Red Chillies Butter Beans and Chickpeas

I took the recipe from 101 Cookbooks and revamped it to its entirety, almost, due to resources restriction. First off, adobo sauce from canned chipotle pepper. Never see fresh or canned chipotle pepper for sale here in Bangkok. I once read somewhere that I could substitute adobo sauce with cayenne pepper, and had been doing it a few times. Now I'm curious about this sauce. I found a homemade recipe here. The only dried chillie they sell here is either Thai chillie or red chillie. I have both but I have no idea if they are different or same. Not knowing which to use best in place of anaheim, I decided to give each type an equal chance.

Homemade Adobo Sauce

• 4 dried red chilies
• 4 dried Thai chilies
• 2 garlic gloves
• 1 TB flour
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• lime juice
  
• sea salt to taste

Roast chilies in hot pan fragrant and not burnt.

Pour in enough hot water to cover and soak for 30 minutes.

Puree chilies with soaking water. Add the rest of the ingredients and puree to a paste.

Heat a spoon of pure sesame oil. Cook paste for a few minutes until thickened. Taste and season with salt and lime juice.

The recipe mentions use of any big white beans. I saw dried butter beans in the store and despite not having heard of it before, they looked familiar enough that I picked them over haricot beans. It took 0.17 seconds for Google to come out with 670,000 search results, faster than the time I took to click on the link that sounded like the answer I was looking for. Apparently butter beans are large, flat and white lima beans. Mystery solved.

Adrian and I also have some reservation about canned tomatoes. First of all, I didn't know why anyone would buy canned whole peeled tomatoes and crushed tomatoes if it's tomatoes you need. Convenient, perhaps? Having returned from our trip in The State and France, I came to accept what my friend Dia once told me: there's no good tomatoes in Thailand. Also Sandra who once defended her love for canned tomatoes because of the consistency in quality. Like strawberry and avocado, tomatoes just don't taste as good here as they do in the West.

Summer display of tomatoes of various shapes and colors at Seattle's Sunday Farmer's Market on Broadway.

Having said that I'm still concerned about the chemical leach that claimed to happen with canned tomatoes due to acidity of the produce. So what to do? For now, I'll make myself contented making crushed or whole peeled tomatoes with local tomatoes, or, I can pay double the price for French tomatoes. NOT. So how do you make crushed tomatoes?

Throw them into hot boiling water and remove to cool running water (or iced water) once the skins start to break. Peel the skin (or not) and crush them however you like. Done.

I somehow managed to make the adobo sauce just right (newbie's luck!), and used just enough of the paste for the right amount of spiciness. The taste went well with the slightest hint of saltiness of feta, and the toasted breadcrumbs were best to have more than less!

Red Chillies Butter Beans and Chickpeas

• Dried butter beans and chickpeas, soaked overnight, cooked according to instruction.
  
• 1 big pinch of red pepper flakes
• 1 generous pinch of sea salt
  
• 1 clove garlic, chopped
• Two medium-size home-crushed tomatoes
  
• 1/2 tablespoon fresh basil leaves and rosemary leaves, chopped
• 1/2 - 1 tablespoon homemade adobo sauce
• 2/3 cup kale, washed, de-stemmed, and very finely chopped
• 1/2 cup feta cheese, crumbled
  
• 4 slices of whole grain French bread (process into crumbs and toast in a skillet with melted butter, or buy ready made bread crumbs)
  
• Green Pesto (Instead of cilantro pesto as suggested in 101 Cookbooks, I used every wilting-greens in the fridge: cilantro, basil and parsley, and blend them with garlic, parmesan and extra-virgin olive oil.)

1. Preheat oven at 200C.
   
2. Gently saute red pepper flakes, garlic and salt over medium heat until just fragrant. Do not brown the garlic.
3. Immediately add crushed tomatoes and herbs. Stir and cook for a few minutes.
   
4. Remove from heat and add adobo sauce. Taste and adjust with salt or more adobo sauce to your own liking.
5. Toss beans, kale and sauce together. Transfer to a baking pan. Sprinkle with feta cheese. Bake for 30 minutes or until cheese brown and beans are crusty. Remove from oven and let cool for 10 minutes.
6. Top beans with toasted breadcrumbs. Drizzle with green pesto just before serving.
   

Maple Grilled Tempeh and Cheddar Corn Polenta

A student-cum-friend of ours, Aaron Goodman, offered us a free cooking lesson with Bangkok Marriot Resort and Spa. The highlight of the event was it was done on the resort boat. Also, this is Aaron's video project with Associated Press, which means you will see Adrian and I dressed in Marriot's aprons in some TV news report very soon! It's 6 and a half minutes of "weight-loss cooking" on the boat aired in more than 20 countries! We are going to be household famous! Woo hoo~

Before we went on the boat, the hotel PR manager and chef took us for a detour at the local market near Saphan Taksin.

