Adventures in Vegetarian Cooking: Shepard's Pie

Hey, hey - a recipe! It has been awhile.  Our eat the freezer month has involved a lot of meat, since we have a lot in the freezer.  Yesterday I wanted to get a vegetarian meal in, vegan even, so I could still claim the title I made up for myself - "quasi-vegetarian."

I don't remember where I got the idea for this, but I've been wanting to try it for awhile.  I've never liked shepard's pie, I remember it being my least favorite school lunch day.  But replacing white potatoes (never been a huge fan) with sweet potatoes (always been a huge fan) sounded appealing to me.  Also sweet potatoes, black beans and corn go really well together. I also had some meatless crumbles in the freezer I was looking to use up for the challenge so I added those in as well.

I paired it with cornbread and a Custom Brewcrafter vanilla latte stout and it made a really nice Friday night dinner!

Even though he made a face when I said I was making vegetarian shepard's pie for dinner, the skeptic gave it a:

Vegan Shepard's Pie

2 T olive oil
1/2 large onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
16 oz black beans and/or meatless crumbles
16 oz corn (I used frozen but fresh or canned would work)
3 sweet potatoes, roasted or microwaved and then mashed
Trader Joe's African smoke spice blend to taste
Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 350.  Sautee the onions in olive oil over medium low heat until they are just about carmelized (about 10 min) and then add the garlic.  Sautee a few minutes more.  Add the meatless crumbles, black beans, corn and spices.  Cook for 5 minutes and then transfer to a greased casserole dish.  Layer the sweet potatoes over the bean and corn mixture and then bake for 30 minutes. 



 I used this South African Smoke Spice, but if you don't have this I would suggest using paprika, garlic powder and basil.  Or you could go with a taco type seasoning and use cumin, chili pepper, and oregano.  That would be good too.

Adventures in Vegetarian Cooking: Carmelized Onion & Butternut Squash Covered Quiche

Let's cut straight to the chase on this one.

Kevin was not a fan of my latest adventure in vegetarian cooking.  I on the other hand, gave it a thumbs up.

I had made a sweet potato, carmelized onion and feta cheese quiche awhile back and we both really liked it.  This time I used what we had on hand: butternut squash puree, carmelized onion, and mozzarella.  I'm not sure what the difference was but Kevin did not like it - so much that he didn't even bother to take leftovers for lunch the next day (so you know his feelings were strong!).

What I liked about it was that because I covered it, it was a cross between a pie and a quiche.  The sweetness of the butternut squash and carmelized onions made it reminiscent of a pumpkin pie.  But the egg and the mozzarella made it acceptable for dinner (and two lunches - you better believe I took the leftovers).

 If you let your pie crust come to room temperature before rolling it out, you will have a prettier crust than me.  I usually plan dinner 5 minutes before I start to make it so I didn't have that option here.

It looks like dessert, but it's dinner!

I paired it with green beans from our freezer and pineapple.  Pineapple because we have two apples left.  Two!

Praise Baby Jesus, I never thought I'd see the day!

Since we are low on our local fruit stock, I don't feel bad buying tropical fruit.  At this time of year the fruit has to come from far away no matter what we get.

Here is the recipe, in case you trust my taste more than Kevin's:

2 Pie Crusts
1 Large Onion
1 c. Butternut Squash Puree (or pumpkin or sweet potato)
1/2 c. Mozzarella (or 1/4 c. feta)
6 eggs, beaten with a dash of half and half (optional)
Salt and Pepper to taste

Sautee onions over medium low heat until carmelized (10-15 minutes).  Meanwhile, preheat oven to 375.  Beat eggs in a separate bowl with half and half (if using) and salt and pepper.  Roll out one pie crust into a pie dish.  Pour butternut squash into the pie crust.  Add the cheese, onions, and eggs to the pie crust in layers.  Do not mix.  Place second pie crust over the mixture and crimp edges together as you would a pie.  Cut four slits into the top crust.  Bake until the egg mixture is cooked through - about 35-45 minutes.  I checked if it was done by lifting and peeking through the slits.

