Gobbles!

No, that is not the gobbler that I will be happily feasting on all weekend. This big guy, along with two of his other buddies, resides on the grounds where I work. Since we are approaching our national Annual Turkey Massacre, these 3 plucky fowls have decided it is high time to assert their presence and remind me of their cuteness by stalking around the parking lot, flapping their wings, and looking generally disgruntled. Guilt. It’s what’s for dinner.

^{Gobbles? (This picture, and this post’s title, will make no sense until you watch this piece of genius from South Park.)}

So! Thanksgiving is in 4 days and I CAN’T WAIT. I looooove Thanksgiving. What’s not to love about a whole day celebrating mashed potatoes (heavenly), butternut squash (highly underrated), stuffing (aka thigh padding), and PIE?! Yes, I am thankful for all of the many blessings in my life. But without fail, every single year, I am especially thankful that I have free rein to eat pumpkin pie for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

I am not kidding.

No, this is not a recipe for pumpkin pie. Everyone has a family recipe that they follow, or a version of the one on the cans of pumpkin, and they are all equally delicious. Like butternut squash, though, I think pumpkin is an underrated vegetable that should be utilized in more dishes.

Since I had a craving for pumpkin-related foods, I decided to make a soup and a non-pie dessert (I am saving myself for my beloved). This soup is incredibly easy, and whether or not you choose to include it in your holiday dinner, it would go great with those leftover turkey sandwiches everyone looks forward to the day after Thanksgiving.

Curried Pumpkin Soup (recipe adapted from Panera)

• 2 large carrots, chopped
• ½ white onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 15 oz. cans of 100% pumpkin puree
• 2 cups vegetable broth
• 2 cups (or 1 15 oz. can) light coconut milk
• 1 tbsp butter or margarine
• 1 tbsp canola oil
• 1 ½ tsp curry powder
• 1 tsp ground (or 2 tsp minced fresh) ginger
• ½ tsp salt
• ¼ tsp sugar

Peel then roughly chop your carrots, onion, and garlic (evenness in size/shape doesn’t matter, since you’ll be blending it later). Heat the butter and oil on medium heat until they get hot, then add the veggies, ginger, and curry powder. Mix well so the spices evenly coat the veggies, and cook for about 8 minutes or until the carrots start to soften.

After the carrots soften, add the vegetable broth. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer while covered for about 10 minutes.

At this point the broth will have cooked down a bit, and the color will have richened from the veggies breaking down into the liquid.

Next, add the pumpkin, coconut milk, salt, and sugar.

Mix well, then continue cooking on medium-low heat for about 3-4 minutes, or until the contents are thoroughly hot.

At this point, you can either transfer your soup to a blender or food processor, or puree it using an immersion blender. I used my immersion blender and the soup reached an even, rich thickness after blending it for about 1 minute.

Heat this for another minute or two, then serve immediately with fresh, crusty bread.

If you want to get all fancy, you can top this with some crème fraÎche, roasted pepitas (pumpkin seeds), or minced red bell peppers. Personally, I was barely able to restrain myself from shoving my face in the bowl, so the foo-fah was unnecessary.

Eric proclaimed this to be the best soup I’ve ever made. With the exception of my tomato basil bisque, it was also the easiest. Without using too many snooty foodie terms, this soup has an amazing depth of flavor. The first taste has mild pumpkin overtones, but each successive bite has layers of vegetables and spices that meld into one un-frickin’-believable meal. We both had large bowls of this for lunch and our plates were literally wiped clean by the time we finished 2.3 minutes later. I cannot recommend this enough – it’s by far my favorite recipe that I’ve made in many months!

Stay tuned…tomorrow (or, knowing me, possibly a day or two later in the week) I’ll post a simple recipe for Pumpkin Crunch Bars that will knock your socks off!

Zuppa!

As I’m sure you’ve figured out by now, I really, really love soup. I apologize if you guys have reached soup overload, but I still haven’t reached my fill. As some friends and I were discussing over lunch (which, yes, included soup) at Panera today, soups are great because they are usually very nutritious, filling, inexpensive to make, and are a good way to get your fill of veggies even if you’re normally not a big fan. When Allison and Mohamed came over for dinner a few weeks ago (the same dinner where I made the Korean Beef), we started out with this soup I found in Eating Well Magazine. I highly recommend their daily newsletter – I’ve never had a bad suggestion from them, and they are usually very simple to make!

