Chicken Noodle Soup – A Cure for Cold Season

Posted on February 17, 2013 by Our Way to Eat

When the long Minnesota winter is starting to wear on us, there are certain classic recipes that we revisit every year. A bowl of homemade soup provides a fortifying boost of energy and straightforward, clean flavors that help a body endure the waning months of cold and darkness.

A steaming bowl of chicken or chicken-less noodle soup is a warming cure for winter blahs if I know one. It is so comforting if you have a cold. I don’t follow an exact recipe to make Chicken and Chicken-less Noodle soup. I chop a few peeled carrots, a few ribs of celery and onion, and saute them in a little oil until fragrant, but still crisp. Then, I add about 5 cups of broth, (homemade when I have it). I bring the soup to a point beyond a simmer and add two handfuls of frozen peas. When the soup returns to almost-boiling I add a few handfuls of egg noodles, and about a quarter cup of chopped fresh parsley. I like to use ample, wavy, dumpling egg noodles. They need 6-10 minutes of cooking time to cook to tender, but not soggy. In order to make chicken-less soup for myself, and classic chicken noodle soup for Bjorn, I saute chicken breasts or thighs separately. When the chicken is cooked through, I chop it and add a hearty serving of chopped chicken to his bowl. You can make a whole pot of chicken-less soup if everyone prefers, or you can saute the chicken along with the veggies if everyone at your house eats chicken. Before serving, I adjust the flavour with salt and pepper. If you are a stickler for following a recipe, Martha Stewart’s Chicken Noodle Soup is similar to my general guidelines, except that she doesn’t add peas; she opts for dill instead of parsley and she uses quick-cooking vermicelli noodles instead of wide egg noodles. This soup is flexible. You could add other veggies. For me, I like to stick to the classic Chicken Noodle soup ingredients, except that I leave out the meat.

A little while ago, Bjorn’s brother was under the weather, so we decided to bring him a serving of our soup. I removed a portion of the soup and put it in a disposable container before the noodles were fully cooked so that he could bring the soup up to temp without the noodles getting soggy.

To round out our care package, we added a bottle of fizzy mineral water for some electrolytes and a quarter-sleeve of saltines to go along with the soup.

I taped my handwritten instructions to a small bag with washi tape and we dropped the package off at Brett’s house, hoping to bring a little warmth and cheer to a dreary sick day. Homemade soup tastes wonderful and fills the house with a comforting aroma. This soup is made entirely of staples that are usually on hand in the pantry and freezer. Chicken Noodle soup cooks quickly and provides comfort, flavor and textures you just can’t get from a can. When you’ve had it with winter, remember to make this soup!

Inspiration for Winter Salad Season

Posted on February 3, 2013 by Our Way to Eat

Mixed Greens with Beet, Grapefruit and Avocado with Grapefruit-Thyme Dressing You might think a person’s natural “Salad Season” would occur in the summer. Since I started photo-documenting the food we eat, I have discovered our true salad season occurs in the deep winter. We certainly don’t have a dazzling array of garden and local produce available, but even so, we do our best to choose the best produce and canned goods available to get by. This is probably the season when we need hearty salads the most here in the Midwest. Our bodies are hiding in bundles of clothing, we spend our time mostly indoors and in natural darkness, and we inevitably encounter a number of virus threats on a weekly basis. I consider these light, bright, crunchy, energizing, nutrient rich, colorful salads, [along with sleep] to be one of the secrets to a maintaining a pretty reliable immune system. They are also my January-February hope that when spring arrives, I will feel and look more springy than a person feels in the depths of winter.

Our first salad, shaved carrot, Parmesan, radish, white bean and raw sunflower seeds on romaine. I start preparing our salads by adding its prominent components to a bowl. Chop something crunchy (celery), add a protein (kidney beans), add any other vegetables you have on hand and wish to include (here, cukes and halved grape tomatoes) , toss with greens, (here, romaine and spinach). If you care to, add a flavor/texture ”treat” such as seeds, nuts, avocado, egg or a bit of cheese. This is the way to make a great winter a great salad.I typically toss greens with either some citrus juice, lime, lemon, orange or grapefruit or a flavored vinegar. My favorite vinegars are red wine, balsamic or tarragon vinegar. Then I drizzle just a few drops of olive oil and toss the greens. It is surprising how little oil you need to bring all of the flavors together. Sometimes I add a tablespoon or two of Dijon mustard, or a teaspoon of honey or jam to the oil and vinegar/citrus mixture before mixing vigorously to add further flavor and help the dressing to emulsify before tossing the liquids with the greens. Chopped fresh herbs or dried herbs along with salt and pepper added according to taste complete the dressing. This salad is composed of beets, peeled bosc pear and sliced cucumber on mixed greens dressed with leftover grapefruit juice and fresh thyme dressing and a little pepper and salt. Don’t hesitate to open a can of beans, beets or citrus canned (hopefully BPA free) in its natural juice. There are many health benefits and few sacrifices when you add these nutrient-rich ingredients the easy way.

