Lentil Stew

So, I had this jar of dried little French lentils sitting in the back of my cupboard. Before I moved to Arizona a year and a half ago, it was sitting in the back of my food shelf in Washington. I'm pretty sure it traveled around to at least three different places of residence with me over the years. Anyway, I rarely cook with lentils.

It may be because they do not share the American culinary ubiquity of, say, black beans or pinto beans or chickpeas. Lentil burritos? No. Refried lentils? No. Lentil hummus? No. But I'm actually inclined to believe that my reluctance to use them originates in my childhood.

We had dried lentils in our pantry, too. They were in an old cylindrical plastic food container, opaque with scratches, with a yellowed snap-on lid. A little paper label on the front read, in my mother's handwriting, "LENTILS." I don't know how long they'd been there (probably about as long as my French lentils stayed unused in my own supply).

It was afternoon. I felt adventuresome, and I wanted candy (bear in mind, not that it changes the story, but I was about 5 or 6 years old at the time, and my parents weren't the type to freely give candy to their offspring). Bored with my usual crime of grazing on pinches of flour out of the container, disillusioned by my recent experience trying to eat baking soda (it looked like flour), and probably running dangerously low on tubed decorative icing nabbed from the spice cabinet, I remember distinctly that I decided to broaden my horizons a bit.

"Lentils," I wondered. I didn't know what those were. I evaluated the shape of a lentil. It was notably comparable to the shape of an M&M. But lentils were smaller, and relatively colorless. "Flour has no color," I thought. "Flour tastes good." As it often does, my sense of exploration overcame my trepidations. I took a small handful of lentils, and I ate them.

The texture was unpleasant. Hard, stale, and simultaneously crunchy and chewy, they had no satisfying give when masticated. The lentils tasted like old, musty rags. I remember making a face and thinking something along the lines of, "yuck," as I grabbed a second handful and swallowed those whole. Positively gag-inducing; certainly no better than the first bunch and likely a little worse. I remember tossing back another handful and a few more individual lentils before deciding, with great disappointment, that this venture was better abandoned.

I don't remember what went on for the rest of that afternoon and evening, but I do recall with clarity the feeling of nausea. The continual aftertaste of musty rags. A dull, building headache. Rolling discomfort in my stomach, and the wrenching quease that never brought relief. I tried to bring them back up to no avail. I didn't want to tell my parents because, well, it's embarrassing when you intentionally eat a bunch of dried lentils and then feel shitty. Besides, I was pretty sure I wasn't supposed to snack on dried goods out of the pantry.

(Looking back over this experience, it seems apparent that, as a child, I had some sort of eating disorder.)

In any case, lentils have never really enchanted my adult self like other legumes. I got the French lentils during some crazy scheme I had one day to have available in my own personal store, every type of dried legume on which I could get my hands. You know, just in case I needed them for something.

After about four years (read: a few weeks ago) I decided to finally cook up my lentils and serve them in a coconut-squash soup. I was excited, because it sounded good, and it's soup season. This is all really beside the point, because it took about 2 hours for the lentils to mostly cook, and the soup didn't really turn out that well.

I don't like giving up on myself, though. I got more lentils (regular ones, this time) and made a soup in which to put them, using neither squash nor coconut milk. It turned into a stew, but whatever. It's amazing when it's cold out. And cheap, which is good when you're living more in the red than you've ever lived before.


LENTIL STEW

1 cup dried lentils, rinsed and picked and then cooked
cooking oil
3 stalks celery, all chopped up
3 carrots, all chopped up
1 onion, all chopped up
2 lbs potatoes, all chopped up (1/2 inch cubes is great)
5 cloves garlic, all chopped up
1 tbsp oregano
1 tbsp dried thyme
1 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
2 bay leaves
few leaves kale or spinach or other green, all chopped up

1. Cook the lentils in 2 cups of water until the water is absorbed and the lentils are thoroughly hydrated and not at all crunchy. This can take anywhere between 20 minutes and an hour, depending on how old your lentils are. Stir every so often toward the end, and add some sea salt to taste.

