Green Curry Broth

While scrolling through my Pinterest app, I saw that Heidi from 101 Cookbooks had posted an older recipe from her site - Green Curry Broth.  I can't explain why, but it really appealed to me at that moment and I made it for dinner not too long after that.

First, you chop and chop and slice and dice and chop some more to create the foundation for the delicious green curry broth.  This is the longest part of the recipe.  After all of this cooks down to impart its flavor, you strain it out and throw it away.  At first I was sad about this, but then I tasted the broth - it was amazing.  Next time, I would not bother with all the fine dicing and such - you can get this done much faster with bigger chunks and since you're straining it, you probably won't even notice a difference.  I also wouldn't hesitate to make this broth with the intention of freezing it, without any add-ins, to enjoy on a rainy day.

Once the broth has been made, you can put pretty much whatever you want in it.  We opted for rice noodles, shredded cabbage, broccoli, frozen corn and green beans, and I saved the tops of the scallions (used in the broth) and added those in too.  I chopped handfuls of mint, basil, and cilantro from my balcony and mixed those in at the very end.  I topped off my own bowl with a little swirl of coconut milk.  This was a good combination of things, but I would break the noodles in half next time, and I had also intended to add cubes of tofu, but things got away from me.

Hard-Cooked Eggs with Dukkah

The phase has passed by now, but when I made this recipe a few weeks ago, I was eating hard boiled eggs almost every day as a snack.  The dukkah recipe from Super Natural Every Day seemed like a great way to spice it up (accidental pun!).  The fragrant mixture of nuts, seeds, and spices is not as strong in taste as it is in smell, but as I write this I find myself craving the flavor.  The dukkah could also be used to flavor dipping oil for bread, and I intend to try it crusted on salmon.  Hopefully I'll be reporting back on that soon.  I'm intending to post more - just need to get my ducks in a row over here...

Roasted Broccoli and Shrimp

Hi! I swear, I'm trying to post more often now that I'm cooking more. This month the 101 Cookbooks Library is featuring Melissa Clark, NY Times food writer and someone who understands the challenges faced by home cooks.

I started with a roasted shrimp and broccoli recipe, something super simple and easy that is still healthy. I love the cumin, coriander, and just a bit of spice - I used red pepper flakes. Next time, I'll roast the broccoli for a bit less time, so there will be some crunch left to it.

And I'm looking forward to some more quick, simple, healthy, and most of all tasty meals from Melissa Clark's books.

Spiced Eggplant Stew

If you came into my living room right now, the first thing you would notice is the stack of books on my living room table.  From the bottom up: Heirloom Beans, Cooking from the Farmers' Market, Edible, Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, Super Natural Cooking, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, and on top of the pile is Tender, open to this Spiced Eggplant Stew.  I've been turning to this book fairly often lately after neglecting it when it was the featured cookbook last month.

This recipe contains the flavors of cardamom, coriander, black pepper, garlic, ginger, turmeric, mint, and cilantro - quite a few flavors, and they all combine with the heat from the chile and the creaminess of the coconut milk to make a really delicious meal.  The tomatoes and eggplant go well together, and the eggplant is smooth and soft.  I served this over brown basmati rice.  The leftovers were delicious as well, and I put some in the freezer to enjoy when the weather cools down.  I'm not certain it will defrost well, but here's hoping.

Red Lentil and Chard Soup

I've had Ottolenghi: The Cookbook sitting on my shelf for a while now.  I like to flip through and look at the pictures.  But the recipes are usually a little too demanding for me.  I've heard only success stories from people who have made recipes from this book, but I just didn't have the time or energy.

We wasted a lot of Swiss chard from the farm last year, so this year I am determined to make better use of it, and this Ottolenghi recipe used the first of the Swiss chard this year.  Red lentils, sauteed onions, Swiss chard, cilantro (coriander, as they call it), plus seasonings with which you can't go wrong - cumin, cinnamon, coriander seed, garlic, a bit of butter, and a squeeze of lemon at the end.  The smell is filling my house right now.  I wish I could send the scent through the internet.

As with most of the recipes in this book, this Red Lentil and Chard Soup is pretty time consuming.  I cooked the red lentils about 36 hours in advance - I didn't have time to do the whole thing right then.  I left that on the back burner while I made something else for dinner, then finished it in the day after next in the morning - it took about 2 hours with all the chopping and such.  Just the delicious scent is worth it though, and the flavors are ones that I tend to love.

Pasta with Middle-Eastern Spiced Lentils

I found this recipe for Pasta with Middle-Eastern Spiced Lentils in the NY Times Recipes for Health section.  I thought it would be a nice quick meal.  I love cumin and coriander and cilantro, so I did enjoy it, especially with the whole wheat spaghetti.  I'm still not totally sold on lentils - I just don't like the texture, as is the case with beans as well.  I'm working on getting over it by incorporating more of them into my diet (at least, I'm trying).  I think this might be good with diced tomatoes as well.  Unfortunately, I did not really enjoy the leftovers.  Maybe because I don't like reheated pasta very much.  I probably won't make this again, but it makes me want to look for other lentil/bean recipes, and ones with cumin and coriander as well.

Roast chicken with sumac, onions and pine nuts AND Hassan's cracked potatoes with coriander

Sam and Sam Clark's Moro East is the featured cookbook for January and February over on the 101 Cookbooks library.  These are the first of (hopefully) many recipes from Moro East that I'll be posting about!  The book is gorgeous and the recipes are inspiring.  I look forward to learning a little bit more about some of the unfamiliar ingredients used in the recipes.