The next salad is composed of sliced radish, sliced pear, white beans and a few slices of brie on spinach with citrus-preserve dressing.

Another great salad is composed of corn, black beans, peeled and quartered cukes, minced scallion, halved grape tomatoes and pepitas dressed with lime juice, olive oil, honey and chili flakes over romaine. In my book, this winter salad is special, grapefruit supremes, sliced avocado and red beets on mixed greens with grapefruit juice and olive oil dressing with thyme leaves. Here is another hearty and satisfying salad we’ve enjoyed composed of shaved carrot, celery, chickpeas, sliced radish and provolone on romaine-spinach mix.

Salads in winter are limited by the produce in season, but those limitations can open up room for creativity. Salads like these complete a meal as a healthy side dish or stand as a meal on their own. Certainly, they brighten your plate and the winter— try ‘em.

Cucumber Days

Posted on August 31, 2012 by Our Way to Eat

Take two, I had a few issues with my first post made from my Ipad, so I’ll try that again…

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3 years into gardening, this is the first year we’ve had any success with cucumbers. This year, we are enjoying them regularly in salads, on tacos and most commonly sliced thin, perhaps peeled, and tossed into a bowl with cracked pepper, sliced purple or white onions, snipped fresh herbs, such as chives, flat-leaf parsley, or dill all soaked in white vinegar and a splash of water. This is a taste from childhood that I learned to love at my Grandma’s house, fresh from her garden. We are harvesting spicy Serrano and hot, citrusy Lemon Drop peppers every day. I have been chopping these and tossing them into the vinegar-water mixture. It mellows their bite enough to make them a perfect, punchy but palatable addition to the mix. I consider this sliced cucumber, onion, hot pepper and herb mixture a perfect summer side dish, snack, condiment and salad.

There are two schools of thought on the ubiquitous sliced cucumber side dish, one vinegary, like mine, and the other, a creamy version made with sour cream. Check out this recipe for the creamy version of sliced cukes on Deucecities Henhouse, a favorite Twin Cities based blog haunt of mine.

Watching the cukes grow has been almost as much fun as eating them. Ours are growing in all sorts of unconventional shapes. I spend time every week tying tomato plants to chicken wire and winding twine around bamboo poles to support green beans, peppers and peas. Cucumber vines take the initiative of sending out tendrils that stretch out until they find other plants and structures nearby, then curling the tendrils tightly around so they hang tight. Cucumbers are fully capable of supporting themselves.

Garden Delights // Square Foot Garden // July Update

Posted on July 29, 2012 by Our Way to Eat

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Our garden delights me! We find ways to eat fresh veggies and herbs in every meal. I keep learning and I enjoy everything except the squirrels!

The Summer Sandwich // Simple Dining, Al Fresco

Posted on July 18, 2012 by Our Way to Eat

This post is one part ode to one of my favor summer meals and one part cautionary tale. I figure that this blog is about my life, including some of the great meals in it, so I will start with a brief account the day when I spent inadvertently spent $17.72 on 0.57 lbs of cheese. [Oopsie.]

It was a typical Saturday morning. We started our day at the Saint Paul Farmer’s Market. I determined my mission that day was to purchase the components of a summer sandwich for our lunch. At the time, our garden still had a few weeks to go before it would have much to offer us. I bought vegetables, bread, and then we left the market and looped our way up Grand Avenue to the Saint Paul Cheese Shop. That place is pretty neat. Sampling is encouraged, so we tasted several paper-thin wisps of cheese the cheesemonger shaved neatly off of several wheels of cheese and dropped into our extended hands from the forked tip of the blade of his cheese knife. I let my guard down. It is atypical for me to make a mindless splurge without glancing at the price per half pound. I was in a cheese-induced stupor when I asked for a small wedge of Marcel Petite Comte raw cow’s milk cheese from France, and a wedge of Terchelling Sheep’s milk cheese from Holland. I’m sure there are people who routinely spend far more than this on cheese in any given week. I’m not knocking it and I might do it again at some point. The difference will be that I do it intentionally. As a consolation, at least the cheese was very, very good.