2. While the lentils cook, toss the carrots, celery, and onion in a little cooking oil in the bottom of a stockpot and put it on medium-low heat. I was going for a sweetening-of-the-onions effect, but I didn't consider the fact that the carrots and the celery were hanging out too and they got kinda bored in the pan. That, and I didn't even have a whole onion to work with like I'd planned. Just half. So... that didn't really do anything. Make sure to stir them every so often.

3. While the vegetables are cooking, you can cut up the potatoes. I like red potatoes. You can leave the skin on, and the texture is nice, and they don't fall apart too much.



Look. Look at that relative uniformity.

4. Maybe, by the time you're done chopping, the vegetables will have relaxed rather a lot in their pot. They cooked in there nice and slowly for about 20 minutes. Maybe more. I don't remember, to be honest.



5. Toss the garlic, oregano, thyme, paprika, salt, and red pepper flakes into the cooking vegetables and let that cook another minute or two.



6. Add the potatoes to the pot, and cover with water. I think I added about 6 cups total. Add the bay leaves. Give it a bit of a stir, cover, and turn the heat up to medium-high to bring to a boil.



7. After it's boiling, reduce heat to medium-low again and cover the pot just partially. Let it simmer away until the potatoes are tender, then stir it every few minutes for 10-20 minutes more, so some of the potatoes break up and thicken the stew. Yeah. Then it gets good.



8. Dump in the lentils. Stir it up a final time, and taste for salt. Add if necessary. You can add your green bits at the end. I leave them out altogether and drop them in when I'm heating up individual portions for leftovers. They should really only be hot for 5 minutes or so. Otherwise they go rather limp and become somewhat gray. Not appealing.

Cooked lentils are easier on the stomach than are dried lentils, come to think of it. They're a lot more palatable in general. There's nothing to fear from lentils in a stew, anyway... especially this one, since it's amazing. Slightly spicy, but it's cold out so that's warranted.

That's really all I have. Go forth and consume more expensive things in my stead.

Cantacoco Smoothie

You know how sometimes, life just starts getting crazy and you can't keep up your habits? Yeah.

Actually, it pleases me when these things happen. Most of the time. After all, most of my habits only exist to prevent me from getting bored. If I know what I am going to do at any given time, I don't have to wonder about what I'm going to do at any given time. But... sometimes something neat happens, and it prevents me from completing my habitual activities. For a whole two and a half weeks I was unable to a) run in circles every other day, b) blog midweek, c) pine about missing my cats and my friends 24 hours a day. I went home to Seattle for awhile, and came back with the two sweet kitties whom I've been missing more than anything else.

None of this is relevant to my post, of course, save the part about being unable to blog midweek for awhile. I meant to, at one point. I made a delightful red kale and golden beet salad, but I never actually got around to typing up a post. Such is life.

So now that life is settling down, I bring you a smoothie. Because I am a fan of fruit, and you should be too.

Oh! And it's evil, I mustn't forget to mention. (My goal for the week, you see, is to use my powers for evil.) Clearly it's evil, as none of my ingredients were sourced even a little bit locally. Well, I guess the cantaloupe comes from Mexico, and I am closer to Mexico than I used to be. But honestly - it's not even the same country. None of them are from the same country as me, none are from the same country as each other, and none of them are in season. HA! How's that for evil?

(Please, though - somebody, stop me from coming up with all these ridiculous names for things.)


CANTACOCO SMOOTHIE

fresh young coconut (they look like... well, see below)
small-medium ripe banana
1/4 small-medium cantaloupe

This (above) is what a fresh young coconut looks like. The white part is just a fibrous cover over the round coconut (like the ones you may be used to seeing), and it was taken out of a big green thing, which you probably will never see. Fresh young coconuts are full to the brim with clear liquid, which tastes like cool, sweet, refreshing water. The flesh is white, and soft and a little jellylike - unlike that of mature coconuts (the round ones with the brown hairy husk). Most of the ones you find in stores are from Thailand, and mine was no exception. They are at Asian markets and some natural food stores, and perhaps normal grocery stores, but I wouldn't know.

