My first taste of baba ghannouj was at the cafeteria on the Saudi Aramco compound in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, and I could easily make a lunch out of their hummus, baba ghannouj, and flatbread. Baba ghannouj is a traditional Middle Eastern dish made from eggplant that has been grilled or roasted, and the smoky flavor carries over to this simple dip that’s popular all over the Middle East. Depending on where you eat, it will probably have eggplant, tahini, garlic, lemon juice, salt, olive oil, and parsley, and may also have chopped tomatoes, cumin, mint, onions, yogurt, or mayonnaise. So consider this a base recipe, a jumping off point to play with and have fun experimenting with the flavors.

I wish the eggplant came from our garden, but after three years of fighting pests that devour the plants, we finally decided that eggplant just wasn’t a good fit for our garden. Fortunately our homegrown garlic and parsley do add some good flavor to the dish. I hope you’ll join us for the third anniversary of Grow Your Own this month! Posts are due on August 31 and should be sent to me at andreasrecipesgyo AT gmail DOT com. You can find more information at the Grow Your Own page.

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BABA GHANNOUJ (BABA GANOUSH)

Adapted from The Complete Middle East Cookbook, by Tess Mallos.

Serves 6.

Equipment

food processor

Ingredients

1 eggplant (12 ounces/375 g)
1/4 cup (60 ml) fresh lemon juice
1/3 cup sesame tahini
2 cloves garlic
1-1/2 teaspoons sea salt
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
3 sprigs parsley

SERVE WITH
khoubiz (pita)

Preparation

1. Pierce the eggplant in a few places, then grill the whole eggplant for about 30 to 40 minutes over medium hot coals, turning about every 7 minutes. Peel the skin off while it’s still hot and remove the stem end, then rough chop the flesh. Place it in a colander and drain out the liquid.

2. Add the flesh to the work bowl of the food processor and puree it. Add the lemon juice and tahini and pulse a few times until well mixed.

3. Add the garlic and 1 teaspoon of salt. Process well and add more lemon juice and salt to taste.

4. Add the olive oil and parsley, processing until the parsley is chopped but still visible.

5. Serve in a shallow dish garnished with parsley. Will keep in the refrigerator for up to 3 days. Bring to room temperature before serving.

Variation

Roast the eggplant in a 400° F/220° C oven.

Other Eggplant Recipes

More Eggplant Recipes From Around the Blogs

Food Blogga – Easy Baked Eggplant Parmesan

FatFree Vegan – Creamy Creole Eggplant Casserole

Kalyn’s Kitchen – Pan-Fried White Eggplant with Onion, Caper, and Herb Sauce

Viet World –Hmong Spicy Eggplant (Lws Kubtshis Tuav)

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For us the Fourth of July is about celebrating our nation’s heritage as well as family, friends, parades, fireworks, and of course the annual Fourth of July cookout. Our cookouts vary somewhat from year to year, but we always have some kind of potato salad for the Fourth, and this potato salad recipe is particularly good for summer cookouts because it has no dairy, so you don’t have to worry about it spoiling in the summer heat.

I used to peel potatoes and boil them when making potato salad, but now I steam them and then peel after they have cooled because they retain their nutrients better. They also less likely to get mushy this way.

The flavor comes from the fresh herbs in our garden parsley, basil, and chives, though you can mix it up with other herbs. This year we are growing basil all over the garden, including the tomato bed, herb bed, and in containers on our deck. Basil usually does well for us in containers, we just mix up some potting soil and seed directly into the soil about the third week in May, then we keep it in the sun and water daily. We trim the plants regularly and in a few weeks we’ll be ready to make our first batch of pesto.

Yes, we like our basil.

This summer herbed potato salad is my post for Grow Your Own, the blogging event that celebrates the dishes we create from foods we’ve grown, raised, foraged, or hunted ourselves. This is the fourth year for Grow Your Own, and we hope you will join us! Gudrun of Kitchen Gadget Girl is our host for July, so be sure to visit her blog for more information about submitting your post. You can read more about the event and the rules for participating at the Grow Your Own page. Posts are due on July 31.

