soups – Peaceful Reader

Christmas morning

The stockings are all hung and filled. We have an abundance of presents under and around our tree. Creatures are stirring somewhere in the house. The sunrise this morning was beautiful with shades of orange, pink, and lavender. It’s a new day, a Christmas morning. I’m thankful I no longer have to pull off the ruse of Santa for the children who are now full grown adults.

We had a lovely Christmas Eve together. In the afternoon Kaylee, Sam, Greg and I made the trek to Waverly to see my mom and play a round of Spite and Malice with her. When we returned I got cooking. I did a lot of early preparations so I didn’t have to spend long hours in the kitchen. I’ve also gained a sous chef in Kaylee’s boyfriend Sam. I put him in charge of the Roasted Squash Salad, same salad we had at Thanksgiving and it was just as good the second time around. For dinner I made Thyme and White Bean Pot Pies. Earlier in the day I created the filling and then the dough so all I had to do was assemble them and slide them into the oven. I added small florets of cauliflower and spinach to this recipe because I could imagine the flavor mixing well. I owe our dinner spread to Dana @Minimalist Baker.

Does everybody have a routine for their holidays? We do thanks to the Holt side of the family. We open up stockings with everyone taking a turn. It’s a calm way to start the day and after we eat breakfast. I am making a vegan scramble with sweet and gold potatoes, spinach, and vegan sausage with grits on the side. Then we get into the fun of opening up the presents under the tree. Again we take turns. Japhy used to wear the Santa hat to pass gifts around to each person.

For dinner I’ve made two soups I’ve made before and all I have to do is reheat them. I will make bread to serve with the soups. Creamy Vegan Wild Rice Soup and Corn Chowder from Natasha’s Kitchen. I made the corn chowder vegan by omitting the whole bacon step and using a combination of creamy oat milk and coconut milk. I usually don’t do the bacon step but the milk switch is new. I’m pretty confident it will taste similar.

My people are all still sleeping and I’m enjoying these last few minutes of quiet time. Our family is growing with the addition of Sam and Courtney, Tristan’s girlfriend and I’m enjoying getting to know both of them as we play games (a hilarious round of Scattegories last night), cook together, and chat. today we will play a round of Spite and Malice, work on the music puzzle that is spread out on the dining room table.

I hope you have a peaceful day whatever your plans. Take care of yourself. Happy holidays from us to you.

I did something revolutionary this week!

(photo courtesy of Chez Us)

Don’t you get tired of buying cans, boxes, jars or cubes of veggie, beef or chicken stock? On my ongoing quest to bring less “stuff” into my house, especially the kitchen, I started to re-evaluate my constant need for stock. While searching through my favorite crock pot book, Fresh from the Vegetarian Slow Cooker by Robin Robertson I ran across an easy recipe for stock and thought I should give it a try.

Maybe some people do this all the time but it was a revelation for me-how ding dang easy it was to make and how great it made my house smell. It made enough for me to use for the next two weeks with some to freeze.

Give it a try-here’s the recipe. I no longer have to worry about purchasing too salty or expensive boxes of organic stock. Thank heavens. I also set up my mise en place for this recipe which made me feel extremely cooking cool.

Light and Easy Vegetable Stock

A 5 1/2-to 6-quart cooker is best.

8 to 10 hours cook time

Low setting

Makes 8 cups

1 T. olive oil

2 medium-size yellow onions, quartered

2 large carrots, cut into 1-inch pieces

1 celery rib, cut into 1-inch pieces

2 or 3 garlic cloves, left unpeeled and crushed

Peels from 2 large well-scrubbed potatoes (I actually used the whole well scrubbed pots)

1/3 cup coarsely chopped fresh parsley leaves

1 large bay leaf

1/2 tsp black peppercorns

8 cups water

2 tsp tamari or other soy sauce (might be nice to make sure it is wheat-free)

1 tsp salt (I kind of thought this was unnecessary and didn’t add it)

1. Drizzle the oil in the bottom of a the slow cooker. Add the onions, carrots, celery, garlic, potato, parsley, bay leaf, and peppercorns, pour in the water, and add the tamari. Cover and cook on Low for 8 to 10 hours.

2. Allow the stock to cool slightly, then strain it through a fine mesh sieve into a pot or bowl, pressing the vegetables against the sieve to release all the juices. Store the cooled stock in tightly sealed containers where it will keep for 3 to 5 days in the refrigerator or in the freezer for up to 3 months.

As I came down the stairs that morning there was a delicious smell filling the house. Now I’m ready to make the several soup recipes from Moosewood that I was interested in as well as the No Hurry Vegetable Curry on my menu for this week.

How ’bout you? Do you make your own or buy the box, cube, jar or can of stock? Do you have a favorite stock recipe?

Weekend Cooking; Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef and other menu ideas

I browsed the new nonfiction shelves of my local library and came up with two cookbooks and two parenting books in under two minutes. I had to quickly walk away after that because I go on these binges and bring armloads of nonfiction home only to let it sit and sit and sit until I return it two days late.

