February 8, 2015 by Marios

Sweet Potato, Kohlrabi, and Peanut Stew

Over the last couple of years, our diet has slowly shifted away from meat. At first, our meals featured chicken a lot more than red meat. At some point, I found myself ordering fish from Fresh Direct and Good Eggs more and more often, until I cooked some kind of seafood at least three times a week. And in the last few months, I have found myself making a completely vegetarian meal for us at least once a week, sometimes twice. It helps that we have access to great vegetables from both local farmers (thank you Good Eggs and farmers’ markets) and far away ones (thank you Whole Foods and Fresh Direct).

Our go-to vegetarian meal has been my mom’s lentil recipe (sometimes with the addition of a little smoked fish, so…vegetarianish). But I have also cooked beans a few times, boiled in water with potatoes and carrots, that we ate with lots of olive oil and lemon juice (my favorite bean dish as a kid). So for Christmas, I gave Steve a 5lb box of five different kinds of dried beans from Rancho Gordo (isn’t it such a romantic gift? <insert fart joke here>). I’ve been cooking beans once a week since then, experimenting with different ways of preparing them.

Today’s recipe does not have beens in it, but it’s vegetarian. In fact, it’s vegan. It’s the result of needing to use up a bunch of veggies I bought in preparation for the giant snowstorm that never came last week. I had leeks, kohlrabi, and sweet potatoes. Not an obvious combination of ingredients. For some reason, however, I remembered a stew I used to make many years ago, that was based on a West African dish made with peanuts. I no longer had that recipe but I figured I could make one up myself. And I did. The result was a thick, rich, vegetarian stew that was perfect for a cold winter night. And a nice addition to our list of vegetarian meals.

Sweet Potato, Kohlrabi, and Peanut Stew

Note: I’ve noticed that some people have identified that this is a paleo recipe as well, though I thought that peanuts were not paleo. In any case, if you are a paleo enthusiast but you still eat peanuts, this is for you.

Makes 5-6 servings

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons olive oil
3 leeks, dark green parts discarded, white parts sliced thinly crosswise
1/2 tablespoon cinnamon
1/2 tablespoon paprika
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
5 cups vegetable stock
2 medium sized kohlrabi, peeled and cut into 1″ cubes
2 sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1″ cubes
1 14oz can of dice tomatoes
2 bay leaves
1 teaspoon salt
freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup natural-style (no sugar added) peanut butter (smooth or chunky)
1/2 cup basmati or jasmine rice
hot sauce (optional)

Directions:

Place peanut butter in a medium-sized heat-proof bowl and set aside.

In a large heavy pot, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add leeks and sauté stirring frequently until soft, about 5 minutes. Add cinnamon, paprika, and garlic. Continue to cook, stirring constantly for about 30-45 seconds. Add stock, kohlrabi, potato, tomatoes with their juices, bay leaves, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, lower heat to medium-low, cover pot and cook for 10 minutes.

Uncover pot and add some of the hot liquid in the bowl with the peanut butter. Use a spoon or whisk to help the peanut butter dissolve. Pour dissolved peanut butter back into pot and add rice. Raise heat to medium-high and bring back to a low boil. Lower heat to medium-low and cook uncovered, stirring occasionally, for about 20 minutes, or until rice and potatoes are fully cooked (kohlrabi will still have a slight crunch). Adjust salt if necessary. Remove and discard bay leaves.

Serve immediately, topped with your favorite hot sauce.

December 13, 2014 by Marios

Chestnut and Apple Soup

When I was a kid, I remember my mom telling me that as she got older, she started remembering things from her childhood that she had thought she had completely forgotten. It seemed that some memories were like fermented foods, stored away and left to mature over time by themselves until the time was right to unveil them again.

As a kid, this didn’t really make a lot of sense to me. But now that I am doing my own older-getting, I understand what she meant. Flashes of memory will pop into my head unexpectedly. They are often little things. Unremarkable events and ordinary days from many years ago. And sometimes these memories carry their own smells.

Like the smell of charred corn on the cob, for example. It’s always tied to my memories of trips we took to see my aunt’s family, who lived closer to the sea. As we drove back in the evening with our windows rolled down, the car would fill with the smoky, sweet smell of corn cooking on coals. There were always vendors selling it on the sidewalks and sometimes, my dad would stop the car and buy some for us. I burned my tongue many times on that corn. It was impossible to wait for it to cool down.

