'Chicken' seitan and spinach in Indian creamy sauce - Malai palak

This is one of those insanely good Indian recipes that I find irresistable.  Malai means cream, Palak is spinach and this is a loosely adapted recipe from Vegan Richa. In her recipe, she uses soy curls to replace chicken, which are then cooked in a delectable creamy spicy sauce. I’m not even sure if you can buy soy curls in New Zealand and can’t imagine them being commonly available around the world, so it strikes me as a much better idea to use seitan.  Seitan also produces a nice 'meaty' result.

In the original, the soy curls are marinaded and then baked. I think marinades are unseamanlike underway, as well as being wasteful. Certainly, I don’t find it makes much difference to seitan and in fact you get infinitely better results from incorporating the flavours into the seitan in the first place. This is what I’ve done in this recipe. As for baking - I assume many small income voyagers stil lsail without ovens and even those who do, will probabaly avoid using them because of the cost - and the fact that they heat up the cabin.

 

I use ginger paste and garlic paste in my ‛Indian’ cooking. If you prefer to use finely minced ginger and garlic, go ahead.  I'm not sure that this is really a Curry For Cooks, in spite the use of ingredients being pretty authentic: most boats would probably have them on board.  The only exception is the methi and if you don't have it you can leave it out.

Serves 2

Ingredients

For the ‟marinaded chicken”

6 slightly rounded tbsp vital wheat gluten

2 tbsp gram flour

2 tsp nutritional yeast

1/2 tsp mushroom stock powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp onion powder

        1/4 tsp garlic granules

1/2 tsp ground coriander

1/2 tsp ground cumin

1/4 cup water

1 tbsp soya sauce

For the sauce:

1 tsp oil

1 (Indian) bay leaf

1 whole clove

1 medium onion, chopped

1/2 tsp garlic paste

1/2 tsp ginger paste

1 small green chilli, diced

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp ground coriander

1/2 tsp ground cumin

1/8 tsp cayenne OR 1/4 tsp Kashmiri chilli powder

pinch ground cinnamon

1/8 tsp black pepper

*200 ml/7 oz ounce can of full fat coconut milk

2 tbsp vegan yoghurt

1/4 cup water or milk

125 g/4 oz spinach, washed and roughly chopped

1 tsp dried fenugreek leaves, kasuri methi

garam masala

chilli flakes

Method:

• Seitan: In a bowl, mix vital wheat gluten, gram flour, nutritional yeast, mushroom stock powder, salt, onion powder, garlic granules, ground coriander and ground cumin.
• In a small jug, mix the water and soya sauce and add them to the bowl.
• Mix into a soft dough, starting with a knife or spatula and ending with your hand. If the mix seems a little bit dry, add a little more water, a teaspoonful at a time. Use the dough to clean your bowl thoroughly, otherwise the dried seitan will need to be soaked off.
• Put the dough on a board and flatten down. You will be cutting it into bite-sized chunks, so it wants to be a suitable thickness.
• Put the trivet into your pressure cooker, along with 1/2 cup water. Place the seitan on the trivet, and bring up to pressure for 5 minutes. Let the pressure go down naturally.
• When you can take the lid off, take out the seitan and cut it up – or tear it for a more ‛authentic’ appearance.
• If you want to, you can now fry the chunks in some oil so that they are crisp on the outside. On odds, I think I prefer them soft.

For the sauce:

• Heat a pan over medium high heat and add some oil.
• Now add the bay leaf, clove, onion, garlic paste, ginger paste, green chilli salt. Cook stirring occasionally until onion is golden.
• Turn down the heat and add coriander, ground cumin, cayenne or Kashmiri chilli, cinnamon and black pepper
• Throw in the seitan pieces and turn for a few minutes so that they are well mixed in and covered in the spices.
• Then add in the milk, yoghurt, water and spinach and mix in. Reduce heat to medium low, cover and cook for 12-15 mins, checking that it’s not drying out. Add some more water, if necessary.
• Add the kasuri methi, check salt and flavour and carry on cooking until you get a rich creamy sauce.

Garnish with garam masala and chilli pepper flakes if you like, and serve with rice, roti or even good quality bread.

Variations:

• Use two or three leaves of Swiss chard instead of spinach.
• Replace the seitan with half a cup of chickpeas or beans, cooked and drained, putting them in with the spinach
• Add some quartered mushrooms, with the onions, etc.
• If you don’t have yoghurt, use more milk/water. If you have a lot of coconut yoghurt, you can just thin that down to suit. You need around 300 ml liquid. You may need to simmer for more or less time to achieve the consistency you want.

Notes:

• * Coconut milk tends to come in an odd assortment of sizes. Just use a can closest to the size in the recipe. If you’re fortunate to find dried, genuine coconut milk, mix that according to the instructions on the container.

 

You will find many more recipeslike this, here, here and here 

 

 

Lentil lasagne

Lasagne is generally served up sizzling hot from the oven, with a crisp top, and often crunchy bits of lasagne sticking out. I’ve read that some Italians prefer to pop it into the oven for only about a quarter of an hour and to eat it moist and soft. That being so, I think we’ll go for the latter ‘gourmet’ version, which means that instead of using an oven, we can use the pressure cooker. However, be warned that this may not work in a cheap pan because it’s likely to stick. (If your pressure cooker is a bit on the thin side, what you’ll have to do is to put the lasagne into something like a cake tin, that will fit in your pressure cooker. Put half a pint of water in the bottom of the cooker, with the tin on the trivet, loosely covered with greaseproof paper or foil. It can then be cooked at high pressure for 10 minutes.)