1. Get into your coconut. Take a sharp, large knife (I prefer to use a standard-sized chef's knife) and shave the fibrous part off the top of the coconut. You'll have to go around shaving bits off in a circle, but it should take you about 30 seconds total.

2. Hold the coconut in one hand, and take your knife in the other and tap the sharp heel of your knife (hard) all around the top of the coconut in a circle.



This is not difficult, because the weight of the knife does most of the work. You don't have to grip the handle super hard or anything. But you will have to hit it kind of hard. Experiment until you get the right amount of pressure. You should hear it crack when you get in.



3. Carefully pop off the top, and there will probably be some liquid that spills out. It should be super full.



Pour this liquid through a strainer into some kind of container. It's ok if little fibers get into it. You'll never notice them. If you're super anal about that kind of thing, you can strain it through a coffee filter or paper towel.



4. You should have a coconut and a top of a coconut. Use a spoon to scrape out all the flesh into another container. This is easy peasy. When you're done, take care to remove the hard bits of shell that may be clinging to some of the white flesh. A little bit of brown stuck to it is fine, but no hard bits.



5. YAY! You are done with that bit. Now you can cut up a cantaloupe quarter, as shown.



Remove the seeds from the center, and then cut once down the middle (like you were cutting it into two long slices, but don't go through the rind), and slice it many times across, then run the knife around underneath everything. Ta da! Another 30 seconds.

6. Put all the coconut flesh, half the coconut water, the cantaloupe, and a sliced up banana into a blender. Or, if you don't have a blender but have a wand blender, into a bowl.



I wasn't sure if I wanted the whole banana or the whole quarter cantaloupe, so I only added half of each at first. But then after blending and tasting, I decided to add the rest. And then I blended again. You should just add it all the first time and blend once.



It's a pretty simple breakfast smoothie. If you like, you can add some plain yogurt to it. I like it as is. It's not as thick as some smoothies, but I don't care. If you want it thicker, and colder, you can pre-cut and freeze the cantaloupe and banana ahead of time and blend them frozen into it. But whatever you do, don't add ice.

I like this smoothie, (and other smoothies using the same model), because it doesn't taste like watered-down under-ripe fruit. It tastes strong. Strong and good.

Speaking of strong fruit, maybe some day I'll make a smoothie with durian. If you haven't had durian, be sure to try it. Another Asian market find... just make sure you don't open it in a less-than-well-ventilated area. Outside is best.

Enjoy your exotic fruiting.

Black Bean Tacos

There are so many different kinds of tacos. One could dedicate an entire blog to tacos alone.

But I have many other things I'd like to cook, so I'll just settle for this post. Maybe in the future, I'll do another post about tacos. Salmon tacos. Tofajita tacos (I made that up, and I like it).

In these tacos, as I am wont to do, I used black beans - as opposed to, say, pinto beans or red beans. I have this thing where I feel like the darker a food is, the more nutrient-rich it is. It's not entirely true, of course, but I like to think it. In that light, black beans are the best thing ever.

So I made up these tacos, and I don't know the first thing about authenticity when it comes to Latin American food (or any food, for that matter), but that's not all that important to me. What's more important, is that it's nutritious and delicious, and preferably colorful. And that, these are. There are a few things I'd change - namely the fact that black beans are merely an equal component of the entire dish, and not featured - but I'll get to that at the end.

I do have to say one thing, though, and if you remember nothing else, remember this. Avocados are not optional on this taco.

I swear up and down I don't say that simply because I love avocados and think you should too (although, I do), but they provide a coolness, neutrality, and velvety lushness that nothing else can provide. They contrast the sharpnesses and strong flavors in the rest of the taco. They're completely necessary. Get over your "texture thing" and start experiencing a whole new world of food.


