Miso Ramen with Poached Egg and Spinach

Unlike many students who were forced - out of poverty - to subsist on a diet of dehydrated ramen noodles throughout their university years, I was lucky enough to live at home and, you know, eat healthily. That's not to say that I didn't have the occasional msg and sodium laden convenience product. My brother and I would regularly split a package when we watched WWE Raw that we would stir fry with veggies instead of turning it into soup.

Yes, I said WWE. I love Shakespeare, Jane Austen and the WWE. I also play video games. It weirds my students out to no end, but I like to say that my interests don't fit into nice, neat boxes.

The first time I went out and ate ramen noodles outside of my house was in my husband's town in Japan. There was a great shop in Toki-shi along Route 19 that served the most gloriously gigantic bowls of noodles. The first time we ate there, it was a painfully chilly, rainy Sunday night in November. The rain was pounding umbrellas with icy fury and we were both exhausted. We'd come back from Nagoya and with a long line at our regular Sunday night sushi joint, we decided to brave the vicious weather and try somewhere new.

Let me tell you, ramen is the perfect antidote to combat the bone chilling rain of an autumn storm. When your monster sized bowl arrives, you're immediately bathed in steam from the broth. On first bite, the noodles are so hot you almost burn your tongue, but you slurp them down anyway. And then, as you begin spooning the salty broth into your mouth, a warmth uncurls itself in your belly and begins to radiate throughout your limbs.

Frankenstein's monster could have been brought to life with ramen. If he had been, he probably would have been in a much better mood.

That first night, I had miso-butter ramen with corn, an egg, and bamboo shoots. And though I tried many other different varieties in my time there, I always returned to the comfort of miso ramen to warm myself.

I don't make ramen much for myself these days - only a handful of times for those chilly days in autumn and winter. The dehydrated stuff just doesn't do it for me. Luckily, there's a company in the GTA (Marufumi Foods) that makes fantastic fresh ramen and freezes it. Their stock base is a miso based paste, not a powder. If you can get hold of fresh or frozen ramen, you're working in a whole new ballpark of awesome.


Miso Ramen with Poached Egg and Spinach

(serves 1)

Ingredients

1 package ramen with seasoning mix (preferably miso)
1 tbsp white vinegar
1 egg
1 handful baby spinach leaves
shichimi, or chili-garlic paste to taste


Directions

1. Cook ramen according to package directions. Meanwhile, bring a pot with 1" water in it to a boil. Add vinegar and reduce heat to a gentle simmer. Crack egg into a small dish and slide into simmering water. Cook for 1-2 minutes or until your desired doneness.

2. Add spinach leaves to ramen and broth. Cook for 30 seconds, just until wilted. Ladle into a large bowl. Remove egg from poaching water with a slotted spoon and place on top of noodles. Sprinkle with shichimi to taste.

Cooking Light's Spinach & Chickpea Soup

All the credit for this recipe has to go to my husband, who whipped this up the other day while I was running late from work (workshop on IEP writing, if you must know). It's a really beautiful, easy dinner that I think will go into rotation as my comfort food on dreary, rainy days.

The lemon juice and zest keep the soup light and fresh, while the spinach adds colour and the pasta brings substance.

Plus, you've got to love anything that's ready in about 20 minutes!

Cooking Light's Spinach & Chickpea Soup

(source) serves 4


Ingredients

2 tsp canola oil
2 green onions, sliced
1 tsp dried oregano
4 cups vegetable or chicken stock
2 cups water
1 tbsp lemon zest
1 15oz can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
3/4 cup pasta of your choice
1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
5 oz baby spinach
½ tsp ground black pepper
shaved Parmesan


Directions

1. Heat canola oil in a large saucepan. Sauté onions and oregano for two minutes. Add in stock and water and bring to a boil. Add in zest, chickpeas and pasta, cover and continue boiling for 10 minutes. Test pasta for doneness. Stir in lemon juice, spinach and black pepper. Serve with Parmesan shaved on top.

