Green tea noodle stirfry

I'm experimenting with tiny recipe photothings. This is what I made for my housemate and I's lunchsnacks:

Vegetarian/Vegan Cottage Pie

(Surely there's a better name for this?)

Filling:
Basically, a big Mix of Stuff - you can use whatever vegetables you have around. Last night I used:
* Onions (1 and a half)
* Garlic (3 cloves)
* A handful of yellow split peas (these give it a meaty flavour)
* About two cups of red lentils
* Two carrots, chopped finely
* Broccoli, chopped
* Zucchini, chopped
* Tinned tomatoes (I can)
* Vegetarian stock (a couple of teaspoons)
* Soy sauce (a couple of tablespoons)

Making:
*Cook the split peas separately, as they'll take a while.
* Meanwhile, fry the onions until soft, then add garlic. Add red lentils, stir around for a while, add some water and let it simmer for a bit.
* Add vegetables.
* When everything looks close to being ready, add the tinned tomatoes, stock, and soy sauce. Let it simmer until it's moist, but not too soupy.

Topping
While you're cooking the filling, chop up a heap of potatoes (maybe six or seven, if they're large) and put them on to boil. I prefer not to peel them.

Once they're cooked, mash them and mix in some soy milk (or real milk, if you prefer). I also like to add a heap of pepper.

Assembling:
Pour the filling into a dish, put the topping on, sprinkle with paprika, then put in a moderate oven for about half an hour.

Hippy Rice Salad

Ingredients:
* Some brown rice (cooked and cooled)
* A few leaves of spinach from the garden, chopped (or something else green: parsley, or peas, or green beans, or all of the above)
* Some tomatoes (chopped)
* Bean sprouts
* Grated carrot
* Olive oil
* Ground coriander, cumin, and turmeric (maybe a teaspoon-full of each?)
* Salt and Pepper

Making:
1. put the spices in a pan, toast over a low heat until they're browner, but not burnt.
2. Mix together all ingredients.
3. Eat on the beach, vainly attempt to keep Small Child from getting sand everywhere as you feed her.

vegetarian medfouna

bread stuff:
* 1/3 millet flour
* make up the rest of the cup with self raising flour, quinoa, and mealie meal.
* 2 teaspoons of yeast
* half a teaspoon of sugar
* teensy bit of salt
* like maybe 1/4 cup of warm water

filling:
* 1 small onion
* some garlic
* some spinach
* 1 tomato
* a couple of mushrooms
* anything else probably
* salt, pepper, cumin, ginger, paprika, parsley, and whatever else you wanna try out
* olive oil

1. knead together all the stuff. Work in more flour or water as needed. The millet flour, quinoa, and mealie meal will dry it out, I think, so maybe make it all a bit wetter than normal bread.
2. let rise for a while in a covered bowl.
3. chop up all the vegetables pretty small cuz they've gotta cook in the bread. you might want to mix them up in a bowl with the spices you've chosen.
4. roll out half the mixture into a circle.
5. use the olive oil to grease up a cake tin or shallowish casserole dish or baking tray.
6. put the rolled out bread in/on your cooking receptacle, and then arrange your filling on top of it. Leave some room around the edges, so you can seal it up without filling poking out. If you haven't added the spices yet, put 'em in now. I recommend slicing up the tomato and putting it on the very top of the pile of filling, so the juice can run through when it cooks. Also putting the ginger on the top of the tomatoes here is pretty rad.
7. roll out the rest of the mixture for the lid. You might wanna use some beaten egg to seal the two bits of bread if you've got a lot of mixture and not much bread.
8. smooth some olive oil over the top of the bread, and put it in a 180 (140 fan forced) oven for about 20 minutes.
8. eating time, hopefully!

I also put some poached chicken bits in it, so we'll see how that goes.

