October 2008 Archives

This recipe was quite tasty and kind of fun. With sun-dried tomatoes, the stuffing is untraditional and delicious. I'd never cooked artichokes before, so it was kind of an experiment. If you've never eaten artichokes before: don't eat the entire thing. Scrape the fleshy bit off the fibrous leaves using your teeth.

Random facts:  artichokes are a thistle.  They can be made into an herbal tea or flavor liquor.

Stuffed Artichokes

Adapted from The Ultimate Vegetarian Cookbook

Ingredients

2 medium artichokes

salt

lemon slices

1 small onion, chopped

1 garlic clove, crushed

2 tbsp olive oil

2 oz mushrooms, chopped

1 small carrot, grated

1 oz sun-dried tomatoes, sliced. If in oil, drain. If not, rehydrate in warm water.

leaves from a sprig of thyme

about 2 or 3 tbsp water

ground black pepper

1 cup fresh bread crumbs

extra olive oil, to cook

fresh parsley, chopped, to garnish

1. Boil the artichokes in salted water with the lemons slices for about 30 minutes or until a leaf pulls easily from the base. Strain through a colander, set artichokes upside down and let cool.

Boiling the artichokes with lemon

1. Gently fry the onion and garlic in the oil for 5 minutes, then add the mushrrooms, carrot, sun-dried tomatoes, and thyme.

Fryng onions

1. Stir in the water, season well and cook for another 5 minutes, then mix in the bread crumbs.

2. Pull the leaves apart on the artichokes and pull out the purple-tipped central leaves. Feel free to eat these. Using a spoon, scrape out the hairy choke. Be careful when you do this. With my first artichoke, I didn't know how much to scrape out and accidentally scraped out the whole bottom. Just get the hairy parts. I thought the artichokes were fascinating: they had layers and layers like a Russian doll; they reminded me of squid or dinosaur beaks.

Artichoke with choke removed

1. Spoon the stuffing into the center of each articoke and push the leaves back into shape. Put the artichokes in an ovenproof dish and pour a little oil into the center of each one.

2. One hour before serving, heat the oven to 375 F and bake the artichokes for about 20-25 minutes until heated through. Garnish with the parsley. Eat!

-Esme

Pumpkin Doughnut Holes

A couple Thursdays ago, the fourth official New Recipe of the Week Day, we tried two new recipes, Katie, Chris and I. We tried sweetcorn and potato chowder and pumpkin doughnut holes, and ate them with stuffing and apple cider.

Apple cider isn't that difficult to make. You put apple juice, cinnamon, cloves, all spice, and cut oranges (peel and all) in a saucepan and simmer until delicious. Then you strain it through cheesecloth.

The pumpkin doughnuts recipe we got from this website:

http://doghillkitchen.blogspot.com/2008/09/pumpkin-spice-donut-holes-vegan.html

Cutting the dough using an empty spice bottle to get the right size and shape.

Frying the doughnuts.

If you don't have a thermometer to check the temperature of the oil, you can put a few drops of water on the oil and see if it sizzles.

Sweetcorn and Potato Chowder (from the Ultimate Vegetarian Cookbook)

1 onion, chopped

1 garlic clobe, crushed

1 medium size potato, chopped

2 stalks celery, sliced

1 small green pepper, seeded, halved and sliced

2 tbsp sunflower oil*

2 tbsp butter**

2 1/2 cups stock or water

salt and ground black pepper

1 1/4 cups milk**

1 x 7 oz can lima beans*

1 x 11 oz can corn kernels*

good pinch dried sage

1. Put the onion, garlic, potato, celery and green pepper into a large saucepan with the oil and butter.

2. Heat the ingredients until sizzling then turn the heat down to low. Cover and sweat the vegetables gently for 10 minutes, shaking the pan occasionally.

3. Pour in the stock or water, season to taste and bring to a boil. Turn down the heat, cover and simmer gently for about 15 minutes.

4. Add the milk, beans and corn-including their liquors-and the sage. Simmer again for 5 minutes. Check the seasoning and serve hot.

*I used olive oil

**I used vegan margarine and rice milk.

*I used frozen corn and lima beans, and thus didn't get the canned liquors with it.

-Esme

Once upon a time, I did not cook--but I baked. Cookies, cakes, brownies, and lots of chocolate. Now, however, I rarely bake anything beside super-hearty muffins. But recently I sat down and watched Chocolat with my good pal Jamie--and dear me, if I didn't have to get up an whip up some chocolately goodness right then!  (I suppose that making truffles is not really baking, but who is keeping score?) So here you have the recipe that got me right back into the swing of things.

Ingredients:

8 oz. semisweet or bittersweet chocolate

¾ c. heavy cream

¼ tsp. ground ginger

1 orange

2 tbsp. unsalted butter

1 tbsp. vanilla extract

Cocoa powder

Directions:

1. Chop chocolate into very small pieces (about the size of chocolate chips). Place in a heat-proof bowl, set aside.

2. In a small saucepan, slowly heat the cream until warm but not boiling. Sprinkle the ground ginger into the cream, stir.

