Accidentally Vegan: Quinoa Salad with Zucchini, Mint, and Pistachios

I believe I may have already blogged about the Meatless Mondays initiative, but as it's been such a long time since I've updated to begin with... Meatless Monday is a campaign with many celebrity contributors (Mario Batalli, Paul McCartney, to name a couple - I even have the McCartney family Meat-free Monday cookbook), as well as those in the health community, targeted to help reduce the amount of meat the average family consumes with the goal of bettering their personal health and the health of the environment. More often than not, I tend to forget Meatless Monday and treat it like a normal day. While putting together our grocery list this morning, I came across a lovely salad recipe from September's issue of Martha Stewart Living. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of Martha, I find much of her magazine to be rather pretentious and WAY out of my league, but... her recipes are hands-down part of my favorites. She has a great style of writing her recipes (or at least her editors have an excellent way of editing them): they're easy, approachable, and very clear. Her recipes rank among Giada DeLaurentiis, Ina Garten, and the folks at America's Test Kitchen/Cooks' Illustrated for the most well-written recipes. And you know these recipes were tested to ensure they're correct, too, something I feel many cookbook authors and chefs don't do nearly enough. Anyway, I thought that I might keep the menu of meals this week rather light. Neither of us ate very consciously this weekend and I figure a nice salad would help turn that around.

I love quinoa and I love finding new ways to cook and prepare it. While there is some controversy about quinoa and the effect the explosion of first-world demand for quinoa has had on the indigenous people who primarily live off of it, I do love the fact that it's a fully balanced protein and can be a tasty stand-in for most starches, like rice, potatoes, and pasta. I also love zucchini and I don't think I cook nearly enough with it. It's such a versatile little gourd. You can bake it, stuff it, sauté it, roast it, grill it! With two of my favorite ingredients in the forefront, how could this salad go wrong? It didn't, to be quite honest. It was quick to make and incredibly flavorful. The sautéed zucchini provided a lovely sweetness next to the savory quinoa, then there was a punch of lemon from the zest and juice and the brightness of the mint. The pistachios add a lovely crunchy texture and toasted flavor note. A sharpness from the lightly sautéed garlic and the scallions made for a really great flavored salad. The great thing, too, is that it was filling, unlike other lettuce-based salads, which can leave you feeling more bloated than satisfied. Both Marshall and I loved it and I know I'll make it again.

A few things I would think to adjust for next time:

• Cut the amount of quinoa to 3/4 of a cup instead of a full cup.
• Increase the amount of zucchini by a full cup. I love having more green on my plate, plus I think the zucchini got a little lost among the quinoa.
• Skip trying to find/use roasted and salted pistachios. Get the shelled raw pistachios and toast them in a dry pan until lightly browned. You honestly won't miss the salt and I think you might end up with an even better flavor.
• Smash and mince the garlic, instead of slicing it. Honestly, I don't have the knife skills to thinly slice garlic and I'm not digging out the mandolin to slice a clove (or in my case 2 cloves) of garlic. If you choose to smash and mince, be super careful not to overcook the garlic in the pan. You merely want to warm it through and cut the rawness, you definitely don't want to brown it. 

A quick note about Martha's measurement "style": I'm not entirely sure where she gets her "medium" zucchinis that yield 2-1/2 cups thinly sliced. I also don't know where she gets her scallions where 3 of them sliced equals 1/2 Cup. Lastly, I think she gets her lemons from the magical lemon tree in her personal grove, because I've never been able to get 3 Tablespoons of juice from a single one! I ended up slicing 3 small-to-medium zucchinis, 6 rather skinny scallions, and the juice from 2 small lemons. My suggestion is to buy a little extra and if you end up with too much, I'm sure you'll find a use for your leftovers (might I suggest garnishing that gin and tonic with a lemon slice?).

I totally recommend this salad for those warm summer nights when you don't have much time to cook and the kitchen is too hot for much else. Plus - you could always grill your zucchini, instead of sautéing it!

Bon appetit!

