Dried Porcini and Fresh Mushroom Tart

January 24th, 2010

I made this dish (and a few others) for my friends, Rhonda and Eric. This one is a little time consuming because you have to make a tart shell, which is actually pretty easy, but it has to go in the freezer for 20 minutes, and then in the oven for 30 minutes before you put any of the goodies in the middle. That turned out to be fine, because I was making a lot of stuff that day and it took several hours. I don't know how long this one dish would take by itself. Probably a little over an hour. You can make the tart shell and freeze it a day ahead to speed things up.

This dish uses dried porcini mushrooms, along with fresh crimini mushrooms, so it has a nice earthy, woodsy flavor. I made a mushroom stock to give it an even more intense flavor. It turned out a little dark in color, but still very tasty.

The tart shell and the mushroom stock are 2 separate recipes in the book, so this post accounts for 3 recipes. If you don't want to take the time to make mushroom stock, you can use half & half or cream (2/3 cup.)

Here's how you do it:
Make the tart shell. In a food processor, combine 1/2 c. whole wheat pastry flour, 1/2 cup + 2 T. all purpose flour, and 1/2 t. salt. Pulse in 5 T. of cold butter, cut into little cubes. Then pulse in 3 T. sour cream and a little ice water. It will look like course crumbs. Dump it out onto a board, shape into a disk, wrap in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge for 20 minutes.

Start the mushroom stock. Cover 1/2 cup dried porcini mushrooms with 3 cups hot water and set aside. Heat up a little oil. Roughly chop 1 onion, 1 carrot, 1 garlic clove, 2 mushrooms and all the trimmings from the mushrooms in the recipe. Saute over high heat until well browned. Reduce heat to medium, stir in 1 t. tomato paste, 1/2 cup white wine, and some marjoram or oregano. Sprinkle on 1 T. flour and some salt and pepper. Add the porcini and their soaking water and simmer for 20 minutes.

Since porcini mushrooms are expensive, I fished them out of the stock and used them in the tart, along with a few more that I soaked in hot water. I was supposed to put them in some wine and bring them to a boil, but soaking them in hot water worked out just fine. When they're soft, chop them and reserve the soaking water.

Take the dough out of the fridge, flour a board, and roll out the dough into a 10 inch circle. Lay it over a tart pan and gently settle it into the pan. It should be about 1/4 inch thick. Press it into all the crevices. Put it in the freezer for 15 minutes. (It can be frozen wrapped in foil for up to a week before baking.) Preheat the over to 425. While you're making the mushroom filling, bake the tart shell for 20 minutes. Check it periodically so it doesn't get too dark.

Heat some oil in a skillet and fry 1 large, chopped onion until it starts to turn golden. Add 1/2 pound sliced crimini mushrooms, 1/2 pound sliced portobellos, and some salt. Raise heat and cook until they start to color. Stir in 1 t. tomato paste, a few tablespoons of mushroom soaking liquid, the chopped porcinis, and more liquid as needed to keep the pan moist. Cook for about 15 minutes or until mushrooms are completely tender. Add a little parsley and marjoram (chopped) and season with pepper.

Beat one egg with 2/3 cup mushroom stock (or half and half or cream). Pour the mushrooms into the baked tart shell and then add the egg and stock mixture. Bake for 25-30 minutes until set. Cool tart for a few minutes and rub a little oil over the top to make it shiny. Garnish with chopped herbs.

This was wonderful with a rose`. Sparkling wine would be good, too.

Approximate Cost:
Tart Shell
1/2 cup pastry flour - $.50
1/2 cup + 2 T. all purpose flour - $.40
5 T. butter - $.40
3 T. sour cream - $.20
TOTAL for tart shell - $1.50
1/2 cup dried porcini - $4.50
1/2 cup dry white wine - $1.50
1 onion - $.25
1/2 pound crimini mushrooms - $2.50
1/2 pound portobello - $2.50
1 egg - $.25
oil, tomato paste (1 tsp.), herbs - negligible
TOTAL for filling - $11.50
TOTAL for 2/3 cup mushroom stock or half & half - $1.50 (?)

TOTAL for dish - $14.50 for 4 people.

This is a beautiful, earthy, tasty dish to make for company.