I specify ‘no-cook’ lasagne, but in fact I believe that nearly all lasagne sheets can be used without pre-cooking.  If you can find the right pasta, this recipe can be gluten free.

Serves 2

Ingredients

6 pieces ‘no-cook’ lasagne

1/2 cup whole lentils

2 tbsp olive oil

1 onion, chopped

2 garlic cloves, diced

1 red or green pepper, chopped

400 g/14 oz can chopped tomatoes

1/2 tsp sage

1/2 tsp basil

1/2 tsp oregano

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp chilli flakes

salt and pepper

cheese sauce, mixed more thickly, as shown in the Variations on that post

Method:

• Cook the soaked lentils as usual and set aside.
• Heat the olive oil in a saucepan. Add the onion, garlic and pepper and fry until the onion is golden.
• Add the tomatoes and mix in the sage, basil, oregano, cinnamon, chilli flakes, salt and pepper.
• When everything is mixed together and heated through, add the lentils. Cook gently for ten minutes or so to let all the flavours combine. Taste and check the seasoning.
• Pour half the sauce into the bottom of the pressure cooker. Add half the lasagne sheets. Unfortunately, these will not fit very neatly, but you will have to do your best. Now add the rest of the sauce and the remaining lasagne. Cover with the cheese sauce, pouring carefully, to ensure that all the lasagne is covered.
• On a medium heat, bring the pressure cooker up to pressure. Cook for 3 to 5 minutes and reduce pressure at room temperature. Ideally, leave it for a further five minutes so that if the lasagne has caught at all, it will lift easily from the pan. It’s impossible to serve this dish at all elegantly, but if you spoon it carefully from the pan, the layers should remain more or less intact.

Serve with a cooked green vegetable or salad.

Variations:

• Use 4 or 5 fresh tomatoes and 1/4 cup red wine in the sauce.
• Add extra grated cheese or "Parmegan"

Alternative cooking:

• Arrange the lasagne in a shallow oven-proof dish and cook it in a moderate oven for a quarter of an hour or so. I don’t find it needs the 45 minutes that most cookbooks recommend. In this case, you can substitute the cheese and yoghurt sauce for cheese sauce. It’s quicker and easier to make, and probably more nutritious, but due to the yoghurt, it might separate in the pressure cooker.
• Layer the lasagne into a deep frying pan, or wide saucepan. Heat over a low heat, using a flame tamer if necessary, to ensure it doesn’t catch and get burnt. Cover and cook for about 15 minutes, checking every now and then to see if the sauce has cooked, by which time it will be quite firm. In this case you can also use the cheese and yoghurt sauce.

 

 

You will find many more recipes for pasta on the page:  Main-course recipes - pasta based

 

 

Chickpeas with mushrooms and rice

Sharp-eyed observers may notice a family resemblance to one or two other recipes on this blog.  I make no apologies. Mushrooms and chickpeas were made for each other and are complemented superbly by tarragon and green peppercorns. 

 

Mushrooms, a sublime gift from a benign Providence, are becoming more and more easily available to cruising people. Because of this, I include them rather more often than I would have done had I written this blog 15 years ago - if there were blogs, 15 years ago. While canned mushrooms are a sad travesty of the real thing, ‘freeze-dried’ ones are a very acceptable substitute and, where available, are not outrageously expensive. While they don’t need pre-soaking, it does them no harm. If you're cooking the chickpeas from scratch, rather than using a tin, put the dried mushrooms in at the same time. Half a cup of mushrooms would need about the same water. You can of course buy such exotics as porcini or Chinese dried mushrooms, although I find the latter rather too chewy and, particularly the dark ones, slightly overpowering unless diced quite small. On the other hand, those packets of Chinese, dried 'white' mushrooms are wonderfully versatile and have a lovely flavour profile.

Serves 2

 

Ingredients 

1/2 cup chick peas, soaked

3/4 cup rice

2½ cups water

2 tbsp olive oil

6 or 8 fresh mushrooms OR 1/3 cup freeze dried mushrooms

1 onion, chopped

1 clove of garlic, chopped

1 tsp tarragon

2 tsp green peppercorns, crushed

salt

 

Method:

• Put the rice and chick peas in the pressure cooker and cook for 15 minutes. If you are using dried mushrooms, put these in at the same time and add an extra 1/2 cup of water.
• While these are cooking, heat the oil in another saucepan, slice the mushrooms and chop up the onion and garlic. Put them all into the pan and cook over a medium heat, turning frequently to prevent them from burning. Be gentle – you don’t want to break up the mushroom slices.
• Using a pestle and mortar, crush the peppercorns and grind the tarragon in with them. (If you don’t have a pestle, crush the peppercorns in a shallow bowl with the back of a spoon. Be careful, they tend to fly about a bit.) Add these to the vegetables and stir to mix everything together. Lower the heat to a minimum.
• When the chickpeas, etc have finished cooking, reduce pressure gradually and then empty the contents of the pressure cooker into the saucepan. Mix carefully, and leave for a few minutes so that the flavours mingle before serving the food.