Whew. Now that I’ve made that confession to my friends and readers, let’s make a sandwich! A Summer Sandwich is quite simply a sandwich with any combination of meat or vegetarian meat substitute, seasonal vegetables, cheese and sandwich spreads piled on top of nice bread.

I sliced a grainy loaf of bread and served the bread and cheese with our own cheese knives on wooden cutting boards. We eat most of our meals al fresco on our patio. It has been 90+ degrees farenheit there lately, but it is still very pleasant in the shade of a Maple Tree canopy.

I filled a platter with sliced cucumber and tomato, garden lettuces, piles of deli turkey and tofurky, along with bowls of mayonnaise and grainy dijon mustard, and placed salt and pepper shakers on the table. The secret to the perfect summer sandwich is bringing out whatever looks good and fresh, and let each person assemble the sandwich they desire.

If Freud were here, he’d say, “a sandwich is never just a sandwich.” It is the meal I ate on pebble beaches out of a cooler with my parents camping in Door County, Wisconsin in grade four. It is the BLT’s that beckoned numerous cousins, Uncles and Aunts to my Grandma’s farm house every July when the tomatoes were all ripe at once. It is the meal of lettuce, ham, turkey, tomato and cheese sandwiches on good sandwich bread that we shared with friends from Edmonton, Winnipeg, Saint Paul and Minneapolis on a lakeshore in Northern Minnesota after a long, hot day on the lake last year over the 4th of July long weekend. It is the halved baguettes piled with cheese, sliced tomato and a pile of pršut [for the meat eaters] that we ate on a secluded pebble beach a few months ago in Croatia.

What is one to serve on the side? Well, nothing—any decent summer sandwich is in itself, a square meal. Or, if the mood strikes, some salty-crunchy potato chips, leftover potato salad out of the fridge, deviled eggs or summer fruit would all be the perfect compliment. On this particular day we rounded out our plates with bright, rainbow radishes that were too pretty to slice or even to remove the stem. Sure, they could have been thinly sliced and piled on the sandwich, but they were refreshing, spicy perfection and a visual treat perched on the side our plates.

A Summer Sandwich is simple perfection. No matter what fresh fixings are available, where you are, or what time it is, a sandwich satisfies hunger. A sandwich feeds a crowd with varied tastes, comes together easily and is a perfect meal to eat outdoors on a hot July day.

And the cheese?

We’re still working our way through it, and savoring every little morsel–we figure it cost us about 8 cents per crumb.

Happy Friday!

Posted on June 22, 2012 by Our Way to Eat

I find it somewhat ironic or at least interesting as a person who spends plenty of time thinking about, preparing and writing about our weekend and evening meals that Bjorn and I eat about 10 meals every week away from home. We eat these meals in our cars, at our desks in our respective offices or in an empty conference room with co-workers. We don’t eat shabbily. I make an effort to make even the food I pack for our breakfasts and lunches something to enjoy, while being easy to prepare, healthy and portable.

The fact that we spend a lot of time at work is a fact of life. It is also a fact that I don’t like to think of the alternative of not having stable careers. I snapped these pictures of my simple breakfast of avocado mashed on top of a reheated slice of garlic bread that I ate at my desk this morning. This was a TGIF moment. As much as I appreciate my job, I love heading home in the bright sunshine with the weekend ahead. Enjoy!

Scrambled Eggs with Chives, Cucumber and Tomato Salad

Posted on April 22, 2012 by Our Way to Eat

This is one of my favorite moments in the spring. We have a tree in our front yard that has burst into bloom and covers our yard in an a canopy of electric-pink blossoms. When the wind blows, soft petals drift through the air and settle into the grass like fuchsia confetti. I try not to stray far from home while this tree is in bloom, lest I miss a precious moment of our tree’s bold and reverent announcement of spring’s arrival.

In the back yard there isn’t a whole lot going on yet. Most of our 96 square feet of raised beds are looking forlorn and neglected. Even so, dandelions are anxiously popping up in the lawn and there are a few random leaves of lettuce and herbs that managed to re-seed themselves poking their way up in our raised beds. The exceptions are the 2 square feet which are abundantly producing our earliest perennial crop — Chives!

