Mmm Mmm Mjeddrah

It's probably strange to be thinking about hot food on a day like this (92 degrees fondly fahrenheit), but I've been reading an assortment of recipes for Mjeddrah, and it is interesting to see the variety of interpretations.

Mjeddrah is one of my go-to recipes and for years I've used the one I learned from "Diet for a Small Planet" and it has worked well both as a main course and as a base for other foods. You can even use it to make a kind of veggie burger. The recipe was simple, cook rice and lentils together with some herbs, spices and stock to get yourself a mess of pottage.

When you have a recipe that works, you can sometimes take it for granted. I did. I recently got hold of an Arabic cookbook and found two recipes in it that were interestingly different. The first one substituted bulghur for the rice, added chilis, tomato sauce, and yoghurt. It is an intentionally soupy mixture rather than the dense starchy mass that I was used to. It was delicious, and I solved the yoghurt problem by blending some silken tofu with lemon juice. I have no proportions for this last since it was done by taste.

The second recipe deconstructed the mixture into concentric circles. The outermost circle is rice, within that is a circle of red lentils and at the bullseye a mass of crispy fried onions. I haven't tried this one yet, but what's not to like?

Then I found a third recipe. This one boils the lentils until soft then puree them. Add some water and boil the puree then add a mixture of rice and bulghur. Chop some onions into small pieces and fry them in oil until golden and crispy. When the rice is almost done add the onions. Serve it with shredded green onion and radishes.

The radishes in my garden are nearly ready, so maybe I'll try that last recipe when the heat wave breaks.

Stir-fried Parrot

This recipe is called parrot because the bright mix of colors looks like the plumage of one of those colorful birds. Chard works well because of its natural color, but other leafy greens like kale, cabbage, bok choy, etc. will also work nicely.

Ingredients

• 4-6 large leaves of ruby chard
• 1/2 large sweet onion
• 1/2 yellow bell pepper
• 1/2 red bell pepper
• 1/2 pound of tofu
• 5-6 fresh basil leaves
• 1+ tsp curry powder
• 1+ tsp sesame/chili oil
• 2 Tbs olive
• 2 Tbs grape seed oil

Process

1. Press the tofu for about two hours.
2. Cut the tofu into small bite-sized chunks.
3. Mix the sesame and olive oils with the curry powder.
4. Marinade the tofu in the oil and spice mixture for an hour.
5. Roll up the chard leaves (stems at one end of the roll) and chop into 3/4 to 1" width strips. Make sure to include some stems if not all.
6. Slice the peppers into slivers.
7. Chiffonade the basil.
8. Heat the grapeseed oil in a wok on medium.
9. Add the tofu piece by piece, ensuring that it does not stick.
10. When the tofu has a crisp surface, remove it and let it drain.
11. Add the onions to the oil, followed by the peppers, chard, basil, and marinade.
12. Stir fry very briefly until the chard wilts. The onion should still be slightly crisp.
13. Remove the wok from the heat.
14. Add the tofu to the wok.
15. Toss quickly.

Serve with rice. Basmati is especially good.

Chard is high in oxalates, so if you are subject to kidney stones (as I am) lemonade, or unsweetened lemon soda is a healthy accompaniment.

The photos are of a simplified Parrot without the bell peppers.

Fennel Compote

This is the last time that I will mention how long I have been chewing vegetables and eschewing meat, dairy, and eggs. Today is the 656th day that I have been on this regimen and I think that it now counts as a permanent change in lifestyle.

I have been lackadaisical at updating this blog, but I hope to do better.

Here is a wonderful recipe with multiple layers of flavors.

Fennel Compote

Ingredients

• 2 small or one large fennel
• 3 garlic scapes
• 1 carrot
• 3 pear or small tomatoes
• 1/4 cup olive oil (or a little less)
• 1/2 cup olives (I prefer a mix of green and black and I leave the pits in.)
• 1 tsp green za'atar

Process

1. Slice the fennel and garlic scapes thinly.
2. Quarter the carrot lengthwise and slice thinly.
3. Heat the oil in a frying pan or wok on medium low.
4. Add the fennel, garlic, and carrots.
5. Cook on medium low.
6. Chop tomatoes into small pieces.
7. After the fennel has cooked for about 15 minutes, add the tomatoes, olives, and za'atar.
8. Cook another 10 minutes or so.

Serve over rice, pasta, or ruzz al shierie.

I served this over Israeli whole wheat couscous made in a rice cooker with vegetable stock.

I'm one of those people who hate to waste, so it used to distress me to discard most of the fennel fronds unused. I'd use some for garnish but most of them would be composted. I recently tried an experiment that solves the problem. I simmer the fennel fronds, along with some carrot tops for about 45 minutes, strain it, and put it into a bottle in the refrigerator. It makes an excellent, slightly licorice, ice tea.

Lentil Soup

Friday was a cold and somewhat gloomy day so I made my favorite cold weather food, lentil soup.

Some of the reasons it's my favorite are:
It's easy to make.
It's easy to modify.
It's a good way to use up stock and any scrag ends of veggies.
It tastes good.
It smells good as it cooks.

I could go on and on, but I won't. This is a good recipe to use as an example to show my thoughts process as I cook.

I decide to make lentil soup at about 0900 and spend 5 minutes searching for the lentils. I finally find a bag of them at the bottom of a plastic container filled with other bags of beans (my wife gets confused by unfamiliar beans and hides them away to avoid feeling threatened). I put the bag on the counter and open the fridge to look for vegetables. I have two carrots and the remnants of a bunch of celery. I also have some onions and garlic in the large storage bowl on the counter along with one lonely potato.

