Category Archives: Easily Multiplies to Feed a Crowd

A Healthy Indulgence: Whole Grain Banana Cardamom Muffins (with optional chocolate, of course)

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I’ve been keeping a close eye on the banana situation recently.  We like bananas in our family, I usually keep the fruit bowl stocked with them, but, you know, sometimes there is disequalibrium between supply and demand.  And for those times there is banana bread.

After the first brown spots appeared on the bananas on my counter, I began to get hopeful.  I flipped through a few of my cookbooks, contemplating my banana bread options.  I saw a recipe for a banana cardamom cake and got excited.  Days went by.  The bananas were definitely going to be mine to bake with.  Really, it was time.  Seriously.

Then today this recipe popped up on my screen, and I was ready.  (Isn’t that a nice blog?  Go ahead, go click through to her website, check out that recipe, and vote for her for a Bloggie for Best Canadian Blog.  I’ll wait.)  You back?  So you saw why I didn’t just make that recipe: the coconut.  I know I’m in the minority here, but coconut isn’t my favorite.  What IS my favorite, you ask?  Chocolate, of course.  So I knew it was time for a recipe mashup.  One other consideration was that I wanted to make these healthy enough for my kids’ school lunches, which meant that starting with a stick of butter was out.

I went halfsies on this recipe and made some some of the muffins with cocoa and chocolate chips and the rest without.  You’ll like them either way.  Banana Cardamom Muffins start with 2-3 mashed bananas, of course, preferably sorry browning specimens that have been rejected by your family.  Mix the mashed bananas with 3/4 c. buttermilk, 1/2 c. brown sugar, an egg, and 2 Tb. melted butter.  Stir 1 c. oats into the wet ingredients.  In a separate bowl, combine 1 1/4 c. whole wheat pastry flour, 1 tsp. ground cardamom, and 1 1/2 tsp. baking soda.  (If you are making the chocolate version, now add 2 Tbsp. cocoa powder and a handful of chocolate chips to the dry ingredients and 1 tsp. vanilla to the wet ingredients.)  Mix the wet ingredients into the dry just to combine and scoop the batter into lined muffin tins.  Bake at 350 for 20-23 minutes, checking every minute after 20 minutes to avoid overbaking.

Simple Brown Rice Sushi Bowl

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There is an extensive list of finicky cooking tasks that J & I don’t do anymore.  Making sushi for a crowd is on that list.  Love the flavors, hate the time it takes to assemble and slice 20 rolls.  This is an easy way out, and can easily be scaled to feed many or a few.

To make this Simple Brown Rice Sushi Bowl spread, start by making a pot of cheaters’ sushi rice.  Bring to a boil one part short-grain brown rice in two parts water with 1/2 tsp. salt per cup of rice, then lower the pot to a simmer for 40 minutes.  Remove from heat and leave covered for 5 minutes (I put a clean dishtowel under the lid to absorb some moisture), then fluff with a fork and stir in seasoned rice vinegar and additional salt to taste.  Set rice aside.  Meanwhile, prepare your toppings: roast a pan of sweet potato batons (for about 30 minutes at 450, stirring a few times), pan-fry some tofu (I season mine with equal parts soy sauce and fish sauce plus a pinch of sugar), and slice up some green onions, nori strips, and avocado.  Other possible toppings could include edamame, mushrooms or spinach sauteed in sesame oil, a thinly-sliced egg pancake, raw fish–whatever floats your sushi boat.  Serve rice and toppings separately and let everyone assemble their own bowls.  Garnish with toasted sesame seeds.

Celebrate Spring with a Canning Jar Coddled Egg

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I admit that, at first, I found Seattle a bit too grey. It took me a few years to stop minding the weather and learn to love soup. But that was more than a decade ago, before I realized that it doesn’t rain that much, and when the sun shines it’s incomparably gorgeous. And now I just think of Seattle as having five months of springtime. Starting today.

So happy springtime! Right on schedule, my hens laid their first two eggs of 2012, and when I poked around in the garden I found soft green herbs unfurling from hibernation. The first chives, tender parsley, tart sorrel, green onion shoots, mint. Lunch.

When I read this the other day, I couldn’t believe that it had never occurred to me to coddle an egg in a canning jar. (Is that weird? Really, I couldn’t believe it.) So, as I said, lunch.

