When life hands you squashes, make…. mac 'n' cheese?

I came across a recipe for (vegan) Butternut Squash Mac ‘n Cheeze recently, either before I went on my RSS fast or during one of the few times I’ve allowed myself to break it (from clearing my feeds 1-2 times per day to 1-2 times per week). It’s fall. Squash is abundant and it’s always nice to find ways to use it, other than soups, plain roasted and curries.

If you’re like me and don’t think about making dinner until you’re hungry, or if you’re more an instant gratification person, or if you don’t like the idea of waiting 40 minutes for part of your meal to prep, roast the squash in advance. That’s what I did.  The challenge is not eating all of the squash before you use it for the mac ‘n’ cheese. I was going to make it on Sunday but a) ended up eating dinner at Fresh because I was already out and b) When I arrived home later, intending to make it anyway so I’d have it for lunch the next day, I found that my coconut milk had gone bad. Over dinner on Sunday I told some vegetarian friends about it and they asked for the recipe. I hadn’t even made it yet but emailed them the Oh She Glows link (Miriam and Risa, this is, in part, for you).

I don’t actually like nutritional yeast. I think it smells like feet and I don’t believe anyone who says it tastes like cheese. To me, savoury + salty = cheese flavour. To me nutritional yeast tastes, well, like feet smell. I also learned last spring that I’m sensitive to yeast (I’ve had a blog post in my “drafts” for months about my food sensitivity testing), and I did get a reaction from this. Bumps, like an invisible rash, near my mouth. I shouldn’t eat it. But, I liked the taste of this dish even though it didn’t taste like cheese.

I encourage you to go over to read the back story and original recipe. I’ve changed little. Once again, I forgot to take photos while cooking. Maybe if this was exclusively a recipe blog I’d remember.

Butternut Squash Mac ‘n Cheeze

Yield: The original recipe says 4 servings or 1.5 cups of cheeze sauce.
Like clothing sizes, I find serving sizes to be somewhat arbitrary, though helpful. I got 3 servings: 1 dinner, 2 lunch.

Ingredients:

• 1 fresh butternut squash
• Extra virgin olive oil, S & P
• 1 tbsp coconut oil. (The original recipes uses Earth Balance but I prefer to go natural.)
• 3/4 cup So Delicious coconut milk (original flavour/unflavoured) or other milk alternative.
• 1 tbsp arrowroot powder or cornstarch
• 6 tbsp nutritional yeast, or more to taste
• 2 tsp Dijon mustard (I always use Kozlik’s, and this time I used the tarragon variety)
• 1/4 tsp garlic powder
•  1/2-3/4 tsp kosher salt (or to taste) & ground black pepper, to taste (I omitted the pepper)
• 4 servings brown rice macaroni (8oz or half a 16oz package) makes 3 1/4 cup cooked
• Mix-ins of choice (Angela’s examples: kale, spinach, broccoli, peas, pumpkin seeds, etc.)

1. [Can be done in advance] Preheat oven to 425F. Line a casserole dish with tin foil. Mix chopped squash with extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper. Roast for about 40 minutes, uncovered, or until tender.
2. Meanwhile, prepare the “cheese” sauce in a pot on the stove top. Add coconut oil over low-medium heat. In a bowl, whisk together milk and arrowroot powder (or cornstarch or flour) until clumps are gone. Add into pot and whisk. Stir in remaining ingredients (nutritional yeast, mustard, garlic, salt and pepper) and whisk over low heat until thickened (about 5-7 minutes or so).
3. Cook your pasta according to package directions. The sauce makes enough to cover 4 servings of pasta.
4. In a blender, blend the sauce with 1 cup of roasted squash.
5. Add cooked, drained, and rinsed macaroni into pot, along with cheese sauce & mix-ins. Heat and serve.

…Now I know that it might seem odd to “de-veganize” a vegan dish, but I imagine that a certain smokey pig product would be tasty in this. Or, if you want the taste of it without the meat, a few drops of liquid smoke.