Spiced Sweet Potato & Carrot Soup

Okay, I might have been exaggerating slightly when I said that chocolate cures all illness. There's definitely a place in my cold-fighting repertoire for vitamin C rich food.

And soup. And the combination of vitamin C therewith.

Can you tell that I haven't quite been healed yet? Can you hear my sniffling through the computer screen?

This makes a ton, so you'll have lots on hand in the freezer for emergency cold-fighting power (you know, should you be out of your first line of defence). If you want to keep things vegan, omit the yogurt and use olive or canola oil in place of the butter.

Spiced Sweet Potato & Carrot Soup

Ingredients

2 tbsp butter, divided
1 medium onion, chopped
¼ tsp ground cinnamon
¼ tsp ground nutmeg
2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and chopped
3 cups chopped, peeled carrots
3½ cups vegetable or chicken broth
3 cups water
1/3 cup plain yogurt, plus more for serving (optional)
salt and pepper to taste
2 tbsp parsley, minced

For added flavour, add one of the following: 1 tbsp orange zest and ½ cup orange juice (remove ½ cup water), ½ tsp curry powder, 1 tbsp freshly grated ginger

Directions

1. Heat 1 tbsp butter in a large dutch oven. Add onions and sauté until translucent and soft, about 4 minutes. Push onions to side of pan. Add remaining 1 tbsp butter to the center of the pan and let milk solids brown. Once browned, stir in cinnamon and nutmeg and stir just until fragrant.

2. Stir in potatoes and carrots, tossing to get butter over all the vegetables. Then pour in broth and water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer until vegetables are tender, about 35 minutes. Purée in batches in a blender or with an immersion blender. Check seasoning and add salt and pepper to taste. Stir in yogurt, if using, and serve in deep bowls with an additional dollop and a sprinkling of parsley.

Roasted Cauliflower, Chickpea & Wheat Berry Toss

There are never enough hours in the day to get everything done. It feels like the instant my head hits the pillow, I'm already asleep. And when I wake up in the morning, I'm bleary eyedly stumbling towards my coffee.

So I'm all about getting as much shut-eye as possible. And that's where easy lunches come into play.
I refuse to give up sleep to prepare food, so I always put my lunch together the night before. Leftovers play a big part in what I eat for lunch, so I'm always looking for meals that are brown bag approved. To me, that means if I have to use cutlery to eat it, I'm only required to use a spoon OR a fork. And, preferably, it can be eaten at room temperature without causing too much of a mess.

If you've been reading the blog for a while, you know that I have a deep and abiding love affair with legumes - and the mixture of legumes and grains always strike me as a perfect combination of ingredients for a packed lunch.

This recipe was adapted from the fabulous blog No Recipes. I tarted mine up with more ingredients and reduced the oil but, I must say the dressing is just killer! I hesitate to say it, but it was even better day two.

Roasted Cauliflower, Chickpea and Wheat Berry Toss

(lightly adapted from No Recipes)

Ingredients

2 cups uncooked wheat berries
1 head of cauliflower, stalks discarded and florets cut into bite sized pieces
1 tbsp olive oil
2 red peppers, roasted, peeled, seeded and diced
1 15 oz can chickpeas
1 tbsp capers, drained and rinsed
3 tbsp parsley, chopped

dressing

3 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp truffle oil (if you have it, if not, use some more olive oil)
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
1 tablespoon honey
2 tsp sesame oil
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. Cook wheat berries according to manufacturer's directions. When finished cooking, place in a large bowl.

2. Preheat oven to 400º. Toss cauliflower florets with olive oil and place on a large baking tray. Bake for 20-30 minutes, or until lightly browned, stirring once or twice. Add to wheat berries. Stir in peppers, chickpeas, capers and parsley.

3. In a separate bowl, whisk together all ingredients. Pour over wheat berry mixture and toss to coat.

Minted Quinoa and Cannellini Bean Salad with Watermelon, Peas & Feta

This recipe was inspired by a Cooking Light recipe that called for farro, watermelon and peas. I was intrigued by the combination, but wanted to make the salad a more substantial meal and balance it out with more salty and tangy flavours.