Vegetarian Madness! Veggie Wheat-Berry Salad with Warm Pita and Grilled Halloumi

But first, a confession. Had you asked me what "halloumi" was 6 months ago, I would've ventured a guess that it was a type of fish. I would have, of course, been absolutely wrong. I had been to countless Greek and Mediterranean restaurants and seen something called "halloumi" on the menu and immediately regarded it as a type of fish, perhaps a white fish like halibut or mahi-mahi or a bronzino. Although, now I see that I probably just equated the way halloumi sounded with a combination of the words halibut and mahi-mahi (I believe covered the fact that I'm weird. Moving on...) Regardless, I would've never thought it was a type of cheese. What kind of name is halloumi for a type of cheese anyway? Well, it is and my sincerest apologies for the island of Cyprus (and its inhabitants) where halloumi originated. Halloumi is, indeed, a cheese and I learned this at a birthday party earlier this year. What's wondrous about halloumi is that it doesn't melt, but one of its famed preparations is grilling it. I'm not sure what kind of magic keeps this brined sheeps' milk cheese from melting once applied to heat, but it remains intact and this delicious salty-briny-crispy crust forms on the outside. It's delicious and irresistible. My friend's boyfriend grilled some up for my friend's birthday party and it just tasted so damn good. Plus, it's super quick and easy. Just a non-stick pan is needed over medium heat. Plop down a few slices, grill a couple minutes on either side, then eat! Well, okay, wait for it to cool down a bit, but then eat!

Weirdly enough, I forgot about the halloumi until this weekend while leafing through this month's issue of Women's Health. Every once in a while they'll have a section on food and cooking chock-full of delicious recipes. This month's held a particular gem: Veggie Wheat Berry Salad. My husband, when presented with this week's menu, immediately said "I knew you'd pick to make that!" pointing to the recipe in the magazine. I asked him why he would think that I would be drawn to this recipe, despite the fact that it sounded delicious and perfect for a summer evening. "Because of the photo. It's in a small little glass, all pretty and colorful." Indeed the photo shows a small appetizer-sized glass full of colorful veggies and little fluffy-looking wheat berries. I can't deny that the photo drew me into the recipe in the first place (ironic considering one of this month's articles is on food porn...), but it was the potential for a delicious one-salad meal with fresh summer veggies and chewy wheat berries. I fell in love with wheat berries when I was living in London. One of the yogurt varieties/brands had winter wheat berries stirred throughout. The yogurt itself was sublime (so much better than the yogurt in the states), but the addition of the wheat berries...it made it more filling and you'd find these little chewy bits of deliciousness amid the creamy clouds of yogurt and sweet chunks of strawberries. I ate more yogurt while I was in London that I'd eaten my entire life. Anyway, for the longest time I didn't know what these little bits were in my yogurt. But now I know and I'm totally going to cook up a batch of plain wheat berries and sprinkle them in my yogurt from now on.

Anyway, getting back to the salad, and the meal as a whole, it was perfect: savory and fresh. I couldn't find any green bell peppers at the store, and wanting a bit more color than red, I found a few purple bell peppers and picked those up (of course, forgetting that the red onion is also purple, but they still stood out). The dressing is a great combination of tangy and savory, akin to the "broth" in a gazpacho (thanks, in part, to the red wine vinegar and Worcestershire sauce). Overall it had a very gazpacho-like quality, but much more filling due to the chewy and delicious wheat berries. Originally, I wasn't sure if this would be filling enough for a dinner, which is why I toasted up a pita bread and grilled up the halloumi. Everything worked so well together. After taking a bit of pita and cheese with a bit of olive oil, a bit of the salad would cleanse the palate. This would make an excellent picnic meal (either pre-grill the cheese or use a pan or be extra-special careful on the open BBQ). The salad itself, of course, is perfect for summer potlucks, too!

