Lentils

I love lentils. I really do. I made my favourite dish last night for dinner (and this leftovers for my dinner at work today): baked lentils with cheese. Except I swapped out the cheese for yam tonight. Yuuuuummmmm.

This is a really great recipe that's quick to put together and you can toss it in the oven and mostly forget about it for awhile. The original recipe comes out if the More with Less cookbook, put out by the Mennonite church (association?). While I am not a Mennonite, the philosophy of this book hits the nail on the head. Mostly. But if you google it, you'll find the following recipe!

1 3/4 cup green lentils, rinsed and picked over

2 large onions (and they do mean Large)

2 cloves of garlic (yah right, try at least 7)

2 cups diced tomatoes***

2 cups water***

Salt (salt until it tastes salty, tomatoes take quite a bit of salt)

Pepper

2-3 sprigs of thyme

2-4 sage leaves

Bay leaf

(Original recipe suggests marjoram and rosemary, but I hate the latter and we never have any in our house).

Preheat oven to 375. Find a large baking dish (9x13 or larger). Mix all the above in a bowl, pour into the dish. Cover with a lid or tinfoil, bake for 30 mins.

Then add:

2 large carrots, sliced into 1/8" pieces

2 stalks of celery, diced.

Bake for another 40 mins.

Check for doneness, then top with grated cheese (2-3 cups) and broil until melted.

OR

Peel and chop 3-4 medium sized yams and steam them until they're cooked. Mash them with some butter and salt, spread on the finished lentils and toss em back in the oven for a few more minutes to dry out a bit on the top.

The secret to this dish is the insane amount of onion. No kidding. I made it once with less onion and it wasn't as exciting.

This also freezes well.

I would've taken more pictures, but alas I was too busy eating. ;)

Soup

We have had an exceptional fall. Sunshine, warm temperatures, beautiful sun which makes all the leaves glow. It's been wonderful.

I'm doing house chores today so pulled a container of tomatillo soup out of the freezer for my lunch. Chicken, tomatillos, cilantro, lime, black eyed peas. Yum!! 

Here a vague recipe... If you google it, you can get a more accurate ingredient list.

I soaked dried black eyed peas the night before.

Onion

Garlic

Black eyed peas (either canned or pre-soaked a min of 6 hrs)

Chicken or vegetable stock

1 bunch cilantro

At least 2.5lbs of tomatillos.

2 limes (or less lime, depending on how sour you like it).

2 chicken breasts (or equivalent in whatever chicken meat you have).

Cumin

Dice your onions and toss them into an oiled, heated pot. Season with salt. Dice your garlic. Remove the leafy covering from your tomatillos and rinse them (they're sticky). Cut them into half and then run them and your cilantro through the blender (you may need to add stock to help it go, or you can chop up stuff moderately fine, they do cook down quite a bit). When your onions are translucent, add 2 cups (ish) of the soaked beans to the pot, add your chicken stock, the chicken (whole is fine, you can shred it later) and the green mix out of your blender. Add some cumin. Check your seasonings and adjust as necessary. Put the lid on and let it simmer until the beans are cooked.

When the beans are cooked, pull the chicken and shred it, return to the pot. Add lime juice. Serve!

Easy dinner

So I made this *fabulous* item off the Budget Bytes website (love love love her food, it's *so* good, and I can so easily sub in different things).

YUM YUM YUM YUM

Salsa chicken casserole.  Seriously, I was eating this at 10pm with a spoon.  Dangerous stuff.  Except I made it without chicken.  And now I'm defrosting chicken to add in because my wife wants chicken in it.  *sigh*  I even added extra beans (she likes teasing me about my undying love of rice and beans).

I used brown rice, added an extra 1/2 cup of water, didn't add the chicken, had a small accident with the chili powder (so it's got way more kick than I intended).  I also forgot to add cheese.  But OH LORDY is it good!!!  Definitely a good freezer meal choice.  My wife refuses to allow me to own a slow-cooker (she says that after 6 hours there's zero nutritional value left in the food), so I have to settle for slow-cooker modified dishes. I will probably buy one eventually to spite her (who else can one spite except their spouse??)

In the meantime, here's a picture of the finished product.  I plan to send this to school with J in the AM for lunch, along with some chicken (currently in the oven) and some plain yogurt (we lack sour cream in this house).  I think it will be quite delicious!