Grilled polenta and roasted vegetables

Ingredients:

(halve this if you want to make enough for fewer people)
* 2 cups of polenta
* 8 cups of water with vegetable or chicken stock
* salt and pepper to taste
* two capsicums
* a bunch of mushrooms
* two tomatoes
* any other vegetables you want on top
* olive oil

Instructions:

1. Line a non-shallow baking tray with grease proof paper for later. Chop the vegetables up for roasting*. Bring the water, stock, salt, and pepper to the boil.
2. Slowly add the polenta, constantly stirring. The mixture should start to thicken up pretty quickly.
3. Turn it right down and cook for about twenty minutes (or until you get sick of it), stirring all the time if you can. This'll stick to the bottom the first chance you give it.
4. Tip the polenta mix into the prepared tray and smooth it out. It'll set pretty quick.
5. Put the polenta in the oven/under the grill for a while, until it cooks through and starts to toast up.
6. Take the polenta out of the oven when it's getting just about yummy.
(6a. Slice the tomato thinly. Cut the mushrooms into chunks. Etc.)
7. Cover the top of the polenta with slisced tomato. Chuck the other vegetables on top. If there's oil from the capsicum, tip some over the vegetables and polenta.
8. Put it in the oven for a bit longer, until the tips of the vegetables are just starting to burn.

Hopefully yummy.


___
* Roast capsicum is nyummy with this. Roast with a bit of oil until not quite done, let cool, then take the skin off. Chop it up into strips. It'll get roasted a bit more later on in the recipe.

Moroccan stew

Ingredients:

* a splash of olive oil
* chopped up onion(s)
* diced celery
* chopped up capsicum(s)
* heaps of chopped up garlic
* vegetable stock (3 cups, if you're counting)
* cubed potatoes (depending on how big you want this, maybe 3 or 4 big ones?)
* 1 can diced or crushed tomatoes
* 1 or 2 cans of chickpeas
* a squeeze of lemon or lime juice (a small lime, or half a lemon)
* 2 tsp grated/ground ginger
* 1 tsp ground cumin
* 1 tsp curry powder
* 1 tsp ground coriander
* 1 tsp ground cayenne pepper
* 1/2 tsp salt
* 1/2 tsp black pepper

Instructions:
1. Chop up all the bits and pieces, drain the chickpeas, juice the lemon/lime.
2. Cook onions, garlic, celery, and capcisum, in the olive oil until everything starts to soften.
3. Add the spices and cook for a bit longer. Add some water if necessary.
4. Add anything you haven't put in yet, and bring to the boil.
5. Stir frequently to avoid burning.
6. Let simmer on a lowish heat until everything is cooked and tasty. The juice should thicken and the vegetables should soften, and it should smell like the tastiest thing in the world.
7. Serve with rice or couscous when you get sick of waiting.

Leek and Potato Soup

Ingredients
* potatoes
* a leek
* some onion (I used two, but I sure do dig that onion)
* olive or canola oil
* chicken or vegetable stock

Instructions:
* chop up the onions and sautee them in the oil until they turn clear.
* chop the potatoes and the leek into smallish bits, and add to the onions.
* add a bunch of water and the stock.
* boil until all the bits go soft and start to disintegrate.

I mashed it up with a potato masher thing once the vegetables had gotten soft enough. If you find leek and potato boring, maybe some spices?

Nervous Gumbo

Ingredients:
(3 tablespoons) vegetable (I used canola) oil
3 tablespoons of flour
l large chopped onion
chopped capsicum
chopped carrot
chopped sweet potato
5 or 6 cloves chopped garlic
some string beans or something
half a thing of tomato paste
1 tin of tomatoes
2 - 3 cups water
1 teaspoon of sugar
1 tablespoon of chopped parsley
1 bay leaf
salt and pepper or whatever seasoning you want

Instructions:
* cut up the vegetables into bits that you'd like to find in your gumbo (bearing in mind that it's meant to cook for, like, an hour and a half).
* Heat the oil in a big ol' pot, then stir in the flour. Stir it like you've never stirred before, until it gets all brown and you wonder if perhaps you've let it go too far.
* Chuck in the onions, capsicum, sweet potato, and garlic. Keep stirring and cooking until the onions go clear.
* Add the tomato paste, and stir.
* Throw in the beans and keep stirring over heat until it "goes crumbly or dry". Or until you get sick of stirring it.
* Tinned tomato goes in, and cook slowly on low heat for ever and ever and ever. Add the water, a little at a time, and stir ocassionally. This thing'll stick to the bottom like some sort of manta ray.
* Hey, remember to put in the sugar and the bay leaf, too. Also I put in some peri peri seasoning to make it a bit bitey.

Goes great with steamed or boiled rice. Also, maybe you should use the proper vegetables? Who knows?