Spicy Red Lentil Cream Soup--To Warm Up

Sometimes when the day is busy and I have no time for a lot of cooking, this simple and rich soup makes a whole dinner. It is lovely, especially on a cold and windy day as today. I always keep all kinds of lentils in my pantry and in no time I can turn them into an easy and healthy dinner that my whole family will enjoy.

Red lentils are easy to cook since, unlike some other beans, they do not require to be soaked before cooking but cook fast straight from the box. Lentils are rich in protein and for that they are much appreciated by vegetarians. Moreover, they are one of the best vegetable sources of iron, B vitamins, zinc, magnesium, and folate. So do not feel guilty for being lazy-- this lentil soup is not only simple and easy, but also very healthy. I hope this argument will convince you to try this recipe.

I like to serve this soup with Middle eastern breads and extra crème fraîche on top, particularly if I serve it as a one-dish dinner.
 

Spicy Red Lentil Cream Soup

Ingredients:
(Serves six)

2 cups red lentil (about 1 lb),
500 ml carrot juice (I buy organic from Costco),
500 ml vegetable broth,
2 shallots chopped,
2 garlic cloves, minced,
1/2 cup crème fraîche (the Latin American crema fresca would be an excellent substitute for it) or any other cream you like, plus extra to decorate,
1 tsp ground cumin,
1 tsp mild curry powder,
1/ cup chopped fresh coriander leaves,
3 tbsp olive oil, 1 tsp of salt, fresh, coarsely ground black pepper.

Preparation:

1. Heat the oil in a large heavy duty pot. Add chopped onion and garlic and fry until soft.
2. Wash and drain red lentils. Add them to the pot. Coat with onion and garlic and fry for about a minute.

3. Pour in the carrot juice and broth and let the lentils cook for about 25 minutes, until they become soft. Cooked lentil will turn into a purée almost by themselves but if you like a smoother texture, you can use a hand blender to purée it more.

4. In a small bowl mix together crème fraîche, salt, pepper, ground cumin, and curry. Add this spiced cream to the lentil and mix everything together. Bring to boil and let it simmer for about 5 minutes. Turn off the heat and let all the flavors infuse for about 5 minutes.
5. Pour the soup into serving bowls. Decorate with a dollop of crème fraîche and chopped, fresh coriander leaves.

Arugula and Lentil Salad--from London's Borough

I happened to be in London during the week of the royal wedding. "Happened" is the right word, as my visit was almost incidental. I was accompanying my mom on her trip back to Poland, and spent a few days in London on my homebound leg.

I was very lucky with the weather--70 F all the time and clear skies. I did wardrobe shopping at my favorite COS, watched Brits getting excited by the approaching royal wedding, and discovered a few places I had no chance to see before. One of them I heard a lot about was Borough. It is well known among foodies mostly because of its food market.

I got there on a sunny morning when vendors just started to open their stands. They were in a rush to take their produce from the boxes. I must say their fruits and vegetables were amazingly fresh looking. The merchants were slightly annoyed with tourists like me, obsessively taking pictures of what they had to sell rather than buying it. And what this market--not a big place at all--can offer is pretty impressive. You can prepare an excellent gourmet dinner party from the stuff you can get there, starting with sophisticated salads, through fantastic fish and meats, very fresh vegetables, and finishing with the best Swiss cheese and French wines.

This place must be impressive by any standards; many Italian and Spanish tourists were admiring the freshness and the variety of products sold and, like me, were taking pictures, perhaps for their own food blogs .

Borough market is quite a trip if you were to go there just to do your regular food shopping. And even an attractive neighbourhood may not be enough of an excuse to go there and shop for food, as I am not sure that walking through Miro exhibition at Tate Modern with a pound of fresh halibut or digging into a Shakespeare bookstore with an aromatic Comté would be an appealing idea. So I wonder who the everyday clients of the market are.

Around noon, when I was about to leave the market I notice a very long line at one of the stands. All that was sold there was one type of salad, that the lady selling it was assembling for the patiently waiting clients. It was lunch time so partly out of curiosity and partly out of a genuine appetite I also bought one such box, sat at the river bank, and ate its content. It was simple but tasty.

Arugula and Lentil Salad

Ingredients:
4 cups of arugula,
2 cups of lentils (cooked or from a can),
2 carrots, shredded,
6 oz mozzarella,
1 cup(about 6-8 oz) grape tomatoes,
a few slices of prosciutto,
3 tbsp olive oil,
juice from half lemon,
2 garlic cloves,minced
salt and pepper.

