Tag: Super Simple

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The Pandemic Pantry -Lentil Soup

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She Who Must Be Obeyed reminded me again this morning of her Executive Order.  Last night’s dinner was a UFO (unidentified frozen object) that thankfully turned out to be chili.  And with some leftover cornbread from the freezer I was once again in compliance with the order to “clean out the freezer”.   A part of her Executive Order limits me to one grocery trip a week (with a mask, disinfectant wipes, and one store only).  This week’s trip was a calculated gamble on one of those tiny grocery sections housed within a burger/ice cream joint whose name will not be divulged for fear of possible legal action after they hear about this post.

Bad gamble.  I managed to find just five of the nearly 20 items on my list.  I did find some fresh spinach that wasn’t on the list.  A tiny win but I’ll take it.  This is going to be a tough week.  Less fresh foods and a heavier reliance upon pantry items and any remaining UFO’s.

I sauntered into my pantry multiple times and opened the freezer multiple times before I figured out what to make for lunch.  My flash of inspiration came from the jars of beans on the kitchen counter.  I had completely forgotten about the lentils.

Until today.  Here’s my Lentil Soup recipe:

  • 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 celery rib, diced
  • 1 very large carrot, diced
  • 1/2 large sweet onion, diced
  • garlic powder
  • pinch dried thyme
  • 1 large bay leaf
  • 1 cup brown lentils, rinsed
  • 2 cups water and 2 cups low sodium chicken broth (approximate)
  • salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
  1. Heat the olive oil in a saucepan, lower the heat to medium and saute the carrot, onion and celery until translucent.
  2. Sprinkle thyme and garlic powder over the vegetables in the pan and saute briefly.
  3. Add lentils and chicken broth.  Bring to a boil.
  4. Drop the heat down to low and simmer for about 30 minutes or until the lentils need more liquid.  Add one cup water and continue to simmer.
  5. Check and stir frequently.  Add either more water or broth to suit your taste.
  6. Adjust your seasonings.  Salt and pepper to taste.
  7. Simmer for a total time of around one hour and 10 minutes.
  8. Serves four.
  9. Or two if you eat half, save the rest for another meal and eat sandwiches/tacos using leftover fillings from the freezer

Tips

Over time I’ve learned how important technique can be for turning out tasty food.  Note the chicken broth is used first, then water.  For a cup of dried lentils you will need about a quart of liquid.  I start with chicken broth (you can sub vegetable broth) and allow the lentils to absorb the broth, then add one cup of water.  The amount of additional liquid will depend upon your personal preferences.  My approach is to add additional broth slowly after the 2 cups broth, one cup water.  Most times I never approach a full quart of liquid.  I like my lentil soup thick.

That half of a fresh onion didn’t sit around long because I made Pete’s Fried Rice without any broccoli.  Instead of broccoli I used half of a green cabbage sliced into strips.  The fried rice turned out just fine.  You have to be flexible nowadays and don’t waste anything.

Here’s my updated list of pantry items.

Pandemic Pantry Items – Updated 04.06.20

  • Canned tomatoes in 14.5 and 28 ounce cans.  Diced, crushed, diced with green chilies and stewed
  • Extra virgin olive oil
  • Brown and white sugar
  • Dried oregano, basil, and parsley
  • Onion and garlic powders
  • Bay leaves
  • Parmesan cheese
  • Dried pastas
  • Dried beans such as brown and green lentils, pinto, black, adzuki, mayocabo, yellow and green split peas, black eye peas and cranberry
  • Broth, vegetable, beef, chicken
  • Rice – multiple varieties like basmati, brown, Texmati, arborio  and plain long grain white
  • Flour tortillas

Stay safe, stay well.

I think I bought too many bay leaves though.

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The Pandemic Pantry – Basic Quick Tomato Sauce

 

“We’re cleaning out the freezer.  We have plenty of leftovers to eat up.”

…said She Who Must Be Obeyed.  Since this Executive Order was issued the frozen stockpile of meals has been gradually dwindling.  Last night’s dinner was a mash up meal that used some leftover frozen ricotta/chicken/spinach filling and a freshly made Alfredo sauce.  The leftover ricotta filling was the result of making far too much for cannelloni a few weeks ago.  Then last night I made too much Farfalle and now I’m staring at the reality of having leftover leftovers for lunch today.