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POTATO SALAD WITH SUMMER HERBS AND WHITE WINE VINAIGRETTE

Serves 8.

Equipment

large pot or pan, about 12 inches across
steamer basket

Ingredients

3 (1.3 k) pounds small red potatoes, scrubbed
1/2 cup (120 ml) extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup (60 m l) white wine vinegar
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper freshly ground
3 tablespoons minced basil
2 tablespoons minced parsley
2 tablespoons minced chives

Preparation

1. Add an inch or two of water to the pan/skillet and insert the steamer basket. Arrange the potatoes around the basket and cover the pot. Bring to a boil and cook until the potatoes are just fork tender, about 10 to 15 minutes. Drain and allow the potatoes to cool until you can handle them. Peel the potatoes and cut them into bite-size chunks. Chill or keep at room temperature.

2. Whisk the oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper together and drizzle over the potatoes. Toss the basil, parsley, and chives with the potatoes and serve.

More Recipes for the Fourth of July

More Potato Salad Recipes From Around the Blogs

Simply Recipes – Potato Salad with Apples and Bacon

Gluten Free Goddess Recipes – Red Potato Salad with Horseradish

Herbivoracious – Potato Salad with Feta Cream Dressing

Kalyn’s Kitchen – Sweet Potato Salad with Green Onion, Basil, Thyme, and Feta

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The garlic only has a few more weeks in the ground, then it will be time to dig it up, and if the flavor of the scapes is any indication, we are in for some spicy garlic this year. We harvested the scapes over the weekend and made three different things with them: pesto, cannellini bean dip, this pasta with chicken, tomatoes, and basil. We saved the pretty flowers and curved parts for the pasta and use the stems for the pesto and bean dip.

The raw flavor of the scapes was pretty intense with a lot of bite, but once sautéed the flavor softened became more like a buttery roasted garlic. Because the raw flavor was so strong we thought the boys might not eat them in the pasta, but Builder Guy actually enjoyed them, though Top Gun and Monkey Boy regarded them with deep suspicion. For extra flavor we added some of our homegrown basil, which is doing very well this year. The tomatoes aren’t quite ready yet, but in a few weeks we should have plenty of warm summer tomatoes fresh from the vine.

We hope you will join us for Grow Your Own, a blogging event that celebrates the foods we grow, raise, hunt, or forage. If you are new to the event, you can read more about the rules for participating at the Grow Your Own page, and you can send post information to me at andreasrecipesgyo AT gmail DOT com. The deadline for this month’s event is June 30th.

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PASTA WITH CHICKEN, GARLIC SCAPES, TOMATOES, AND BASIL

Serves 4.

Equipment

6-quart pot with lid
12-inch skillet

Ingredients

8 ounces (227 g) farfalle pasta
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 chicken breasts, boneless and skinless, thinly sliced
sea salt, to taste
black pepper freshly ground, to taste
1 cup garlic scapes, cut into 6-inch lengths
1-1/2 cups cherry tomatoes, halved
10 basil leaves, chopped
1/2 cup (120 ml) white wine, dry
grated Parmesan cheese, to sprinkle on top

Preparation

1. Bring water to boil in the pot, then cook the pasta until ad dente, about 10 minutes. Drain.

2. While the water boils, heat the olive oil in the pan and add the chicken, cooking until it’s almost cooked through, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

3. Add the scapes and cook until the start to brown, about 3 to 4 minutes. Add the tomato halves and sauté until they brighten and just begin to release their juices, about 1 minute. Add the white wine and the basil leaves, cooking until the basil begins to wilt.

4. Toss the cooked pasta with the chicken and scapes until it’s all thoroughly mixed. Divide among plates and served garnished with grated Parmesan cheese.

