Side Dishes – Veggies – Page 2

Creamy Curried Butternut Squash Soup

Creamy Curried Butternut Squash Soup

*squash can be roasted ahead of time, peeled and then refrigerated, until needed

* immersion blender or food processor is necessary for this recipe

one very large butternut squash (about 3 1/2 pounds)

3/4 cup finely chopped white onion

1 tsp. finely minced garlic (2 to 3 small cloves or 1 very large one)

1/2 cup dry white wine (I usually use vermouth)

2 Tbsp olive oil, plus a little more for roasting the squash

6 ounces Yukon Gold potato (three smallish or one very large one)

1 32-ounce box of vegetable broth

1 1/2 to 2 tsp curry powder

1 13.5 ounce can of unsweetened coconut milk

kosher salt and white pepper to taste

fresh cilantro, optional

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Cut the squash in half lengthwise and scoop out the seeds from each half with a large spoon. Brush all of the cut surfaces very lightly with olive oil. Place the squash halves (cut side up) on a large baking sheet and cook for about 90 minutes.

While the squash is cooking, peel the potato/es and cut them into 2-inch pieces. Next, put them in a small saucepan and add enough cold water to cover them, then sprinkle in about 1 tsp. kosher salt. Bring them to a boil over high heat and cook until they are fork tender. Drain them and set aside, reserving the cooking water.

When squash is done, let it cool enough to handle and gently remove the skin by pulling it off. Also cut off any burned or hardened edges. Some light browning is OK and gives good flavor, so you can leave that, but you just want to remove anything really crunchy or blackened. Set the squash aside.

In a large stockpot (or French/Dutch oven), heat the remaining olive oil until it starts to just barely shimmer. Add the onions and saute over medium heat until they are softened and translucent. Add the garlic and continue to saute for one more minute, stirring constantly. Carefully (it may sputter) pour in the wine or vermouth, stirring the deglaze the pan.

Add the cooked squash and potato and stir to coat the veggie pieces with the wine/onion mixture. Stir in 3 cups of the veggie broth and the can of coconut milk. Stir in 1 1/2 teaspoons of the curry powder. Puree the soup with an immersion blender*, starting at the lowest setting and working up to the medium setting, making sure to puree any lumps. Taste the soup and add more curry powder, if necessary, and/or more vegetable stock, if necessary, to reach the desired consistency. If you need even more liquid to reach the right consistency, add the reserved potato cooking water. Taste the soup again and add kosher salt and white pepper to taste.

* If you don’t have an immersion blender, you can puree the soup, in batches, in a food processor, blender or food mill and then return it to the pot for final seasoning.

Garnish with finely chopped fresh cilantro, if desired.

This is a REALLY delicious soup, but is VERY filling and this recipe makes a LOT. I haven’t tried to freeze it yet, but I’d bet it would freeze nicely. If you have a little leftover New Year’s ham, you could sprinkle some diced ham over the top of the soup to make any carnivores at your house happy. Or maybe a little leftover roasted or grilled chicken, but it’s not necessary. It’s plenty tasty on its own.

Nota bene: I used 1 tsp. of Penzey’s sweet curry powder and 1 tsp. Penzey’s hot curry powder in our version of this soup and it was perfect for us. Not too spicy, but plenty flavorful. Since curry preference is pretty subjective, feel free to add more or less to suit your own taste…just start out with a little, ’cause you can always add more, but can’t remove it, once it’s in.

Pizza Pancakes & Greek-style Lima beans

Pizza pancakes recipe here. I left the pepperoni out and made a few “veggie” pancakes for Vegetarian Girl first, and then added the chopped pepperoni, for the rest of us.

Lima beans recipe here.

I’ve been making some weird things with pancakes lately, and this recipe is definitely weird, but it was quick and easy and very tasty. We all really liked them.

The lima beans were even better. They were outstanding. I would NEVER have guessed that frozen lima beans would be so good, but they were fantastic and buttery. I used a larger bag than the recipe called for and didn’t add the final tablespoonful of olive oil that the recipe called for, and I believe it was an improvement. They would have been WAY too oily if prepared exactly according to the recipe.

Who Needs Lettuce? Greek Farro Salad

Greek Farro Salad

3/4 cup farro, cooked according to package directions, drained, rinsed and set aside to cool

1 and 1/2 cups grape tomatoes, halved

1 large cucumber, peeled, seeded and slice into bite-sized half-moons

1/2 cup thinly sliced red onion

1/2 cup Kalamata olives, halved

4 ounces fresh feta cheese, cut into large dice

1 batch of my friend Arnie’s Greek salad dressing

Gently toss all ingredients together until lightly coated with dressing. You may not need ALL of the dressing, so reserve a few tablespoonfuls and adjust as needed.

