Recipe: vegetarian paella

I've started making a little recipe book to leave in the house we lived in while we were in Costa Rica (named "Base Cero" or Base zero, or simply "Spy house"). There are some foods that are ridiculously easy to get in Costa Rica that aren't readily available here (i.e.: refried beans are NOT $3 a can there), whereas there are some ingredients that are everyday here, but impossible or expensive there (i.e: peanut butter). So I'm starting a new label, called "Base Cero friendly", and it indicates whether I think a meal can be used (as is, or adapted) in CR. If it's 'friendly' it will end up in the Base Cero cookbook.

Vegetarian Paella
Effort: very easy
Ingredients: easy to get, except maybe saffron if you choose to use it.
Base Cero friendly: yes, with a few slight modifications
Cookbook: the best ever vegetarian

Vegetarian Paella

Apparently this dish doesn't need seafood, although saffron is an "indispensible" ingredient. I've made it without saffron, substituting 1/8 tsp of turmeric.

¼ tsp saffron threads (a small container of about 1 tbsp is available from bulk barn for $5.99)

6 tbsp olive oil

1 spanish onion, sliced

3 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1 red bell pepper, seeded and sliced

1 orange bell pepper, seeded and sliced

1 large eggplant, cut into cubes (optional, seeing as not everyone likes eggplant)

Generous 1 cup risotto/Arborio rice (normal rice should work although the dish will be less creamy. I got arborio rice from bulk barn. it was still slightly pricey but A&P only sells little bags for expensive prices)

2 ½ cups vegetable stock (I used dried veggie broth + a tbsp of fake chicken broth from Bulk barn)

1lb tomatoes, peeled and chopped (score the skin of the potatoes with a sharp knife, then pour boiling water over them and let sit for a few min. The skin will be easier to remove)

Salt and pepper

4 oz mushrooms, sliced (I'd say 1-2 cups)

4 oz green beans, halved (I went with about 1 cup)

14 oz canned pinto beans (I used chickpeas)

1. Place saffron and 3 tbsp of hot water in a bowl and reserve. Meanwhile, heat oil in large skillet. Add onion and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 min or until softened. Add garlic, bell peppers and eggplant and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 min.
2. Add rice and stir for 1 min or until grains are coated in oil. Add stock, tomatoes, saffron, and soaking water. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 15 min.
3. Stir in mushrooms, green beans, and pinto beans with their can juices. Cook for an additional 10minutes, then serve.

Green Peas with Coconut and Cilantro

Eek, I'm getting behind on these recipe emails, sorry! I've come across a few yummy ones that I've been meaning to share, but just can't seem to find the time. But today Kyle and I made a meal so good I had to share it right away. As we were cooking it, it kind of started to smell like dirty socks, which had us worried... so imagine my surprise when I took my first bite and it actually tasted like Indian food. Which makes it the first meal I've ever made that actually tasted Indian. Sweet. We were worried because it didn't have any protein, so we added some tofu, which actually worked out well because it had the texture of the indian cheese (paneer). the recipe doesn't say how to serve it, but it was delicious served over basmati rice.
A tip: make sure you have ALL of the ingredients ready ahead of time because you end up adding nearly everything within a minute of everything else.

Green Peas with Coconut and Cilantro
Effort: super easy
Ingredients: easy to get, if you take a trip to bulk barn's spice section!
Cookbook: modified slightly from World Vegetarian (Madhur Jaffrey)

3 tbsp peanut or canola oil (can be reduced to about half this amount)
1 tsp whole brown mustard seeds (ours are from Bulk Barn)
1/2 tsp whole cumin seeds (Bulk Barn)
1/2-3/4 of a block of firm-extra firm tofu, chopped into 1/2 inch cubes (this is Nic and Kyle's addition)
15 fresh curry leaves (we used basil because we have no clue where to find curry leaves)
2 1/2 cups shelled fresh or defrosted frozen peas (we used frozen)
1-2 fresh hot green chilies, finely chopped (we used 2 of the tiny Thai chilis and the meal was a bit on the spicey side)
1 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar (we used brown sugar, but I don't know if it makes a difference)
1/4 tsp ground tumeric (Bulk Barn)
1/2 tsp ground cumin (available at Bulk Barn)
1/2 tsp ground coriander (we used whole coriander because it's what we had on hand, I just tried to crush the seeds a bit)
3/4 cup freshly grated coconut (or, you can do as we do: 8 tbsp desiccated, unsweetened coconut soaked for an hour in 3/4 cup of hot water, or 1/2 hour in boiling water)
3 tbsp very finely chopped fresh cilantro (I used about 1.5 tbsp in the meal itself and then had some on the side to add to my meal, because Kyle hates cilantro)