So I thought to myself, Self…wouldn’t this be good with some tomato sauce?  Of course I answered to myself and went to an old favorite cookbook for inspiration.  My quick tomato sauce is inspired by a recipe from:

Cooking from an Italian Garden Paperback –
by Paola Scaravelli and Jon Cohen

Paperback: 372 pages
Publisher: Harvest Books (November 15, 1985)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0156225921
ISBN-13: 978-0156225922

But as I have discovered over the years I’ve accidentally created my own recipe.  Here it is.

  • 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 celery rib, tiny dice
  • 1 small carrot, tiny dice
  • garlic powder
  • onion powder
  • pinch dried oregano
  • pinch dried basil
  • pinch dried parsley
  • a splash of white wine
  • 1 (14.5-ounce) can organic stewed tomatoes
  • 1/2 teaspoon light brown sugar
  • salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
  1. Heat the olive oil in a saucepan, lower the heat to medium and saute the carrot and celery until translucent.
  2. Sprinkle the herbs and vegetable powders in the pan and saute briefly.
  3. Add a splash of wine to de-glaze the pan.
  4. Add the tin of tomatoes and bring to a boil.
  5. Drop the heat down to low.
  6. When the tomatoes start to soften begin crushing them with the flat side of a wooden spoon.
  7. Simmer for about 30 minutes.
  8. Adjust your seasonings.  Add sugar.  Salt and pepper to taste.
  9. Serve over leftover leftovers (freshly made pasta works too).

Tips

Sugar is only needed to counteract the acidity of the tomatoes.  You might not need any sugar at all.  I wanted to use as many pantry items as possible.  If you feel you can spare a fresh onion or fresh clove of garlic, use them.  The wine is a luxury but can probably be eliminated if you don’t have an open bottle in the fridge. Taste as you go because stewed tomatoes are sweeter than plain canned tomatoes and come already seasoned.

Here’s a list of pantry items.  Hopefully you have many if not all on hand as we shelter in place.

Pandemic Pantry Items

  • Canned tomatoes in 14.5 and 28 ounce cans.  Diced, crushed, diced with green chilies and stewed
  • Extra virgin olive oil
  • Brown and white sugar
  • Dried oregano, basil, and parsley
  • Onion and garlic powders
  • Parmesan cheese
  • Dried pastas

Stay safe, stay well.

 

 

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Roasted Cauliflower Frittata

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Sometimes you have odds and ends in the fridge.   This was the inspiration for Scraps Frittata which in the end turned out fine.  The other night at a bring a dish dinner I was asked to bring some Roasted Cauliflower with Parmesan for a side veggie.  Our gracious host well known for his blunt honesty said,

“Maybe we shouldn’t have microwaved the cauliflower.  The texture was different.”

I agreed.  The veggie was kind of mushy.  Maybe I shouldn’t have made the cauliflower earlier, covered the dish with aluminum foil, then microwaved it for serving.  This veggie is obviously best served immediately from the oven.

Our host who does not like leftovers besides Good Pie didn’t want the rest of the veggie so I took it back home.  What do you do with about 3 cups of leftover mushy roasted cauliflower? 

  • 2 T EV olive oil
  • 1/2 medium sweet onion diced
  • 2 C red potatoes small dice
  • 6 eggs
  • 3 cups Roasted Cauliflower with Parmesan
  • shredded sharp Cheddar cheese about a cup
  • shredded Monterrey Jack cheese about a half cup
  • Parmesan cheese grated, a couple of Tablespoons
  • Dried thyme, healthy pinch
  • Salt and pepper
  1. Heat the olive oil in an 10 inch non-stick pan.
  2. Add the potatoes and cook until nearly cooked through, about 10-15  minutes medium heat.
  3. Add the onion and saute for five minutes.
  4. Add the thyme, salt, and pepper.
  5. Spread the cauliflower over the potato/onion mixture.
  6. Sprinkle the cheeses over the veggies.
  7. Beat the eggs.  Pour over the vegetable mixture.
  8. Preheat your broiler.
  9. Allow the frittata to sit over a very low flame until set.
  10. Place the pan under the broiler to brown the top.
  11. Remove from the broiler and place the frittata on a serving plate.
  12. Serve warm or cold.  Makes about 6 servings.
  13. Yum.
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Roasted Cauliflower with Parmesan

What do you do when you want to surprise your friends with a new dish?  You think of something that they probably never had, never thought they would like, and make it.  You sneak it in as a side dish.  Serve it with something familiar like Maple Soy Roasted Salmon.  You make…

Hipster food.  And if you’re thinking to yourself that cauliflower can’t possibly be hip and trendy I actually found a restaurant that has whole head roasted on their menu for seven bucks.