Macaroni & Cheese

January 28th, 2010

Believe me, this is not the stuff you make for your kids. No bright yellow powder or processed cheese product. This is really good. I think if I make it again, I will make twice as much sauce for the amount of noodles. I made this for my friend, Sarah, and her family, and if they are telling the truth, they loved it. George & I had some, too, and we really liked it, except something kind of weird happened with the bread crumbs on top. They were too crunchy. I thought it would be a good use for some stale bread, but maybe I should have used really fresh bread.

Here's how it went.

You start by putting a slice of onion, a bay leaf, a little fresh thyme, and a couple sliced garlic cloves in 3 cups of milk. Warm the milk until it starts to bubble at the edges and then turn it off. Let the milk steep with the aromatics for at least 10 minutes.

Grate 2-3 cups of cheese. Deborah Madison says 1 1/2 cups, but I used more and I thought it worked out well. I used smoked 2 cups of smoked cheddar and 1 cup Emmentaler swiss.

Boil elbow macaroni noodles (be sure to add a handful of salt to the boiling water before putting the macaroni in to cook). The recipe calls for a full pound, but in the future I plan to use 1/2 pound. While the pasta is boiling, heat 3 T. butter in a large pan. When it is melted, stir in 3 T. flour. Strain the hot milk directly into the butter, flour mixture. Whisk until a little thicker, and then cook over low heat for 20 minutes or so, stirring frequently. It should thicken up and

Drain the macaroni and put it into a buttered casserole dish. Pour in the roux (flour, butter, milk mixture) and then add the cheeses. Mix well. Top with fresh mozzarella slices and bread crumbs. Bake at 350 for about 25 minutes.

If you use the full pound of macaroni noodles, this makes A LOT of macaroni and cheese. It's a nice dish to take to a pot luck.

I served this with sauteed spinach with lemon zest and a little lemon juice. The spinach was even better than the mac & cheese, in my opinion. I also made some roasted red pepper soup as a starter, which was divine. A simple salad and some bread would probably suffice for dinner.

Approximate cost:
1 pound elbow macaroni noodles - $2.50
2 cups smoked cheddar - $3.00
1 cup Emmentaler - $.50 (I got this in a large block)
3 cups milk - $1.20
4 slices mozzarella - $1.00
bread crumbs - $.20
flour, butter, aromatics - negligible
TOTAL $8.40 for about 8-10 servings.

Stuffed Portobello Mushrooms

January 20th, 2010

Well, I finally made a meal in under 30 minutes, thanks to Rachel Ray. I made stuffed portobello mushrooms for dinner and are they ever scrumptious. The recipe is here:

http://www.rachaelray.com/recipe.php?recipe_id=1055

She actually includes 2 dishes in this recipe - stuffed portobellos and bread salad with tomatoes. Since tomatoes aren't in season, I just made the stuffed portobellos and a salad. I also served leftover green rice from the day before.

Since I was only making this recipe for 2 people, I had leftover artichoke and spinach filling. I think I'm going to try making some hand-made ravioli. I make pasta by hand quite often, but I've never tried ravioli before. I'll let you know how it goes.

The portobellos were fast, easy, and really tasty. You start by trimming and preparing your portobello, which usually includes scraping out the gills, but I didn't bother this time and they were really delicious. You oil the top side of the portobello and put it in the oven for 8 minutes or so. While it is cooking on that side, you combine frozen spinach (thawed), artichoke hearts, ricotta cheese, 1 egg yolk, one clove of garlic, and a little nutmeg, salt, and pepper. You then flip the portobellos over, and stuff them, and add a small handful of grated parmesan on top. Put them back in the oven for about 5 minutes. That's it.

They were juicy and delicious. With a salad, you've got a quick meal.

Approximate cost to prepare:
2 portobello mushrooms - 3.50
1 can artichoke hearts (organic) - 4.00
10 ounces frozen spinach (organic) - 2.00
1 egg yolk - .25
1 1/2 cups ricotta - 3.00
garlic, salt, pepper, nutmeg - negligible
1/4 cup parmesan - 1.00 (I found paremsan for $5.00/pound, which is unusual)
TOTAL - $13.75 However...

This was supposed to make 8 mushrooms. I counted the cost to make the stuffing for the full recipe, but only the cost of 2 portobellos. If you were making 8 of these, you would need to add another $10.00 or so for 6 more portobellos.