Roasting chestnuts is another one. I grew up without central heating. We had one portable gas heater that we huddled around in the evenings as we watched TV in the living room. Sometimes, my parents would buy fresh chestnuts and bring them home. I remember my dad would score the tops with an X and then put them on the top of the heater. Their smell as they roasted would fill the room and my sister and I would wait breathlessly for my parents to take them off the heater, blow on them to cool them down, and peel them for us. The sweet and nutty flesh was as good as candy.
Chestnut and Apple Soup – Slightly adapted from Epicurious.com

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) butter
1 1/2 cups chopped onion
1 small Golden Delicious (or other sweet variety) apple, peeled, cored, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 7.41-oz jar vacuum-packed chestnuts
1 large celery stalk, chopped
3 small fresh thyme sprigs
3 tablespoons brandy
3 cups (or more) chicken broth (use vegetable broth for vegetarian version)
1/4 cup crème fraîche
pumpkin seed oil, for garnish (you can also use hazelnut oil, or simply olive oil)

Directions:

Melt butter in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add onion, apple, chestnuts, celery, and thyme sprigs. Sauté until onion is soft and translucent, about 7 minutes. Add brandy; stir until liquid is absorbed, about 1-2 minutes. Add 3 cups broth and bring to boil. Reduce heat to medium and simmer until chestnuts are soft, about 15 minutes; cool slightly. Remove and discard thyme sprigs.

Working in batches, puree soup in blender until very smooth. Return soup to pan and cook until heated through, adding more chicken broth by tablespoonfuls to thin as needed and stirring often, about 2 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Divide soup among bowls. Top with dollop of crème fraîche and drizzle with pumpkin seed oil. Serve immediately.

November 15, 2014 by Marios

Steve’s Vegetable Chili

Steve has always talked about the vegetable chili he used to make in college. He has talked about how other students would appear in the kitchen when they smelled the zucchini sautéing in olive oil. Everyone loved it, he has always claimed.

I was not convinced. An all-vegetable chili just didn’t sound that appetizing to me. So we never made it.

Steve insisted. “My mom sent me to college with this recipe,” he always liked to remind me. Every now and then, he’d go through the folder with printouts of old recipes that he’s had for a couple of decades and he’d show me the xeroxed page from Parade magazine in 1986, with his mom’s handwritten changes and additions to the original recipe for “Red Hot Vegetable Chili.”

I was still not convinced. The recipe went back in the folder and we moved on to something else.

Then a week ago, we were hosting some friends, one of whom is vegan. As we were trying to plan a menu for the dinner we would cook for them, the vegetable chili came up again. This time I relented. We bought everything we needed and spent Saturday afternoon making it together.

I began to suspect that he had been right all along, that the chili would be good, when I put together the spices that went into it. That was a lot of spices. But it wasn’t until we sat down and I took a first bite that I really understood. This chili was exceptional, managing to explode with flavor without even a hint of meat. Every bite offered texture, a little heat, gentle sweetness, and sultry smokiness. I couldn’t stop eating it.

I was finally convinced.
Steve’s Vegetable Chili – Adapted from Parade magazine

Ingredients:

1/2 cup olive oil
4 medium zucchini, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
3 medium yellow onions, chopped
6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 large red bell peppers, cored and chopped
2 28 oz cans of whole peeled tomatoes
3 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon smoked paprika
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon dried oregano
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
3 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon fennel seeds
1/2 cup chopped Italian parsley
1 14.5 oz can red kidney beans, drained
1 14.5 oz can chickpeas, drained
1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil
1/2 cup chopped fresh dill
2 tablespoons lemon juice

Directions:

Heat oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add zucchini and sauté until just tender. Remove zucchini from pot. Add onions, garlic and red pepper to the pot and sauté until just wilted, about 10 minutes. Lower heat to medium low.

Using kitchen sheers or two knives, roughly cut up tomatoes in their cans. Pour tomatoes with their juices in pot with onions. Add chili, cumin, oregano, pepper, salt, fennel and parsley. Stir to combine. Cook uncovered for 30 minutes, stirring often.

Stir in kidney beans, chickpeas, basil, dill, and lemon juice. Cook for 15 minutes more. Stir well and adjust seasonings to taste.

Serve over plain white rice or polenta.