I swear that the first moment the sun comes out in the spring, these little troopers start growing like mad. They don’t give a rip about snow and frost. I love these dark coloured, mild-flavoured little toughies. I transplanted mine from my parents’ garden. My Mom and Dad tend an amazing flower garden in their partially wooded, partially sun-soaked yard on a lake in rural Northern Minnesota. They focus on flora and their only edibles are chives, rhubarb and my Dad’s small blueberry patch. They have always grown chives and my Mom sends me out to snip a small bunch to garnish baked potatoes and other dishes when I’m home. I love chives on potatoes, salads, and pasta and pretty much anything that can be heightened by the addition of a dark green garnish with a mild, onion-y flavour.

Our garden’s earliest offering provided me with the jumping-off point for our breakfast. I did a quick Google search to see what others have been saying about chives at breakfast time. I quickly found two breakfasts with chives in a starring role. The first was a recipe for Chive Scrambled Eggs by Martha Stewart. I don’t dig the thought of cottage cheese in scrambled eggs* so instead, I decided to follow inspiration and guidance in a recent post on a lovin’ forkful for our breakfast of scrambled eggs with chives and a grape tomato salad with a few tweaks of my own.

Tomato and Cucumber Salad, serves 2

1 cup grape tomatoes, sliced in half lengthwise
4 inches of cucumber, quartered and chopped
1 ½ Tablespoons Red Wine Vinegar
1 ½ Tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 ½ Tablespoons of fresh chives, rinsed and chopped
Fresh Ground Black Pepper

To begin, I went outside with my kitchen scissors and snipped a small bunch of chives from each of my two abundant bunches. There will be no shortage of chives for us this summer, but I still try to use each bunch equally.

Then I sliced about a cup of grape tomatoes in half the long way, and sliced a chunk of English cucumber into quarters and chopped it. I rinsed, dried and chopped the chives, and streamed a few tablespoons of Red Wine Vinegar and Olive Oil to dress the salad. I tossed the cucumber, grape tomato, red wine vinegar together in a bowl with the chopped chives and fresh ground black pepper and let it sit while I made the eggs. The time allows the chives, pepper, vinegar and oil to meld with the vegetables.

Scrambled Eggs with Chives, serves 2

2 Whole eggs, plus 4 egg whites, lightly beaten
3 ½ Tablespoons light cream cheese
2 ½ Tablespoons fresh chives, rinsed and chopped
½ Tablespoon unsalted butter

Once the salad was assembled, I cracked the eggs 2 whole eggs into a bowl, then separated 4 more eggs, and added only the whites. I measured the cream cheese into the bowl, and ground black pepper into the eggs. Most recipes call for salt at this point but if you add salt as much as recipes and food shows call for, you are going to consume way too much salt. There is no need to exceed healthy sodium levels in your diet. There are so many other flavors and textures going on in most meals that you don’t need to salt your food at every turn for it to taste wonderful. Once the eggs were adequately whisked, I melted the butter in a non-stick pan and scrambled the eggs.

When the eggs were just set, I sprinkled chives and folded them in while the eggs finished cooking. I like my eggs on the done side. I’m all for super-soft eggs that are made so creamy and decadent at the Birchwood Cafe, but if I’m not there I prefer mine to be fairly firm. With the addition of cream cheese, the eggs stayed moist and turned out to be some of the fluffiest eggs I have ever made. As soon as the eggs were done to my liking, I served them in a low dish, and served the salad in small bowls on the side of our plates.

This breakfast hit the spot. It felt as springy as the day. The salad had light, refreshing flavors and the eggs were fluffy with a subtle creaminess. Our garden’s verdant chives carried a mild and pleasant onion-note throughout the plate. This breakfast was satisfying and gave us lightness and energy to enjoy the beautiful spring day before us, missing not one precious, perfumed breath.

*I didn’t have any cottage cheese with which to try Martha Stewart’s recipe anyway.