Pecorino and Bean Salad

January 17, 2009

This recipe is from Giada de Laurentis of the Food Network. It is super easy, beautiful, and really yummy. Another must try. Here's the link to the recipe.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/pecorino-and-bean-salad-recipe/index.html

This salad combines the creaminess of the cannelini beans, with the bright, fresh, crispiness of the shelled edamame. It is dressed with garlic and rosemary infused olive oil, salt, pepper, and parsley. Then you add cheese for a tangy finish. I couldn't find pecorino romano, so I used lemon-garlic feta, which was really tasty. I also used the cannelini beans I had in my freezer, rather than canned.

Giada says that this is a great dish to take to a potluck or on a picnic because it doesn't need to be refrigerated. I suppose that is more true of a semi-dry cheese like pecorino, though I would be more careful with the feta, I think.

I served this with leftover root veggies over brown and wild rice. (I scraped off the old pancake and just served the veggies that were underneath. I added a bit more salt and balsamic vinegar to wake up the flavors. The combination of the deep purple vegetables and the bright green salad was really beautiful.

Approximate cost
1 can cannelini beans - $1.00
2 cups edamame - $2.00
oil, garlic, rosemary - negligible
parsley - .20
feta, 4 oz. - $2.50 (I'm sure it would cost more if you used pecorino)
TOTAL cost - $5.70, serves 6 or more

Ginger

Here's a tip from my cousin, Christie. If you have leftover ginger, peel it and put it in the freezer. It keeps almost forever and you can grate it straight out of the freezer. I also learned from Rachel Ray, that you can rub off the skin of the ginger root with a teaspoon. Very easy. Now I will always have ginger on hand!

A slice of ginger root with some boiling water, some lemon juice, and a little honey also makes a lovely warming tea. Ginger is good for digestion and helps decrease motion sickness.

Leftovers

Here's how the leftovers worked out for the Black-eyed peas and greens, and the Shredded Root Vegetables under a Wild Rice Pancake.

I froze the peas and greens, and the bulgur separately. This was good. I didn't give them enough time to thaw on their own, so I thawed them in the microwave. They came out a little mushy when cooked. I also forgot to taste before serving. They were a little bland. They needed to be "woken up" with a splash of vinegar while cooking. Otherwise, very tasty and a healthy, easy night's meal.

I had baked the shredded root vegetables with the wild rice pancake on top, and then put the finished dish in the refrigerator. I heated it up in the oven. The pancake was too crunchy. If I were doing it again, I would refrigerate the vegetables and the pancake batter separately. When I was ready to make my supper, I would just pour the batter over the veggies and bake. I think this would work out better.

Both dishes were absolutely worth having in the fridge. One of the great things about this project so far is that we eat homemade food almost every night of the week, partly because of the leftovers. This must be a good thing.

I didn't know an egg could do that (Sauteed Mushrooms & Croutons)

January 15, 2010

Well, I finally had a mini-disaster. This wouldn't be any fun without something going wrong, right?

Last night I made Baked Eggs Over Sauteed Mushrooms and Croutons, which was absolutely delicious, but I screwed up the eggs. Now, I really want to make this again to get the eggs right. I wish I'd taken a picture, but I can't seem to get the camera ready at the same time as the dish coming out of the oven. Maybe I should put George in charge of that.

So, here's the basic recipe. It serves 2 but can be multiplied for serving more people.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Oil or butter small dish that can go in the oven. I made this all in one dish, but next time, I'm going to try putting it in individual bowls that can go in the oven. Cut 2 slices of bread into cubes. Melt 1 T. butter over low heat and toss bread cubes in butter. Let brown (8 minutes or so.) Put croutons in oiled dish (or dishes). While the bread is browning, chop 2 small or 1 large shallots, 1 T. parsley, 2 t. rosemary, and half a pound of crimini mushrooms. Melt another tablespoon of butter and 1 T. of oil in the same pan. Saute the shallots for a couple minutes, then add the mushrooms and herbs and saute until mushrooms start to brown. Add 2 t. tomato paste and 3/4 cup red wine. Simmer until only a couple teaspoons of liquid remain. Put sauteed mushrooms in with croutons and mix a little. Break an egg or 2 over each dish and bake for 15 minutes in a 400 degree oven.