Variations: 

• If you’re not fond of ‘spicy’ food, you may find 2 tsp of green peppercorns a bit much. In that case, reduce the amount to 1 tsp.
• If you substitute 1/4 cup wild rice for brown rice, you get a luxurious version, which you can happily serve to any guests.
• If you don't happen to have green peppercorns aboard, use black
• Thyme can be substituted for tarragon: it goes well with mushrooms, but will, of course, impart a completely different flavour to the dish.

 

You will find many more rice recipes here 

Swiss chard with white beans

 

 

It is often difficult to lay hands on the actual beans called for in a recipe, so I'm trying to remember  to use the phrase 'white beans' in the title, while suggesting what would be ideal, in the text.

This recipe is quick to make and when eaten with bread as intended, would make a substantial starter for four, or a good lunch or light dinner for two. If you use canned beans, which speeds the whole process up substantially, it would also make a good snack with something like large crackers or Melba toast, to give to visitors who have lingered until sundowners.  The combination of bread, beans and Swiss chard make for a pretty well-rounded meal nutritionally.

 

I first made this when I had no appetite and little enthusiasm for cooking, but had a large bunch of chard looking at me.  As it soon yellows, it had be to be eaten up!  I slightly altered the recipe to what is shown below, and ate it on the previous day's naan bread (= ½ cup flour), reheated on the toaster, rather than the recommended sourdough.  It was still was surprisingly good; indeed, I ate more of it than I'd anticipated.  Although the original called for cannelini beans, I can only buy them canned and as I prefer to cook my own legumes, I used haricot beans. However, using canned beans would make this meal almost ‘instant’.

 

Although the stems are a little more sturdy, the leaves of chard tend to disappear like spinach, when heated, so you will want at least six large leaves of chard and possibly more.

 

Serves 4 as a substantial starter or two for lunch or a light dinner.

 

Ingredients

 

1/2 cup haricot beans, soaked and cooked in the usual way.

1 large bunch of chard (any type) 

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

5 large cloves of garlic, sliced

1/4 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp sage

1/2 tsp red pepper flakes

1 tsp wine vinegar 

generous grind of pepper

Method

• Cook the beans and set aside.
• Cut off the stems from the chard and chop them into smallish pieces.  Set aside.
• Cut the leaves into strips lengthways and then across into manageable-sized strips - remember you're going to be piling this on bread!
• Heat the olive oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. Add  the chopped garlic and cook for 2 minutes, making sure it doesn't burn.
• Add the chopped chard stems and cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring frequently until they start to soften.  Sprinkle over the salt.
• Add the leaves, toss well and cook until they start to wilt. 
• Season with sage and red pepper flakes.
• Tip in in the cooked, drained beans. Gently mix together and continue to cook for 4-5 minutes, until the beans are hot.
• Add the vinegar.  Mix gently to ensure the flavours are all spread around and cook for an additional 3-5 minutes.  Grind over plenty of black pepper.
• Serve hot over thick slices of sourdough bread, or home-made bread, or even flat bread if that’s all you have. Put it on a big plate as most of the topping will try to fall off! 

It truly tastes much better than you might anticipate from the few ingredients, used.

 

Note:

• I really recommend the vinegar, it adds a je ne sais quoi that you wouldn't get from lemon juice.

Variations:

• If you retain the liquid from the can, or use a little stock to moisten the mix, it would make a more filling meal over polenta, short pasta or mixed in with rice, pilau-style.
• Spinach could be used instead of chard, as could any sort of softer green, such as mustard greens or spring cabbage.
  

Mushroom and barley soup

 

For the past several weeks I have had no appetite to speak of.  This isn't a good thing for a food blogger, but it is a miserable state of affairs for someone who usually wakes up in the morning, anticipating eating a very hearty breakfast and already wondering what to cook for dinner.  Admittedly I have lost quite a bit of weight, but I am one of those rare and lucky people who actually quite likes my body the size and the shape it is.  (At my age, this is a sane and sensible place to be!)  Apart from fruit and yogurt, at the moment the thought of any Indian food, which I usually eat several times a week, appalls me; the idea of pasta makes me feel squeamish and the only things which seem slightly appealing are bread and potatoes, preferably fried.  Sometimes I can face a few florets of broccoli, but an aubergine I bought nearly a month ago - one of my absolute favourite foods - will probably have to be thrown out.  If you knew my views about throwing food out, you would realise how bad I am.

However, a couple of weeks ago, I reckoned I could probably fancy some soup.  To be appealing it had to be thick, not to have too many ingredients, be very lightly flavoured and not too colourful.  I tried a simple lentil soup and that was a success.  I ate a whole bowl of it without any problem, which felt like quite an achievement.  None of my other recipes seemed at all tempting, so I decided to try and make something which would fit the bill, and this is the result.  The barley I buy here in New Zealand is hulled, but not 'pearl and is perfect comfort food.  I actually found the soup really enjoyable and again ate a whole bowl without difficulty.  It's obviously the perfect soup for an 'invalid'!!

