Chickpeas with Tomatoes, Spinach & Feta ♥

Today's vegetarian supper, a vegetarian version of one of my favorite suppers of all time. It's made with favorite pantry ingredients (don't we just love chickpeas?!) and fresh spinach and a salty sprinkle of feta cheese.

No surprise, I love-love-love cookbooks, especially the ones that teach, the ones that inspire movement to the kitchen now, the ones that introduce new ideas and new techniques but still KISS (you know, Keep It Simple, um, Silly). So a couple of weeks ago, a new cookbook arrived, one that is getting a lot of attention, one I was so excited to preview. But the truth is, it left me cold. Finding ingredients would require moving to New York or maybe Italy. Fish is great but really, aren't we worried about our fast-depleting fisheries? (Tastes vary. You just might just love this cookbook. But I'm not going to mention it by name because, well, I'm just not.)

But one recipe did fit my it's-winter-and-I-crave-simple-comfort-food mentality. But a few minutes in, I realized how "simple" is different than "nothing going on". On a dime, I saved supper by converting the dish from bland nothing-ness into a vegetarian version of one of my favorite dishes of all time, Shrimp with Tomatoes, Spinach & Feta.
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How to Roast Vegetables ♥ 15 Tips & A Master Recipe

Quick! Name the single technique for cooking vegetables that we can use again and again, the same method for every single vegetable, without ever once referring to a “recipe”.

Hint: In part, the attraction to this style of cooking vegetables is seasonal. It begins in the autumn as the air turns cool and our bodies begin to crave hearty food to sustain us through the long dark winter. It’s perfect for winter, when a kitchen is an oasis of warmth and our bodies demand fresh healthy food.

Give up? It’s roasting vegetables. You’ll never forget again, once you’ve tried roasting vegetables, whether root vegetables like beets, carrots, sweet potatoes and parsnips or others like zucchini, kohlrabi and this time of year, winter squash like butternut and acorn squash.

Truth is, roasting transforms vegetables. If vegetables were to write a love letter, the page would begin, “Dear Oven: How we love thee. You coax the sweetness from our earthly forms, you transform our color into golden bites of caramel.”

The technique is dead simple, requiring just vegetables, oil and seasoning – and heat. Still, a few simple tricks will help. So make this your year to get up close and acquainted with roasting vegetables. Start with a vegetable you already like. If you like, check the roasted vegetable recipes for a recipe to eliminate uncertainty about temperature and timing. Soon enough, you’ll be writing your own love letter.

How to Roast Vegetables - Tips & Techniques & A Master Recipe

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How to Cook Sweet Potatoes in Slow Cooker ♥

Ever wonder how to cook sweet potatoes in the crockpot? Just throw them into the slow cooker in the morning, they'll be ready when you get home from work.

I swear, my crockpot and I are getting close to BFF status. And all it took was a new outlet! You see, my kitchen is decent size. But all the cooking is done in one corner, albeit one ever-so-efficient corner. What my kitchen lacks is outlets – until last fall, there were only two, one in my work corner and one other commandeered by the coffee maker and an under-cupboard radio. But last fall, an electrician put an outlet in above another counter. What a difference! Now the crockpot (or the yogurt maker or ...) can work-work-work away over in its own corner while I work in mine.

So I've taken to using my crockpot like an energy-efficient oven, cooking stuff I'd never before even considered making in a slow cooker. Like sweet potatoes – yes, really, you can cook sweet potatoes in a crockpot!
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Vegetables 101: What Are Bitter Greens?

So many vegetables, so many that are unfamiliar! This is one of an occasional series of posts, quick, easy and practical information about out-of-the-ordinary vegetables. Links to recipes!

On Christmas Eve, a cousin sidled up to me, "Hey, I wanna ask you something." Usually Denny's face carries a big, open smile but in spite of the champagne and frivolity surrounding us that afternoon, he seemed serious. I braced myself for some thorny personal matter. Instead, he queried, "What are bitter greens?"

I laughed out loud, half in relief, half in sudden understanding. Earlier in the day, he and his wife Jan had seen a recipe that called for bitter greens and wanted to know what they were and where to buy them. "We'll ask Alanna," they agreed. "She'll know." And no doubt, the term "bitter greens" is one tossed off by food writers and passionate food people who presume we all speak the same language. (Remember the time when someone was searching grocery shelves for "tepid water"? It's another good story, see my recipe for Acorn Squash with Quinoa & Cherries on Kitchen Parade. But I digress.)

First, let's remind ourselves that bitter is one our our five basic taste sensations: sweet, sour, salty, bitter and the elusive savory / umami. That taste of bitterness appears in many favorite foods: think chocolate, coffee, marmalade, citrus zest and olives, even the quinine in the tonic water for gin and tonics.
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Steamed Vegetable Medley ♥

Today's healthy recipe: Fresh vegetables steamed over an olive oil-onion-wine-broth mixture that is turned into a rich and flavorful sauce for drizzling or dipping. Not just vegan, "Vegan Done Real".

