Tag: Dirty Dozen

by Veggie Sutra

Potatoes with Greens Curry

Today is a backyard-to-table kind of day, that is, I harvested whatever I could from the garden and put it together as a simple dish.  With both of us traveling, we haven’t had a chance to visit the Farmer’s Market  of late.  I am sure with the recent high temps, summer produce has started to appear and I can’t wait to go next week.

 

 

Personally, I am not a fan of hot weather, but I hope my peppers are happy and do well.  I usually do not have much luck with growing peppers  in containers as I lack enough space to put them in the ground.   Yet, I desperately try every year, because peppers notoriously appear on the Dirty Dozen list almost every single year.

 

 

Today when I went out in to the backyard I was able to dig up quite a few potatoes that were hiding just below the surface and I also harvested a bunch of greens.  As a bonus, potatoes and spinach also appear on the Dirty Dozen list consistently.  Which means, growing them in the backyard sans any pesticides makes a whole lot of sense!

I have talked about the greens that I harvested in detail in an earlier post which contained a recipe for Leafy Greens with Lentils.  The greens are called sessile joyweed.  Having survived this past winter in a pot outdoors, beautiful new shoots with bright green leaves have appeared at the onset of warm weather.  Again, similar to the recipe for Leafy Greens with Lentils, spinach or chard can be substituted for joyweed in the below recipe as well.

Recipe for Potatoes with Greens Curry

[Printable Recipe]

Serves 3-4 as a side dish

Ingredients:

  • 2 Tbsp vegetable oil
  • 1/2 tsp mustard seeds
  • 1/2 tsp carom seeds / ajwain (you can find this in an ethnic Indian grocery store.  If you don’t have carom seeds, feel free to use cumin seeds).
  • 5-6 medium potatoes, washed well and cut in to bite-sized pieces
  • 3 cups leafy greens, thoroughly washed, drained and chopped  (I used sessile joyweed but spinach or chard or amaranth leaves would work wonderfully as well)
  • 1/4 tsp turmeric powder
  • 1/4 to 1/2 tsp red chili powder (depending on whether you want it spicy or not)
  • 1/4 tsp coriander powder
  • Salt to taste

Method:

  • Heat oil in a pan.  When the oil is hot, add the mustard seeds.  When the mustard seeds start to sputter, lower the heat and add the carom or cumin seeds.
  • Add the potatoes, turmeric and salt to taste.  Pan fry on low to medium heat until golden brown and cooked (pierce with a knife to check)
  • Add the washed leafy greens on top of the potatoes, close with a lid, lower the heat and let it cook.  The moisture from washing the greens should be sufficient and there is no need to add water.

 

 

  • After around 10 mins, check if the greens are cooked otherwise let it cook for 5-10 mins more
  • When the greens have wilted and cooked down, add the chili powder and coriander powder, and more salt if needed for taste and mix
  • Serve as a side dish with white rice or rotis

 

A simple homemade meal with produce from the backyard on a lazy Sunday morning was just what we needed after all the travel and erratic eating.

 

by Veggie Sutra

Poached Pears in Red Wine with Spices

Every year during the holiday season I get in to the baking-and-giving mood. I bake cookies, cakes, fruit breads and desserts and I share it with neighbors and friends.  V also relaxes his sugar rules and digs in to the desserts and sweets with gusto.   The whole house smells of vanilla and spices and everything is perfectly festive.

 

 

V and I also cooked a bunch of stews and curries this weekend to store for later in the week.  When amma is visiting, we get freshly cooked food every single day, but when we are alone, we simply do not have the energy.  So we cook big batches and freeze/refrigerate in airtight containers to consume later.  I recently had an argument with my cousin about this.  She simply could not understand how I could consume something that is not fresh off the stove.  To which my answer is, I would rather do this than eat processed foods or take out from restaurants.  She does have a point though.  Freezing and refrigerating foods is considered taboo in many cultures even today.  Pickling is perhaps the only accepted way of preserving foods.