Of course, I have a story to go with this.  The recipe calls for a whole chicken cut into 8 pieces.  I've never cooked like this before, so I asked the guy at the meat counter at Whole Foods for a whole chicken that was already cut into the pieces.  I even confirmed what I was asking for.  And of course he sent me home with a whole chicken, cut into NO pieces.  I hid in the bathroom while Ken cut it up.  It was gross :(  However, now I know from experience that this is totally unnecessary.  If I wanted to use all chicken breasts or thighs or whatever, it would have turned out fine.

The Roasted Chicken with Sumac, Onions and Pine Nuts was delicious.  You brown the chicken, take it out of the pan and dump the extra fat, drop in some onions and sumac, put the chicken back, sprinkle with more sumac and pine nuts, and pop it in the oven.  Super easy.  I look forward to seasoning chicken with sumac in the future.  It has a slightly lemony, not-too-strong flavor.  I used frozen pearl onions, but next time I'll probably use small onions cut into 8ths for a stronger flavor and because the layers will come apart - I just think it'll be better.  I'll also use fewer pine nuts.  They are so expensive now!

Hassan's Cracked Potatoes with Coriander went nicely with the chicken.  My favorite part of the recipe was cracking the potatoes.  I got to smash them with the flat side of a meat tenderizer.  Not too much, just enough to make some cracks.  I love the orange-y fragrance of coriander.  The wine was a fantastic addition that I was skeptical about at first, but after it was cooked, it added a great flavor to the potatoes.  I should have halved the recipe, because it didn't all fit well in the pot, but it worked out alright in the end.

One thing I did NOT like about these recipes was that I could feel how high in fat they were.  I'd like to use some of these flavors in more healthy dishes.  Now I know to trust my instincts with these recipes and cut down on some of the less healthy parts of them.

Confetti Chili

So I have never had chili before.  (I know, I am totally weird.)  I have been thinking about it for a few weeks (kinda like my soup thing) and it finally culminated in this Confetti Chili from Ellie Krieger's book The Food You Crave.  I didn't plan for it to be so appropriate for New Years (confetti, get it?) and I was skeptical about it being a healthier recipe but I think it hit all the important components.  My friend Hilary mentioned a few essential things that could not possibly be left out of a good chili recipe.  I don't remember them all but cumin was one that stuck with me and I looove cumin so I was happy to see quite a bit of that in here.  Another plus was that this used up a bunch of stuff from my freezer, although it also caused a bit to be added - but this chili was delicious, so I'm sure it won't be staying long!  In fact, I already defrosted one container for my lunch today!

The one departure I made from the recipe was in regards to the chipotles in adobo sauce.  The recipe called for one chipotle chili to be seeded and minced, plus two teaspoons of the sauce to be added.  Instead, we used two chipotles and did not attempt to seed them, plus the sauce as well.  I think the level of heat was appropriate, but I think we could probably go a little hotter next time.  I also got some delicious (and local, yay!) cheese from Cherry Grove Organic Farm at the indoor market a few weekends back.  It's called Cuminjack and the guy told Hilary and me that it would be perfect for chili, right after we were talking about chili, so naturally I had to get some.  I tried it there and it was delicious.  I already mentioned I love cumin.  So tasty!  Anyway, when I first made the chili and had a big bowl of it, I totally forgot all about the cheese.  It was delicious on its own.  I tried it with the cheese for lunch today and it was OK.  I feel that the outstanding flavor of the cheese gets lost in the chili, though.

I made some cornbread to go along with the chili too.  Ken's boss asked (out of nowhere) if I was going to make chili and cornbread this weekend.  I swear, he had no way to know that!  Ken said actually, yes, but probably not cornbread.  Actually, I love cornbread.  It reminds me of when I was little and we had Jiffy corn muffins all the time.  So I whipped some up according to the directions on the package of cornmeal I have in my fridge.  I was happy to use up some of that too.  I added a bit of extra sugar, bumping it up from 1/4 cup to 1/3 cup, mainly because I couldn't find my 1/4 cup, but I thought it was the perfect sweetness to go with chili.  I froze two pieces per serving of chili that I froze, because you wouldn't want to go without it.

I look forward to making more chili in the near future.  I'd like to try a white chicken chili in particular - I have a microwave version from Pampered Chef done in the Deep Covered Baker, I've heard good things about that one.  I'd also like to try Heidi's Pierce Street Chili on 101 Cookbooks, a vegetarian chili that looks like it's going in a different direction.  Lentils, barley, bulgur, chickpeas, etc.  That would be fun to play around with.  Plus Georgie's vegetarian black bean chili - I'm going to give that one a shot too!  So many options!

Butternut Squash Muffins

I wanted to make a particular Butternut Squash Muffin recipe last year, but never managed to carve out the time to do so.  This year I made it a priority.  I still have plenty of squash from the CSA, so I cut up the right amount of butternut squash and put the remaining cubes in the freezer for another use.

This recipe is complicated.  After making it, I think I can say it is unnecessarily so.  I boiled the spiced apple cider syrup down for HOURS and I'm not sure I can say that those spice flavors really came through.  Beating the eggs separately seemed like an unnecessary step as well.  My muffins came out looking much more dense than those in the original photo, and not so cake-like.  They tasted good, though.

The recipe yielded me 12 regular-size muffins plus 12 mini-muffins as well.  I baked the mini muffins for about 20 minutes and the full-size for about 25, but I think both could have used 2-3 minutes less in the oven.

I can't say I'll be making this again, as it was quite complicated and there are many other butternut squash muffin recipes out there, but I'm glad I finally gave it a shot.