On the site, I frequently make mention of food, and somewhat often write up recipes that I've made up or that are from the family. I figured I may as well put them all in one place.

These meals are all meatless, but not all are vegan. Most I would consider to go under the heading of "comfort food": nothing too exciting, culinarily, but everything tastes right. Occasionally, I list a place where you could substitute meat, but hey: try something new for once.

The recipes are in very roughly alphabetical order, and can also be found in the archives if you poke around.




Butt-Kickin' Butternut Squash Soup

You'll need:
one good-sized Butternut Squash
half a medium onion
Enough oil to saute some stuff--a tablespoon or two.
3 medium carrots (or so)
6 cups of stock, or 6 c. water with boullion or miso.
12 oz. package of soft silken tofu
3 cloves of garlic (or so)
1/2 a lemon
1/2 tsp. ginger
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tb. brown sugar.
1.5-2 tbs. garam masala (depending on how intense you want it)
1/2-1 tsp. red pepper flakes (again depending on your taste preference)

And you'll need a big stockpot and a blender, and either some ice cubes or enough patience to let the soup cool off if you have a plastic blender like me.
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Chop up the onion and mince the garlic. Throw it all in the stockpot with the oil, and turn the heat pretty low--you want the onions and garlic to carmelize a bit. Stir them once in awhile, but have the heat low enough that it takes about 20 minutes for them to get any color on them.

While that's happening, peel the butternut squash and carrots. Scoop out the squash guts and chop it into 1.5-2 inch squares. Chop the carrots into 1-ish inch pieces. (side note--the squash is a pain. A good peeler and sharp knife are reccomended.)

Once the onions and garlic are tanned, put in the 6 cups of liquid and crank the heat to medium. Add the spices (you may want to start with the smaller amounts and adjust after pureeing) the squash, and the carrot--everything except the tofu and lemon. If 6 cups isn't enough to cover everything, put in a little more.

Cover the pot and go watch tv for 30-45 minutes. You're ready for the next step when the carrots and squash can get mashed against the side of the pot with a spoon.

Take everything off the heat, put the tofu in, and smash it up with your spoon. If, like me, you have a plastic blender, you'll want to cool everything down a bit before you blend it. I did this by adding the refrigerated tofu and a whole container of ice cubes and letting it sit for 10 minutes. You could also just let the soup stand for a half hour. Whatever you prefer.

You'll probably need to blend everything in a few batches (I needed 2.5), so get a big bowl to put the puree into. Blend it until you see no bits of vegetable whirling around, then blend it for 10 extra seconds for good measure. It should be about the consistency of tomato soup. If it's unappetizingly thick, add some water until it's okay.

If you cooled it too much put it back in the pot for a few minutes. Taste it and add seasonings--it shouldn't be painful-spicy, but it should be enough that you should suddenly realize you need a drink of water 5 sips into it. Serve it with a squeeze of lemon (or you could float a slice of lemon on the top, that would be pretty) and some nice bread. It freezes well, too. Makes oh, let's say 8 bowls. More if you threw a few extra carrots in.





Black Beans and Rice Casserole

An old family favorite.

1 cup uncooked rice
1 12-16 oz. can of black beans
about a cup of cheese--I like Monterey Jack, but it's also good with cheddar, mozzarella, muenster, or a combination.
breadcrumbs--enough to cover the top of the casserole
1\2 cup finely chopped walnuts or a few pine nuts(optional)
parmesean cheese (optional, mixed with the breadcrumbs)

Cook rice.
Open can of beans and drain. Rinse them if grey rice doesn't appeal. Toast the walnuts or pine nuts if you're feeling sassy.
Grate cheese or cut it into half-inch cubes.
When the rice is done, put it into a casserole dish. Mix in the beans, cheese, and walnuts. Sprinkle breadcrumbs and parmesean on top.
Place in oven (350 F) for about 20 minutes or until thouroughly heated through.



Curry Pot Pie

There area few listings on Google, but they are of poor quality. Curry powder does not a curry make, and rice is not a pie crust.

Also, I know it sounds kind of wierd, but trust me on this one. It's basically an enormous samosa, but better. The buttery pie crust adds something wonderful to Indian spiciness. I was inspired by a recent vegetarian special at Monty's Blue Plate, that had curry served over some buttery, flaky biscuits. It's a perfect comfort food combination.

So, general directions. Feel free to vary the amounts of vegetables, substitute meat for the tofu, etc. Just keep these things in mind as you do:
1: You'll want 4-5 cups of "stuff" to put into the pie shell, so if you use vegetables that cook down a lot, start with more.
2: Remember that these things are going to get cooked in a pan, then baked for a while. Veggies that won't hold up to this treatment may end up kind of nasty. Green beans and broccoli come to mind. Sweet potatoes would be wonderful.