Here's where I went wrong. After 15 minutes, it looked like the whites weren't cooked, so I turned the oven to broil to finish cooking the eggs. The eggs got this hard skin on top that resembled plastic and was inedible. The yolks were beyond hard boiled, but the whites were still edible. What I thought was uncooked egg white was just too thin to turn white. Since the egg white goes down into the nooks and crannies, some of it is just very thin over the croutons and mushrooms.

Anyway, it was SUPER yummy. The rosemary made the whole house smell wonderful. Despite the egg problem, George said this was his favorite dish so far. I could just imagine how this dish would taste if it had the addition of egg yolks running into the bread and mushrooms. It seems like it would work just as well and be faster to just fry a couple eggs and put them on top of the mushrooms and croutons, but it wouldn't be as pretty as the sunny-side-up eggs. I don't think this would make good leftovers, so plan for about a slice of bread, 1/4 pound of mushroom, and one egg per person. Along with a salad and a hearty red wine, this is a fairly quick and easy weeknight dinner. I would definitely make this for guests because it is just so incredibly tasty.

This meal still took me an hour to prepare, including making the salad and setting the table. I think you could probably make the dish itself in about 40 minutes, including the 15 minutes of baking time. Maybe even faster. I made a spinach, endive, red cabbage, goat cheese and pecan salad with a dijon vinaigrette, which stood up nicely to the hearty mushroom dish. The recommended wine was a "working man's red", so I just pulled something out of the wine pantry - a nice spicy zin. Of course, this is the wine I used in the dish, too.

What I'd do differently if I made this again:
- Bake for exactly 15 minutes in a 400 degree oven and just trust that it would all work out.
- Use separate serving dishes for each person

Approximate cost:
- 2 slices of bread (the good stuff from the local bakery) - .50
- 1/2 pound crimini mushrooms - $3.00
- herbs - $.20
- 2 eggs - .50
- 3/4 cup wine - $2.50
- shallot - .30
TOTAL without wine - $7.00 for 2 people

You've got to try this one!

Root Vegetable Ragout under a Wild Rice Pancake

January 11th, 2010

Can we talk about equipment? Why is it I can never figure out the appropriate tool until it's too late? I was supposed to shred the root vegetables and thought it would be a piece of cake with my flat grater. Halfway through I realized I needed the food processor, but it was too late to get it out, and I ended up hand chopping everything. Ugh.

But, I'm getting this all out of order.

Last night's meal was a warm and satisfying root vegetable ragout. I just learned from wikipedia that "ragout" is a french word for main dish stew. Though the word is related to the Italian ragu, the concept is different. An Italian ragu is a sauce for pasta.

This particular ragout has a gorgeous color and flavor. It contains beets, parsnips (which I've never cooked with before) carrots, and red cabbage, so the color is a super dark purple. You take the finished ragout and put it in a baking dish and cover it with a savory pancake type mixture, and bake it for half and hour.

This dish took me 2 hours to make, plus cooking the rice. I'm sure it doesn't take Deborah that long since she knows which equipment to use! It also turns out this was a recipe for 6, which I failed to notice when starting the dish, so we have lots of it left. Good thing it's YUMMY!

It is supposed to be made with wild rice, but following the principle of using up what I have, I used a wild and brown rice mix for this recipe. You start by whipping up a pancake batter (poor George - we just had pancakes for breakfast), to which you add some green onions, tarragon and parsley and the rice. You let that rest while you make the ragout. The pancake batter used 3 egg yolks, a cup of milk, 3 T. oil, 3/4 cup flour, 2 t. baking powder, and some salt.

The ragout starts with an onion in olive oil (doesn't every dish?), along with some more tarragon and a couple bay leaves. You then add grated beet, parsnip, and carrot, and a bunch of sliced purple cabbage. The recipe called for one large beet, but I put in four small ones because I didn't want leftover beets to cook later. Once that all gets soft, you add in 1 chopped apple, 1 T. tomato paste and some vinegar. You might have to add water along the way to keep the vegetables moist.

I was much better at tasting along the way with this dish and adding salt and pepper when needed. While the ragout is finishing up, you whip the egg whites until stiff. Thank god I bought a hand mixer a few weeks ago. This time I had the right tool. If I'd had to whip the eggs by hand, I would have been crying on the floor. You fold that into the pancake batter.

