Weekend Cooking: Coconut Lentil Soup with Lemongrass

Here's a recipe I've been playing around with for awhile. The inspiration was in Anne Sheasby's wonderful The Ultimate Soup Bible. My family liked her original recipe, but we all agreed it didn't have enough "punch," somehow. Here is our version. The great thing about this recipe is that it goes from 0 to dinner in under an hour. In our house, it cooks while the homework is getting done!

Col’s Coconut Lentil Soup with Lemongrass

2 medium Yellow Onions, chopped
2 tbsp Canola Oil
1 Serrano Pepper or 2 Thai Chili Peppers, seeded and chopped
1 tbsp Ginger, freshly grated
3 Garlic Cloves, sliced
1 tsp Ground Cumin
1 tsp Ground Coriander Seed
1 tsp Paprika
1/2 tsp Cayenne Pepper
1 cup Red Lentils*
14 oz can of Coconut Milk (regular, not light)
4 cups Vegetable Stock (homemade if possible; water will also work)
1 stick Lemongrass, bruised with a mallet (kids love this job)
3 tblsp Fresh Lime Juice (about 3 lime halves)
4 tblsp Scallions, chopped
1/4 cup Cilantro Leaves, chopped (if you hate cilantro, Thai basil would work)
Salt, to taste

Directions

Heat oil in dutch oven. Add onions, peppers, ginger and garlic to soften, not brown. Add dried spices to warm (1 minute), then add lentils. Add coconut milk, lemongrass and stock. Bring to a boil and cook about 45 minutes, until lentils totally break down. Remove lemongrass. Puree with a stick blender. Put back on heat, add lime juice, half scallions and half cilantro. Adjust seasonings. Salt to taste. Garnish individual bowls with remaining cilantro, scallions and lime slices.

*Red lentils are found in Indian and Middle Eastern groceries, and in well stocked supermarkets. You can't substitute brown lentils in this recipe, as they take far longer to cook.


Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. Thanks to Beth Fish Reads for hosting!

Saturday Snapshot: A Hopeful Sign

Found yesterday after a short thaw: a daffodil!

To participate in the Saturday Snapshot meme bloggers are asked to post a photo that
they (or a friend or family member) have taken, then leave a direct link to your post on the Saturday Snapshot site. Photos can be old or new, and be of any subject as long as they are clean and appropriate for all eyes to see. How much detail you give in the caption is entirely up to you. All she asks is that you don't post random photos that you find online.

Thanks to Alyce at At Home With Books for hosting!!

Book Review: A Long, Long Time Ago, and Essentially True

Brigid Pasulka’s A Long, Long Time Ago, and Essentially True reminded me of why I am a reader. Because reading puts you in touch with the endless possibilities of the human condition.

The story is told in two voices and in two time frames, but both are set in motion by the same small miracle: one man’s enduring love for a beautiful young woman. The Pigeon loves Anielica so completely that he wants to make the world a perfect place for her. He starts by turning her father’s hut into a house worthy of her. But after the Germans roll through Poland at the beginning of the Second World War, the Pigeon works to change Poland itself, as a member of the Polish Resistance.

The second story takes place in post-Soviet Krakow, and is told by “Baba Yaga,” a young woman who has recently lost her beloved grandmother. She is living with some of her only relatives, Irena and her daughter Magda. While they are kind – in their bantering way – to the country cousin, Baba Yaga seems rudderless and apathetic. In fact, it was her story that gave me a slow start with this novel, as I kept wondering what this boring little bar girl had to do with the heroic, romantic events in the older narrative.

I am so happy I stuck with it.

A Long, Long Time Ago, and Essentially True is ultimately a novel about the ingenuity and perseverance of the Polish people. Pasulka tells that story beautifully and with great depth of feeling, as when Anielica’s brother tries to convince her that the Pigeon will return safely to them:

”I was in the woods with him for five years, and there was never anything he couldn’t manage. We just need to wait a little while longer, and I’m sure he will be back any time now.” But the words coming from his mouth were too abundant to be reassuring. Reassuring words were tall, sparse, stoic. “Don’t be silly.” “He’s fine.” Trust me.” But Anielica did not press. She knew that her brother was worried too. She had noticed the furrows in his forehead deepening, his eyebrows slowly creeping upward for the past hour. Kindle location 4488

And while many reviews have described this book as “sad,” what I thought Pasulka captured best was the profound ability of the Polish people to find happiness despite history. Happiness in small things. In a wedding shared with 9 other couples in a post-war Poland with too few priests and too many deferred dreams. In an open-air bed. In a secret shared between sweethearts.

