Spaghetti Squash with Anytime Fresh Tomato Sauce

The bowl on our early November table has two pale tomatoes waiting to turn into something resembling summer tomatoes. The farm markets continue to offer beautiful cool weather greens and winter squash in every variety. So the dinner plan formed around a round lovely spaghetti squash, and my husband suggested that a fresh tomato sauce would be lovely. "Fresh tomato sauce?" I thought looking at him sideways.  Then I remembered my strategy at summer's end -- I had thrown piles of ripe plum tomatoes into plastic freezer bags and plopped them into the freezer. I use these in soups and chili and they taste as fresh as summer. As soon as the cold tomato hits the heat of the broth or whatever, the peelings pop right off, leaving just the succulence of the tomato. Of course they turn to mush -- but isn't that what we want in a sauce? So this evolved into another instant favorite -- sweet spaghetti squash well saturated with fresh tomato, garlic, slivered kale leaves and herbes de Provence. Oooh la la! This is a beautiful dish that takes less than an hour to make fresh.


SPAGHETTI SQUASH WITH ANYTIME FRESH TOMATO SAUCE

1 medium large spaghetti squash
6-10 cloves fresh garlic roughly chopped
8 or so fresh-frozen plum tomatoes (you could use a can I suppose)
5-8 medium kale leaves, destemmed
1/2-3/4 c water
1/2 - 1 tsp salt (your taste...)
1 TBLSP herbes de Provence
Freshly ground pepper
Sesame seed gomasio (if you want to imitate a finishing sprinkle on top)

FIRST BAKE THE SQUASH:
Heat the oven to 350F. Cut the spaghetti squash in half length-wise (from stem to end). Open the squash and scrape out the seeds and seed goop with a large strong tablespoon. Place the squash halves on a baking sheet covered with tin foil and leave in the oven for about 30 minutes, or until you can press into the peeling side and it feels soft.  This is just the right amount of time for making the sauce.

MAKE THE SAUCE:
Plop the frozen tomatoes into a sauce/stew pot with roughly chopped garlic and the water and salt. You can start with less salt and always add more as it simmers, or on the table.  Cover and heat a few minutes, turning the tomatoes once or twice so that you can pick up each tomato and squeeze off the peelings. Then add the kale, cut into slivers. I wad the leaves up on a cutting board and cut thin slices through the wadded leaves. This is not a precise science. Stir in the kale with the herbes de Provence, a bit more salt, and let this simmer covered for at least half an hour.

JOINING SQUASH AND SAUCE:
When the sauce has simmered for at least 15-20 minutes, take the squash halves out of the oven, turn them over carefully. Let them cool a little (5 minutes at least), then hold one half in one hand with a well protected hand (using an oven mit is a good technique), while scraping out the squash flesh into a large bowl. Break up the squash flesh into its spaghetti like strands with a fork. Do both halves.

Pour the sauce over the squash in the bowl and serve. People can fish down into the bowl to pull the squash out, with the beautiful layer of sauce all over the top (and the juiciest part of the sauce filtering down into the bowl through the squash).  Serve with a choice of fresh pepper grinder, sea salt, and sesame seed gomasio as possible at-table finishing touches.

Note: You can roast these squash seeds if you like. Clean off the debris, rinse them, sprinkle them with Tamari, layer them on a baking sheet and let them crisp up, turning with a spatula at least once in about 15 minutes.

Brussels Sprouts with mustard sauce

Lately my husband has been enamored with mustard. There is a tang and a depth added to a dish with just the right amount of mustard in addition to the usual ingredients. Yes, there are patterns and habits in making vegan meals every day, and mustard quite simply adds a bit of spice to life! So when I was planning a fairly common combination of brussels sprouts, onion and mushrooms as a major side dish, I chose to add a stone ground mustard to the Bragg Liquid Amino, water and dash of black pepper. It was well worth it, and turned this one-pan dish into an instant favorite.