This time one recipe stuck out like a yummy thumb just waiting to be cooked. I had a beautiful small pie pumpkin from the last farmer’s market and I didn’t know what to do with it; no one here really likes pumpkin pie. So I thought what the hey, I’m sure they’ll love pumpkin soup. Ha.

I’ve enjoyed reading Gluten-Free Girl’s blog a few times on my recent quest to explore and understand celiac disease so her name popped out at me as my neck twisted sideways at the new cookbook spines. I would own this book if I were to indeed become gluten-free just for the stories splattered among the recipes. I’ve enjoyed understanding more about Shauna’s journey and their sweet love story.
How can you resist headings like; Grocery Shopping as Foreplay and Honey, remember to eat.

Many of the recipes are too complicated for me or include ingredients unavailable to me in my sleepy small town but there is much more to this cookbook than just recipes. In a small section at the front Daniel explains the importance of “mise en place”-a perfect three paragraph summary of my cooking life. He describes Shauna in the beginning like this “she’d put a hot pan on the burner and then start chopping her onions with the oil getting hot in the pan. She’d run from the stove to the refrigerator while a dish was simmering, always a bit frantic.” (14) That’s me-most of the time. I do not set up ingredients first. I want to be that organized and now I can name it; mise en place. Daniel gently reminds the reader that is why the ingredients list tells us what to do; chop, dice, cups, tsps so it can be there ready! I feel enlightened.

If you are gluten-free this book would make a great holiday gift to yourself!

I made pumpkin muffins last night while I put the finishing touches on the soup and on Wednesday afternoon I had a brownie craving and made a pan of them just like my mother used to. I thought her recipe was magic when I was growing up. She admitted to me just a few years ago that she peeled that recipe from the back of the Hershey chocolate can. How deflating. I’ve cleaned it up a bit and made it my own.

Click for recipes:

Pumpkin Soup
Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Muffins
Judy’s Chocolate Brownies
Butternut Couscous (tonight’s menu with salmon from the co-op)

p.s. my kids disliked the soup but loved the muffins even though I told them (after the fact) that the muffins also had pumpkin in them. They didn’t care. It’s all about the dark chocolate! My husband, with a more discernible palate, had several bowls of soup and then, three muffins.

I discovered a new foodie blog this week while searching for the above butternut and Israeli couscous recipe. Meet Peter and Keith at Feast. I scrolled through a few recipes and they all look wonderful. I hope they keep going.

This post is linked to Weekend Cooking. Click over to Beth Fish Reads for more food-related posts. Happy eating!

Weekend Cooking-A casserole of sorts

I don’t have a recipe for a casserole-I’ve never made a casserole after having far too many of them growing up but too me a casserole is an odd mixture of things together and that is what I have for today’s Weekend Cooking post.

Thursday night was my stepdaughter’s last night home with us as she wanted to get back to Chicago to see friends. For a special dinner I made Pad Thai. It was the best we’ve made in awhile so I have that recipe to share. Plus my brother called this morning asking me what to do with the leftover ham bone he had (frozen) from his Christmas dinner. We talked it over and decided making soup would be the best option for him and his 6-year-old son, except he didn’t think split pea soup would work. In my Soup, A Way of Life by Barbara Kafka I found a chicken soup recipe that adds ham-which is perfect for my meat-loving brother! Two meats in one soup-Hot Dog! I have that recipe to share right here-Chicken Soup with Chinese Flavors. I can’t wait to hear his success story with this recipe.

Then my Vegetarian Times magazine arrived last night with a beautiful photo of lasagna on the front cover! I’m a sucker for lasagna recipes so I will be trying this recipe for Kale lasagna this week. I’ve shared two of my favorite lasagna recipes; Eggplant Lasagna and the newer, Spinach and Feta Lasagna. so if you are looking for something delicious to cook this weekend, any of these lasagna recipes will make you happy! The interesting thing about the Kale recipe is it is made in an 8-inch baking pan so it will be smaller-not as many leftovers, which sometimes can be a good thing but might be just perfect to feed my family with a side salad or some fruit and bread-don’t ever forget the bread here.

Okay, here is the star of the week, Vegetarian Pad Thai:

1 pound Asian Rice Noodles
1/4 cup soy/ Tamari sauce
1/2 cup lime juice
3 T. peanut butter
2 T. hot sauce
1/4 cup sugar
1 block tofu
1 onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 T Sesame oil
1/2 cup bean sprouts
1/4 cup crushed peanuts
4 scallions, sliced

1. Cook noodles according to package directions.
2. Whisk together soy sauce, peanut butter, lime juice, sugar, and hot sauce.
3. In large wok, sautee tofu, onions and garlic in sesame oil.
4. Add cooked noodles, peanut butter sauce to wok, stir well.
5. Top with sprouts, chopped peanuts and scallions. Serve hot.
6. I added fresh chopped basil at the table.

It was delicious and we had enough for lunch leftovers the next day.
Served with fresh bread and a spinach salad.

What’s in your “casserole” for the weekend??

Happy Cooking and reading!
Check out other Weekend Cooking posts at Beth Fish Reads.