Tag Archives: Pickled Vegetables

Brassica Grain Bowl

3 Replies

While this is ostensibly a post about a Brassica Grain Bowl, what I really want to tell you about is a new habit I have adopted. If you are a friend of my daughter, you know not to call her on a Sunday afternoon. That’s when she does her weekly meal prep. She chops, roasts and steams various vegetables and grains and fills her fridge with the component parts she will need for healthy meals all week long. That way, when she gets home from work, she is less likely to call a glass of wine and a bag of chips dinner, as her mother has been known to occasionally do, 
At some point, many children’s intelligence surpasses their parents and they start teaching us. I have decided to take a page out of my daughter’s book and start doing some weekly meal prep, so that my occasional solitary meals will be a bit healthier.

At the beginning of the week I fill a big zip-loc bag with chopped raw vegetables. My blend includes raw broccoli, brussels sprouts, kale and sugar snap peas.
Shredding Brussels sprouts is admittedly a fiddly task. Do it by hand to work on your knife skills or go ahead an bust out the Cuisinart.

All this chopping takes time. I binge-watch something addictive on Netflix. This month I’m watching Offspring. Shot in Australia, I have become smitten with the protagonist, Dr. Nina Proudman, a slightly neurotic and very funny OBGYN. She is a rockstar in the operating room, but not so skilled in her lovelife. The series showcases her two siblings and parents. While I would not call them dysfunctional, they are decidedly eccentric and unconventional. Good luck watching just one episode! Completely addictive.

This raw veggie mix makes a great base for a grain bowl, an excellent slaw to accompany roast chicken, a delicious stuffer for Tuesday fish tacos, and a perfect foundation for some shredded chicken for lunch. You can sauté it in butter or olive oil and garlic and serve it as a side dish.

After I chop the vegetables, I cook up one or two kinds of grains or some brown rice. I love farro, barley and I’ve really been into wheat berries lately. I adore their chewy texture and nutty flavour. If you like quinoa, go ahead and cook up a batch of that. I won’t judge you.

I like to keep a jar or two of homemade dressing in the fridge so that a salad can come together quickly. For this grain bowl I mixed up a herb-lemon vinaigrette.

I also roasted some butternut squash. Sweet potatoes would also be delicious. Chop it small so it roasts quickly.The last component of my meal prep is a batch of pickled vegetables. Carrots, cucumber and shallots are a nice mix. They last for a while in the fridge and are excellent on tacos and sandwiches.You can top your grain bowl with whatever protein you like. Grilled chicken, skirt steak, salmon, tofu, chickpeas, cheese and eggs are all great options. Avocado is always a good idea and don’t forget the crunch on top. Seeds and nuts of all kind add welcome texture.

 Click here to print recipe for Brassica Grain Bowl.

 

 

Bahn Mi Bowl

Leave a reply

one bowlBánh mì is the Vietnamese word for bread. The origin comes from bánh (bread) and mì (wheat). Over time, because of French colonialism in Vietnam, the term Bánh mì has become synonymous with a baguette sandwich. This is no ordinary sandwich. It represents two cultures coming together to create something glorious.

The French contributed the baguette, mayo, and pork, but the Vietnamese brought the party with the addition of pickled vegetables, cilantro and jalapeño.

The idea for this lightened up version of Báhn mì comes from Amy Rosen in the 2016 Holiday issue of Food and Drink magazine. Replace the baguette with rice noodles and toss everything together in a bowl. I lightened up her version even more by using ground turkey instead of pork in my meatballs.

Start by making a Radish and Carrot Quickle (quick pickle!) with rice wine vinegar, sugar and salt pickled VegCilantro, green onion, garlic and Sriracha sauce are mixed in with ground turkey for the meatballs.making little meatballscooked meatballsSweet, salty, and sour come together in the dressing for this bowl. Lime juice, fish sauce, soy sauce and brown sugar are whisked together for a simple sauce.