I expect some research student badly wanting a PhD will soon do a study on the effects of eating precooked and refrigerated food pretty soon!   In the meantime, we will continue following our known health rules like being mindful of the Dirty Dozen.  Today’s featured produce on our Dirty Dozen series is pears.  Apples and pears are #4 and #6 respectively on EWG’s Dirty Dozen list.  Terribly unfortunate as both of them are such great fruits to snack on.

When I turned on the oven today for baking my holiday goodies, I also wanted to make a simple dessert for dinner.  What is simpler than a dessert that incorporates the natural sweetness of fruit.   Like the chia seed pudding with blueberry compote dessert, this dessert with pears is also easy to make and can be made a day ahead.

 

 

Recipe for Poached Pears in Red Wine with Spices

[Printable Recipe]

Serves 5 – one each

Ingredients:

  • 5 short squat organic pears like comice pears (you could use any pear you want but pick ones with stem attached)
  • 1 cup of full-bodied red wine
  • 1/2 cup orange juice from 2 large oranges
  • 2 Tbsp sugar + 1 Tbsp
  • 2 sticks cinnamon, broken
  • Around 5 whole cloves
  • 1-2 cardamom pods (optional)
  • 2-3 thick slices of lemon
  • Optional: Ice cream for serving

Method:

  • Preheat oven to 350F
  • Peel the pears with stems intact. Then slice the bottom off a bit so it can stand up
  • In a shallow casserole just large enough to hold 5 pears, place the red wine, orange juice, and 2 Tbsps of sugar and stir a bit to dissolve
  • Place the pears in the dish.  Add the cinnamon sticks, cloves, cardamom (if using) and lemon slices and cover with aluminum foil
  • Bake for around 45 mins.  If the liquid does not completely cover the pears, open the oven once or twice to turn the pears on their sides to that the liquid evenly seeps through.  I had to do this twice
  • Once the pears are tender, but not falling apart, switch off the oven and remove the pears on to a serving dish and refrigerate
  • Now strain the liquid in to a sauce pan and throw away the spices and lemon slices.  Place it on low heat on the stove, add a tablespoon of sugar and simmer until the liquid has reduced to less than half its volume and takes on a syrupy consistency
  • Refrigerate the syrup separately from the pears
  • While serving, place one pear on each plate.  Spoon some of the red wine syrup on top.  Serve with a side of ice cream optionally.

 

 

This dessert is perfect for the holidays.  First, it is very festive looking and perfect for a small holiday dinner get-together.  Secondly, the process of making it makes the whole house smell of spiced cider and mulled wine which puts everyone in a holiday mood.  And finally, it is a very light, and not overly sugary dessert.  Don’t we get enough sugar during the holiday season anyway?  Of course, if you want more sweetness, like we did today, you could serve it with vanilla ice cream.

 

by Veggie Sutra

Roasted Potato and Brussels Sprouts with Wilted Spinach

Lo and behold, winter is upon us here in Northern California.  And with it, the hectic holiday season.  It is probably not very PC of me to say this, but I am not a big fan of this time of the year just because it gets so crazy.  There is a lot of shopping madness and social calendars get too jam packed to be enjoyable.   Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy some aspects of it….  like lighting up the porch and walking around the neighborhood to gaze at the lovely Christmas lighting.   I love turning on the oven to bake cookies….  in fact, bake anything.  I love the smell of pies and mulled cider and poached pears wafting through the house and all the great food.  Indeed the holiday season is the time of entertaining and I am always on the lookout for easy-to-make crowd-pleasers to serve at dinner parties.

 

 

Potatoes are certainly up there when it comes to being crowd pleasers.   They are very versatile, and ubiquitous throughout the year, served cold as potato salads at summer picnics and served warm as mashed potatoes at Thanksgiving tables.    I may not have met anyone so far who doesn’t like potatoes.  Alas, as discussed before in our Dirty Dozen series, the humble spud is up there when it comes to pesticide residue and is currently at #12 on EWG’s Dirty Dozen list.

