Too much of a good thing

I do love spicy food but this dish was so freakin' hot that my head and neck(!) were sweating. Maybe I had a death wish or something that day but I ate my portion because despite the heat, it was really tasty. DB really loves me because he ate his portion although I knew he didn't want to partake in this masochistic act. Note to self: use thai green curry paste sparingly. The recipe called for 2-3 TB and I used 2 1/2. Next time, I'll use 1 1/2. In this recipe I added red potatoes, green beans, carrots, cilantro, chicken and eggplants from the garden. Not posting this recipe for said reason. I'm not giving up on this dish. I will find a recipe that works because I love the flavors.

Creamy eggplant with assorted veggies

I got the eggplants from the garden and I wanted a dish that was creamy that satisfied the fat craving that one gets from alfredo sauce or some sort of mayonnaise based salad BUT it had to be healthy (the nut spread is key in the creaminess of the dish). Every eggplant dish I know of requires lots of oil to soften it so I came up with this recipe which uses the water that is released from the other veggies to infuse the eggplant with moisture and flavor. In the past week I have made this twice and can't get enough. I made a huge batch yesterday (about 4x the recipe) because of all the eggplants that were ready to use. I couldn't use one of the Ichiban eggplants because it got too big so was seedy. I used young eggplants so the seeds were super tender so the texture of the dish isn't affected by the seeds. The big one in the picture had some seeds so I scraped them out.

Creamy eggplant with assorted veggies
Makes approximately 3 1/4 cups
Note: I like this to be chunky so I chopped all the veggies and minced the garlic

3/4 cup eggplant, peeled and seeds removed
2/3 cup carrots
2/3 cup red onions
1 cup portobello mushrooms
1/2 cup red pepper
1 cup tomatoes
2 cloves minced garlic
2 TB olive oil
1/2 tsp salt
1 TB balsamic vinegar
1 tsp agave nectar (or other sweetener)
1/3 cup nut spread

Saute first 7 ingredients in olive oil for about 5 minutes. Mix in salt, vinegar, and agave nectar. Cover the pan and cook on low for 30 minutes (or when veggies are tender), stirring often. Remove from heat and mix in the nut spread. Add salt if needed.

In the photo of the completed dish, I blanched napa cabbage leaves for a minute then stuffed it. Other ideas:

- Toss this with your favorite pasta. I use Tinkyada brown rice pasta.
- Eat it as is as the main or side dish.
- Top it on chicken, a baked potato, or a piece of fish.
- Roll it up with some raw veggies and nori.

Veggie nori rolls

I've been eating veggie rolls a few times a week for lunch because it's light and quick to prepare. I fill it with carrots, sauteed asparagus, cucumbers, blanched napa cabbage, and a nut spread all wrapped up in nori (sushi seaweed sheet). Use whatever veggies that sound good to you. I bought some bean sprouts today so will add that to the mix tomorrow. Two rolls are enough for me and keeps my belly happy until the next meal 2-3 hours later.

Assemble as shown in this picture and roll it up. Add a little water to the end of the nori so it'll stick to itself. Dip the roll in the teriyaki sauce and enjoy!

Teriyaki sauce
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup pure maple syrup
1 tsp grated ginger
1 tsp grated garlic

I use a microplane to grate. Mix all together in a bowl.



Nut spread
1/2 cup raw macadamia nuts
1 1/2 cups raw cashews
1/2 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 1/2 TB soy sauce
1 tsp garlic
almond milk

Grind in food processor until smooth. Add almond milk to facilitate blending (just drizzle a little at a time).

I got the raw macadamia nuts in the bulk section at Whole Foods and the raw cashews from an Indian grocery store. You will have plenty of the nut mixture leftover. Use it as a veggie dip or save it for an eggplant recipe I will post soon.

Pesto Zucchini Tomato Gratin

I really enjoy cooking meals at lunch because I can go about it at a leisurely pace. In the evenings, I feel like I'm racing to get everything done in time to get Boo in bed by 7 so some of the fun is taken out of cooking. The past couple days I've been trying new recipes at lunch and here's one I made yesterday. It's a pesto zucchini tomato gratin from Karina's Kitchen. I followed the recipe except I added zucchini blossoms (have a bunch from the garden, not sure what to do with them) and substituted the mozzarella with feta since I have a big tub of it in the fridge. I made brown rice noodles and tossed them in pesto as the recipe recommends and it was yummy. It's been so long since I gave Boo pesto that she has no recollection of ever eating it. She didn't like the gratin part but absolutely loved the pasta with pesto so I gave that to her along with a mug of sweet potato bisque from Trader Joe's. She said "mmmm" the entire time and asked for it for dinner that night. DB and I really enjoyed this dish and I actually prefer it sans the pasta.