BLACK BEAN TACOS

red bell pepper
ear of corn
corn tortillas
shredded lettuce (whatever you have on hand)
shredded cabbage (purple or green)
thinly sliced onion
cooked and seasoned black beans
goat cheese, crumbled
sliced avocado
lime juice
fresh cilantro
sour cream or lime crème fraîche
Tabasco sauce
pinch of salt

1. If you don't have a grill, and you want "grilled" vegetables, sometimes sticking them right under the broiler will get the job done. In my case, I did the aforementioned treatment to an ear of corn and a red pepper. If you want lots of leftover "grilled" vegetables, just put lots of them in there. First of all, you want to put them on a cookie sheet.

Turn on the broiler and put the cookie sheet on the top rack so the vegetables are as close as they can get to the heating element without touching it (this might also be good if you lightly oil the corn first, but I haven't tried it). Leave them in there awhile, but make sure you watch to see when they are charring. Use tongs (or whatever you have) to turn them as they char, so you can char all the sides. Don't be alarmed if you hear popping and sizzling.

2. While your vegetables are broiling, cut up some of your other ingredients. I did my lettuce, cabbage, and onion during this time - it won't suffer if it sits out, cut, for awhile. The avocado, on the other hand, you should save until last.



Make sure to keep an eye on the oven during this time. If one vegetable gets done faster, take it out. In my case, that was the pepper.



You'll see that it got all wrinkly. This means the skin has started to separate from the flesh, which is ideal when you cook a pepper (it gets tough and curly and you need to peel it). Let it cool for a few minutes (10, maybe), and peel the pepper. During the cooling time, steam should form in the pepper that separates the skin further and makes it easier to peel.

Next came my corn, and it looked good.



Obviously, I like a little carbon on my food.

3. Cut the stem off the fat end of the corn cob when it cools, sit it upright and slice off the kernels. Just keep turning the cob and slicing off the kernels from the pointy end to the fat end. Mmmm!



4. Here's where it gets kind of blurry. You need to heat up your tortillas, but there are lots of ways to do this, and all of them are a little bit temperamental. The best way that I've found is to dip them briefly in water (however many you're going to use), stack them up, and wrap them tightly in foil that has a light coating of oil on the inside. Then you heat them, either in a warm toaster oven, or normal oven if it's on for something else (don't heat it up just for tortillas, though), or in a hot pan, covered. Heat them until the foil puffs a little. The goal here is to get the tortillas to soften and not be really dry.

5. Lay your warmed, softened tortillas on a plate, and pile stuff on them. (If you want to make them easier to pick up, stick their sides together so it's like that scene in Forrest Gump where Bubba and Forrest are sleeping outside in the rain and they lean their backs up against one another so they don't have their heads in the mud.) I started with lettuce and cabbage, followed by onion, and then spooned some delicious black beans (they should be warm, bordering on hot) on that, and crumbled a good amount of goat cheese over it. I lined it with broiled corn and red pepper, topped it with sliced avocado (onto which I sprinkled some lime juice) and cilantro, and drizzled on some lime crème fraîche (you can substitute a small amount of sour cream - I only used lime crème fraîche because I still had some). I then doobled on some Tabasco, and sprinkled some sea salt over the whole thing. It's all a matter of taste how much you use; if you find it lacking, put more on.

So... that's pretty much how I make most tacos, the only variations being in the ingredients.

In these tacos, I might leave out the lettuce and cabbage altogether. I don't think it added anything. I would use a little more black bean, and a little less pepper and corn.

The rest, I do believe, is lovely.

Roasted Applesauce

I started out the week thinking I was going to be blogging about rice and beans again. Plain, old rice and beans. See blog name. Funds are low, spirits high, yada yada. I enjoy it. But then I went to a farmer's market on the Arizona State University campus in Tempe, and given a golden opportunity. One too good to pass up.

Free locally-grown blemished organic apples.

Like, FREE. So I took 5 pounds.



I believe that slightly wrinkled, a little old, somewhat banged-up apples make the best sauce. I can only hope that I prove to be as useful when I'm slightly wrinkled, a little old, and somewhat banged up.

