Creamy Fall Vegetable Risotto

Arborio. Arboreal. Something creamy, warm and smoked, for my belly today (and yours?).

What have we there? Broccoli, fennel, mushroom, orange pepper, and onion, surrounded by perfectly al dente little bites of rice. Onion grass from the back yard (aka, foraged chives). And some decadently creamy cashew stock, with smoked black pepper and roasted garlic.

I was concerned the creaminess of the stock would interfere with the rice performing its magic, but no worries. Perfecto. And easy.

Creamy Fall Vegetable Risotto
serves 6 (or 3 hungry me's)

2.5 cups arborio rice
3 tablespoons canola or olive oil

5 cups water
2 tablespoons mushroom stock concentrate, or another strongly flavored vegetable stock
6 cloves roasted garlic
2/3 cup raw cashews
Smoked black peppercorns, to taste
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast

2 cups mushrooms, sliced
Small fistful of fresh onion grass, minced
Fresh thyme, 1 1/2 teaspoons
Fresh sage, 3 leaves, minced (optional)
1 small head broccoli, tough stems removed, cut to florets
1 onion, diced
1 orange bell pepper, diced
1 small head fennel, sliced to rings

Salt, at the end, only if it needs it.

Roast your mushrooms, fennel, garlic (wrapped in foil, with a tsp of oil) and broccoli in the oven at 430f. Use the same roasting pan, toss them with a little oil, and remove them to a plate as they finish cooking (broccoli at 8 minutes or so, mushrooms at 10, fennel then or at 12, garlic at 18-20).

Throw the first 6 ingredients into your blender and puree until very smooth. Remove to a small saucepan and heat over medium low, keeping it warm.

In a large risotto or saute pan, heat your oil over medium-high heat. Add your onion and pepper, and cook 4 minutes, until the onion is translucent. Lower heat to medium-low.

Add your rice and stir to coat with the oil. Toss for 4-5 minutes, until each granule has a translucent "halo" around its edges. Now it is time to add the stock.

2/3 of a cup at a time, dears - stirring constantly. Cashews contain protein, so beware of rice trying to become one with the bottom of your pan. 20-22 minutes ought to get you through most if not all of your stock and see your rice to near perfection - if you need a little more water at the end, don't hesitate to use it.

Add a little more thyme or sage, if you'd like. Taste for salt.

Go at it while its still warm. Cheers!

Sweet Potato Avocado Rolls with Maple Tamari Reduction

Yeeeeeeeehaw, let's go ahead and just put the sesame seeds away. It's ok. I've got something different for you to try.

Bit of a disclosure: this roll was supposed to be pumpkin and avocado, but by time I got to chopping and roasting the huge pumpkin I'd had lying around for a while, and discovering its sinewy reluctance to be delicious at all, well, the cute little sweet tater hanging in my produce basket was looking mighty fine. And so it got roasted. And cut into cubey strips. And wrapped in nori with a good friend (avocado) and coconut rice.

And rolled in toasted, salted pumpkin seeds. So good.

Earthy, nutty little suckers. A lovely coating - even when lying next to fellow rolls, being squished and leaned on, no one got stuck to each other. Uber easy to cut, even with my (gasp) non-recently sharpened knife.  Higher protein, these seeds, perhaps? Who knows, but for taste alone, I'd do it again. Maybe with some tempeh bacon next time, oh yeah.

And let's not forget - a small saucepan, half maple syrup, half tamari, healthy dash of smoked habanero poweder, simmered down to the consistency of balsamic reduction, drizzled over top with a fork. This isn't salty sushi. This is Prelude to Pumpkin Pie sushi.

Sweet Potato Avocado Sushi with Pepitas and Maple-Tamari Reduction
makes 6 rolls

Let's do this.

2 cups sushi rice, washed until water runs clean
1 can coconut milk + half a cup of water

1 medium sweet potato, roasted, sliced to 1/2 inch strips
1 avocado, sliced to strips
6 sheets nori
2 cups roasted, salted pumpkin seeds, crushed

1 cup maple syrup
1 cup tamari soy sauce
1/2 tsp smoked habanero powder

sushi mat
sharp knife

Easy peasy.

Prep your rice as you would normal sushi rice, but leave out the rice vinegar. Cool to room temperature.

Meanwhile, combine your tamari, maple syrup, and habanero powder in a small saucepan. Simmer over medium-low heat 12-14 minutes, until reduced by half. Set aside.