To make a Coddled Egg in a Canning Jar, butter a wide mouth half pint canning jar. Crack in two eggs and season with a pinch of salt. I drizzled in a spoonful of cream because I had some in the fridge, then piled in the handful of chopped fresh herbs. You wouldn’t go wrong adding cheese instead of the cream (or, go crazy, use both), but I didn’t. Put the lid on the jar and place it in a pot. Fill the pot with water to just below the jar lid. Remove the jar from the water, bring the water to a simmer, put the jar back in, and simmer 12-15 minutes, depending on how well-cooked you want your yolks. (Think ahead of time about how you will lift the jar from the simmering water. I used a jar lifter, which I own for canning, but I’ve heard of people using tongs with the ends wrapped in rubber bands for traction. If you plan to use this method, you should probably try it first in cold water to make sure it seems safe.)

I love the idea of serving these for brunch with a toppings bar–label the lids with a Sharpie and let everyone assemble their own. With a few pots on the stove you could cook a lot of these at once. Serve with buttered toast.

 

Everyone’s Doing It: Sweet, Salty, Savory Olive Oil Granola

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I have been reading Melissa Clark recipes as my bedtime stories this past month, and I was intrigued by a recipe she described for a granola made with olive oil.  Sweetness from brown sugar, earthy undertones from the olive oil, you understand why I bookmarked the page.  But you know that thing that happens sometimes, where you never heard of something and then once you learn about it you see it EVERYWHERE?  Turns out, suddenly there are variations on this recipe for olive oil granola all over the interwebs.

And tonight I learned why.  Because it’s good.  So good I could hardly stop stealing pinches off the tray–and that was before it was baked.  You might want to make it this weekend–if you can wait that long.

Of all the nearly-identical recipes, I started with this one, which was pretty much pared down to the essentials already, but I simplified it one step further by eliminating the coconut, which is not my thing.  If it’s yours, add a cup of coconut flakes to the recipe below.  Like most granola recipes, you can vary the nuts and seeds and/or add fruit to suit your taste.

Preheat your oven to 300 while you get a big bowl and mix 3 1/2 c. oats with 1 c. each of raw pumpkin seeds and raw sunflower seeds and 1 1/2 c. whole pecans.  Pour over 1/2 c. brown sugar, 1/2 c. olive oil, 3/4 c. maple syrup and 1 tsp. kosher salt and mix well.  Divide between two sheet pans and bake until nice and toasty, about 30 mins., switching the pans and stirring well every 10 minutes.  Let cool completely before storing in an airtight jar.

Eat by the handful from said jar.  Or, if you want to get fancy, you could put your handful of granola in a little bowl first.

 

 

 

p.s. As you may have guessed, this granola is not exactly health food.  If you’re looking for an everyday recipe with a lower proportion of sweetener and fat, you might like this Almond and Dried Cherry Granola recipe.

An Easy Little Butterscotch Cookie (or Nutella Sandwich Cookie)

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When there are children–sometimes many children–running around the house all day every day, it’s handy to have a quick and easy cookie recipe at your fingertips.  Because at some point you’re going to need some cookies, stat.  And maybe the children will want one, too.  This recipe will make both you and them happy.

I felt the need to make amends after dissing a Moosewood cookbook the other day (is there a special karmic penalty for that, do you think?).  So I pulled one of my many Moosewoods off the shelf and flipped through it.  And right away the book (Simple Suppers) reminded me to make these cookies again, because they take five minutes and can be smooshed full of Nutella.  What’s not to love?

This is a cookie that you can take in a few different directions.  Need a tray of warm cookies 15 minutes from now?  Preheat your your oven while you mix the ingredients then scoop and flatten 1″ balls of dough onto your cookie sheet, and you can be enjoying soft butterscotch-scented bites of love after 8 minutes of baking.  Maybe you could have them ready even sooner.

Or whip up a batch of dough, roll it into logs and freeze it, then cut it into quarter-inch slices and bake your cookies into nice uniform wafers, ready to be nibbled alone or– don’t forget these cookies’ highest calling!–sandwiched together with Nutella.

However you decide to bake the little beauties, the recipe is simple.  Cream a stick of butter with a cup of brown sugar, then add an egg, a tsp. of vanilla, and 1/4 tsp. salt.  Scrape down your bowl and then mix in 1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour.  Voila.  Now is the time to freeze them in 1 1/2″ diameter logs, if you can wait; or go ahead and bake ’em now.  Bake at 375 until the bottoms are just getting light golden for a soft cookie, or until they’re golden brown for a crisp wafer (8-12 minutes).

Remembering Summer: Fish Taco Spread for a Snowy Day

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It’s charming to be cooped up by a rare Seattle snowfall.  For about three hours.  Snowball fight, check.  Snowman, check.  Snowy tromp through the neighborhood, check.  Hot chocolate.  Um, is the snow starting to melt yet?