Muhammara (Roasted Red Pepper Dip)

Recipe here.

This was delicious. Both spicy and sweet. Delicious with veggies to dip, but would also be fantastic with pita chips or as a spread on a veggie sandwich. I’m always looking for healthy snacks for Vegetarian Girl and this one was a hit and was surprisingly easy. I actually used pomegranate molasses and Aleppo pepper instead of the honey and crushed red pepper, because I just happened to have both on hand, but I’m sure it would be fine with whatever you have.

Pork Loin Chops with Cinnamon Apples, Classic Potato Pancakes, Spicy Green Beans with Garlic Oil and Preserved Lemon

Pork Chops and Apples recipe here.

Potato Pancakes recipe here (we served them with sour cream and they were fantastic!)

For the green beans, I was inspired by this recipe (which I’ve made before) and another one with preserved lemon in Madhur Jaffrey’s awesome World Vegetarian cookbook and combined them and adapted them to make my own, which was quite delicious. Ideally, the beans would be a little more browned that the ones in my photo, but these were still good.

Spicy Green Beans with with Garlic Oil and Preserved Lemon

1 pound fresh green beans, washed and cut into 1 1/2 to 2 inch long pieces

2 or 3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced (think Paul Sorvino in Goodfellas)

2 Tbsp olive oil

1 wedge of preserved lemon (Use the rind only; remove and discard the pulp), rinsed well and finely chopped

(If you don’t want to make your own, you can buy preserved/Moroccan lemons at a gourmet store. They are VERY simple and inexpensive to make, but they do have to sit for a while.)

a sprinkle of red pepper flakes, to taste (start with 1/4 tsp.)

kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Blanch green beans by covering them with cold water in a medium saucepan. When they come to a boil, drain them and soak them in ice water until they are cool. Drain them again and set them aside.

Heat the oil in a large saute pan over medium-high heat until hot but not smoking. Add the garlic and cook, stirring constantly, until the garlic is lightly golden-toasted, but not brown. Quickly remove and discard the garlic.

Add the green beans to the pan and cook, stirring only once or twice, until the beans are slightly softened and lightly browned in spots, but not mushy. You’ll need to watch them carefully, since they won’t brown if you stir them too much, but if you don’t toss/stir them enough, they’ll scorch or stick to the bottom of the pan.

When the beans have reached your desired doneness, sprinkle them with salt and pepper, add the chili flakes and lemon and stir to coat evenly. Remove from heat and serve.

Adobo Grilled Chicken, Black Bean & Quinoa Salad and a Crunchy Roasted Corn repeat

YUM! This was SUCH a delicious meal. I had planned on only making the black bean & quinoa salad and grilled chicken, but The Boy was with me at the supermarket and saw corn on the cob and requested this corn, which he loves. It sort “went with” the meal, so I acquiesced.

Black bean and quinoa salad recipe here. This recipe is delicious, but makes a ton, but it also keeps in the fridge fairly well for a day or two and makes a great lunch the next day. If you’re not a fan of leftovers and you’re not feeding a crowd, I’d recommend making a half-batch. It was quite good and pretty simple.

The corn recipe, basically, is here, but I used Penzey’s Arizona Dreaming for the seasoning this time. A universal hit, every time. Have served it for company and always have people ask for the recipe. Boy, in particular, LOVES this stuff.

The chicken is just boneless, skinless thighs sprinkled liberally with this fantastic Adobo seasoning mixture (scroll down) and then grilled. I really love this spice blend and am planning to use it more in the future. It’s great on chicken that you’re planning to put in any kind of Mexican dish (enchiladas, tostadas, fajitas, etc.) Achiote/annatto can be a little bit hard to find, but try a Latin market (or the Latin aisle of a large supermarket.) If you’re in Austin, Central Market has whole annatto seeds (in their bulk section) that can be ground in your spice-dedicated grinder.

What? You don’t have one of those?!!?! $20 can fix that. You NEED one. How else can you make garam masala?

*This meal is gluten-free, if you use gluten-free breadcrumbs.

More Spring Rolls, with some new dipping sauces

Spring Rolls are becoming one of our all-time favorite meals lately. They’re very vegetarian-friendly (although it’s easy to add meat, for any carnivores that would like it,) there’s not much “cooking” involved (although there is lots of chopping!) and they’re light and healthy.