Serves 2

Ingredients

1/4 cup gram flour

2 cups water

5 mushrooms, diced

1/2 cup barley 

1 tsp dried onion powder

1/4 tsp ground coriander

1/2 tsp za'atar or 1/4 tsp thyme

1 tsp Annie's mushroom stock powder

salt and pepper 

•  Put the gram flour into your pressure cooker and add about 1/4 cup of water.  Mix very, very thoroughly to remove all the lumps, adding more water as you go.  Gram flour doesn't tend to form lumps while it's heating in the way the wheat and cornflour do, but any lumps remaining in the original mixture are hard to get rid of.
• Now add the mushrooms, barley, dried onion powder ground coriander, za'atar/thyme, salt and pepper.  Add the stock powder, too, if you have any.
• Bring to the boil stirring pretty often to make sure the flour paste doesn't stick to the pan - it will thicken as you go.  The 2 cups of water should be enough for the gram flour and the barley.
• Put on the lid, bring up to pressure and cook for 10 minutes, to thoroughly soften the barley.
• Let the pressure reduce at room temperature, remove the lid and stir the soup.  If it seems too thick, add more water - I wanted a very thick soup.
•  Serve as is, or with bread.

Notes: 

• use diced onion, if you prefer: I couldn't face it!

 

 

Breakfast avocado

Smashed avocado on toast is a very popular breakfast/brunch/snack.  This is really a variation on it that I dreamt up while trying to create an acceptable substitute for scrambled eggs.  There isn't one, in my opinion, although I've achieved a passable result using peanuts, but this avocado recipe is very good in its own right.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I can't tolerate rubbery, dried out scrambled eggs, but as this is how they are generally served, I assume that other people think differently.  To be fair, it is very difficult to keep scramblers in that lovely, soft, curdy state, because they carry on cooking in their own heat, so have to be put on a plate the moment they're ready.  The advantage of this avocado 'substitute' is that the avocado doesn't soften with heating: the drawback is that the avocado has to be at the perfect stage of ripeness for the recipe to work and it won't work if the avocado is too firm, nor if it has started to go stringy.  I am lucky to live somewhere where I can buy avocados very cheaply, so it isn't a disaster if I cut one open and it's the wrong stage of ripeness.  However, if that happens, you can always resort to smashed avocado on toast, after all.

 

 Ingredients

 

1 ripe avocado

olive oil

1/4 tsp garlic granules or 1 finely minced clove of garlic

2 tbsp water/yoghurt/cream

1/8 tsp chilli flakes - optional

salt and pepper

Method:

• Cut the avocado in half, remove the stone and peel it.  If the peel is very stiff, as it so often is with Hass avocado, cut the fruit into quarters; it should then be easy to peel.
  
• Carefully chop the avocado into chunks. 
• Heat a little olive oil in a small saucepan;  move it carefully around in the pan until it starts to get warm.
• Now add the water/yoghurt/cream and garlic.  Turn down the heat and stir the avocado very gently so that some of it gets mixed into, and thickens the liquid.  You don't want to mash it into a purée.  
• Season with salt and pepper and some chilli flakes if you like them.  Gently stir them in.
  
• While the avocado is heating, slice a couple of pieces of bread and toast it.  Put it onto a warmed plate and tip the avocado mix over it.  Serve hot.

Notes:

• The avocado needs to be properly ripe - a firm one won't produce the desired effect.
• Instead of, or as well as, the olive oil, you might like to add chilli oil.  In this case, omit the chilli flakes.
  

Broccoli sauce with walnuts and lemon

Blender alert (see Note)

This creamy broccoli sauce is perfect for pasta, and so easy to make. Whizzed together with walnuts and seasonings, it is both surprisingly satisfying and creamy. The first time I cooked it, my reaction was that it was hard to believe that it was dairy free.  Broccoli is by no means a voyaging vegetable, because it keeps so poorly, but it is readily available in many places. This recipe is a particularly good way of using up broccoli, when has started to turn yellow and it's great if you haven't been able to use up the stalk.

I like to serve it with spaghetti, but I think it would go well with most varieties of pasta.

 

Serves 2 

 

Ingredients

 

1/2 broccoli

1/3 cup walnuts

1 clove garlic

1/2 tsp onion powder

juice of 1/2 lemon

1 tbsp nutritionalyeast

1/4 tsp chilli flakes

1 tbsp olive oil

salt and pepper

 

Instructions:

• Add about half a cup of water to a saucepan and bring it to the boil.
• Cut the broccoli into florets, and cut off the woody end. Peel the thick skin from the stalk and slice the stalk. (You can use a peeler, if you wish, but I find that you can loosen the skin from the base of the stalk and simply tear it off with your knife blade.) Boil the broccoli and stalk for 4-5 minutes until just soft.
• Remove from the pan, reserving the cooking water, and tip it into a blender or food processor.
• Add the walnuts, garlic, onion powder, lemon and olive oil to the blender with the broccoli and whizz them together until they form a smooth paste.
• Season generously with salt and pepper, then add a little of the cooking water, whizz again, and continue adding more water until it reaches a sauce-like consistency.  Check the seasoning, once the sauce is the thickness you want..
• In the meantime, cook your pasta of choice according to the instructions on the package. You can use some of the pasta water in the sauce to thin it to the correct consistency, if necessary.