In the Dirty Dozen roundup post, I talked about several measures one can take to avoid pesticides in the food we eat everyday.   One of them is to grow the offending produce ourselves.   Surprisingly, potatoes are really easy to grow even in a pot!   I learnt this while volunteering at a local community farm and the farmer taught me that if you cover the top of the soil with hay, the potatoes just appear in the hay and do not even need to be washed.  I haven’t been successful in growing it that way, but I can vouch that nothing is more satisfying than to plunge one’s hand in to the mud and pull out an enormous potato!   So go ahead and give it a try!   If not, try to buy organic or at least wash the potato and peel before cooking it.

 

 

Today’s recipe features a couple of my favorite ingredients to roast – potatoes and brussels sprouts.  As with all vegetables, brussels sprouts lose their bitterness when roasted and take on a super smooth caramelized flavor, as in this other Caramelized Brussels Sprouts recipe.   This super-simple side dish is a great hit on holiday tables.

 

Recipe for Roasted Potatoes and Brussels Sprouts with Wilted Spinach

[Printable Recipe]

Serves 6 as a side dish

Ingredients:

  • 2 cups brussels sprouts, washed and halved or quartered in to bite-sized cubes
  • 2 cups organic baby potatoes (red and white) washed and cut in to bite-sized cubes
  • 4 tablespoons white truffle flavored olive oil
  • A couple of generous pinches of salt
  • A couple of generous pinches of pepper
  • A couple of generous shakes of dried garlic or garlic powder (you can use freshly minced garlic if you wish)
  • 1 cup spinach leaves, washed and chopped
  • A squeeze of lemon juice

Method:

  • Pre-heat oven to 425F
  • You will need 2 cookie sheets, one for the sprouts and one for the potatoes
  • In a large bowl, combine the brussels sprouts with 2 tablespoons of olive oil and a generous pinch of salt, pepper and a dash of garlic.  Spread on a cookie sheet and place it on the top shelf of the oven
  • In the same bowl, combine the potatoes with the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil and a generous pinch of salt, pepper and a dash of garlic.  Spread on a cookie sheet and place it on the bottom shelf of the oven
  • Set the cook time to 45 mins
  • After 20 mins, check the potatoes by piercing with a knife.  If it pierces easily, remove from the oven and move the brussels sprouts to the bottom shelf.  If not wait another 10 mins and do the same
  • Check if the brussels sprouts have charred slightly and caramelized after 45 mins
  • Remove the potatoes and brussels sprouts to a serving bowl.  Add the spinach while warm so the spinach wilts immediately
  • Adjust salt and pepper, squeeze some lemon juice to taste
  • Serve warm

 

 

The holiday season should be about friends and family and of course good food and not about stress.  Keep your cooking as simple and hands off as possible by serving dishes like this!

by Veggie Sutra

Sun-dried tomato hummus

Last month, I had kicked off the Dirty Dozen series with a recipe for lentils with leafy greens like spinach.  Spinach has consistently stayed around the top of the Dirty Dozen list at least for the past 5 years.  However, tomatoes appeared on the list just this year.  I was dismayed to see staples like tomatoes and potatoes on the list now at #10 and #12 respectively.   What’s a girl supposed to eat if tomatoes and potatoes are now “dirty”?

 

 

In the Dirty Dozen Recipe Roundup, I had listed a few of my strategies for dealing with the dirty list. One of them is to try and grow some of the offending produce in my own backyard to ensure it is totally chemical free.  While this may not be feasible for everyone, if you even have space for potted plants, tomatoes can be grown.   Since we have a very small vegetable patch, we typically plant 1-2 tomato saplings around March.    After a long, patient wait, we start getting ripe tomatoes around July.   In a good year, we get enough for our immediate cooking needs as well as to save for later. During years when we don’t have abundant produce at home, we simply buy organic tomatoes in the farmers market in peak summer when it is super cheap and save for later.

To save tomatoes for those wonderful soups and stews in winter, simply cut them in to small pieces and place in a saucepan at low heat and let it cook with a lid on.  I typically add a bit of turmeric to the tomatoes.  Once it has released all the liquid and cooked well, allow it to cook completely.  Scoop in to small bottles and store them in the freezer. Then during those cold dreary months, you can just pull out one bottle at a time as needed. You could also make sun-dried tomatoes to save for later. Thinly slice the tomatoes and place it in a single layer on large plates or cookie sheets.  Place in direct sun until the liquids have evaporated and the tomato shrivels up.