Quinoa and Cannellini Bean Salad with Watermelon, Peas & Feta

(inspired by Cooking Light)

serves 6

Ingredients

1 cup quinoa
1½ cups water
1 cup freshly shelled peas
1½ cups diced seedless watermelon
1 can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
½ cup minced parsley
¼ cup shredded mint
1/3 cup crumbled feta
2 tbsp lemon juice
1 tbsp olive oil
½ tsp kosher salt
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper

Directions

1. Rinse quinoa in a fine mesh strainer, rubbing grains between fingers to remove any residue. Place in a large pot with the water, bring to a boil, then reduce heat, cover and simmer for 15 minutes. Stir in the peas in the last two minutes of cooking time, and replace lid. If peas are not bright green and tender after two minutes, let cook for a minute longer. Remove from heat, drain any excess water off and rinse under cold water.

2. Place quinoa mixture in a large bowl. Toss with watermelon, cannellini beans, parsley, mint and feta.

3. Whisk together dressing ingredients (lemon juice through pepper) in a separate bowl. Pour over quinoa, toss again and serve.

An Inauthentic Flammekueche

Lately, I've been really trying hard to steer clear of cheese. As much as I love it, it just doesn't seem to love me. And when cheese goes... well... I've tried to love pizza without the cheese, but I just haven't been successful.

Enter the Alsatian dish: Flammekueche.

Flammekueche (or Flammekuchen in German) roughly translates into baked in fire... which means you're required to get that oven piping hot. It's a thin crust, topped with fromage blanc (or, in my inauthentic case, full fat sour cream), onions and cooked bacon.

I like mine with a beer crust.

Beer. Bacon. Shallots. It's a winner based on those ingredients alone.

Flammekueche

(adapted from bonjourlafrance.com)

serves 4-6

Ingredients

2¼ cups all purpose flour, divided
¼ cup warm water (100º-110ºF)
1 tbsp granulated sugar
2¼ tsp active dry yeast
1 tsp kosher salt
¼ cup dark beer
6 tbsp milk

1 cup sour cream
½ tsp kosher salt
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
3 pinches ground nutmeg (crucial to the dish)
3 slices bacon, chopped into ¼"-½" wide strips
4 large shallots, peeled and thinly sliced

Directions

1. In a large bowl, mix together ¼ cup flour with water, sugar and yeast. Set aside for 30 minutes, or until bubbly. Stir in remaining flour, 1 tsp kosher salt, beer and milk. Turn ingredients onto a lightly floured surface and knead until you have a smooth, elastic ball. Place in a greased bowl, turning dough all over to coat. Cover with a tea towel and set aside in a draft free location, and let rise for 1 hour, or until doubled in bulk. Punch down and let rise again for 1 more hour.

2. Meanwhile, with a rack in the middle, preheat oven to 475º and line your largest square baking sheet with parchment paper.

3. In a bowl, stir together sour cream, salt, pepper and nutmeg. Set aside

4. Heat a skillet over medium heat and fry bacon until crispy. Remove bacon and drain off all but ½ tbsp fat. Fry shallots in fat until golden and brown, about 5 minutes. Remove from pan and set aside.

5. Roll dough out on a lightly floured surface until  as thin as you can manage to transfer. Transfer to baking sheet, cover with tea towel and let rest for 5 - 10 minutes.

6. Spread sour cream mixture over surface of dough, leaving a ½" border on all sides. Sprinkle with shallots and bacon. Fold up sides of dough.

7. Bake for 15 minutes, or until bottom is golden. Let cool on rack for 5 minutes before cutting and serving.

Best enjoyed with beer, in my opinion.

Three Bean Salad with Corn and Red Peppers

Sometimes I think my mother and I are the only people on the planet who love bean salads. There's something so delightfully passé about them. I always associate them with the '80s... Does anyone else?