Serve the sauce piping hot with the pasta, with more black pepper ground over it.

 

Note:

• If you don’t have a blender, you can still make this into a delicious sauce, but of course it won’t be as creamy.

Variations:

• Leave out the salt and/or lemon juice and add some salted lemon at the blender stage.
• Add freshly-grated nutmeg just before serving.
• instead of blending in the walnuts, chop them, to add additional texture to the sauce.
• Instead of using onion powder, chop a small onion and cook it with the broccoli.
• Rather than using this as a pasta sauce, pour it over vegetables or any main course dish.

Fried Indian Rice, Tawa Pulao

 

 

This is my adaptation of Tawa Pulao, an Indian fried rice dish, made with vegetables and seasoned with the Pav Bhaji blend of spices. Pav bhaji is a vegetable (bhaji) street food, served with bread (pav), so the spice blend goes well with vegetable dishes. Tawa pulao is usually served as a light meal, or with dal, but I have added lentils to it, to turn it into a main-course meal. I cook the rice and lentils in the same pan and then add them to the almost-cooked vegetable. The great thing about this recipe is that it’s one of those that you can use for clearing out your fresh food locker. I suggest ‛typical’ vegetables, but I’ve found most things work in it. The ideal, however, is to have a little of several vegetables rather than a lot of one or two. I prepare about a cup and a half of diced vegetables, in addition to the onion. If you want to keep the recipe more like the street-style tawa, but still want a full meal, double up on the potato, increase the other vegetables and leave out the lentils.

To make the recipe accessible for those who don’t really want to deal with half a dozen or more different spices, I am suggesting you make it with a ready-mixed pav bhaji spice blend, the recipe for which you can find here and at the end of this recipe. You might be able to buy it online, if you don’t want to make it yourself. If all else fails, I suppose you could add curry powder, instead, although it will taste quite different.

Serves 2

 

Ingredients

 

1/2 cup basmati rice

1/2 cup small green lentils or mung beans

2 cups water

coconut oil, or oil of your choice

1 small onion, chopped

1 heaped tsp ginger paste

1 heaped tsp garlic paste

1/4 tsp cumin seeds

1/8 tsp fennel seeds

1½ tsp pav bhaji spice blend (here)

1/4 tsp cayenne

1 medium tomato, chopped OR 2 tbsp tomato paste and 1/4 cup water

1/2 medium red and/or green pepper, diced

1 carrot, diced

1 small potato, diced

1/4 cup freeze-dried peas, if available, soaked in 1/4 cup of water

salt to taste

Method

• Add the rice and lentils to the water and cook until they are just softened.
• Heat some oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. Add the onion and cook until it’s translucent.
• Now add the ginger, garlic, cumin, and fennel seeds Mix everything well and cook for a minute.
• Add the pav bhaji and cayenne to the pan, mix again and cook for another minute.
• Stir in the tomatoes, pepper, carrot and potato. Stir to make sure everything is well combined. Lower the heat and cook until the tomatoes are completely softened and form a sauce.
• Now add the peas and their water, and salt. Combine with the other ingredients and lower the heat.
• Stir in the rice and lentils and gently mix everything really well. Increase the heat to medium-high.
• Cook until everything is heated through and softened. If the rice and lentils are not quite soft, lower the heat and cook under a lid until they’re done, adding a drop more water if necessary to stop them burning.

Notes:

• All the recipes that I’ve seen include tomatoes, peas and peppers, and usually potatoes and carrots, but if you don’t have them, the meal will still taste fantastic.
• Like most Indian food, the flavour improves with time. If you cook extra, you can use it to stuff samosa. I like the leftovers for breakfast.

Variations:

• Other vegetables such as finely chopped cabbage, sweet potato, green beans chopped root vegetables can be used instead of, or as well as the vegetables in the recipe.

Aubergine, spinach and tomato casserole

I invented this dish in Trinidad, where one of the shops had a very limited supply of fresh vegetables, but they nearly always included wonderful aubergines and beautiful, local spinach. You had to buy large quantities of both, so I would cook half the spinach in a recipe one day, followed by spinach and aubergine the next day, finishing up with aubergine alone on the third. This is the recipe I invented for day two!

I can’t really give a measurement for spinach. So often you have to buy it as is: by the bunch, already tied up, or by the bag, which frequently doesn’t mention the weight. If it includes the roots, there will be more wastage than, say, baby spinach. Put it this way: a huge amount of spinach disappears into very little. For two people you would probably want as much as would fit in a 3 litre (3 quart) bowl, before it’s washed and chopped. If the spinach still has its roots on, it will want very thorough washing. Sea water is fine for this, as long as it’s clean. Give the spinach a really good shake and wait until the meal is just about cooked before adding any more salt.

