Rosemary Butternut Squash Polenta Chips

"The Modern Vegetarian", by Maria Elia was a 5.00$ secret treasure I found in Barnes and Noble one day when I was trying to return a book I never read. So I decided this weekend that I'd try a recipe from the book to make lunches more interesting. For this week's lunch menu I decided to go with a veggie burger, California style with avocados, greens, and cheese, and fries on the side. I really wasn't in the mood for potato fries, and for some reason sweet potato fries just don't taste right unless they're deep fried (and I don't own a deep fryer) so I decided to make make recipe from this book. OMG! These fries are so good. Not only are they nutrient dense with the butternut squash, but the texture and flavour are so different from the typical fry that it makes lunch more exciting. The only thing I did not do was deep fry the chips. I chose to heat oil in a frying pan and cook them instead.

Rosemary Butternut Squash Polenta Chips from "The Modern Vegetarian"

1.5 cups of finely diced butternut squash

2 tsp chopped rosemary

salt and pepper to season

6 cups of water

2 cups polenta (cornmeal)

In a large pot boil the water. Add the squash and rosemary and reduce the heat to a simmer. Slowly stir in the polenta and cook for about 3 minutes. Season well with salt and pepper. Once cooked, pour the batter in a greased rectangular baking dish and allow to cool. Once cooled, refrigerate for 1 hour. Take the block of polenta out of the pan and onto a cutting board. Cut into french fry size. As mentioned before, I didn't deep fry them. Instead, I coated a frying pan with extra virgin olive oil and, on high heat, I fried the chips until crispy. Trust me, you'll be replacing your regular side of fries with these real son. 

Spicy Paneer and Spinach

So my Dakota girls N and A (well, only A is a true North Dakota girl) came for dinner last Saturday. Instead of going out to eat, which we have been doing a lot, I decided to cook for my belles. So I pulled out my package Rasoi Magic Paneer Butter Masala mix, but made a couple of changes.

Take the Paneer mix and mix with a cup of milk. In a hot pan, heat the 2tbsp oil on medium head and instead of tomato paste, I used 1/2bag of fresh spinach and cooked it down. I then followed the remaining directions according the package which were to add the spice mixture to the pan, add the paneer, and 1 cup water and allow to simmer. OMG, it tasted so good. There wasn't a drop left. We poured the curry over brown basmati rice and as a side, homemade hummous with crackers. YUMMY!

Magic Carpet Ride

Well, not exactly. While Kima was in Disney World taking her turn on Aladdin's Magic Carpet Ride, I was in Fargo, ND, on a mission: find my spices to I can cook, and find a decent Indian or Middle Eastern restaurant to eat at as there are none in Bismarck (ah yes, I am currently living in Bismarck). So, hitting the road at 10am with my girl N, my Passat flew us into Fargo, where we did minor damage at the mall and Kohls before we decided that we were hungry. Well, relying on the magic of Garmin, we discovered two restaurants: Cafe Aladdin, and Aladdin Cafe. Well, deciding we'd try the first, I programmed the GPS and drove to the Cafe, which, turned out to be closed on Sundays. Alas, I re-programmed the GPS to Aladdin Cafe, and in about 6 minutes, N and I found ourselves in front of a sign that said Aladdin Cafe, but more importantly, OPEN! Well, how happy was I when the first thing I saw when I came in was a menu with the words: falafel, kibbe, kabobs, fatoush... oh yummy, this girl is so happy right now. The owner, a Palestinian man who has been in America for 30 years or so, greeted us with a big smile and began describing to us the various pastries that were on display in the glass case. You see, before any meal, one must choose her dessert. Well, N and I decided we were kinda hungry so we decided to split this delicious cashew treat. A paste made of sugar and cashews stuffed and rolled up in layers of phyllo with a syrup poured over- really, is that not heaven?
Anyway, as depicted below, we finally ordered our meals. As I gave up beef and N doesn't like lamb, we picked a couple of vegetarian dishes. Grape leaves stuffed with rice accompanied by a side of saffron rice, and lentils and rice with a side of hummous and pita. Oh, and we did get a side salad topped with fresh olives. The food was good, not hte best, but definitely good and makes your tummy happy. Why not the best? Well, when you've been spoiled as I have with homemade Middle Eastern foods, and MANY restaurants in the DMV, its very hard to find anything that compares, however; the grape leaves definitely had a nice lemon twang to it, and the saffron rice was fragrant and delicious. The hummous was a little think, and being Indian, I'm more used to yellow lentils than green (because dal is usually yellow), but it was still a good and satisfying meal.
So in the end, if for some reason you find yourself in Fargo, definitely check out Aladdin Cafe (which, by the way, is owned by the same people that own Cafe Aladdin)

Aladdin Cafe
1609 32nd St S
Fargo, ND 58103
701-242-4200

Vegetable Stir Fry and Coconut-Mango Sticky Rice

Round 3! Ding ding ding!

This third cooking lesson with Randi was Asian inspired. The vegetable stir fry was so easy and quick to make it was ready in about 15 minutes. If you have any left over vegetables in the fridge you can add them into the stir fry. I knew I wanted to teach Randi how to make mango sticky rice because she's only had it once before at a restaurant. Verdict says...Randi will be making this a lot at home!