This is a wonderful book. In addition to the gripping storylines, the book also offers a glimpse into the recent history of Poland, which I found fascinating. In fact, it made me realize I need to learn more about the post-war years in Eastern Europe in general, and Poland in particular. I would absolutely recommend it to those love contemporary literary fiction, as well as those whose tastes run to historical fiction and even to lighter romances – there’s something here for those in any of those groups.

This book counts for a “Size” in the What’s in a Name 4 Challenge, and is my first book for this year’s Eastern European Reading Challenge at The Black Sheep Dances. Thanks to Beth Fish Reads and Amy for hosting!

New Cookbook Romance: Vegan Fire and Spice

Last week I was thinking about cookbook marriage: the cookbook relationships that last, that stand the test of time, that aren’t so sexy but are oh-so-reliable. But this week I’m thinking about the beginning of the relationship: that first flush of cookbook romance.

You know how it is. A new cookbook enters your life. Maybe you sought it out after reading reviews. Maybe you asked for a recipe after a potluck, and received a glowing review. Maybe the cover art grabbed you as you browsed in your favorite bookstore. Suddenly, you’re hooked.

New cookbooks, like new romances, occupy your time. This week I received Robin Robertson’s Vegan Fire and Spice. This is a book I researched, for two reasons. First, although I’m an omnivore, our family is committed to shifting to a more plant-based diet – Mark Bittman calls this approach “flexitarianism.” Second, I’m at the age where the things I eat have health consequences. Many vegetarian cookbooks rely on cheese and dairy products to replace some of the richness of a meat-based diet – I wanted to learn a different approach.

Like a new romance, new cookbooks expand your horizons. Reading them stimulates new ideas, diversifying – and hopefully improving – your cooking style. Last night I accompanied my family’s favorite meatloaf with a vegan potato salad I wouldn’t have thought of putting together, thanks to Fire and Spice. Robertson’s Veracruz Potato salad includes capers, cilantro and Serrano peppers, and is coated in lime vinaigrette. Of course, new romances, cookbook and real, require compromise, and I played around with the vinaigrette portion of the recipe, knowing what my family likes. And the salad was, indeed, a huge success – I’m already looking forward to the leftovers in my lunchbox on Monday!

I have another meal from this cookbook on the menu tonight: Japanese Soba Noodles. It includes ingredients my family loves, and I’m always trying to expand the grain menu beyond rice and wheat. We’ll see how it goes. Right now, Vegan Fire and Spice looks like it has serious work horse potential. But I also know these things take time to figure out! If the book is showing some wear-and-tear in the next few months, I’ll know this is the beginning of a long-term relationship in the kitchen!


Thanks, as always, to Beth Fish Reads for hosting Weekend Cooking! It's open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page.

Book Review: The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony

Remember how you felt the first time you read Homer? Stretched and slightly confused, but in a good way? Reading Roberto Calasso’s The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony gave me that feeling again – for the first time in a long time.

Calasso’s landmark work is not just a retelling of the Greek myths – although the myths are central to the book. Rather, Calasso puts the myths, and their evolution, into perspective. Starting with Zeus’ rape of Europa, Calasso explores the Greek world’s uneasy relationship with their gods, and thereby tries to explain their relationship to the world.

Calasso finds patterns and subtle differences in familiar stories that I never noticed before. He writes poetically and persuasively. Speaking of the disaster wrought by the necklace given to Harmony by her mother Aphrodite for her wedding, Calasso explains the irony:

What conclusions can we draw? To invite the gods ruins our relationship with them but sets history in motion. A life in which the gods are not invited isn’t worth living. It will be quieter, but there won’t be any stories. And you could suppose that these dangerous invitations were in fact contrived by the gods themselves, because the gods get bored with men who have no stories. (p. 387)

This is a very enjoyable but by no means light read. First, the text assumes a fundamental understanding of ancient Greece’s philosophical terms. For a mythologist, this is just jargon. For me, it required a lot of trips to the dictionary – along with Wikipedia, I must admit. Likewise, even though I have a pretty good background in Classics, there were many myths and characters – especially from the older Greek Pantheon – with which I was unfamiliar. Again, these required a good deal of cross reference to understand Calasso’s arguments. Lastly, there’s the problem of chronology – while the book has numbered chapters, the structure is hard to understand. Some paragraphs seemed to bear no relationship to the paragraphs before or after them. I think this was intentional on the author’s part, hoping to emulate a kind of discussion with the reader. But there were times when I simply found it disorienting.

I would urge anyone with an interest in Classics or Greek mythology to read this book. I read it looking for a non-fiction title about mythology for the Read-A-Myth Challenge, and I would highly recommend it to the other participants in that challenge. I would simply urge readers to be patient – it’s not a book to be devoured in a day or two. I found myself reading a section, reflecting, sometimes re-reading and referencing, and then finally moving on. There’s just so much information here that I think to plow through it would be a disservice to Calasso’s accomplishment. Reading this book really will give you a completely different perspective on myths you thought you knew.