More Summer Grow Your Own Recipes

More Scapes Recipes From Around the Blogs

Grow Cook Eat – Hake with Tomato-Coconut Sauce

Apple Pie, Patis, and Pate – Garlic Scapes 12 Ways

Herbivoracious – Garlic Scape, Ricotta, and Zatar Pizza

Love and Olive Oil – Beet Green and Garlic Scape Bruschetta

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Our nighttime temperatures settled into the 60s last week, so we could finally plant the basil, peppers, eggplant, and beans. My favorite kind of bean is the very thin French type, aka fillet beans, and we decided to try growing them last year. We planted the Maxibel variety of fillet beans and the plants sprouted just fine, then we agonized as two full rounds of bean seedlings were devoured by ravenous bunnies. We never got a single French bean (or snow pea or sugar snap pea or yellow bean), and the only bean plant they didn’t touch was the asparagus beans. This year we are better prepared after 99% bunny proofing the yard, but of course there’s always a flip side: the bunnies are now terrorizing our neighbors.

Green beans aren’t just for autumn. You can plant them in late spring to early summer, keeping in mind the nighttime temperatures, and depending on the type of bean, you can begin harvesting in as early as 50 days. This dish is one of my favorite ways to prepare green beans, and even though the sage in the recipe may make you think of autumn or Thanksgiving, it really is beautiful with the lemon flavor in these beans beans any time of year. In fact our sage is full and bushy and in bloom right now with beautiful pale lavender colored flowers.

My friend Diane runs the blog The W.H.O.L.E. Gang, and she came up with a wonderful idea to get bloggers together in honor of Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution and have our own 30 Day Food Revolution. Bloggers from all over have been sharing their tips for cooking real food and living a healthy lifestyle, and I’m honored to share my tips with her readers. Make sure you check out all the food revolution posts on Diane’s blog, there’s some wonderful stuff there.

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FRENCH GREEN BEANS WITH PROSCIUTTO AND PINE NUTS

Adapted from EatingWell Magazine.

Serves 4.

Equipment

4 quart pot with lid
large nonstick skillet

Ingredients

1 pound haricot verts (thin French green beans), trimmed
1 teaspoon light olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoons minced fresh sage
sea salt, to taste
Freshly ground pepper, to taste
2 slices prosciutto, cut into ribbon
2 tablespoons toasted pine nuts
1 lemon, zested
1 teaspoon lemon juice

Preparation

1. Bring about 3 quarts of water to a boil. Add the beans, return to a boil, and simmer until crisp-tender, about 3 to 4 minutes. Drain and set aside.

2. Heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the beans, garlic, sage, a pinch of the salt and several grinds of pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the beans are browned in places, about 3 to 4 minutes. Stir in the pine nuts, lemon zest, and prosciutto. Season with lemon juice and zest, and add more salt and pepper to taste.

More Easy Vegetable Recipes

More Green Bean Recipes From Around the Blogs

Kalyn’s Kitchen – Garlic-Roasted Green Beans with Shallots

The Perfect Pantry – Spicy Green Beans with Ginger and Garlic

A Veggie Venture – World’s Best Green Bean Casserole

eCurry – Green Beans, Tomatoes, and Almonds with Sumac

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If I had to choose a favorite spring vegetable, it would be a tie between asparagus and snow peas. Pencil-thin asparagus stalks look so pretty on a plate and like snow peas it tastes delicious either fresh or cooked. Though we don’t yet grow our own asparagus, the thought has crossed our minds on several occasions. We keep looking around the yard trying to decide where we want to put everything we want to grow, and we just haven’t chosen a place yet for asparagus. Things are getting tight in some spots so we have to think carefully about how plants will work together before building more beds and putting in anything else.

Asparagus is a perfect ingredient for quiche; well actually for egg dishes in general. I choose the thin stalks of asparagus for tenderness and save the thicker stalks for soup. Think of omelets with asparagus or scrambled eggs with asparagus and prosciutto, a beautiful way to liven up your morning eggs.