Have your fillings at hand. Set up a separate plate for rolling your sushi in the crushed pumpkin seeds (ie, a spare cutting board). Be near a sink, for rinsing your knife in between cuts.

Cover your mat in plastic wrap, folding it around itself at the edges.

Press 2/3 cup sushi rice onto the plastic, about covering the area of one of your nori sheets. Press a sheet of nori in place over your square of rice. Place 3-4 potato strips and 5-6 slices of avocado at roll bottom, then bring the bottom edge up and using the mat, roll your sushi tightly, following through at the end, so that the riced nori sticks to itself.

Dust your spare cutting board with 1/2 cup pepitas and roll your sushi in the delish powder. Set roll aside.

Complete the rest of your rolls. If you have leftover rice/nori, try your hand at ....

Starting with a sharp knife that has been run under the faucet, slice your sushi into 8-10 pieces. Plate as you go, and drizzle your lovely rolls with tamari-maple reduction, when done.

Taking those babies to a party? Skewer each piece with a toothpick. Enjoy!

Latest obession: dumplings.

Is it the chill breezes and slow, drifting orange shower of leaves that make me want my bread cooked right in the pot with whatever stew I'm concocting?

Guess so.

Remember these, from last year? 'Member? MEMBER? Well, I've gone and lightened them, FREED them, if you will, from their cheesy shackles, but instead - a little pureed almond, some lemon, nutritional yeast (ye holiest of holy flavorings), a slow bake in a warm oven, and we're still tasting salty, stinky parm. In the dumplings, and on top, deeeeelish. Go ahead. Sprinkle it onna pizza.

Minestrone Stew with "Parm" Dumplings

You'll need:

A batch of delish minestrone stew a la this recipe

And for the dumplings:

1.5 cups flour (GF flour works fine - just add a tsp of xantham gum and up the liquid a couple of tablespoons, dearies)
4 tablespoons vegan margarine, very cold
2 tsp baking soda
Pepper
Finely minced parsley and scallion
1/3 cup rice or almond milk, unsweetened
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon salt
1/2 cup vegan parmesian - recipe follows

Flour in a bowl, of course - add baking soda and salt - then all spices, sans cheeze. Mix well. Get a pastry cutter out and go at the margarine, just long enough for it to disperse and look breadcrumby. Add your parm. Add milk, a little at a time, and test dough by gathering it - you want it soft, almost sticky. If you need a few more drops of milk to reach the right consistency, go right ahead. Divide dough into 10 balls, about 2/3 the size of a golf ball. Dust them, and your bowl, with flour as you go, until the dough is gone. Set aside.

Bring your delicious stew to a boil, drop your dumplings in, one at a time, then reduce heat to medium-low and simmer 8-9 minutes.

No toast needed. Ladle soup, then a dumpling or two or three in a bowl, then another ladle of soup on top. Dust with another generous pinch of Parm, and you're golden.

Vegan Parm

1/2 cup almonds, blanched
juice of 1 lemon
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
Dash toasted sesame oil
1 tablespoon salt
Soaking water, 1/3 cup or less

Soak your almonds in just-boiled water for 30 minutes to an hour. Drain, reserving some liquid.

Get out your big blender, and pour the soaked almonds in. Add your lemon juice and salt, and start that motor running.

Add some liquid - you want the almonds to be pureeing, with the least amount of liquid added. Scrape down the sides, if they need some help. Add a little more soaking water, if you need to.

When a smooth consistency is reached, add the remaining ingredients, and whirr a few more times to combine.

Lightly oil a baking sheet. Preheat the oven to 250f.

Scrape the pre-cheese out and spread it 1/2 inch thick in a corner of the baking sheet. Stick her in the oven.

Check and stir every 15 minutes or so to prevent browning. Eventually, it'll start to crumble. Keep going until the granules form naturally into small, parmesan-esque textures.

Enjoy :)

Luxurious Mushroom-Seitan Moussaka

This is my nerdy holiday dish.

Nerdy, because it's complicated, and delicate.

Holiday, because it's impressive, very rich, and goes best with 30 degree weather.

It's a definite undertaking - you'll want to start a day ahead if you're following the recipe exactly. But the layers of soft, yummy seitan, mushrooms, tomatoes both fresh and dried, nutmeg and cinnamon, and let's not forget the towering layer of fluffy, decadent, rich bechamel, well, it's guaranteed food coma, but yum yum yummy. A dish to tell your vegetarian friends that you love and appreciate them. Or even argue that meatless food can be as deeply flavorful as meatfull.

Just make sure there's salad nearby. Or simple, blanched green beans.