Adventures in Vegetarian Cooking: Chili & Cornbread Dumplings

Chili is one of my favorite winter meals.  Like pumpkin in the fall, I start to crave it as soon as the snow starts to fall.  Honestly, it might be because of the cornbread - I really love sweet cornbread (I love anything sweet that counts as a healthy meal!).  This time I decided to try cooking the cornbread in the chili, creating a dish similar to chicken and dumplings.  My mom suggested I call it chili shepard's pie, which it is also similar to, but I'm sticking with the Chili & Dumplings.

We are in eat down the freezer mode so all of the veggies in the chili were local, either from our winter share or our freezer.  It is a long time until we'll get fresh produce again but I also know that Kevin won't let me sign up for the CSA this year if we still have a freezer full of veggies.  So for the next few months a lot of our meals will be revolving around what veggies we have unfrozen that week.  Chili is a good way to use the corn, peppers and tomatoes.

 My secret ingredients:

Kevin often accuses me of wasting good alcohol when I cook with it. I don't care, it makes food better.

The cornbread in the chili worked well (and bonus, less dishes to do!).  I will probably make it this way again.

What did the meat lover think?

Success! [****Edited to add: after a couple of days the cornbread was pretty mushy.  I probably would make this again for company or I otherwise knew we'd go through it quickly.  If I was going to make it again for just us two I would cook the cornbread separately.]

Here is the recipe:
2 T Olive Oil
1 onion chopped
2 cloves garlic
2 cans fire roasted tomatoes*
1 jalapeno pepper, partly deseeded (more if you like it hot!)
1 c. corn
1 c. green peppers
1 can black eye peas
1 can chickpeas
2 squares dark chocolate
1/2 a beer (6 oz) (feel free to drink the rest while cooking!)
2 T paprika
2 t cumin
a dash cinnamon
cayenne pepper, salt and pepper to taste.

Corn bread batter (I used a mix)**


Sautee the onion in the olive oil in a dutch oven (or other oven safe dish) until soft.  Add the garlic and sautee a few minutes more.  Add the rest of the chili ingredients and stir to combine.  If you have the time, let simmer on a low heat for 30 min. Meanwhile, heat the oven to 400. Mix the cornbread batter. Drop spoonfuls of batter over the chili.  Don't worry if they sink a bit, they will rise to the top during cooking.  Place into the oven uncovered and bake until cornbread is done (about 30 minutes). 

*You can use fresh peeled roma tomatoes (4 cups) as well.  I actually used 24 oz of tomato puree we got from our CSA winter share and 1 cup of roasted tomatoes I put up over the summer when we were drowning in them.

**Pumpkin bread would also work well, I may try that next time!

CSA 6 months in and Indian Spiced Root Vegetable Soup

We ended the fall share of our CSA, which brought us to a total of 6 months (16 weeks for the summer, 10 weeks for the fall).  Overall we have had a good experience and I will even make a bold declaration: we now like kale! Crazy, I know, since we were so adamantly against it. I discovered the trick with kale is to treat it like onions, and cook it until it only slightly resembles its original self.  I also try to pair it with something sweet (sweet potatoes for example) to offset the bitterness. 

We've gotten to the time of year that all that is available locally is storage crops.  We accumulated a lot of carrots, apples, potatoes, etc over the last few weeks of the share.

Those alien looking things are celeriac (celery root).  Tastes exactly like celery.

We are splitting the winter share three ways with two friends, since we will be in for more storage crops.  We like storage crops but don't get through them very quickly, so it should be a perfect amount!

Last week I decided to try a variation on my potato leek soup and use more of the root vegetables.  I used Indian spices and coconut milk to add creaminess/keep it vegan.  It ended up tasting pretty great and made a lot of it so we've been eating it all week.