Just before you put the veggies in the oiled baking dish, you stir in a half cup chopped, toasted walnuts and about 5 ounces goat cheese. Once in the dish, top with the pancake batter, and bake the whole thing at 375 degrees for 25 minutes or so. She says to use a 9 x 12 inch dish, but I used a medium and a small baking dish. I thought it was going to be a big mess because I filled the pans right up to the top. I thought they would puff up and ooze all over my oven, but instead, they turned this beautiful golden brown and behaved perfectly. I had some extra pancake batter, so I cooked that in a separate dish. I don't know what I'm going to use it for, though.

When it was done, I served it with some yogurt because I was out of sour cream. The yogurt provided a great contrast and compliment to the beets. This meal should have had a spinach salad to go with it. The recommended wine was a reisling, which I never think to buy. It was fantastic with the beets. The slight sweetness was absolutely perfect with the tang and sweetness of the root vegetables.

The smaller of the two baking dishes was perfect for 2 people. That means we have 4 servings left over. Anybody want to come over for dinner?

Things I'd do differently next time:

• Grate vegetables with the food processor
• Make this dish when I already had leftover rice
• Try making it with wild rice
• Toast the nuts at the beginning (when will I learn this?)
• Maybe add some caraway seeds. I kept thinking it needed them as I was eating it.
• Make a spinach salad to go with it - probably with goat cheese and nuts.
• Invite people over or take it to a potluck.

Things I did well that I'm feeling good about:

• Tasting as I cook
• Starting with a sparkling clean and tidy kitchen. I was able to clean up my cooking mess while the dish was baking. I even put on nice music and lit candles. Very relaxing and rewarding.

Approximate cost to make this dish:

3 eggs - $1.00

1 cup milk - $.40

2 green onions - $.20

2 c. cooked rice - $.50 (?)

1 big red onion - 1.00

4 cups red cabbage - $1.00

1 large parsnip - $1.80

1 granny smith apple - $.40

4 small beets - $3.50 (it only called for one large beet)

parsley - $.20

tarragon - $1.00

goat cheese - $3.00

1/2 c. walnuts - $.50 (?)

3/4 c. flour, olive oil, baking powder, bay leaves, tomato paste, vinegar - negligible

TOTAL without wine - $14.50 for 6 servings, or $2.42 per serving

Notes after the first week

I am trying to prepare about two recipes a week, and I am choosing recipes that use some of the same ingredients. Last week, I had recipes that used about half a bunch of cilantro each. I had ginger leftover from my first week, so I'm going to try to find a recipe this week that will use the rest of my ginger.

I'm also going to start taking pictures and adding them to the blog - assuming I can figure out how to do that.

I would love some feedback if anyone is actually reading these. I have deliberately not included the actual recipes because I would love it if people bought Deborah Madison's cookbook and I'm not sure if I will get in trouble for reproducing her recipes here. If you want more details, though, I'm happy to give them out to my friends. I am also hoping to include other recipes and quick thoughts on food and cooking as I go along.

Buon appetito.

Star Anise Glazed Tempeh

January 9th, 2010

I am largely unfamiliar with tempeh as an ingredient. I've used it a few times, but not enough to regularly put it on my shopping list. Wikipedia tells me that tempeh is a soybean cake made by fermenting cooked soybeans, which are formed into a firm, dense, chewy cake with a yeasty, nutty flavor. My tempeh was called "5 grain" which makes me wonder if it was made out of other grains. In any case, it is high in protein and pretty good for you if you get organic tempeh.

I chose this recipe because it had a really pretty picture. As it turns out, this would be a nice dish to make for company - it is super yummy and very pretty. I'm sure you meat eaters could substitute chicken or something for the tempeh.

This is basically a stir fry, served over rice. I used basmati rice (because I already had it in my pantry), but Deborah suggests black rice, also known as forbidden rice. I would like to try that next time.

This dish is pretty easy - though it still took me almost an hour start to finish, including setting the table. First you start the rice. Then you make a marinade of 1/4 cup soy sauce, 1/4 cup mirin (Japanese cooking wine), 2 T. brown sugar, 1 T. maple syrup, 1 cinnamon stick, and 2 star anise. You cook this mixture "at a lively pace" for 4 minutes. I assumed this meant that you bring it to a boil, but not a big boil and let it cook for a couple minutes at the little boil stage. Not sure if that was right, but it seemed to work out.