3. Add the zest of one orange, stir. Quarter the orange and sqeeze the juice into the cream, then place the slices into the saucepan. Steep for 15 minutes, not allowing the cream to boil.

4. Remove from heat. Strain the cream mixture to remove orange pulp and slices. Return the strained cream to heat.

5. Add butter to cream, bring to boil. Once boiling, immediately pour the cream over the chocolate. Let stand for 5 minutes, then whisk mixture until smooth. Add vanilla, whisk until it is all incorporated.

6. Cover the bowl with plastic, place in refridgerator until firm (around 6 hours or overnight).

7. Using your hands and a spoon, form the chocolate into small balls. Roll the balls in cocoa powder, tap off the excess, and place on a platter. Serve immediately, or refridgerate for later consumption.

A few notes: 

This recipe is super easy to tweak. My original recipe called for lavender buds, and I decided I would rather try orange and ginger. The quantities of fruit and spice can be adapted to fit your own tastes. I prefer using really dark chocolate with any orange flavoring, though milk chocolate would work as well. I recommend, though, that when you cook with chocolate you want the very best ingredients. Splurge on the really nice baking chocolate, and use the cream with the highest fat content you can find!

-Katie

This is not your ordinary quiche. It's like a luscious, savory pumpkin pie.

Pastry:

1 1/2 c. unbleached flour

4 oz. cream cheese

4 oz. butter (at room temperature)

Filling:

1 tbsp. oil

1 onion, finely chopped

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 tsp. curry powder

3 eggs

1/2 c. heavy cream

1/2 c. pureed pumpkin

parsley

Preheat oven to 415 degrees.

1. Sift the flour into a large bowl. Add the cream cheese and butter. Rub the mixture together for about two minutes. It will begin to clump until you will be able to form it into a ball. 

2. Kneed the dough for about 10 seconds until it is smooth. Do not overwork the pastry. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for half an hour.

3. Take chilled dough and divide it into eight equal portions. Roll these out and put into small greased pastry tins. (The dough will be easier to roll out if everything is chilled. Try chilling your pastry roller in the refrigerator and rolling out the dough between sheets of parchment paper.)

4. Bake dough for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Put cooking stones on top of pastry if you are worried about the dough shrinking. Remove from oven, and reduce heat to 350 degrees.

5. While the dough is cooking, prepare the filing. Combine eggs, cream, and pumpkin in a bowl, whisk until smooth. Set aside.

6. Heat oil in a saucepan. Add onion and garlic. Sauté for 5 minutes over low heat or until soft and translucent. Add curry powder, stir for one minute. Remove from heat.

7. Spoon the onion mixture into the bottom of each pastry. Pour the egg mixture over the onions until the pastry is almost full.

8. Sprinkle dried parsley over the tops of each quiche. Place in oven and cook at the reduced temperature for 20 minutes or until the filling has set.

9. Serve warm.

Notes: I like using a 'garden vegetable' cream cheese that has bits of chopped vegetables in it. This adds an interesting flavor to the pastry, but it makes it a bit difficult to roll out. Also, sometimes it is tricky to figure out precisely when the filling has set, but these little quiches can withstand some sustained cooking--just don't burn them.

-Katie

Katie and I moved into a new apartment last month and I brought up all of my cookbooks and cooking magazines. I've barely begun to try the recipes in these cookbooks, so I've decided to try a new recipe every week. Last week's was Peanut-Tamarind Sweet Potato Curry. The orange juice in the recipe gives it a pleasant citrus flavor. Tamarind is the fruit from a tree native to Africa.

Ingredients

1 large sweet potato, peeled and cubed (about 1 lb.)

1 Tbs. minced fresh ginger

1 jalapeño, chopped (about 1 Tbs.)

1 tsp. curry powder

½ cup low-sodium vegetable broth

¾ cup orange juice

¼ cup crunchy peanut butter

1 Tbs. brown sugar

1 tsp. tamarind paste*

½ tsp. salt

2 cups cooked brown rice

1. Heat skillet coated with cooking spray over medium-high heat. Add potatoes and sauté 1 minute. Add ginger and jalapeño and cook 1 minute, or until fragrant. Stir in curry powder and cook 1 minute more. Add broth, cover, and reduce heat to medium low. Simmer potatoes 10 minutes, or until soft.

2. Whisk together juice, peanut butter, brown sugar, tamarind past and salt in bowl. Add to sweet potato mixture, and bring to a simmer. Cook 5 minutes, or until sauce thickens. Serve over rice.

*I couldn't find tamarind paste at the Food Co-op or Public Market here in Bellingham, but 1 tsp. lime juice can be substituted. When I got back from the grocery store, I realized my lime had disappeared, so I ended up using lemon juice in place of the tamarind.

Recipe taken from Vegetarian Times March 2007.

-Esme