easy eggplant, tomato, etc dish

This varies depending on what food I have on hand, and doesn't need to be followed exactly.

Ingredients:

1-2 medium eggplants

1-2 16 oz cans tomatoes or 3-6 fresh tomatoes

1 lb mushrooms

1 onion or some leeks

a bunch of kale

a can of beans, any kind

fresh basil, parsley, chives, or dried italian seasoning

ground seeds, e.g., sesame, flax, sunflower, pumpkin, hemp, or chia (no need to grind the chia)

1 Tbsp date syrup

Chop everything up except date syrup and seeds, throw into a big pressure cooker, cook for 3 minutes, then add the date syrup and seeds. This probably works with any veggie substituted of eggplant, like broccoli and cauliflower, brussels sprouts.

weekend cooking

I had fun in the kitchen this evening, spent about 3 hours picking greens, washing, chopping, juicing, and cooking. First I made some vegetable juices that I froze. I got these from the Fuhrman forums:

The first was from Chef AJ, modified slightly based on what I had and wanted: 4 oz kale, 4 oz collard greens, 2 cucumbers, 3 small apples, and juice of one lime and orange. Everything but the lime and orange came from my garden or a local farm.

Next was from another member of the forums (I don't recall but I'll try to look it up). This is called green lemonade, only I didn't have a lemon. So I used juice of an orange, 3 small apples, some salad greens (2-3 oz was all I had), some kale and collard greens.

Between these, I made 5 bottles filled to 10 oz with juice, that I froze.

Next I made a giant vegetables, beans, and greens dish. This dish was along the lines of this one. I must have had a couple of lbs of kale and collard greens still left after the juicing. I chopped these in the food processor. Then there was eggplant, 2 zucchini (green and yellow), mushroom, 2 onions, 2 cans of tomatoes (from the garden, yum). I cooked these up together in the pressure cooker for 3 minutes. I added lots of chopped parsley, basil and swiss chard and let that cook in the hot pan--plenty of heat to cook as it cooled. I cooked cauliflower separately for 2 minutes, and then blended that with 1/2 cup almonds and 1/3 cup hemp and some juice from the canned tomatoes. This made a creamy sauce which I added. Oh, yeah, and then there were the beans. Earlier today I cooked up red and white kidney beans (2 cups dry, so probably 5 cups after cooking). So this is your classic Fuhrman dish with tons of greens, beans, veggies, nuts and seeds. I offered housemate a bite even though she doesn't like zucchini. But you can hardly taste that with all the other flavors, and she had a couple of small bowls. Here's what it looks like. You do tend to get greens all over your teeth while eating it.

I poured 2 generous cups into each of 8 bowls. I left 2 out and froze the others. So there will be plenty to eat over the next week!

eggplant, veggies, & seeds

This is one of my favorites now. I finally learned how to make eggplant: you have to cook it enough for it to get really tender--at least for my tastes. The pressure cooker is perfect for that.  But this dish will work fine one a conventional stove--just cook for a long time.  Which reminds me,  the PC is a great summer appliance because it cooks things so quickly.  I highly recommend it!  Here is the one I got:

Ingredients:

1 eggplant

1 bunch of kale, or more if you'd like

a bunch of mushrooms, 8-16 oz

a leek or onion

any other veggie you want to throw in or subsitute--zucchini, for example.

2 16-oz cans of tomatoes (or 1 if you want)

herbs or italian spices or other spices (I used stuff currently in my garden:  chives, cilantro, tarragon, parsley.  The basil isn't ready yet).

ground seeds, I used hemp, sunflower, pumpkin.  I did 4 Tbsp but I might do 6 next time.

Peel and cut up the eggplant.  Cut up the kale, mushrooms and leek/onion.   Here's how I made it in the pressure cooker:  cooked the eggplant in 1/2 cup water for 2 minutes.  Then added the kale and onions for another 2 minutes.  Then added everything else for another minute.   For conventional stove, cook the eggplant, onions, kale and tomatoes for about 20 minutes, then add everything else for another 10.  that's my guess.  maybe cook the eggplant for even longer.

The ground seeds remind me of ricotta cheese so this feels kind of like an Italian dish.  