…In two of my servings I added smoked turkey, leftover from Thanksgiving dinner and made by my friend who smoked an entire turkey. He vacuum sealed some for me. I also used tomatoes. I added my mix-ins into individual servings.

…Try adding curry, turmeric, cinnamon and similar.

…Everything tastes better with Rossy’s hot sauce. Update: Her hot sauce is now being sold at Pimenton on Mt. Pleasant in Toronto. This is exciting news!

Enjoy.

National Organic Week October 15-22, 2011 + okra soup

National Organic Week is almost here.

National Organic Week is dedicated to creating awareness and promoting sustainable and healthy living. It’s Canada-wide, organized by Canadian Organic Growers and the Canada Organic Trade Association.

List of National Organic Week events.

Enter the Organic Breakfast Challenge, win a gift basket.

To celebrate the upcoming Organic Week, I’m sharing the recipe for a soup that I made recently after buying okra for soup from a farmer. The recipe comes from a blog called Coffee and Cornbread. The tomatoes I used came from Shana’s garden. She gave them to me green and I’ve watched them change to yellow, to orange and to red. I’d give a shout out to the farm but I don’t remember what they’re called.

Tomato Okra Soup

Serves 3-4

6-8 okra pod sliced
4 large ripe tomato diced
1 medium onion chopped
1 clove garlic diced
3 – 4 cups chicken broth
dash of red pepper to taste
salt and pepper to taste
chives for garnish

Just place all ingredients but chives in a stock pot.
Bring to boil and then simmer until Okra is tender, about 20 minutes.
Garnish with chives.

Here’s the original, if you want to bump her visitor stats.

My only changes (from what I remember): I used vegetable broth instead of chicken, and a whole hot pepper. The woman who sold me okra at the farmers’ market also had hot peppers (I forget the variety) and tossed a few in the bag for free because I didn’t have use for a full quantity. One small red pepper packed a lot of heat. I didn’t use any chives.

• See what else I’ve written about okra in the past. (Or search “okra” on my blog)
• Read Meghan’s now-famous post about okra. I think that she once said that it was in her top popular posts, though maybe I’m making that up because it’s past my bedtime and I’m finishing a blog post that I thought was ready to go this morning.

Don’t forget about Foodstock this Sunday!

Eat well, be well

Avocado corn salad: Bursting with deliciousness

Yesterday I wanted to make a salad with corn and avocado, and lime and cilantro, and some smokey pepper.

After that tweet I was asked for the recipe, except that I rarely follow or do recipes and rarely measure. I looked to a couple of recipes just to see what they said, but did my own thing.

Here’s what I came up with. If avocado was grown in Ontario, this salad would be a locavore’s delight.

Salad
Kernels from 1 cob of corn (keep it raw, unless you prefer to roast it first)
1 tomato, chopped (could use a handful of cherry or grape tomatoes, cut in half)
1/2 avocado
handful of cilantro
Mung bean sprouts (grown by me!)

Dressing
2 TBSP lime juice
1 TBSP oil of choice (I used Vega Antioxidant EFA Oil Blend. You can use olive oil, flax oil, hemp oil, etc.)
1/4 tsp coriander (I didn’t measure so I’m guessing)
1 TBSP Kozlik’s maple mustard
Chipotle pepper powder (to taste).
Salt and pepper
Optional: Lime zest

It’s a salad. You can figure out the rest.

Milk War post script

[The last post was getting long and unwieldy.]

Alternatives to dairy are sometimes just as tasty, or tastier, than the real thing.

To close out my last post I went Googling for a recipe for vegan coconut ice cream that doesn’t require an ice cream maker. I’d given up after a search that included the term “recipe”. I was about to suggest just going out and buying Coconut Bliss, which I still suggest, when I googled “coconut milk ice cream” to see who else makes it. Not surprisingly I found that Meghan has a recipe for coconut milk ice cream on her site. I should have known and looked there first. I imagine her laughing at me and giving me a “well, duh!”.  Here’s the recipe. Go read the post and see some beautiful photos. The top one hangs on the wall at Making Love in the Kitchen headquarters.