The best salmon dish in the whole wide world

Wasabi-maple salmon with stir fried baby bok choy and brown rice

(Picture doesn't do the meal justice!)

When I first tried Je Mange la Ville's recipe for Wasabi-Maple Salmon 2 years ago, I made it once a week for months, no joke - it's that good and best of all, easy to make. I've made it for several dinner guests and everyone loves this fish dish. I made some adjustments to the recipes and they are as follows:

- Instead of grilling it (b/c I don't know how and I don't care to learn), I bake it at 475 F for 10 minutes and it comes out just right (sliced about 1.5" to 2" wide).

- I slice the salmon before marinating.

- I love how the spring onions complement the fish so I triple the quantity.

- I use gluten free soy sauce.

This dish isn't spicy like you would think with the wasabi in it. I would increase the amount but don't so Boo will eat it. Taste the sauce and add more if you want. By the way, I made this Monday night and she ate the same amount of salmon as I did and she said "mmmmmm" several times. Seriously, you must try this recipe.

Pizza!

I've been wanting to make homemade gluten free pizza. I thought it would be fun to have pizza night at home, getting the family involved with making the dough and playing around with different topping combos. Yesterday Boo and I tested out Bob's Red Mill GF pizza crust and it was easy to make and pretty tasty. I roasted some mushrooms and zucchini in advance, made an olive oil garlic sauce, added more veggies & herbs (roasted red peppers, artichokes, spring onions, basil, thyme), and feta and we have dinner. It did come at a cost, though...whilst slicing pieces of zucchinni with my mandolin, it happened. My poor pinky! It didn't hurt until an hour later...that's when you know it's a bad cut when you don't feel it at first. I didn't use the safety feature so it was a dumb move on my part. At least the pizza came out well. I would be really upset if after the sacrifice, my dinner stunk!

Raw lasagna

DB surprised me by making this absolutely delicious lasagna (photo courtesy of The Raw Chef Blog) this evening. It's raw, vegan, and the flavors and textures complement each other extremely well. I couldn't get enough of the lasagna and am actually thinking about tomorrow when I can eat it again! The "cheese" is made from macadamia and pine nuts and is AMAZING - it was creamy like ricotta cheese in traditional lasagna. We ate it at 6pm and it's 10pm now and it has kept me full although writing about it is making me hungry again! This is the 2nd recipe DB has made from The Raw Chef and both are delicious (other was a carrot cake) and we're not even vegans or vegetarians. He has a few recipes bookmarked so we'll have to try one out this weekend.

Note: The walnut meat layer was really salty from the miso and soy sauce so DB left the salt out from the other components of the recipe.

4/20 Update: It's even better the next day. I've already eaten it twice today!

Shrimp and tofu mini burgers

Despite stabbing my thumb with a shard of glass then burning the same finger on a 325 F baking pan, lunch and dinner came out successful! I've been wanting to make Just Bento's shrimp and tofu mini-burgers (tsukune) with red pepper sauce and I made them for lunch today. It was absolutely delicious!!! I served it with brown rice and winter melon miso soup. It did take some time to prepare b/c I had to peel and devein the shrimp but Boo was busy helping DB organize his office so I was able to make lunch without interruptions. Next time I'm going to make a double or triple batch and freeze them.

Fri & Sat dinner

Friday night dinner: Lotus root mini-cakes with sweet chili sauce and bacon wrapped tofu. The two work really well together. Loved the lotus cake and it's dumpling-like texture sans any kind of grains - it's all veggies. It was the first time I tasted sweet chili sauce and I really like it. I think it tastes like a Thai sweet and sour sauce. The only part of the prep that was time consuming was grating the lotus root. I think I had my mandolin shredder setting too small so it took forever but I will make both again.

Tonight's dinner: Zucchini & chickpea pancakes (thanks to Cooking for Monkeys for posting this recipe on her site) with nut and fruit chutney along with curried kidney beans and veggies. The chutney can overpower the pancakes if you add too much. Just a touch is nice.

I like everything I have made this week (except the eggplant dish) because they were all super easy to make, tasty, and were made with minimal ingredients. I don't like making food with a long ingredient list with multiple steps so these were right up my alley. I hope you enjoyed my week of Asian cooking and are inspired to try something new. :)

Update 9/22: I made roasted carrot spread and it tastes WONDERFUL as a dip with the chickpea pancakes. The two complement each other very nicely.