Hello Dal-ly, Take Two: Curried Red Onion Jam with Simple Dal

I know it wasn't too long ago that I posted a delicious dal recipe. This particular post isn't necessarily going to focus on the dal, but rather on the condiment which elevates this simple dal into something incredible. You'll recall from my last post that I'm rather enamored with a new cookbook. It shouldn't surprise then that this recipe comes from the same book. While the onion is called "red", it certainly doesn't look RED like other truly red fruits and vegetables. Instead, the author quite rightly puts the red onion in the purple chapter. Yes, a look at a color wheel would show that the connection between red and purple is only a small amount of blue away, but it's still purple. Okay, how did we get on the topic of color? When I set about to make this condiment, I had no idea how much flavor a red onion could have. I have a slight issue with onions. Raw onions tend to not have the best affect on me; they leave me tasting onions for days afterward and my stomach is certainly far from happy. Cooked onions are better for me, but I tend to keep my distance from too much onion regardless. But this jam? Oh my... it's sweet, tangy, spicy, and, well, jammy. It's super simple to make and even though I made mine the night before making the dal, they can both be made at the same time and in about an hour. So, while it's certainly not a 30-minute meal, it can be done after coming  home from work. I have a feeling this jam would also make a great gift. Snag a couple of small jars and a few pieces of decorative fabric/cloth and you've got a gift for just about anyone. Cheryl, the author of Ripe, mentions you can use the leftover jam for sandwiches and I'm eager to give it a try. I figure some roasted chicken, mayo, and some spinach with plenty of this jam would make a kind of curried chicken salad sandwich. You could also use it in a pita with hummus and crunchy veggies for a flavor-packed vegetarian option. Either way, this jam can be an excellent condiment for just about anything in need of kick.

I did want to touch upon the simple dal. It really is very simple. I could barely believe just how simple it was to cook and yet so incredibly flavorful, creamy, and rich it came out to be. I'd never cooked with red lentils before, so this was a first. I think the last dal I made, using lentils of course, used the regular brown/green lentils (I think...it was a while ago). The red lentils don't retain their shape like French black lentils do, but instead break down into this super rich creaminess. The aromatics in this recipe also stand out. I mean, this dal only calls for lentils, water, star anise, ginger, and a chili pepper (I used jalapeno since I couldn't find a red chili at the store). Since it's only 1 chili, there isn't a whole lot of spice, but ginger makes up for the lack of heat. The star anise provides this sweetness and underlying tone, which I'd never noticed in other dal I've had. Honestly, this is probably the simplest recipe I'll ever post here.

I got a request from a friend to post more vegetarian-friendly recipes. I have another vegetarian dish, which I'll post next. I honestly love cooking vegetarian. Not only does it tend to be simpler to make, but it's also a lot lighter on the wallet. The times when I've spent the most at the grocery store have usually been when I had a lot of meat on the week's menu. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't think I could ever turn completely vegetarian. I love fish, chicken, pork, and beef way too much to give it all up. I pride myself on being an omnivore and am lucky to have a husband who doesn't have to have meat on his dinner plate every night.

I Heart Broccoli: Broccoli Soup with Cheddar Croutons

Last weekend, my two very good friends from college took me out to give me my birthday present: mani-pedi's. We also threw in some eating, drinking, and shopping, too. While we were sauntering around and window shopping, we ended up at Anthropologie. I honestly cannot wear anything in that store, try as I might. I don't have the right complexion for the majority of the tones they play with and I definitely do not have the body, either (a wide body + flowy skirts, dresses, and tops = not that great). The thing that Anthropologie does have that I love to browse is their kitchenware section. Most of it is tchotchke items, but if I had the money to throw, I'd buy a handful of their beautiful mugs and linens. Anyway, while browsing, something caught my eye: a beautiful...brightly colored...cookbook. I love big splashy cookbooks with pages of photographed dishes and food. The book is Ripe: A Fresh Colorful Approach to Fruits and Vegetables. It's a gorgeous book, first separated by color, and then by ingredient. I'd never seen a cookbook organized by color, but I love it (even has a website)! It helps illustrate the approach the author, Cheryl Sternman Rule, is going for. What grabs your attention in the produce section or farmer's market? Color. Color is was signifies ripeness, it signifies nutritional value, it signifies deliciousness. I quickly grabbed the book and brought it home. I haven't treated this cookbook like the others I have on my shelf. I have treated this cookbook like an actual book. My husband found me in the chair in our office curled up with this book, reading it, and he chuckled. "Who reads a cookbook?" Well, I do, I suppose. Each ingredient is prefaced with a vignette from the author, talking about her relationship with the ingredient. Her writing style is humorous, sarcastic, and genuine. It's similar to how I talk and even a bit how I write. I know I'll find myself leafing through this book a hundred more times, and you'll see plenty of her recipes posted here, as I find something new and exciting to make. But, of course, the first ingredient I turned to was broccoli.

