Moroccan Meal

Here is that Moroccan dish again! (see here for the original post).

It consists of a Moroccan/Syrian bean dish I got from Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian. (Fabulous book!) with Moroccan carrot salad and couscous flavoured with preserved lemon and currants.

The recipe I am giving here is the bean dish. It is very yum, so I hope you try it
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The carrot salad was delicious ~ eventually. I was disappointed with my recipe, but by the time I had done a lot of fiddling it was good, and I think next time I might make a beautiful salad straight off. I will post it when I perfect it!  But to give you an idea: garlic is fried, then the carrots and spices are added and gently cooked and then a sweet and acid dressing finishes it off.

I just made my usual couscous, but added some currants and finely chopped preserved lemon to make it more exciting.

BLACK-EYED BEANS WITH HERBS
225g /8oz black-eyed beans just cooked (I use one cupful cooked 8 mins in the pressure cooker), keep one cup or so of the cooking liquid.
Meanwhile
Heat 2 tbsp olive oil on medium in a pan
Add a dried chili and let it puff up and turn dark
Add 3 finely chopped garlic cloves and stir.
Add the beans, liquid and:
3 bay leaves
1 tsp chopped oregano
1 1/2 tsp fresh thyme
1 tsp paprika
1 1/2 tsp salt
Simmer gently for 20 minutes. The liquid will have reduced to a sauce. Serve hot.

I have been very flexible with the herbs, adding whatever I have on hand. One time I added heaps of spinach and that was good too. Today I added spring onion and parsley as well as oregano and thyme.

Sorrel Soup

This is the soup selection for my Meatless Monday Menu for the YamDaisy Cafe.

I was so inspired (about 15 years ago!), by Jane Grigson writing about Sorrel Soup that I went out and bought a plant, and I have been growing it ever since, in a big pot right near the door. She spoke of the French country housewife with such a pot, and able to whip up this soup if a visitor called unexpectedly.
I have never lost the pleasurable feeling of this scene, even though I didn't particularly enjoy my first few attempts at sorrel soup.

Here is my sorrel. Snails love it, as you can see, but it is still a gorgeous pot full!

Sorrel tastes just wonderful, it is a bit like spinach but with a sharp lemony flavour. It does go grey when it is cooked, but it doesn't taste grey. The first sorrel soups I tried were blended, and it wasn't until I saw one in a book called Potager by Georgeanne Brennan that I was able to make a version that is just perfect for me!

This is the recipe of how I make it for that unexpected visitor and myself!

SORREL SOUP
1 tsp olive oil and 1 tsp butter, heated in a saucepan
Add a finely chopped small onion, or 1/2 a leek and
1 potato (a yellow fleshed one is my preference for this) in 1 cm dice
(like the littlest blocks in the cuisinaire we used at school!)

Saute until glistening 5 - 10 minutes
Add 2 cups of vegetable stock and simmer
In the meantime cut the stems off 6 - 8 leaves of sorrel and then roll them up and slice them finely.
Add half the leaves just a few minutes before the potato is tender, and season with salt and pepper.
When the potato is cooked, stir in the rest of the sorrel and serve.
This way you get the green of the sorrel, and it is tender enough to melt into the soup.

I often make this when there is nothing in the house but a potato, and onion and a bit of stock!
If I don't have that unexpected visitor I think I will have a bowl and then keep the rest for later. But I never do, I always have a second bowl straight away, because it is so lovely!

Meatless Monday Menu

In my dream of YamDaisy Cafes in every neighbourhood, providing delicious, everyday food, the manager/chef will have as much leeway as possible to make the cafe suit the community and fulfil its mission.
One possibility would be to take on 'Meat Free Monday'
This is how it is descibed in the Wikipedia link:
Meatless Monday is an international campaign that encourages people to not eat meat on Mondays to improve their health and the health of the planet. Reducing meat consumption by 15% (the equivalent of one day a week) lessens the risk of chronic preventable illness and has a strong impact on the environment.

It is a good fit for the YamDaisy Cafe. Many people want to eat more healthily, want to do better by the environment, may even have their doctor telling them to cut down on meat ~ but they may have no idea how to go about it. A local YamDaisy Cafe could make it all easy: here is the meatless meal, cooked beautifully. The recipe could be in the YamDaisy Magazine or available on the phone app. The chef is there to give advice.

Even the meat eater who is scared of vegetarian meals can come and have a nibble and become familiar with the variety of things, and maybe find some meatless foods they like.

So here is the Meatless Monday Menu
Soup: Sorrel and Potato Soup with Bread and Butter
Main 1: Moroccan Meal of Black-eyed Beans and Carrot Salad accompanied by Couscous made with Currants and Preserved Lemon.
Main 2: Egg Noodles with Cabbage, Mushroom, and fried Tempeh
Dessert: Muhallabia with Raspberries

In coming days (health permitting) I will put these up in full because they are all so yummy! The Moroccan dish is pictured at the top and here is the Muhallabia!

Cheers everyone!