Apparently not.  Apparently there is more coming.  It’s gorgeous, of course, and I’m sure we’ll have more fun family adventures in the snow tomorrow–but for tonight we channeled summer, drank beer with friends, and ate fish tacos.

This Fish Taco Spread isn’t the kind of authentic that will transport you to a San Diego beach, but it hits the spot in mid-winter in Seattle.

First, start your quick-pickled onions and hot peppers: combine a small, thinly-sliced red onion with strips of jalapeno in a non-reactive pot and add 1 c. seasoned rice vinegar, the juice of half a lime, and a tsp. of salt.  Bring to a bare simmer and stir for a minute, then remove from the heat and cool to room temperature.

Make a lime crema by combining equal parts sour cream and mayonnaise with a big pinch of salt; zest in a lime and then thin the mixture with lime juice to taste.

Prepare your fish (we used a couple of cod fillets) by making a rub of 1 tsp. oregano, 2 tsp. cumin, 1 Tbsp. chili powder, 1/2 tsp. salt, 1/2 tsp. black pepper, and a Tbsp. or more of brown sugar.  Rub the fish with oil and then pat the spice mixture all over it.  Bake at 400 until the fish flakes (this will depend on the thickness of your fish); turn on the broiler for a minute or two at the end to caramelize the spice mix if it isn’t already bubbling.

Heat plenty of corn tortillas (you can toss them in the oven with the fish for a few minutes) and serve them wrapped in a towel with the fish, pickled onions, crema, grated cheese, shredded cabbage, cilantro, and a good salsa or two.  Everyone grabs a couple tortillas, breaks off chunks of fish, and adorns their own plate of fish tacos.

 

Winter Vegetarian Chili

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The chili purists bicker about beans, no beans, veggies, no veggies, whatever.  This recipe is not for them.  They’d flip out over this one. It’s smoky, meaty, tomato-y, all the things a good chili should be–but it’s vegetarian.

This is a secret, shh, but this chili has wheat berries* in it.  I know, it’s crazy.  But they’re great.  They are combined with black beans to give the chili texture and rib-sticking density, while the flavor is anchored by chipotles and cumin and elevated by lime and cilantro at the end.  This is my go-to winter chili.

To make this Winter Vegetarian Chili, start by cooking about a cup of wheat berries in water to cover by an inch and a teaspoon of salt.  (Cooked wheat berries freeze well, though, so why not make more while you’re at it?)  Bring them to a boil and simmer for about an hour, until pleasantly chewy.  Meanwhile, get your chili going: saute a chopped onion with a chopped red pepper for a few minutes, then add 5 minced cloves of garlic, 1 tsp. oregano and 2 tsp. each of chili powder and cumin.  Once the spices start to get toasty, stir in 1-2 tsp. of pureed chipotles until fragrant (I buy canned chipotles in adobo and puree the whole can with the adobo sauce; the puree keeps in the fridge forever, as far as I can tell).  Then add a big can of chopped tomatoes, 3-4 c. of cooked or canned black beans (with some of their liquid, if you cooked them yourself), some of the liquid from the cooked wheat berries, a Tbsp. of brown sugar and salt and pepper to taste.  Simmer for a while and then add your drained cooked wheat berries and cook for a few minutes longer.  Squeeze in a whole lime at the end.  I first found this recipe in Eating Well, which basically means it’s health food.  But don’t let that stop you from topping your bowl with some grated cheese and sour cream in addition to avocado, a lime wedge and cilantro.  And you can never go wrong with a chunk of corn bread.

*What’s a wheat berry, you ask?  It’s the whole wheat kernel, it looks a little like brown rice, and it cooks up into a nutty, chewy, delicious little bite of good-for-you-whole-grain.  Wheat berries make great salads, I’ll tell you about that another time.  And when you’re shopping for them, pick hard red wheat berries instead of soft white ones–but if white wheat berries are all you have, don’t worry, they’ll work just fine.

Cherry Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies = “Breakfast Cookies”

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The baby is sick, so no one is sleeping–and no one is cooking.

But J made breakfast cookies, which will surely be breakfast tomorrow.

Yes, we call these Breakfast Cookies.  They are our house’s specialty cookie.  The name started as a joke, but–let’s be honest–is there a time of day when a cookie doesn’t sound delicious?  Why NOT for breakfast?  Anyway, they can be varied with different dried fruits and nuts, and we always bake some without chocolate for the child in our family who doesn’t like chocolate (I know, it’s crazy, but we have one).  I like raisins and walnuts, myself.   The kids like dried cranberries.  We were out of both of those dried fruits, but luckily Cherry Chocolate Chip Breakfast Cookies aren’t half bad.

