greener pastures

i have to be honest, i cannot stand blogspot software; it's a piece of sh*t (worse than something a particle physicist would write.  yes, it's THAT bad.)

so i'm gonna make a jump and attempt to migrate this blog to wordpress:

http://weliketofu.wordpress.com/

see you all on the other side!  <3

vegan valentine

what better way to celebrate valentine's day than with a vegan feast. i guess you could also spend it with your significant other.. but hey, some of us don't have significant others and are doomed to die alone, eaten by our cats.

on that note... may as well eat a bunch before that happens! here's what we had for our vegan valentine's:

• roasted tomatoes
• roasted broccoli with tahini-miso sauce
• pasta with broccoli rabe & raisins
• artichokes in mmmm mega delicious vegetable broth

these recipes were, in fact, inspired by my favorite people.. camellia introduced me to slow-roasted tomatoes, and dorothy first showed me how to make tahini-miso sauce. of course, it's even better when they make it :-)

roasted tomatoes (the CT way)

• small tomatoes, cut in half
• extra virgin olive oil
• salt & pepper
• oregano
• brown sugar (optional)

1. arrange the tomatoes in a ceramic or metal dish.. drizzle olive oil on top. the sprinkle with salt & pepper, oregano, and brown sugar (optional if your tomatoes don't look so great)
2. roast in the oven at 200F for several hours... as slowly as possible! they'll come out delicious!

roasted broccoli with tahini-miso sauce (the DK way)

• 2 heads broccoli, cut into florets
• olive oil
• salt & pepper
• tahini
• white miso
• lemon juice
• 1 clove garlic

1. toss the broccoli with some olive oil, salt and pepper.
2. roast it in the oven at 400F, until tender.
3. meanwhile, prepare the sauce by blending the tahini, white miso, lemon juice, garlic, and water to desired consistency. here i leave out the proportions of tahini-miso-lemon and leave it up to you to decide; i used something like 1-1-1.
4. when the broccoli is done, serve it with the sauce!

pasta with broccoli rabe and raisins

• pasta of your choice
• extra virgin olive oil
• garlic, 1 clove, minced
• leeks, sliced
• broccoli rabe (cima di rapa), chopped
• raisins
• hot pepper
• salt & pepper

1. prepare a pot of boiling salt water. first, boil the broccoli rabe in the water for just a minute. do not overcook it!! (i hate overcooked anything...) then drain the broccoli rabe, but keeping the boiling water. prepare the pasta in this same water. usually when i cook pasta, i undercook it a little since i'll cook it again in the pan at the end.
2. sautee the leeks and garlic in olive oil. then add the broccoli rabe, and sautee until tender.
3. add the pasta and raisin, and heat through. season with salt, pepper, and hot pepper!

artichokes steamed in vegetable broth

• artichokes, 4
• olive oil
• garlic, minced
• leeks, sliced
• carrot, chopped
• celery, chopped
• celery root, chopped
• fresh thyme sprig
• fresh bay leaf
• salt & pepper

1. prepare the artichokes. in all honesty, i don't know how to do this myself.. you basically have to cut off all the outer layers and remove the central flower part. perhaps the intertubes would be useful here.
2. prepare the vegetable broth. sautee the garlic, onion, carrot, celery, and celery root briefly. then add some water and bring to a boil. lower the heat and simmer, with the fresh thyme and bay leaf, as well as the salt & pepper to taste.
3. steam the artichokes in the vegetable broth for about 10 minutes, or until the artichokes are sufficiently tender. be sure to keep that the artichokes are sufficiently covered in the broth and that the pot is covered while artichokes steam. just above, you can see a picture of what they looked like when they finished steaming!
4. not done yet! next bake them in the oven for 5 minutes, at 400F.
5. to serve, place one artichoke in a bowl, and ladle the vegetable broth over the artichoke.. and voila--super delicious awesomeness!

ribollita, here i come...!