Stir-Fried Vegetables with Tofu and Udon Noodles in a Spicy Peanut Sauce

Posted on April 4, 2012 by Our Way to Eat

I have been eating and making stir fries all of my life. Stir-frying vegetables and a protein of choice served with rice or noodles is a weeknight staple in so many homes. It is easy and flexible in that you can use whatever vegetables you have. It is also satisfying and can be quite healthy if you aren’t heavy-handed with oil in the preparation. I consider myself to be fairly adept at stir-frying vegetables to tender-crisp, but my challenge has been developing a tasty and full flavored sauce. I don’t buy stir-fry sauces, and in experimenting with the ingredients and seasonings used to develop flavor, I have served some meals in which the flavor was weak. After many trials and much error I took some guidance from others [here and here]. Now, I am finally cracking the code of making tasty stir-fry sauces from scratch that are simple and flavorful. Tonight’s Stir-fried Vegetables and Tofu with Udon Noodles in a Spicy Peanut sauce was declared a winner.

Stir Fried Vegetables with Tofu -Yields about 4 Hearty Servings

1 block of Extra Firm Tofu, with excess water removed then cut into cubes. Meat eaters might enjoy chicken, beef or pork instead of tofu, either pre-cooked, or sautéed with onions and other seasonings before vegetables are stir-fried.
1/3 of a Package of Udon Noodles – cooked according to package directions
Olive Oil or Peanut Oil, for cooking
Approximately 4 Cups of Vegetables, I used:
- ½ of a medium red onion, diced
- 1 broccoli crown, cut into florets
- 1 cup of fresh spinach
- ¾ cup of frozen soy beans (Edamame)
- ¾ cup of sliced button mushrooms,
- ¼ of a Red Bell Pepper, sliced into strips
- ¼ of an Orange Bell Pepper, sliced into strips

There are no limits on the vegetables that would be great in this Stir Fry. Other vegetables that come to mind include cauliflower, shitake or cremini mushrooms, green peas, green onions, water chestnuts, baby corn, bamboo shoots, carrots, celery, bok choy, cabbage, asparagus, snow peas, broccolini and green beans… It will be great with just about any vegetable you like. You simply assemble an assortment of vegetables, wash them, and then chop them into nice, bite-size pieces.

This is a meal that comes together quickly once you start cooking it, so I like to get all of the vegetables ready and make the sauce before I even start stir-frying the vegetables. I whisked together the following ingredients into a spicy-peanutty sauce. You can adjust the heat up or down according to your preference by adding additional Red Chili Flakes or Garlic-Chili paste. My sauce was fairly spicy to begin with, so I decided simply to stick to my original recipe. I placed a bottle of Rooster Sauce on the table in case either of us found the spice level to be lacking.

Spicy Peanut Sauce

2 tablespoons natural chunky peanut butter
1/3 cup veggie broth or water
1 1/2 teaspoons crushed red chile flakes
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon ginger, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons Braggs Liquid Aminos or soy sauce
A squeeze of lime juice

Once the Spicy Peanut Sauce was ready and all of the veggies were chopped, I selected Japanese udon noodles from the pantry to serve with the stir-fried vegetables. I like udon noodles quite a bit. Even though udon have a light colour, they are a whole wheat noodle. They have a smooth texture and a similar size to linguine. Instead of udon noodles we often have nutty buckwheat soba noodles, rice noodles, regular whole grain spaghetti or occasionally rice. I have noticed that udon noodles are salty enough without additional salt added to the water as you would add to most pastas.

I like the way udon noodles come wrapped in individual portions. I typically make way too much pasta, and we have leftovers for days. The guidance helps.

Let me let you in on a nifty trick for preparing tofu to be cooked. When you purchase tofu packaged in water, you need to squeeze out some of the liquid so that the tofu can absorb the sauce and flavor of the vegetables. Rather than pressing tofu between plates and setting it precariously under a heavy object, which always wants to tip off and fall on my foot, someone once told me to wrap the tofu in a paper towel or a clean kitchen towel and microwave it for 2 minutes.* This process works wonderfully to remove the excess liquid from the tofu and makes it ready to absorb a flavorful sauce after being nuked on high for two minutes for 2 or three rounds. This is far easier and less dangerous for my feet. After microwaving the tofu and slicing it into bite sized cubes I started my veggies.

Other than a great sauce, the key to a good stir-fry is not to overcook the vegetables. I always start with onion, giving it a 2-3 minute head start in the pan with a small glug of oil before adding anything else. I use a large, deep nonstick pan, because I don’t have a wok. A wok or a well-seasoned cast-iron pan are very helpful to making a healthy stir-fry because the vegetables don’t stick, even if you only use a little oil. Next, I add the remaining vegetables in the order that allows everything to finish cooking at the same time without overcooking any single ingredient. If I was using carrots and celery, for example, I’d add them first, and cauliflower soon after, followed by frozen vegetables, and finishing with mushrooms, bell peppers and anything that takes only a few minutes to cook. You can probably look up estimated cooking times for vegetables in a cookbook or on the internet. I have learned through trial and error. Tonight, I was able to add most of the vegetables at the same time, reserving the broccoli, tofu and spinach to add later, since they need a shorter cooking time.