Preparation:
1. Arrange arugula on a plate in a nest leaving an hole in the middle.
2. Mix carrot, garlic, and lentils and put them inside the arugula nest.
3. Throw on top tomatoes and mozzarella cut into small cubes.
4. Mix olive oil with lemon juice, salt and pepper, and drizzle over the salad.
5. Put on top prosciutto cut into slices .

Serve alone or with fresh bread.

And some pictures from Borough:

Red Lentil Patties--A Vegetarian Burger Option

Last week, when I was cleaning my overstuffed kitchen cabinets, I found several bags of different lentils. I like to have them handy whenever I feel like cooking my family's favorite Afghan lentil dish, but even though I think my stock was too big. I decided to use some of them and to try finally a vegetarian recipe I had in mind for a long time.

This is another recipe from Metropolitan Home, which I thought could become a success also in my home and I thought I could use it on my younger son, who refuses to eat meat burgers and most other meats, to give him all the necessary proteins.

Many similar dishes come from the Indian cuisine, which is largely vegetarian, and often incorporates lentils, for their remarkable nutritious values. In Poland we use a similar technique to make potato patties, as a meat alternative. Last Saturday, while exchanging recipes with my Afghan friend, I learned that also in their cuisine there is a fairly similar dish, a sort of kebab, which can be made from both lentils and potatoes,and to which beef can be added as an option. We have already scheduled our cooking session for one of the forthcoming weekends, when I will try to learn some of the Afghan cuisine secrets.

But before that, today we are cooking lentil patties. I made some changes in the original recipe, most of all cutting on the amount of carrot, which I was afraid would make them taste too sweet. The dish was suggested to be served with curried mayonnaise or chutney. I found both sauces too rich and too bland. I tried my burgers with wasabi mayonnaise, that gave a nice hot contrast to their delicate taste, but most of all I enjoyed them with a thick Greek yogurt sauce, which is naturally sour, and I spiced it with garlic and chopped fresh coriander. And of course a bowl of a fresh cucumber or green salad on the side to lighten up a little bit the burgers, which because of lentil and cashews I found extremely fulfilling.

Lentil Burgers
(Makes 10 burgers)

Ingredients:
1 cup red lentil,
1 cup roasted cashew nuts,
1 cup diced carrot,
1 large onion chopped (about a cup),
1 large egg,
1 cup breadcrumbs,
3 garlic cloves, minced,
3 tsp mild curry powder,
2 tbsp olive oil, plus some extra for frying burgers,
1/2 tsp salt,
pepper to taste.

Preparation:
1. Put lentils and carrots in a medium pot, cover with water(about 1 and 1/2 cup), add salt, and bring to boil. Reduce the heat and cook until all the water evaporates and lentils become soft. This should take about 12-15 minutes. If there is some water left just drain the excess.
2. Heat the oil in a skillet, add onion, and fry until soft. Add curry and garlic and stir fry for about 30 seconds. Remove from the heat and let it cool.
3. Chop cashews in a food processor, add lentils with carrots, onions, and an egg. Pulse until the mixture is smooth but still has some texture. Transfer to a bowl and add breadcrumbs, salt, and pepper, and blend well all the ingredients.
4. Divide the mixture into 10 equal portions, and with hands dusted with flower form patties.

5. Cook burgers in a skillet on hot vegetable oil for about 2-3 minutes per side. Serve hot.

For yogurt sauce:
1 cup of Greek yogurt,
1/3 cup chopped fresh coriander leaves,
1 minced garlic clove,
salt and pepper.
Mix all the ingredients and serve over the burgers.

Lentil and Garlic Salad--from Lunch to Grill Party

I am not a big fan of social marathons. I like going out, seeing people, invite and be invited, but I can easily feel overwhelmed doing that too many times in a row. Funny enough, it often happens that way, as people get excited and socially active around the same occasions and holidays. That is what happens now, when people have returned from vacation to DC and want to meet friends after a couple months of the summer break, but cannot meet them all at the same time. As a result, I have on my schedule a picnic on Friday, grill on Saturday, and people coming over on Monday.

For today's grill I have offered to make a salad to accompany the delicious meats that the hosts will grill for us. Again a very easy one. I ate it first many years ago in Switzerland, and I make it quite often. It is very helpful to serve it at grill events, when we mostly serve meats, but also happen to have vegetarians among guests. Lentil is a plant that is third richest in protein, and also one of the best sources of iron, and therefore it can be a nutritious meal in itself especially when served with other vegetables. This lentil salad can also be served as a great lunch dish, just with fresh bread, and with or without cold cuts.