SO...having been inspired by toyoko's recipe and the fact that ribollita just happens to be her androgenius twin dorothy's favorite soup, i was like, for sure, "i gotsta git me some o' dat." you'll see, though, that this entry follows more than a week after toyoko's posting because A) i am by no means an androgenius with the uncanny ability of cooking the same dish as either toyoko or dorothy on any given day; and B) i was out of potatoes.

russian butterball potatoes...check. laptop with toyoko's recipe handy...check. 

however, anyone who knows me can attest to the fact that no matter how hard i try, my ADD-ness makes it absolutely impossible for me to completely read--much less follow any one recipe ever. so here's what happened (working backwards with what i can recall of the recipe because it's the only way i'll ever be able to remember the ingredients):

disclaimer #1: yikes! i just realized that i neither measure nor time anything ever...sorry.

da recipe:

1. since i don't have a pressure cooker, i simmered the cannellini beans until just before they reached desired texture. be sure you remove them from heat even a little before that because you'll add them to the soup later, where they'll cook still further and soak up some o' dat soup-y good flava.

2. chop and sauté onions, followed by carrots and celery, in olive oil. 

3. add minced garlic (and this is where i first wandered away from toyoko's recipe because i accidentally threw in a chile de arbol out of habit) and cavolo nero. (next mishap: i forgot the potatoes.) then add the canned diced tomatoes (which i crushed with my manly fist because seeing perfectly machine-cut squares of tomatoes in food bothers me for some reason).

4. add the beans and (ideally) their soaking water (<--i accidentally threw this out and realized as my liquid gold was rushing down the drain) because you want those good starches to add body to your soup. then add however much more water you want...i brought the water level maybe about 2" above the ingredients?

note: i can't leave anything i cook alone and am, therefore, constantly adjusting flavors, adding more stuff, covering up mistakes, etc...repeat, repeat.

5. in goes a vegetable bouillon cube...it was even an italian one!


6. next, two sprigs of thyme and one bay leaf (but i removed the bay leaf after about 15mins because bay leaf overkill drives me nuts).


7. (toyoko and dorothy, don't read this part!!) remembering that my italian friend angela told me that she often simmers a parmesan rind in her soups for that extra oomph, i thought, "that still technically falls within the definition of VEGfriends, right?" however, i just noticed that the heading on this Blogger site reads "androgeniuses... cook... VEGAN... science!" ...whoOps! ...okay, so parmesan rind--optional. :p


8. add a bit of salt and pepper--not the full amount, maybe just a tad shy of how salty you ultimately want it to be, remembering that it still needs to simmer further. i tend to pre-season on the early side to ensure that tough ingredients like beans get to absorb some o' dat salty goodness. mmHMM.


9. in a blender,  first add toasted bread (mine needed no toasting since it was a super-stale, rock hard baguette leftover from december...or was it november? hahaha...i learned how not to waste bread from toyoko!), followed by whatever portion of ribollita ingredients and liquid you want to purée.


10. return puréed contents in blender to pot and mix evenly.


11. season with salt and pepper as you like, simmering for a bit longer until ribollita is where you want it to be. 


12. finally, ladle soup into a bowl and drizzle with a pepper-y olive oil. oh! and some parsley.

question: it just occured to me--was i supposed to put more toasted bread into the bottom of the bowl??? if so, oops again...

ingredientz: i have a small appetite and get bored of eating too much of any one thing, so i adjusted the ingredients to make a smaller batch of ribollita.


1c - cannellini beans


1 - spanish onion, finely chopped (i'm not 100% over my onion phobia, so i chop them smaller, in hopes that they'll melt and just disappear)
2 - carrots, chopped into 1/2" wedges
1 - celery stalk, chopped into 1/2" pieces
1 - chile de arbol, crumbled with seeds included
3 - garlic cloves, minced
3/4 of a bunch - cavolo nero, chopped into 1" pieces
1 - bouillon cube
2 - thyme sprigs--next time, i'll just add them earlier along with the chile de arbol before step 2, like normal cooks.
1 - parmesan rind (like i said, totally optional!)

salt and pepper to taste
pepper-y olive oil for drizzling
chopped parsley

disclaimer #2: i cannot honestly say that no organisms were harmed in the making of this soup because the super-organic cavolo nero i bought from the farmers market had hell-of tiny silver bugs (those aren't aphids, are they?) on it, and though i tried to wash the leaves off as best as i could but......more protein anyone?





