Sample - June 21, 2009

I had ventured to what turned out to be a great Farmers' Market in Hyde Park earlier in the day and had some new foods to try. I just wanted to get a taste of these independently before I started using them in recipes. I just considered this a little appetizer before my meal.


What we had were two types of oyster mushrooms and some garlic scapes.

I like all three. What I learned on the oyster mushrooms is to just use the soft leafy part. I loved the yellow oyster mushrooms which I believe I was told were a tropical mushroom.

Dinner - June 21, 2009

The recipe I used here was Stir-Fried Cauliflower and Spinach with Red Curry Sauce from Bishop's Vegetables Every Day. I actually used beet greens. The vegetables here all came from vendors at the Hyde Park Farmers' Market.

I used basil and 1.5 tsp of Thai red curry paste. I served each of the 4 serving over 1.5 servings of brown jasmine rice. The directions said that this would be spicy hot but it was not so I probably did not need all the rice. I thought it tasted good anyway.

This recipe was easy and came together in the time it took to cook the rice. I think I would serve this to company. The beet greens did have a little more bight than spinach would have and while I liked that Matt found it a little challenging. Beets are one of my favorite vegetables and one of Matt's least favorite.

Dinner - June 20, 2009

This meal was created as I approached the end of the food in the refrigerator. The next day I was going to a well reviewed farmer's market so I didn't want to restock from the grocery.

This meal was made up of Spicy Baked Beans served with Quinoa-Grits Polenta and a side of leeks and carrot salad. The beans and polenta recipes are from Kornfeld's Healthy Hedonist. The Sauteed Leeks and Boiled Carrots with North African Spices are from Bishop's Vegetables Every Day.

This might not look like a great meal but it mostly was. I did not like the carrots at all. Matt was okay with them but not excited. The beans and polenta were great and even better together. I really enjoyed the leeks although Matt found the outsides a little tough.

The beans and polenta held up well as leftovers. This would be considered comfort food for me and I would love to have this again soon but I will try and hold off until fall.

The leeks are steamed before they are sauteed. I allowed the carrot salad to cool to room temperature.

Lunch - June 20, 2009

This is Red Lentil Patties with Cilantro Sauce from Kornfeld's Healthy Hedonist. I served this along side a green salad for a nice lunch. We both thought these patties were pretty tasty. I think these could make into our rotation and I could serve these to my vegetarian friends.

I made these with Red Bhutanese rice as is mentioned as an alternate in the recipe text. The cakes did not hold together very well when I was making and dredging them but I stuck with it and they held together well enough in the end. I used sesame oil through out the recipe.

This made 8 patties with 2 patties used for each serving. I calculated 416 calories for each serving for the patties plus 35 calories per serving for the Cilantro Sauce for a total of 451 per serving.

This took me 90 minutes to make from starting the rice to plates on the table.

Several of Myra Kornfeld's recipes take the mono-textured mixtures of grains and beans that make up much of vegan cooking and take them through an extra step of making them into patties and frying them to give them some texture and definition. I think this will be a good tool to add to my kit of tricks.

Dinner - June 18, 2009

A simple dinner of soup and salad. As you may have noticed from the previous post we had a pretty big lunch.

This soup does not fit the regular posts on this blog. It is from an old Eating Well cookbook and it contains both chicken broth and milk. It is called Creamy Fennel Soup and it also contains some Pernod. Betty, Matt's mom, had made this and thought we would enjoy it as well. She sent some Pernod home with us a few months ago and I finally got around to giving it a try.

It was quite good. We ate it hot for dinner and then I had the leftovers cold with my parents for lunch which was also quite good.

Lunch - June 18, 2009

I rarely have lunch posts because we just eat dinner leftovers for lunch. I was not going to have any lunch to send with Matt the next day so I decided to make up this extra meal a day ahead. It ended up that Matt came home from work early and we both had this for lunch on the day that I made it. I later took the left overs up to my parents and the three of us had it for lunch.

This is from the Healthy Hedonist and is served over 50% whole wheat pasta. This is the Tofu and Vegetable Stir-Fry with Glazed Tofu. The recipe says you can make this in half an hour but I found that is just the cooking time. It took me an hour to get this together. The tofu recipe is separate and is located just one page ahead in the cookbook.

Matt and I liked this and my dad really liked it to. It is probably a little bit sweeter than I am used to making things but it made it taste like it came from a restaurant. I will definitely make this again. It could become a weeknight regular that would work for unexpected company.

