Thursday, February, 21, 2013
Brrr! We’re having a snow day here. There’s really nothing better than a crockpot full of chili on a cold, snowy day!
Last month I shared this post with you about my calendar project. I brought a calendar home from my favorite little grocery store in Key West and am re-making each month’s featured recipe to fit my dietary style.
This month the calendar features Turkey Pumpkin Chili.
This didn’t require a lot of modifications on my part. I really could have just subbed tempeh for the turkey. But that would have been too easy. I’ve upped the phytonutrient content in addition to subbing out the meat. I knew you were over there googling “chili high in phytronutrients,” right? To do that, I added a bunch of kale. If you have picky eaters in your house, you can chop the kale up into teeny tiny pieces or even chop it until it’s almost a puree in your food processor. We’re big kale fans here, so we just give it a rough chop.
A quick note about the tempeh: beyond making sure it is gluten-free (not all are, some contain barley, read the labels carefully as always), it is a very forgiving protein, super easy to work with. You may choose to grate it on the large side of a box grater so that it is crumbled like ground meat, you can cut it into cubes or break it by hand into pieces. I broke it into pieces by hand in the batch pictured here. I used a variety that contains flax seeds, but any gluten-free variety is fine.
Pumpkin Kale Chili in the Crockpot
Ingredients
- 1 medium yellow onion, chopped
- 3 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 package tempeh, gluten-free
- 1 bunch, 6 to 8 stems, kale (remove from stems, chopped to desired size)
- 4 cups vegetable broth, gluten-free
- 1 (15 oz.) can kidney beans, rinsed and drained
- 1 (15 oz.) can pumpkin puree
- 1 (14.5 oz.) can diced tomatoes with chiles
- 1 T. chili powder
- 2 t. ground cumin
- 1/2 t. salt
- 1/2 t. black pepper
Instructions
- Heat a large sauce pan until droplets of water poured into the pan will sizzle and dash across the pan. Once the pan is that warm, add 2 Tablespoons of water, the chopped onion and garlic. (This is water sauteing.)
- Once onions are transparent, add tempeh. Cook, stirring occasionally, to brown the tempeh just a bit. Add kale, cooking until kale has softened a bit.
- Add this mixture and all remaining ingredients to crockpot. Cook on low for 7-8 hours or on high for 4-5 hours.
2.2
http://injohnnaskitchen.com/2013/02/twelve-months-of-healthy-eating-pumpkin-kale-chili-in-the-crockpot/
Friday, November, 23, 2012
Thanksgiving night we had friends and neighbors over for dessert. It’s such a nice way to wrap up the holiday, a low-key evening with lots of sweet treats. The conversation always turns to what we ate earlier in the day, followed by how we are going to re-purpose them for the next several days.
One of our neighbors mentioned a dish that was rice-based and baked in a pumpkin. She didn’t know the details, it was someone else’s recipe but she did say she would check into it for me.
I’m impatient about these things. I just brought my pie pumpkins in from outside since it has turned chilly here all of a sudden. I wanted to do something with them today. So I looked around on-line, found lots of stuffed pumpkin recipes. Some sounded similar to stuffed peppers, some used lots of bread and cheese. Some even used the grey, jiggly, condensed mushroom soup in a can. Then it struck me, I have a fridge full of dishes that blend well with the flavor of pumpkin.
So here it is, an un-recipe of sorts. Mine is different from what you may make as we have different leftovers. What I can tell you is this is the tastiest way I’ve re-purposed our Thanksgiving leftovers. We are fans of pumpkin crepes stuffed with leftovers, but this even trumps that. Not only that, it was easy!
Roasted Stuffed Pumpkin
1 small pumpkin, top removed, cleaned out
Thanksgiving leftovers (we had mashed potatoes, cornbread stuffing, maple sweet potatoes, tofu roast and gravy)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
After cleaning out pumpkin, place it on a parchment lined baking sheet. Layer in your Thanksgiving leftovers, pressing down firmly on each layer to make more room. I poured in a bit of gravy on top of every second or third layer to keep the ingredients moist.
For the last layer, sprinkle a bit of stuffing on top if you have it. It will get that terrific crunch on top.
Bake for 90 minutes or longer, depending on the size of the pumpkin. It is done when the pumpkin is soft on the outside. Give it a good poke with a spoon, you’ll be able to tell if it is soft. It may also be starting to collapse a bit on the baking sheet. Because the pumpkin is now soft, this makes transferring it to a pretty serving platter problematic. You may find it easiest to serve from the baking sheet.
You may either cut out slices of this to serve or scoop it out along with the pumpkin. We drizzled Orange Bourbon Cranberry Sauce on ours.
And now I find myself wishing we had more leftovers…
What are you making with your leftovers? I’d love to hear!
Tuesday, October, 30, 2012
My dear friend Suzanne recently told me she had indulged in the best pumpkin cookies EVER. She got them at a bake sale. As Suzanne does so well, she made friends with the gal who had baked them and got a copy of the recipe. The recipe landed in my inbox with a request to make it gluten-, dairy- and egg-free.
Because I’m all about pumpkin right now and also enjoy a challenge, I set to work on this recipe. The result is a cake-like cookie, minimally sweetened and full of deep, dark chocolate. I love the flavor combination of pumpkin and chocolate.
Pumpkin Chocolate Cookies
Makes 24-27 cookies
1/2 cup coconut oil, liquified
2 T. Flax meal dissolved in 5 T. hot water (replacement for two eggs)
1/2 cup coconut sugar
1-15 oz. can pumpkin puree
2 cups almond meal/flour
1 cup teff flour
2 t. baking powder
1 t. baking soda
1 t. fine sea salt
1 T. pumpkin pie spice
1 t. vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
4 oz. dark chocolate, roughly chopped or chocolate chips of your choice
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
In bowl of stand mixer, cream coconut oil, flax “egg” slurry, coconut sugar and pumpkin. Next add dry ingredients, mixing until well combined. Gently stir in chocolate.
Drop by large spoonfuls onto a lightly oiled or silpat lined baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 to 17 minutes. Cool on a rack before storing in an airtight container. These are delicious warm and so good with a cup of coffee!