Mushroom Seitan Moussaka

For the seitan:

2 cups vital wheat gluten
1/2 cup tapioca starch
1/2 garbanzo flour
1/2 cup nutritional yeast
1.5 tablespoons fennel seeds, whole
1 tablespoon smoked paprika
1 tablespoon roasted garlic powder
1 tablespoon parsley
1 tablespoon freshly fround black pepper
1 tablespoon smoked salt
You can add other herbs here, if you'd like: rubbed sage, thyme, ground rosemary. I just stuck with the above this time.

1/2 cup olive oil + dash truffle oil
6 tablespoons tamari
1 tablespoon molasses
1 tsp smoke flavoring
2/3 cup water

4-5 cups water (plus 6 tablespoons tamari) or veggie broth
4 bay leaves
10 cloves garlic
1 red onion, sliced

A medium-sized crock pot

Mix your dry ingredients well and make a well in the center. In another bowl, mix your wet ingredients. Using a fork or your fingers, mix continually while pouring the wet mix in, until the dough balls up. Knead in the bowl for a minute, until everything is well incorporated.

Layer the onion in the bottom of the pot and place the seitan on top. Pour broth around the roast and add garlic cloves and bay leaves. Cook on low for 4 hours.

Usually, I make the seitan the day before and let it sit in the warmish broth all night. Makes for soft, but firm.

For this next step, you'll need:

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
Canola oil, to fry

Using the chopping blade on your food processor, mince the seitan. Cut it into small, uniformly sized pieces first, then pule 4-5 times until the mixture has been broken down into mostly small, quarter-sized chunks. Do this in three batches to keep things uniform.

In a large bowl, mix the seitan with the flour until well-coated on all sides. Add a little more flour, if you need to.

Heat your canola oil in a heavy skillet over medium-high heat and add half of your seitan. Press down into the oil and let it cook for 2-3 minutes, until browning has occured. Flip the seitan carefully and press into the oil again, cook for another 2-3 minutes, then drain on paper towels. Repeat with other 1/2 batch.

For the rest of the filling, you'll need:

1 20oz can crushed tomatoes
1/2 cup sundried tomatoes in oil
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 small red onion, minced
1 handful white raisins, chopped fine
1 stalk celery, minced
1 tsp cloves, ground
Several grates fresh nutmeg
Several grates cinnamon
Red wine, 1/2 cup
Smoked salt, tsp (or to taste)
Dash sugar or molasses

2 medium yukon gold potatoes, sliced thin
2 pounds baby bella mushrooms, sliced thin
2 tablespoons butter
4 cloves garlic, minced

Heat the sundried tomatoes and their oil in a small saute pan or skillet. Add the onion, celery, and garlic, and cook 3-4 minutes, until the onion is translucent. Add the cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, and cook until fragrant, 1 minute. Deglaze the pan with the red wine and simmer off the alcohol, about 2 minutes. Add the tomatoes, 1/2 their juice, the raisins, and 2/3 of the seitan. Mix well. Add sugar and simmer mixture about 10 minutes, until very thick.

In a separate pan or skillet, melt the butter. Add garlic and mushrooms and toss to coat. Cook over medium heat until the mushrooms have released their liquid and it has evaporated, about 18-20 minutes, stirring often.

For the bechamel topping, you'll need:

3 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour
2 cups whole milk, warmed
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup gruyere cheese, finely grated
4 egg yolks
Grated parmesian or extra gruyere, to top

Melt the butter in a skillet or small saucepan. Add garlic and salt. Add flour and whisk until flour turns golden, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in warmed milk. Return pan to heat and whisk mixture until it thickens, 3-4 minutes. Add cheese and whisk until mixture is very smooth and cheese has totally melted. Remove sauce from heat and stir in yolks, breaking them up and mixing them in thoroughly as well. Set sauce aside, covered with plastic wrap to prevent a skin from forming.

Assemble and bake:

Preheat oven to 375f.

Butter a deep 8x8 baking dish. Layer potatoes on the bottom, followed by mushrooms, then seitan mixture, then bechamel. Cover and bake 30 minutes until bubbling: add remaining cheese and bake uncovered 20 minutes more, until top has browned a bit and bubbling has ceased.

Let rest 15 minutes before slicing and serving, otherwise it'll be mess.

