I haven't been great at keeping up with recipe write-ups lately. I still have recipes from Thanksgiving that need written up. Plus some curries, breads, and soups. But I'll start with today's recipe and work my way through from there.

Recipe-as-written this was meant to be a Swiss chard (silverbeet) dish. But I didn't have any Swiss chard and TF doesn't like it anyway, so I opted to make it with kale instead.

I quite liked this. So did TF. Sadly, the Kidlet wasn't a fan. But she liked the last kale dish I made, so she just had some of that with dinner instead.

Chopped Greens with Lemon and Anchovy

Slightly adapted from Vegetable of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 400-450g kale or Swiss chard (silverbeet)
• 3 Tbsp. olive oil, divided
• 3/4 c. chicken or vegetable stock, divided
• 2 oil-packed anchovies
• 2 Tbsp. lemon juice
• pepper, to taste
• 1/2 onion, chopped
• 1/2 c. diced tomatoes

Directions

1. Cut the leaves from the stems of the kale.
2. Cut the kale leaves into ribbons (chiffonade) and set them aside.
3. Cut the stems crosswise into 1cm chunks, discarding the tough end pieces.
4. Heat 1 Tbsp. of the oil over medium heat.
5. Add the stems and cook for ~5 minutes.
6. Add 1/4 c. of the stock and cook for another 4 minutes.
7. Push the stems to one side of the pan and add the anchovies to the other side.
8. Cook and mash the anchovies until they break down.
9. Mix the stems with the anchovies.
10. Turn off heat and stir in the lemon juice and mix in freshly ground pepper to taste.
11. Stir around in the hot pan for a minute or so, then transfer to a serving dish.
12. Once the pan has been thoroughly scraped out, return to medium heat and add the remaining 2 Tbsp. of oil.
13. Add the onion and cook for 6-7 minutes.
14. Add the chopped leaves one large handful at a time.
15. Once all the greens have been added and slightly wilted, add the remaining stock along with the tomatoes.
16. Cook, stirring occasionally, for ~10 minutes.

I picked up a bunch of cookbooks in a Humble Bundle a while back. I'm not really used to using digital/PDF cookbooks, so it's taken me a while to get around to using them. But I was in a cookbook browsing mood the other day, so I decided to crack one open and take a look.

This recipe is from the Vegetable of the Day Cookbook. It's organized like a calendar with one recipe for each day of the year.

I'm not really interested in trying to cook each recipe on the day it's assigned to in the book. But I do appreciate the collection of varied and somewhat seasonal vegetable recipes.

I thought about trying to start with a November recipe (for maximum seasonality) or trying to find something that looked like it would match thematically with the rest of the dinner. But, in the end, what I really felt like, was just starting at the beginning of the book and working my way though. So that's what I ended up doing!

The January 1^st recipe was for "spicy sautéed kale and chickpeas". I didn't have any tinned chickpeas on hand though and I didn't feel like cooking dried ones from scratch, so I decided to use cannellini beans instead. The creaminess of the beans actually worked quite well with the kale and chili flakes, so I think I will just default to using them for this dish from now on. I'm sure the chickpeas would also be good, but I think I prefer the cannellini beans here.

Spicy Sautéed Kale and Beans

Slightly adapted from Vegetable of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 3-4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
• 1/4 c. olive oil
• 450g black kale, coarsely shredded
• 1 (540mL) can cannellini (white kidney) beans, drained and rinsed
• 1/8-1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes
• 1 tsp. coarse sea salt

Directions

1. Warm garlic and oil over medium-low heat and cook, stirring often, until softened (~7 minutes).
2. Add ~1/2 of the kale to the pan, cover, and cook for ~2 minutes.
3. Add remaining kale and toss to coat with oil.
4. Cover and cook until tender (~15 minutes).
5. Uncover and stir in beans, pepper flakes, and salt.
6. Increase heat to medium and cook until the beans are heated through (~5 minutes).

I'm very tired and I was seriously tempted to just post this recipe as a list of ingredients with baker's percentages. That would be sufficient for most wheat breads. But I'm not super confident with rye yet. So it probably makes sense to try to document exactly what I did. So, here we go!

Sourdough Rye

Slightly adapted form Sourdough Companion

Ingredients

• 188g (100% hydration) starter
• 200mL water, plus a bit extra for kneading
• 122g all-purpose flour
• 122g hard (strong/high grade/bread) whole wheat flour
• 122g rye flour¹
• 11g olive oil
• 11g molasses
• 7g coarse sea salt
• 4g carroway seeds

