Smashed Potatoes and Roasted Sprouts
This past Sunday was nuts! We served close to 70 plates! I barely got out of the kitchen the whole night, so I apologize if I didn't get to say hello to you. The great thing is we're still getting new people in each week, some of which have never even been to the Brillobox!
So, I was surprised by how many people love brussels sprouts as much as I do! I always felt they were a misunderstood vegetable, but apparently people have finally come around. I don't know who made them fashionable but everybody seemed super excited to see them on the menu this week. And with good reason, they're delicious!
Tonight's were roasted with carrots and parsnips and tossed with chopped toasted walnuts, parsley, lemon and olive oil. This is a vegan version of a dish my mom made for the first time this past Thanksgiving. They totally don't need the parmesan cheese. They taste great hot, room temperature and straight out of the refrigerator.
As always, thanks to my old friend Pete for taking pictures and my new friend Aaron for being the best kitchen partner EVER. Click here to see more of Pete's great photos.
By the way, all the meals will continue to be vegan until after Lent is over. I gave up eggs and dairy, not for religious reasons but because I occasionally need to impose a little self discipline on myself. It's been surprisingly easy despite by being a self-proclaimed cheese-head. Anyhow I doubt you'll even notice. In fact I really hope you don't.
Coming this Sunday, April 1st if you can believe it...
(VEGAN by nature not by design) Coconut curry with crispy tofu, toasted cashews and Thompson raisins over basmati rice with mixed greens tossed with a ginger carrot dressing.
Full Dinner: $7
Second Helping (half portion): $3.50
If you've never been to the Brillobox, they also have an excellent selection of draft beers to accompany your meal which is truly a bonus. Doors open at 6pm, so come on down!
Sunday Night Suppers are brought to you in part by the East End Food Coop, one of my favorite places to waste 2 hours. I swear it takes me 30 minutes just to get out of produce! Any how if you're not a member you should be! It just costs $100 which you can pay over a year's time and if you ever move you can get all your money back! THANKS KARA!
Chickpea, Kale and Tomato Stew
So apparently some people still read the newspaper, because a small line was waiting when we opened the Brillobox doors this Sunday. People had started showing up at 5:30pm and by 6pm a good dozen people were ready to eat. I experienced my first dinner rush, we ran out of bowls, I briefly ran out of food...it was fantastic!
This week's menu combined a stew made from chickpeas, tomatoes, kale, red onions, ginger, garlic, orange juice, cumin... with giant croutons made fresh from Breadworks beautiful rustic sour dough loaves.
It was only about 9pm when we kicked the first 32 quarts of stew so I made a second batch substituting some lovely green cabbage I found in the walk in cooler. Round two was more of a soup but it was just as delicious with croutons piled on top. The photo above is actually the cabbage variety.
Sourdough Croutons
Sourdough Bread - stale but not moldy, cut into 1 inch cubes
Olive Oil - depends on how much bread you've got
Garlic - smashed and chopped
Pepper - fresh cracked
Salt - from the sea
Just take your bread and saute it in some hot olive oil and garlic and toss with salt and pepper. You can also toss everything together and put your cubes on a cookie sheet and bake them on low until they are crispy and golden brown.
The one thing to be careful of when making homemade croutons is the infamous Captain Crunch effect. You know, when you eat so much cereal you cut the crap out of the inside of your mouth. Trust me, the same goes for croutons, I speak from experience.
Thanks so much to all of you who came out this week, especially those of you who ventured out to the Brillobox for the first time! I hope to see you back around! And as always, thanks to my old friend Pete for taking pictures and my new friend Aaron for being the best kitchen partner EVER. Click here to see more of Pete's great photos.
Coming this Sunday...
(VEGAN by nature not by design) Pan seared tempeh with roasted root vegetables and brussel sprouts over smashed garlic potatoes topped with toasted walnuts and parsley with mixed green salad topped with red onions and dried cranberries.
Full Dinner: $7
Second Helping (half portion): $3.50
If you've never been to the Brillobox, they also have an excellent selection of draft beers to accompany your meal which is truly a bonus. Doors open at 6pm, so come on down!
