Ingredients:
1 small onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 green bell pepper, diced
1 carrot, sliced
6 large mushrooms, sliced
1 tbs olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

1/3 c pesto sauce
1/2 c cream cheese

1/3 sliced olives (about half an 8oz can)
2 small tomatoes, seeded and diced
2 veggie patties, cooked and diced (I use Morningstar Farms Garden Vegetable)
1/3 c shredded cheddar cheese
2 pie crusts (yep, I just buy 'em)

One egg
2 tablespoons water

Preheat oven to 350°. Toss onion, garlic, pepper, carrot, mushrooms with olive oil, salt, and pepper. Spread on a greased cookie sheet and bake for 45 minutes. When done, mix with cream cheese and pesto while still warm.

Increase oven temp to 450°. Put bottom pie crust in a 9" ungreased glass pie pan. Load with veggie mixture, pressing lightly to make sure it's distributed evenly. Top with tomatoes, olives, veggie patties, and cheese. Cover with top pie crust. Cut four slits in the pie crust. Wisk the egg and water together to make an egg wash, and brush the top of the pie. Bake for 20 minutes.

1 sheet puff pastry, thawed
4 oz cream cheese
1/4 tsp vanilla
3 tsp sugar (I use Whey Low)
1 apple, peeled and sliced thinly
3 Tbsp cinnamon-sugar mix (1 part cinnamon, 2 parts sugar)
1 Tbsp melted butter

Mix together the cream cheese, vanilla, and sugar until soft and smooth. Spread on pastry, leaving an inch clear all the way around. Place apples on top of cream cheese, and sprinkle with cinnamon-sugar mix. Drizzle with butter. Bake at 400 for 10 minutes.

Just got back from Lungta, at 46th and NE Sandy. It has a wonderful hole-in-the-wall ambiance (seriously, we love the casual places), with Tibetan music and many examples of the restaurant's namesake, "windhorses"--colorful flags flown outside Tibetan homes.

We ordered the Tsel Momo, a vegetable dumpling that can be ordered steamed or fried, and Tsel Balab (I think--I didn't write it down. #13), a vegetable turnover.

If you like cilantro, the Balab is for you, as it's positively packed with the demon weed stuff. We ordered the momos steamed, and they were mild and delicious. The meal also came with a lovely lentil soup, which the Spousal Unit gleefully used for dipping.

We'll definitely be back to try the rest of their vegetarian fare. Though we'll ask about cilantro next time.

I've started drinking wine again, and the Spousal Unit recommended keeping notes here so as not to lose track of what I've tried. (It takes me a month to get through a bottle, so these reviews will be sporadic at best.) Because what little I know about wine is about white wines, I thought I'd try some reds. I was originally going to stick to Oregon wines, but then I decided to go with "local" instead, mainly because it lets me include Columbia Valley WA, which contains lots of good vineyards -- including Barnard Griffin. Their 2004 Syrah is, in my terms, yummy. In winewanker terms, it's not particularly acid and it's nice and light on the tannins -- this is a good one for newbie palates like mine. It is rich though, with a nice full feeling on the tongue, and it has a fruity, slightly floral aftertaste. I'm drinking it right now with vegetable samosas, and it's coping very nicely with the spice -- though I have a feeling the combination might not be to everyone's taste. It's more than good enough to drink on its own, anyway. At about $14 it's at the upper end of my tightwad range, but worth it.

One other thing, about taking a month to get through a bottle -- I heartily recommend a Zyliss bottle stopper (I have the "bell" kind but the other one should work as well). This has also led to the discovery that I am a horrible philistine and quite enjoy some red wines cold; the BG 2004 Syrah is one of these, though I must say it's better at room temp; it gets a little thin and bitter in the cold.

Oh, this was the best soup, and it became a satisfying sludge the next day. Now I'm going to try to remember how I did it. A lot of my recipes start this way.

Ingredients:

• 2 T olive oil
  
• 4 yellow onions, sliced
  
• 6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
  
• 5 carrots, sliced
  
• 1 red pepper, diced
  
• 5 small potatoes, peeled and diced
  
• 2 cans diced tomatoes
  
• 2 can whole corn
  
• 1 can tomato paste
  
• 1 c jasmine rice
  
• 4 c vegetable broth
  
• 4 T butter

Spices:

• Key (a tbsp or more): Basil, Oregano
  
• Note (tsp) Coriander, Red pepper flakes, tarragon, thyme
  
• Lots of salt and some pepper

Method:

• In a large soup pot, sautee the hell outta them onions. Cook them until there's brown stuff on the pan.
  