Put the rice on before you start chopping. Put oil in large frying pan / wok over med-high heat. When hot, add mustard seeds and cumin seeds. As soon as the mustard seeds pop (a few seconds), add the tofu and then the curry/basil leaves. Stir to combine and then add peas, chilies, salt, sugar, tumeric, ground cumin, and coriander. Stir for a minute until the peas turn bright green. Add 4 tablespoons of water and bring to a boil. Cover, turn heat down to low and simmer gently for 5 minutes or until peas are tender. Uncover, turn heat up to med-high and add coconut and cilantro. Stir, boiling away any extra water. Serve immediately (over rice).

OH, and if you try out any of these recipes, please tell me how they go!!

Recipe: delicious puree of mixed veggies

Happy holidays everyone!

I kid you not about the name of this recipe. It sounds odd, and it ends up looking pretty weird too. But I found it really tasty (once I added a few extra things) when served with bread. It takes a long time to make, but it's mostly chopping and then let everything simmer for an hour, so it's not bad. I'm sure it could be adopted for crockpot cooking, too. I'll point out the extra ingredients that I added.

A delicious puree of mixed vegetables
Effort: pretty easy
Ingredients: very common (fresh dill is the most difficult, but it's essential so don't omit it! and garam masala can be picked up at any bulk barn)
Cookbook: World vegetarian (Madhur jaffrey)

1/4 cup peanut or olive oil
4 garlic cloves, pealed and chopped
1 fresh hot green chili (use more or less as desired)
1 med. onion, pelled and finely chopped
10 ounces fresh spinach, trimmed, well washed and chopped (note: a bag in the produce section is about 8oz. we used that amount and it worked out well)
10 green beans, cut crosswise into fine rounds
1 med. carrot, peeled, halved lengthwise and then cut crosswise into fine slices
1 med. potato, pelled and cut into small dice (i think the peel could be left on here)
2 large tomatoes, pelled and chopped (I don't think I peeled them and I was fine)
1 med suzzhini, cut into small dice
1 very well-packed cup of chopped fresh dill
1/2 cup yellow split peas (we couldn't find any so we subsituted lentils which we boiled for 10min before adding)
3 cups water
2 tsp salt
margarine / butter (Nic's addition)
garam masala (Nic's addition)
baguette and/or flatbread (to eat the puree with)

- put oil, garlic and chili into very large pan (we used a wok) over med-high heat.
- when garlic is golden, add onion, spinach, green beans, carrot, potato, tomatoes, zucchini dill, split peas/lentils, and 3 cups of water. Stir and bring to a simmer
- cover, turn heat down to low, and simmer gently for 30min.
-turn heat up slightly to med-low, uncover partially, and continue to cook for another 30min.
-add salt and mix.
- mash vegetables together until you have a coarse puree (I used one of those hand-blenders that you can use to make milkshakes with. i didn't blend it to homogenization, though)
- serve in bowls. add some margarine to each bowl to help make the flavour "deeper" or "more savoury". sprinkle with a little bit of garam masala, until you like the taste. eat with bread, pitas, flatbread, etc.

Please let me know if you try any of these recipes and what you think of it. I'm curious if these are useful at all!

Pad Thai

I don't know where I found this recipe...sometimes I safe tasty-sounding recipes on the 'Net, and I copy them to my computer. Or maybe it's from the Wildlife Research Station. In any event, I like Pad Thai and this one is easy and doesn't require fish sauce.

Pad Thai
Effort: pretty easy
Ingredients: pretty common (rice vinegar and rice noodles would be the only difficulty)
Cookbook: I can't remember where I found this recipe, sorry!

