Indian Food

Hey dudes, good to see the blog is active again. Let's keep this going with an old one that I keep forgetting to post. Here's a dish that I made weekly for a while. Good for filling you up and warming your bones. Serve everything up with basmati rice and mint chutney, enjoy!



Channa Masala w/ TVP

1 large yellow onion
2 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp hot curry powder
2 cans chick peas
1 can diced tomatoes
1 can tomato paste
1 handful tvp

Wow, I've been cooking with can's too much. I didn't realize that until I wrote down what goes in this recipe. The TVP makes this dish really filling and hearty. I think the recipe would be great without it. Pretty much here's the process:

- get the onions going in a cast iron skillet over medium heat with the oil and curry powder until the onions get translucent
- let your can opener do the cooking and add everything else
- keep adding water as the tvp soaks it up so it stays real saucy
- let it stew for a bit to mix all the flavors

Creamy Curry Kale

Alliteration alert! This dish's title would look good on a brew pub menu. Stephen? For this one I start the same way with the oil, curry powder, and onions. Once the onions are translucent, I add the kale and let it cook down. I finish it off by adding some cashew or almond cream and molasses.

Haven't tried it, but it might be nice to toss in some nutritional yeast to give it a Paneer kind of taste. I'll let you know how that goes.

Teese Challenge// Loaded Sweet Potato Fries.

So, the fine folks of Chicago Soy Dairy put out a little tweet, offering some free product to those of us who have food blogs. http://www.chicagosoydairy.com/. So awesome, thanks guys!

I received a tube of both Mozzarella and Nacho Cheese flavored Teese. Due to the fact that it has been so long since I have cooked with any sort of "cheese," my first attempt with Mozzarella Teese ended up being quite a failure. It was a delicious mush of a failure though, to say the least.

For my second attempt, I chose to mix two delicious dishes: Sweet Potato Fries and well-topped Nachos.

Loaded Sweet Potato Fries

Ingredients:

2 Sweet Potatoes, skinned and sliced into small fries

1 Poblano Pepper, diced

1 Jalapeno Pepper,diced

1/2 medium Red Onion, diced

1 tsp Cumin

1/2 tsp cayenne

1 1/2 TBSP Olive Oil

1 TBSP Maple Syrup

5 Green Onions

1 can Black Beans, rinsed and drained

1 tube Nacho Cheese TEESE

Avocado

Sea Salt to taste

1. Preheat oven to 400'F.

2. Mix together ingredients up to maple syrup. Make sure all of the fries are coated well with both olive oil and the onion/peppers mixture.

3. Bake for 15 minutes in a casserole dish.

4. Remove from oven, mix up well.

5. Add ingredients through TEESE, mix a bit more.

6. Bake for 15 more minutes.

7. Remove from oven and garnish with some avocado slices.

8. Enjoy

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Snowed in Breakfast - Biscuts w/ Snausage Gravy

About 2 weeks ago, Philly got like 20 inches of snow and freaked out. With the city totally shut down we declared a a 2 day cooking and eating binge. In Sarah's cold apartment we made an array of fatty, creamy dishes to warm us up inside and out. We also had a chip buffet, but that's irrelevant to this dish.

The sausages in the gravy were made using Vegandad's sausage recipe. I always forget to leave the dough really wet before I steam them so it was a good experience for me to use the recipe on this one. We tossed those sausages in EVERYTHING we made, but this dish really stood out to me. I won't bore you with other recipes for the gravy and biscuits, because we pretty much just pulled the off the internet, nothing special. Fresh baked biscuits.... MMMMmmmm.

Also, I think that since people write vegan cheese like "Cheeze", we ought to be able to say "snausage" instead of "vegan sausages". It's saving you a couple of syllables dropping the vegan from the phrase even if the 'sn' sound is a bit tough to get used to. Who's with me? If I can get the support of a few good spellers on my side, that might add some legitimacy to my campaign. Every team needs a speller.

Asparagus and Lemongrass Risotto

Risotto has been on of those foods I was intimidated to make because, well, you spend over 1/2 an hour stirring, and food patience has never been my forte. I recommend making this with a friend to trade off stirring duty, or get a good book to read with your free hand to pass the time. I promise it'll be worth the wait - cream, tangy, rich and hearty. Not to mention asparagus season is right around the corner.

broth:
4 whole
cloves garlic
1 inch ginger, sliced
1 T dried lemongrass
3 c veg broth
3 c water
3 T soy sauce

risotto:
1/3 c sherry
1 lb asparagus
5 T peanut oil
1 c basil leaves
2 T fresh mint
6 large shallots
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 t red pepper flakes
1 1/2 c Arborio rice
1 t sugar
2 T lime juice


1.) Bruise the ginger and smash the garlic, place those and the lemongrass inside a loose leave tea bag. Put the teabag and all the broth ingredients in a large stock pot. Bring to a boil, simmer for 10 minutes. Turn heat to low and remove the teabag.
2.) Cut asparagus into 1/2 inch pieces, and saute in 4 T of oil until bright green and tender, about 5 minutes. add basil and mint, saute for 30 seconds and remove from heat, but in a separate bowl.
3.) Warm the sherry in a small pot over medium-low heat
4.) Add 1 T oil, saute the shallots and garlic until soft, about 7 minutes. stir in pepper flakes and rice, saute for about 8 more minutes until the rice sounds slightly toasted. Add the sherry and stir until absorbed.
5.) Now get ready to stir. Ladle 1/2 cup of broth at a time into the rice, stirring constantly until all the liquid is absorbed each time. When the broth is almost gone, stir the sugar and lime juice into the last of the broth before absorbing it into the rice. This will end up taking about 35 minutes total.
4.) Stir in the asparagus stems and cook for another 5 minutes. Garnish with chopped peanuts.