MFB

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

Happy New Year!

As is traditional in the American South (Maryland is below the Mason-Dixon line) we made Hoppin' John for a New Year's Day meal. It is supposed to bring good fortune for the coming year so why not, oh and black-eyed peas look cool, are cheap and nutritious. No not these Black Eyed Peas,

who are neither cool nor nutritious.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSD4vsh1zDA

Anyway, black-eyed peas are nice because they do not need to be soaked overnight. We tossed them in a pot with an onion, carrot and bay leaf and boiled about 60 minutes or so, adding salt about halfway through. Meanwhile we sauteed an onion, green pepper, garlic and, while not traditional, added some canned tomato, cooked it down with a chopped chipotle and some cumin. The dish came together by adding the beans to the sauce, moistening with some reserved cooking liquid, then tossing and finishing with a couple drops of liquid smoke. The liquid smoke gives this vegan version a similar flavor to the traditional one which uses smoky bacon as the underlying flavor.

Following the Southern theme, we cooked some Collard Greens, first boiling for 10-15minutes, then adding to sweated onion and garlic, some bean liquid/veg stock, apple cider vinegar and, again, some liquid smoke. Not sure what those loooong cooked collard recipes are all about, but this one was delicious and ready in about 20 minutes.
Here is what it looked like on the plate, served with white rice. We will report back on the effectiveness of this meal to provide a year's worth of good fortune. In the meantime, it was pretty tasty.

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Macaroni and Cheese

Baked Macaroni and Cheese

Who doesn’t love macaroni and cheese? No one, that’s who! We sure do, so of course it was quite distressing pondering the thought of giving it up for good. I don’t really remember where this recipe came from but it makes a shockingly good vegan version, and as you’ll see its really easy.

The cheesy-ness comes from nutritional yeast. It has a funky, parmesan-y kinda flavor that I really don’t like plainly sprinkled on things like popcorn. When used judiciously though, as in this recipe, it really works. This is the basic version but of course we like to jazz it up once in a while too, adding things like peas or mushrooms (or really anything in the fridge that needs to get used up). We always plan on having leftovers of this for days but it rarely lasts the night!

Here are the ingredients:

½ c. Earth Balance

½ c. flour

Water/veg stock

S+p, nutmeg

½ c. nutritional yeast

1lb. macaroni noodles, whole wheat if you like

Olive oil

Garlic

Chili flakes

Panko bread crumbs

Begin by making the sauce. Combine the Earth Balance and flour over medium heat until well combined, no lumps, and the rawness cooked out of the flour.

Whisk in the stock (you could simply use water too) and cook until it has the consistency of gravy.

Bread crum topping:

Start a little less than ¼ c. olive oil and garlic in a small sauté pan, bringing up to heat together. Add a pinch of chili flakes about 30seconds before garlic is done. Add panko and stir to saturate with the garlic-chili oil. Keep toasting on medium, stirring quite often until the panko is evenly (lightly) toasted.

Boil macaroni and until not quite tender.

Add seasonings, then nutritional yeast and simmer on medium low. Add extra liquid to achieve the consistency you want, or to simply stretch the sauce a little bit for a saucier end result.

Combine cooked noodles and sauce in a bowl, then pour into 8x8” baking dish

Top the macaroni with breadcrumbs, bake for about 20minutes at 350F. Everything is already cooked and warm so the trick to achieving a creamy (not dry) result is, duh, to not bake it too long.

Here's the end result. It serves up into beautifully uniform squares that hold their shape if you wait a few minutes before serving (or as leftovers out of the fridge). We didn't wait this time.