Alternatives abound:

Sub sliced, salted eggplant, 3 large, roasted for 10 minutes in a 350f oven for the Seitan mixture.
Use double the mushrooms (4 pounds) and create the tomato sauce with them instead, adding diced carrot, celeriac, or fennel as well.
Use yogurt and egg yolks for the topping for a lighter version - but still top with the parmesan.
Pureed silken tofu, lemon juice, and nutritional yeast, mixed with a little egg replacer and corn starch, topped with breadcrumbs, is a suitable vegan topping. Bake the entire casserole uncovered for the full 50 minutes if you go this way :)

Crock Pot Setian and Veggies

Not the biggest fan of faux meat, here. Fake bacon, all that Quorn stuff, sometimes it puts me off. That's not to say I don't find crumbled Fakon an awesome taste atop roasted corn chowder - just that if you're trying to stay away from processed foods, fake meat is about as Outta a Tube as you can get, so I try to stick with Au Natural proteins, both for my clients and for our little fam.

But when you're going to a foodie pre-Thanksgiving bash, and there's nothing but Meaters as far as the eye can see, well, a compromise isn't out of the question. Enter pot roast. Of Seitan.

The base of this dish isn't much different than my sausage recipe - flavors and herbs vary, but the gluten/soy/tapioca ratios are the same. The process gets a lot more complicated, tho, since my biggest gripe about Big Ol Pile of Braised Seitan is that the texture is too uniform. I wanted a crust, some crunch, so I added some steps.

This recipe isn't vegan - it contains some butter, some honey. Easy conversions would be EarthBalance and Agave - they'd work fine, and the results would be slightly less rich. Let me know if you take that plunge, and how it turns out!

Seitan Pot Roast and Veggies, in a Crock Pot

makes 10 slices and tons of veggie - serves 10-12

For the Seitan:
Dry mix:
3 cups vital wheat gluten
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1/4 cup soy flour
1/4 cup nutritional yeast
2 tablespoons veggie bouillion powder
Tons of freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons fennel seed
Fresh nutmeg, a couple rasps
1 tablespoon hickory or smoked salt
1 tablespoon tarragon, rubbed

Wet mix:
2 tablespoons smoke flavor
2/3 cup water
1/3 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons tamari
6 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon honey

Mix your dry ingredients well in a large bowl, make a well in the center, and while stirring with a fork (or be like me and use your paws!) add your wet ingredients. Grab and hunk and knead it for a few minutes, and shape it into a "roast", making sure it'll fit in your crockpot (the one I have, a friends, actually, is rather large).

We're not wrapping this in cheesecloth as many seitan recipes call for because we want a soft, slightly chewy texture. If you prefer your seitan super-dense, wrap away.

Accompanying Veggies:
1 package pearl onions, peeled
1 package tiny potatoes, pricked all over with a fork
1/4 fennel bulb, chopped
1 small head raddichio, chopped
12 garlic cloves, peeled
1 package whole baby bella mushrooms
1/2 package grape tomatoes
1 pound small carrots, both orange and purple, greens cut off

Layer some fennel on the bottom of the pot and put the roast on top. Scatter the remaining veggies around and on top of the roast.

For braising the seitan:

4 tablespoons butter
4 cloves garlic, minced
3/4 fennel bulb, chopped
2 tablespoons flavorful honey
2 stalks celery, chopped
1/2 package grape tomatoes, chopped
2 tablespoons sun-dried tomatoes, chopped fine
Fresh thyme, a sprig
Dash soy sauce
Dash hickory flavoring
4 cups well-seasoned vegetable stock (use mushroom, faux chicken, whatever you prefer)
1 cup bourbon

In a saucepot, melt your butter and add garlic, fennel, celery. Saute 5 minutes. Add tomatoes, dry and fresh, and cook until fresh tomatoes fall apart.

Add the rest of your ingredients and bring to a boil - then simmer 15 minutes until the bourbon has mellowed out a bit. Taste for salt, add if needed.

Assemble and cook:

Pour your broth over the roast, making sure it and most of the veggies are covered. Turn your crock pot to LOW and cook 3 hours, then turn to HIGH for another hour, hour and a half. Your seitan will be softer than if you used my regular method - that is OK, trust me!

Finishing touches:

1/2 cup flour
Fresh black pepper, ground

Canola oil, for shallow-frying

After it cools a bit, slice your roast into 1/4 inch thick slices. Heat your oil to medium-high. Dredge each piece of seitan in your flour mixture and gently place in the oil (I did this in a skillet and could fit two slices at once). Fry until browned and carefully flip, cooking 2 minutes on each side. Drain well on paper towels. Repeat.