Garden Tortellini Soup with Italian Meatballs (adapted from here)

What You’ll Need

• 2 green zucchini, sliced and quartered
• 2 large carrots, peeled, sliced and quartered
• 1 large white onion, diced
• 5 cloves garlic, minced
• 4 plum tomatoes, diced (about ½ can)
• 32 oz low-sodium vegetable broth
• 1 package turkey sausages, Italian style, with the casings removed
• 2 cups (one small bag) frozen tortellini, preferably spinach & cheese or plain cheese
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tbsp dried rosemary
• 2 tbsp freshly ground black pepper
• 2 tbsp red wine vinegar

What To Do

After chopping the vegetables, heat your Dutch oven or large pot plus the olive oil on medium heat. Once it’s hot, sauté the onion and carrot for 1 minute uncovered. Slightly reduce the heat, cover the pot, and cook for about 6 minutes, or until the veggies start to soften and the onion is translucent. Uncover, add the garlic and rosemary, and cook for 1 more minute.

During the 6 minute cooking period from Step 1, remove the casings from the turkey sausages by cutting a slit down the length of the sausage with a sharp knife. The casing should peel right off, leaving the slightly gooey meat. Divide each sausage into 3-4 small balls and form mini-meatballs. In a medium skillet, cook the meatballs on medium heat, turning frequently so that all sides are evenly cooked. There should be no need for oil as the meatballs will give off their own fat.

After the meatballs are cooked, remove them from the pan and set aside. Into the pot with the veggies, add your vegetable broth and zucchini; increase the heat slightly and bring the soup to a boil. Once it boils, reduce the heat to medium low and simmer for about 3 minutes.  Add the cooked meatballs, frozen tortellini, and plum tomatoes. Let this cook for about 10 minutes, or until the tortellini plump up and are fully cooked.

Just before serving the soup, stir the red wine vinegar into the pot and mix well. Serve with crusty bread while piping hot.

The ratio of tortellini to other ingredients was way off in this bowl of soup, primarily because I was also spazzing and trying to get the other parts of our dinner ready at the same time. This soup was a huge hit – we all had full bowls before dinner and would have kept on eating it if not for the other dishes waiting for us. I’ve experimented with this recipe since my first time trying it, and I think I even improved it a little bit. The second time I made it, I used dried tortellini with a pesto filling, skipped the turkey meatballs, and added an entire bag of baby spinach with the stems removed. I also added the entire can of plum tomatoes, half a bag of frozen peas that I found in the back of my freezer, and 2 heaping tablespoons of Spike Seasoning on top of the spices already listed in this recipe. I suggest playing with the spices to fit your taste – this would obviously be best with fresh herbs, but I tend not to buy them in the winter as I always have leftovers that go bad before I can use them up. I brought this every day for lunch the week after I made it, and all of my coworkers kept asking what I was eating because it smelled so great!

Black Bean Soup

For some reason I kept thinking that I had posted this awhile ago, because it was my favorite of the recipes from the soup class I took at Whole Foods.  When I was at the grocery store on Friday I was trying to remember the ingredients so I could get them to make the soup again this weekend.  When I tried looking the recipe up on my phone, I realized I had never posted it – the horror! This is simply too good to be missed.

Fast Black Bean Soup

What You’ll Need

• 2 15 oz cans of black beans, preferably low- or no-salt
• 15 oz  can of prepared black bean soup, preferably low- or no-salt (*or substitute additional can of black beans)
• 2 cups (½ bag) of frozen mixed vegetables
• 2 cups (½ bag) frozen corn
• 2 cups (½ bag) frozen broccoli florets
• 2 cups (16 fl oz bottle) carrot juice
• 1 cup fresh chopped tomatoes
• ⅛ tsp chili powder
• 2 tbsp cumin
• Salt and pepper to taste

Optional Ingredients

• ¼ cup chopped cilantro
• ½ cup chopped green onions (scallions)
• 1 avocado, chopped
• ¼ cup pepitas (raw pumpkin seeds), lightly toasted
• 2 tsp hot sauce

Ready for the easiest soup recipe ever?

Here it is:

Combine the frozen mixed veggies, corn, broccoli, black beans, can of soup, carrot juice, water, hot sauce and spices in a soup pot.

Bring to a boil, them reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes.

Add the tomatoes, then continue cooking until they are heated through.

Serve topped with avocado, green onions, and pumpkin seeds (or plain). Enjoy!