Hey, word dancers! I'm looking for a word, would you help? In a single word or short phrase, I want to instantly convey that this dish is "a whole pile of beautiful rainbow-colored fresh vegetables, lovely to look at, tasty to consume, all in the same dish". 'Medley' is a word that food writers use, 'cornucopia' too. But they don't quite express the healthy wholesomeness that I'd like to express. Is there such a word, in any language?

In the mean time, I'm sticking with "medley", that's the word that Myra Kornfeld used for this recipe for Vegetarian Times' January-February issue. I didn't expect to be knocked over by what is essentially a big plate of vegetables because steamed vegetables, well, aren't they just a little boring? Not here!

Vegetables are usually steamed over nothing more than water. This recipe calls for cooking a little butter (I used olive oil), onion and white wine with vegetable broth, using that to steam the vegetables, then turning the mixture into a sauce to drizzle the vegetables with. KNOCK ME OVER GOOD, this stuff.
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How to Make Homemade Vegetable Soup ♥

Today's brand-new master recipe: How to make homemade vegetable soup using whatever vegetables are in season or happen to be on hand or which just sound good.

Happy New Year, all! Are we done with cookies? champagne? fun and frivolity? Yeah, me too. It feels so good to be back to eating healthy food again. Soups like this will help kickstart the new year!

CSA folks, especially are going to love this recipe. Ah heck, I hope we all love this recipe, it posted this morning on Kitchen Parade, see Master Recipe: How to Make Homemade Vegetable Soup. (Easier still – just click the photo!) I'd love to know what you think but here's why you just might like it:

It's a master recipe for soup, getting us started with the right proportions but giving free rein to the choice of vegetables, the choice of cooking liquid and the choice of seasoning.
It's not just vegan, it's "Vegan Done Real".
It's similar to the Weight Watchers Zero Points Garden Soup (and all the many Weight Watcher variations of this soup) except that it's much more variable.
It's a basic recipe, a starter recipe, but the results are anything but ordinary.

PS I have a fabulous new many-vegetables-in-one-pot recipe for A Veggie Venture on Tuesday too. I think 2012 may just be a banner year for vegetables. Did I mention we joined a CSA? More on that later!
PPS Lots of exclamation points !!! in today's post, a big sign of excitement about this recipe. Let's hope you feel exclamation points too!
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One Side from One Sister: Potato, Fennel Gratin

My sisters and my brother all love to cook and at gatherings, and especially at Thanksgiving and Christmas, many, many good dishes are made. I featured Christine and Cathy's dishes from Thanksgiving in a previous post (Thanksgiving 2011: Three Sides from Two Sisters) and now it's Sara's turn.

 For our Christmas Eve dinner, Sara made a potato, fennel gratin based on a recipe by Ina Garten, from "The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook", and it's a very good recipe, but Sara's tweaks made it better still.

Slight caramelization of the onions and fennel, a little nutmeg plus a combination of Gruyère and Fontina (also doubling the amount) cheeses elevate the dish.

RECIPE: POTATO-FENNEL GRATIN
Adapted from Ina Garten, "The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook"
Serves: 10 to 12 or more

Equipment: 10 cup baking dish with high sides (approximately 2"). If your baking pan has lower sides, check the potatoes earlier.


Ingredients

• 2 small fennel bulbs
• 1 yellow onion
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter + more to grease the baking dish
• 2 pounds russet potatoes
• 2 cups + 2 tablespoons heavy cream
• 1/2 pounds grated Gruyère cheese, divided
• 1/2 pound grated Fontina cheese, divided
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

Preparation
Preheat the oven to 350F, rack in the middle.


Thoroughly butter the inside of your baking dish.

Remove the stalks from the fennel and cut the bulbs in half lengthwise. Remove the cores and cut the remainder of the fennel in a medium dice and set aside. Dice (medium) the onions and combine with the fennel. Heat a skillet on medium heat for a few minutes and add the olive oil and 1 tablespoon of butter to the pan. When the butter stops foaming, add the onions and fennel and sauté on medium heat until the onion and fennel is soft and the edges are slightly caramelized. Remove from the heat and set aside.

Peel the potatoes, cut each on into quarters lengthwise and slice each quarter thinly (1/8th OR 1/4 inch) and place in a large bowl. Mix the sliced potatoes with 2 cups of cream. Reserve 1/2 cup each of the Gruyère  and the Fontina and add the remainder to the potato and cream mixture, mixing thoroughly.


Pour the potatoes into the baking dish. Press the mixture down to smooth the top. Combine the remaining 2 tablespoons of cream with the reserved Gruyère and Fontina and sprinkle on the top. Bake for 1 1/2 hours until the potatoes are fully tender and the top is browned and bubbly. If it is browning too fast before the potatoes are tender. cover the top with a piece of foil. Remove from the oven and allow the gratin to set for 10 minutes before serving.

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