Red Lentil Soup

This is one of those recipes that is so fundamentally simple it seems like it couldn't possibly be that great. The fact that when it's finished cooking it looks like a pot full of orange mush doesn't do it any favors either. But once you top it with a few crumbles of feta and almonds this soup shows what it's all about.

I certainly didn't think I was going to like this soup as much as I did. It seemed like something this mushy was going to be a chore to eat and wouldn't be very yummy but it showed me how wrong I was. It is warm and filling and perfect for fall low maintenance low fat cooking. It was great the first day and just kept getting better as left overs. Those lentils suck up moisture though so keep some extra stock around to thin out the left overs the next couple days.

Think while I curl up under a blanket this afternoon I'm going to start another pot of this.

Red Lentil Soup

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 onion, chopped
3 shallots, chopped
1/2 teaspoon red-pepper flakes

6 cups good-tasting vegetable stock (or water)
1/2 cup brown rice, picked over and rinsed
1 1/3 cup red lentils, picked over and rinsed

slivered almonds, toasted
black oil cured olives, chopped
feta, crumbled

In a big soup pot, over medium heat, combine the olive oil, onion, shallots, and red pepper flakes. Let them brown, and caramelize a bit, stirring occasionally.

Stir in the broth, bring to a boil, then stir in the rice. Simmer for about 30 minutes or until the rice is about half cooked then add lentils four about another 10 minutes or until both rice and lentils are very tender, and not at all toothsome. By this time, the lentils will have collapsed into a thick slop of sorts. If you need to add more water/broth at any point do so a splash at a time, until the soup thins out to the point you prefer.

Unless you used a salty broth, you will likely need to salt generously, until the the soup no longer tastes flat. Serve each bowl topped with almonds, olives, feta, and a slight drizzle of olive oil if you like.

Original recipe from 101 Cookbooks blog.

Root Vegetable Flatbreads

A couple weekends ago the fella and I drove to visit my family for the afternoon. While we were waiting on gathering the entire family to have dinner together my mother got out the Vitamix that had been hiding unused in my grandmother's basement for a while. It is an original version from the late sixties with a very vague instruction manual and no lid for the spout on the top. The book suggests using an apple to cover the hole in the top of the mixer while it is in use. Ah the good ole days when seatbelts and kitchen appliances with safety latches were largely over looked.

My mother stood back amused as the fella and I made flour out of everything she handed us. An hour later we had several pound of very finely ground almond flour, lentil flour, chickpea flour, and brown rice flour. At the cost of some raw ingredients and the loss our hearing for the afternoon (chickpeas in a grinder is one of the worst noises you will ever hear) we had enough flour to play with for months. Now I really want a Vitamix, a hand flour grinder, anything to never have to pay the outrageous prices for non gluten flour again.

Now the problem became what to make with something as crazy as lentil flour. All signs pointed to some flatbread Indian type creation. So I modified a flatbread recipe that called for wheat flour by switching in almond and lentil flour. It seemed likely to fail but with enough creativity I made it work. These were okay with the Shahi Paneer for “date night” dinner with the fella the other night but they weren't as great as I was hoping for.

The problem was I made them too thick, trying to roll them out and treat them like the gluteny original recipe would have which lead to a lot of crumbled dough and flatbreads that were raw in the middle. I put the rest of the dough in tin foil in the fridge for the next couple of days trying to figure what to do with it, worried that I wasted my exciting homemade flour on this creation.

While I was trying to figure out what to bring to my wine tasting group I remembered this flatbread dough was waiting to be fried up. I figured that though they weren't that great people might find a couple bites each interesting and it at least wouldn't get thrown away. To my great surprise while cooking them up at the last minute, this time around they were amazing. Turns out allowing the vegetables time to moisten the dough improved the consistency a lot and hand shaping tiny bite sized pieces made them easier to fry and made sure they got cooked all the way through making them chewy but crispy . My recipe worked out really well and I almost would have never known if I wouldn't have been too lazy to make something original to go with my wine.