Lentil and Garlic Salad
(Six to eight servings)

Ingredients:
3 cups of cooked lentil (canned lentil would be just fine--you would need two 15.5 oz cans),
2 pint boxes or 1 lb of cherry tomatoes,
1 bunch of dill--you will need about 1/2 cup of chopped dill,
2 cloves of garlic,
1/2 lb of Ricotta Salata cheese,
1 lemon,
3 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil,
Pepper to taste.

Preparation:
1. If you use canned lentil, drain it, wash in cold water, drain again and place in a large bowl.
2. Cut tomatoes in half if they are of the larger variety, or leave them whole if they are very small, and add to the lentil.
3. Chop dill and add to the bowl.
4. Cut the cheese into very small cubes, mix it with all the ingredients.
5. Squeeze garlic into the salad.
6. Add pepper (no salt as Ricotta Salata is very salty already).
7. Add oil and freshly squeezed lemon juice, mix carefully and serve.

It is important to have all the ingredients cut into small pieces, as the salad prepared this way tastes better. I tried recently to make this salad in Poland--where Ricotta Salata is not widely available--with Feta cheese but this did not work because Feta is much more wet and soft than Ricotta Salata.

Afghan Lentils--on the Exotic Side

One of the past weekends, my beautiful Afghan friend invited me for dinner. Our kids have a lot of fun playing together and I liked her cooking very much. My friend has lived outside her country since early childhood but she still favors her national cuisine over any other she tried. Her daily dinners are always Afghan and are always served with rice. She is open to new recipes, but most often ends up preparing something Afghan. Jokingly, she calls it "boring", but she finds it very comforting. The traditional food she cooks is in a contrast to her very modern look and style, which underscores her oriental beauty.

I do not think Afghan food is boring at all. As a matter of fact, I find it more exotic than for example Indian food, which I am more familiar with and also like a lot. Although spicy and sometimes heavy in oil, it is not as hot and rich as Indian food.

That day, a perfectly sunny morning turned into a rainy afternoon. Our plans had to change and instead of a grill on the deck we had our dinner indoors. My friend also had to change the menu at the last minute, which was OK by me. I was happy she decided to prepare Afghan food instead of ordinary hamburgers and hot dogs that she meant to prepare to please the kids.

The new menu--chicken, lentil, rice, bread, and cucumber salad made everybody happy. I was very excited especially about lentil, which is rich in protein and is an excellent substitute for meat, which my younger son refuses to eat.

We left late at night, after a very relaxing evening, not only very full, but also taking home delicious leftovers and a new recipe for lentil Afghan style.

Afghan Lentils

Ingredients:
1 cup yellow mung lentil,
1 onion,
2 cloves garlic,
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 cup tomato sauce,
1 large fresh tomato,
1 and 1/2 - 2 cups of water,
2 tsp ground coriander,
1/2 tsp turmeric,
1/4 tsp cumin (optional, Indian influence, but brings the taste out and helps to digest),
olive oil to fry in,
salt and pepper to taste.

For garnish:
a piece of ginger, about 1 inch long,
a few chili peppers,
fresh chopped coriander,
3 gloves of garlic and 1 tbsp of oil.

Preparation:
1. Wash lentil and dry it on the colander.
2. Heat an oil in a pot, add chopped garlic,ginger and onion.Fry until onion is gold.
3. Add to the pan tomato sauce and tomatoe, and cook for couple of minute until all the ingredients are combine.
4. Put in spices--coriander, turmeric, chili pepper, and cumin (not used in the purely Afghan version).
5. Throw lentils into a tomato mixture, stir and add 2 and 1/2 cups of water (add another half a cup if lentils are still hard and there is not enough water for them to cook properly).
6. Cook for about 30 minutes, until lentils become soft.
7. Serve garnished with fried garlic, fresh coriander, ginger, and fried garlic.

Garnish:
1. Crush 3 cloves of garlic and fry them in oil until gold. Put them on top of the lentils.
2. Cut ginger in slices, chop coriander roughly. Add chili peppers and serve on a separate dish for anyone to spice up according to taste.

Useful tips:
Serve with rice or Afghan bread, any Middle Eastern, or Indian Naan.
Accompany with yogurt cucumbers salad.