 

magical bean salad

i'm only calling this "magical bean salad" because "bean salad" doesn't seem to do these beans justice.. NC just introduced me to the idea of a simple bean salad, and it has stuck... maybe these beans are magical, after all; i can't stop eating them! i've been eating beans every day for almost a week!

as with the other dishes i've been cooking, simplicity is key.. also, i think the truly magical ingredient is good olive oil. NC has graciously endowed me with the remains of this giant bottle of olive oil. i think this bottle of olive oil and i are going to be making beautiful music together...

• chickpeas or cannellini beans, either dried or canned
• carrots, chopped
• celery, chopped
• garlic, minced
• extra virgin olive oil
• salt & pepper
• fresh parsley, chopped (optional)

1. cook the beans until tender. i cooked my chickpeas for about 40 minutes in my magical pressure cooker!
2. mix the beans with the rest of the ingredients. salt & pepper to taste.

a tale of two pastas

in true freakish wondertwin spirit, dorothy and i both happened to have similar pasta dinners last night. below you find a tale of two pastas: one a simple tale of pasta with just zucchini, the other a recipe with more flair! enjoy!

• toyo's recipe for pasta with zucchini
• dorothy & melissa's for extra special pasta with zucchini

"the other pasta with zucchini" OR "pasta with zucchini, with gay flair" (by dorothy)

For the gritter, dirtier more low-brow version of "pasta with zucchini", look here! Melissa made a delicious red sauce last nite, chock full of veggies and highlighted with zucchini and veggie sausage for some protein punch. This is especially suitable for the cold winter nights in Brooklyn.

ingredients:

cellentani pasta (or whatever you want)

onion

garlic

zucchini

veg sausage (optional)

canned tomatoes - whole peeled, fire roasted!

canned crushed tomatoes (optional, for thicker sauce)

oregano

thyme

salt/pepper

kalamata olives

1. Boil pasta water. Throw salt in after it boils! Raoult's law! Add pasta after boil!

2. Sautee onion til translucent, throw in sausage and brown (or you can brown sausage first, set aside, then add back after onions are cooked.)

3. Add zucchini, garlic, and herbs. Sautee 1-2 min.

4. Add tomatoes, let simmer til zukes are softened. If you want to add some pasta water, be my guest.

5. Throw in some olives at the end.

6. Top some pasta with some sauce and enjoy with some red wine and some Downton Abbey! Or talk to your dinner companion.

pasta with zucchini

for me, the best pastas are the simplest ones.. pasta is already so delicious in and of itself! (i <3 carbs...)

here we do a pasta with just zucchini and garlic, salt and pepper.. i know it's not summer squash season, but i found these guys on sale at the grocery store and couldn't resist. (i have to admit, this usually comes out better in the summer :-)

you can use whatever pasta shape you like.. though to be honest, i'm pretty damn picky about pasta shape and texture. i normally like cooking barilla "whole grain" pasta, but i didn't have any and ended up using some gemelli i had bought at manor. (i <3 carbs in the form of gemelli...)

ingredients:

pasta (i used half the bag of gemelli pictured here ==>)

extra virgin olive oil

2 large zucchini, sliced as above (or more!)

1-2 cloves garlic, minced (or more!)

1 onion, chopped (optional)

chili pepper flakes (optional)

salt & pepper

1. prepare the pasta. i always like my pasta super al dente... and salty! (mm.. carbs..)

2. while the pasta is boiling, sautee the onion (if you want to include it) in olive oil. add the garlic and the zucchini slices. sautee on medium heat until the zucchini browns, as pictured below. you can add chili flakes if you like.

3. when the zucchini is sufficiently browned and tender, add the cooked pasta. heat together for a few minutes, seasoning generously with salt and pepper. also, add more olive oil if you like. as you can tell from my photos, i not only like my pasta al dente and salty, i also like it oily... (mm.. olive oil..)

ribollita! (dorothy's favorite soup! ;-)

it's snowy here in geneva, and one of the only consolations i have suffering through winter is: SOUP.

as i mentioned in my last post, i had some great soups while visiting tuscany. i was chatting with dorothy about a great ribollita i had, and she said that it's her favorite soup! apparently, when she was backpacking through tuscany more than a decade ago, she was told by the locals to have this soup.. she loved it, and it's held a special place in her heart ever since (and lemme tell you, dorothy loves soups...) i was so lucky to have serendipitously tried it last week in pisa! (shameless plug: this story should probably also go on our other blog, http://freakishwondertwins.blogspot.com/, where we document all of our freakish-wonder-twin experiences.)