I made a “fancy” version last night, with a few extra ingredients and dipping sauces.

The ingredients that I used (in large tray) are:

rice noodles, sauteed sliced mushrooms, shredded romaine lettuce, thinly sliced red onion, sliced avocado, mung bean sprouts (that I grew myself!,) julienned red bell pepper, cucumber and carrot, grilled Teriyaki chicken, shrimp, baby corn and chopped water chestnuts.

I also had some fresh chopped chives and peanuts and cilantro and mint leaves to add as garnish inside the rolls.

The new dipping sauces that I tried were Hoisin dipping sauce and a peanut dipping sauce. The third one is the spicy/sweet sauce that we’ve used before. The spicy-sweet sauce is still Hubby’s favorite, but the kids and I LOVED the peanut sauce, so I will definitely be making that one again in the future. Deee-lish.

For quantity/planning purposes, in case you decide to make this, I used two boneless, skinless chicken breasts (marinated in Teriyaki sauce, then grilled and sliced) and about a cup of thawed, frozen, pre-cooked shrimp. I made a half-batch of the peanut sauce (single batches of the other two.) I used one can each of the water chestnuts and baby corn, one avocado, about a cup of sprouts, about 1/4 of a red onion, about 1/4 lb of mushrooms (sliced and sauteed in butter/olive oil until softened and golden) and one romaine lettuce heart. I used half of an 8 ounce package of rice sticks/rice vermicelli noodles and less than one package of spring roll wrappers.

I was serving 6 people, one of whom is a vegetarian and two others of whom do not eat shrimp, but everyone at their fill and there were enough ingredients leftover to make 6 more vegetarian spring rolls (the meat was all gone) the next day. I also served some steamed, in-the-shell edamame along with this. If you’re serving REALLY hungry people, you might not have many/any leftovers.

Chicken Cutlets with Chickpea and Pesto Salad

Recipe here.

The Chickpea-Pesto Salad came together in two seconds flat and was a nice entree for Vegetarian Girl. We adapted the chicken a bit for the carnivores in the crowd…I cut two boneless, skinless chicken breasts into three pieces each and then dredged them in flour, then beaten egg, then in a mixture of half plain bread, half panko, spiced up with a touch of dried parsley, dried thyme and just a touch of paprika and garlic powder. I fried them in half butter/half olive oil.

This was quite yummy and SUPER easy. I made half of the chicken to serve with the red lentil-kohlrabi-couscous salad from last night and the other half for tonight. Two chicken breasts to serve two meals to three people? Awesome! I cut them up like this, before breading and frying.

I used the “gluten-free” tag for the chickpea salad. The chicken cutlets are not gluten-free, unless you use some sort of gluten-free breadcrumbs (in which case, you’re home free!)

Ranch Dip for Veggies

Recipe here.

Another tray that I made for Girl’s birthday party. This is great as a salad dressing or a dip and is vastly better, despite what The Pioneer Woman says, than the stuff in the green and white package. Sorry I don’t have a better photo of the dip, itself, but I was taking these photos as 11 hungry girls were standing by, eager to dig in.

I’ve added the gluten free tag to this post, but, be sure that your ingredients (sour cream, mayo, etc.) don’t have any starch wheat-based additives or thickeners. If you make this with all-natural (sour cream is supposed to be just dairy, and mayo is supposed to be just eggs and oil, maybe a little lemon juice) ingredients, it will be gluten-free.

Hoisin-Glazed Scallops with Sauteed Spinach and Peanut Butter Noodles

Peanut Butter Noodles recipe here.

The scallops recipe is from the subscription-only section of Fine Cooking’s website, but basically, you just cook the scallops in a VERY HOT lightly oiled pan (after sprinkling them with a tiny bit of cayenne and salt) until they’re browned on both sides and opaque throughout and then you lightly brush them with hoisin sauce. Easy peasy. The accompanying spinach recipe is slightly more difficult to sum, but I didn’t use it, anyway. I just sauteed my spinach the same old way, with a little Baby Bam.

I’ve added the “vegetarian” tag to this post, because the peanut butter noodles would be (and were, for The Girl) an acceptable vegetarian entree, on their own. They were delicious and were a huge hit with all four of us. You could add any veggies that suit your taste (mushrooms, water chestnuts, baby corn, broccoli, etc.) and you could add a bit or sriracha to spice it up, if you like that sort of thing. We added cucumber, grated carrot, red bell pepper, cilantro and finely chopped peanuts.