Cabbage Kielbasa Soup

I never buy the same groceries. I always scour the window ads and browse the weekly circular to see what is on sale and menu plan based on my good finds. While I know this idea may not work for everyone, for most dishes I can plan ingredients and recipes on the go. Today's soup was born out of two purchases I never have on my radar: cabbage and kielbasa. (I channeled my secret Polish grandma that I never had.) The outcome was so tasty, I would definitely make it again.

Cabbage Kielbasa Soup

1 medium white onion
1 stalk celery
1 carrot
1 pound beef kielbasa
1 red pepper
4 cloves garlic
1 16 oz can crushed tomatoes
1 head green cabbage (about 3 pounds)

1. Prepare the onion, celery, carrot, kielbasa, and red pepper by dicing them into 1/2 inch cubes. Mince the garlic. Core and cut the cabbage into ribbons (1/4 inch by 1 1/2 inches).
2. In a 4 quart stock pot (or larger) heat 2 tablespoons olive oil. Sautè the kielbasa, onion, and garlic. When the onions have softened, add the celery, carrot, and red pepper. Sautè until soft.
3. On the side, boil a quart of water.
4. Add the can of tomatoes to the kielbasa and vegetable mix. Add the cabbage and boiling water to cover and reach the consistency you like.
5. Simmer for about 30 minutes. Season liberally with salt and pepper. A bay leaf, basil, oregano, or a little chili would be good too.

Serves an army.

Escarole, Sausage, and Split Pea Stew

It is 35 degrees in New York. My toes are cold, my humidifier is on high, and I have more layers on than an onion. Which means that it is time for SOUP! I pretty much exclusively live off of soup in the winter months and I have made more soups than is probably normal for someone my age. But I digress, I love soup and here is another recipe.

Escarole is a leafy green vegetable. I was first introduced to it in lentil soup, Progresso to be precise, which I ate with slices of whole wheat toast as a winter after school snack. I rediscovered it in my local supermarket and it tends to be on sale often. Its a bit temperamental as a vegetable - if you cook it even a tiny bit too long, it acquires a bitter aftertaste. So the key to this recipe really is simple: add the escarole at the very last minute.

The following recipe is a meld of two foods I enjoy - lentil soup and yellow daal (an Indian pea soup). It has a lot of meatiness in the sausage and chicken broth and requires very little seasoning.

Escarole, Sausage, and Split Pea Stew
Serves four, about an hour

1/2 pound (1 cup) of dried split yellow peas
1/2 pound of sausage (I used breakfast sausage, but italian is good too)
1 large onion, diced
1 large carrot, cut into coins
4 cloves garlic, smashed
1 can low sodium chicken broth
1 cup water
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon curry powder
1 head escarole, sliced into 1/4 inch ribbons, no longer than 2 inches
5 leaves lettuce (Optional: if you have a small head of escarole or want to mellow the flavor)

1. Boil three cups of water. Soak the dried split peas
2. Prep all vegetables and remove the sausage from the casing
3. Heat a stockpot on medium. When hot, add the sausage, crumbling into small pieces.
4. When the sausage is mostly cooked through, add the onion, carrots, and garlic. Saute until onion is cooked through.
5. Drain the split peas and rinse.
6. Add the chicken broth, water, bay leaf, curry, and the split peas. Cover and simmer for 20 minutes, until lentils are cooked through and are soft.
7. Add the escarole and lettuce and stir to incorporate. Cook for about 3 minutes and serve with crusty bread. 
8. Can be served as a hearty side, a chunky stew, or pureed with more water as a creamy soup.

Pumpkin Oat Pancakes (Gluten Free)

Autumn is good for only a few things: crisp apples, no air conditioning, pretty landscapes, and the return of the Pumpkin Spice Latte. Otherwise, it really just portends the winter apocalypse, but you know, let's be positive about my toes being perpetually cold between now and April.

To cheer myself of the cold morning blues, I was craving something that tasted like fall, but preferably with slightly less sugar. Pancakes came to mind as a great carrier of pumpkin spice, and a quick scan for similar recipes landed me on Cookie + Kate's banana oat pancakes. Now, Kate is a pro - her photos are amazing, the measurements exacting. and the recipes make you drool. I adapted her recipe, adopting the oat flour so the pancakes would be more whole grain, but substituting pumpkin for the banana.