8 oz rice noodles, uncooked (I just used one package of rice noodles)
1/4 cup ketchup
2 tbsp each reduced-sodium soy sauce, lime juice, and brown sugar
1 tbsp seasoned rice vinegar
1 tsp sesame oil
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
1 tsp vegetable oil
1/2 cup diced red onions
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 cup bean sprouts
1/2 cup grated carrots
1/4 cup each chopped green onions and chopped, fresh cilantro
1/4 cup chopped peanuts

- Cook noodles according to package directions. Drain. Rinse with cold water and drain again. Set aside.
- To makes sauce, combine ketchup, soy sauce, lime juice, brown sugar, vinegar, oil, and crushed red pepper flakes in a small bowl. Set aside.
- Heat oil in a large, non-stick wok or skillet over medium heat. Add onions and garlic. Cook and stir until onions are tender, about 3 minutes. Add sauce and bring to a boil. Add cooked noodles, bean spouts, carrots, green onions, and cilantro. Mix well. Cook until noodles are heated through, about 2 minutes. Sprinkle individual servings with chopped peanuts.

why no blog + recipes

I've been wondering why I don't blog anymore. And I have an easy answer: I started blogging when I was spending 8 hours a day counting caterpillar poop as a research assistant at Laurier... I had a lot of time to sit and think about various things. I needed an outlet to express those thoughts, and my blog was it. I also liked when people replied back with their own comments.

However, I now have a boyfriend who I live and work with, and anytime I have a "thought", I can share it with him and it's a more immediate discussion than anything that could happen on a blog. So yes, blog, I've left you for a boy. Not to say that I won't ever blog again - I just don't feel the same pull as I used to.

I was keeping up on my Birdnerd blog for a little bit while in Costa Rica, but it was taking too much effort so I changed to an email forum. I still have intentions on making my emails into blogs - but that's way down on the list of "things to do when I have some spare time", after video-games, sorting photos on my computer, and the like.

So I've decided to try something new, as a trial. I recently started a recipe email list to some of my friends/family who I thought might enjoy learning of new recipes. Kyle (my boyfriend) and I have several cookbooks (world, thai, mexican, brand-name, student, etc etc) and we usually try about 1-2 new recipes a week. I felt like sharing the ones that worked out, hence the email list. Now I'm moving it to the blog to see if there is interest. If anyone actually cares, I'll consider starting a separate blog, because who wants idle musings to be on the same blog as a pile of recipes!? I don't feel like it's bad taste to share a few recipes from these cookbooks, because maybe you'll actually be so inspired that you go out and buy the cookbook yourself.

On with the trial:
Fiesta Burrito Bake
Effort: easy
Ingredients: common
Cookbook: favorite brand name Vegetarian cooking 1997

1/2 envelope Club House Marinades seasoning - Tex Mex flavour (this was my modification - I couldn't find the original "fiesta red pepper soup mix")
1 can refried beans
1/2 cup sour cream
1/4 cup water
10 (6") flour tortillas (get whole wheat and it's healthier)
1 medium tomato, coarsely chopped (I usually omit the tomato because it goes soggy in the oven)
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese

- Preheat oven to 375 F
- in small bowl, combine seasoning powder, beans, sour cream and water. Spoon bean mixture onto tortillas, then roll.
- In a 13 x 9in. baking dish sprayed with nonstick cooking spray, arrange rolled tortillas; top with tomato then cheese.
- Bake covered for 15minutes. Remove cover and continue baking until cheese is melted and tortillas are heated through.
- serve, if desired, with shredded lettuce, sour cream and guacamole

Nic's comment: goes really well with "taco salad", below.


Taco Salad
Effort: med-easy
Ingredients: common
Cookbook: Student's vegetarian cookbook, Carole Raymond 1997, 2003

1 tsp veg oil
1 cup frozen corn
1 tbsp water
1 tsp ground cumin
1 med avocado, fairly ripe
1 tbsp lemon/lime juice
1/2 med. tomato, chopped
2 tbsp chopped green onion (including green part) (Nic: I prefer more onion)
2 cups salad greens, torn into bite-sized pieces
Baked tortilla chips, crumbled (I like those yellow corn ones, rather than Tostidos, for this recipe)
1 tbsp chopped fresh cilantro (this can be omitted, but it makes it taste extra good)
tabasco or other hot sauce (optional)

- in small pan, combine oil, corn, water and cumin. cover and cook on med. heat for 3 min. uncover and cook for 1-2min until water evaporates. set aside.
- slice avocado lengthwise and remove seed. cut lengthwise and crosswise slices in the flesh, making a grid pattern. scoop avocado cubes out of shells and into med. sized bowl. stir in lemon juice. add corn mixture, tomato, and scallion.
- spoon salad onto handful of greens. crumble a handful of baked tortilla chips and sprinkle them on top. toss on cilantro and a shake (or more) of Tabasco if desired.