Thanks so much to JoV and Bina for hosting the Read-A-Myth Challenge! If you have room in your challenge schedule, I think you'll learn a lot from this one!

Since Calasso's treatise is about Greek mythology, and not a retelling of myth, I think it also counts for the Dewey Decimal Challenge! Thanks to Jen for hosting.

Book Blogger Hop: What Am I Reading?

Today's Book Blogger Hop at Crazy for Books asks, “What are you reading now and why are your reading it?”

This week I’m tackling Brigid Pasulka’s A Long, Long Time Ago, and Essentially True. I read a review of it at The Black Sheep Dances,* and it sounded like just my type of book, both romantic and historical, and about a country I know very little about, Poland. It’s taking some time to get into it, but I actually have more time to read during the week. This counts for the What’s in a Name 4 Challenge and the Eastern European Reading Challenge.

I’m also planning to finish Robert Calasso’s The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony for the Read A Myth Challenge. This book is an academic treatment of the “utility” of the Greek gods in ancient culture, and uses the gradual shifts in the familiar stories to explicate changes in Greek society. I’ve found it very enjoyable, just a bit dense – I have to read it in small doses.

Thanks to Crazy-for-Books for sponsoring the Book Blogger Hop. Have a wonderful reading week!

Col

*At least I think it was on The Black Sheep Dances. I went to link to it and couldn't find it, so you'll have to correct me if I'm wrong, Amy!

Weekend Cooking: Cookbooks I Couldn’t Live Without

I have a LOT of cookbooks, collected throughout the years, on a bookshelf in the dining room. Yesterday, one of my daughter’s friends asked a reasonable question: “Do you use all those?”

The answer was, not surprisingly, “No.”

Some cookbooks were gifts from friends who think of me and think “cookbook.” Some of the spines on those don’t appear to have been opened, although some others have a recipe or two that I go back to over and over again. Stephen Langlois’ Prairie: Cuisine from the Heartland is one of those, a gift from my Midwestern mother-in-law when I joined the family. The book opens automatically to Kansas City Strip Steaks with Herbed Maytag Blue Cheese Sauce. That one recipe secures its place on the shelf forever.

Other cookbooks were souvenirs of trips where the local cuisine had a dish that we wanted to be able to make at home. I bought Jan Robinson’s Ship to Shore after a trip to Barbados. I bought it for the Vanity Punch recipe – it’s a classic rum punch – but found the recipes from ships’ galleys fit my little Manhattan apartment so perfectly that it got a real workout for a while. Now it only comes off the shelf for cocktails and appetizers, though. Time has marched on.

So which are the work horse cookbooks of my current kitchen? Looking at the shelf, they’re easy to locate, battered and splattered and loved to dog-ears:

Irma Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker and Ethan Becker’s Joy of Cooking. This is the present I give as a shower gift to young couples who are just starting out in the kitchen, because it has a basic recipe for virtually anything you bring home from the market.

Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything Vegetarian. That book is out at least 2 or 3 nights a week. I love how every Bittman recipe is a starting point for endless variation on a theme. Having the book in the house helps me face the farmer’s market without fear, knowing that whatever beautiful veggie I bring home, I’ll have a recipe for it!

Anne Sheasby’s The Ultimate Soup Bible. This gorgeous Barnes & Noble title looks like a coffee table book, but has 400 soup recipes from around the world. It’s the kind of book you love having when your kid grabs “Malaysia” for the school’s international food fair. It even has a brilliant section of cold soups for summer. Sadly out of print now, if you find a copy, buy it!

Diane Seed’ Top 100 Pasta Sauces and Andrew Schloss with Ken Bookman’s While the Pasta Cooks share the pasta work horse chores. Seed’s book is a thin but comprehensive look at Italy’s regional pasta sauces – traditional and superb. Schloss’ book is the opposite – he often turns to non-traditional ingredients in his quick-fix dishes. It’s a great way to reduce your meat budget, while still getting the flavor, as in a pasta dish ½ pound of fish easily feeds a family of four.

Finally, Lorna Sass’ Pressure Perfect, recommended by a colleague when I invested in a pressure cooker, has become my go-to weeknight comfort food guide, for things like ribs, or stew or bean dishes. I cannot believe I lived without a pressure cooker for so long. Sass’ comprehensive guide to dried beans in the pressure cooker – which are so much tastier than canned – have earned it a place on my dining room bookshelf.

So how about you? What cookbooks can’t you live without? I’d love to hear about them!


Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. Thanks to Beth Fish Reads for hosting!