Two Dish Curry Dinner

Garlic scapes have their own timing and when it is the moment to cut them in order to promote the growth of the garlic bulb, well, something has to be done with them. They are sweet and subtle, but definitely with a garlic tendency. So I thought I'd make something sweet and subtle. It ended up with tofu, scallions (that come at the same time as the scapes it turns out) and spinach as one curry, and potatoes with scapes and red and poblano peppers as the base of the other. Since we had no chutney, I cut up an amazingly ripe plum, which served exactly the same purpose! I'm going to let the pictures tell this story -- you can use whatever curry spices you like. I soaked the little cubes of tofu in  paprika, cumin, Bragg Liquid Amino and tumeric before adding it to the tender young spinach leaves with a little water. The scapes and potato chunks had to cook a little on their own, separately, and then came together in their respective dishes, scapes with tofu and spinach, and potatoes with the peppers, some dissolved miso and a little water with a dash of cumin and coriander.  It's best to use non stick pans, but the tofu dish can be in a regular pan so that if you only have one, use it for the potatoes. This is lovely with rice, or applesauce, or a crisp lettuce salad on the side.

  

cut scapes into 1" pieces

adding curried tofu to scapes

add spinach to tofu/scape pan

combine parboiled potato, both peppers, onion

ENJOY!

keep scraping and turning potatoes

Coconut Cauliflower Curry/ Brown Basmati Rice

There comes a time when that half a can of coconut milk in the fridge just has to get used or it starts to go bad. I had been thinking about the fact that it had actually been a long time since we had rice with anything, and the idea began with the thought of putting coconut milk in rice. Pretty soon that morphed into this cauliflower curry with coconut milk and whatever coconut milk was left could go in the rice. I decided to mix the traditional dal (pureed lentils) into the dish, so that the whole thing would have curry flavor and be poured right over the rice, which began to take on its own shape. Portion nutrition is based on 4 large servings. Of course you can stretch this to feed 6 by adding a side dish (I'm thinking green beans...). You can also add heat (peppers) or sweet (peaches or tomatoes) or heft (potato, sweet or otherwise!)

Coconut Cauliflower Curry with Brown Basmati Rice
1 cup red lentils
2 1/4 cup water for lentils
Florets of a whole head of cauliflower
1/2 cup water for sauteing
1 large onion chopped fine
3 large white or cremini mushrooms halved and sliced
2 tsp fresh grated ginger
2 tsp coriander
1.5 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 tsp tumeric in curry
1/8 tsp tumeric in rice
4 Tblsp light coconut milk for curry

FOR THE RICE
1 cup brown basmati rice
1.5 cups water  (I used the water from steaming the cauliflower)
1 minced carrot
2 finely chopped sun dried tomatoes
4 Tblsp light coconut milk for rice
1 Tblsp dry currants (or other dried fruit)

1. Wash and cut up the cauliflower and steam the florets in a large pot until they are cooked but not at all mushy. You can use the leftover water for making the rice.
2. Cook the red lentils - put lentils in a medium small pot, add the water and the 1/8 tsp tumeric, cook until totally soft so that you can whisk this and it will get all creamy. Cover and let it sit.
2. Chop the onion and slice the mushrooms, grate the ginger, and put this in a wide saute pan with the 1/2 cup water. This needs to be big enough to hold the whole curry. Add the herbs and the salt and the 1/2 tsp tumeric. Cook stirring occasionally until the onion softens and the mushrooms are nearly cooked.

3. Cook the rice: Put the rice, water, carrot, tomato, coconut milk, currants and bring to a boil. Turn down immediately to simmer without a lid until most of the liquid is absorbed. Stir once, cover and let sit.  If the sun dried tomatoes are cured with salt - rather than soaked in oil - you do not need to salt the rice.  Otherwise, you can add salt and pepper if you like it that way when you fluff it up to serve it.