Next time I'll try to take photos!

how to tile a counter - Costa Rica style

Make sure the counter is ugly enough that it warrants re-tiling. Yup, this one sure makes the cut!




Scrape the paint off. Hmm, it almost looks better with bare concrete than it does with peeling, water-damaged paint.



Apply Plasterbond, a chalky blue substance that is supposedly a "sealer and adhesive". and yet it appears to be water soluble. hmm.... Make sure that you don't drink any plasterbond (I swear i didn't, even if it looks like I did).


Get the tile store to cut tiles for you (it helps if the two people asking for tiles are women between the ages of 23 and 30). Based on the poor construction of your counter to begin with, plus your quick measuring job, and the fact that the tile store may or may not account for grout when they cut you tiles, you will probably have tiles that don't quite fit. It's probably good that you took home a bunch of scrap tiles, but you still have to sand down the pieces that are just too big. The rough concrete floor on your back porch works well for this step.


Mix and apply mortar. The (spanish) instructionsn on the bag only give you the appropriate ratio of water to powder if you are intending to make the whole bag. You aren't, so you try to approximate a third of the bag. You don't know how thick it's supposed to be, but when you decide it looks decent you start applying. Note: if you have a limited wardrobe, it might be wise to avoid getting any of your clothes covered in mortar - it may not come off.



Set the tiles. Use little white crosses (spacers) that don't like to stay in place. Make sure to account for flaws in the counter's construction, such as edges and corners that aren't square. You will end up with crooked grout lines and tile that don't line up, but that's OK, right?

Let the mortar set over night. Apply grout on the next rain day. Use a rubber trowel. If you don't have a rubber trowel for this step.

If you don't have a rubber trowel, a my patented flip flop technique works just as well. I give you permission to use this technique if you ever need to.

And voila! a tiled counter!

pictures

No time for a written blog today, so I post some photos of me in the field, taken by Dan, my supervisor.

Rainy Season Part Two

My last blog was about the rainy season and how frustrating it is to get out of the car, realize it’s raining too hard to do anything, sit around for 1/2 hour and then go home. On Wednesday, we got up, got dressed, got in the car and drove for 2 minutes before the rain started. What’s really frustrating is a) our field house, which is only a 5 minute drive from the study site in the Park, doesn’t get rain even when the Park does so we don’t know that it’s raining in the park until we get there, and b) it doesn’t often rain right AT dawn, it rains until 3am, then stops from 3-5 and starts again. Meaning: it’s not raining JUST exactly when we wake up, so we get ready and head out into the park, only to be shut down by the rain. Fortunately, this morning it was raining at 4am, so we just didn’t get out of bed. That’s much more tolerable. AND I got to sleep in until 6am, woohoo! Which is good, because I was awake most of the night listening to rain on the tin roof. Speaking of, our roof is leaking. There’s a leak over the toilet, a leak near our shoes, and a rotten spot of roof above my bed that occasionally drops wood chips and other random junk onto my mosquito net. I moved my bed the other day to avoid more random crap being dropped on my feet. Now I’m closer to the window, which means I get splashed with rain when it’s really heavy and the wind is strong. Classy accommodations :)

Even though the rain is frustrating, we took advantage of the time “off” to paint and clean the house. Steph and Dan have been painting one room a year since they acquired this house, and there was only one room left to paint this year: the study/office. Painting here is a bit of an ordeal, because we have to sweep the walls for cobwebs, dust, and insect leftovers and then we have to wash the wails to get rid of accumulated dirt, etc. BUT it was really rewarding because it’s clean and bright in here and I know we cleaned out most of the spiders, for now. I have a desk in the study, so it’s nice to have it clean and bright (walls are nearly white). We had some leftover paint and decided to touch up the walls in the rest of the living space (kitchen and dining room), which cascaded into us sweeping and washing THOSE walls, and now the whole place is clean and bright. I found a decorative sarong that we’re putting up in the dining room for a splash of colour. It makes me happy.