BRUSSELS SPROUTS WITH MUSTARD SAUCE

2 torpedo (or other pungent red) onions
10-12 medium button mushrooms
2-3 cups or 1.5 pounds Brussels sprouts
2 tsp Bragg Liquid Amino
2 TBLSP stone ground mustard of your choice
1/2 c water
dash freshly ground black pepper

Slice the onions in thin slices, separating the rings in the bottom of a wide non-stick pan.
Clean the Brussels sprouts (cut off the tough stem ends and peel away any yucky leaves, washing off any dirt), and slice them in half vertically - cutting through from the stem end through the floret.
Brush the mushrooms and cut in quarters if large enough, or in half if smaller (use more of them if they are small).

Layer the Brussels Sprouts over the onion layer, putting the mushrooms on top. Pour 1/2 c water, Bragg's, and mustard over all of this and cover with lid. Simmer for about 10-15 minutes, stirring once or twice. Then turn off and leave covered, allowing the Brussels sprouts to steam and soften further, while not overcooking the mushrooms.

You can serve just like this, or cook a couple minutes without the lid to further reduce the mustard sauce onto the veggies.

Garden Rescue: Green Bean & Tomato Casserole

Away from our August garden for a whole week, I came back to take on the challenge of making something delicious from the wreckage. Our pretty "Black Prince" tomatoes all split in concentric circles from the rain, and the slugs had a feast. The "provider bush beans" had recovered from their mid-summer doldrums and produced an enormous amount of fresh and tasty overly large green beans. When asked what he might envision as a casserole with green beans, my husband said, "maybe millet? mushrooms? some kind of creamy sauce?"  And so it began. This dish doesn't require over-the-top garden materials, and could actually be made any time with a variety of tomatoes, green beans, millet, mushrooms, onion, garlic, corn, and a tahini-based "creamy" sauce. I threw sesame seeds on top for fun.

Green Bean & Tomato Summer Casserole
(easily serves 4)

4 cups of chunky cut up mixed tomatoes (green/red)
3 cups green beans, cut into 1-1.5inch pieces
1 cup corn kernels
4 large white mushrooms, sliced and then rough cut (or whatever you like)
2 medium onions, chopped fine (your choice, I used red tropea onions)
2 cloves fresh garlic or use powdered garlic
1 cup organic millet
2 cups water to cook the millet
2 cups water to blanche the beans
1/4-1/2 cup water for "creamy sauce"
2 tsp Braggs Liquid Amino
1 tsp dry tarragon
2 Tblsp tahini
1 Tblsp tamari
1/4 cup water
1/8 tsp tumeric
1/8 tsp mustard powder (or mustard)
2-4 Tblsp sesame seeds

1. Bring the millet to a boil in the water over medium heat and then turn to low for about 15 minutes, turning off and covering when it begins to look as though all the water is gone.

2. Wash and cut the tomatoes into 1-3" chunks of any size or slice you like. The chunkier it is the more likely it will retain some shape, slices will disintegrate (both nice). Wash, trim and cut the green beans into 1-1.5" pieces, and in a separate pot bring about 2 cups water to a boil, then toss in the bean pieces, stirring to be sure they all make good contact with the hot water, then turn down a bit and cover for just about 2-3 minutes NO MORE because you really don't want them turning to mush.

3. In a large non-stick saute pan, put the finely chopped onions, tomato chunks, corn (fresh or frozen), mushrooms, tarragon and Bragg's Liquid Amino. Cover and saute quietly for about 10 minutes while you rinse the beans in cold water in a colander, and turn off the millet.

4. Sauce: Mix together the tahini, tamari, water, tumeric, mustard powder, and dry powdered garlic or totally crushed/smashed fresh garlic. Beat until smooth - adding water if necessary to make about 1/2-2/3 cup in all.

5. Construction:  In a round or rectangular cast iron enamel lidded casserole, spread out the millet, put the green beans on top of that, pour the vegetable mixture on top and gently combine. Pour out the sauce onto this in a thin concentric drizzle starting around the outside edge and working your way until there is some on the whole surface. Sprinkle with sesame seeds - as much or as little as you like.

6. Bake at 350F with the lid on for about 20-25
minutes, then turning the oven up to 450F, crisp with the lid off for about 10 minutes. Great with applesauce, arugula salad or really anything you want! (Also good cold for breakfast if you like that sort of leftover to start your day.)

