This has been another week of lacklusterness in the Kinky Elfery Kitchen; BUT, we have reasons. Remember the saga of the kitchen make-over that went on and on until the original contractor just disappeared, leaving much unfinished. Well, we found a most worthy contractor who has re-energized our contractor beliefs and has brought such expertise as to think of amazing things to make the kitchen even better!! Add that to the bitterly cold weather and SNOW we had for almost the entire week!! Y’all we just aren’t used to such weather…usually, when it snows down South, it’s gone in an hour or two or AT LEAST by the next day. We had snow on the ground for 3 or 4 days! Here’s a picture of Mail Order Annie as it was snowing last Tuesday morning
and the identical view the next day!
So, that calls for cooking stuff that is comfort food and hunkerin’ down with a good book or bingeing on a TV series (such as ‘Vikings’). We did fix two really large batches of comfort soup and chili. You KNOW we have fallen in love with the Spinach and Mushroom Soup with Cinnamon, Coriander, and Cumin as shown in the Blog of 1/7/18.
With each preparation, we’ve tweaked the recipe a little bit, this time adding a bit more Allspice and Coriander and less pureeing with the hand-held blender.
We made enough to share with friends. Next up, we decided to make some chili off the top of our little Elfin head. No recipe, just experimentation. We had cooked a LOT of black lentils to have on hand for a quick rice/lentil lunch. Well, we cooked so many, we HAD to think of another use. So, we sautéed some onion and bell pepper, added some Boca Crumbles
until they were nicely browned and seasoned with Chipotle Chili powder and regular Chili powder. Into that we added our black lentils…probably about two cups. Then we added a couple of cans of Muir Glen Fire-Roasted Tomatoes
THEN, we finally had to face down our fear of making The Gentle Chef's Chikun Shreds...if you remember, the last couple of times we made them, we almost blew up the house with the exploding dough. So, we only made ONE batch of dough and instead of processing it for 60 seconds to get that taffy-like consistency, we processed for 30 seconds. The texture was still approaching 'taffiness' but not the gooeyesqueness of taffy. Nonetheless, we TRIPLE-WRAPPED in heavy duty foil (like we did before) but were extra careful to leave MORE room for expansion. We also altered our wrapping technique to assure a better seal at each end. THEN, as one more precaution, we TIED IT UP! SEE!
It was the longest two hours of your Elf's life! We watched that oven like a damn hawk and even took the package out of the oven at the 90 minute mark to make sure there was still room for expansion...there was, so it went back in. We actually made the two hours with a great sigh of relief. After cooling for a bit, we unwrapped it to see what it looked like... and we were pleased!
The cooked 'chikun' had to refrigerate overnight to allow it to texturize appropriately. We did lose a bit of the 'chiken-like' texture but the taste is great. We have nerve up now to try it again soon and will press our luck with a longer processing time for the dough. If you recall also from last week, we had purchased an Air Fryer. We tried some potatoes
which we had sliced too thickly and did not really crisp up. Later in the week we 'air-fried' some broccoli and Brussels Sprouts.We added them to some Red Lentil Pasta along with some Gardein chicken. We also sautéed some home made seitan
and threw that in as well. Seasoned with EVOO and some fresh lemon juice, it was a nice little spur of the moment meal.
As for the Air Fryer, it was returned after some additional researching for a different brand. We are waiting for it to arrive Monday (tomorrow). We also bought Kathy Hesters' new AF cookbook and have found several recipes to try.
She also has some great commentary on the use of an AF as well as things to avoid. So you can rest assured that you will be seeing some things from the world of Air Frying! And finally, we always eat Thai at least once a week, usually on the weekend at a local Thai restaurant (Fusion). They are very vegan friendly and are aware of preparing dishes without fish sauce or other 'hidden' animal ingredients or seasonings. Plus the food is delicious! This is your Elf's favorite, crispy Tofu with vegetables.
So, again and for always, LOOK for the GOOD, be an EXAMPLE of the GOOD, and ACT for the GOOD as HARD as you can, in as MANY WAYS as you can, EVERY DAY that you can. Your Elf
along with about a cup and a half of Chikun Bouillon. We let that simmer for a while and tweaked the seasoning with some pink salt and fresh ground black pepper. The final product turned our really quite delicious and with an outside high temperature of 24, hit the spot for warmth and spiciness.
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