To make a huge mountain of them (for a small mountain, halve the recipe), mix together 1 c. brown sugar, 1 c. granulated sugar, 1/4 c. canola oil and 1/4 c. applesauce, then mix in 2 eggs, 2 tsp. vanilla, and 2 Tbsp. milk.  In a separate bowl, combine 2 c. flour (you can use part whole wheat), 1 tsp. baking soda, 1 tsp. baking powder, and 1 tsp. salt.  Mix these dry ingredients into the wet ingredients.  Adding them a cup at a time, work 4 c. oats into the dough.  Mix in 1 c. chocolate chips, 1 c. dried fruit and 1 c. chopped nuts (or whatever chocolate/dried fruit/nut combo sounds good to you).  Bake at 350 until the tops of the cookies are almost completely dry (how long to cook them depends on the size; we usually cook 2-Tbsp. mounds of dough for about 10 minutes).  The cookies will be soft but you can leave them on the cookie sheet to cool for a crispy bottom.

Spinach-Mushroom-Swiss Egg White Frittata and Lentil Soup with Rosemary

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As a mostly-vegetarian (and especially during this time in my life when I’m nursing babies), I find that one of my challenges is getting enough protein without overdoing it in the fat/calorie department.  (Not that I’m OPPOSED to overdoing it in the fat/calorie department–but, you know, moderation in all…nah, scratch that.)  So anyway, I am tentatively experimenting with things that I don’t normally consider food, like egg whites from a carton–which I can only bear to do because our chickens have stopped laying for the winter–and low-fat cheeses.  So if that sounds terrible to you, stop right here and skip to the soup below.  But if you’re looking for a way to add protein to your diet and/or cut back on fat and calories, this frittata isn’t half bad.

A Spinach-Mushroom-Swiss Egg White Frittata could really have any combination of veggies and cheese, of course, but here’s what I did: Cook nearly a pound of mushrooms like crazy over high heat in a little olive oil until they release their liquid and it evaporates and they get nice and brown. Then and only then, add a pinch of salt, then some handfuls of spinach, then another pinch of salt.  When the spinach wilts, take the pan off the heat and scoop the veggies into your waiting bowl of 16 oz. egg whites beaten with 4 whole eggs, more salt, a splash of water and 4 shredded slices of lite Jarlsberg cheese.  Return your pan to a medium-low burner, wipe it out and add a little more olive oil, and pour in the whole mixture.  Once the edges of the frittata have set, I like to transfer the pan to a hot oven to finish baking, then brown the top by flipping on the broiler for a well-supervised minute or two.  This was lunch today on a slice of toast with a drizzle of lemony, salty harissa oil–and it will be breakfast for the rest of the week.

To recover from my slight queasiness over the very idea of low-fat cheese, I needed a good honest lentil soup for dinner.  This is a pure, clean recipe, courtesy of Alice Waters from her book In The Green Kitchen.  Of course, I doubled the recipe, because you know how I feel about soup–and about leftovers.  Both divine.

Lentil Soup with Rosemary: Finely dice 2 small onions, 4 ribs of celery, and 4 carrots.  Sautee with a tsp. salt until the onion is lightly browned, then add 6 big cloves of chopped garlic and the chopped-up leaves of a big branch of rosemary.  When these additions become fragrant after a minute or two, add 2 c. sorted and rinsed tiny black or French green lentils,  3 1/2 quarts of water, and another Tbsp. salt.  Bring to a boil and simmer until everything is very soft, about an hour.  Season to taste with salt and black pepper and serve each bowl with a dollop of greek yogurt.

Cherry Almond Granola

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We served a make-your-own yogurt parfait bar this morning when friends came to breakfast with their kiddos: just-baked Cherry Almond Granola, yogurt and milk, fruit salad, honey and jam.  With strong french press coffee with cinnamon mixed into the coffee grounds–why didn’t anyone tell me about that trick before this week?  Delicious.  I am going to try cardamom next.

The Cherry Almond Granola is a riff on my usual granola recipe from Deborah Madison’s Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone.  Mix 6 c. oats, 1 c. wheat germ, 1 c. almonds (we had delicious tiny ones that my mom sent; there are lots of almond orchards near where I grew up), 1 Tb. cinnamon and 1 tsp. nutmeg in a big bowl with a big pinch of salt.  Pour in 1/2 c. canola oil and 3/4 c. honey and stir well. Spread onto two baking sheets and bake for 30 mins. at 300, stirring well and switching the pans every 10 minutes.  Mix in 1 c. dried cherries and let the granola cool to get crunchy.