When the veggies had cooked about 2 minutes and were looking bright and well on their way to tender-crisp, I added the peanut sauce, turned the heat to low and let the whole thing cook for 4 minutes. A few minutes with heat allows the salty-spicy-sweet-citrusy-nutty elements of the sauce to meld. When I figured the vegetables and sauce needed another 4 minutes more to cook, I added the broccoli and tofu. Even though broccoli is a dense, cruciferous vegetable, it cooks quickly, and after no more than about 4 minutes, it is done. When the vegetables are done they are bright and softened, and still retain a firm bite. Tofu is great sautéed or broiled, but tonight I wanted to eat it fresh, so I cooked it just enough time to absorb the sauce and to be heated through.

When the noodles were cooked, I drained them and served them on a small platter with a few sprigs of curly parsley. Cilantro would be a suitable garnish for the pasta, if you like cilantro, but we aren’t big fans. Before serving the stir-fry, I scattered the fresh spinach leaves in a pile on the platter. I could have stirred the spinach into the veggies and sauce and allowed it to wilt, but I find that spinach is great, even if it only half-wilts under a mound of steamy vegetables.

We both enjoyed this stir-fry. It was full of spicy, peanutty flavor and a bright variety of vegetables that retained their bite. The tofu also soaked up plenty of flavor and was as easy as could be to prepare. And the pasta? Everything tastes good on a serving of steamy, al dente pasta. When you are in the mood for an easy and delicious vegetable stir-fry, consider trying this tasty recipe. The sauce and veggies are full of texture and flavor. This dish is flexible, quick and easy enough to make any night of the week.

*Thank you to the person who told me the tofu-nuking tip, whoever you are. I am so pleased that I don’t have to press tofu ever again.

Hearty Salad of White Bean, Broccoli, Spinach, Sprouts and Avocado with Soft Egg and Toasted Cheese Bread

Posted on April 1, 2012 by Our Way to Eat

If you are anything like us and you like to eat 3 square meals a day, it tends to be a good idea to throw a salad in the mix once or twice a week. The other night I came home with just such a meal in mind. I started with an inventory of the fridge. I gathered up the remaining vegetables that we had on hand, and along with a few items from the pantry, this is what I put together for our supper tonight.

Hearty Salad of White Bean, Broccoli, Spinach, and Avocado with Soft Egg Yields 4 Hearty Portions

4 Cups Spinach
1 Cup of Romaine Lettuce – Washed and Cut into bite size pieces
1 Broccoli Crown – Cut into Small Florets
1/8^th Cup of a Red Onion – Finely Diced
Large Handful of Julienned Carrots
1—8 ounce can Cannellini Beans – Rinsed and Drained
1 Avocado – peeled and sliced, drizzled with a squeeze of lime juice.
4 Eggs
1 Can of Tuna – optional

Once I had assembled all of the vegetables I heaped the lettuce and spinach into a medium-sized mixing bowl, began rinsing and chopping the other vegetables, and placed them in the bowl. At the same time, I started a small saucepan of water heating on the stove to cook the eggs. When the water came to a boil, I placed 4 eggs in the sauce pan of water, reduced it to a simmer, and set the timer for 6 minutes. When the bowl seemed to be filled with an ample rainbow of vegetables, I whisked together the ingredients for a spicy and flavorful vinaigrette in a separate bowl.

Spicy Red Pepper, Honey and Mustard Vinaigrette:

2-3 Tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil – optional: use one or two tablespoons of garlic infused olive oil
3-4 Tablespoons Flavored Vinegar – I used Champagne and Tarragon vinegar
1.5 Tablespoons Crushed Red Pepper Flakes
1 Tablespoon Honey
2 Tablespoons Spicy Mustard – I used Kühne, a hot prepared mustard from Germany
Course Ground Black Pepper – to taste

While I worked on the salad dressing, Bjorn split several yellow, eggy buns in half and topped them with thinly sliced, reduced fat Colby-Jack Cheese, and then placed the buns on a foil-lined sheet pan in the oven at 350 degrees for a few minutes to melt the cheese. He also heated a small bowl of leftover spaghetti sauce in the microwave, for dipping the toasted cheese bread.