 

 

The hummus I made today uses sun-dried tomatoes but they came from a huge jar that I bought in Costco.  You can buy sun-dried tomatoes preserved in olive oil in regular stores as well, but look for organic.

Recipe for Sun-dried Tomato Hummus

[Printable Recipe]

Makes a little more than 1 cup

Ingredients:

  • 1/2 cup dried chickpeas (If you are using canned chickpeas, use one 15 oz can)
  • 1/4 cup sun-dried tomatoes with a little of the preserve oil
  • 2 Tbsp tahini paste (I buy organic Kevala tahini paste from Whole Foods)
  • 1-2 Tbsp lemon juice
  • 2 Tbsp olive oil
  • 2 cloves garlic (optional)
  • A handful of basil leaves, washed and roughly chopped
  • Pinch cumin powder
  • Pinch paprika
  • salt to taste

Method:

  • Cook the chickpeas (skip this step if you are using canned chickpeas):
    • Rinse the chickpeas and soak in tepid water at least overnight, for up to 2 days occasionally changing the water.   The longer you soak it, the easier it is to cook.  Also if they start to sprout, that’s a good thing as sprouted chickpeas are super healthy
    • Throw away the soaking water before cooking
    • Cook the chickpeas in a pressure cooker or slow cooker with enough water to submerge the soaked chickpeas.   Allow 4-5 whistles in the pressure cooker and wait a while before opening.  If cooking in a saucepan, use more water and cover and cook on low heat until the chickpeas become mushy
    • Reserve some of the cooking liquid
  • Blend the hummus:
    • Throw in the drained chickpeas, sun-dried tomatoes with oil, tahini paste, lemon juice, olive oil, garlic, basil leaves, and spices in a high-speed blender or food processor
    • Blend until super smooth using as much of the cooking liquid as and when you need it
    • The consistency should be that of peanut butter or maybe just a tad more liquidy but not much
  • Scoop in to an airtight container and refrigerate if you are not using it right away

 

 

This hummus will be a great hit as an appetizer at parties.  Serve it with vegetables like celery, carrots, cauliflower and broccoli, or with dinner crackers.

However at our place, we use hummus for breakfast.    The very first post on Veggie Sutra featured a Cilantro Hummus recipe, and as mentioned in that post, hummus is a staple in our household for breakfast.  I love to dress up the hummus with whatever herbs I have on hand or in the garden.  This time, I used basil from the garden in addition to the sun-dried tomatoes.   A healthy, wholesome spread on top of crackers or rice cakes or bread makes for a very satisfying breakfast in the morning!

Other breakfast spread variations from our kitchen:

 

by Veggie Sutra

A Dirty Dozen Roundup – Recipes

I had kicked off the Dirty Dozen series in the last post with a focus on greens, such as spinach.   This year, the Environmental Working Group (EWG) moved spinach to #2 on the Dirty Dozen list, citing that it has more pesticide residue by weight than all other produce tested!  Yikes!  While going organic for all produce does burn a big hole in the wallet, I would definitely choose to go organic for a few select produce like greens, tomatoes, potatoes and bell peppers.

 

 

I had intended to continue to cover other culprits of contamination, but was stumped when I realized that it may not be the season for specific produce, like say strawberries, in Fall.  Strawberries by the way, are at the top of the list in 2017, which breaks my heart.   In late spring and summer, when V and I visit friends in Sacramento, our car whizzes past vast stretches of farms where bright red strawberries stand out gloriously on low lying shrubs.  What a sight to watch!  Strawberry picking with kids is a popular activity here in Northern California and it is sad that one cannot snack on strawberries right off the bush if the farm is not an organic one.

The same applies to stone fruit like nectarines and peaches, which grow abundantly in Northern California and ripen in peak summer.  In fact, Silicon Valley used to be called “The Valley of the Heart’s Delight” for all the amazing drupes that grew here.  Unfortunately they are also on the Dirty Dozen list.