Pumpkin Oat Pancakes
1 dry cup oats
12 oz pumpkin puree
1 inch grated ginger
2 tablespoons butter, melted
2 eggs
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
pinch of salt, and nutmeg
1/2 cup warm water

1. Make oat flour out of old-fashioned oats: Pour one cup of oats into a food processor and process until it is ground well. (I also added a handful of almonds to the food processor to make the pancakes nuttier.)
2. Beat the eggs in a mixing bowl.
3. Add the pumpkin puree, butter, ginger, and sugar to the eggs and mix.
4. In a larger mixing bowl, mix the oat flour, baking soda, salt, and spices
5. Make a well in the middle of the dry ingredients and pour in the wet ingredients. Stir a few times to incorporate.
6. The batter should be the consistency of melted ice cream. If it is too thick, add water or milk to thin it. Let the batter sit for 5-10 minutes for the oats to soak up the liquid.
7. Heat up a skillet or non stick pan. Spray with cooking spray if you're not using a nonstick.
8. Pour 1/4 cup of batter into the pan (to make a regular sized pancake). I made mini's so these were about 2 tablespoons of batter.
9. Cook for 3-4 minutes, until the pancake is cooked at the edges and the pancake comes off the pan easily. The pan side should be golden brown.
10. Flip and cook for another 2 minutes
11. Serve with maple syrup and apples.

Beef Taco Hamburger Helper Hack

Okay okay, you should know by now that we don't do processed food here at the Chic-Peas. The most processed we get is canned pumpkin and pre-made tomato sauce for lazy days. Kelly is probably going to facepalm that I'm even writing this recipe. Buuuuuuut I'll admit I grew up on things like Hamburger Helper, and Old El Paso taco mixes, and frozen pizza. That's because as a high school student, it was MY job to get dinner on the table most nights, and poor mom had to settle for what I was capable of making unassisted. Since then, thankfully, my eating habits and cooking skills have improved dramatically.

I had a pound of ground beef in the freezer and I was craving something savory, but would pack well for lunches. I had already made stir fry and fried rice this week, so rice was out. And ground beef should be cooked with a sauce that helps you pick up the little bits. And so I thought of Hamburger Helper. I haven't had Hamburger Helper in about 15 years.  Buuuuuuuuuuut I wanted it with veggies. I wanted it to be just a tiny bit cheesy. And I sure as heck was not going to buy a box to help me out. So we're going to do this the right way!

Beef Taco Stove Top Pasta (Hamburger Helper Hack)
1/2 pound lean ground beef
2 small potatoes
1 small onion
1 small bell pepper
1 jalapeno pepper
1 cup pasta sauce or tomato puree
1 cup milk
3 dry cups pasta shells (get the quick cook variety if available)
4 oz mild cheddar cheese
Salt, paprika, cumin
Cilantro to top

1. Prep your veggies and cheese by cutting them into 1 cm dice.
2. Heat two tablespoons of vegetable oil in a large skillet or saute pan. Using non-stick is ideal for this as this recipe can get rather messy!
3. Brown the ground beef and the potatoes until 90% cooked and crumbled.
4. Add the onion and peppers. Saute for a few minutes.
5. Add the tomato puree and the milk. Bring to a simmer.
6. Add the dry pasta and lower the heat to medium low. Stir the pot to make sure the pasta is wet. If the mixture doesn't have enough free liquid, add half a cup of water. Cover and stir every 2-3 minutes for about 10 minutes.
7. Add the cheese, which should be roughly chopped or shredded. Mix into the liquid so it melts.
8. When the pasta is cooked through, serve in bowls topped with chopped cilantro.

Parsley Pesto

Maoz is a falafel chain down the street from my office. The falafel aren't my favorite, but they have a vegetable topping bar that is vegetarian heaven! One of my favorite toppings is roasted broccoli and cauliflower with a spicy parsley sauce on top, maybe mixed with some hummus. It's fresh, tasty, and packed with flavor. Since cauliflower and broccoli were on sale this week, I figured I should try my hand at making it myself.