Directions

1. Feed up your starter and get it good and active.²
2. Mix the water, all-purpose flour, and whole wheat flour, cover, and let sit for at least an hour.
3. Spread a little of the rye flour on your work surface and turn the dough-like flour-water mixture out onto it.
4. Add the starter on top of the dough and knead it a few strokes to begin working the starter into the dough.
5. Once the starter and flour on the work surface have been incorporated, add the oil and continue kneading.
6. Add a little more rye flour to the work surface under the dough and add the molasses and salt on top of it. Knead to work it in.
7. Add a bit more flour to the work surface and add the carroway seeds on top. Knead to incorporate.
8. Once the carroway seeds have been worked in, wet your hands.
9. Continue kneading, wetting your hands every few strokes, until the dough begins to get sticky.
10. Add the rest of the rye flour to the work surface and continue kneading to work it in.
11. If the dough starts to seem tight or dry, wet your hands and add more water, a little at a time.
12. Once the dough seems to have reached a good consistency and is pleasantly supple, return to bowl, cover, and allow to rest until well risen³.
13. Wet your work surface slightly and turn the dough out onto it.
14. Press the dough flat and fold in thirds (letter fold).
15. Fold in thirds the other way.
16. Roll up jelly-roll-style and place seam-side-up in a well-floured banneton.
17. Cover and let rest until well-risen. (Timing will depend on temperature.)
18. Preheat oven to 230°C (450°F).
19. Grease a baking sheet and sprinkle with cornmeal.
20. Place a pan of boiling water on the bottom rack of the oven.
21. Turn the loaf out onto the baking sheet and slash as desired.
22. Bake on the middle rack for 15 minutes.
23. Carefully remove steam pan from oven and reduce temperature to 180°C (350°F) and bake for another 20 minutes.
24. Turn off heat and let bread sit in hot oven for 10 minutes.
25. Remove from oven and transfer bread to wire rack to cool.

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¹ I usually grind my own rye flour fresh. If you're using store-bought rye flour, look for "dark" or "whole" rye if possible. That said, any rye flour should work for this recipe. ^Back
2 I like to start with 10g of starter 24-36 hours before I want to mix the dough. I add 20g each of flour and water to the starter and let it sit for 8-16 hours. Then I give it a second feeding of 70g each of flour and water and let it sit for another 12 hours or so until it looks nice and bubbly. The flour and water for the dough can be mixed any time during this second feeding/fermentation. ^Back
3 The original recipe calls for ~3 hours of rising at room temperature, but this will vary with your room and the activity of the starter. I didn't want to have to deal with mine until the next day, so I put it in the cold room overnight and it still didn't seem quite ready to go yet 16 hours later. Use your judgement (and your fingers) to determine when your dough has finished rising and is ready for the next step. ^Back

This Hello Fresh recipe was a quick build. Symbol and I both liked it; the Kidlet liked it so much that she had it for lunch several days in a row!

Black Bean & Corn Stew

Hello Fresh

Ingredients

• 30mL (2 tbsp) oil
• 740mL (3 C) black beans, tinned, with their juice
• 30mL (2 tbsp) enchilada spice blend
• 1 tsp garlic salt
• 360mL (1½ C) vegetable broth
• 2.5mL (½ tsp) sugar
• 2 bell peppers, diced
• 480mL (2 C) tomato salsa
• 250g corn kernels
• ~120mL cilantro, chopped
• ~120mL (½ C) guacamole
• 1 lime, wedged
• tortilla chips or toasted pita wedges, for serving

Directions

1. Heat a large pot over medium-high heat.
2. Add the oil, beans (with their tinning liquid), enchilada spice blend, garlic salt, and black pepper to taste.
3. Bring to a simmer, reduce heat to medium, and cook until heated through and beans soften slightly, ~4-5 minutes.
4. Carefully mash most of the beans, leaving some whole.
5. Add broth, sugar, cilantro, corn, and peppers.
6. Simmer until peppers are tender, 8-10 minutes.
7. Garnish with guacamole and lime squeezings. Serve with tortilla chips.

Lamb is a popular meat in Morocco and mechoui is one of the most famous lamb preparations. It involves spit-roasting a whole lamb over hot coals and basting it liberally with butter. This is an approximation of that dish. Since spit-roasting a whole lamb is not exactly accessible for the average home cook, Wolfert presents this recipe that involves roasting a lamb quarter in the oven.

I'm really happy with how this came out overall. Everyone seemed to enjoy it. And I think the leftovers actually tasted even better the next day! I'd love to try the real thing done with a whole lamb sometime. Although that's definitely not something I could do at home.

I served this as the centrepiece of my Thanksgiving dinner this year. It ended up being a pretty nice spread. I cooked lamb, purslane salad, couscous, harissa, red pepper sauce, eggplant zaalouk, byssara, tagine bread, and poached pears. My brother brought a great cucumber-tomato salad with tahini and pitas. And my mom did some lovely Moroccan-spiced squash and made a delicious orange cake for dessert.

Getting the lamb ended up being a bit of an adventure, but I managed to get it sorted out eventually!