I think I've mentioned my love of this particular member of the cabbage family before. I love broccoli. I've always had. It's not like it's a newly found favorite, like brussel sprouts (shh, don't tell my mom...), I've always loved broccoli. When I was a kid, my favorite vegetable side was steamed broccoli, topped with a splash of red wine vinegar. I never understood my cousins' infatuation with cheese sauce. Why drown these little tender trees with heavy thick cheese? Don't get me wrong, I love cheese sauce, but broccoli has this great flavor - why cover it up? Plus, I loved the texture of the stalk and the "leaves" of the crowns. It's a little sweet, a little bitter, and a whole lot of delicious. In college, my dorm fridge was stocked with bags of prepared broccoli florets. I'd throw them in a bowl with a bit of water and pop in the microwave for a minute or so. Pull it out and snack on them while watching TV or chatting online. The second half of my senior year consisted of broccoli florets and microwave-baked potatoes (plus its various toppings: hello baked beans!). My husband would shake his head whenever he'd visit and open my fridge to find these two items in abundance (amid bottles of beer, of course). No one could ever say my diet was unhealthy. It certainly wasn't a varied diet by any extent, but at least I wasn't living off of Hot Pockets.

So, what did Ms. Rule have in store for my favorite vegetable? Why, soup, of course! I love a good soup, but unfortunately the majority of broccoli soups at restaurants tend to be heavy, thick, and full of "cheese", with absolutely no flavor of broccoli, unless you count the sour taste of overcooked cabbage as the flavor of broccoli (which no one should). This soup has but a little bit of cheese in it and no cream. It uses an immersion blender and a bit of Greek yogurt to thicken at the end, but otherwise it's all broccoli on the inside. The thing that really caught my attention for this soup, though, was the combination of spices used to flavor the soup: whole cumin seeds, fennel seeds, and ground coriander. This elevates the soup entirely and places it into more Indian fare than American. Oh, and did I mention it's topped with cheddar croutons?* I love croutons in my soup (one of the reasons I LOVE French Onion Soup) and these add a lovely sharpness against the spicy thick soup. As the author notes before the recipe "As with most soups, its flavor improves over time." The spices are super potent even after a day after the soup is cooked. Total powerhouse of flavor, it definitely stands on its own. Or, you know, paired with an open-faced grilled cheese with tomato, which is what we did with the leftovers.

* Haha, okay, funny story about the croutons. The recipe says to line a baking sheet with parchment when making the cheddar croutons. I pulled out my roll of parchment and grabbed what was left of the roll: a 18" x 1" strip. Well, that wasn't going to do me any good. So, I grabbed what I thought would've been a fine substitute: aluminum foil. Boy, was I wrong. The cheese immediately stuck fast to the foil and took the cubes of bread hostage. I did what I could with my spatula when trying to flip and turn the croutons during baking, but it was a big fat mess. In my final step, attempting to rescue the croutons from the metal clutches of the foil, my husband peeks over my shoulder and says "Wouldn't a silpat worked better?" I shot him the look of death over my shoulder and he high-tailed it out of the kitchen. How stupid of me? I have 2 silpats in my arsenal. Why didn't I think to use them?! As I went about picking little bits of foil off of the salvaged croutons, I yelled to my husband in our office: "And, yes, a slipat would've worked better."

Hello Dal-y: Broccolini and Chickpea Dal

Last year I started a subscription to Sunset. Yes, I am my mother, and I've accepted that (to be honest, she is a pretty cool lady). Anyway, I didn't quite know what to expect when I got my first issue in the mail. I knew there were going to be a lot of articles about gardening (have I not mentioned my rather brown thumb?), home renovations (although drool-worthy, can't use them), and travel (okay, that fits into our life a little more). I had a feeling there would be some recipes involved (I mean, what else are you going to do with your perfectly grown summer squash in your homemade redwood raised beds?), but I wasn't sure what kind. I didn't want a repeat of Mario Batalli, in which he goes on in a pompous manner about how readily available he finds monkfish at his local fishmonger's and how his father owns his own charcuterie (or the Italian equivalent) and makes his own salumi and other dried meats and sausage. Oh--you don't have these things available? Too bad, no substitutions for you, peasant! *ahem* Where was I? Oh, right... I was pleasantly surprised to find that Sunset's recipes were easy to follow and were, of course, delicious. Plus, since Sunset is all about the seasonal availability of everything, the recipes coincide with the seasons and use fresh ingredients, which you can find in abundance at your local store, in my case Whole Foods (anyone who follows me on Twitter will know I have a bit of a Whole Foods addiction). 