I chose to enjoy this with just some green onions on top, and they are a great addition to this.  Green onions are milder than regular white or yellow onions, so they don’t have an overwhelmingly oniony taste (like my awesome vocab there?). They do provide a nice coolness and bit of crunch to this soup and they balance the slight heat provided by the chili powder and hot sauce. This is definitely not a “spicy” soup, but feel free to use those two ingredients as little or as much as you’d prefer. I didn’t use the avocado or pumpkin seeds, but I’m sure they would both be tasty toppings. I looooove this soup. I love it so much that it makes me use multiple unnecessary consonants in my words.  For reals, though, this is the best black bean soup I’ve ever had, and trust me, I’ve eaten ALL of them.  Pretty much every prepared black bean soup on the market is chock full of sodium (which gives it “flavor”), but lacks the fresh vegetables and textures this soup has. The black bean soup at Panera is a great healthy option, but it’s essentially just mushy black beans (I still like it – black beans and I are tight). There is absolutely no reason to buy canned soups when you can make something this healthy and delicious in almost no time, for very little money, and with very little effort.  This made enough for Eric and I to eat it for dinner (it’s that filling) twice and for me to take it for lunch a couple times. I’m making this tomorrow as the appetizer for a recipe I have planned for an upcoming post – Asian-inspired Steak Fajitas from Bobby Flay’s Throwdown! Cookbook. I can’t wait to eat them both tomorrow night!

Creamy Cauliflower Soup

At the risk of sounding overwhelmingly self-satisfied and obnoxious, I really do think I’m one of the luckiest girls in the world. My husband, Eric, knows me better than anyone else, and this nearly always translates into gifts of epic levels of awesomeness.  This Christmas was no disappointment, as he gave me something I’ve been desperately longing for but was too cheap to buy for myself – cooking classes.  The three he signed me up for (healthy soups, French sauces, and chili) are held at our local Whole Foods and I highly recommend them for those of you with a WF in your area. The soup class, my first of the three, was focused on healthy ingredients without the use of fats, butter, or oil.  Although you may be saying to yourself “Gee, those are what make things taste so yummy!”, with which I would agree, the four soups we made were all fantastic.  I’ve already made 2 – black bean soup and the cauliflower soup in this post.  I plan on making the other two (chunky sweet potato stew and chicken with long grain wild rice) soon, and I’ll post all three at some point in the future.  The cauliflower soup recipe came from Rip Esselstyn’s Engine 2 Diet cookbook, which is by all accounts a tough and demanding diet that will greatly reduce your cholesterol and help you drop weight.  I can attest that, should you decide to try out this cookbook, this recipe at least was very simple to prepare, and extremely tasty.  Without further ado:

Creamy Cauliflower Soup
What You’ll Need

• 2 medium white or yellow onions, diced
  
• 4 cups low-sodium vegetable broth
  
• 2 medium Russet potatoes, peeled and cubed
  
• 2 stalks celery, diced
  
• 2 medium carrots, peeled and diced
  
• 1 small head cauliflower, roughly chopped into bite-size florets
  
• 1 tbsp cashew butter (Note: I used reduced fat PB)
  
• 2 tbsp low-sodium tamari (Note: I used LS soy sauce)
  
• 1 tbsp Salt-Free Spike seasoning (or to taste)
  
• Sea salt/black pepper to taste

The most unique part of this recipe is the fact that the diced onions are not initially cooked in butter or oils, but instead in ½ cup of the vegetable broth. Simmer the onions in the broth over medium heat, uncovered, for about 20 minutes.  It’s okay if there’s some caramelization, but keep an eye on the pot so that the onions don’t burn.


After the onions are translucent and soft to the touch (with a fork, not your fingers!), add the chopped potatoes, celery, carrots, cauliflower, and the remaining vegetable broth.  Make sure to use a sufficiently large pot, so that you don’t replicate the space issue I always seem to have.


I bought a cauliflower head that was definitely more jumbo-sized than small, since my grocery store charges by the head and I have an intrinsic need to get the most possible for my money (see: cheapness). This resulted in a giant freaking heap of vegetables in my pot that I was more than a little concerned wouldn’t cook down.  Being the stalwart chef that I am, I decided to stick it out and keep them as they were (aka, I didn’t feel like dirtying, then washing, another pot). As I had fervently hoped known all along, after 20 minutes of simmering the veggies were greatly reduced in size.  Once they are soft and easily pierced with a fork, remove the pot from the heat and add the cashew/peanut butter and tamari/soy sauce.  Seeing as my fingers were covered with peanut butter, I didn’t take a picture of this step, but I’m sure you can get the idea.  Although it sounds weird, these two ingredients are critical to getting the creamy texture and slight bite to the finished soup.  Mix the contents thoroughly until the cashew/peanut butter is completely melted and mixed evenly.