This step gives the seitan a slightly crunchy, rough crust - a nice compliment to the soft, chewy interior. Worth the time and some smoke in the kitchen, says I!

To serve, cover the bottom of a large platter with the "unrecognizables" (read: delicious) like the fennel and raddichio from your crock pot and place the splayed roast slices out on top. Scatter the potatoes and mushrooms, etc, around the roast, tucking single parsley leaves behind and beside until you have a nice balance of color. Serve your cooking liquid alongside as gravy (I thickened mine with a butter/flour paste, a la JC, but you could easily use cornstarch if you'd prefer).

Laborious. But super-yum.

Latkes! Encore!

Since we're all unabashed potato lovers in this house (that's right, I even PEEL them half the time), I'm often looking for new flavors to pair with earthy-starchy.

We still had several pounds of VA apples from our camping/foraging trip last weekend, so I started off by simmering them with a little molasses and brown sugar, a la this recipe. And since we'd also brought home 3 pounds of the biggest, gnarliest taters I'd seen in many moons, well, Latkes were on the menu again. What a tragedy, eh?

The fun thing about these was surely the secret filling - folded slices of brie, all melty and creamy. Man. I think I ate 5 before I realized what I was doing. Add a little applesauce on top, and there's some serious flavor play happening here. Yum.

Brie-Stuffed Latkes

4 large potatoes, parboiled and peeled
2 large eggs, scrambled
1 medium onion
3 cloves garlic
2/3 pound Brie, rind on
Handful of all-puropse flour
1 tsp baking powder
Dash of milk, soymilk, cream, or water
Salt and pepper, to taste

Vegetable oil, to shallow-fry

We're following this technique almost totally - the only difference is the stuffing part, which happens in the pan, so procede as decribed - parboiling, peeling and shredding your taters - shredding the onion over the same disc, adding your minced garlic, salt and pepper, then mix. Add your eggs, flour, baking powder, mix, and then a tiny pour of milk, until you see batter thinly coating each shred of tater.

Heat about 1/2 inch of oil in a heavy iron skillet to medium. Have your cheese at the ready. We're keeping the heat a little lower than usual to give us time to make and stuff three latkes at a time.

Fork about a tablespoon of batter into the pan and flatten it with the back of a spoon. Quickly press a piece of brie into the batter, leaving a border of pancake free from cheese all the way around it. Fold it to fit if need be. Fork an equal portion of batter over the cheese, making sure to enclose it completely. Procede to make 2 more latkes in this way - by time you finish the third, it'll be time to flip the first.

When you flip these babies, press down slightly to compress, but be gentle. You don't want to squash your cheese out of its pocket.

Continue making latkes until the batter is gone. You'll have 10-12 large pancakes.

The cheese replaces the traditional sour cream accompaniment, at least for me. I didn't have any on hand, so I didn't try. Could be magic, who knows?

Enjoy.

Octoberness

Sweet, sweet fungus. Can you tell what object in the picture I'm most excited about munching?

Oh yes. Wild puffballs. They're gonna get stuffed with something, so says I.

From the same awesome lady that foraged the Insane Chicken Mushroom last month. She also makes amazing goat cheese. I kinda wanna be her when I grow up.

Other awesomeness - tasty Japanese greens. Apples are everywhere. And bootleg goat cheese. We have really strange dairy laws in this state.

Foraging, then fondue! All Hail Autumn.

I always get a little pagan around this time of year. Things smell amazing, the air is perfectly crisp, leaves floating around, getting stuck in your hairs.

Nothing like a weekend of hiking to get your fall cravings rumbling.

Cheddar. Fondue. Is. What. I. Crave.

Do I love the Gruyere/Emmenthaler mix? Oui. Do I like beer cheese more?

Yup.

Especially with apples, toasty bread, hard boiled eggs, pickles, and slices of tomato. So fun. Every bite is a little, tiny sammich.

We had mustard and hot sauce out, too, for a last dunk before shoveling. But yeah, sammichdue is great, because it forces you to SLOW DOWN. So that maybe, MAYBE, you won't eat an entire pound of delicious cheesebeer in 10 minutes. It did not phase me nor my three cheesepatriots this time. Perhaps next.

There really isn't anything special about this recipe - the only thing to worry about is the cheese. You need the oldest, stinkiest, sharpest chunk of cheddar you can get your hands on. Don't worry if it's crumbly, or if there are salt crystals, the process will take care of that.

If you don't usually smell your cheese before purchasing, do so now. If there's even a whiff of plastic, or the wrap is loosened because of stray oil, put that sucker down - it has been kept improperly.