This is a crustless quiche, my favorite for ease of preparation, with some low fat cottage cheese for creamy texture as well as extra protein. We use low fat cottage cheese for a variety of things, and it’s actually a favorite snack item in our home. Daisy is my favorite brand of cottage cheese (and sour cream) because unlike many other brands, they use only milk, cream, salt, and vitamin A to make their cottage cheese. Nothing extra is added, which also makes it a good option for those following a gluten-free diet. [Disclosure: This opinion is my own, and Daisy didn’t ask or pay me to write this.]

More Asparagus Recipes

More Quiche Recipes From Around the Blogs

Gluten-Free Goddess – Purple Potato and Carrot Quiche

A Veggie Venture – Spinach & Feta Quiche

Joy the Baker – Creme Fraiche Quiche

Sarah’s Cucina Bella – Blue Cheese and Caramelized Shallot Quiche

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My grandmothers always made a big pot of Southern style green beans with a Virginia ham bone in it when we came to visit, and I would eat multiple helpings of those flavorful beans. The ham bone lent a smoky flavor to the beans that stuck in my memory and remains to this day. You could find them on the table amongst the fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, and biscuits.

These vegan green beans, while not my grandmother’s, are full of flavor with caramelized red onions and a light balsamic vinegar sauce. The recipe comes from one of my go-to healthy foods cookbooks, The Essential Eating Well Cookbook from the editors of EatingWell magazine. If balsamic vinegar isn’t your thing, you can use red wine vinegar or a dry red wine instead.

GREEN BEANS WITH CARAMELIZED RED ONIONS

Adapted from The Essential Eating Well Cookbook. (review)

Makes 8 servings.

Equipment

5 to 6-quart pot with lid
12-inch skillet with lid

Ingredients

1 tablespoon olive oil
3 medium red onions (about 1-3/4 pounds/794 g), each cut into 16 wedges
16 ounces (454 g) green beans, trimmed
1/2 cup (120 ml) vegetable stock
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar (or red wine vinegar or dry red wine)
2 teaspoons light brown sugar
sea salt to taste
fresh ground black pepper to taste

Preparation

1.In the skillet, warm the olive oil over medium heat and add the onions. Cook until caramelized around the edges, about 20 minutes.

2. While the onions cook, bring water to boil in the large pot. Add a bit of salt and the green beans. Cook uncovered until crisp-tender, about 6 to 7 minutes. Drain.

3. Add the broth to the onions and stir, cooking for about 5 more minutes. Add the balsamic vinegar, brown sugar, salt, and pepper, and stir.

4. Add the green beans to the skillet and cover. Cook for about 2 minutes. Serve warm.

More Easy and Healthy Recipes

More Green Bean Recipes From Around the Blogs

Kalyn’s Kitchen – Garlic-Roasted Green Beans with Shallots and Almonds

Simply Recipes – Roasted Green Beans with Onions and Walnuts

A Veggie Venture – Slooow Country Green Beans

Karina’s Kitchen – Pomegranate Glazed Green Beans and Portobellos

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One of my fondest food memories is of the tiny round potatoes known as papas criollas from Colombia. The Colombian papas criollas grow wild in the Andes highlands and have a thin, tender skin and a buttery yellow interior that yields an amazing flavor. They are a favorite for soups such as Ajiaco or served as appetizers or sides either roasted, fried, mashed, boiled, or skewered and grilled. Here in the United States you can buy them frozen in some stores or in jars from various online grocers (see Where to Buy below). I have searched for years but still have not found frozen, canned, or fresh papas criollas in any of our local Hispanic or international grocery stores.

If you’ve ever had a memory of food so strong that you still dream of it 15 years later, you’ll understand my excitement when I spotted tiny yellow potatoes in Trader Joe’s last week. Small potatoes have been in vogue for a few years, but the little yellow Dutch creamers in our area stores are bigger than papas criollas and I’ve never been quite happy with them. When I saw these petite gems my heart went pitter patter and I jumped with glee and clapped. In Trader Joe’s. Yes, people stared.