Served along side a toasted cheese and tempeh sandwich, it makes for a perfectly filling and delicious vegetarian lunch!  Here is the recipe:


Indian Spiced Root Vegetable Soup

4 large scallions, greens removed and diced
1 small onion, diced
2 large garlic cloves, diced
8 medium unpeeled potatoes, washed well, medium chopped 
1 rutabaga peeled and medium chopped
2 large unpeeled carrots, washed well, medium chopped
1 small celeriac, peeled and medium chopped
4 cups vegetable broth
1 T garam marsala
1 t turmeric
1 t cumin
1 t salt
1.5 t pepper
1/2 t ginger
1/4 t cinnamon
1/4 t cayenne pepper (more or less to taste)
1 can coconut milk

Sautee scallions and onions until soft and brown, add garlic and sautee a few more minutes.  Add the rest of the ingredients except for the coconut milk and pressure cook for 30 minutes (or slow cook for 8 hours).  Add coconut milk and blend with immersion blender or regular blender.  Taste and season accordingly.  If you pressure cooked it, give 30 more minutes on a low heat for spices to blend.

To make the toasted cheese and tempeh sandwich simply add tempeh and chutney to a grilled cheese sandwich.  Toast in a toaster oven until cheese is melted or grill on the stove top.  Between the cheese and the chutney, you can't really taste the tempeh (just how Kevin likes it) but it adds a good protein boost.

Adventures in Vegetarian Cooking: Lentil Loaf

I've been meaning to try this cranberry-orange lentil loaf for awhile now and decided to give it a whirl on a rainy Sunday afternoon. Here is what I did and what I would do differently:

I had most of the ingredients on hand, and subbed where I needed to.  I used my trusty super-pot to pressure cook the quinoa and the lentils.  I looked up how long to pressure cook lentils (9 minutes) but needed to double the time due to the amount of liquid the recipe called for (ended up taking 20 minutes to absorb).  I assume this was to make the lentils more mushy and "meatloaf" like, and it did work.

The recipe calls for you to sautee the carrots, celery and onions all at once.

I did this but wished I had started the onions in some olive oil earlier to carmelize them.  I heart carmelized onions but feel lukewarm about regular old onions, so this would have been an improvement.  Lukewarm is a big step up since up until recently I disliked regular onions and would only eat them carmelized.  I also don't really like celery so next time I would sub out something else or leave them out completely.

I used eggs instead of the chia seed mixture she uses in the vegan version.  I was smart enough to let the mixture cool completely before mixing the eggs in.  I learned this during the polenta crust disaster. If you add eggs to a hot mixture, they just scramble, which is not what you are looking for.

[I'm sparing you the picture of the mixture before it cooked - it did not look appetizing.]

I also used pecans instead of sunflower seeds and mixed regular salsa with fruit salsa.  We had some fruit salsa left over from our Gypsy Burritos but not enough to coat the pan completely.

It made a huge pan! We were eating this for a solid week. The first night I paired it with roasted brussel sprouts and left over mashed potatoes from Thanksgiving.

I liked it okay, and will probably make some variation of it again, but there was something missing. It needed more spices and I thought it too much on the sweet vs. savory side.  Between the orange juice, the cranberries, pecans, and the fruit salsa it was quite sweet.  While it is unlike me to say something is too sweet, I would stick to regular salsa next time.  I also might switch up the orange-cranberry combination and try something else.  What did the meat lover think?

 

He agreed it was okay.  Not off the "to make again" list but definitely won't appear on regular rotation in our house.

Adventures in Vegetarian Cooking: Beans and Greens Pasta

The night before Thanksgiving I wanted to make something simple and easy since we had spent most of the day cooking the side dishes.  I also wanted something vegetarian since we were going to have turkey the next day.  Beans and greens is one of my favorite things to order when we are out so I decided to try it.  Black-eyed peas have never really been on my radar but I've used them twice recently and really like them.