Our first stop was at a store where they make fresh coconut milk with machine as pictured. The chef said this is much better than those sold at the supermarket. I bet. On the right is white dessicated coconut, used for dessert. There is also dessicated coconut made with coconut skin, which is more commonly used for curry.


The same store also sells a variety of chili paste made from shrimp, anchovies, etc. You can pick them based on your preferred degree of spiciness.

This lady sells fresh handmade spring-roll sheets. Her skill and ease was fascinating to watch.


Here you see Aaron shooting the man at shrimp shop and a family of beggars patronizing the wet market.


Back on the boat: our chefs showed and cooked for us 5 Thai dishes made the "healthy" way: Pomela Salad with Tamarind Sauce instead of fish sauce; Sour Fish Soup made with vegetable stock instead of chicken stock, and the taste was brought out using tomatoes and pineapples; Banana Buds Salad with shredded Pork; Grilled skinless Salmon served with Thai Chili paste; and Baked Eggplant with Grilled Chicken Breast. Good thing no one made us eat the meats.

We hardly did anything but watched and enjoyed the view as the boat cruise along Chao Praya river. The only thing required of us was to sample the foods and shared our insight into healthy Thai cooking through TV interview. I hope we said the right thing. It was quite an experience for us on a weekday morning for an otherwise 2800THB experience. We live a blessed life :)

Now it takes us back to what I cooked for dinner. After the cooking cruise, we headed straight to the Tops Market at Wong Wian Yai for a quick grocery shopping. I didn't have a shopping list as I usually do. Therefore I picked a few "safe" ingredients that I could play with given what's available back home: I was thinking of polenta and tempeh (again). Having what I wanted as main in mind, I chose asparagus and red bell pepper as side. It really doesn't take much to make a good meal.

Having had tempeh for three meals in two days, I still crave it. Especially with the maple marinate. Adrian was perplexed by the intricate taste: he liked the sweetness that came with a lingering fatty after taste. He asked how much would a plate of this cost. Hmmm... it probably won't go any higher than 100THB (I was thinking somewhere between 50 - 60THB but then I never keep track of food prices). How much would restaurant charge? I'll probably charge 400THB with a nicer looking plate and cutlery, with a napkin, too. Although it is quite laborious to make, most of the steps can be prepared in advance, and in excess for future use. Once prepared, they are ready to go in a jiffy.

Ingredients:

(serve 2)
Cheddar Corn Polenta

This was made based on this and this recipe. Instead of serving the chili-roasted mushroom on the side, I decided to mix them into the polenta to broil. I also added some left over maple syrup-roasted cherry tomatoes from Open-Faced Polenta Tempeh Sandwich. The key in keeping the polenta in shape is "patient". You want it to cool to firm after broiling, before cutting into serving size.
Sauce and Dressing

I had a small bunch of rocket leaves and a handful of parsley that were calling out for use before they wilted for good. I chopped them up with a deseeded orange chili pepper, garlic and pine nuts, as I usually do with pesto except there wasn't Parmesan in it - a small pinch of sea salt adjusted the taste just fine. This pesto went well with the left over Garlic Mayo Spread from yesterday.

Maple-Grilled Tempeh

• Tempeh, cut into strips
• 3 Tablespoons Chili oil (or olive oil)
• 1 glove garlic, smashed and chopped
  
• 3 soy sauce
• 1 Teaspoon Brown rice vinegar (or balsamic vinegar/ rice wine vinegar)
• 3 Tablespoons organic maple syrup
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1. Combine everything, except tempeh, together in a small bowl. Place tempeh to a baking dish in one even layer. Pour maple marinate over to cover top and bottom of tempeh. Let it sit in refrigerator for at least two hours, or up to two days.
2. Coat and heat a frying pan with just enough butter. Fry tempeh on both sides until browned.
3. Pour in remaining marinate and let it simmer over low heat. Remove when marinate has thickened.

Pesto Cheesecake

I chopped up a bunch of basil and parsley with pecan nuts the other night to make pesto - what a delicious good way to preserving vegetables before they wilt. Cover it with enough olive oil and it just basically sit, fresh as it is, in the corner of refrigerator for a long enough time till I need it again. Usually I would leave out salt and lemon juice until just before using the pesto.