When I was in elementary school, we had several Canadian Living seasonal cooking magazines, and inevitably the summer ones had bean salads in them. Whenever the teachers had lunch & learn sessions at school, the library would be set up with tons of food with a mandatory gigantic bowl of bean salad. As a kid, I just assumed that they were making bean salads out of the Canadian Living magazines, because that was the logical assumption to make.

I'm all about the logic.

I'd lobby to bring back the bean salad into vogue. It's healthy, filling, fibre rich, and, when done right, colourful. Plus, it makes a quick and easy lunch to bring.

So, now, my go to bean salad recipe is based off a Canadian Living recipe: Red Barn Bean and Corn Salad. It serves 12 and keeps a decent amount of time in the fridge which especially important if you're, like me, not serving 12 people at once.

If you're alone in liking bean salads in your house, be prepared to be eating this for the better part of a week. It makes about 9 cups worth!

But, it's way better than those drenched salads from the supermarket, and you know you love it. So go ahead, grab a gigantic spoon and dig in.

Three Bean Salad with Corn and Red Peppers

(adapted from Canadian Living)

Ingredients

1 14oz can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 14oz can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 14oz can red kidney beans, drained and rinsed
½ cup finely chopped sweet onion
1 cup frozen corn, thawed
½ cup celery, chopped
1 red pepper, chopped
1 tbsp dried basil (you can use ¼ cup fresh, if you anticipate no leftovers)
¼ cup chopped fresh parsley

½ cup apple cider vinegar
3 tbsp olive oil
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
1 tsp kosher salt
½ tsp freshly ground black pepper

Directions

1. Mix together first 9 ingredients, chickpeas through parsley in a large bowl. Toss well. In a measuring up, whisk together remaining ingredients. Pour over bean mixture, toss well and refrigerate for at least 1 hour to let flavours meld together.

How easy was that?

A Cool Salad of Herbs and Yogurt with Honey Sriracha Tempeh

I love, love, LOVE it when leftovers from dinner provide the perfect next-day lunch. Last night, we chowed down on Bon Appetit's Yogurt Marinated Chicken and Cucumber-Mint Raita from Epicurious. Both were amazing, and highly recommended. I set aside one of the two chicken breasts that I'd grilled last night for today's lunch.

Originally intending to make a sandwich with the chicken and raita, I found myself wilting in the heat and instead cravings something fresher. So, a salad it was!

I marinated a package of tempeh in sriracha, lime, honey and shallot to play off the balance of cool herbs in the raita. Grilled and served opposite the cold chicken, the salad totally hit the spot.

Hello summer! Aren't you looking colourful? Heirloom Ontario tomatoes, carrots, snow peas, lettuce, cucumber, romaine and butter lettuce, plus fresh mint to garnish. Man, oh man, was this some seriously tasty stuff. I'm planning on making a massive batch of raita up to dip veggies in this week.

Honey Sriracha Tempeh

Ingredients

1 block tempeh, cut into 16 slices
2 tbsp honey
2 tbsp sriracha
2 tbsp lime juice
1 shallot, minced
¼ tsp kosher salt


Directions

1. Whisk together honey, sriracha, lime juice and shallot. Place in a ziploc bag with tempeh. Marinate in fridge for at least 1 hour, preferably overnight.

2. Remove tempeh from marinade. Sprinkle with salt and grill over medium heat for 2 minutes on each side, just until grill marks form. Cut into chunks and sprinkle over salad.

Is there anything more beautiful than summer's produce? I think not.

My Favourite Chickpea Salad Sandwich

Most of us, at some point in have had an egg salad sandwich or a tuna salad sandwich or chicken salad. Now, I love a good tuna salad as much as the next person, but sometimes, you just want something with a little more oomph, and a little less slathered in mayo.

Enter Fresh's Chickpea Salad. Smashed chickpeas, carrots, celery, green onions and dill pickle... it's got all the right stuff going on. Pumped up with dijon mustard and honey and a mere tablespoon of mayonnaise (I've recently swapped this out for vegenaise because the latter just tastes SO much better), this is a friendly riff off of a classic comfort food.