Roast Forequarter of Lamb

From The Food of Morocco by Paula Wolfert

Ingredients

• 1 lamb forequarter (4.5-5.5kg)
• 6 cloves garlic, chopped
• 1 Tbsp. coarse sea salt
• 2 Tbsp. olive oil
• 3 Tbsp. unsalted butter, softened
• 2 Tbsp. coriander seeds, ground
• 1 Tbsp. cumin seeds, ground
• 1/2 Tbsp. sweet paprika
• coarse sea salt and ground cumin, for serving

Directions

1. Make a deep incision under the foreleg and along the breastplate of the lamb.
2. Combine the garlic and sea salt in a mortar or molcajete and grind to a paste.
3. Combine the garlic paste, olive oil, butter, coriander, cumin, and paprika and mix well.
4. Rub the buttery spice mix into the meat and let stand for 30 minutes.
5. Preheat oven to 250°C (475°F).
6. Place the lamb (fatty side up) on a large roasting pan or rimmed baking sheet.
7. Place on the middle shelf of the oven and roast at 250°C (475°F) for 15 minutes.
8. Reduce heat to 150°C (300°F) and continue to roast for 4-5 hours, basting thoroughly with the pan juices every 15 minutes. You should be able to easily pull the meat from the bones with your fingers when the lamb is done. It will be very tender with a crispy outer layer.
9. Serve with bowls of salt and cumin.

This makes a tasty topping for many baked goods. Decide whether to use the chile flakes and/or salt based on what the mixture will be going on.

Seed Sprinkle Topping

Slightly adapted from Everyday Healthy Cookbook by Dana Jacobi

Ingredients

• 20g sliced almonds
• 2 tsp. raw pumpkin seeds
• 1 tsp. chia seeds
• 1 tsp. sesame seeds
• 1/8 tsp. red chile flakes (optional)
• 1/4 tsp. coarse sea salt

Directions

1. Heat a pan over medium-low heat.
2. Add the almonds and cook for a minute or two.
3. Add hte pumpkin seeds and cook for another minute or so.
4. Add the chia and sesame seeds and cook until almonds and sesame are light golden. Be careful not to burn them!
5. Remove from heat and stir in chile flakes and/or salt, if using.

It's been a while since I've made anything out of our Cook's Country magazines and I was feeling at a bit of a loss for dinner inspiration, so I figured maybe it was time to browse the recipe list again. This chili looked easy and tasty and I already had most of the ingredients on hand, so it seemed ideal. Not least of all because it would let us use up a little more ground beef, which we have in abundance at the moment.

The original recipe involved cooking the rice in the skillet and then keeping it warm in individual serving bowls while you cook the chili in the same skillet you used for the rice. I appreciate that this avoids dirtying a second cooking vessel. But I wasn't crazy about cooking the two components sequentially and bringing the oven into the mix, so I opted to use the InstantPot for the rice and let it do its thing while TF helped me put together the chili.

Skillet Chili Bowls

Slightly adapted from Cook's Country October/November 2020

Ingredients

• 1/2 c. sour cream
• 1/4 c. chopped fresh cilantro, divided
• 2 tsp. grated lime zest, divided
• 2-3 Tbsp. lime juice, divided
• 450g ground beef (preferably 90% lean)
• 2 Tbsp. water
• 1/4 tsp. baking soda
• 3/4 tsp. coarse sea salt¹, divided
• 1/8 tsp. black peppercorns, ground
• 1 c. long-grain brown rice
• 1 Tbsp. bacon fat
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 red bell pepper, chopped
• 1 Tbsp. cumin seeds, ground
• 2-3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 chipotle in adobo, minced
• 450mL tomato sauce
• 2 c. cooked black beans²
• 1 c. frozen corn
• grated Cheddar, to serve (optional)
• pickled jalapeños, to serve (optional)

Directions

1. Combine sour cream, 2 Tbsp. of the cilantro, 1 tsp. of the lime zest, and half the lemon juice and mix well. Set aside and chill until ready to use.
2. Mix beef with the water, baking soda, 1/4 tsp. of the salt, and pepper and let rest for 20-30 minutes.
3. Cook the rice by your preferred method with 1/2 tsp. of the salt.³
4. Once the rice is done, stir in the remaining lime zest, lime juice, and cilantro.
5. Melt the bacon grease over medium heat.
6. Add the onion and bell pepper and cook for ~7 minutes.
7. Add the beef and cook for another 6-7 minutes.
8. Add cumin, garlic, and chipotle and cook for 1 minute.
9. Add tomato sauce, beans, and corn and cook for 5 more minutes.
10. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
11. Serve chili over rice and topped with Cheddar, jalapeños, and/or crema (the cilantro-lime sour cream mixture).

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¹ The original recipe called for a whopping 2 tsp. of salt! 1/4 tsp. in the beef, 1/4 tsp. in the crema, 1/2 tsp. in the rice, and 1 tsp. added to the chili in the last 5 minutes of cooking. That seemed like way too much to me. Especially since we were using tinned beans and tinned tomato sauce (both of which the recipe specifically calls for). If you are cooking your own beans from scratch and making your own tomato sauce, then you might find you need to add a little salt at the end of cooking, but taste it first! ^Back
2 I forgot to get my beans cooking ahead of time, so we didn't have any black beans ready to hand for the chili. My second and third choice would've been kidney or pinto beans, but we didn't have any of those pre=cooked either. I ended up tossing in a tin of cannellini (white kidney) beans. They actually worked pretty well! Although I do think it would've been even better with black beans. ^Back
3 For me this means a 1:1 ratio of rice and water in the InstantPot on high pressure for 18 minutes (for long-grain brown rice) with a 10-minute natural release. ^Back