These tasty little potatoes are only 1-inch in diameter, a perfect bite size. Michael was thrilled that I found them and assumed I was going to make Ajiaco, but I shocked him when I announced that I planned to fry these. I don’t like to fry, it always makes a big splattery mess leaving me with a big cleanup, but the memory of crispy fried papas is burned in my brain and I wanted to share that experience with my family without buying plane tickets to Bogotá.

My next step is to test the papas in Ajiaco. If they are a true match, they will break up and dissolve into the soup, and then I will set up some space to grow my own papas criollas. What a dream come true.

Just for fun: If you want to experience papas criollas the way I first did years ago, listen to Clasicos de la Provincia by Carlos Vives while eating. For something instrumental, The Rumba Foundation by Jesse Cook offers some great Colombian-inspired sounds that will give you rumba fever.

FRIED PAPAS CRIOLLAS

Makes 1 pound, serves 2 to 4.

Equipment

steamer basket
large heavy bottom pot with lid
cast iron pot or frying appliance
splatter screen
plate or platter lined with paper towels

Ingredients

1 pound (~450 g) papas criollas or similar tiny yellow potato (about 1-inch in diameter)
cooking oil (I use canola.)
sea salt

Preparation

1. STEAM OR PARBOIL: Pour water into bottom of large pot and insert the steamer basket. Add the potatoes, cover, and bring to a boil. Steam the potatoes for about 4 to 5 minutes, then drain and pat dry. If you don’t have a steamer basket, you can parboil the potatoes. Add enough water to cover the potatoes, bring to a boil, and cook for 3 to 4 minutes. Drain and dry.

2. FRY: While cooking the potatoes, add oil to the cast iron pot or frying appliance. There should be enough oil for the potatoes to float, but it doesn’t need to be very deep. Add potatoes, about 10 to 15 at a time. They will probably bubble and splatter, so keep a screen handy. Some of the potato skins may burst open, and that’s ok, the skin will be particularly crispy. Fry for about 2 to 3 minutes, then remove and drain well on the plate lined with paper towels. Allow to cool for a minute or two. Salt generously and serve.

Where to Buy Canned Papas Criollas

Hatogrande

Amigo Foods

More Colombian Recipes

More Bloggers with Authentic Colombian Recipes

Nikas Culinaria

My Colombian Recipes

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Have I ever mentioned that purple is my favorite color? I find the color exhilarating and like plants that bear purple fruits and vegetables, including tomatillos.

Our tomatillo plants were slow this year along with everything else in the garden. The extended cold, wet spring put a damper on things, making everything slow to grow and blossom. We finally harvested some tomatillos a few weeks ago, much later than last year, and with the early cold snap this week we didn’t get much of a growing season at all. All we can do is preserve what we have and hope for better next year.

This was our second year for growing tomatillos, and we planted two green and two purple, both of which took off in late July and shot up to about nine feet tall. The purple tomatillo fruits are generally smaller than the green, with shades ranging from bright amethyst to almost black.

The interiors are only slightly lighter in color than the exterior, and the salsa is a brilliant purple.

When the cold snap hit this week we started pulling things off the plants, hoping to save as much as possible. The tomatillos stopped producing but still have hundreds of little paper lanterns hanging from the four plants. Fortunately they stand up to cold better than tomatoes and peppers, so we have a little time to finish the harvest. We’ll roast the rest, make them into salsa, and freeze it for the winter. I don’t like to process salsa because it tastes cooked rather than fresh, but I do recommend using the salsa within a couple months before it gets freezer burn and loses flavor.

Roasting the tomatillos is easy, just spread them out onto a sheet pan lined with aluminum foil and cook under the broiler until they char, about 6 to 8 minutes. Once roasted, the tomatillos can be thrown into a blender with your own blend of chiles, cilantro, garlic, onion, limes, whatever sounds good, and you’ll have roasted tomatillo salsa. This works with either the green or purple tomatillos, and we make both. This year the tomatillos, garlic, and serrano chiles all came from our garden.