They were a mixed variety, all grown in Willcox, AZ. As they were unmarked, I don't know exactly what they were - but it looked to me as though they were selections from their golden delicious, red delicious, and gala apples. Before you cry, "why, red delicious?? How awful!" I feel compelled to tell you that these red delicious apples in no way resemble the grown-in-Washington red delicious abomination of an apple for which my home state is unfortunately famous. They were small and round and stripy. Not tall and knobby, overly shiny and the color of ostrich meat.

One more thing, before I get to making the sauce. I must forewarn you that if you do not have a food mill and you do not wish for skins to remain in your applesauce, you are in for a workout when it comes time to strain the sauce. Don't worry, it makes your applesauce (and your triumphant victory) taste all the sweeter.

"Mightn't I just peel the apples first?" you ask naïvely. "No, good applewife (or appleman)," I tell you, "you may not." For the apple skins provide unparalleled color and flavor to your sauce as they cook, not to mention the pectin that thickens it and gives it body. If you're in it to take the easy way out, go to the 7-11 and buy a jar of lamesauce commercially-prepared applesauce, which gets all the color it needs from food coloring and all the flavor it needs from the ambiguous "natural flavors."

OK, I lied - one more thing. This was my grand experiment with making applesauce in the oven. That is, to say, roasting it. I must say, I approve of the result. One might say this is actually the recipe for...

Wait for it...

Awesomesauce? Yeah, I said it.


ROASTED APPLESAUCE

5lbs mixed apples, or McIntosh (they'd probably make the best sauce), or whatever
3 tbsp lemon juice (about 1 1/2 lemon's worth)
1/4 cup plus 1 tbsp brown sugar
5 cinnamon sticks
10 whole cloves
Pinch of sea salt
3/4 cup water

1. Preheat the oven to 375°F and start with your large amount of blemished (or simply just nice and ripe) apples. Bruises are fine. Mold and rot are not so fine. As for worms, that's your discretion. Cut out whatever you're not comfortable with. I should mention that there's sort of a formula to this recipe - for every pound of apples, you should have about 1 1/2 tsp lemon juice (I rounded up a little), 1 tbsp brown sugar, 1 cinnamon stick, two whole cloves, and 2 tbsp water (I rounded up a little). It's not an exact science, just a guideline.

So, you have your apples. Core them and cut them in eighths, like I did making the apple crumble, only do not skin them. Just leave them in eighths. For larger apples, you can cut them in 12 slices. It doesn't really matter. The bigger they are, the longer they need to cook, and vice versa. Try and make them somewhat even, though.

2. If you can find a bowl large enough for your 5lbs of cut up apples with a little room, great! I could not, however, and ended up simply with a very full bowl.



It makes it interesting, anyway, as you then have to toss the apples with the lemon juice and brown sugar. Somehow I managed.



3. Pile them all in a largish-sized roasting pan. If you don't have a roasting pan, a 9x13-inch cake pan will do. If you don't have a cake pan of that size, a 9x13-inch-ish glass baking dish should work. If you don't have anything like that, improvise.

Pour in the water and tuck the cinnamon sticks wherever they'll fit, but make sure they're buried under apples, or they'll lose their flavor to the hot oven air. Stick the cloves into apple slices.



4. Put the pan in the oven and leave it there for about 40 minutes. Remove it after this time, but keep the oven on. The apples should have a slightly brown appearance.



Take a potato masher or similar device and smash as many apples as you can. Just try and get them into small pieces.



Put it back in the oven for - oh, 25 minutes or so.

5. Take it out again, smash it again, and return to the oven.



When you remove it a third time, it should be ready. Smash it some more, just for good measure, and you're ready to strain it! It should look like this, by the way. If there are still somewhat firm chunks of apple, it needs more time in the oven. If it's looking dry, you can add some water.