I have the Glazed Tofu at 184 calories per serving for 4 servings. I have the Tofu and Vegetable Stir-Fry (including the Glazed Tofu) at 364 calories per serving for 4 servings plus the pasta. I said the pasta was about 200 calories per serving.

I made a note to try cutting the sesame oil back in the Glazed Tofu next time but I doubt it would be as good.

Breakfast - June 18, 2009

I tried the leftover cornbread with some fresh fruit for breakfast and really enjoyed it. The little bits of green onion might have been a bit odd but the the hot pepper was surprisingly satisfying. The cornbread was a vegan recipe from Berley's Modern Vegetarian Kitchen.

A week later I decided to try it again. This time I made the cornbread without the onion and pepper. I enjoyed this for breakfast and dessert with some coffee.

You could probably serve this to dairy eaters as long as you gave them a big dollop of something creamy on top. I really don't think they would miss the eggs at all. Really a very good recipe.

Dinner - June 17, 2009

This is Smokin' Drunken Chili from Healthy Hedonist. Vegan Cornbread from Berley's Modern Vegetarian Kitchen. Both excellent. Will make both again. Would serve both to all comers.

Matt drank the Mount Carmel beer that was to go in the Chili so I would like to try it again with the beer. Matt had the left over Chili for lunch several days later and said it was even better.

I have the chili at 450 calories per serving for 4 servings. I used a whole avocado because they taste good and I don't think you can really keep half just laying around. The whole avocado but the calories at 490 per serving. I think this is a recipe that should be doubled as it would solve the avocado problem and it tastes so good leftover. My avocado did not slice up very well so I just chopped it and mixed it in. I will have to get back with the calories on the cornbread.

I have 14 posts with pictures ready to go and more waiting on the camera.


I had some left over cornbread for breakfast and found it held up well in the refrigerator. See next post for details.

Dinner - June 15, 2009

This looks to be a sort of stir fry designed to use up the vegetables left in the refrigerator. I am going to have to check if there was a recipe for the stir fry or the tofu. I think there was.

I guess this can not be called updating my blog as I am failing to add the useful information. My goal was to get up to date and start using formal tags and ratings again. I will try again tomorrow.

Dinner - June 13, 2009

This would be when I gave up on the complicated recipes. Here we have a nice salad served along an old classic bean and rice dish. This old classic predated our healthy eating and was originally based on the recipe on the Progresso label. In short: cook up some onions and peppers, add some canned beans, serve over rice.

Dinner - June 10, 2009

This meal was a partial try from my complicated list mentioned in the previous post. This was some sort of eggplant hotdish. I am going to have to look up the recipe. The spread on the bread was the remaining sundried tomato and olive spread mixed with some white beans.

Dinner - June 9, 2009

Fresh vegetables - looks like I made it to the store.

I think this is when I decided to try a bunch of recipes from a complicated cookbook. I made versions of the two easier dishes but then gave up and just got creative with the remaining ingredients. This was probably close to a real recipe. I am going to have to go look it up and get back to you.

Dinner - June 8, 2009

Looks like I still had not made it to the store. This would be another pantry dinner.

The white beans are extracted from a recipe for pork loin from Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy. The beans are heated up with a lemon remoulade which in this case was made with some pine nuts and parsley. The pasta was tossed with a sun dried tomato and olive spread from Bishop's Italian Vegetarian.

Both dishes tasted good and I would make this again but probably not together.

Dinner - June 6, 2009

I have some catching up to do with my posts so I am going to go for speed.

This was a meal that was concocted from items we had in the pantry and freezer as I had not yet been to the store. It is a version of Berley's Yellow Split Pea Dahl from the Flexitarian Table served over some brown rice made with cumin seeds into which some frozen peas were mixed. I used black sesame seeds in the dahl.

I found the whole thing satisfying and will gladly make it again for the two of use when there is nothing else in the house.

Dinner - May 31, 2009

I almost forgot this last recipe that I tried from the Recipes for Health column in the New York Times. This was called Provencal Potato "Bouillabaisse" or "poor man's bouillabaisse" and the recipe can be found on their website.

This recipe was quite unusual for me because it included 4 eggs. The week before I had bought a bag of potatoes when I only needed one and I was looking for potato recipes this week. I thought I would try some local eggs and see how the recipe worked.

Matt was very reluctant to eat this. But we both enjoyed it. If I had caught the part of the recipe that suggested some toasted country bread with garlic, we would have enjoyed it even more. We each ate one serving and I ate most of the left overs the next day.