4. Add the lentils, and half the coconut milk, stirring. Add the cauliflower and simmer covered for about 10 minutes.  Serve spooned over rice, with a decorative bunch of cilantro or parsley leaves.

Coconut Cauliflower Curry/Basmati Rice Nutrition Facts Serving Size: 1 Serving (460g) Amount Per Serving % Daily Value* Calories 427 21% Total Fat 4g 6% Saturated Fat 1g 3% Trans Fat Cholesterol 0% Sodium 470mg 20% Total Carbohydrate 83g 28% Dietary Fiber 10g 39% Sugars 14g 0% Protein 18g 35% Vitamin A 9% • Vitamin C 10% Calcium 8% • Iron 33% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calories needs. courtesy of cronometer.com using my data.

Curried Potato Leek Chard Bundles

My husband is the researcher, the person who will shop for exactly the right container, or google until he finds out all about a new ingredient.  He likes to be informed about things. Luckily he shares what he learns with me. He was looking at  information on the web about the two doctors who figure the most prominently in the movie, "Forks Over Knives" and ran across a series of YouTube videos of former President Clinton speaking about working with one of them. He said the diet  "saved his life."  There was an article about a celebrity chef who took on the challenge of cooking vegan for the President, a celebrity chef who was not an expert in vegetarian cooking.  So, creatively the way chefs do, he said he just decided he would figure out how to make interesting foods within the parameters, and mentioned that he made curried potato leek chard bundles. 

That's what he said, "curried potato leek chard bundles."  When I heard that, I started imagining how delicious that would be.  I can imagine all manner of variations. My husband's comment after eating them leftover for lunch was that they bore a similarity to knishes, in all the right ways.  We had this for dinner with tarragon garlicked Le Puy lentils and a salad. Two bundles were plenty for each of us, so we had great leftovers.

Here's what happened:

Curried Chard Bundles
3 long whites of leeks
6 small Yukon gold potatoes (you could use sweet potato!)
8 white mushrooms 
2 parsnips

8 beautiful chard leaves 
about 4 tsp homemade curry spices 
(cumin, coriander, ginger, turmeric, cardamom, oregano, salt)
1/3 c almond milk. 

1.  Chop the leeks & mushrooms and "sauté" in 1/2 c water with 1/2 the spices. Save out 1/2 cup (for the topping), put the rest in a large bowl. 
2. Boil the rough chopped potatoes & parsnips. When soft, mash these with nearly all the rest of the spices, saving 1/2 tsp of spices out. 
3. Gently steam (covered) the pile of washed leaves in a broad pan with a little water, stems cut off at the base of the leaf.  You will want to lift and shuffle these leaves so that they cook evenly, the bottom ones don't get mushy, and the top ones get cooked. But most importantly, do not overlook chard! It needs to have some spunk left so you can wrap with it. 
4. Mix potato & leek mixtures. Add some almond milk (or any other milk you like) if its too thick. 
5. Put the rest of the almond milk (may add more) with remaining curry spices into the leeks you set aside, then purée this for sauce on top. 

6. ASSEMBLY: Take each leaf, rib side down, plop 4" of potato mixture along the spine. Fold top of leaf in, one side, bottom stem, last side. Roll it & serve rib side up with a blob of "sauce." 
7. Can be made ahead & reheated. 

curried potato leek chard bundles Nutrition Facts Serving Size: 1 Serving (460g) (2 chard bundles) Amount Per Serving % Daily Value* Calories 253 13% Total Fat 2g 2% Saturated Fat 0g 1% Trans Fat Cholesterol 0% Sodium 236mg 10% Total Carbohydrate 57g 19% Dietary Fiber 9g 34% Sugars 7g 0% Protein 8g 16% Vitamin A 22% • Vitamin C 102% Calcium 16% • Iron 25% * Percent Daily Values are based on a 2,000 calorie diet. Your daily values may be higher or lower depending on your calories needs. courtesy of cronometer.com based on my input