6. In batches (I did three), run it through your food mill into a large bowl. If you find yourself devoid of a food mill, your only option is a large strainer/colander/sieve and a big spoon. Scoop some of the apples into the strainer (set over a bowl, if you please, otherwise you'll be trying to salvage applesauce from your countertops), and mash it through with the spoon. Remove the cinnamon sticks and cloves as you go. A rubber spatula is not strong enough for this. Just keep mashing, scraping, pushing, and muscling through until all that's left in the strainer is a pile of skins.



Repeat with the remaining portions of applesauce until you have your skins in one place:



...and your sauce in a bowl.



At this point, what you do with the sauce is up to you. I freeze some, refrigerate some, and eat some. I like it just as it is, sometimes with a little vanilla ice cream. Some people put it on stuff. Maybe it's good mixed into oatmeal (but I don't know, so don't blame me if it's not). It is certainly worth the trouble to make, though, particularly if you are able to score free apples.

I'm sure there's something interesting you can do with the skins, but I just like to eat them. Why not? They're toothsome and spiced and taste like apples. The cinnamon sticks and cloves I plan on sticking in a small, shallow pan with water on the stove and simmering gently to keep this lovely aroma alive. Make some holiday potpourri afterward, maybe.

Happy applesaucing.

Chickpea Stew

I thought I'd throw together a little stew this week. I haven't made it before, and there wasn't a recipe. So goes cooking, though. Recipes can be tedious if that's all you ever use when you cook.

Part of the inspiration for the stew came from the failure of central Arizona to enter a proper autumnal phase, after the equinox, like all the other states. I guess I thought that if I invoked the power of butternut squash and russet potatoes (autumn) to draw the life out of tomatoes and corn (summer), somehow a new season would float in and we'd all be saved.

Alas. The forecast for tomorrow is 104 and sunny.

My stew, on the other hand, was very good. Eating it almost made me believe that I was warming my bones on a cool September evening.

I only call it "chickpea" stew because I don't know what else to call it. It was supposed to be focused on chickpeas, as the "chunk" factor, but I piled so much other stuff in there that they're just one element now. And I like the word "chickpea." Like, a lot. I always used to call them garbanzo beans, but saying that makes me feel heavy-footed and trollish. "Chickpea" makes me feel like a bird. A bird that perches on things and sings sweetly.


CHICKPEA STEW

1 cup dry chickpeas (or 2 cups cooked)
3 fat cloves garlic
1/2 large onion
2 large celery stalks (leaves are fine)
1 medium butternut squash, cleaned but not peeled
3/4 lb russet potato, or red potatoes
Sea salt
Cooking oil
1 tsp red pepper flakes
2 tbsp dry crumbled oregano
2 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp powdered mustard
2-3 tbsp red wine vinegar
28 oz can diced tomatoes (fire-roasted are best, as always!)
4 oz frozen chopped spinach
4 oz frozen corn kernels
Tabasco sauce
Handful fresh basil leaves, roughly chopped
Handful fresh cilantro leaves, roughly chopped
Smoked cheese for topping
Hard, aged cheese for topping

1. Soak the chickpeas before you cook them. To do this, cover them with water by an inch, and let them sit for 3-10 hours. If you don't have that much time, do what I did. Cover them with water, to start.

Bring to a boil. Let it boil for 5 minutes, and then take the pan off the heat. The chickpeas have already begun to take in water.



Cover it, and let it sit for an hour. It's still an hour, but it beats 10 hours, right? After they've soaked they should have swollen a bit more.



Drain them and re-cover them with water by an inch or two. Bring to a simmer, partially cover the pan, and let them cook for an hour or more, depending on their age. Mine were old and took 3 hours. I didn't eat until 11pm.

2. Meanwhile, though, you may prepare the other ingredients for the stew. Garlic needs to be smashed and roughly chopped. Onions need to be sliced. Celery needs to be cut into bits, and set aside with the onions, but separate from the garlic. You can do this however you see fit, but this is my method.



3. And now you can cube the squash and potatoes. Some people like theirs peeled, but I don't know why. It's not like the peel tastes bad, or gets in the way, or is ugly. It has nutritional value, and adds fiber. And it will take you twice as long to prepare your vegetables if you peel them. But suit yourself.