One of the first recipes I tried from Sunset was this one, Broccolini and Chickpea Dal. Alright, pun aside, I love a good dal. As I've established a number of times before, I cannot get enough of legumes. I think I could easily go vegetarian, as long as I subsisted on nothing but legumes (and, of course, pairing them with the right grain as to ensure I'm getting my complete protein). Of course, this would mean no meat and that would make me a very sad omnivore. Nonetheless, I have been known o make a vegetarian meal every so often and this has become one of my absolute favorites. I also love anything that starts with "brocco-", whether it's plain ol' broccoli or perhaps its bitter cousin broccoli rabe or its sweeter and more tender brethren broccolini, I love it all. I've been known to live off of broccoli (okay, it was broccoli and baked potatoes, but still, my college dorm's mini-fridge wasn't complete without a few bags of already prepared fresh broccoli florets). This dish is perfect: it's spicy, tender, creamy, and perfect for all occasions. I'm sure if you can't find broccolini, you can simply use regular broccoli. Although, I would recommend just trim up the stems a bit more so that it cooks in the time allotted without overcooking the chickpeas. Seriously - this is a meal I would easily make year round. Who cares if it's the middle of summer and you can't get off the couch because your thighs are stuck to it? This will make you sweat just enough to loosen things up and off you go!

Way Better than Boca: Homemade Veggie Burgers

Remember when the Food Network showed cooking shows?  Well, it feels lately that the network has been overrun with food competition shows.  Granted some of them are very good; I'm a huge fan of Chopped, actually.  Anyway, there were my favorites, like Everyday Italian, Nigella Bites, and Good Eats, which now can only be found at odd hours of the morning on Sundays.  Very rarely did I ever pay attention to the vibrant host of Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives - yes, he DID have an actual cooking show before they just let him eat on camera - Guy Fieri.  In all honesty, he's kind of a tool and I really don't care for him all that much, but I happened to be bored one afternoon and home and watching, as one often does in these situations, the Food Network and I saw an episode of his cooking show.  He had two guests on, his mother and his sister.  His sister happens to be vegetarian and so Fieri's show centered around her recipe for homemade veggie patties, or burgers.  They're awesome, as you can see depicted by my empty plate.  I managed to scarf down everything before I remember to take a picture of my plate all done up!

Now, I love beans and these veggie patties are all about beans.  There are 3 different kinds of beans in these patties with very different flavors and textures.  Another thing about this recipe is that it contains a heck of a lot of ingredients; 21 to be exact.  You certainly can't say these veggie burgers lack any kind of flavor at all and surprisingly enough, even with 21 ingredients, it isn't too big or muddled.  You do taste each spice and flavor and they end up being really delicious.  Since we've had these (first time I made these was more than a year ago), every time I've eaten a boca- or gardenburger, I'm horribly disappointed.  Plus, both of those patties are full of fillers like rice and bread (you'll notice the main filler here is rolled oats with only a little bit of bread crumbs, to hold everything together; you definitely don't taste either of these fillers, unlike the rice in gardenburgers); there's really no substance at all and they're rather tasteless.  I honestly think that prepared vegetarian or vegan foods are the words most processed foods and contain as much or maybe more chemicals than all other non-vegetarian processed foods.  These homemade veggie burgers are tasty, delicious, nutritious and easy to make.  They're great with sweet potato oven fries, which I spray with olive oil and sprinkle with salt, pepper and cayenne with a little bit of brown sugar.

Just remember:  to make this meal a complete protein, make sure to pair with a whole grain (we served the burgers on whole wheat buns)!

Oh yeah, I wanted to comment on the funky measurements below.  The first time I made these, I had to keep a conversion chart handy, so I knew how many of each item I actually needed.  I'm a fan of volume measurements (cups, teaspoons, tablespoons, etc) and not weight, especially since I don't have a kitchen scale.  I have a strong feeling that since Fieri's shtick is that of a bachelor, he has a shot glass or jigger handy from his bar and uses that for measuring out liquids.  Anyway, believe me when I say that the measurements here really don't make a huge difference.  You will, though, end up with a mishmash of half-open cans of beans.  I usually end up making some kind of chili soon after making these burgers, just to use up the beans and not let them go to waste.