For the next step, you will need either a large food processor, a blender, or an immersion blender.  Even though I now own all three appliances (yay Christmas presents!), I went with the suggestion of my chef instructor and broke out my brandy new immersion blender.  This also allowed me to avoid cleaning yet another extra vessel, as you blend the soup right in the pot (seriously, it’s genius).


If the soup is too thick, feel free to add some water to help thin it out to the consistency you desire – I added approximately ½ cup of water at this stage. Add salt and pepper to taste, which for me was about ½ tsp of each.

My final addition, which is not in the additional recipe but which we used in class, was 1 tbsp of Salt Free Spike Seasoning.



For those of you who have never used Spike before (like me, prior to my class), the Spike line of seasonings contain approximately 92874 different spices in one magical bag. It’s really a combination of 39 herbs, spices, and vegetables, but as we all know, I like to exaggerate.  This is my new favorite spice because it’s a) inexpensive, b) got great flavor, and c)is super convenient.  According to this website,

The main ingredients for the Spike seasoning include hydrolyzed protein from vegetables, various powders (like onion, orange, celery leaf and celery root, garlic, mushroom, parsley, spinach, tomato, etc), toasted onion, soy flour, dill, curry, white pepper, green and red peppers, tarragon, saffron, rosehips, sweet paprika, oregano, basil, marjoram, rosemary and thyme…

I mean, really, who has all those different things in their spice cabinet at any one time?

After adding the salt, pepper, and Spike, blend thoroughly until completely smooth.  If, like me, your carrots were massive, it may take an extra 1 or 2 minutes to remove any of the tiny orange chunks floating around.



Like most soups, I’d recommend serving this with crusty French or Italian bread, and a nice side salad.  Although this soup is delicious, it may not be hearty enough for a full meal, although feel free to eat as much of it as you want – there’s no added fat, very few calories, and it’s chock full of veggies and nutrients. Overall, this creamy yet healthy starter was Whole Foods selected, hungry husband (and wife) approved.

Tomato Basil Bisque

‘Tis the season…for soup! I am definitely one of those weirdos who loves to eat soup year round, and yes, I do mean even in the dog days of summer. However, I don’t think anyone can argue with the fact that soups are the perfect winter dish – warm, satisfying, and the overall epitome of comfort food.  While there are some great seasonal dishes, such as butternut squash soup, my all-time favorite is tomato soup.  I have so many memories from my childhood of eating grilled cheese sandwiches with Campbell’s tomato soup (come on, who DOESN’T?!) after playing outside on cold fall and winter days.  This soup is a slightly more grown-up version, but that doesn’t make it any less tasty.

Tomato Basil Bisque

What You’ll Need:

2 cans crushed tomatoes

16 fluid oz. chicken broth

18 basil leaves (one large handful), minced

1 cup fat free half-and-half

3 tbsp. butter cut into 1tbsp. chunks

2 tbsp. sugar

Salt and pepper to taste

What To Do:

Drain the tomatoes into a large soup pan and add the chicken broth.  Bring to a boil over medium-high heat; reduce the heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer for 10 minutes.

While the tomatoes are simmering, rinse the basil then roughly chop it into thin strips.

After the 10 minutes is up, add the basil and the sugar.  Reduce heat to low and cook for 3-4 more minutes. Finally, add the half-and-half and cubed butter.  Mix well, and cook on low until the butter has fully melted.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

I served this as an appetizer at dinner with some crusty Italian bread and OH MY GOD IT WAS AMAZING.  Sorry – I couldn’t restrain myself.  But seriously, this was some damn good soup.  I had to stop myself from eating so much of it that I wouldn’t have room for dinner.  This tastes exactly like the best tomato bisque you’ve had at a restaurant.  It’s got a strong tomato flavor, although it’s creamy enough to cut the acidity.  The basil isn’t overpowering but you could certainly add more or less depending on how strong of a flavor you like.  The best part of this soup is that it’s so easy to make – it only involves 6 ingredients! I was making this while preparing the rest of our dinner and I barely had to worry about it, beyond dumping things in the pot at different times. This also makes a giant amount of soup – I can’t wait for leftovers at lunch with a piping hot grilled cheese!