Salad for Scott
Who's Scott? He's my new roommate! He started at Dance Alloy Theater about the same time I did last summer and unlike myself, he's actually a dancer.
Pretty soon Ian my old friend and other current roommate will be moving out and little Leigh (my sister) and her boyfriend Jaehee (who I just love) will be moving in with me too! Don't forget Nona is still here, so it's going to be a full house. Don't get me wrong, I love my space and lord knows I've got enough crap to fill it with, but it's so much nicer to always have someone to cook for.
You live with me, you're going to get fed. That's just how it works.
Tonight I got to make my favorite kind of dinner, the kind where you make something delicious out of what you find in an "empty" kitchen. You poke around your pantry items, see what can goods you have laying around, check the refrigerator see what ends of fresh herbs might still be green, anything you can make a meal out of.
Scott just went to Trader Joes so we had some mixed greens and I had one last package of tempeh in my stash so salads we shall have!
Salad for Scott (mixed greens with tempeh, oranges and caramelized onions)
Greens - mixed or red leaf lettuce, spinach would work, anything, just don't use iceberg
Olive Oil - 2-3 tablespoons
Onion - one sliced thick
Shallot - one large chopped
Tempeh - one package sliced into 1/4 inch strips
Braggs
Orange - peeled and de-pithed and cut into bite sized chunks
Cranberries - dried
Chickpeas - drained and rinsed
Walnuts - toasted or not if you're in a hurry
Sprouts - alfalfa
Salt - from the sea
Pepper - fresh ground, is there any other way?
Balsamic Vinaigrette - I make my own maple Dijon version, but if I gave you the recipe I'd have to kill you
The first things you want to start cooking are the onions and shallots. Heat some olive oil in a chef's pan and toss them in. Just let them keep cooking while you make everything else. The shallots should get pretty brown and a little crispy, though not burnt. Add salt and pepper to taste. You can cook your tempeh while you do this in another pan, or after the onions are getting close, move them to the side of your pan and start your tempeh. Cook the tempeh like I did in the last recipe (Tuesday Night Tempeh), brown it and then squirt some Braggs on it and crack some pepper over top.
Dinner's almost ready! Just put your greens and other salad fixings in two big bowls, that's one for me and one for you, and put your tempeh, caramelized onions and fried shallots over top. I put a few alfalfa sprouts on the very top for garnish and because they were about to over stay their welcome in my refrigerator. Add your dressing and you're good to go.
Serve with a toasted tortilla. Just throw the tortilla in the pan when you're done cooking. Keep the flame on medium and flip frequently so it puffs up a little and gets golden brown.
So the thing to remember about all my recipes is that they are a first draft. This is the first time I've ever tried to write about what I cook and I'm just jotting things down as I'm making them. As delicious as they might be, there is always room for improvement. I've made a million different versions of this salad and I'll probably make a million more. Add pears and blue cheese or avocados and cottage cheese instead of oranges and caramelized onions. It's just about balancing flavors, textures and colors. Use what ever you have in your kitchen. I rarely buy for a recipe, I just have staple items always on hand and then I buy what looks beautiful and worry about what to make later.
What's for supper this week?
Chickpea, kale, and tomato stew with orange and ginger over giant garlic sourdough croutons (I just got a bunch of rustic loaves from Breadworks!) with a mixed green salad and my not so secret salad dressing. Doors open at 6pm and food is served till it's gone.
Hope to see you there!
If you haven't made it out to the Brillobox for a Sunday Supper yet, you can read all about it in today's Post-Gazette, thanks Bob!
Macaroni and Cheese with Pesto and Tomatoes
My Sunday began in Washington D.C. and ended knee deep in Macaroni and Cheese. I drove down to the capital to see my backyard neighbor Brenna who is currently living in another compound in Qatar but was in town for a conference.
After a leisurely 24 hours I packed things up and hit the road by 7am. There couldn't have been a worse morning for Daylight Saving to begin. We had exited the bar the night before at 2am which instantly became 3am and before I knew it I was waking up at 6am which was actually 7am. I was working on a record fast 3 1/2 hour trip when I got pulled over for speeding. My first ticket in 10 years! I was exhausted but remained in a good mood as I cruised along for the rest of the drive at exactly 65 mph because I wasn't going home to go to work, I was going home to cook my second Sunday Night Supper!