While the marinade is coming up to temperature, I cut the tempeh slab into 4 quarters, and then cut each of those in half diagonally to make 8 triangles. (Next time I would cut the big slab in half lengthwise so it isn't so thick and so you get more delicious little tempeh pieces on your plate.)

You turn off the heat to the marinade and put the tempeh triangles in to soak. Meanwhile, you chop up 1 garlic clove, 1 bunch of scallions (slivered diagonally), a handful of cilantro, and you grate 1 T. fresh ginger. I found out that if you grate ginger on a microplane grater, it turns into a thick liquid - not what you want for this recipe. The regular large grater you use for cheese works much better. Then you slice (not dice) 4+ cups red cabbage, 1 red pepper, and 1 yellow pepper. I'm glad I used the red and yellow, because the red, yellow, purple cabbage color combination is really pretty.

Remove the tempeh from the marinade. She says it only needs 4 minutes of soaking, turning once in the middle of the soaking time. I left it for the length of time it took me to chop the other ingredients. Heat up some oil in a wok or skillet (I used peanut oil, which was a perfect flavor combination with the rest of the dish), and cook the tempeh triangles about a minute on each side. Then add a few tablespoons of the marinade and let it glaze the tempeh. Set aside the tempeh and wipe out the pan.

Heat up some more oil and stir fry the garlic, ginger and scallions for 30 seconds or so. Add the veggies, season with salt & pepper, and stir fry until just wilted. Reserve about half a cup of marinade for serving at the table, and pour the rest over the veggies and add the chopped cilantro. Cook for 30 seconds or so.

Mound rice on plate, top with tempeh triangles, add stir fry over top, and top with roasted cashews. I bought raw cashews and had to toast them myself. I had forgotten that they went in this dish at all, so my serving was delayed by toasting the cashews.

This dish is gorgeous, super-yummy, and nice enough for company. I will make this many more times. The wine pairing suggestion was a Mendocino sparkling rose. I found a French sparkling rose, but it was a little too intense for the dish. I think a light pinot might work well, too.

What I'd do differently next time: I'd toast the cashews toward the beginning and have them standing by, or I would buy roasted cashews. I would cut the tempeh slab in half lengthwise to make it less thick. I would store the leftover rice separately from the leftover veggies, tempeh, and cashews. The rice absorbed all the juices and got too soggy.

Approximate Cost to prepare:

Tempeh - $2.80

Cabbage - $.85

Cilantro - $.20

Red & yellow bell pepper - $2.95

Scallions - $.50

Ginger - $.15

Cashew - $1.00 (I used more than was called for)

Rice - $.50

Marinade - unknown. I had all the ingredients in my pantry. Maybe $1.00?

Garlic, oil, salt, pepper - negligible

TOTAL without wine - $9.95

Sparkling wine - $8.99

This served 2 people, with enough leftovers for another meal.

Black-Eyed Peas with Coriander and Greens

January 5, 2010

I chose this dish to start with because I associate black-eyed peas with the new year. Someone once told me that they are supposed to bring good fortune, but I think that only applies when you eat them on New Year's Day. I missed by 4 days, but perhaps the gods of fortune will smile on me anyway. I figure I get extra points with the kitchen gods because I cooked my own organic peas from scratch, rather than using frozen as the recipe suggested.

I'm going through the book in a completely random manner, by the way. I'm hoping to utilize ingredients when they are in season. This dish came from the chapter entitled "Hearty Cool Weather Suppers". In the introduction, Deborah Madison talks about supper as distinct from dinner. She says that it doesn't carry the formal expectation that dinner does. Supper is for when you bump into a friend at the farmer's market and invite them over to share the bounty. It's for a Sunday night or a Thursday. It can be far more casual and simple. This appeals to me.

The black-eyed peas dish, however, took me about an hour and a half to prepare. This is largely because I forgot to soak the peas earlier in the day. Here's how the evening went:

I rinsed the black-eyed peas and put them in a pot with boiling water to soak for an hour. Meanwhile I prepared 2 bunches of chard, coarsely chopping the leaves and finely chopping the stems. I used one bunch of rainbow chard and one bunch of red chard. The addition of the cut up stems was a great idea. I loved not throwing them away and they provided a lot of nice texture. The recipe also called for wild greens, which I didn't know where to find. The recommendations were amaranth, blanched nettles or wild greens. Does anyone know how to safely incorporate these into your cooking? Can you really just go pick dandelion greens from your lawn and eat them? Somehow this seems hazardous to me.

