Polenta Lasagna with Creamy Marinara Sauce

This one gets me the "gourmet quality" award from my sole taster.

I made more than necessary for two persons because I knew I could play with each of the following ingredients in different ways, separate from one another. For instance, the roasted vegetables filling can easily be made into an omelet.

For the Polenta:
(8x8 baking pan)

• 1 cup cornmeal
• 3 cups water
• 1/2 teaspoon chopped rosemary
• Sea salt and black pepper to taste

1. Bring water to boiling. Stir in cornmeal and keep whisking until cooked and thick. Add rosemary, salt and pepper to taste.
2. Line a 8x8 baking pan with aluminum foil. Pour polenta over. Let cool and chill for at least 1 hour.
   

For the filling:

• 1 eggplant
  
• 1 red bell pepper
  
• mushroom, chopped
• 1 red onion, chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 Tablespoons water
• 1 Tablespoon basil leaves, chopped
• 1 tablespoon oregano, chopped
• 4 oz mozzarella cheese
• Shaved Parmesan cheese for topping
  

Preheat oven to 200C. With the eggplant, use a fork to punch a few holes throughout and bake until the skin is charred and flesh is soft (about 45 minutes). Cut roasted eggplant into halves and scoop out the flesh from the skin. Chop coarsely.


With the red bell pepper, turning and roasting until the skin is charred. Peel off the skin once it's cool. Remove the seeds and chop coarsely.

Saute onions, garlic and mushroom with 1 tablespoon of butter and a generous pinch of salt. Stir to coat evenly. Add water, cover and cook until onions are soft. Uncover and cook until water evaporates. Remove from heat. Stir in eggplant, red bell pepper, basil, oregano and mozzarella cheese.

For the Marinara Sauce:

I twisted and combined two marinara sauce recipes into one. You may skip the cream cheese - it's good though. I didn't bother to puree the mixture - it's kind of good in its chunky, rough way.

While I was searching through the fridge for ingredients, the container where this Ethiopian spice-mix has been resting in for more than 6 months stared right into my eyes. I took a sniff at it - smelled good to me - and decided to use it in place of chillies flakes. Hey! It worked! I can now declare it "keep well in refrigeration for more than 6 months."

Once again, I'm showing my unrelenting effort in making homemade crushed tomatoes. Feel free to ignore my stubbornness. The tomatoes tasted better this time. Lucky strike!

• 2 large ripe tomatoes
• 1 red onion, chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 teaspoon Ethiopian spice-mix (or chillies flakes)
  
• 2 Tablespoons basil, chopped
• 2 oz cream cheese, cubed
• sea salt to taste

1. Bring a pot of water to boil. Throw in tomatoes and cook until the skins break. Remove and let cool under running water (or cold water). Peel the skins and cut into quarters. Mash roughly. Set aside.
   
2. Saute onions and garlic with spice until fragrant (watch out for browning). Add crushed tomatoes. Cook until boiling.
3. Stir in basil and cream cheese to blend.
   
4. Taste and season with salt if necessary.
   

To assemble:

Preheat oven at 180C. Cut polenta into sizes that best fit your baking pan. Layer in this sequence (from the bottom): sauce, polenta, filling, sauce, polenta, filling..... End with sauce and top with shaved Parmesan cheese. Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 20 minutes. Uncover, reduce the temperature to 150. Bake for another 10 minutes. Allow it to cool 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.

Roasted Stuffed Pumpkin

I never knew Thanksgiving is a American thing. I always thought it's one of those "Christmas", "Boxing Day" or "Halloween" things. So I did a little bit of googling and found out Thanksgiving falls on 26th November. So why did I make this now and not later? I guess I just wanted to try something different and Thanksgiving is just an excuses.

With apples, cranberries and nuts as ingredients, this dish has a festive taste to it. I know Adrian was very pleased with his "Malaysian Chinese wife making Thanksgiving dinner for her American husband in Thailand". It also answers his needs for Thanksgiving meal; it used to be "should I eat the turkey? Is it ok to eat just the stuffing?"

There's a lot of room to play with the ingredients. You can substitute cooked barley with lentils, toasted bread, long grain rice or seitan; raisin always works in place of cranberries; any types of nuts you have in hand; apple cider vinegar or dry white wine instead of lemon juice. Use a whole pumpkin if you are serving a small group of people. Cut a large circle around the stem and remove the seeds and stringy matter from the inside.