the ribollita that i had was really fantastic, and it's inspired me. from the soup i had in pisa, i'm gathering that the essential ingredients are: kale (cavolo nero), beans (cannellini), and bread! geneva sucks and kale is noooo where to be found, so i had to wait for a friend to bring some up from italy for me :-P

btw, ribollita apparently means "reboiled"! the server at the restaurant in pisa said that they spent days cooking their ribollita.. not sure if he was joking or not, but i guess the point is that it should be cooked for a long time...

anyway, here goes my first attempt... (it came out really good, actually.. and not too far from what i had tasted in pisa :-)

ingredients:

extra virgin olive oil

1 onion, chopped

2 carrots, chopped

3 stalks of celery, chopped

1 clove garlic, minced

several small potatoes, chopped into bite-size pieces

1 bunch of dinosaur kale (cavolo nero?), chopped into bite-size pieces

1 can of tomatoes

cannellini beans (dried or canned), however much you want

salt & pepper

bread (several slides of good, dry bread)

1. prepare the beans (if you're using dried beans). i cooked my cannellini beans in a pressure cooker, for 30 minutes, until they were good and tender.

2. prepare the vegetables. sautee the onion, carrot, and celery in a stock pot. when tender, add the garlic, potatoes, and kale. add the canned tomatoes and let simmer until the potatoes and kale are tender (about 30 minutes?)

3. add the beans and let it simmer for another 10-20 minutes. add salt and pepper to taste.

4. take half the soup and puree it in your blender (adding water as needed), and return it to the stock pot. (if you have an immersion blender, just use that and puree as much as you like.. as i mentioned in my last post, i kinda like my soups to maintain their vegetable integrity, so i don't puree too much.)

5. prepare the bread. cut the bread into bite-size pieces and toast it in the oven until just toasted. when serving the soup, put the bread into the bottom of the bowl, and then ladle the soup on top of the bread. (btw, i got the impression from other recipes i perused and also from the soup i had in italy that the bread should be cooked into the soup. for some reason, that idea grosses me out, so i just added the bread just before serving!)

6. voila! delicious soup. enjoy!

pasta & bean soup

i had some great soups while i was in pisa last week... in particular, i had an amazing ribollita and also a great farro & fagioli soup. as for the former, i couldn't find any cavolo nero (tuscan kale) in geneva, and i'm consequently awaiting a shipment from NC, who'll bring some for me from italy. (ribollita recipe coming soon... :-P)

as for the latter, i didn't have any farro on hand, and instead, i tried making a similar soup with pasta. the farro & fagioli soup i had in pisa was creamier than this one (since all the vegetables were puréed). however, i like keeping some integrity to the vegetables in my soup, and i refrained from puréeing it all. also, i probably added too much pasta; i always feel like too much pasta dilutes the quality of a good soup.

the point of this soup was to be simple, but delicious.. which it indeed turned out to be!

borlotti beans, dry or canned (if you can't find borlotti, i bet cannellini beans would work well)

small pasta (i used "mezze penne rigate")

olive oil

carrot, chopped

celery, chopped

onion, choppd

garlic, minceed

rosemary

thyme

salt & pepper

1. prepare the beans. i used dried beans and cooked them in the pressure cooker with salt, for about 30minutes. i cooked the beans until they were really tender. be sure to save the water that the beans were cooked in; we'll use this as the soup stock.

2. prepare the pasta; i decided to boil the pasta half-way before putting it into the soup, to prevent the soup from becoming too thick & starchy.. however, i think it'd turn out fine with the pasta cooked in the soup stock directly (in step 5).

3. in a stock pot, sautee the chopped onion, carrot, and celery with olive oil.. toss in the minced garlic, rosemary & thyme (to taste; i put about 1 tsp dried rosemary and just a dash of thyme). once everything is tender, add the beans, bean "stock", salt and pepper (to taste) to the sauteed vegetables.

4. then, take half of this soupy mixture and puree it in your food processor, adding water if needed.. then put it back into your stock pot. (or if you have an immersion blender, just blend it directly in the soup pot). let it simmer for a while, until your soup attains the desired consistency and flavor.

5. now (if you haven't already added pasta), add the half-way cooked pasta now. let it simmer until the pasta is done!