These went over really well at the tasting. Not sure they are the perfect thing to pair with Malbec but it worked out alright nonetheless. So here is the recipe for all my fellow winos who wondered what was in the weird little fried breads. There are a lot of ingredients but I tried to organize them so you can track down all the related ingredients at the same time rather than running in circles around the kitchen.

Root Vegetable Flatbreads

1/2 cup chickpea flour
1 1/2 cup almond flour
3/4 cup lentil flour

2 cups grated carrot
1/2 cup grated radish or zucchini
1/2 cup cilantro, finely chopped
1 inch piece fresh ginger, grated
1 chili, finely diced
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 egg, whisked well
2 tablespoons yogurt

2 tablespoon ground flaxseed
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon caraway seeds
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1 teaspoon chili powder

oil for frying


Dry roast the chickpea flour in a frying pan over medium heat until it is fragrant and no longer smells raw. The flour will give off a really nice smell as it cooks letting you know when it's toasted. It will benefit from being shifted through a mesh sieve after toasting so it won't be clumpy. I shifted the other two flours before adding them too the bowl as well.

In a large mixing bowl, combine all the ingredients except for the oil.

Coat your hands with a thin layer of oil and hand mix the ingredients together until it is a sticky fully integrated dough. You will probably need to add a couple tablespoons water to get the dough to be properly sticky and hold together without crumbling. Keep kneading the ingredients together with your fingers until it is moist enough to form a ball.

Add enough oil to a large frying pan in fry the bread. When the oil is hot enough for frying add more oil to your hands and beginning forming thin cookie sized rounds out of the dough with your fingers. Get them as thin as you possibly can without the dough crumbling. They don't have to be perfectly shaped or a totally uniform thickness.

Fry as many as you can fit in the pan at a time without over crowding them, for about 1 minute on each side or until they just start turning brown. Remove from pan and drain on a plate covered in paper towel.

The dough will keep for a couple days if stored in an air tight container in the refrigerator. This recipe makes enough for two people to nibble on for days so I fried up small batches over the week. The dough actually becomes easier to work with the day after it's mixed up as the grated vegetables give off some moisture so if it is giving you trouble right after combining it, chill it over night and come back to it the next day.

Idea from very not gluten free original recipe at Ecurry blog.

Shahi Paneer

When I want to treat myself while not thinking about little things like fat content and such this is my favorite dish to order out in an Indian place. It is a saturated fat monster of a meal what with heavy cream, cashews, and tons of cheese. It's a treat for sure and not a dish to put in the regular cooking rotation. It was a fun experience to cook at home though because it turned out so well we pretty much have no need to go out for Indian anymore. We cooked little fried lentil and chickpea breads with this paneer and had a really great Indian feast.

After making this meal however I'm officially fed up with paneer. This is the hazard of bulk food shopping. We've made some really delicious curries out of it but the remaining 2 pounds are going in the freezer to be excavated in a couple months. I need a break from paneer.

Shahi Paneer

8 tablespoons vegetable oil (divided use)
1/4 cup chopped cashews, roughly chopped
1/4 cup golden raisins

1/2 pound paneer, cut in small cubes

2 medium onions, chopped
1 inch piece of ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
4 garlic cloves
2 green chillies, chopped

Salt to taste
1 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon cubeb pepper
3/4 teaspoon turmeric
1 teaspoon garam masala

1/2 cup Milk
4 tablespoon heavy cream


Heat 1 tablespoon oil in large frying pan over medium heat. Saute the cashews and raisins until just barely browned. Remove from pan and reserve.

Add 5 tablespoons of oil to pan. Fry paneer until browned over medium heat. Remove from pan and reserve.

In food processor puree onion, ginger, garlic, green chili into a fine paste. Fry the mixture in the remaining 2 tablespoons oil until golden brown. Add salt, chili powder, cubeb pepper, turmeric powder, and garam masala. Saute for 1-2 minutes.