Chickpea Salad Sandwich with Avocado and Pea Sprouts

Chickpea Salad 

(from Fresh at Home)

Ingredients

1 19 oz can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 large carrot, shredded
1 stalk celery, finely chopped
1 green onion, minced
1 large dill pickle, minced
1½ tbsp dijon mustard
½ tbsp honey (or agave)
1 tbsp vegenaise/mayonnaise
1 tsp lemon juice
kosher salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. Break up chickpeas in a food processor until coarsely chopped. Alternatively, you can mash them with a potato masher.

2. In a large bowl, mix together chickpeas with remaining ingredients. Mixture will keep for 3 days in the fridge.

Makes enough for 6 sandwiches. I like topping mine with avocado, roasted red peppers and some alfalfa sprouts.

Quinoa with Artichokes and Parsley

Quinoa is one of those ingredients that I love a lot. Its texture never fails to keep me interested, and I love that it's high in protein.

It's a personal favourite for brown bagged lunches.

And when you throw in artichoke hearts, another of my favourite things, well, that's just awesome.

The whole recipe is brightened up by handfuls of parsley, some fresh lemon juice and zest.

Quinoa with Artichokes and Parsley

(from Cooking Light)

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil
1 cup chopped sweet onion
¼ tsp dried thyme
1 can artichoke hearts, drained and chopped
1 cup vegetable or chicken broth
1/2 cup quinoa, well rinsed (don't omit that step, it's an important one)
1 cup chopped fresh parsley
2 tbsp grated lemon rind
1½ tbsp fresh lemon juice
¼ tsp kosher salt

Directions

1. Heat olive oil in a medium saucepan. Sauté onions with thyme for 4-5 minutes or until softened. Stir in artichoke hearts, and sauté for about a minute or until warmed through. Mix in broth and quinoa, bring to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and let simmer for 15-20 minutes, or until broth is completely absorbed.

2. Remove from heat and stir in remaining ingredients. Best served hot or at room temperature.

Happy Saturday

To me, there is nothing more sublime than a lunch composed of preserves, meat and bread. Today saw thinly sliced roast pork, with just a gossamer whisper of soft fat, slivers of crisp honeycrisp apple and Scottish caramelized onion chutney top several plain crackers. The crackers were the perfect foil to all the sweet, spicy and rich flavours.

I only wish I'd remembered about the small wedge of Bleu de la Moutonniere cheese tucked away in the corner of the fridge before I'd eaten.

Bulghur Salad with Cranberries and Cucumbers.

This was my first time using bulgur, and it's something I definitely plan to use again in the future. I brought this salad for lunch twice this week, and I really found that it gave me a lot of energy throughout the day... so if you're brown bagging things as I do, but haven't cooked with bulgur before, this is a great intro recipe to a really tasty grain.

Day three in the fridge, just as tasty as day one!

Bulgur is a wheat cereal - though different kinds of wheat can be used to make it. Most commonly, durum semolina seems to be the wheat of choice.

A close up

 I've based this recipe on one from Eat, Shrink and Be Merry called Grainman. My measurements are usually pretty loose... so although I've given exact ones here, you should feel more than free to play around with them.

Ingredients

1 cup orange juice
1 cup bulgur
½ cup cranberries
½ cup each diced celery and diced cucumber (I used a baby cuke)
¼ cup chopped almonds
2 tbsp chopped chives
one handful chopped fresh parsley
half a handful chopped fresh mint

1 tbsp walnut oil
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
zest from one lemon
¼ tsp each salt and pepper

Directions

Combine orange juice and 1 cup water in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce to low and add bulgur. Simmer, covered for 5 minutes, then remove from heat and let stand, covered, for 20 minutes or until bulgur has absorbed all that delicious liquid.

While the bulgur is doing its thing, mix cranberries through nuts in a large bowl.

Once the bulgur has absorbed everything, add it, along with the remaining ingredients to the bowl. Stir well. Taste and check seasonings. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours. Salad will keep, covered in the fridge, for 3 days.