Beans and Greens Pasta:
1 T Olive Oil
1/2 onion, diced
1 garlic clove diced
2 T butter
3/4 cup vegetable broth, more on hand if needed
salt and pepper to taste
2 small heads escarole, chopped into small pieces
1 can black-eyed peas, drained and rinsed
1 box pasta of choice, I used bow-tie
Parmesan cheese for the table

Cook pasta according to package directions.  Meanwhile sautee the onion in the olive oil over medium heat until just about carmelized, about 10 minutes.  Add the garlic and cook for a few more minutes.  Add butter, vegetable broth, salt and pepper and let condense (about 5 minutes).  Add escarole and black eyed peas.  Cook until escarole is wilted.  Combine with pasta and top with Parmesan cheese.  You may need to add more vegetable broth to coat the pasta. 

Kevin said store bought broth was cheating but after all the cooking we had done that day I was fine with cheating.

What did my parents think?

Thumbs up! Definitely on the to make again list.

Adventures in Vegetarian Cooking: Park Cafe's Gypsy Burrito (Vegan Curry Burrito)

When we were in Montana last month we went to Park Cafe in St. Marys.  It was in East Glacier, the less popular but prettier (in my opinion) side of Glacier National Park.  We went there because our friends had recommended their pie and after a 10 mile hike through Siyeh pass nothing sounded better.  When we got there and finally secured a spot at the counter (the place was packed!) we found out they were closing their doors for good two days later.

They were running out of things left and right.  We overheard one waitress tell a customer "You ordered a Greek Salad but we are out of Greek dressing and feta.  So how about Italian dressing and cheddar instead?"  Another waiter promised a customer they still had bbq chicken only to go into the back to find out they had just run out.

I was lucky and got my first choice: A Gypsy Burrito.  I am also lucky someone took a picture of the menu and burrito and posted it to flicker!

The description was this: curry spices season this blend of potatoes, yams, parsnips, onions, carrots, coconut milk, and garbanzo beans, wrapped in a flour tortilla and topped with a tangy pineapple salsa and cashews.  Here is my version:

Ingredients: 
2 T olive oil
1 small onion, diced
3 medium potatoes, medium chopped*
1 large carrot, medium chopped
2 medium sweet potatoes, medium chopped
1 can chickpeas
1 can coconut milk
1 T curry powder
Salt and pepper to taste
Flour tortillas
Pineapple salsa and pecans

Saute onion in olive oil until brown.  Transfer to slow cooker.  Add all ingredients except tortillas, salsa and nuts and cook on low for 8 hours or until potatoes are tender.  Stir occasionally.  When potatoes are tender, fill tortillas with curry mixture and top with pineapple (or any fruit) salsa and nuts.

What did the meat lover/chickpea hater think?

Success!  It was also a really easy slow cooker meal, perfect for a busy and chilly Sunday.  It is on the to make list again for sure.

The only thing better would have been a slice of razzleberry pie a la mode to end the meal.

*In writing this recipe I was curious about the difference between diced and chopped was.  This website has a definition.

Adventures in Vegetarian Cooking: Cheesy (or Vegan) Potato Leek Soup with a Kick

One of my family's favorite stories is when my sister was a toddler and my mom asked her what she wanted for dinner.  "Drip Soup" was her answer.  It took my mom awhile to figure out that she was referring to Leek Soup (Drip - Leak - Leek).  It has been Drip Soup in our house since.

We've gotten leeks a couple of times in our CSA share and this time we also got potatoes.  Even though it was a hot August day and not really the best day for soup, I decided I'd make the soup for the freezer.  Even though I made this in August both leeks and potatoes store well so you can probably still find them at fall or winter farmers' markets.

Make sure to wash the leeks really well. Dirt hides in the leaves so strip the outer layers off under cold running water.  You'll probably end up with something like this:

Chop up the leeks, the onions and the jalapeno pepper (what adds the kick).  This will be pureed at the end so no need to worry about size or uniformity.