Here’s what I made:

Roasted Cauliflower with Parmesan

One head cauliflower
Extra virgin olive oil
Granulated garlic
Dried thyme
Shredded Parmesan Cheese
Salt and black pepper

  1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
  2. Remove the green outer leaves and stalks from the cauliflower head. Tear and cut the cauliflower into florets, removing any hard tiny stalks. Each piece should be about a US quarter in width. Golf ball size is too big.
  3. Place the florets into a baking/roasting pan with sides.
  4. Drizzle the cauliflower with olive oil. Toss with a wooden spoon. You want a nice thin coating of oil on each piece.
  5. Lightly salt and pepper and sprinkle with a hint of thyme.
  6. Generously sprinkle granulated garlic over all.
  7. Place in the oven and roast for approximately 35-40 minutes. Shake the pan every 10 minutes or so to ensure most of the surfaces of each floret get browned (this is why you want a pan with sides).
  8. When nicely browned add a handful of shredded Parmesan cheese over the cauliflower. Roast for an additional 5 minutes or until the cheese is melted.
  9. Transfer the cauliflower to a serving bowl and add more Parmesan.
  10. Eat.

 

Unfortunately this dish is Not Tiny Taste Tester Approved.  She was not present at the dinner.

“What is a Collie Flower?”

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High-protein Ricotta Pancakes — Hurry The Food Up

High-protein ricotta pancakes. Even just writing that sentence makes me happy. We love pancakes, and when they’re simple, tasty and packed with protein we love them even more. Protein is important, and many people don’t get enough. If you’re not sure exactly how much protein you need then there’s a free guide and meal plan…

via High-protein Ricotta Pancakes — Hurry The Food Up

I thought I’d re-post this post from Hurry The Food Up featuring several ricotta pancake recipes.  When I mentioned to a friend I gave a sample of my Ricotta Buttermilk Pancakes to the Tiny Taste Tester I got the following response:

“Ricotta what?“

PANCAKES!  You have to start them young.  Hopefully if you raise ’em right they get to the peanut butter and pancake pinnacle of pancake heaven.

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Yogurt Marinade

  • 4 cloves garlic, minced
  • juice of one lemon
  • 2 T red wine vinegar
  • 2 T extra virgin olive oil
  • 3 T plain Greek yogurt
  • 1 T oregano

One of the benefits of a blog is quick accessibility to your recipes.

Except when you’re looking for something that you thought you posted but never did.  The plan was to toss together a quick Greek Salad from The Pioneer Woman and grill some chicken.  So the yogurt marinade came to mind but where was it?  The last time I remember seeing the recipe it was scribbled on a piece of scrap paper that more likely than not got thrown away.

For an Old Guy Playing With Technology I sometimes surprise myself.

I actually remembered to take a picture and save it to my online drafts folder.

I found it!

 

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Never Been to Peru Potato and Bean Stew

In the bookstore the other day I could hardly contain my excitement.  I found a used copy of Mollie Katzen’s 2013 cookbook The Heart of the Plate for six dollars!  Middle and Early Boomers might remember  her Moosewood cookbook.  I still have a copy of that cookbook in my collection.  There are a few recipes from The Heart of the Plate I want to try.  The first one was Peruvian Potato-Bean Stew.  But immediately I saw a problem.

There are over 4,000 edible varieties of potato, mostly found in the Andes of South America.!

“If you can’t get blue potatoes…”

I’m not in Peru.  4000 to pick from and the recipe calls for the blue one.  Since I wasn’t going to find blue potatoes I figured I might as well just mess with the rest of the recipe too.  So here’s my version inspired by Mollie.

Adapted from The Heart of Plate by Mollie Katzen

  • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 1/2 large sweet onion, diced
  • 1 teaspoon chili powder
  • 1 teaspoon cumin
  • 1 teaspoon ground red chili
  • 1 teaspoon Mexican oregano
  • 1/2 large red bell pepper, diced
  • 2 large cloves garlic, minced
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 4 medium Yukon Gold potatoes, 1/2 inch dice
  • 3 cups cooked Mayocabo beans with cooking liquid
  • 15-ounce can diced tomatoes with roasted garlic and onion
  • freshly squeezed lime juice
  • salt and pepper to taste
  1. Heat a Dutch oven over medium heat.
  2. Add oil, onions, chili powder, ground chili, oregano and cumin .  Gently saute for 5 minutes.
  3. Add the bell pepper,  garlic, and salt.  Saute for another 5 minutes.
  4. Add the potatoes.. Cover, reduce heat to low, and cook for 5 minutes. Add 1/2 cup of the bean cooking liquid, canned tomatoes, cover again, and cook until potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes.
  5. Add the beans, reduce heat to low and simmer until beans are warmed through.
  6. Season individual servings with lime juice, salt and pepper to taste.
  7. Yum