I tried to cut the squash into 1/2-inch cubes and the potatoes into 3/4-inch chunks. To simplify things, I cooked them together, and potato cooks fast; I didn't want it to cook faster than the squash and then fall apart. Plus, with all the stirring I knew I was going to be doing, I didn't want the potato to completely disappear into mush, so I thought it had ought to start out in larger chunks than did the squash.



4. Once your starchies (read: potatoes and squash) are cubed, you can cook them. You will be cooking them in water - the very water that will become your soup water. I used filtered water, because I want to believe that it makes the tap water of Phoenix taste acceptable. It doesn't, but who can afford that much bottled water? And who wants to waste that much plastic?

Anyway, cover your potatoes and squash with water in a large pot. Maybe a half an inch to spare. Add a fat pinch of sea salt and bring to a gentle boil. A hearty simmer, if you will.



5. Let them simmer for 20-30 minutes, until both squash and potatoes are cooked but not mushy. I believe the term is "fork-tender," but I don't really like it. It seems fleeting and faddish.

The water will look slightly orange and cloudy, and that's OK.



Set the pot aside and bring out a frying pan. Or, if you have more than one large burner, as I do not, you can bring out the frying pan while the stockpot is cooking the starchies. It's all up to you.

Add some oil to your pan, over medium heat. When it heats up properly, add the celery and onion that you set aside earlier.



Stir it up good, and continue to do so for about 3 minutes. Maybe 5. Definitely not 4.



6. Stir until the celery is popping and the onion is limp and threatening to brown if you stop stirring. (If it does brown, I don't see what the big deal is. Mine always does when I stop stirring to take a picture, and I haven't suffered from it yet.)



Toss in the garlic, spices, and oregano. Stir that up and keep at it. The moment you see the spices stick to the pan and start to smell amazing on the cusp of burnt, douse it with some red wine vinegar. Or maybe wine; I haven't tried that. It'll hiss at you something fierce. Respond by dumping the entire can of fire-roasted diced tomatoes into the pan and mixing the whole shebang together. That oughta hush things up.





7. Now everything will be coming together. Take the frying pan off the burner and return the stockpot with the starchies. Keep the heat on it - medium is fine - while you add things. You can add spinach and corn now. Stir it gently to distribute everything, but try not to pulverize the potatoes in the process.



You can also drain, rinse, and add the chickpeas to the stockpot, assuming they've cooked by this point. Add the tomato mixture.

This would be where a wand blender comes in very handy. To thicken the stew so it's not just chunky seasoned water, I used the wand blender to blend just a little bit of the contents of the stockpot. Most things were left intact, but enough squash and potatoes and onions and spinach got pureed that the stew developed a really hearty base. Desirable in a stew.

Season it with sea salt - and really, you need a fair amount for it to not be bland and tasteless. Just keep adding a little bit and tasting until you get the right amount. If the stew tastes like hot water, add more salt! And Tabasco sauce, of course. Just ploonk a bunch in until you get the right amount of zip.



8. You can take the (hopefully simmering) stew off of the heat, now, and stir in the chopped fresh herbs.



Bowl it up, grate on some cheese, and eat your heart out.

Despite the lengthy ingredient list, this is not an expensive stew. It uses no broth, no cream or butter, and I had at least 75% of the contents in my pantry/refrigerator already. It is a great way to use things you don't know what to do with.

Let me tell you right now, the stew was really good. It may be a temptation (at least, it was for me) to serve it over rice or some other kind of grain, but I would advise resistance to this particular hankering. Most of the calories (although they are few) that come from this stew are carbohydrate calories; you don't need more added from a grain, even a whole one. I would be intrigued, however, to try this stew ladled on a piece of sturdy white fish (cod or halibut, perhaps). It may compliment nicely.

Of course, you are welcome to do what I did and simply enjoy a bowl by itself, as 11pm is rather late to be eating a large meal.




(Oh, and I'm still on the fence about this whole video thing. My arms are really beefy. And it took me 8 hours to edit all this stuff and make an entry.)