And come Fall, it is time to visit Apple Hill at the foothills of the Sierras.   Last month, one of my hiking buddies, who was looking forward to this year’s festival, remarked how she and her husband make the pilgrimage to Apple Hill every year in Fall just to get one single caramel apple each from their favorite farm, and they have been doing this for over 18 years!  Several others make an annual pilgrimage to Napa Valley in late Fall to watch the year’s grape harvest being metamorphosed into world-class California wine.

Such is California’s devotion to local produce!  If only we could banish excessive use of pesticides so that we can freely enjoy this abundance without worries!

 

Sunnyvale Farmers Market Open Saturdays 9 AM to 1 PM

 

Before moving on to recipes, here are a few rules that I follow to minimize exposure to pesticides through produce:

  1. Keep track of the Dirty Dozen on EWG’s website as they update it every year.
  2. Use the EWG shopping guide to buy organic on the most contaminated produce.  However, if you can afford it, go organic all the way.
  3. Shop at local Farmers Markets but do not assume that everything sold there is organic.  Talk to the farmer and get information.  I find organic potatoes in the farmers market, while it is not that commonly seen in regular grocery stores.
  4. Buy organic frozen berries for smoothies and desserts.  While there is nothing more satisfying than snacking on a fresh berry, organic fresh berries are exorbitantly expensive, and go bad so quickly that you are left feeling guilty.  So opt for frozen if you are buying berries for smoothies or desserts.
  5. Wash thoroughly and peel non-organic produce.  Typically I would keep the peel on apples and pears to benefit from the nutrients and fiber in the peel, but if they happen to be non-organic, I do peel them before eating.
  6. Try your hand at growing some of the notorious produce.  Tomatoes, for example, are a favorite for house gardening and given enough water and sunshine, they produce abundantly even in containers.  Bell peppers do really well in hot weather, like in Sacramento, but here in the Bay Area with cool nights, they produce only in late summer.  Figure out what works in your garden or kitchen counter.
  7. Finally, as a bonus, try activism perhaps in small doses, like contributing to the Environmental Working Group and talking to the farmers in your Farmers Markets and letting them know which vegetables you would prefer to buy organic.

 

Home-made peach jam

 

Here are 8 recipes from previous posts featuring some of the Dirty Dozen culprits.  Feel free to add your own recipes, and remember to buy organic for the Dirty Dozen.

  1. Spinach Kale Bites
    • Dirty Dozen member: Spinach
  2. Oat Bars with Peach Jam Filling
    • Dirty Dozen member: Peaches
  3. A Cleansing Juice with Celery, Peppers, Tomatoes and Ginger
    • Dirty Dozen members: Celery, Red bell peppers, Tomatoes
  4. Vegan Enchiladas with Spicy Fermented Tomato Salsa
    • Dirty Dozen member: Tomatoes
  5. Roasted Bell Pepper and Yam Soup
    • Dirty Dozen member: Red bell pepper
  6. Stuffed Eggplant with Potatoes, Red Bell Pepper and Greens
    • Dirty Dozen members: Potatoes, Red bell pepper, Greens like Spinach
  7. Stir-fried Traffic Light Bell Pepper Curry
    • Dirty Dozen member: Red bell pepper
  8. Warm Kale Salad with Pear
    • Dirty Dozen member: Pears

 

Warm Kale Salad with Sliced Pear

 

Happy fall and happy cooking!   I will try to keep the Dirty Dozen series going with new recipes next time!

by Veggie Sutra

Leafy Greens with Lentils

This is the first of the Dirty Dozen series focusing on produce that have the most pesticide traces.  Greens like spinach are notoriously on the top of the list always.  Luckily, some greens just grow like weeds even in containers.

Our visit to the Farmers Market in Sunnyvale yesterday was rather interesting.  It has been a warm summer (apparently the warmest on record) and the market still has an abundance of summer vegetables like peppers, beans, eggplant and tomatoes.  We were a bit late yesterday and the greens at our favorite farmer had been picked clean.