Beer Cheese Fondue

8 oz beer (2/3 of a can), any (seriously) will do (as in, we used PBR. I saved the good stuff for drinking as we dipped)
4 cloves garlic
1 tablespoon strong mustard
1 tsp salt
1.5 pounds sharp, sharp, sharp cheddar, grated
1 handful flour

1 loaf bread, cubed and toasted
1 tomato and 1 hard boiled egg per person
Several slices garlic pickles per person
Small serving bowls of mustard and hot sauce (franks or Tabasco, please) to serve

If you use an electric fondue pot like we do, you'll need to make the cheese in a separate pot. If you're using an old school sterno set, you can stick that metal sucker on the stove!

Warm your beer to simmering, add garlic. Simmer 2 minutes. Discard garlic. Dissolve mustard and salt in the beer.

Toss your cheese with the flour thoroughly. Add the cheese by handfuls into the beer, stirring constantly. Adjust consistency with a dash of beer or flour as needed - you want the sauce thick enough to coat the back of a spoon to near translucency.

Toast your chopped bread under the broiler for a few minutes, until corners are toasting. Slice your tomatoes and eggs into thin rounds.

Keep your eye on the bottom of the pot as you work your way through - this stuff burns easily. But then you get to peel the submerged island off the bottom and eat it. Which is awesome.

Since we were eating with a fellow camper from the past weekend, and the two of us had successfully foraged for mushrooms, we ate those as well, sharing, generously, with our lazier campmate. They went in record time, so all I have to show you is this shot:

I identified them as Meadow Mushrooms after many hours of research and spore printmaking:

After taking a tiny bite, and waiting 48 hours to make sure my belly wasn't going to become possessed and attempt to thwart me, I knew they were A-OK. The 2 pounds we harvested, however, were technically some of the most expensive fungi I'd ever eaten, since I'd bought this book (and another on edible plants in our region) the week before as a reference. There are tons of online resources too - a favorite of mine is Roger's Mushrooms.

Mushroom foraging is actually pretty risky, as there are thousands of species, many that are unnamed or of questionable edibility. But it's fall. Mushroom season (except for Morels, aaauugh). And we were in the forest for days. Had to happen.

That reference I linked to is good, full of large photos and detailed descriptions. I wish he'd included some spore prints, because the descriptions of brown (a prevalent print color) varied from light, to dark, to fawn, to chocolate brown, and all of those shades are apparent in the prints I took. Still, check it out if you plan on doing some foraging of your own. And if not the above mentioned book, make sure to go armed with a good reference. And bags to keep your different finds separated, and the wherewithal to keep your hands away from your mouth and eyes as you go. Wash them paws often.

You'll be surprised how quickly you'll train yourself to spot fungus. I've been doing some sighting (and stopping, and creepily hanging out in stranger's yards, poking at whatever's growing out of their lawn/tree) just driving around town - saw puffballs on the grassy side of a highway on-ramp, saw some HUGE yellow shelf mushrooms on a neighbor's oak. But it had a distinctively toxic smell - stingy, tangy, creosote-like (another key identifying phrase for foragers - a sign to stay far away). So I let it be.

I thoroughly enjoyed my first foray. If you've got a story of a hunt of your own, I'd love to hear it!

Stuffed Borscht?

I mean, you've got red cabbage, tomato juice, grated beets, red quinoa... some soy sour cream... no dill, but lots of sage and thyme... yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and dub this spread Quinoa Stuffed Borscht. And take it from me, it is uber-tasty.

And full of anti-oxidants! Whoopeeee! Not that I need any further dosing, what with the glass (or two... or 5) of red wine I have nightly. Brings back memories of mixing my bowl o' red with an order of Kasha Varnishkas at B+H, minus the butter and cream. I've been told that plated, this looks like something out of Gray's Anatomy. Venture on, dear fellow chef, and whip yourself up a batch of slightly-intestinal looking stuffs in time for Halloween.

Quinoa Stuffed Borscht

1 medium head red cabbage
2 small sweet potatoes, baked, grated
1 cup quinoa
1 large red onion
6 cloves garlic
1 large beet, baked, grated
Handful mushrooms, chopped
1 small can tomato paste
1 large tomato, roasted, chopped
1 carrot, grated
1 medium piece of soy sausage or homemade seitan sausage, grated coarsely
2 tsp sage
1.5 tsp thyme
1 egg's worth of egg replacer, mixed
6 tablespoons Earth Balance
Faux-beef bouillion, 4 cups
Black pepper, fresh, lots

To start, preheat your oven to 400f and roast your potatoes, beet, and tomato for 20 minutes. Cover and set aside.

