1-inch lengths
2 large shallots, thin sliced
generous sprinkling of salt and pepper
Stir frequently on medium-high for 2 minutes. Cover, and then reduce heat to medium low and cook for an additional 5-8 minutes or until ginger has softened. Stir in a handful of coarse chopped basil (Thai or regular) and stir, uncovered for 30 seconds or less, just to wilt the basil. Spoon sauce over your yams and then give a squeeze of lime over the entire dish. This packs a lot of flavor and tasted pretty damn healthy too.
It was a nice compliment to the Ginger Meatballs. Good leftovers too.
64 recipes down in How To Eat Supper.
Back into the now empty pot on the stove, add one 14 oz. can of chicken broth, 2 /2 cups water, 3/4 cups of lentils, and the uncooked onions you set aside. Bring that to a boil, ok, a gentle bubble (I call that a simmer), and cook, partially covered for about 10 minutes, no more.
Melt some parmigiano on some whole grain bread and a fabulous feast you have. The orange wasn't as overwhelming as you might think, but I could definitely taste it as well as smell it. My husband couldn't even put his finger on it at first that it was orange because it is a little unexpected. I also loved how much onion was in the soup.
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