Curried Lentil Soup with Lemon

This weekend, my hubby and I went to visit his grandparents in South Jersey for a joint celebration of both our birthdays.  One of my favorite parts of visiting them is when Grandma inevitably pulls out a stack of food magazines and cookbooks and lets me take whatever ones I want.  On top of a bunch of Family Circles, I was very excited to snag two issues from Vegetarian Times, a great magazine that I have pilfered from her in the past.  On the way home I read both cover to cover, and one particular recipe caught my eye.  Ever since I had a lentil lasagna at my friend Ruth's house, I've been meaning to try and recreate that unique but delicious dish. I bought the lentils, but never put them to good use until tonight, when I made this vegan soup from the October 2009 VT issue.


Curried Red Lentil Soup with Lemon
What You'll Need
2 cups (1 bag) red lentils, sorted and rinsed
1 1/2 qts. vegetable stock
4 cups water
1 large onion, finely chopped
2 1/2 large or 3 medium carrots, peeled and finely chopped
4 stalks of celery, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
1 heaping tbsp curry powder
1 heaping tsp cumin
2 tbsp lemon juice
Fresh cracked black pepper (to taste)

Simple ingredients make for big flavor!

Start out by preparing your mirepoix - ahem, your carrots, onions, and celery (I have just been itching to use that Top Chef-acquired term!). Get the veggies, including the garlic, cleaned and peeled.

Next, I sorted and rinsed my lentils, a tip that VT helpfully included below the main recipe. Very simply, I dumped the bag of lentils into a mixing bowl and covered them with a couple of inches of cold water. 

They tend to clump, so swirl them around with a fork to separate them, then let them settle.  Empty hulls and other debris may be present, which will float to the top of the water; skim this off with a large spoon or strainer, then completely drain the lentils. Bring the lentils, vegetable broth, and water to a slow boil in a large soup pot.  You may notice some brownish foam forming on the top - this is normal, just skim it away like you did earlier with the lentils (don't worry, they're worth the hassle!). Cover the pot, then lower the heat and slowly simmer for 5 min.

Lentils simmering, aka poopy brown water.

While the lentils were a-cookin', I chopped up my carrots, celery, and onion and minced my garlic. After the 5 minutes are up, add these to the pot and simmer, uncovered, for 20 minutes.  You might need to increase the heat a bit at this point since the pot is so much more full.  Stir the pot every so often to make sure that the lentils are behaving, and bask in the lovely veggie scents that will continually waft out of the pot and make you extremely hungry.

After the first 20 minutes of simmering, the vegetables will have begun to cook down nicely, and the lentils will have plumped up considerably.  At this point, I noticed that there was not enough liquid in my soup - the original recipe called for only 1 quart of vegetable stock, but luckily I had an extra 1/2 quart that I threw in last minute.  If you use the 1 1/2 quarts at the beginning, you shouldn't run into this problem, but you can always add some water if you do.

For the final step, add the curry, cumin,  and cilantro, then cook for another 10-15 minutes or until the lentils are soft.  Mine were ready much faster than the original recipe stated, so I recommend taste-testing them periodically until you find the right texture.  If you're not familiar with lentils, they should have a 'toothsome' or al dente consistency, but not be mushy.  After the soup is done, add the 2 tbsp of lemon juice to the pot and give it a final stir.

Hearty and delicious!

I topped my bowl of soup with a healthy dose of freshly cracked black pepper but no salt, because the vegetable broth provides plenty.  One large bowl of this was more than filling enough for my whole dinner, but it would also be good with some whole grain bread for dipping. This soup smelled amazing, and the scent does not lie - it is a bold mouthful of flavors that combine wonderfully in each mouthful.  I wish I could serve this dish to people who argue that vegan/vegetarian cooking is bland and boring, because in this case it most definitely was neither. The curry flavor is very mild, so this doesn't end up resembling a traditional curry, but it blends well with the cumin to liven up the blandness of the lentils.  My lentils were cooked perfectly (go me!) and were firm enough to make this resemble a stew as opposed to a brothy soup.  I'm definitely looking forward to reheating this during the week for lunch, since it makes a LOT of soup (easily 5-6 large servings).  One of the best parts of all is the total cost for this dish - about $5.50, assuming you have the spices on hand.   I have already asked for a subscription to Vegetarian Times for Christmas, so hopefully I will be trying out many more of their recipes in the New Year!