Serves 2

Ingredients

1 onion

2 garlic cloves

2 tbsp olive oil

1 aubergine

1 tsp oregano

6 juniper berries

400 g/14 oz can tomatoes

spinach, well washed

grated cheese

• Chop the onion, dice the garlic and fry them in the olive oil for five minutes.
• Meanwhile, chop the aubergine into chunky pieces.
• When the onion is softened, add the aubergine and stir it round until most of it is coated in oil. (Aubergine is like blotting paper, so don’t worry too much about getting it evenly distributed.) Turn down the heat, cover and cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the aubergine is soft.
• Add the oregano; crush or chop the juniper berries and add these. Pour in the tomatoes, roughly chopping them with your spoon. Roughly chop the spinach and add this. Cover and cook for a further 5 minutes.
• Take the lid off and stir everything around so that it’s all mixed together. Smooth the top and sprinkle with the grated cheese. Turn the heat right down, insert a flame tamer and cook gently until the cheese has melted.

Serve with pasta or potatoes.

Notes:

• If you can lay hands on it, vegan cheese is fine for this. It’s also good with my 'Parmegan cheese', even though that doesn’t melt. Either put it on before serving, or add it at the table. Or both! 
• A green such as chard would substitute for the spinach, but kale and cabbage would take too much cooking. If you don’t have soft greens, serve a vegetable on the side.

 

Aubergine, with pesto and pasta

Gluten free with the appropriate pasta

 

This recipe is very freely adapted from one of Jamie Oliver’s. Firstly I tweaked it so that it just made one serving, then I tweaked it again for this blog to serve two, and then I adapted it for a voyaging locker, which probably doesn’t include fresh basil, but might and, I now believe should, include a jar of pesto.

Before going any further, not all jars of pesto are created equal. Some contain a ghastly green puree, while others look like something you’d be quite proud to make yourself and have a delightful texture, just like the Real Thing. When I first came across jars of pesto, I was inclined to believe what it said on the label about having to be kept refrigerated. However, my local supermarket sells small jars at a very reasonable price and as I wanted to try out different recipes for calzone, I thought I’d probably get through the jar quite quickly, anyway. I used most of it and then out of curiosity, left the near-empty jar in my locker. it kept for months.

I was also surprised how good it tasted: the one that looked the best value, “Pam’s” is not an expensive brand, so therefore there wasn’t much chance of it being made with Extra Virgin Olive Oil, pine nuts or Pecorino cheese - all of which would be found in a traditional pesto. In fact the ingredients were canola oil, 35% basil, sunflower seeds, cheese (unspecified), garlic, sugar :-(, salt and natural flavours, so it’s rather surprising that it does taste so good, which implies that the best part of the pesto is the basil. My “Pam’s” Pesto also included three e-numbers in the ingredient list: E202 - potassium sorbate, E270 - lactic acid and E300 - ascorbic acid, and I thought that before suggesting that others put it in their lockers, I should see what these were. I had a look online and even the most hysterical of ‘health-food’ sites seemed pretty chilled about lactic and ascorbic acid. There was a bit more tooth sucking about potassium sorbate, although it is derived from sorbic acid, which occurs naturally in rowan berries. It is very commonly used in all sorts of food production and the worst that anyone had to say about it was that if it is consumed in high doses during pregnancy, it might effect the DNA. Personally, I feel quite happy about my jar of pesto: my only genuine reservation is that it contains cheese, and I prefer to eat a vegan diet. The reason I’m rabbiting on about this is because fresh basil doesn’t keep well at all - even if you have a fridge and for something like this recipe, you wouldn’t want more than a quarter of a cup, which wouldn’t use up a whole bunch. However, by all means make your own pesto if you prefer!

Serves 2

Ingredients

1 large or 2 small aubergine

olive oil

salt

4 tbsp pesto

Pecorino cheese or "Parmegan"

pasta spirals or similar

6 cherry tomatoes

black pepper

• Cut the aubergine in half. Rub it – particularly the flesh, with oil and put it on a well-oiled baking sheet. Roast it at 180° for 35 mins. Or cook it in the pressure cooker until it’s tender, cut it in half and briefly fry it in a little oil so that the flesh is lightly browned.
• While it’s cooking, cut the tomatoes in half. The original recipe says to remove the seeds, but I don’t bother. Then cut them into fine dice.
• When the aubergine is thoroughly soft, let it cool and scoop out the flesh. Chop it all up, put it into a bowl and keep warm.
• Pour the pesto over the aubergine and mix it all up. Add olive oil for taste and texture.
• Now add a little bit of cheese.
• As soon as the pasta is ready, add some of the water to the aubergines so that you have a saucy consistency.
• Mix in the tomatoes.  Grind plenty of black pepper over it.
  
• Tip in the drained pasta and serve.

Pass round extra cheese, and maybe pine nuts, chopped almonds - or sunflower seeds at the table.

Notes:

• If you have fresh basil, some leaves would be a lovely addition when the pasta is served.
• I like aubergine skin, so I generally just dice the aubergine and mix it with the pesto.
• This isn’t particularly filling, so you might want to increase the pasta from what you normally would cook, or serve it with bread, or maybe even add some cooked white beans or chickpeas to the aubergine sauce.

Chana dal with courgettes

 

Edit   I made this the other night and found it rather bland, so decided to alter the recipe.  However, I then thought that this is actually a very good introductory curry for people who don't like their food too 'hot' or are a bit cautious about the whole concept of curry.  Therefore, I've decided to insert the additional ingredients in italics, so that you can decide whether or not to add them yourself.  The only really 'hot' addition would be chilli powder.