My new best friend Aaron again insisted on helping me and honestly I don't know how I would have done it without him, because before we knew it, it was 6pm and dinner guests were beginning to arrive.
Though I'm not Catholic, I gave up eggs and dairy for Lent so I've been trying to make every other Sunday Supper vegan. This weeks meal however was decidedly not. If you're trying to refrain from animal products, just stop reading now.
Macaroni and Cheese with Pesto and Tomatoes
Pasta - 1 lb (elbow macaroni with lines are great but penne is delicious too)
Butter - 3 tablespoons
Garlic - 1 tablespoon chopped
Flour - 3 tablespoons
Milk - 3 cups (anywhere from whole to skim)
Cheese - about 10-12 oz shredded (any mixture of mozzarella, provolone, cheddar, whatever)
Cottage Cheese - about 8 oz
Pesto - enough to spread a thin layer over the top
Tomatoes - 4 romas diced
Pepper - fresh ground (is there any other way?)
Salt
First, cook your pasta most of the way through, it will have plenty of time to continue cooking in the oven. Make a white sauce by starting melting the butter in a heavy bottomed sauce pan add the garlic and cook for a minute, then add the flour and cook for another minute to get out the floury taste. You could add any other flavors you like here too. If I was doing this mac and cheese straight up I would through in chopped onion and dry mustard instead of the garlic or with the garlic if you want to get crazy. Start slowly adding the milk and whisk frequently. You want the sauce to get a little bit thick but keep the heat on medium so it doesn't boil up and or burn. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Meanwhile drain your pasta and run under cold water. You never want to rinse pasta if your going to eat it right away but in this case it stops the cooking and keeps it firm. Mix your chopped tomatoes with pesto (we'll make homemade pesto once basil season begins) and set aside to marinate.)
Grease a baking dish big enough to accommodate your selected pasta and dump it in. Mix in most of the cheese, cottage and otherwise, crack some more pepper in there while you're at it. When your white sauce is thickened, pour it over the pasta and cheese and mix everything together and smooth out the surface. Let the pan sit for a minute and then spread the pesto and tomatoes over top and cover with the rest of your cheese. Bake for about 1 hour or until browned and bubbly.
Serve with something green. (see photo by Peter Pawlowski which includes collards topped with caramelized onions)
This coming Sunday's Supper...
Chickpea, Tomato and Kale Stew with Orange and Ginger over giant garlic sourdough croutons with a mixed green salad with My House dressing.
Dinner starts at 6pm at the Brillobox, hope to see you there!
Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili
Greetings friends! For those of you who don't know, I am now cooking vegetarian Sunday Night Suppers at the Brillobox (an incredibly popular bar/performance space practically at the end of my street) so I thought I'd revive this blog for all you out of towners who can't make it each week so you can check in to see what I made via the photo documentation of Peter Pawlowski.
So how did all this come to be? Actually I just proposed the idea to the owner one night after I realized there was no Sunday night cook. He loved the idea and wanted to get started right away so this past weekend was the first dinner! I'm creating the menu, shopping for the food, cooking and serving back in the kitchen. I basically get to pretend I have a restaurant for one day a week which is a truly amazing opportunity! Thanks to everyone who came out and to Eric for having faith in me before you'd even tasted my cooking! Thanks also to my new friend Aaron who signed on to help me with prep work and ended up staying till the bitter end.
I made Roasted Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili over spicy fried (deep fried thanks to Aaron) polenta with a mixed green salad topped with Maple Dijon Vinaigrette, crispy tortilla strips and fresh cilantro (see photo).
I had such a great time, people loved the food and there was only one bowl of chili left at the end of the night! What I think people respond to with my cooking is that it's just good food that happens to be vegetarian not vegetarian food that happens to be good.
This coming Sunday's menu...
Homemade 3 Cheese Macaroni and Cheese topped with pesto and tomatoes with a side of Garlicky Greens. Dinner starts at 6pm and goes until the food runs out. The cost is $10 and it comes with a bottle of beer.
Hope to see you on Sunday!