Coconut Ice Cream

• 1 can full fat organic coconut milk
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1 large banana
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 3 Tbs dried coconut
• 1-2 Tbs Vodka (optional- will lower freezing point and make ice-cream smoother)

Optional: Can use any fruit of choice- berries, mango, pineapple etc. Were I still in the Caribbean, I would use mango, papaya, and my favourite: soursop

1. Place banana, lemon juice and honey in a blender and process until well mashed.
2. Add coconut milk, dried coconut and optional vodka and blend
3. Freeze in ice cube trays for 3 or more hours, reserving about a 1/2 cup in the fridge.
4. Place about 3 cubes per person into the food processor, add some of the non-frozen mix and process until smooth.

Serve

Vegetables, tahini & brown rice, quite nice!

In addition to cole slaw and chocolate pudding for my Island picnic I’d originally intended to make a brown rice bowl using seasonal produce inspired by the bowls I love at Fresh. I made a potful of rice on Saturday.

That’s a lot of food (coleslaw, pudding, brown rice salad) and more work for one day, so I decided to hold back the brown rice that I’d made the day before and make the rice bowl for myself to have for the work week. That’s 5 days of not having to think about what to bring for lunch and not having to buy it. Making it all for myself may be selfish, but the goodness is all mine.

So, on the holiday Monday I made this:

Brown rice goodness

I specifically went looking for a recipe with a tahini-based dressing. Sesame is one of my favourite flavours. The craving for the flavour comes on strong.
This recipe comes from 101 cookbooks. Here in Ontario asparagus is in season, and this dish seemed like such a great way to use green leafy vegetables as well. The recipe writer says that it serves 4-6. My yield came out to around 4.5 cups. I know this because I ate 3 half cup servings (the ladle I used has measurement marks). What’s left squeezes into a 3 cup container.

Ten Minute Tasty Asparagus and Brown Rice

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 or 2 14-ounce cans of chickpeas, drained
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
1 bunch asparagus, cut into 1-inch segments
3 cups pre-cooked brown rice
1 cup almond slivers, toasted
fine grain sea salt

Tahini Dressing:
1 garlic clove, smashed and chopped
1/4 cup tahini
zest of one lemon
scant 1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons hot water
scant 1/2 teaspoon fine grain sea salt

If you’re using frozen rice, heat it on its own in a pot or per package instructions.

Make the dressing by whisking together the garlic, tahini, lemon zest and juice, and olive oil. Add the hot water to thin a bit and then the salt. Set aside.

Add a couple glugs of olive oil (roughly 3 tablespoons) to a big skillet over medium-high heat. Swirl the oil around to coat the pan, then add the chickpeas and sprinkling of salt. Let the beans saute there for a couple minutes (I like to try to get some crusty color on them). Be careful, they seem to hiss and pop more then other beans over high heat. Add the garlic and onions. Stir for a minute. Stir in the asparagus with another pinch or two of salt, cover with a lid for a minute or two to steam – just until the asparagus brightens and softens up just a bit. Uncover and stir in the rice and almond slivers, reserving a few almonds for garnish. Taste and add more salt if needed (likely). Serve family-style in a big bowl drizzled with a few tablespoons of the tahini dressing, let each person add more dressing to their tastes.

Serves 4-6.

---

Original recipe with writer’s notes.

My notes:
-I didn’t use zest.
-After cooking the asparagus for a minute or two I added spinach and kale. They take less time to cook and wilt down. Add any vegetables you want, just remember that harder vegetables will take longer to cook.
-I sprinkled the final product with sesame seeds and drizzled with Sriracha.
-I had home-sprouted bean sprouts ready to top the bowl with but forgot to. Sprouts will definitely make their way onto subsequent servings.

I imagine that the brown rice bowl would be tasty with diced, crunchy, extra firm sprouted tofu.

Plain cooked rice can be frozen and reheated with a bit of water, and I did have some leftover plain rice after this so now I’ve got a ziplock bag of brown rice with chives, labeled and dated, sitting in the freezer.

Eat well, be well.