Vegetable Stir Fry
Adapted from Shape Magazine

• 2 tablespoons Asian (toasted) sesame oil
• 1 1/2 cup (1/2 pound) mushrooms, stems removed and sliced. We used a variety pack of shiitake, button, and oyster mushrooms.
• 1 of any color bell pepper, cored and thinly sliced
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger
• 1 tablespoon garlic, minced
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1 1/2 cup (1/2 pound) sugar snap peas, trimmed
• 4 scallions, thinly sliced
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• 1 1/2 teaspoon reduced-sodium soy sauce
• 1 cup low-sodium vegetable broth
• 1 cup brown or white rice, prepared according to package directions

Directions

1. In a large skillet or wok, heat sesame oil over medium-high heat. Add mushrooms, bell pepper slices, ginger, garlic, and red pepper flakes, stirring constantly so the ingredients don't burn. (If they start to brown, pour a little vegetable broth into the skillet.) Continue to cook for about 5 minutes.
2. Add the snap peas and scallions to the skillet. Stir-fry for about 2 minutes. In a small bowl, stir cornstarch into soy sauce, then add the mixture to the pan.
3. Pour in the vegetable broth; cook for about 2 minutes, until the mixture comes to a boil and starts to thicken. Serve over brown or white rice.

Coconut-Mango Sticky Rice
Adapted from Food.com

• 1 cup jasmine rice or 1 cup other sweet Asian
• 1 (14 ounce) can coconut milk
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 mango sliced

Directions

1. Cook rice according to package directions, but substitute coconut milk for half of the water, and add 1/4 cup of sugar. What we did here was filled the pot with water to the top of the rice and put half the can of coconut milk in the pot.
2. It should be fairly dry when you finish cooking it, without any liquid visible in the pot.
3. In a medium saucepan, boil the rest of the coconut milk with the second half of the sugar.
4. Keep this at a full boil until the rice is cooked, or until it reaches a thick, syrupy consistency.
5. Arrange the cooked coconut rice in a bowl or plate with the mango slices in some kind of pretty formation and dribble a bit of the sauce over the whole thing.

Silly Rabbit, Carrot cake is for grown-ups!

So I was going through this, "I need carrot cake" phase the past weeks. Why? I have no idea. Thinking about the good ol' days and the family parties, where, for some reason, Indian people think American dessert is symbolic by carrot cake (I'd rather have apple pie... hmm, apple pie). So anyway, I started googling healthy carrot cake recipes and I found one that is was healthier, but I didn't have all the ingredients so I made some modifications with the recipe and came up with my own. It turned out pretty alright. I did not use whole wheat flour, because in all honesty, its nasty. Really, it is. I rather oat flour or soy over whole wheat. So I used enriched white as that is what my dad carries in his kitchen. The recipe wanted oat bran, which I also did not have, so I used flaxseed. They also asked for egg substitute, and I don't believe in fake foods so I used real eggs. I also used stevia because I'm sure Splenda is powdered cancer (or so says my friend Di).


So anyway, here's Lulu's Carrot Cake Recipe
1 3/4 cup flour
1/4 cup flax seed
1 cup stevia
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp of salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
4 eggs
1 package of shredded carrots
1/2 cup crushed pineapple 
1/4 oil


I just dumped everything in the kitchen aid and let it swirl away. Once mixed well, place in two round cake pans and bake at 350 degrees for about 32 mins (it just seemed right in my oven). Once the cakes have cooled and are removed from the pan, they are ready of assembly. To make the frosting I whipped up 4 oz of tofu (silken) with 8 oz of cream cheese and a dash of vanilla, a small carton of heavy whipping cream and a cup of stevia. The first thing is whipping the heavy cream and stevia. Then slowly add the remaining ingredients. I decorated it with raisins.

Cooking Lesson 2: Fried Tofu with Green Onion and Cilantro Sauce

Ever since Randi moved to the DC area from NC she started eating tofu. I knew the perfect dish for this cooking lesson but I needed the help of my mom who's been making this ever since I was little. This is a super easy recipe with very few ingredients.

Ingredients

A tub of firm tofu (I got ours at the local Asian market)
A bunch of chopped cilantro
5 stems of chopped green onions
2 cups of vegetable oil to fry
1/2 cup soy sauce

1. Drain the tofu water and place tofu in a strainer for about 15 minutes.
2. Chop up green onions and cilantro and place in a bowl. Add 1/4 cup of soy sauce and set aside. Put the rest of the soy sauce in another bowl.
3. In a frying pan, heat up oil for about 5 minutes. Don't let the oil smoke. We set the temperature at 400 degrees.
4. Add the tofu and cook for about 10 minutes on each side.
   
   
5. Once tofu is brown take the tofu out of the oil and immediately dip in the second bowl of soy sauce. Then place in the bowl of green onion and cilantro. You only need to coat the tofu on each side lightly.
6. Mix the cooked tofu and green onion and cilantro together.
7. Serve and eat!

Festive Corn Salsa

Happy 4th of July! What a more festive way to celebrate is to make a colorful corn salsa. This recipe is taken from my wonderful mother and is made several times a year. My mom makes it with beans and you can opt in or out your own ingredients. I mix my corn salsa with pasta to make a pasta salad or you can eat them with tortilla chips. Bring this to a bbq, work party, or make it just because you're craving something good. This recipe always gets rave reviews and everyone will be asking you for the recipe.

Corn Salsa

1 bag frozen sweet corn (I use Trader Joes frozen sweet corn)
1 green pepper
1 red pepper
1 yellow pepper
1 orange pepper
1 bunch of cilantro
1/2 red onion
1/2 cup Robusto Italian dressing (If you can't find Robusto then regular Italian dressing is fine)

Chop all the peppers, cilantro and red onion the same size as the corn. Mix all ingredients in a large bowl. Refrigerate for at least an hour before serving. Enjoy!