When the eggs had cooked 6 minutes, I removed two for our supper and carefully peeled them. I let the remaining eggs continue to cook a few minutes longer so that they would be hard-boiled, making them easier to pack for our lunches tomorrow.

I drizzled the dressing over the bowl of salad, tossed the salad gently with tongs, and served it on a platter. I placed the avocado slices on top, and gently sliced the eggs just before serving to expose the warm, soft yellow yolk. I’m seeing “soft eggs” everywhere, in blogs, such as this tasty-looking and classic presentation on Smitten Kitchen, in magazines and in restaurants on bruschetta, pizza, and salads. Talk about having a classic food item go trendy! I’m all for it though, eggs are a versatile, simple yet exquisite food. Bjorn added about half of a can of tuna to his plate, and mixed it into the salad. Adding tuna to the omnivore version of this salad added protein and healthy omega 3 fatty acid, a heart-healthy fat. The Avocado and the Extra Virgin Olive Oil in the dressing also added heart healthy fats to both of our plates.

The spinach, romaine, sprouts, carrots and broccoli gave the salad a nice crunch and were full of antioxidants, calcium and potassium. The white beans and egg added a contrasting soft texture to the salad, and protein which made the salad a hearty meal. The vinaigrette had a pleasant kick of dijony, red-pepper heat, and set off the flavors of the soft egg, avocado and red onion. The toasted cheese bread made a yummy side dish dipped in the warm spaghetti sauce. We enjoyed it all.

The salad was huge and made plenty for two servings at supper time, two servings for lunch the next day with a little more to spare. The salad was hearty enough to be a satisfying, complete meal, and had a healthy rainbow of veggies, good sources of protein and healthy fats to make it a nourishing meal, nutritionally speaking. It is wonderful to toss together a variety of vegetables and pantry staples into a salad. It makes for a simple, healthy and satisfying supper that makes you feel good, and that you can feel good about eating. Give it a try!

Creamy Minnesota Wild Rice Soup slow-cooked in the Crock-Pot

Posted on March 8, 2012 by Our Way to Eat

For the past month or two, I have been preparing a meal every Sunday that cooks all day in the Crock-Pot on Monday and welcomes us home for an easy, satisfying supper. Earlier this week I made a delicious Wild Rice soup in our Crock-Pot.* I bought Wild Rice that was raised on the Red Lake Reservation, a community about 40 miles from where my parents live in northern Minnesota. When I buy Wild Rice, I seek out rice raised on a reservation from that region, White Earth, Red Lake and Leech Lake Bands all harvest and sell wild rice. It is the very best wild rice, and I like knowing where it comes from, and supporting the local economy in these communities with the purchase. Before establishing a weekly Crock-Pot routine, we often arrived home on a Monday night tired, a little worn down from stress of the new work week and in no mood to cook. Nights like that, we often end up going out to eat. Sure, it is nice to be able to give ourselves a night off, but neither of us are thrilled about using part of our “dining” budget on a last-minute meal that we haven’t anticipated as a nice evening out. As much as I have been resistant to planning meals ahead in the past, I am tentatively starting to use forethought to my advantage. I am glad I didn’t know I would start doing this 6 years ago though. I think I would have been scared by the prospect of becoming a crazed Crock-Pot enthusiast, or at least would have hoped that the meal was served with a touch of irony. It turns out, at this point in my life, the routine is the opposite of scary, and there isn’t a hint of irony involved. Making a small effort to have a meal ready when I come home is breathing new life into Mondays! I leave for work in the morning feeling organized and like a real, functioning grown up. When the evening ahead crosses my mind throughout the day I look forward to being welcomed home by the scent of simmering soup seeping from the cracks of my old house as I approach the door. As I cross the threshold, I have little to do to enjoy a satisfying supper and a relaxing evening.

To make this week’s soup, I chopped and measured all of the ingredients into the liner of our Crock-Pot on Sunday night, covered it, and placed it in the fridge.