Stuffed potato oyaki with wakame & cucumber salad

Tonight I made potato oyaki filled with ground turkey soboro with wakame & cucumber sunomono. What does all that mean, you ask? The oyaki is a mashed potato patty filled with soboro, a sweet & salty meat, pan fried in sesame oil. Wakame is the same seaweed you can find floating in your miso soup at a Japanese restaurant. It along with cucumbers are tossed with sugar and rice wine vinegar. I didn't take a picture because there are good ones already along with the recipes. The only difference was my potato oyakis were more caramel in color and not so dark (burned?) as in the photo.

I followed the potato oyaki as written. When I made the potatoes yesterday, I set aside 2 cups for this oyaki recipe. The only change to the wakame & cucumber sunomono was replacing the sugar with agave nectar. I modified the soboro slightly by increasing the soy sauce (gluten-free) by 1 TB and omitted the oyster sauce since I couldn't find a gluten free version. I added a splash of fish sauce to kind of make up for the flavor oyster sauce provides. It took me an hour to make all this and clean-up wasn't as bad as last night. We all enjoyed dinner and Boo especially liked the sunomono. DB and I liked the soboro so much that we added a scoopful over the oyaki.

Chicken, potatoes, and sprouts

Yay!!! DB is finally off of his high-protein-barely-any-carbs eating regimen so fun cooking can resume once again! I spent a couple hours late last night looking through two food blogs, Just Hungry and Just Bento, both written by a Japanese woman named Maki. I got sucked into both of her blogs and bookmarked a bunch of recipes, created my shopping list, and went grocery shopping today for the ingredients.

Tonight I made chicken tsukune dumplings with carrots, potatoes with sweet-spicy miso, and bean sprout namul. I originally planned to make bok choy namul, too, but I got lazy and didn't feel like washing every individual leaf with all those crevices that trap dirt - too bad because it would've livened up the plate with the green color. I followed the chicken recipe as written, using ground chicken, but changed the other two a little. I didn't use kochujang (Korean spicy bean paste) in the potato recipe because it contains wheat so I used 3 TB of miso then drizzled just a little garlic chili sauce on top (the Vietnamese chili sauce w/ a pic of a rooster on the container). I used 2 TB of agave nectar and about 1/2 tsp of molasses to give it that brown sugar taste. I steamed the potatoes instead of boiling and used red because the store didn't have new potatoes as called for in the recipe. For the bean sprouts, I stir-fried it in a little sesame oil and salt then after a couple minutes threw it in the collander to drain, tossed in some toasted sesame seeds, and about 1/8 tsp of sesame seed oil.

DB and I loved everything while Boo ate one piece of chicken and a couple carrots. She didn't like the sprouts nor the potatoes this time. I read that kids need to be introduced to new food at least 10 times so I'm not giving up. It's been true with Boo thus far so I'm a believer of this statement.

All three recipes were very straightforward, easy, and tasty. It took about an hour to make everything but I was also stopping here and there to attend to Boo. I will definitely make all three again and highly recommend them. We have enough leftovers for lunch tomorrow for all three of us - is it lunch yet???

Quick & easy falafel

I totally lost track of time today and before I knew it, it was almost 5pm and I didn't know what to make for dinner. Just one of those days. We have to start Boo's bedtime routine by no later than 6:15 to ensure she's tucked in bed by 7 so we eat dinner early. I checked out the frig contents then the pantry where I spotted the garbanzo beans so I decided to make falafel. I quickly whipped up a batch and while it was baking, I checked out the produce drawer and found spinach, carrots, and zucchini - good, we have salad. I tossed the veggies in some Annie's Naturals Goddess dressing which contains tahini so complements the falafel perfectly. By 5:45 we were sitting down for dinner. When I copied and pasted this recipe into my recipe document a while ago, I did not include the link so I cannot give the appropriate credit. Definitely try it - it's yummy, easy, and quick to make.

Baked Falafel
- two 15-oz cans garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
- ½ cup chopped onion
- 1 medium carrot, chopped
- ½ cup chopped parsley
- ¼ cup flaxseed meal
- ¾ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 tsp cumin
- ¼ tsp coriander
- pinch cayenne pepper
- 2 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice

PREPARATION:
1. Preheat oven to 350. In a food processor, puree 2 cups of the garbanzo beans and other ingredients until creamy and well combined.

2. Add the remaining garbanzo beans and pulse several times until mixture is combined but there are still pieces of garbanzos left intact.

3. Make falafel into 2-3" patties and place them on a greased baking sheet

4. Bake 15-20 minutes, flipping the patties halfway into cooking.