This is my contribution to Grow Your Own, a blogging event that celebrates the dishes we create from foods we’ve grown, raised, foraged, or hunted ourselves. I am the host for this final event of 2009, and you can send your post information to me at andreasrecipesgyo AT gmail DOT com. Posts are due on October 30. Grow Your Own is taking a winter break this year while we tend to some family matters, but we’ll be back in the spring ready for more fun. If you would like to host in 2010, please drop me a note. If you are new to the event, you can read more about the rules for participating and find the links to previous events at the Grow Your Own page.

OVEN-ROASTED TOMATILLO SALSA

Makes about 24 ounces/710 ml.

Equipment

baking sheet lined with heavy duty aluminum foil
blender

Ingredients

3 pounds (1.4 k) tomatillos, color of your choice, husked and rinsed
1/2 medium onion, quartered (red for purple tomatillos, white for green tomatillos)
1 fresh chile, stemmed (serrano or jalapeno work well)
3 cloves garlic, peeled
handful of cilantro leaves and tiny stems, rinsed and patted dry
1/2 lime, juiced

Preparation

1. Spread the tomatillos out on the lined baking sheet stem side down. Place under broiler until charred, about 6 to 8 minutes. Some will crack and release juice, and that’s ok. Add tomatillos and juice to the blender jar.

2. On a dry skillet, toast the onion, chile, and garlic, turning until charred on all sides. Add to the blender jar. (Note: Remove the seeds of the chile if you want a milder salsa.)

3. Add the cilantro and lime juice to the blender jar. Blend all for a few seconds. Pour into a large bowl and serve, or pour into jars and refrigerate for up to 1 week. Can also freeze in plastic containers. I use the Ball Plastic Freezer Jars.

More Grow Your Own Recipes

More Tomatillo Recipes From Around the Blogs

Simply Recipes – Tomatillo Chicken Stew

Cookworm – Chickpea and Tomatillo Soup

What’s Cooking? – Mexican Tomatillo Rice

Kalyn’s Kitchen – Grilled Halibut with Southwestern Rub and Tomatillo Salsa

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Zucchini season will soon come to an end, but there’s still time to enjoy this icon of the summer garden. We’ve made salads, pasta, bread, gratins, and all sorts of things with zucchini, even though it was a sad zucchini year for us after losing all our zucchini plants to garden pests.

Risotto is comfort food for me anytime of the year no matter what I put into it, and this one with zucchini and our fresh homegrown basil and garlic does not disappoint. The Grana Padano cheese adds a slightly nutty yet delicate flavor that is worth the search, but you can also substitute Parmigiano Reggiano if you can’t find Grana Padano. The recipe is adapted from My Italian Garden, by Viana La Place (in my personal collection), a lovely little book with watercolor illustrations based on cooking from her own Italian garden in San Francisco. The book is divided into seasons, making it perfect for cooking with seasonal produce.

This is my contribution to Grow Your Own, the blogging event that celebrates the dishes we create from foods we’ve grown, raised, foraged, or hunted ourselves. Praveen of Masala Heaven is our host for this round, so be sure to visit her blog for more information about submitting your post. If you are new to the event, you can read more about the rules for participating at the Grow Your Own page. I hope you will join us!

ZUCCHINI RISOTTO

Adapted from My Italian Garden, by Viana La Place.

Makes about 4 to 6 servings.

Equipment

3-quart sauce pan with heavy bottom
2-quart sauce pan
box grater (optional)

Ingredients

6 cups (1.44 liters) vegetable broth or water
1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/2 medium yellow onion, finely diced
2 medium zucchini or striato d’Italia, diced (I grated them.)
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 cups (360 g) Arborio rice
8 fresh basil leave, chiffonade
sea salt, to taste
fresh ground black pepper, to taste
1/2 cup freshly grated Grana Padano cheese (You can substitute Parmesan if necessary.)

Preparation

1. In the 2-quart sauce pan, bring the vegetable broth to a simmer. Keep it hot but not boiling.

2. In the 3-quart sauce pan, heat 1/4 cup olive oil over low heat. Add the onion and sauté slowly until soft. Add the zucchini and garlic and sauté over medium heat for 2 to 3 minutes. Add the rice and stir until the rice is translucent, about 1 to 2 minutes.