I then diced one onion, whacked up half a cup of cilantro and half a cup of parsley, diced a couple cloves of garlic and set all that aside. Then I started cooking the bulgur.

One of her tips for how to make cooking more enjoyable and economical is to use what you have. I already had course bulgur, so I used that instead of the fine or medium bulgur that was called for. By this time, my peas had been soaking for about 40 minutes, so I decided to just start cooking them.

I then cooked the onions in some olive oil until tender, added the cilantro, parsley, garlic, and diced chard stems and let that soften a bit. Then I added 1 T. tomato paste, some paprika, and the chopped greens, and seasoned with a little salt. I then put the cover on, turned down the heat to very low and let the greens cook until they were "meltingly tender" - her words - much more lovely than "falling apart" - my words. This took about 25 minutes.

When the peas were soft, I added them to the chard mixture along with some of their cooking liquid. I actually made a double batch of black-eyed peas and froze them so that I would have them on hand the next time I made this dish or a soup or something. Her recipe says to use 3 cups of water to cook the frozen peas in and then add all the water, so you know just how much to put in. I guessed. I checked for salt and pepper (usually one of my failings as a cook, but I remembered this time.)

By then the bulgur was done and I served the peas and greens over the bulgur, with a spoonful of greek yogurt on top. With the yogurt, this dish makes a complete protein. Without it, the dish is completely vegan.

This is a very unpretentious looking dish. It reminded me of the look of some Indian food. The flavors, however, are more Greek, so she recommended a spicy Greek red wine to go with it. I couldn't find one easily or cheaply, so I substituted an Italian red (2007 Terra Mia) from the Abruzzo region of Italy. That's where the earthquake was in April of last year. George and I visited this area and it is stunning. We raised a glass and wished for prosperity and healing for the Abruzzo region, and toasted our first sit-down, candle lit dinner of 2010.

The dish was SO delicious. It's interesting that it has coriander in the name of the dish, but no coriander seed - just cilantro. I always think of them as different, though I know they are the same plant. I guess half a cup of cilantro is quite a bit and it must have contributed significantly to the flavor. I would definitely like to make this one again. I think I could do it in under an hour using my extra peas in the freezer and my ever developing chopping skills.

This recipe serves 4, so we had leftovers that went into the freezer. I'll let you know if the freezing works out well.

If I made this dish again: I would soak and perhaps cook the black-eyed peas ahead of time, or use frozen peas. Otherwise, I wouldn't change a thing.

Cost to prepare:

1 cup black-eyed peas - .65

2 bunches chard - 4.60

cilantro - .20

parsley - .20

tomato paste - .20

bulgur - .45

onion - .50

Olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic, paprika - negligible

TOTAL without wine = $6.80

Cost of wine - $8.99

Served 2 people, plus leftovers for another meal!

Let's get cooking

Having been inspired by Julie & Julia, I decided to cook my way through a vegetarian cookbook during 2010. My project is much less ambitious than the one undertaken by Julie, but I'm hoping it will help me cook homemade, healthy meals at least twice a week, all year long.

I've had lots of friends ask me what a vegetarian eats for dinner. They understand vegetarian side dishes but are perplexed about how to put together a vegetarian meal. I've been a vegetarian for 15 years and I must admit that I have relied too heavily on ready-made dishes from Trader Joe's and elsewhere.

My absolute favorite cookbook author is Deborah Madison, author of "Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone", "Vegetarian Suppers", and numerous other cookbooks. I would love to make my way all the way through Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, but that is over 1,000 recipes - far too ambitious for a single year. I have selected "Vegetarian Suppers" to cook from instead - only about 100 recipes, but they are all intended to be the center of a vegetarian meal, with perhaps a side dish or a salad to compliment the main dish. She also gives wine pairing suggestions, which I intend to try when possible.

My project officially began on January 1st, but my first meal was made on January 5th. I really don't know what will be included in each blog post, but I hope you will find this endeavor entertaining and informative. I welcome feedback.

Here's to happy, healthy meals in your own kitchen!