Fresh cilantro, mint, thinly sliced cucumber and chopped peanuts are sprinkled on top for a fast and healthy dinner. 4 bowls on marble counter 2

Click here to print recipe for Bahn Mi Bowls.

4 bowls on black backdrop

 

 

Thai Lamb Larb

4 Replies

all-the-fixings-2You may know larb (pronounced “lawb”) from seeing it on the menu of your local Thai restaurant, but it actually originated in Laos, Thailand’s neighbour to the north-east. It has become a staple dish of Thai street food.

Larb is a salad, but not a regular vegetable salad. It is best described as a meat salad. Typically made with  minced pork, chicken or beef, it is seasoned with fish sauce, chili flakes, lime juice and toasted rice to give it a crunchy texture. It is finished with green onions and an assortment of herbs (cilantro, mint and thai basil) to give it a verdant freshness and bring it all together.

Larb, wrapped in a lettuce leaf, (because anytime I can wrap something in a leaf and call it dinner, I am exceedingly happy), with a spoonful of sticky Thai rice, is a magical flavour bomb. Salty, spicy, sour, sweet and crunchy, it hits all the right notes.1-wrap-72-dpi    I decided to make it with ground lamb. While not totally authentic, my version is still quite delicious. I think it would also be great with ground turkey or chicken, for a lighter version.

No discussion of larb is complete without chatting about toasted rice. Browned ground rice adds a crunchy bite and a toasted fragrance. Leela over at shesimmers says, “ Whenever a Thai recipe calls for toasted rice powder, even just a smidgen of it, don’t be tempted to leave it out… This insignificant-looking (ingredient) is what differentiates a vaguely Thai-inspired dish from what a Thai mother serves her family somewhere in Thailand as we speak.”

Toasted rice powder is available at many Asian markets as well as on-line, but it is simple to make at home. Start with about 1/2 cup uncooked Thai rice and toast it in a dry skillet over medium heat for about 10-15 minutes, stirring frequently, until light brown and fragrant. (It will smell like you just made popcorn!) Let the rice cool and coarsely grind a few tablespoons at a time in a spice grinder. You only need 1-2 Tablespoons of the ground rice for their recipe. Just store the remainder in an airtight container in the pantry. toasting-rice Once the toasted rice is done, this dinner comes together in about 30 minutes, if you follow this timetable.

Start with making a quickle. (That’s short for a quick pickle!) Julienne some cucumber and carrots and thinly slice some purple onion. Let them hang out in a vinegar/salt/sugar mixture for about 20 minutes, then drain and discard the pickling liquid. The pickled vegetables add a perfect sour note that contrasts beautifully with the rich lamb meat. making-a-quicklePut some Thai rice on to cook. While a rice cooker turns out perfect rice everytime, I have always resisted getting one because I don’t want another kitchen appliance. The reason rice made in a rice cooker always turns out light and fluffy is that it has a mechanism to release steam, which forces out additional moisture that normally gets trapped in a pot resulting in wet rice. Here is my fool-proof method for cooking rice.

I wrap the pot lid in a kitchen towel. The towel mimics the steam release mechanism by absorbing all the excess steam and leaves you with perfectly cooked rice. lid-for-rice-1lid-for-rice-2lid-for-rice-3While the rice is cooking and the vegetables are pickling, cook the lamb. I find a potato masher is the perfect tool for breaking the meat up.

Once the lamb is cooked through, take it off the heat and stir in the toasted rice powder. Start with 1 teaspoon fish sauce, 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes, 1 Tablespoon lime juice and 1 teaspoon brown sugar. Stir well and taste. Add more of whatever you think it needs. You want a balance of sweet, spicy, sour and salty. Stir in some sliced green onions.

Let everyone assemble their own wraps. Chopped peanuts add extra crunch. 2-wraps

Click here to print recipe for Thai-Lamb-Larb.