Beyond Tofu Dogs: Red Lentils with Cilantro, Spring Greens and Tomatoes

Tomorrow I'm headed to London for three days of training with an amazing Ayurvedic gynecologist. I can't wait. And when I return, Colm will be home. I can't wait for that, too. Honestly, I think I've forgotten how to be a bachelorette. There's no one here to share the food, so the leftovers are piling up in the fridge. And parts of my routine have really gone out the window. A couple of days saw me lapsing into old habits like reading until 1am, letting the dishes pile up a day or two longer than usual, and talking to the cat...perhaps more than is normal.

Not that I think any of this is bad: in fact, it's very good to shake up the routine and stay up late; you know, just to see what actually goes on at 1am, since I usually miss out on that. And Miso has been very dominant of my lap, claiming it as her territory, which she doesn't do as much when there's two of us here.

I'm not sure what I used to do when I lived alone in Brooklyn...did I use my super-human mental math skills to devide recipes by 1/4? I do remember eating a lot more 'tofurkey jerky' sticks and single serving yogurts - things that I hopefully wouldn't touch now but that were handy for one person...especially since I wasn't cooking much at the time. I often get teased by Colm for the time I ate those tofu dogs that melted in the microwave...scary. Thank goodness, I now know better.

One thing I learned this week is that next time I'm cooking for one, I'll stick with dishes that have it all in one pot, and are yummy enough to eat for consecutive meals. Like this one a friend of mine found in the NYTimes: very yummy! It also pushed me to make another batch of home-made curry powder, which is easier than one might think...but I'll save that for later.

I found this soup really easy once the onion was chopped and it was all simmering. I modified it a bit, and added chopped spring green leaves for extra nutrients. I love the colours of it: red tomatoes, orange from the lentils, a bit of yellow turmeric, bright green cilantro and dark green spring green leaves.


Tomato Cilantro Soup
Adapted from the New York Times, who adapted it from Martha Rose Shulman. July 7, 2006.

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
2 minced garlic cloves
Salt to taste
1 teaspoon cumin seeds, lightly toasted and ground
1 teaspoon coriander seeds, lightly toasted and ground
2 teaspoons hot curry powder (or mild if you prefer)
1 pound chopped tomatoes with juice
1/2 pound red lentils (a heaping cup), preferably soaked for several hours beforehand
1 quart vegetable stock
black pepper to taste
cayenne to taste (optional, omit for Pitta and Vata)
juice of 1/2 small lime
For garnish: chopped fresh cilantro, thick greek yogurt if you like

Heat the oil in a soup pot, and add the onion. Cook until translucent and sweet but not brown, about 5 minutes over medium heat. Add the garlic, salt and spices; stir for about a minute, not too long; don't burn the spices. Add the tomatoes and put the heat just under medium. Cook for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the tomatoes have reduced their juices. Add the lentils and the stock; stir well and taste for salt. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, cover and simmer for 30 minutes, until the lentils have broken up. Add the spring greens and cook for another 5-10 minutes, until they are bright green and tender.



When the lentils and greens are ready, taste the soup for spice and salt. Add black pepper and cayenne, if using. Add the lime juice and stir it in. Toss in a handful of chopped cilantro (coriander) leaves and take the soup off the heat. Stir the leaves around. Serve topped with a spoonful of thickened yogurt if you like. I didn't have any but it didn't matter; it was totally delicious anyway. I ate it with a fresh salad of leaves from our amazing local CSA farm, with bits of fresh organic mozzarella. Perfect dinner for one. Enjoy!

An ode to summer...that it might return. Grilled eggplant, tomato and haloumi.

My favourite day of the year isn't Christmas or my birthday...it's the first day, after the long English fall, winter and spring, where we can sleep with the window open. Where we need to sleep with the window open because it's that hot outside. Oh, it feels so amazingly indulgent and...gosh, I feel a bit silly saying it...but it feels luscious to sleep with the window open in England. This reminds me of the dinner party I was at recently where someone said 'fecund' and we had to keep using it all evening, just to giggle at how naughty it sounded without being a naughty word.