I scaled the recipe down to a 4" x 7" casserole dish, good enough for two persons. You may triple the volume and bake it in a 8" springform pan as you would with ordinary cheesecake. The recipe I found uses breadcrumbs as crust. I used the wheat biscuits left from whatever dessert I last made with. The crust was a tad to the sweet side, which turned out to be an interesting compliment to the savory cream cheese pesto layer. I also threw in some sun dried tomatoes because I was thinking they had been sitting in the fridge for a wee bit too long.

Adrian enjoyed this very much. Initially he was going to save a piece for next day. Then he kept picking at the crumbs. Eventually he devoured what's left of the picking with a cup of coffee.

I guess this dish is meant to be some Italian appetizer to serve over garlic bread or cracker. But why limit my imagination? I just happened to fry up some sunny-side up to supplement the nutritive profile of our Sunday breakfast. OH! Not the forget a bed of fresh from the farm organic lettuces, courtesy of my lovely friend, Pinnada :)

Ingredients:

• 4 pieces wheat biscuits, crushed
• 1 Tablespoon Parmesan cheese, grated
• 1 Tablespoon butter, room temperature
• 4oz cream cheese, soften
• 1/3 homemade ricotta cheese
• pinch of salt and cayenne pepper
• sun dried tomatoes, chopped
  
• 1/3 cup homemade pesto
• Pecan nuts

1. Preheat oven at 160C. Lightly grease a 4"x7" casserole dish.
2. Roll together biscuits, Parmesan and butter. Press to the bottom of prepared dish. Bake in the oven for 10 minutes, until the crust is lightly browned.
3. Blend together cream cheese and ricotta until smooth and fluffy. Fold in sun dried tomatoes and pesto. Season with salt and cayenne pepper to taste.
   
4. Pour evenly over biscuit crust. Sprinkle with pecan nuts. Bake for 45 - 60 minutes - center should move just slightly when shaken.
5. Cover and refrigerate overnight. Loosen the edges with knife and transfer to individual serving plates.
   

Ricotta and Sun-dried Tomatoes Crepe

For three days in a row I was making the same omelet for breakfast: sun-dried tomatoes, rocket leaves and Gruyere cheese. Although Adrian was very happy with the omelet, and claimed to never get bored, I did. So I decided to make something different with the same ingredients - savory crepe.

I prepared the pesto and filling a night before. I'm getting more comfortable with my cooking instinct, i.e. less precise measurement.

Ingredients:
(one big crepe)

Rocket Pesto:

• Rocket leaves
• Garlic cloves
• Parmesan cheese, grated
• Extra virgin olive oil

Start with chopping one clove of garlic. Throw in a big handful of rocket leaves and some grated parmesan cheese to chop. Continue until you get the amount you need. Press it into cake and cover with extra-virgin olive oil. Store in refrigerator.

For the filling:

• Homemade Ricotta cheese
• Water
  
• 5 pieces Sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
• Parmesan cheese, grated

I started thinning about 1/2 cup ricotta cheese with 2 tablespoons of water. Stir in sun-dried tomatoes and parmesan cheese to mix. Taste and adjust with sea salt if necessary. Add more ricotta to increase volume.

For the crepe:

• 2 tablespoons flour
• 1 tablespoon milk
• 4 eggs, slightly beaten
  
• pinch of salt

Option: Gruyere cheese

Mix flour and milk thoroughly. Fold in beaten eggs and salt. Melt enough butter cover a 9" skillet. Pour the batter over and swirl the pan to cover the bottom. Fry until the bottom is nicely browned and top sets. Transfer to serving plate.
Spread top with ricotta filling and slices of Gruyere cheese. Fold crepe into half. Serve with ground black pepper and pesto sauce.

Spicy Polenta Roasted Vegetable Pesto Terrine

Ingredients:
(makes 2 servings)

• 1/2 cup organic polenta
• 1 cup water
• 1/2 cup whole milk
• pinch of sea salt
• 1/2 cup Parmesan, grated
• Sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
• Fresh thyme and oregano, minced
  
• Roasted vegetable pesto
• 1/2 cup goat cheese, grated

1. Grease baking dish. Preheat broiler at 180C.
   
2. Bring water, milk and sea salt to boil. Stir in polenta to cook. Remove from heat wheng liquid is fully absorbed.
   
3. Add Parmesan, sun-dried tomatoes and herbs. Stir to combine well.
4. Pour half the cooked polenta to the prepared baking dish. Smooth out to a even layer. Let cool slightly. (if you are going to make bake egg, bake the cooked polenta now.)
   
5. Top the bottom layer with pesto and grated goat cheese. Cover with the other half of cooked polenta. (or eggs) Smooth out and let cool.
   