 

Chana dal are split white chickpeas and look very similar to yellow split peas. I've seen various ways of cooking this curry, some of which appear to have the chana dal served very firm. This one cooks them to a tender state; because it uses a pressure cooker, it also requires less time and fuel. This is a good curry for someone who wants to start out with ‛authentic’ curries, because there aren’t many spices and the only one that you're unlikely already to have in your lockers is asafoetida; on the other hand, you're not likely to find the recipe in most Western food blogs.

 

Courgettes/zucchini can sometimes present a problem for voyagers. In places where they’re grown, you are likely to be offered them frequently. When they're very fresh, they'll keep for days or even a fortnight without refrigeration, which is just as well, because a generous gift of courgettes will take up a lot of room in any fridge. I have on occasion, been swamped with them and I like this recipe, because you can use up your surplus of courgettes without requiring other vegetables for the recipe. If you are really swamped with them, you can make a courgette curry, without the dal and just use as many courgettes as you think will suffice for a full, main course!  Chana dal goes very well with the courgette: the different textures complement one another. If you're trying to use up your courgettes, you can add more than is recommended in the recipe, but remember that they produce a lot of moisture, so use the minimum with your dal when you cook it (ie 2:1 water to dal by volume). The end result is an attractively colourful dal, with the green courgette and the red tomatoes a pretty contrast to the yellow dal.  However, if you don’t want to use fresh tomatoes, or part of a tin, you can add purée to get the flavour.

Serves 2

 

Ingredients

 

1/2 cup chana dal

1 cup water

1/8 tsp ground turmeric

1 medium courgette, cut into half moons

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp Kashmiri chilli powder or 1/8 tsp cayenne

1 tbsp oil/ghee/coconut oil

1/4 tsp cumin seeds

1/4 tsp mustard seeds

pinch asafoetida (omit if GF)

1/2 tsp garlic paste

1/2 tsp ginger paste

1 green chilli, minced

1 small onion, finely chopped

1 medium tomato, chopped (or I whole canned)

1 tsp ground coriander

1/2 tsp dried fenugreek leaves

Method:

• Put the chana dal in the pressure cooker, together with the water and turmeric, bring up to pressure and cook for 7 minutes. Reduce pressure naturally.
• Once you can take the lid off, add the courgette and salt. If the dal is very dry, add a couple of tablespoons of water.
  
• Cover the cooker and put it over a low flame and gently simmer the dal and courgette until the latter starts to soften, at which stage you can remove the lid, because by then the courgettes will have exuded their juices. Now add the chilli powder. Keep an eye on it so that it doesn’t overcook – you still want a bit of texture in it. Add more water, if you think it needs it, but usually the courgettes let out a lot of moisture.  (If you want the courgette to be a bit softer, just replace the lid and bring the cooker back up to pressure.  Immediately remove it from the heat and let it lose pressure naturally.)
  
• Make the tempering. Put a small frying pan over a medium heat and add a glug of oil or a scoop of ghee or coconut oil.
  
• When the oil is hot, add the cumin and mustard seeds and let them sizzle for a few seconds. (If you’re not sure the oil is sufficiently hot, just put a few in the pan first.)
• Now add the asafoetida and the onion - don’t let the asafoetida burn.
• Cook for about a minute and then add the ginger, garlic and green chilli. Cook until the onion becomes translucent.
• Now add the chopped tomato and coriander and cook for a further couple of minutes.
• By now the courgette should have softened. Check the texture, taste to see there is sufficient salt and then pour in the tempering. Add the dried fenugreek leaves.
  
• Carefully, mix everything, ensuring you neither mash the chana nor break up the courgette,  and simmer for a further 5 minutes.

Traditionally, this curry is served with roti or naan, but you can serve it with rice if you’d rather.

Notes:

• If you don't have chana dal, then yellow split peas will work fine. They may cook a little more quickly, so it’s probably worth letting the pressure off after 5 minutes and checking them.
• Use 1 clove garlic, finely chopped instead of the paste
• Use 1/2 tsp ginger, grated instead of paste.
• Use a few cherry tomatoes, halved, instead of the chopped tomato, or, as suggested in the intro, 1 tbsp tomato purée.
  

Mushrooms and Brussels sprouts with creamy hemp sauce

Blender Alert

I love Brussels sprouts and it always seems a bit of a shame to use them as an addition on the side rather than star of the show. They go very well with mushrooms and mixed with this thick hemp sauce, shine in a really good combination to go with pasta.

Hemp seeds, aka hemp hearts

Hemp seeds, also known as hemp hearts, are one of the latest wonder foods, but I particularly like them for making vegan milk and a cream for cooking, because there’s no need to soak them first. Hemp is also a very low-impact crop to grow, requiring little water and no fertiliser; it doesn’t have to be grown in the tropics and processing the seeds doesn’t mean (generally) women are using caustic chemicals, often with inadequate protection, so we should certainly use it in preference to cashew nuts. To serve, linguine, or fettuccine are my choice.