Minnesota Wild Rice Soup Ingredients:

1 Medium Onion, Chopped
2 Stalks of Celery, Diced
1 large Handful of Julienned Carrots, or about 2 Medium Carrots, Chopped
2 Yukon Gold Potatoes, Washed and Chopped
5 to 8 Button or Cremini Mushrooms, Wiped Clean and Sliced
2 Boneless, Skinless Chicken Breasts optional
1 Cup of Minnesota-Grown Wild Rice
½ Cup Brown Rice – not necessary, but it is cheaper, and adds additional texture to the soup.
1 Teaspoon Dried Tarragon Leaves
1 Teaspoon Poultry Seasoning
2 Bay Leaves – remove before serving.
1 – 32 Ounce Carton of Vegetable, Chicken or Turkey Broth
A Splash of Skim Milk, Half and Half or Heavy Cream optional.
Salt and Pepper, to taste.

You might notice that there is no oil or butter in my recipe. Some soup recipes call for sautéing the onion before putting it in the crock. I find that step to be unnecessary. With the long, slow cooking process, everything cooks thoroughly and all of the flavors blend well. As an added bonus, without sautéing any of the vegetables in butter or oil, calories are spared. Monday morning, I added the carton of broth, gave it a stir, and set the crock to cook on low heat for 8 hours. I am not sure if all slow cookers have this feature, but my crock switches to “Warm” when the programmed cooking time is done. It works wonderfully to keep the soup warm, but not to continue to cook it longer than needed. This recipe made a nice amount of soup for us for supper and leftovers for lunch. We don’t need more than two meals of soup, but there would be plenty of room in the crock to double the recipe to feed a larger group, or to freeze extra soup for a later date. If the entire crock of soup will be devoured the night it is first served, I might add just a touch more Tarragon and Poultry Seasoning, because seasoning was a bit faint on first night. We thought that the seasoning in the soup came together nicely when we reheated it for our lunches at work. This is great soup to make in advance and reheat.

If I was making this strictly for meat-eaters,** I would add a few boneless, skinless chicken breasts to the crock when I added the broth. The chicken breasts can be chopped and mixed back into the soup right before serving

If there are vegetarians in your house who are not strict about meat juices in their food,*** you could even cook the chicken breasts in the soup, take them out and then add chopped chicken to the bowls of only those who want it. If you want your soup to be strictly vegetarian, chicken can be cooked separately, and added to the bowls of those who want it, or not cooked at all, if no one is eating meat. There is a continuum upon which every vegetarian places themselves that ranges from unoffended by some exposure of their food to meat at the one end, to completely avoiding meat coming into contact with their food or having meat juices in their food at the other end of the continuum. You need to do what works for you and yours, and this recipe is easily adapted to accommodate varied diets. The only remaining step is optional. About ten minutes before serving you can stir in a splash of warmed milk, half and half or cream. The soup would be fine without it, but I really like having a little milk or cream in my soup.

Tonight, we didn’t top our soup with anything, but some sliced almonds or sunflower seeds would be nice. I also like a little shredded cheddar on my wild rice soup upon occasion. Some people wouldn’t go near soup without a shot of spicy Rooster Sauce, or Sriracha for those who are less familiar with what has become the most popular condiment in the world. The soup is very hearty and satisfying on its own, so you don’t need much to round out the meal. A chunk of warm, crusty bread, with or without butter and cheese would be perfect. Tonight I pulled out a few crackers from the pantry, which I served with some sliced white cheddar and Asiago cheese.

Growing up, my Mom always served egg salad along with soup or chili, so it is what I crave when we’re having soup for dinner, so of course, I made some. The egg salad was mostly made before I realized that we had no mayonnaise. I used Dijonnaise instead, and it turned out to be a surprisingly good substitution for regular mayo. Dijonnaise has the creaminess of mayo, and with the kick of Dijon mustard flavor, I swear that you cannot tell that it is fat-free.

When life is busy and stressful, there are little things you can do for yourself and your family to provide warmth and calm. Coming home to delicious soup for supper that has simmered slowly in the Crock-Pot all day feeds the body and soul. We loved this creamy, comforting soup full of vegetables and wild rice. I will make it again soon.

*I apologize if trademark dilution offends you. My slow cooker just so happens to be a Crock-Pot. Words like Crock-Pot, Kleenex and Kraft Dinner are far too deeply embedded in my vocabulary to use their proper generic terminology, especially since I actually use these brands.

**I can’t think of why I would make this soup solely for meat eaters. It is so good! I would want a bowl. Maybe if I made a separate crock of the meat-free version for a party.

***In my reference to vegetarians who are not strict about being meat-free, I might be politely referring to households with picky children.

Our Way to Eat

A Vegetarian and an Omnivore // Living in Harmony

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