Mushroom Soup

Half a red onion

1 stick of celery

10 mushrooms

salt + pepper 

1 garlic clove 

white wine

1 potato

milk

oil

Pickled Peppers

My palate loves spice and heat. Peppers are sometimes more potent when dried, smoked, and pickled. Am I forgetting any? A bag of 15 serranos are a dollar at my favorite produce outlet. This is the perfect way to use them. I made a very small batch here just to see how they would turn out...

Ingredients:
6 serranos
2 garlic cloves
carrot for sweetness and presentation
3/4 cup water
3/4 cup white vinegar
1 teaspon salt per cup of pickling liquid, a generous pinch will do

My jar is so cute! Sanitize the jar in boiling water. Add in peppers, garlic and carrot.

Boil water, vinegar and salt.

Pour in boiling liquid, close the top. In a sauce pan, boil some water and gently put the jar into the water for 10 minutes rapid boil. Remove jar, let cool. Refrigerate and enjoy!

Pad Thai

My goblin of a sister making faces at my creations.

Used the simplest of ingredients: beans, tofu, chives, parsley, scallions, bean sprouts

dried rice noodles

boil rice noodles, when al dente, add in tofu and beans

Drain. Using the same sauce pan, on med-high heat, drizzle in oil and saute ingredients with desired sauces. I used hoisin and chili oil, stir in bean sprouts and chives.

garnish with parsley and scallions.

Easy.

Fear Not A Cold Winters Day, Soup's On The Way!

Since before I could even cook, I have been making all sorts of cabbage soups. Usually a tomato base with a lot of vegetables that won't gunk up (potatoes especially, corn and peas don't taste good after a day) after a day. Possibly the easiest thing you can make is soup. Throw it all together, fill it up with water. Soup.

My father.. recently went on a strange shopping escapade.. buying 52 cans of soup. The chicken noodle is a classic favorite.. however the beef barley and lentil cans have not been touched. I used 3 cans of the lentils in here.

Chop 2 onions, 4 skinny carrots, 2/3 head of cabbage, 4 tomatoes.
In a large pot at medium high heat, add some olive oil to lightly cover bottom of pot, saute onions and carrots. Sweating them and cover the pot for a few minutes. Add in cabbage and stir. Throw in tomatoes and gently press the tomatoes to release juice. The pot will become dry and your veggies can brown.. water, stock, anything.. But no, not just anything today.. I poured in half a bottle of champagne. Then a small can of tomato paste and lastly, the lentil soups.

Vegetarian Lasagna

 

The most common theme about my cooking is that I don't intend to make anything until I am left with half used ingredients. There was 1/4 box of oven ready lasagna noodles and scarce vegetables left from making pizza. I almost always have tomato sauce in the pantry.. and this proves to be another super easy and fast meal when you're low on the dough!  Please don't mind the lack of ingredients.

 

I made a bechamel sauce for added flavor and moisture in the lasagna. Melt about 2 tbsp butter on medium low heat. Stir in 2 tbsp flour and whisk at low heat for a few minutes until your roux is golden..

 

In a separate pot heat 2 cups of milk. Whisk milk into the roux, making sure heat is still low. Let it cook for 10 minutes, whisking when needed. Take it off the heat and season with 1 tsp salt and a pinch of nutmeg. Pour into a bowl and put plastic wrap on the sauce to prevent a film.

 

To make the sauce tasty, saute 2 chopped carrots, 1 onion, and a handful of mushrooms in olive oil. When the vegetables have softened a little, add some chopped garlic. Pour in a large can of tomato sauce.  Stir constantly until well mixed and then take off the heat.

 

I sliced some eggplant, zucchini and tomatoes. Spread a little tomato sauce on the bottom of the pan.

 

Here is the really sad part, I only had 8 lasagna noodles, not enough to make 3 layers. Break the noodles up to fit. Spread more tomato sauce on first layer of noodles.

 

 Spoon on 1/3 of your bechamel sauce. Layer with vegetables and some morsels of cheese. Repeat with layering noodles, tomato sauce, bechamel, vegetables and cheese.

 

Pour on the rest of your tomato sauce and sprinkle cheeses, cover with tin foil. Bake in a 350 degree oven for half an hour.

 

After half an hour, remove foil and continue baking for 15 minutes.

It is very healthy due to the fact that there isn't a lot of noodles.

So delicious!

A Delicious Mourning

A vegetarian meal my mother prepared for her father's death anniversary. He passed away in 1977, her family has feasted every single year since. 

Incense are a must have.

In Buddhist tradition it is better to mourn with vegan food than meats because no animal was harmed in the sacred ritual.

Flowers complete the set up.

Mom's vegan soup.

I pretty much ate half the batch of soup mother cooked that day, so maybe a gallon was mine? I did not watch her cook it but I'm guessing that I know exactly what went it in!

Ingredients:
-Water
-seaweed
-julienne carrots
-shitake mushrooms
-soft tofu
-parsley
-black pepper
-salt

Sounds pretty bland? Not one bit. When you soak dried shitake mushrooms, you reserve that rich brown liquid to use as broth. Mom might also have used vegetable bouillon cubes/powder. Cook everything but tofu, carrots and parsley. Carrots and tofu can go in after you rapid boil the seaweed. Parsley and pepper to taste.

Isn't this beautiful? Fried tofu with lemon grass and pineapple.

Inspired by Hien & Vy

On my recent trip to Calgary, AB, my cousins, sisters Hien and Vy made their wonderful homemade salsa as a side on our spaghetti dish one night. Their salsa consisted of 4:1 of tomatoes to avocado, light and fresh with hints of lemon and cilantro. Until that point I had never considered making salsa and guacamole into one.. but it is genious! Of course being a MUFA lover my tomato to avocado ratio is more like 1:4! Hien and Vy made a base of tomatoes with avocados as a background.. myself I love guacamole so it is more "mole than toes" says my sister Nancy. Funny because I started out with more tomatoes than avocados but to adjust to my own taste there had to be more avocado in the end.

Ingredients:
~ 7 small tomatoes
6 avocados
1 medium red onion
juice of 1 lime
4 cloves of garlic
Tabasco to taste

Notice the difference between the romas (top) and regular tomatoes (bottom). The romas I find contain more water and are more tart than average tomatoes that hold their shape better.

 Chop your tomatoes!

Chop your avocados! When picking out avocados, I choose the teardrop over the round. The teardrop shaped have been tree ripened and are richer in taste. Hass avocados (California) contain almost twice the amount of MUFA than their Florida counterparts.

The pit is so small in this avocado that I sliced it right in half! I usually buy about 10-12 avocados in a week, only half of them ripe enough to consume leaving the other half to shelf until they soften.

This is the essence of my guacamole. A little bit goes a long way.
In a large bowl mix your tomatoes, avocados, chopped red onion, lime juice, garlic and hot sauce.

Enjoy with your loved ones!