Unfortunately, you really do need a blender or this sauce, although, of course, you could take the concept and use some other form of cream.

Serves 2

Ingredients

olive oil

2 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 medium onion, diced

200 ml water

1/2 cup hemp seeds

1/2 tsp mushroom stock powder

2 tbsp nutritional yeast

1/4 tsp salt

generous grind black pepper

2 cups Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved

6 or 8 button mushrooms, thickly sliced

fettucine or linguine – about 25mm/1” dia. stacked on end

Parmesan cheese to serve

Method

• Heat some olive oil in a saucepan over a medium heat. Add the garlic and onion and cook for a couple of minutes, until the onions become translucent. Remove from heat.
• Now add the cooked onion and garlic to a blender, together with the water, hemp hearts, stock powder (if using), nutritional yeast, salt and pepper. Blend for a minute or so to make a smooth and creamy sauce. Taste and adjust seasonings.
• Put some more oil in the saucepan, and add the Brussels sprouts and cook for a few minutes, until they start to brown on the edges.
• Meanwhile, add water to another saucepan and bring to the boil for the pasta. When it’s boiling, cook the pasta as usual.
• Now add the mushrooms to the sprouts and fry for a few more minutes, stirring frequently, until they are browned. A pinch of salt might help here.
• Lower the heat and add the prepared sauce to the vegetables and stir to combine. Gently cook the sauce until it’s thick. When the pasta is cooked, add it to the pan, saving the pasta water, into a jug. Use some of this water to rinse out the blender and add to the pan.
• Cook the sauce a little longer: if it seems too thick, add more of the pasta water.

Serve immediately with extra hemp seeds and/or Parmesan or vegan "Parmesan" cheese.

Notes:

• The pasta sauce will thicken quickly once heated. Keep a close eye on it. If it is too thick, add extra pasta water to loosen it up.

Variations:

• You could use other vegetables, such as asparagus, green beans, mange-tout peas, etc instead of the Brussels sprouts. But the latter are particularly good!

• One alternative I would recommend is broccoli, but cut it into very small florets, the same size as half a sprout, otherwise the sauce won’t coat everything evenly.
• Substitute dried mushrooms for fresh, if these are unavailable.

 

Pasta with chickpeas and vegetables in tahini sauce

I have just suggested 'Pasta' for his recipe, because it will really go with just about any short pasta.  Indeed, if you make more sauce, it would also successfully coat a longer type of pasta.  While I've suggested specific vegetables, this is essentially a meal that can be made using ingredients you’d have in your lockers, with whatever vegetables you have to hand. There is, however, one proviso to this: I suggest sprinkling black sesame seeds over the meal when it’s served: white sesame seeds can be used as a substitute, but the black ones look and taste great!

 

Serves 2

 

Ingredients

1/2 cup of chickpeas, soaked and cooked

olive oil

1 onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

about 4 button mushrooms, sliced

1/2 red pepper, chopped

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp chilli flakes, or to taste

about 6 florets from a head of broccoli

4 handfuls of pasta, such as fusilli

2 tbsp tahini

reserved water from the pasta

salt and pepper

1 tbsp black sesame seeds

 

Method:

• Cook the chickpeas in the usual way and set aside.
• Add olive oil to a large saucepan over a moderately high heat.
• Add the onions and garlic and cook for a few minutes until the onions are softening, stirring frequently to ensure nothing burns.
• Add the mushroom and red pepper and sprinkle with salt, stir into the onions and garlic and cook for a few minutes until there is some colour on both the onions and red peppers, then lower the heat. Add in the chilli flakes, stir well and cover. Leave over a low heat while you cook the pasta.
• Bring salted water to boil in a saucepan and throw in the pasta. Stir well to ensure that it doesn’t stick together. Bring back to the boil, cover and lower the heat so that it doesn’t boil over. Set the timer for 5 minutes
• When the timer rings, add the broccoli florets and cook until both pasta and broccoli are just not soft. If you like crunchy broccoli, wait a bit longer before adding it.
• While this is cooking, put the tahini into a small, together with generous amounts of salt and pepper. When the pasta and broccoli are done, remove them from the water, using a slotted spoon, or drain the water into a jug, and add them to the vegetables.
• Add a tablespoonful or so of pasta water to the tahini and mix to a smooth consistency. Tahini varies tremendously in how thick it is, but you want to end up with a sauce that pours easily and will coat the pasta and vegetables. Mix with a butter knife or mini whisk until it becomes a creamy colour, then add to the pan.
• Stir gently until everything is mixed and serve.

Garnish with a generous amount of black sesame seeds.

 

Note:

• If you have no black sesame seeds, substitute with white.
• I'm not sure the pasta water has the same effect when used with gluten-free pasta, but it can't do any harm!
  

Variations: 

• Use white beans instead of chickpeas.
• Replace the broccoli with cauliflower florets.
• For a voyaging variation, use chopped cabbage.
• Add green beans or asparagus with or instead of some of the other vegetables.
• Replace the red pepper with carrot.
• Add a couple of tbsp of freeze-dried peas with or instead of some of the vegetables.
• Use bulgur wheatinstead of pasta. In this case you will have to cook the broccoli separately.
• Add chopped fresh herbs, if you have some.