I thought my broth was a little heavy on the tomato side but this may have been because I used canned tomatoes. I poured in each egg individually along different areas of the edge of the pot.

This is not exactly a poor man's dish because of the saffron. Even though we liked this I probably won't make it again because we don't usually eat eggs and rarely eat potatoes.

I mentioned in the last post that these recipes have been pretty good but now that I look at the success ratio I think I should have been a bit more glowing in my praise. I will definitely be trying more of these recipes. To check the whole series with the recipes grouped by ingredient themes go to http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/series/recipes_for_health/index.html

Lunch - May 31, 2009

I made up this Recipe for Health from the New York Times for lunch. It is called Spinach, Tofu and Sesame Stir-Fry and can be found on their website.

I served this in pita bread as suggested but we also ate some plain on the side to keep the bread count down a bit.

I increased the recipe but did not exactly double it. The recipe is based on a half pound of tofu which is a weird amount. I did not double the oil but used roasted peanut oil in place of the canola. I only increased the tofu by half because I had a 12 oz package. I doubled the garlic, ginger, and red pepper flake. I used 2 tablespoons of soy sauce. I more than doubled the spinach to a pound. I increased the sesame seeds by half and doubled the sesame oil.

I like this dish but I don't think I would have liked it as much if it had been made with the higher tofu to spinach ratio in the recipe. The single cooking method on the spinach works okay here with the tofu and the pita. The recipe does not call for pressing the tofu on towel but I did and would recommend that. The recipe also does not call for adding the red pepper but I would suggest adding it with the garlic.

The recipe says that it serves 3, but the two of us ate the "doubled" recipe. I put this "doubled" recipe at 910 calories plus 300 for the pita which put us each at 605 calories each.

I probably won't be planning on making this dish but I will probably call on it occasionally when I am looking in the refrigerator and trying to think of what to make for dinner.

Over all I think the recipes that I tried from the Recipes for Health by Martha Rose Shulman were good and easy. I say easy but I do think that sometimes they rely on you having a history of cooking and shopping on which to fall back. There are not that many in the series that are totally herbivore in nature but I will be checking back for when more are added. I hope they keep the column going.

Dinner - May 30, 2009

Here is one more recipe from the New York Times' Recipes for Health. This is called Middle Eastern Lentils with Pasta and can be found on their website along with a more attractive photo.

I was rushing to get all of these recipes made both to use up the ingredients and to stock Matt up with leftovers ahead of my trip to see my sister.

I am writing this up long after the fact so I lack much in the way of details. I liked this dish and felt it satisfied kind of like Skyline Chili. I do not think it is a vegetarian version of that local delicacy but it has some similar satisfying characteristics.

As I recall this was easy. I didn't make any notes on recipe modifications. I would make it again and would consider it an option for a new weeknight regular.

I calculated this at 2200 calories for the whole batch. It is said to serve 6 generously but I think that is only the case if it is part of a meal including some additional dishes. We treated this as a complete meal and made it into 4 servings. For 6 servings it would be 367 calories and 550 calories for 4 servings.

Lunch - May 30, 2009

This recipe is from the New York Times' Recipes for Health. It is called Spicy Stir-Fried Tofu with Bok Choy or Baby Broccoli.

I don't know what baby broccoli is. The market did not have bok choy so I went with broccolini. Broccolini is not broccoli rabe (aka rapini). I had to significantly up the cooking time so I am going to guess that broccolini is not baby broccoli. The label claimed that broccolini was a natural hybrid of broccoli and some vegetable I had never heard of and that it was similar to asparagus. It was pretty good and the whole bunch was good for cooking.


I used roasted peanut oil and green Thai chili paste. I also ended up adding more water as the broccolini was cooking. I also may have had twice as much broccolini as I should. I am without a kitchen scale and I forgot to weigh it at the market. I served this with brown jasmine rice made from 1 cup of dry rice.

The bottom parts of the green onion get cooked. I put the top parts in a bowl of ice water while I prepared the dish. I drained and sprinkled on top at the end. I think this mellowed the onions nicely.

I had the stir fry at 860 calories total and the rice at 680 calories for a total of 1540. That works out to 385 per serving which is a nice size for a lunch.

We both liked this dish. It had enough heat that I was glad to have the rice. It was pretty easy to put together and could probably be done in the time it takes to cook the rice. I was doing other things while I cooked so it took me a bit longer.

I would make this agan and I would serve it up to guests for a nice lunch.