• Add spices, stir a bit, then deglaze pan with a cup of veg broth.
  
• Add garlic, let it cook a bit.
  
• Add everything except the butter, then add water to cover.
  
• Simmer, covered, for about 30 minutes, or until veggies are tender.
  
• Add the butter. Once incorporated, test seasoning. Add basil and salt if the broth is at all bitter--it should be tomoto-ey and sweet.
  
• Add dumplings. Oh, I didn't mention the dumplings? They go like this (recipe from Joy of Cooking):
  • Mix together 2 cups flour, a tablespoon of baking powder, and 3/4 teaspoon of salt.
    
  • In a small saucepan, bring a cup of milk and 3 tablespoons of butter just to a simmer.
    
  • Mix the wet into the dry with a fork until it all comes together. Don't overmix unless you're like me, and you love
  • chewy dumplings.
    
  • Roll dough into about 18 little balls and place on top of soup. Cover and cook 10 minutes.

Last night was cooking night, and it has brung more veggie loaf and the casserole below. We cooked up our entire delivery of vegetables, except for just a few potatoes and a couple cloves of garlic. Note to veggie-loaf lovers: this time, we roasted the veggies first, and it didn't really make a difference. So don't waste the extra time. In the delivery were some fresh green beans, so naturally we did what our white-person instincts demanded: got out the cream-of-mushroom soup.

2 medium potatoes, peeled and sliced
4 plump cloves of garlic, sliced
1-1/2 cups cheddar cheese, shredded (I probably used more--I just grabbed handfuls. Thus the title.)
1 cup fresh green beans, cut into 1-inch bits
1/2 cup milk
1 can condensed cream-of-mushroom soup (the cheaper the better!)

• preheat oven to 375°.
  
• Spray a medium casserole dish with nonstick spray.
  
• Layer in the pan thusly: potatoes, garlic, green beans, cheese. Make about two layers.
  
• Mix the milk and soup, whisking lightly until the big lumps are gone. Pour over the top of the layers.
  
• Bake for about an hour, or until the potatoes are tender.
• Serve to cheese-lovin' Spousal Unit.
• Administer CPR.

As I sit munching on my second veggie-loaf sandwich of the evening, I realize I must try to remember what I put in this amazing stuff, in hopes of recreating it someday.

Amounts will be vague. I had just cooked a batch of a dozen onions until they were just caramelized, and tonged them into various foodstuffs.

Pre-cooking:

3 medium onions, sliced, cooked just until caramelized
1 head garlic, chopped, also caramelized
3 cups cooked rice

Blade-process in batches:

2 red bell peppers, chopped
1 bunch fresh spinach, chopped
3 carrots, grated
6 leaves fresh basil
1 can garbanzo beans, drained
1 can roasted tomatoes, drained
1 package extra-firm silken tofu
About half the onions
Garlic

Put everything in a huge-ass bowl. Stir in:

½ cup cheddar cheese, grated
4 beaten eggs
Cooked rice
Remaining onion

Spice generously with:

Salt
Pepper
Cumin
Oregano
Tarragon
Thyme
Sage

Bake in a 350° oven for about an hour. I used a pan that produces six mini-loaves, and had a little mix left over. While the loaves hold together more or less, it is more like a pate than a loaf. I wrapped each loaf in wax paper, and they are very handy for making sandwiches.

We had a surplus of onions this weekend, so I cooked up a mess of them and did various things. This was the tastiest, and it's good hot or cold:

Extra-virgin olive oil
2 large yellow onions, sliced
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
8 eggs, beaten
1 heaping teaspoon dried dill
Healthy dash jalapeno tabasco
Salt and pepper to taste
½-cup cheddar cheese, shredded

Spray a glass pie pan with nonstick coating. Preheat oven to 350°.

Sautee the onions and garlic in the EVOO until they just begin to caramelize (I actually did them separately because I was doing batches of both ingredients, but I don't think cooking them together will hurt, just put the garlic in later so it doesn't burn). Place the onions and garlic in the pie pan and spread them out so they make an even layer on the bottom.

Sprinkle cheese evenly over onion layer.

Mix salt, pepper, dill, and tabasco with the eggs, and pour mixture over the onions and cheese.

Bake for 45 minutes.

Bento 06 February 13, originally uploaded by frykitty.

Mine is on the left, Spousal Unit's on the right. Using a couple of new boxes today! They are smaller than our original bento boxes, which caused a little spousal pouting.

The contents (L to R): veggie curry left over from dinner, rice with a basil leaf on top, celery sticks, pistachios, sugar-free Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, tangelos.