Ingredients:

*A double batch of pie crust--use your own recipe, or be lazy like me and use the Pillsbury ones (if it hadn't been a weeknight, I might have made my own, but I was hungry).
*2 medium baking potatoes, diced in .5 inch cubes.
*a medium carrot, cut in a short julienne (I made a normal julienne and cut them in half widthwise).
*4 oz. mushrooms (half a square package), quartered.
*A package of firm silken tofu, cut in .25 x .25 x 1 inch rectangles.
*Half a white diced onion,
*A clove or two of minced garlic,
*Some oil--any is fine, sesame is extra-tasty.
*A few cups of water
*Some flour or cornstarch (thickener)
*A decent curry sauce recipe--this one looks pretty similar to mine, without the fenugreek and with some extra cumin. You'll want the overall consistency of this sauce to be reminicent of pot pie gravy, so avoid drier curry recipies. Also, keep the spiciness between mild and medium-hot. Too spicy and you'll never be able to taste the pie crust.

Directions:

Get out your big deep frying pan. A lot of stuff is going into it.

Fry the onion and garlic in the oil until they've got a nice tan. Add the spices, potatoes, and a cup and a half of water. (if one was using meat, cook it before the potatoes, I guess).

While the potatoes are cooking, put a pie crust into the bottom of a pie pan, and have a second one ready.

Add water to the potatoes as necessary--if the sauce is looking a little thick, add a cup. I ended up putting 2-3 cups of water in throughout the process.

Simmer until the potatoes are nearly cooked through, then add the carrots and mushrooms.

This would be a good time to turn the oven on--375, please.

Mix the vegetables around for a couple of minutes, then add the tofu and just get it coated.

At this point, play with the sauce a bit. The starchiness of the potatoes will thicken the sauce some, but you may want to add a half-teaspoon of cornstarch or a few teaspoons of flour. Again, think of a gravy-like consistency.

When the sauce is right, turn off the heat and let things cool off for a minute or two, then throw the whole mess into the pie pan. Cover with the second pie crust, and thoroughly seal the edges. Cut a few slits in the top. Put a cookie sheet under the pie in case you didn't seal those edges as well as you thought you did--it's easier to clean a cookie sheet than an oven.

Stick in oven.

Start up some rice, do some dishes.

Wait for 20-35 minutes (I lost track), until the crust is golden brown and the curry is bubbling through the slashes in the top pie crust.

Pull it out of the oven, let it rest for 5 minutes, and serve with rice.





Fetasparagus Delight

You'll need:

1 lb. asparagus, as fresh as you can get it-- it's in season from late April to early June, depending.
1 glob of non-aged feta--I'd say we used about 1.5 American cheese slices' worth, and again, the fresher the better.
Enough pasta to make you full. (spagetti or linguini would be good)
blob of olive oil--a tsp. or so
Blob of lemon juice--5 or 6 drops from those lemon-shaped plastic things per serving.

Making Food:

Wash and chop the asparagus into 3-4 inch pieces,

Start the water for the pasta, and turn on the broiler (I just used the toaster oven).

Put the asparagus on a baking rack, and put that on a baking sheet, and put that under the broiler. Check on them, but it should take about 5 or 6 minutes for the tops and leaves to get a little crunchy looking--not burned, but starting to get brown and dry and smell kind of grill-y.

While all of those things are cooking, crumble up the glob of feta and put it in a bowl.

Put the asparagus into another bowl.

Put the pasta in yet another bowl, and add the olive oil to that one.

Then, put some asparagus and feta on your pasta, and put about 5 drops of lemon juice on top.

Proceed to snarf.



Fake Israeli Salad

You'll need: 1 cucumber
1 sweet pepper
1 big or 3-4 small or 2 medium carrots
2-3 green onions (little less than 1/4 cup)
1/4 cup rice vinegar (sooo tasty, go buy some)
1 tablesp. olive oil, with a couple of drops of sesame oil
1/8 tsp. garlic powder
1/4 tsp. black pepper
1/4 to 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes (depending on your spice tolerance--I use about halfway between the two)
1 tsp. brown sugar

Chop the vegetables up to bite-sized pieces, small enough to not poke holes in pita.
Mix everything up until the veggies are all coated with dressing and spices. Let it sit for awhile in the fridge. Eat it, either by itself, or with pita and hummus.