Kimchi for all seasons

My husband has discovered that he loves kimchi. We ate at a Korean restaurant and it was the most memorable part of the meal. Since then, I bought a couple different brands of kimchi at the food co-op, and then someone there said, It’s nuts to buy this stuff when it is so easy to make.”  Really?  Yes, actually, if you can get your hands on the authentic “red pepper powder” which comes in various sizes of flake (we used the smaller flakes imported by Hansung Sikpoom Trading Corp), kosher salt, a good sized head of Napa cabbage, radishes of almost any description, onions, carrots, garlic, ginger, and brown rice flour, miso (or you can use the real fish sauce but we don’t), add slant-cut scallions, and you’re all set! We now dream of an authentic ceramic kimchi pot … but that’s another story.

It takes time to make kimchi. The vegetables salt soak for at least 4 hours, and then the whole thing gets put together and sits out for 24-48 hours (we’ve always done at least 48), with occasional checking for bubbling. THEN it sits in the refrigerator for as long as it takes for you to eat it up. We’ve kept the tale end of a batch for 5- 6 weeks and it still tastes great, but sometimes it doesn’t last even 3 weeks because we love to share it.

Here’s how we make our kimchi – and be advised that the pepper glows slowly as it ferments. One recipe called for 1/2 cup, another for 4 cups (yes, 4 cups) of red pepper powder. Some use two medium heads of Napa cabbage, we like to either use one big one or one medium and 1/2 of a different cabbage for texture. 

You will need 2 chunks of time: the first is about an hour to get the vegetables organized into their salt bath. The second is at least an hour for the rinsing out, making the pudding/sauce, preparing the additional ingredients and then assembling the kimchi in its fermentation container. Don’t plan to leave town while you are fermenting kimchi, because it is also critical that after the first 24 hours you do check on it. Depending upon how much head space it has in your fermentation container, it can bubble up quite a bit once it gets started, and you will need to open it and compress it down – perhaps sticking a chopstick into the sides along the inner edges to release the bubble build-up. Your house will begin to smell like a kimchi batch at this point. Stick it out for another 24 hours and you will have a marvelous kimchi for weeks to come. (You can dole it out into smaller jars with good lids to store it or give it to friends, or to eat up a jar at a meal and still keep the others closed.)

Equipment to have on hand:

A medium saucepan to make the “sauce/pudding?

A large bowl (big enough to hold everything)

A large wide baking pan (enamel, ceramic or glass is good) to salt the cabbage

A good sized wide serving bowl to salt the radish/carrot mix

A colander (draining rinsed veggies)

A whisk (stirring sauce)

A fermentation container that closes tightly – either a cookie jar or flour contaner type thing, a large pasta storage container or other glass or ceramic tightly lidded container (not plastic)

A good knife or two (I use one large chopper and one paring)

Long handled wooden spoon

GLOVES – you can use dishwashing gloves

Measuring cups (1 cup, 1/2 cup, 1/4 cup, 1/3 cup)

INGREDIENTS:

3/4 cup Kosher salt

1 large head Napa cabbage

8-10 big red radishes or 1 good chunk Daikon or Korean radish

4-6 carrots

“Pudding” SAUCE:

3 cups water

1/2 cup brown rice flour

1/2 cup sugar

Add to Sauce Before Adding Veggies:

1/3 cup Korean red pepper powder (you can adjust this to taste)

1 cup onion chopped finely (2-3 slices of large Vidalia or 1 medium sized regular)

1/2 cup smashed garlic, chopped roughly

1/4 cup finely chopped ginger

1 cup white miso – (1 tablespoon miso in 1 cup water)

6-8 scallions slivered slantwise

REMEMBER THAT AFTER PREPARING THE VEGETABLES, IT TAKES MINIMIMUM OF 4 HOURS OF SALTED SOAKING.