Our super pot has a brown function so I sauteed the leeks and the garlic prior to adding the potatoes.  You can also do this on the stove top in a separate pan prior to adding it to your slow cooker or pressure cooker.

Pippa is not allowed on the counters.  She is allowed on windowsills and she exploits this loophole to watch what is going on:

I pressure cooked it for 30 minutes in our super pot.  You could also cook it in a slow cooker or on the stove top.  I then used an immersion blender and ended up with...

 It doesn't look super great, but it got a ...

Thumbs up! (Served along side a covered quiche - which was an experiment that worked out well and may just show up in a future "adventures in vegetarian cooking" post).

The rest went into the freezer for a future winter meal.

Here is the recipe:

2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 large leeks, green tops removed rinsed well and roughly chopped
5 cups of potatoes (any kind), chopped up (peeled or unpeeled)
1 jalapeno, partly deseeded (more if you want a bigger kick)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1.5 teaspoons pepper
4 cups vegetable broth*
Cheddar cheese for topping (without the cheese this recipe would be vegan.  In fact, I served this to my vegan friend Molly a few years back when she visited me in Alaska.  If I recall correctly, and if she was not just being polite, she gave it a thumps up too.)

Sautee the olive oil, garlic, and leeks until soft (about 5 minutes).  Add the potatoes, jalapeno, salt, pepper and broth.  Pressure cook on high for 30 minutes.  Blend with an immersion blender and either freeze or serve with cheddar cheese.

*Full disclosure, instead of vegetable broth I added water and a couple of turkey bones (from summersgiving), which makes this recipe not vegetarian.  Let me talk a bit about my philosophy towards eating meat.  I've already mentioned that I've wavered back and forth between eating meat/no meat since I was a teenager.  I've also mentioned how I abhor (my feelings are stronger than hate) wasting meat.  To me, wasting meat is wasting that animal's life completely.  That animal already lived (probably miserably in a factory farm) and died for me and for me to throw it away means its suffering was for nothing.  So we rarely throw away meat. 

Upon reflecting on it a bit more, I also think that the reason that vegetarianism never stuck for me was because I hate to be an inconvenience and it was always all or nothing for me.  Either I ate meat or I didn't.   So if I went over to your house and ate the meat lasagna you cooked for me (the inconvenience part) I might as well have a turkey sandwich for lunch the next day because I was clearly not a vegetarian (the all or nothing part).

But now the goal is not to give up meat entirely but to reduce it a lot.  Since starting this experiment we've cut down on our meat consumption considerably (we rarely buy it anymore and I go days without eating any at all).  So I feel less guilty eating the meat lasagna and will have a hummus sandwich the next day.  Sometimes if I'm sharing tapas with Kevin and he wants the grilled pizza with ham on it, I'll eat it because it's his dinner too.  Other times I'll ask if we can share the vegetarian version.

Maybe this makes me a hypocrite and if you've found this post by googling "Vegan Potato Leek Soup" you probably won't stick around.  But that is okay because this blog is for family and friends and this choice is really working for me.

Tomato Cobbler

This is the time of year when tomatoes are overwhelming us.  (I need to remember this feeling of being overwhelmed in February when I'm really missing tomatoes. We've stopped buying tomatoes in the winter because the red orbs that resemble tomatoes you can buy then have no taste.  Especially compared to what you get right off the vines.)  The tomatoes we planted in the courtyard are going crazy right now, literally climbing the wall of our garage.

  One unique way to eat them is to make tomato cobbler.  It is inspired by the fruit dessert but savory.

I used cherry tomatoes cut in half, about three cloves of minced garlic and a generous amount of basil.  I put them all in to a baking dish and add salt and pepper.

Follow any old cobbler dough recipe (I used Joy of Cooking's) but reduce the amount of sugar to a teaspoon and increase the salt a bit.  Also add grated Parmesan cheese (about half a cup) and pepper (to taste) to the dough.  Dot the dough over the tomato mix:

Bake according to the cobbler recipes instructions and enjoy!