The roasted veggies were easy. Line a tray with aluminum foil, toss with olive oil and maybe some spices and salt, roast for an hour, stirring every 20 minutes. Done.

The parsley sauce would be more complicated. Its a watery sauce, bright green, with flecks of dried chile pepper. Moaz has a picture here.I knew it was obviously parsley, something spicy, but I wasn't sure about the rest. What I ended up with was not really Maoz, but more of a parsley sauce pesto medley that softened the heat (I added way too much jalapeno) but ended up being a great hearty sauce at the end. It ended up not being very spicy at all!

Parsley Pesto, inspired by Maoz
Yields 3/4 cup sauce (which will last me a week and a half)

Special equipment: Food processor or blender

1 bunch parsley, chopped roughly
a few spoons of water
1 tablespoon roasted garlic
1 jalapeno, chopped, no seeds
1/4 cup parmesan cheese
12 almonds

1. Place all the parsley in the blender and add a teaspoon of water. Blend until pureed. You may have to add more water, but only add a tiny bit at a time. We don't want watery sauce.
2. Add the garlic, jalapeno, and parmesan. Blend.
3. Add the almonds a few at a time until you reach a consistency where the sauce isn't separating out the water any longer, or until at desired spiciness.
4. Enjoy on roasted veggies, steaks, fish, pita chips, and anything else that needs a bright green kick!

Japchae! Well, sort of. Korean inspired stir fried glass noodles

One of my favorite sides at Korean restaurants is Japchae. Its a cold or warm stir fry dish of sweet potato noodles and various veggies and sometimes beef. Its tasty, savory, filling, but not heavy, and full of healthy things.

However, I knew that making japchae (like making bimbimbap) requires many steps. All the vegetables are prepared one by one so that they retain the cleanest flavors. So with fair warning, this recipe does take some time. I think the results are totally worth it, but only if you're making 4+ servings.

The type of noodles used in japchae are also not easy to find unless you're around a specialty store. I cheated and used bean strings (mai fun) which is a thin rice noodle. The rice noodle also requires no boiling, just a soak and a quick fry in the pan. The results are similar enough where I would happily substitute mai fun in the future!

Recipe courtesy of Transparent Korean Language Blog.

Spicy Eggplant Tofu

After my two week vacation, I wanted to detox a little and get my eating habits back in order. I'm typically vegetarian 4 days out of 7 and I've definitely trying to pack lunches more often too.  I made a run to Chinatown and picked up some eggplant and tofu, among other things. I wanted something savory tasting, but not too heavy feeling, and this is what I got!

Spicy Eggplant with Silken Tofu 

1 block silken tofu

2 medium Chinese eggplant, in 1/3rd inch thick half moons

1 tablespoon sugar

1 yellow onion, chopped

2 large cloves garlic, minced

1 coin ginger, minced

1 large tomato, chopped

1 large pinch red chili flakes

1 star anise

1 teaspoon gochujang (Korean red pepper paste)

1 teaspoon cider vinegar

4 leaves basil

Optional: Cornstarch

1. Drain water from silken tofu container. Turn tofu out of container and onto a plate. Cut the tofu into 1.5 inch cubes and spread out into a single layer, gently. Sprinkle with salt (you'll use about two teaspoons). Allow water to drain from tofu for about 30 minutes.
2. Wash and cut the eggplant. In a bowl, toss with the sugar. 
3. Prep the onion, garlic, ginger, and tomato. 
4. Heat a large saute pan with two tablespoons of vegetable or olive oil.
5. Pan fry the eggplant for 2-4 minutes on medium high heat.
6. Add the onion, garlic, and ginger. Saute another 2-3 minutes, until fragrant.
7. Add the tomato, star anise, chili flakes, gochujang, and  vinegar. Saute 2 minutes.
8. Drain the tofu again. Add the tofu to the pan and fold in lightly, trying to maintain the shape of the tofu. 
9. Reduce heat to medium. More water will drain from the tomato. Allow to simmer off until you have a thicker gravy. You can also cheat and make a cornstarch and water slurry to thicken it. 
10. Serve over rice.