Quiche For Dummies

You'll need:

3 or 4 eggs
milk
cheese (Cheddar, Colby, and Monterey Jack are good options)
spinach and/or broccoli (frozen ok, and usually what I do, but thaw it) and/or fresh mushrooms and/or fresh green onions (about 1/2 cup in all, whatever you pick)
pie crust (go ahead and use the Pillsbury, I usually do, but make sure it's had 20 minutes at room temperature from the fridge before you mess with it).

A few shakes of black pepper, dill, basil, or sage will not be lost, if you have any of them around.

Directions:

Break 3 eggs into a 2-cup measuring cup and look at it. Is it at 3/4 cup or less? If so, you have smaller eggs, and you'll want to break the 4th into there as well. If it's between 3/4 and a cup, don't add the 4th egg.

Then, leaving the eggs in that measuring cup, add enough milk for the eggs and milk combined to equal 1.5 cups.

Put into a biggish bowl and beat with a fork until there are no blobs of yolk. About 30 seconds if you're vigorous. Put in spices if you want them.

Put your pie crust into the pie plate, and make sure if it's store-bought that it's all in one piece. If it isn't, overlap the torn pieces and smush them like play-doh.

Pour the egg/milk mixture into the crust. This would be a good time to turn your oven to a smidge above 350 degrees F (less than 375F).

You can grate the cheese, but if you're reading "Quiche for Dummies" you probably don't have a cheese grater, so slice pieces of cheese about as thick as American Cheese. About a third of a typical Cracker Barrel block is good, which I'd say is a half to full cup. Plop half of it into the crust in a relatively even arrangement.

Plop your half-cup of veggies into the crust, arranging evenly. (note that if you put fresh mushrooms in, the end result will have a bit more water in it than it will otherwise, though it still tastes fine. If you want to get all fancy-pants, heat the mushrooms in oil for 5 minutes until they've sweated a bit).

Put the rest of the cheese on the top, and make sure that everything in the pie has been covered by egg by pushing down those stray bits of cheese and broccoli sticking up from the surface.

Put the pan into the 350F oven and wait for 40 minutes. Of course, this would be a good time to make that rice (which'll take about 30 minutes to cook), and then wash your lettuce (while both things are cooking). Towards the end of the 40 minutes, check the quiche for doneness by slightly jiggling the pan. If it's done it won't move, if it isn't it will be jiggly in the middle.

After 40-45 minutes it should be set. Take it out of the oven and let it sit for a few minutes. Then slice it up like a pie. Eat with impresee.


Tofu Parmesean

You'll need:

-Half a block of firm tofu, in big thin slices and dried off a bit, or else the breading won't stay on when it's frying.
-one egg if you want a light breading, two if you want it heavy.
-1/3-3/4 cup of breadcrumbs, depending on how much breading you want (see above). You can always add some more to the bowl if you're running low.
-about a scant teaspoon each of sage, basil, oregano, and black pepper.
-about a half-teaspoon of salt--though you could substitute this with a tablespoon of parmesan, if cholesterol is your friend.
-4 or so tablespoons of oil--a little more than you'd use for pancakes, but not to the point of deep-frying everything.
-pasta, jarred sauce, parmesan cheese, maybe some mozzarella.

Get the water for the pasta going. Put half that oil in a frying pan, and turn the pan's heat to medium, medium-high.

Mix the breadcrumbs and seasonings together. Beat the egg or eggs. Dip the tofu in the eggs, get it good and coated, then dip it in the breadcrumbs. If you want a hefty coating of breading, put that same piece in the egg, then again with the breading. If the pan is pretty hot, lay the tofu in it, otherwise set it aside until the pan's ready.

Repeat with the rest of the tofu. The water should be boiling and ready for pasta about now.

Flip tofu/stir pasta as needed. Nuke some sauce (and cover it with a paper towel). When all the tofu's been flipped, put in the rest of the oil if it's looking dry in there.

Take a breath. That frying/saucy/spicy smell? That's the smell of my dad's parents' house when things were cooking. I realized last night: my gramma on that side must have liked sage too. I was too small to notice.

When the foods are al dente and/or golden brown, plate them up. You may find that you'll need more sauce than usual. I typically use tomato sauce sparingly, but this needed a dousing.

I was surprized at how quick this went. For some reason I thought that breading would be a chore, but I'd do it again on a weeknight, no problem.

Variation:
I thought the tofu itself was a little bland. If you're thinking ahead, let it marinate in some soy sauce.

You could probably bake it instead of frying, but it'll take longer.





To my knowledge, these recipes have not been printed elsewhere. They have all either a) Been thought up from scratch by yours truly, or b)taken from the "family recipe stash" which is written on index cards. If this is in error, please inform me.