Nachos

These are dinner-style nachos with refried beans, chipotle peppers, banana peppers, broccoli, carrots, and garlic. Nachos really don't need cheese or cheese imitations to be tasty and filling. Guacamole is another favorite topping but you can really throw just about anything savory or vegetable on top.

Lentil Soup recipe

Lentil Soup
This is my favorite soup, excellent comfort food. Mung dhal can be found in Indian grocery stores. We score ours at the Fair Price Market on 14th Street in DC.

Ingredients:
lentils, split yellow mung dhal works best
potatoes, peeled
onions, chopped
jalapeno, chopped
canola oil
turmeric
asafoetida
cumin
lemon juice
cilantro, chopped finely
salt & pepper to taste
touch of sesame oil

Boil lentils and potatoes separately. Saute onion in large stock pot with canola oil. Add water, turmeric, and asafoetida to the stock pot and cook. Mash or puree the cooked lentils and potatoes, making them as smooth or chunky as you like. Add these mashed items to the soup with chopped cilantro. Season with lemon, cumin, and salt and pepper to taste. Add a small amount of sesame oil at end. Serve with bread, pitas, or chapati.

Holiday Tofurkeys

These are Thanksgiving weekend and Christmas Eve meals featuring Tofurky. Tofurky has become our holiday splurge. Roasted veggies and mashed potatoes with gravy aren't everyday eats for us either. So it is a great treat. The roasted veggies included yams, carrots, parsnips, rutabaga, garlic, mushrooms, and onions. Mushroom gravy with local portabello mushrooms that appeared on our salads.

Injera week

These photos are from a week when Matt picked up some injera at a local Ethiopian market. We had many styles of dishes on it, including an Indian style aloo gobhi, garlicky spinach, potatoes with bell peppers, lentils, brussels, and salad with jalapenos. Injera is great for folks with celiac disease. Matt used to live next to an "injera factory," a busy wholesale kitchen where many women cooked injera on flat skillets.

Pizza, pizza, pizza

Somehow it has been a month since my last entry. Perhaps I can catch up in the last weeks of December. I'm now sporting a lime green cast on my left foot which is my excuse for lazy blogging.

Tonight we had vegan "cheese" pizza on frozen Vicolo corn meal crusts. Looks like Vicolo makes a spelt crust too. Also posting earlier nights' colorful tomato pies, one with soy meatballs. Banana peppers and broccoli are the hot toppings of late. Still doing the big salads, now with red cabbage.