6. Lightly brush the surface with olive oil. Broil for 10 minutes or until the top turns golden brown. (Broil until the eggs are cooked to desired consistency.)
   
7. Cut into individual serving sizes to serve.
   

Four-Cheeses Pizza withTwo Toppings

Here's to put the pizza dough to test. I must say I am very pleased and proud of my first pizza, the crust to be more specific. The biggest compliment came when Adrian said his mother used to make pizza but she could never get the crust right. Call it rivalry if you may. His mother, however, is my source of inspiration (or challenge?). Adrian has this childhood memory of wholesome home cooked foods by his Swiss mother: tart, pie, jam, French toast etc. I guess I'm just helping my husband to relive the good old time.

Four-Cheeses Pizza with Homemade Tomato Salsa

Ingredients:

• 1 6 oz pizza dough
• Homemade Tomato Salsa
• 1 oz Fontina, grated
• 1 oz Mozzarella, grated
• 1 oz Goat cheese, grated
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves, minced
• 1 teaspoon fresh oregano, minced
• 1 Tablespoon Parmesan, grated

1. Preheat oven to 250C. Lightly flour the back of baking tray.
   
2. Dip pizza dough in a bowl of flour. Shake off the excess. Using a rolling pin, roll the pizza dough into a 8" round, with the edges slightly thicker than the inner circle.
   
3. Brush the inner circle with tomato salsa and top with Fontina, Mozzarella and Goat cheeses. Sprinkle with thyme leaves and oregano. Top with Parmesan.
4. Place it on the back of floured baking tray. Bake for 10 - 15 minutes or until it turns brown.

Four-Cheeses Pizza with Homemade Pesto and Oven-Dried Tomatoes

I got Adrian to contribute to this pizza: flipping and tossing. Peter Reinhart would have approved.

Unlike the on that I made with rolling pin - thin throughout -, this pizza crust is somehow puffy like Indian puri, and crispy like biscuit. Must be the skilled pizza dough tossing.

Ingredients:

(makes for one 8" pizza)

• Pesto
• Oven-dried tomatoes
• 1 oz Fontina Cheese, grated
  
• 1 oz Mozzarella, grated
  
• 4 cherry tomatoes, quartered
• 1 oz Goat cheese, grated
  
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves, minced
• 1teaspoon fresh oregano, minced
• 1 Tablespoon Parmesan, grated
  

Basil and Pecan Pesto
Go here for the pesto recipe.


Oven Dried Tomatoes:

(makes for one 8" pizza)

This recipe is not unlike the Herbed Oven Dried Tomatoes except it uses fresh thyme instead of basil and marjoram. I bake it for a mere 60 minutes instead of the full-on 6-12 hours needed for a "real" oven dried tomatoes. I used cherry tomatoes simply because that's what I got. Any tomato varieties would work.

• 6 cherry tomatoes
  
• extra-virgin olive oil
  
• fresh thyme leaves, minced
  
• 1 garlic cloves, crushed
• sea salt
• ground black pepper
• sugar
  

1. Preheat the over to 150C. In a pot of boiling water, blanch tomatoes. Drain and refresh in ice water. Drain. Peel, core, cut into halves, and remove seeds.
2. In a mixing bowl, whisk together olive oil, thyme, garlic, salt and pepper. Taste and season as needed. Toss and coat tomatoes with the oil mixture.
   
3. Arrange tomatoes, cut side down, in a baking pan. Drizzle with the excess oil mixture. Sprinkle sugar evenly over tomatoes.
4. Bake until the tomatoes begin to shrivel, about 1 hour. When the tomatoes are cool enough to handle, transfer to a container. Pour olive oil over and cover the container. Refrigerate and use as needed.

Dress the pizza as above except substitute Homemade Tomato Salsa with Pesto; add Oven-Dried Tomatoes around the inner circle after pesto; arrange fresh tomatoes before goat cheese; and top with fresh basil leaves after baking.

Camembert and Cranberry Stuffed Eggplant with Pesto

I am going to Singapore from tomorrow for 8 days. Past couple of days have been a struggle between clearing what's left in the fridge and buying what I'd like to cook with. Eventually I did a pretty good job having just a bunch of parsley and basil left. With such combination, one naturally thinks of Pesto. I would just like to emphasize the beauty of chopping instead of processing: you get these bits and bites of nuts and the ingredients that you don't get with the homogeneous paste from processor. It's a lot of patient and work especially so in a hot kitchen - you may want to make it a point to whoever you make it for. I have no doubt Adrian is well aware of the effort I put in to this pesto.