You can add beans or edamame too.   I often add edamame to the leftovers.

may 20

Today I made another fun dish in the pressure cooker. That makes cooking so easy! I peeled and cut an eggplant, ripped up a bunch of kale (that's how I "chop" it), cut up a bunch of mushrooms and an onion, combined that with 2 cans of tomatoes and cooked for 2 minutes! Then threw in a bag of arugula to get more greens (shared some of the kale with housemate). and a half chopped red pepper. and some cilantro (I will be eating cilantro every day now because it's growing crazy in the garden). I let that cook a little in the hot pan (no additional stove heat). It was great. Really, all you have to do is throw in whatever vegetables you want, it and it will taste great. nothing hard about it. I'm into eggplants right now. I had that for lunch and dinner. wasn't hungry at breakfast. had some carrots and an apple too.

ratatouille #2

I threw a bunch of vegetables together and realized it was essentially a ratatouille recipe.  In the past, I've found this to be a boring dish, but I liked this one.  And I liked how the eggplant tasted.  In several of my past attempts at cooking eggplant, it was bitter.  I think slow cooking in tomato sauce works well.

Ingredients:

1 eggplant

1 onion or a couple of leeks

1 bunch collard greens

1/4 cup pesto (or lots of chopped basil, chopped garlic, 1 Tbsp nutritional yeast and 1 oz ground walnuts)

2 garlic cloves (or however many you want, I kind of like this to be garlicy)

2 16-oz cans tomatoes (or 1 28 oz, whatever the big ones are at the store)

a bunch of mushrooms (I must have had a pound)

zucchini would be good too, I didn't have any

herbs:  I had some tarragon and chives from my garden.  dried italian seasoning would work fine or just fresh basil (above) if you have some.

Chop the onion, put it in a big pot, add the tomatoes and start cooking.  Peel the eggplant, chop into bite-size pieces, add to pot.  Wash and chop the collard greens, add to the pot.  Chop the garlic and add.  Wash and chop the mushrooms and add.  Add the pesto or ingredients therein  (you can grind the walnuts in a coffee grinder, or don't bother with them, they just happened to be in my pesto).   chop the zucchini and add.  Let it cook until the eggplant is tender.  40 minutes after you add it?

I think the nutritional yeast was a key ingredient, neutralizing the metallic taste of tomatoes when you don't use salt.

apr 12 food

brekky: spinach-mango smoothie

lunch: I made a recipe from Picks over Peas' blog: Roasted Eggplant Tofu with spinach and mushrooms. This was the best eggplant, tomato, italian type recipe I've had since I stopped using salt and oil. The tofu ricotta was great. The eggplant was great. I didn't follow the recipe exactly (do I ever?)--this is why I'm a lousy baker. I made my own tomato sauce. I used fresh basil and some sorrel that I happened to have (it's a lemony, peppery leaf) in the tofu ricotta, which I blended all up in the blender. I used more lemon juice too. The nutritional yeast gave it a perfect cheesy flavor. I didn't make sandwiches from the eggplants--didn't slice them thin enough and I preferred it my way. I just had sauce, eggplant, tofu ricotta, spinach, mushrooms, and sauce, as the layers. It was great! I ate about half of it today (oops). Then portioned the leftovers into two large servings. Hopefully I will have the willpower to spread them over two days.

Dinner: I wasn't too hungry but know breakfast will be late after lots of exercising, so at 8:30 pm, I had an orange, apple, 2 prunes, and some arugula with blueberry vinegar. That might have been a bit too much.

I didn't have time to compute the nutritional info of the eggplant recipe. It's probably high calorie and high fat from the tofu. I'm sure I had a lot of calories today. That's okay with me. It was good!

chickpea-avocado-eggplant dip

Ingredients:

1 cup dried chickpeas or 1 can

1 medium eggplant

1 avocado

some green onions

1-2 cloves garlic

1 tomato (I used canned tomatoes from the garden)

juice of 1-2 lemons (I used 2)

If using dried chickpeas, soak them overnight, then cook for about 4 hours. At the end, I threw in the garlic cloves for about 5 minutes to cook them a bit so they aren't as strong in the dip. Cut the eggplant in half lengthwise, bake at 350 F for an hour (check after 45 minutes---if it starts getting burned, it's done). Blend the chickpeas, garlic and lemon in a food processor. Scoop out the eggplant, add that and blend some more. scoop out the avocado, blend that in. Add the green onions, blend a bit. Add the tomatoes, blend just a bit.

I didn't add any spices but you could try parsley or cilantro. If you really want some saltiness, you could add 1 Tbsp of soy sauce (or tamari or Bragg's)