Add milk to make a gravy. Bring the gravy to boil then reduce the heat and cook until the gravy becomes thick. Put a most of the toasted cashews and raisins in the gravy while it is being cooked, reserving a small portion for decorating.

Add paneer cubes and cream, heating for 5 minutes. Garnish with extra cream, cashews and raisins.

Original recipe from Indian Food Forever.

Spicy Coconut Milk and Mushroom Soup

It started innocently enough with my 3 jalapeño curry, the fella amped it up with 4 Serrano in his pea and paneer dish and the chef shamed us with this evilly delicious soup. There were 5 unseeded habenaros involved. I think it is safe to say I will not be continuing the spicy cooking challenge by making a jerk sauce with 6 Scotch bennet peppers. I'm okay with letting Jacob win, he is after all the professional.

The really amazing thing about the soup was that not only was it hot but it was tasty as well. Yes it made us all cry in the very best way while clutching our beers (mine sorghum from Red Bridge and theirs Founder's wet hopped seasonal) but it also had great flavor. The habenaros open up every taste bud you never knew you had to all the other things going in the soup. Citrusy lemon grass, salty fish sauce, herbal cilantro, creamy coconut milk. They all work together to make something amazing.

We're all crazy people who like spice so the heat wasn't a problem for us. If you aren't up for that much spice you can put in less peppers or cook some of the heat off of them by frying up the onion puree which will cut the spice a bit. And if the spice is still too much in the finished product you can do what we resorted to and pour it over some brown rice and toss in some paneer to add something to compete with the habenaros.

Spicy Coconut Milk and Mushroom Soup

1 1/2 cups mushrooms, chopped
2 tablespoons oil
2 medium onions, chopped

3tablespoon lemon grass puree
1teaspoon fish sauce

5 cloves of garlic
1-inch piece of ginger, peeled and roughly chopped
5 habenaro peppers, seeded

3 cups coconut milk
6 Cubeb peppercorns, ground (1 teaspoon of regular pepper and a pinch of clove would work fine)
2 1/2 cup chicken stock
3 tablespoons cilantro, chopped (mint or basil will work as well)


In a pot heat oil over medium heat then add mushrooms and one of the chopped onions. Cook until browned. Add lemon grass and fish sauce.

Puree remaining onion, garlic, ginger and habenaros in the food processor. Add in one cup of the coconut milk and puree until you have a paste. If you want to lesson the heat of the soup sauté this puree until the onions are no longer raw before adding to the pot with the mushroom mixture.

To soup pot add remaining 2 cups of coconut milk, peppercorns, and chicken stock and bring to a boil.

Add cilantro and simmer soup for 5 minutes. Serve over brown rice with paneer or tofu to cut spice if needed.

A purely original Jacob Schenk recipe.

Leek and Fennel Coulis

This simple but flavorful sauce is a great addition to just about anything. Fish, chicken, veggies or pasta with the addition of a little Parmesan. When I'm having a lazy menu making week I whip up a full recipe of this and use it to top a low maintenance piece of meat and then later in the week when I have zero time to cook I toss it over some pasta. Recipes like this keep me sane when I'm working too much because the only thing worse than working two jobs is not eating well and trying to make it through the day.

Leek and Fennel Coulis

1/4 cup olive oil
2 leeks, white part and two inches of green part, chopped
1 fennel bulb, finely chopped

1 tablespoon fresh thyme, finely chopped
3 cups baby spinach, roughly chopped

1 cup coconut milk
1/4 cup olive oil

Heat olive oil in a large skillet. Saute leeks and fennel for 6-8 minutes until soft. Stir in thyme and spinach and cover skillet for 2-3 minutes until spinach is thoroughly wilted. Remove pan from heat and stir coconut milk into mixture

Transfer mixture to a food processor and puree on highest speed until smooth. While food processor is running on medium speed, slowly drizzle in olive oil.

Original recipe from Elana's Pantry blog.