Here is something I made long before that I have always wanted to redo. It's a very intricate combination of flavors from the tartness of dried cranberry, creamy Camembert, savory pesto served with the ambiguous mushroom. Unfortunately despite all these varieties of mushroom they are showcasing during the Nine Emperor Festival, I couldn't find the wide, flat mushroom that I needed for this recipe. So what was I going to do? I bought eggplant. I knew I have made it my mission to challenge Adrian's taste bud but this time it was unintentional.

Instead of using dried cranberry, I used Homemade Cranberry Sauce made from dried cranberry. If you don't have the time for a proper pesto, go to the original recipe and follow its use of rocket leaves.

We liked the play of different elements in this recipe. Although I think mushroom is still the better choice than eggplant. I may do it again with mushroom when I come back if Adrian decides not to do anything with the extra pesto for the next 8 days.

Updated: I came home from Singapore and guess what? The extra pesto was left intact in the far corner of the refrigerator. No surprise there. Hence I decided to repeat this recipe with Portabella mushroom. You can use any flat mushroom. Remember to pick the big ones because mushroom shrinks in size when cooked. The method is basically the same:

• Fry mushroom (stalk removed) in a ovenproof pan until golden brown all over.
• Arrange mushroom with the bottom side up in the pan. Pile cheese and cranberry on the mushroom. Sprinkle with salt, pepper and basil leaves.
• Bake until cheese has melted.
• Serve with pesto.

I made this into a main dish by serving it along with a Cheesy Cheddar Corn Polenta. The real essence develops when the foods are slightly cooled and it is much better with mushroom than with eggplant. Two hours after the dinner, while I was preparing Sticky Date Pudding and Adrian slouching on the coach slaying yet another alien on X-Box, he said "dinner was really good". And guess who I made it for?

Ingredients:
(makes 2 servings)
For the Pesto:

• A few bunches of parley and basil
• 3/4 C Parmesan, grated
• 3 gloves garlic
• A handful of raw pine nuts (or walnuts/ pecans)
• Extra virgin Olive oil
• Freshly squeezed lemon juice
• Sea salt

1. Start chopping the some of leaves. Add some Parmesan, garlic and nuts as you chop. Add more of the leaves, Parmesan, nuts and garlic as you continue to chop and chop and chop.... until they become more or less homogenized.
2. You'll need approximately 1 Cup of pesto for this recipe. If there's extra, press them into a cake in a jar, cover with extra virgin olive oil and keep refrigerated for future use.
   
3. To the 1 cup pesto, mix in 2 tablespoon lemon juice, 2 tablespoon olive oil and pinch of salt. Taste and adjust with more oil, lemon juice, and salt as needed.

For the Eggplant:

• 1 eggplant, sliced lengthwise
• Olive oil
• sea salt
• 1 Cup Homemade cranberry sauce (or dried cranberry)
• 125g Camembert, cubed
  

1. Preheat oven to 180C. Rub eggplant halves with oil and salt. Let roast for about 30 minutes, until the cut sides are browned.
2. Remove cooked eggplant from the oven. Top it with cranberry sauce and cubed Camembert. Return to the oven and let bake for another 20 minutes, until Camembert melts.

To serve:
Place eggplant halves onto individual serving plates. Drizzle pesto over and serve warm.

Roasted Ratatouille

Ratatouille originated as a vegetable stew from Provence and Nice in France. A "classical" ratatouille has tomato as the main ingredient, with zucchini, eggplant, bell peppers, onion, garlic, bay leave, thyme, basil, or mixed green herbs such as herbs de Provence. I opted out eggplant and used the leftover carrot, and red and yellow bell peppers instead.

Roasting really brings out the flavor of the vegetables. You can serve this as a side dish, or main with crusty bread, rice or noodles, or roasted potatoes.

I have adapted this dish based on a book called Vegetarian Meat and Potatoes Cookbook by Robin Robertson.

Ingredients:
1/2 of each red bell pepper and yellow bell pepper, diced
1/2 large carrot, cut into coin slices
1 small zucchini, cut into coin slices
2 small tomatoes, chopped
1/4 large onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 teaspoon thyme
3 tablespoon basil pesto (homemade or store bought)
2 tablespoon parsley, chopped

1. Preheat oven to 200C. Lightly grease baking tray.
   
2. Toss together all the ingredients, except zucchini and tomatoes, together in a medium bowl.

3. Pour over baking tray. Cover and bake for 20 minutes.

4. Remove cover, add zucchini, tomatoes and thyme. Bake uncover for another 20 minutes, or until vegetables are tender.

5. Stir in basil pesto, sprinkle with chopped parsley. Serve warm.