Another thing that feels silly, but which I must do sometimes, is take pictures of the laundry which dries on the line in our backyard. Do you ever notice film directors using billowing, creamy linen drying in the sun to convey emotion? I'm not sure where I've seen this but something about hanging out the wash does it for me. Especially the way white sheets will capture the light, whether it's the first hot, totally sunny days of the year or an approaching storm.


I have plenty of good food anecdotes that came out of last week's amazing weather, but for now I shall focus on this one: barbecued summer vegetables and haloumi. We make this in the oven once every month or two, but making it over an open flame is at least ten times better. I might even wax philosophical about reconnecting with the element of fire in our modern lives, so full of microwaves and plastic-wrapped ready meals. Bleagh.

In case you're not familiar with haloumi, it's a fresh cheese made from goat and sheep's milk, originally from Palestine. It has a high melting point, so you can grill it. Don't salt it, though, as it has plenty on its own. This isn't so good from an Ayurvedic perspective, since salt is heating and on a hot day...you've already got heat. But once in a while, I can't help myself. And the other day, I discovered that if you have some fresh-baked local artisan whole grain bread, and a fire-roasted tomato that you brushed with herbed garlic olive oil marinade, you can make a juicy open-faced sandwich that gets your hand messy and tastes like heaven.


I feel an 'ode to aubergine/eggplant' moment coming on, too. Eggplants don't seem to have the potent flavours on their own that, say, a tomato might; but when you brush them with herby oil and fire-roast them...wow. They take up an essential essence of flame that, really, is exactly what you might want in the middle of a cold winter. It prompted one of our frequent "We eat such good food!" conversations, which goes something like this:
Colm: Wow. We eat really good food.
Michelle: Mm, I know. Amazing, huh?
Colm: Mm hmm.
Yes, highly intellectual, but true. So do try this very simple summer BBQ, there's nothing unusual about it, it's just simple and good. It may be the perfect way to start eating your vegetables (dad!). Unless, of course, you live in my area where we've gone back to 60F (15C) and drizzle.

Roasted Summer Vegetables and Haloumi

You'll need:
1 package of haloumi cheese, sliced into pieces 1 cm thick
1 or 2 eggplants/aubergines; 1 or 2 zucchini/courgettes; 2 tomatoes; other nice vegetables to use: large shiitake or portobello mushrooms, onions, corn on the cob, asparagus...
Herbal oil: 1/4 cup good olive oil, into which you can put: 1 large or 2 minced/pressed garlic cloves; salt and fresh ground pepper; and herbs of your choice. We had sage, thyme and oregano.

Make the herby oil ahead of time so the flavours infuse the oil. Instead of slicing the tomatoes and having the juice go everywhere, I cut out the top where the stem was, made a little funnel and put some oil with the garlic bits & herbs down inside. Slice the eggplant and courgette in long strips from end to end, about 1 cm thick, and lay them out on a baking tray or flat plates. Brush them on both sides with the oil (I don't soak the veg in the oil the way one might do with some meats; they'll soak it up and become little grease bags) and let them sit for a while, maybe 30 minutes while you get the grill going.

The next part I did not do, so this is guesswork; but basically, once the fire has died down and the coals are nice and hot, put your veggies on the racks and grill them until they start to blacken a bit but not too much; you know, barbecue them. Careful not to let them burn or to drop them in the ashes. A good pair of tongs helps.

Grill the haloumi until it gets the nice grill lines on it and is toasty brown. Slice some bread, put a tomato on it (or half of one), smoosh it on the bread and put a piece of haloumi on top. Eat. Love.

Note: the herbal marinade contributes essential flavour and moisture to the vegetables here, so don't skimp on the herbs, garlic, minced shallot or spring onion...whatever you like. Basil would be lovely in there, too. If you don't eat cheese, or bread, then just take that part out and enjoy what you can eat here - all elements were amazing on their own, but some make great combinations.

Tomatoes, garlic, haloumi and eggplant are too heating and/or oily for Pitta, so Pitta-types shouldn't have this all the time. But the courgettes, asparagus, corn on the cob and shiitake mushrooms that we also brushed with oil and grilled were absolutely amazing, and those are fine for Pitta.

One thing's for sure - beet risotto

Colm left on a train, about 40 minutes ago, and won't be back for over a week. I found myself walking home, racing the rain to get inside before it covered my head, wondering what the next 10 days will be like. I've been in a particularly dreamy, creative frame of mind for the past two weeks and now with the house to myself, I can't wait to see what I'll do with all this time.