But I noticed just one type of greens still piled high.  It seemed like it hadn’t moved at all.  The long vines had beautiful maple-shaped leaves and yellow flowers and delicate tendrils grew on the stems.   Upon a bit of querying it turned out they were bitter melon leaves.  For those of you who have not eaten a bitter melon or even seen one, it looks a squash with ridges and tastes… bitter!   It is used widely in China and India and is somewhat of an acquired taste.  Fortunately both V and I love the taste of it!   But, I did not know that the leaves can be cooked.  The farmer said that her Chinese grand parents make a soup with it.  Although, we do have a bitter melon vine growing in our garden now, I haven’t dared to cook with it… yet!

 

Leafy greens are an essential nutritional component of many old world cuisines.  I remember learning about cooking with borage leaves from a Greek friend when I was volunteering at an urban farm in San Jose.  Dandelion greens are another example of a weed consumed widely. However, there was not much fanfare to these greens.  They were certainly not called “super foods” and they were not sold triple-washed in plastic clamshell boxes.   Most often they were just weeds foraged from the wild or from the swamp at the edge of the backyard or picked off the vine growing on the neighbor’s fence.

 

 

The greens that amma made today, called “sessile joyweed“, is one such weed that grows profusely in swamps in Southern India, spreading low to the ground.  It is called “ponnangani keerai” in Tamil.  In our garden, we have it growing in a couple of pots and as it is a perennial plant, we do not bother bringing it in during the winters.

 

 

This recipe would be considered a rather quotidian one in a South Indian household, and the version I am posting below comes courtesy of amma.  At least once a week, if not more often than that, some type of leafy greens are prepared, perhaps in this simple fashion with or without the lentils.  You can substitute almost any type of edible leafy greens, like spinach or amaranth leaves or swiss chard, in lieu of sessile joyweed.

 

 

Recipe for Leafy Greens with Lentils

[Printable Recipe]

Serves 3-4 as a side dish

Ingredients:

  • 1/2 cup split yellow -mung daal (yellow lentils) (you can find it in an ethnic Indian grocery store called moong daal)
  • 3 cups leafy greens, thoroughly washed and chopped  (I used “sessile joyweed”/Ponnangani keerai but spinach or chard or amaranth leaves would work wonderfully as well)
  • 1/4th tsp turmeric powder
  • To grind with very little water:
    • 2 Tbsp grated coconut (you can find frozen grated coconut in ethnic Indian grocery stores)
    • 2 dried red chilies
    • 1/2 tsp cumin seeds
  • To temper in hot oil:
    • About 2 tsp oil (you can use coconut oil or just regular vegetable oil)
    • 1/2 tsp mustard seeds
    • 1/2 tsp split black lentils (you can find it an ethnic Indian grocery store called urad daal
  • Salt to taste

Method:

  • Rinse the lentils in running water.  In a saucepan, bring 2 cups of water to a boil and add the lentils.  Once the water comes to a boil again, switch to lowest heat setting and let the lentils simmer.  Keep an eye on it to make sure the water does not dry out and add some hot water if needed.  Moong dal tends to cook faster than other types of lentils, so after about 30 mins, check if it mashes easily which means it is done
  • Once the lentils are cooked add the chopped greens, and turmeric and cook covered on low for 5-10 mins
  • While the greens are cooking, grind the grated coconut, dried red chilies and cumin seeds in to a smooth paste in a mini food processor
  • After the greens have wilted, add in the grated coconut mixture to the saucepan and mix.  Add salt to taste
  • Cook on low heat for another 5 mins and switch off
  • Heat oil in a small pan.  When the oil is hot, add the mustard seeds.  When the mustard seeds sputter, lower the heat and add the lentils and fry until golden brown.
  • Add the tempering to the saucepan, mix and serve

 

 

This is comfort food at its best when served over steamed white rice with a dollop of ghee!  What a simple, wholesome way to have your greens and enjoy it too!   You can also add more water and serve it as a hearty soup with a side of crusty bread.