3. Reduce temperature to low. Add the hot broth to the rice mixture one ladleful at a time, stirring frequently. Wait until the liquid is absorbed before adding the next ladleful of broth. Midway during cooking, add the basil and salt and pepper to taste. Continue cooking until all the broth has been added.

4. Test the risotto to make sure it’s al dente, but not too hard. If it’s still a little crunchy, add a ladleful of water and continue stirring. When risotto is ready, remove from heat and stir in the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil and the Grana Padano cheese. Serve immediately.

Other Italian Recipes

More Zucchini Recipes From Around the Blogs

Simply Recipes – Zucchini Breakfast Casserole

Karina’s Kitchen – Pesto Zucchini Tomato Gratin

Wasibomon – Light Zucchini Hummus

A Veggie Venture – Eight Ball Stuffed Zucchini

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My first cookbook from Sheila Lukins was the 1980s classic Silver Palate Cookbook, a popular book that led many people in the United States to change the way they cooked and viewed food. I’ve collected just about all of the books she wrote and have cooked from them many times over the years, learning something new with each dish. My favorite book of hers is the All Around the World Cookbook because it complemented my taste for authentic regional foods, and I’ve gifted copies many times over the years.

After learning of Lukins’ untimely death from brain cancer on August 30, I felt the urge to cook from her books again as a reminder of her importance in my own cooking. I opened my copy of All Around the World Cookbook and chose her Spiced Vegetable Dal, one of my favorites. I often play around with the flavors, using three or four shakes rather than the pinch of turmeric listed just because I like the warm yellow color it lends to the dish, sometimes adding a touch of cinnamon, or using cilantro instead of parsley. It’s uncomplicated fare that I’ve eaten for breakfast, lunch, and dinner over the years, but sometimes simple is best.

Because we lost Sheila to cancer, it seems fitting to share her healthy dish with this years A Taste of Yellow event, hosted by the beautiful Barbara of Winos and Foodies. Barbara started A Taste of Yellow in 2007 as a way to show her support for the Lance Armstrong Foundation while she herself battled cancer, and we are so glad that we still have her today. Thank you, Barbara, for keeping this event going and continuing to bring awareness to cancer causes. Livestrong Day is October 2, and if you would like to participate in cancer awareness activities in your community, you can find more information at Livestrong.org.

SPICED VEGETABLE DAL

Adapted from All Around the World Cookbook, by Sheila Lukins.

Serves 6 to 8.

Equipment

strainer
4-quart pot with lid

Ingredients

1 cup red lentils, rinsed and drained
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon canola oil
2 tablespoons minced peeled fresh ginger
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 large onion, halved and slivered
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
pinch of ground turmeric (or more as desired)
4 cups vegetable broth
4 plum tomatoes, seeded and cut into 1/4-inch dice
1/2 cup coarsely chopped flat-leaf parsley
salt, to taste
fresh ground black pepper, to taste

Preparation

1. In the 4-quart pot, heat the butter and canola oil over medium-low heat. Add the ginger, garlic, and slivered onions, cooking and stirring until wilted, about 10 minutes.

2. Stir in the drained lentils, add the vegetable broth, and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to around medium and simmer uncovered for about 20 minutes, until the lentils are soft but not mushy, stirring occasionally. Skim off the foam as it rises to the top.

3. Stir in the tomatoes and parsley. Continue to cook and stir for another 15 minutes. The lentils should be very soft. Add salt and pepper to taste.

4. Serve hot or at room temperature. Will keep in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.

More Sheila Lukins Recipes

More Sheila Lukins Recipes From Around the Blogs

Farmgirl Fare – Kohlrabi Purée

Sticky, Gooey, Creamy, Chewy – Chicken Marbella

Champaign Taste – The Silver Palate Smoky Pumpkin Soup

The Perfect Pantry – Pasta Puttanesca

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