Work room before:



Work room after:
Living room Before:


Living room After:



Alrighty, it’s now June 1 and we had ANOTHER rain day today. Today was the frustrating kind; we got up, got dressed, and drove to the park. I had just turned my recorder (I record bird song from 5-6am) and it started to rain. Then it started to rain harder. What makes matters worse is I didn’t know the shortcut to get back to the main road (which is where I’d be picked up), so I bushwacked up a cliff of sorts, dodging acacia trees and stepping in puddles. What an adventure.

Back at the house, we decided to take further advantage of our time off, and we tiled the kitchen sink. Now, this sounds like a decently easy job, but Stephanie and I worked on it all day today. Yesterday we prepped the area by peeling paint and applying the Plasterbond (whatever that is). Today we did the actual tiling part... and it took us just under 12 hours. What an ordeal. We didn’t know how thick to make the “bondex” mortor stuff, and then it kept making a mess, and the tiles didn’t want to stay on vertically... Anyways, at about 4:30 we placed the last tile and cleaned up. Tomorrow is grout day. Then we have to apply caulking and then it’ll be finally done!!! We should have started this project on the first rain day. I’ll post photos of that project when we’re finished the whole shebang.

That’s pretty much all I have to say for now... it’s pretty boring when we don’t go out into the field!!!

rainy season

The rainy season official started a few days ago. Since then, we've had rain every day. It's been kind of annoying, actually.... We get up at the usual 4am, head off to the park and start doing out field research. Then around 6am it starts raining and we have to go back home. I just wish it was raining at 4am so we didn't even get out of bed!!!! Today was worse. It was raining as we got out of the car at our study site... we waited it out a bit but ended up leaving by 5:30. Really frustrating.

On the bright side, it's allowed me to catch up on some of the work I've been getting behind on. so I guess that's nice.

Today we started painting one of the rooms in the field house. It's the last room that hasn't been painted, so it'll be nice when it's finished. Boy did we uncover a lot of spiders when we moved the furniture around. Blah.

Erm I don't have much else to say so i guess that's it.

This picture is a storm front that was coming in one day. We thought it would dump a ton of rain but it was pretty anticlimactic and we didn't get any rain that day. This was before the rainy season....

Monteverde

Yesterday I had my first hot shower since leaving Canada. It was wonderful.

We're in Monteverde, a really touristy cloud forest in Costa Rica. We delayed our 3rd day off and bumped up our 4th day off to form a weekend proper, and we made the 3 hour drive from our home in Santa Rosa to a hotel in Monteverde.

We had a rain day yesterday. We went out into the field at the usual time (4:30am) and were rained out by 6:15. This works for me seeing as my best data is collected between 5am and 6am. We then left for Monteverde around 9:30 or so. Almost as soon as we got here, it started raining. Well... it IS the rainy season, I guess. We hung out in our room (Jess, Celia, David and I) and I played with my computer. After we had dinner, Jess Celia and I spend the evening reminiscing over old music and singing to old 90s dance music. It was fun. We used the "strobe effect" on our headlamps and had a party.

Today we went for a hike in the forest. But before we went into the forest itself, we hung out in a hummingbird garden. So far, I think that has to be the highlight of my trip. There were at least 7 different species of hummingbird and they were all flying around these hummingbird feeders. I took A LOT of photos, but they're still on my camera so I'll post some later. At one point, I realized how tame some of the hummingbirds were, and I got my face within about 3 inches of the hummingbird feeder, with hummingbirds on it. I even reached up my hand really slowly and pet a couple hummingbirds. I couldn't believe it. fortunately Jess was taking photos at the same time, so I have proof that I tickled a wild hummingbird's belly!!

I'm currently sitting on a balcony of a restaurant using the free wireless. I had a full meal but I'm still feeling hungry! I'm glad I'll be eating dinner in a couple hours :)

I've been posting photos on my flickr site.