Random Thoughts

If you like chili you’ll like this recipe.  It’s basically a potato and bean chili, no meat.  If you cannot find Mayocabo beans use pintos.  It won’t taste the same but will still be excellent, kind of like using yellow potatoes instead of the blue ones.  Pinto beans will hold their shape better whereas the Mayocabo is creamier and tends to fall apart with prolonged cooking.

For the beans I used a pound dried, rinsed multiple times and soaked overnight.  The next day I tossed the beans into a pot, added water to one inch above the beans with about a teaspoon each of cumin, Mexican oregano, garlic powder and a bay leaf.

 

 

 

 

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Sweet Potato and White Bean Hummus

  • 1 large sweet potato, baked
  • 3 small whole garlic cloves, peeled
  • 1 can Great Northern White Beans, drained and rinsed
  • 1/4 cup tahini, organic, unsalted
  • 1 and 1/2 large lemons, juiced
  • 1 tsp pure maple syrup
  • ½ tsp cumin
  • Salt to taste

The Office Christmas party is at the house this year.  I was asked to make some hummus for the event.  Since I was going to dirty up the juicer and the food processor I decided to try something different.  I made more hummus.  There was a leftover baked sweet potato in the fridge.  A quick Google search turned up this recipe which I’ll credit as my inspiration.

  1. Bake the sweet potato for around 75 minutes or until soft to the touch.  I actually had my potato in the oven for 2 hours at 425F because I forgot about it.  Allow to cool and set aside.
  2. Process the garlic first.
  3. Toss everything else in the pool and process until smooth and creamy.
  4. Did you take the skin off the potato?
  5. Find some pita bread or crackers STAT.

The first thing is to avoid any arguments about whether or not you can call this dip hummus.  It has no chickpeas so technically it’s not hummus.   Google “is hummus without chickpeas really hummus” and take a side.  The second thing you have to get used to is the color.

Pink.  The dip comes out pink.

Serving Suggestions

Put this hummus out at a party and tell everyone it’s a salmon dip.

Have your smartphone cameras ready for your guests’ reactions.

Priceless.

 

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Scraps Frittata

Sometimes you have odds and ends in the fridge.  Half an onion, two halves of red and green peppers, maybe even some leftover fresh spinach sauteed with garlic in the freezer.  No one else is home.  So it doesn’t really matter if this thing turns out OK or not.

I hate wasting food.  There’s just too many people on the planet who would gladly take your odds and ends, the scraps that might get thrown away.  So tonight I made a frittata with what I had on hand.  And if it turns out OK, then this recipe stays on the blog.

If not, well you’ll never know it was here.

  • 2 Tbl EVOO
  • 1/2 medium sweet onion, sliced thinly
  • 1/4 red pepper, sliced thinly
  • 1/4 green pepper, sliced thinly
  • 2 small Yukon Gold potatoes, organic, small dice
  • 1 cup sauteed fresh spinach with garlic, drained
  • 5 eggs
  • 1/4 cup half and half
  • Parmesan cheese
  • Dried basil, healthy pinch
  • Salt and pepper
  1. Heat the olive oil in an 8 inch non-stick pan.
  2. Saute the onions and peppers for 5 minutes.
  3. Add the potatoes and continue cooking until nearly cooked through, about 10  minutes.  Add more olive oil if needed to prevent sticking on the bottom of the pan.
  4. Add the basil, salt, and pepper.  Add oil if needed.
  5. Spread the spinach evenly over the potato/pepper mixture.
  6. Sprinkle Parmesan over the spinach. Be as generous as you like.
  7. Beat the eggs and half and half.  Pour over the vegetable mixture.
  8. Preheat your broiler.
  9. Allow the frittata to sit over a very low flame until set.
  10. Place the pan under the broiler to brown the top.
  11. Remove from the broiler and place the frittata on a serving plate.
  12. Serve warm or cold.  Makes about 4 servings.
  13. Yum.

Update

The recipe stays.

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