This dreaminess has inspired many goals for my time alone with the cat. I'd like to: 1. make some significant progress reading "The Mists of Avalon"; 2. start working through the list of movies for 'Deeply Feeling People' on the Anima Center website, and maybe invite the girls over for one or two of them; 3. bake a batch of these...and give some to George, the bare-footed poet / shaman / rune master who works at Gaia, the local organic foods store, who gave me an amazing rune reading today, and will soon be making me a wand and medallion (I am so spoiled!). I also made a to-do list today, full of things like 're-vamp website' and 'email so-and-so'...you get the idea. On Sunday, there's a 10K race which, yesterday, I found out I'll be running in; and a conference call that night.

So I'm full of anticipation and can't keep it to myself. Something funny happens when the 'half of two' leaves and we're left to our own devices, in the house, alone with the cat who snores on the stairs. Late-night whims kick in, whether it be blogging or pulling out the deck of tarot cards or reading journals from 10 years ago to puzzle over old desires...and then when the other one comes back, we're refreshed and have a new perspective. We forget how beautiful the other person is and get to look at them with fresh eyes; it's like the first date all over again (well, perhaps a bit more familiar than the first). I guess what I mean is, it's good to have a life together and a life of one's own. But you knew that.



I'm finding it hard to segway from my musings into this recipe for beet risotto. I haven't blogged in several months, and I know it will take a handful of posting before I feel focused. But the idea went something like this: "I don't know what I'll actually get done this week. But one thing I do know is that I really like beet risotto!" I'm not sure if that will fly, but who cares when it's so yummy?

This is a recipe that I got from "Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone" by the impeccable Deborah Madison. I call this book 'The Bible', because it's so freakin' huge, and because it has every ingredient in it that a vegetarian might ever want some inspiration for: it's a cookbook to live by. There are over 1,400 recipes, and it really helped me learn how to cook when I started in 2004. One night, coming home on the subway in NYC, I saw two girls holding a copy and I knew I was destined to have one of my own.

I jumped at this recipe because of the 'jewel-color' she promises in the final product. If we owned this house, I would paint a wall a similar shade. It also sounded so unusual, which is a major attraction factor between me and food. It didn't fail to please, and even Colm, the professional skeptic who is slightly more picky than I, loved it. Beets are wonderful for blood health, and in Ayurveda they're decently tolerated by all doshas (don't overdo it for Pitta). I love juicing them with ginger and apple, too.



Beet Risotto
Adapted from Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison

You'll need:
1 bunch of beets and their greens; 1 small/medium diced onion; 1/2 cup dry white wine; 3 TBS olive oil or butter or a mixture; 1.5 cups arborio rice; 6 cups vegetable stock; 2 teaspoons dried basil; 1 tablespoon dried parsley; fresh ground black pepper; zest and juice of one small lemon or part of a large one; a handful of pre-toasted pine nuts or chopped walnuts; 1/2 cup crumbled goat's cheese (optional). Note: the herbs can be fresh, of course; but our basil isn't grown up enough for me to start eating it, and I didn't want to go all the way to the top of town for fresh parsley, so I cheated.

How to make it:
Wash, peel and grate the beets until you have about 2 cups. Wash the greens and chop them into small squares or whatever bite-size you fancy. You may want to de-stem them, unless you're a fan of beet stems.
Melt the butter or heat the oil in a medium/large saucepan, and add the onion. Cook over medium heat until translucent and sweet but not caramelized. Add the rice and stir until well coated, about a minute; then add the white wine and simmer until it's absorbed. Now add in the grated beet root, along with the basil and parsley. Stir this all around, then add 2 cups of stock and bring to a simmer. Cover and simmer until the stock is absorbed, then keep adding stock in 1/2 cup increments and let each addition absorb before adding more. When you've added all 6 cups and the risotto is just about done, add in the beet greens. Adding them at this late stage will keep them fresh and not overcooked, but heated enough so that the texture is nice and they're easily digestible. Season with fresh pepper, taste for salt, and add the lemon zest and juice. Thoroughly mix, then serve. Sprinkle with goat's cheese and the toasted nuts - enJOY!