Boil the quinoa with a little salt in 2 cups water for 15 minutes or until water is absorbed. If it's looking wet at 10, uncover the stuff for the rest of the boil.

Melt 4 tablespoons of EB in a large, flat bottomed pot. Add your garlic and onion, saute a few minutes. Add the chopped tomato, cook another 2. Add the stock, tomato paste, and half of the grated beet. Add a dash of sage and thyme (or dill!) and your bay leaves. Add half the garlic. Simmer sauce until tomatoes start to disperse, about 20 minutes.

In another pot, melt 2 tablespoons EB. Add your mushrooms and seitan, stir, and turn up the heat to medium-high. Cook until the mushrooms loose some liquid, about 4 minutes. Toss in your grated carrot and potato and beet. Stir in the remaining sage and thyme, and taste for salt. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add egg replacer, stir well, set aside.

Boil 4 quarts of water in a large pot. Core your cabbage by using a paring knife and a strong grip - slice into the cabbage about an inch down, in a small circle around the stem. Using a fork, pry the core from the cabbage. Slice a little more from the core, so that you can see where each leaf separates from each other. Dunk the cabbage into the boiling water. Using tongs, free leaves as they cook away from the cabbage - the first should fall off around two minutes, the entire process should take 15-20. Set the leaves on a cutting board to cool. You'll need about 10 leaves.

Using a small knife, cut the hard part from the bottom of each leaf's main vein, being careful not to cut all the way through the leaf. Repeat with remaining leaves.

In a shallow but wide dish or roasting pan, ladle a cup or two of sauce.

Lay a leaf on your cutting board. Spoon about 2/3 cup of filling into the center of each leaf and roll it like a burrito (or cigar, if the leaf isn't as flexible as you'd like, or is tiny). Place face down in the sauced baking dish. Repeat with remaining stuffing and leaves.

You'll end up with a semi-tender core after boiling the cabbage head - slice it into thick pieces. Tuck pieces of cabbage in and around the rolls. Spoon the rest of the sauce over the cabbage and cover. Bake for 20-30 minutes, until the thickest part of each leaf appears soft when poked.

Serve with soy sour cream as garnish. Enjoy!

50 mile breakfast! - Latkes, herbed goat cheese, ruby relish.

I was telling my Gramma the other day what I've been doing for work lately. Since, you know, not-for-profit work in CLT is incredibly difficult to come by these days. "Yeah, I've been cooking food for people." I told her. "Vegan and vegetarian stuff with a local focus."

She found this totally amusing - turns out my great grandpa was big into cooking to, which was news to me. There really aren't a ton of "happy" cooks in my close fam - my aunt, me, and.... yeah, that's it. "He made amazing latkes." She said, kinda wistfully.

Basically, I've had a tater pancake craving ever since. Ze time to satisfy is at hand!


Bjinte Potato Latkes 

Everyone's got their little secrets when making latkes. Mine is kind of a wimp out.

Cook the potatoes first.

None of this soaking business (adds too much liquid). None of this raw, crunchy mistake stuff (if you just go to it with freshly grated 'taters, you could end up with uncooked shreds at the center of your cake). Make it easy. Parboil!

5 medium potatoes such as Bjinte or a good, sturdy baking potato
1 medium onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
1.5 tsp salt
Black pepper, freshly ground
2 eggs
Dash milk or cream
A fistful of flour
1 tsp baking soda
2 tablespoons oil
2 tablespoons butter

Boil a pot of water, add your unpeeled taters, and cook 10 minutes. Set them in a colander under cold running water for a couple of minutes to cool. Peel 'em with a vegetable peeler.

In a large bowl, grate your potatoes, then onion. Add garlic, salt, pepper, mix well with your hands. Add your eggs, beat them where they land a little, and mix it all together.

Add your flour and baking soda and mix, then add a dash of milk. You want a coating on each shred of potato, but no pooling batter, like in the photo above. Add flour then milk, little bit by little bit, until the consistency looks good.

Heat 1 tablespoon of oil and 1 tablespoon butter in a heavy skillet until the foam subsides. Reduce heat to medium, and using a slotted spoon, spoon about a tablespoon of batter into the skillet. Repeat 3-4 times, depending on the size of your pan.

See how it's holding its shape? Yay.