Preparing the veggies:

Rinse the cabbage well, cutting off the biggest part of the stem but leaving part of it to hold the leaves together. Slice the whole head in half LONGWISE, through the stem core so it opens into two parts like a book. This way you can rinse between the leaf layers. If it is a huge head, you can slice it one more time though NOT through the core so the 1/4 parts stay connected. Then spread the kosher salt between the layers, carefully getting inbetween the leaves and let this sit in a large pan for 2 hours. (Use about 1/2 cup salt)

Once you have the cabbage organized, wash and peel the radishes and carrots, slicing them any way you want to run into them in your kimchi. We have made little cubes, and we have sliced in rounds and slants… We like all of this, so make your own choices. Put these peeled pieces (it will be about 2-3 cups of each) into a wide bowl and sprinkle and toss with kosher salt. Let sit 2 hours as well. (Use about 1/8 cup salt)

IN 2 HOURS: you will turn the cabbage pieces and add a little salt in between the layers making sure to get to the parts that are less softened or not salted from the first side. Also turn and stir the carrots/radishes and add a little fresh salt. (Use 1/8 cup salt for all of this or less)  LET SIT ANOTHER 2 HOURS.

At some point you can make the pudding/sauce and leave it quietly cooling – OR you can do this in 4 hours and set the bowl in a sink or bowl full of cold water to cool it faster while you prepare the other materials that go into the mixture.

4 HOURS AFTER STARTING:

Put 1/2 cup brown rice flour (or use sweet rice flour if you can find it) in a saucepan with 3 cups water. Turn on medium heat and stir with the whisk, calmly and continuously. When you first start to see bubbles, add the 1/2 cup sugar and cook, stirring, for another minute. This will really start to look like pudding!  Remove from heat, pour it into a large bowl (big enough for everything to fit into it) and let it cool.  YOU CAN ALSO COOL IT IN THE PAN, putting the pan into a larger pan of cold water.

While the pudding is cooling, finely chop the onion and ginger, measure out the pepper and smash and chop the garlic. You can sliver the scallions too if you are using them (these are optional). Dissolve a tablespoon of white miso into one cup of cool water.

RINSE THE VEGGIES:

Take the cabbage out of the pan, dumping out the salty water. Run cold water through the cabbage leaves, then leave it soak a few minutes in the pan with cold fresh water. Take the cabbage out of the pan, rinse it under cold water, then let it soak AGAIN for a few minutes in fresh cold water in the pan. While it is soaking, DO THE SAME THING with radish/carrot mixture.  Dumping them into the colander and run cold water on them, rinse the salty water out of their bowl and then let them soak in the bowl of fresh water. DO THIS TWICE TOO. After rinsing for a 3^rd time, you can let the radish/carrots drain in the colander, while you RINSE THE CABBAGE a 3^rd time. Then squeeze out the water from the cabbage (you can squeeze it like you would doing a handwash … it’s so limp!)

Shake all excess water off the radish/carrot mixture.

COMBINE THE PUDDING with SPICES

Add garlic, onion, ginger, miso, and pepper flakes to the cool pudding and stir it with a long wooden spoon until it is one strange red-flecked substance.

Take the cabbage and rough chop it into 2-4 inch chunks of various shapes. Add this to the bowl of spicy mix, then add the well shaken carrots and radishes, and scallions if you are using them.  Stir gently until everything is coated well.

Put your container in the sink and put on your gloves.

Handful by handful, stuff the spiced veggies into the jar, carefully pouring the last of the spicy juices in as well. Close the lid, and set this somewhere visible but out of the way for 24 hours. You will want to make note of how high the ingredients start out in the jar, making sure there are several inches of air space above that level when you leave it to ferment.

CHECK YOUR KIMCHI after 12 hours and push it down if it has started rising. CHECK YOUR KIMCHI every 3 hours after the first 24 hours. I’ve come home from teaching a class to find kimchi juice all over the kitchen counter and a hissing screw-top lid!! We left more head space for the next batch and used an even larger container. 

ENJOY YOUR KIMCHI. 

There’s every reason on earth to take a tiny sample taste after the first 12 hours just to taste what’s going on.  Remember, though, that all the flavor melds and changes as it ferments so it may be surprising in the end that you don’t taste the salt so salty or the pepper so distinctly. 

WARNING:  Making kimchi may be habit forming, and can lead to interesting experimentation! You might find yourself serving rice noodles smothered with kimchi to guests! (We do!)