Ingredients:
(serves 2)
For the Stuffing:
1/2 medium onion, chopped
1/3 cup celery, diced
1/2 cup mushroom, sliced
1/4 cup cooked barley
1/4 big apple, diced
Handful of walnuts and hazelnuts, chopped
Handful of dried cranberries
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 tablespoon fresh oregano and sage, chopped
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
pinch of ground cumin
pinch of salt and pepper
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

1. In a sauce pan, saute onion with pinch of salt until fragrant. Add celery and cook for 2 - 3 minutes. Add mushroom and cook for another 1 minute. Toss in cooked barley to coat evenly. Remove from heat and pour sauteed vegetable into a large mixing bowl.
   
2. Stir in apple, nuts, cranberries and beaten egg. Let the mixture sit for a moment.
3. Melt a tablespoon of butter over medium heat until it bubbles. Stir in garlic and cook for one minute. Stir garlic butter over vegetable mixture.
4. Add herbs and spices, finish with lemon juice and blend thoroughly.

For the Pumpkin:

• 1/2 medium pumpkin, seeds removed.

1. Press stuffing into the shell until the pumpkin is completely stuffed.
2. Using a sharp knife, cut several small, slit-like pockets at different levels in the exterior wall of the pumpkin. Dab a pat of butter into each of these crevices.
3. Place the stuffed pumpkin in an oiled baking dish and cook, in a preheated 180C oven, for about 1 1/2 hour. (Cooking time may vary, depending on the thickness of the pumpkin's wall.) Pumpkin is ready when fork inserted comes in and out easily through the shell.
   
4. As the pumpkin bakes, the butter will trickle down from one side-slit to another, finally winding up in the pan. Collect the dripping and dressing.
   

For The Gravy:

• cooked dressing and dripping from the pumpkin
• 2 tablespoons butter
  
• 4 tbsp flour
• 2 cups water
• 1/2 teaspoon soy sauce

1. Heat the oil over medium heat in a small frying pan. Add the pumpkin drippings and stuffing, being careful to break up the dressing as it simmers. Then slowly add the flour, stirring constantly. When the flour starts to brown, gradually pour in the water a little at a time, still stirring continuously. Add soy sauce. As soon as the gravy thickens, remove it from the burner. This should make 1 cup of sumptuous sauce for spooning over roast pumpkin slices.

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.

Parmesan Polenta with Chili-roasted Mushroom

I have been wanting to make this savory polenta since the day I bought the polenta. For some reasons I kept getting sidetracked by the sweet polenta recipes:

• Polenta and Ricotta Cake
• Polenta Lemon Muffins with Homemade Lemon Curd

Anyway here it is. It's better than I thought it would be. Parmesan goes very well with the otherwise bland polenta. I must also credit it to the chili-roasted mushrooms: It started with the inspiration coming from chili-roasted tomatoes that I made last night and the bottle of chili oil that I whisked up months ago for Hummus on Fire. Last but not least: my latest discovery of egg frying trick.

If you don't have cream, use 1 Cup milk to 1 Cup water. I ran out of milk hence the use of cream.

Ingredients:
(2 main servings)

• 1/2 C uncooked organic polenta
• 1/2 C cream
• 1 1/2 C water
• salt and pepper
  
• Mushrooms, cut into bite-sized chunks
  
• Splash of dried chili-infused olive oil
• sea salt and black pepper
• Pinch of paprika
• 1/2 C Parmesan cheese, shaved
• Chives, chopped
  
• 2 Eggs

1. Preheat oven to 200C.
2. Coat chopped mushrooms with chili oil, sea salt, black pepper and paprika. Roast in oven for 15 minutes.
3. In a saucepan, mix together polenta, cream, water, salt and pepper. Bring it to boiling over medium heat, turn to low heat and let cook over cracked lid.
4. In a skillet, heat a tablespoon of butter over medium heat until sizzling. Crack the eggs over. When egg whites set, pour a couple tablespoons of water over and cover with lid. Remove when egg yolks are cooked to desired doneness.
5. Stir Parmesan into cooked polenta and spoon into individual serving plates. Top it with chili roasted mushrooms, fried egg and garnish with chives.