Cook 2-3 minutes a side. You'll smell their toastiness and know it's time to flip:

Cook until browned on both sides. Drain on paper towels.

And on the side, we have...

Herbed Goat Cheese

5 oz fresh goat cheese
Dash cream
Large handful chives, chopped

Mix it all together, with a fork. Set aside.

Ruby Relish

1 pear, sliced thin
1/8 red cabbage, sliced thin
1/2 red onion, sliced thin
Splash sherry or bourbon
1 tablespoon honey
1 tsp Salt
2 tablespoons butter

Melt your butter in a small saucepan and add onions and cabbage. Over medium-high heat, get a little browning happening. Add your sliced pears, cook 2-3 minutes. Add your bourbon, honey, salt, and a splash of water. Lower heat to low and simmer 20 minutes, adding water as needed to prevent sticking.

Once everything is nicely softened, throw it in your blender and pulse 6-8 times, until things are uniformly small. Return to saucepan and heat to serve.

Best way to go at these babies is with a schmear of both goat cheese and relish on each bite, but to preserve crispness, serve your sauces on the side and let your pals do their own.

Fallish Haul

Pickins are definitely slimming, but there's still tons. Late season lettuce and greens are coming in, still in bean-land, but the tomatoes are gradually disappearing. We're going to miss them.

But this is it, the weather I wait all year for - dry, breezy, cool. Leaves are already all over the dang place. Happy.

Cool stuffs this week - contraband goat cheese, freshly-ground cornmeal, and more awesome longbeans. And tons of mushrooms. Mmmm.

Seriously, I'm stoked about that 'meal. Isn't it gorgeous?

Anson Mills, eat yer heart out! Mwa! Just kidding, I love you.

(you know that stuff's gonna end up in a tamale, right?)

And free stuff is always prettier than non-free stuff:

Mmm, pears.

50 mile meal, take 10! French Onion/Mushroom Stew, Open-faced Croque Madame

I discovered this cheese maker a couple of weeks back, and had a hunk of the Appalachian Tomme in my cheese drawer. It was gradually getting whittled down by late-night wine-snacking, so I figured I needed to get it in a dish, fast. And since fall's coming... and French Onion Soup is totally my "welcome, autumn!!" meal, and Nova's makes a great french loaf, well, the stars aligned, and we ate them all.

Yeah, I left the lightbox up since last I shot. Lazy, fo sho.

French Mushroom Soup with Sammich

For the stew:

1/2 pound wild mushrooms, or 1 large portabello cap, thinly sliced
1 medium sweet onion, sliced into thin rings
1/4 small head red cabbage, sliced thin
3 tablespoons butter
6 cloves garlic
1 tablespoon honey
2 springs fresh Tarragon
1/2 cup bourbon
3 cups good quality vegetable stock or water
Salt to taste

Melt your butter in a deep saucepan or dutch oven over medium heat. Turn heat to low and add onions and cabbage, and garlic. Toss to coat with butter, cover, and simmer over low heat, stirring occasionally, until veggies are super soft and have tiny brown bits.

Add your mushrooms, toss to coat again, simmer another 10 minutes.

Turn heat to high, add your bourbon, toss veggies, and simmer until the alcohol has burned off. Add your stock, tarragon, honey, turn heat to low, simmer another 30 minutes.

Taste for salt and adjust. Set aside.

For ze Croque Madame:

1 thick slice french bread, smeared with butter or mayonaisse
2 slices homemade seitan, quick-seared in smoked paprika and oil, or a couple slabs of tempeh bacon, pan-fried
1 large farmstead egg
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup coarsely-grated Appalachian Tomme or Gruyere cheese

Fry your egg in the butter until set on the bottom and somewhat set on top. Put your bread on a pizza pan or baking pan. On top of the bread, place bacon, egg, then sprinkle the entire 1/2 cup of cheese over the top, letting some fall over the sides. Broil 5 minutes until cheese is bubbling and starting to brown.

With a ladle, spoon 3 spoonfuls of stew onto a plate, spreading the stew to the edges with the back of the ladle. With a spatula, carefully lift your sammich, including melty-cheese, and place it in the middle of the stew.

We munched this 50-miler with a simple salad: spicy salad greens, 1/2 peach thinly sliced, 1/2 cup toasted pecans, and some sliced cukes. A pal had passed along a small jar of his homemade honey mustard dressing. Perfect!

Hard cheeses are hard to find in our state because the milk laws are rather restrictive. This cheese was really complex, very earthy. Contrasted well with the smokiness of the bourbon and mushrooms. Ya!