A Few Good Recipes

Ahh, remember the days when Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson and Demi Moore were.... Well, they had a bit more box office draw than they do now, remember? Cruise and Moore are just...creepy (well, creepier) with their respective marriages to significantly younger partners, and Jack is just an even bigger joke than he was when he made A Few Good Men.

Did you too have to suffer through bad impressions of Nicholson delivering that awful "You want the truth? You can't handle the truth!" line by over-the-top, hammy wannabe high school thespians, Gentle Reader? Or did I just badly date myself?

Anywho, since I was lazy over the past few weeks and didn't post about some new recipes that are pretty easy and really tasty. Coming up with a catchy title for such a makeup post is, at 6 a.m. on a Friday morning after a long week with a long, busy day ahead, not the easiest thing in the world. I beg your indulgence, Gentle Reader.

The following recipe I nabbed from a copy of Whole Paycheck's The Whole Deal, which comes out monthly, I think. It often has fabulous coupons for the kefir I drink for breakfast, and every now and then I find a recipe I might actually try.

Chickpea and Lentil Bangladesh Stew**This is the name given to the recipe as it appeared in The Whole Deal. On WF's Web site, it's dubbed Slow Cooker Chickpea and Lentil Stew and is scrubbed of the WF product placements.

2 T extra virgin olive oil
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
3 medium chile peppers, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
2 t garam masala
1/4 C sesame seeds
2 15-oz. cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1/2 C dried red lentils
1 28-oz. can tomato puree
2 C vegetable stock
1/4 C pitted black olives
1/2 C yogurt

Serving size: About 15 ounces

1. Heat the olive oil in a pan, then sauté the onions.
   
2. Add the peppers, garlic, garam masala and sesame seeds and cook until the peppers begin to soften.
   
3. Combine everything except the yogurt in the slow cooker.
   
4. Cook on low 8 to 10 hours.
   
5. Add the yogurt about 15 minutes before serving.

Nutritional Info
Calories: 250
Fat: 10 g
Saturated fat: 1 g
Cholesterol: 5 mg
Protein: 11 g
Carbs: 33 (9 g sugar)
Fiber: 8 g
Na: 680 mg

The Faudie's Futzings
This recipe, if you haven't noticed, is really simple and too easy to make. I, however, found ways to make it even easier to prepare.

• Canned chiles are cheaper and conveniently come three to a can (at least the HEB brand does). I didn't bother with gutting them--me likes a little heat.
  
• I used the quick-soak method to prepare my own chickpeas rather than buying canned ones. Sure, that might seem like more work, thus defeating my aim of finding ways to make this recipe even easier to prepare, but I just prefer to measure out my own chickpeas. Guess I'm a bit anal retentive that way. (Nah, really?)
  
• Hold the black olives and the yogurt. I don't like black olives and keep none in my stockpile, and I've yet to find that adding yogurt shortly before serving does nothing for it.

I can really close to making my own tomato puree from the canned whole tomatoes I had in the pantry, but I found a brand that was pretty low in sodium and competitively priced. Plus that saved me from dirtying the food processor, and I wasn't terribly keen on cleaning that puppy up.

The stew goes well with both naan and idlis (if you're lucky enough to have an idli maker and some batter, or you've found a reputable brand of micronuke idlis). When I reheated it yesterday for supper for me, I ate a chapati with it, which worked quite well too. If you don't have access to chapati or naan or idlis, try a flour tortilla. They're quite close to chapati.

By the way, when I reheated the stew last night, I added some more veggie broth (Pacific Natural Foods brand). When I divvied up the stew, for we didn't eat it the day I made it--I don't think I put equal amounts of the liquid into the two containers. That extra broth also helped the chickpeas from drying up and getting nasty while simmering on the stove.

Someone Might Begin to Think I Like Pineapple....
And that person wouldn't be wrong. I do like pineapple. Especially fresh chunks (although the ones I cut for the very first time were a tad overripe). I like chicken a lot, as does the family (that includes the feline members), so imagine our delight upon finding a quick, easy, tasty recipe for sweet and sour chicken.

Sweet and Sour Chicken1 T olive oil
1 T bottled minced garlic
1 t bottled ground fresh ginger (such as Spice World)
1/4 t crushed red pepper
1 1/2 lb. skinless, boneless chicken breast, cut into 1/2" pieces
3/4 C chopped onion
1/2 C chopped celery
1/2 C chopped red bell pepper
1 15.25-oz. can pineapple chunks in juice, undrained
1/3 C reduced-sodium soy sauce
2 T dry sherry
1 1/2 T cornstarch
2 t brown sugar
1/4 C dry-roasted chopped cashews

1. Heat the oil in a large, nonstick skillet over medium-high heat.
   
2. Add the garlic, ginger, red pepper and chicken, then sauté 5 min. or until the chicken is done.
   
3. Remove the chicken mixture from the pan and set aside.
   
4. Add the onion, celery and bell pepper to the pan, then sauté 4 min. or until crisp-tender.
   
5. Drain the pineapple, reserving half a cup of the juice.
   
6. Add 1 cup of pineapple chunks to the pan, then cook 30 seconds. Reserve the remaining pineapple for another use.
   
7. Combine the reserved half-cup of juice, soy sauce, sherry, cornstarch and sugar in a bowl, stirring with a whisk until smooth.
   
8. Return the chicken mixture to the pan.
   
9. Stir in the juice mixture, bring to boil and cook 1 min.
   
10. Sprinkle with cashews.

Yield: 4 servings (serving size: about 1 cup)

Nutritional Info
Calories: 388
Fat: 11.6 g
Sat fat: 2.4 g
Protein: 41.5 g
Carbs: 28.9 g
Fiber: 2.1 g
Cholesterol: 101 mg
Sodium: 858 mg

The Faudie's Futzings
By and large, I followed the recipe. By and large.

I omitted the cashews and the celery. I had raw cashews but didn't want the added fat. I didn't have celery. Because I didn't have celery, I used the green bell pepper I did have. I diced it so it would contrast with the red bell pepper, which I left in long, yummy-licious strips that all the human members of Chez Boeckman-Walker enjoy.

Some of the ingredients I didn't measure, I guiltily admit. I chopped up half an sizeable onion--I loves me them alums! As for the pineapple, I threw in all the chunks since the boy doesn't like taking them to school in his lunch, and the husband no longer puts them on his chicken pizzas on Tuesdays. So why let perfectly good pineapple chunks linger?

Oh yeah, forget the bottled ginger and garlic. I used fresh--even though I do have bottled minced garlic in my refrigerator. I just happened to have some fresh stuff on hand that I'd bought when I'd been unable to find the bottled stuff, and I didn't want it to go to waste. Plus I've found that I really, really enjoy mincing garlic.

My only disappointment with this recipe is that it didn't reheat well. For all the wonderful flavor it had when freshly made, it was nonexistent upon micronuking. The pineapple was so fabulously distinct the first time, but it just was totally missing the second time. Bummer.