Cool! I dice the onion, celery, and potato. I mince the garlic, and grate the carrot.  I pour some olive oil into a soup pot (medium-low) and start the onion, garlic, carrot, and celery frying. I wash and dry my hands.

Now I pull down some spice jars. I put a hefty 3-finger pinch of whole cumin into the pot, followed by a 2-finger pinches of whole mustard seed, rosemary, thyme, and sea salt. Two dried chilis are tossed in whole. I have about 3 cups of stock left and I pour it all in followed by the potatoes and, at last, about a half pound of lentils. I wait until it starts to simmer, then turn the heat down until it's just barely on.

I get to work on my writing projects for the day. Every time I go out to the kitchen to make a cup of tea, I stir the soup and add water if it needs it. Once the lentils are nice and soft, I add a cup of chopped tomatoes left over from the Metch failure.

About 1730 my wife decides that she wants to play a couple of games of Mancala. Before we start I toss check the cupboards and find a couple of partial boxes of pasta and toss them into the soup too.

Dinner is at 1830 and is wonderful. A big bowl of soup with plenty of refills available, a couple of slices of toasted whole grain bread with an olive oil based spread.

Now I've made myself hungry again.

Zkhuk Yarok - Step-by-step

Yes, I know I changed the spelling. It's listed as an alternative and I like all the Zs and Ks.

I listed the ingredient amounts in an earlier post so I'm just going to take you through the process.

First you wash your cilantro to make sure that it is clear of sand or whatever other growing medium they used. Let it drip-dry in a colander.

Then, if like me you're crazy enough to only have pods, you have to decorticate the cardamom (take the seeds out).

Take the cardamom seed, cumin seed, and coriander seed and dry roast them in a skillet.

When they are nice and toasty, put them into a suribachi or mortar and grind them to a powder.

After I grind the spices, I put the powder through a wire strainer to remove the hull of the coriander. (Anything that doesn't get through the sieve goes into the stock pot.) Ad some ground cloves and a two-finger pinch of salt to the other spices.

Peel an entire bulb's worth of garlic cloves.

Smash them with the side of the cleaver and mince them coarsely.

Cut off the stems of about 6 fresh green chilis (I used jalapenos) and slice them in half. long ways.

Clean out the pith but leave some of the seeds. Toss everything that you just prepared into the food processor and turn it on. Drizzle olive oil into it until it seems to have the right consistency.

This makes enough to fill one of my standard small storage containers (empty 1 pound Teddy Peanut Butter glass jar. 

I've designed a label for it, and my wife is going to illuminate it. when it's done I'll post a picture of the finished product. 

Day 65/240: Roast Baby Bellas with Brussels Sprouts

No need to repeat the instructions. The modification this time was that, after cleaning and halving the sprouts, I tossed them in a mixture of olive oil and mango chutney and left them to marinate for a while.

They were very tasty but, for some reason, this time they left me gassy.

Day 60/240: Hummus Roll-ups with Skhug Yarok

I made a supply of hummus today. A pound of cooked chickpeas formed the base to which I added 2 Tbs of tahini, about 1/4 cup olive oil, a tsp of ground cumin, a dash of cayenne, and four minced cloves of garlic. This should last me a couple of days.

Then, for the very first time I made Skhug Yarok. This is the hot green sauce that you get at traditional felafel stands. The last time I had some was in Israel many years ago. Someone reminded me of the sauce and some searching got me a couple of excellent recipes which I tweaked very slightly.

DAMN that stuff is good. It is going to be my new "go to" condiment, and the recipe is dead simple, it's just a pesto that substitutes green chilis for the cheese.


Skhug Yarok
Ingredients

• 1 bunch cilantro
• 6-8 hot green peppers (choose them to your own capsaicin tolerance)
• 6-8 cloves of garlic
• 2 tsps cumin seed
• 2 tsps coriander seed
• 1 tsp black peppercorn
• 2 tsps cardamom seed
• 1/4 tsp ground cloves
• 2/3 tsp salt
• EV olive oil

Preparation

1. Wash the cilantro and let it drip dry while you ... 
2. Clean and seed the peppers. 
3. Toast coriander, cardamom, and cumin seed.
4. Grind all seeds in a suribachi or mortar.
5. Mince garlic.
6. Put everything into a food processor.
7. Process to a paste adding a small amount of olive oil until your preferred consistency is reached.

Supposedly this will keep nicely in the refrigerator for 2-4 weeks but, in reality, I think it'll be used-up long before that time.


I purchased some tomato-basil flatbreads and spread the hummus down the middle of one, added some avocado slices, a little tomato, and a beautiful green stripe of Skhug Yarok.

Bliss, my friends ... just bliss.

Day 57/240: Seitanic Salad Sandwich

I cooked up a small batch of seitan tonight. The gluten was mixed with curry powder and stock. I tried something new, though. Instead of simmering the seitan in a flavored liquid, instead I steamed it with plain water.

I was really pleased with how it turned out. It was nowhere near as juicy (soggy) as the simmered stuff. I put about half of the batch into the fridge for a future meal, and chopped up the rest into a fairly small dice. I mixed it with diced celery and diced onions and held the mass together with a tofu mayonnaise.

Two slices of whole grain toast and some additional celery sticks completed the meal. All in all a very successful experiment.

Day 55/240: Worm Salad

No, of course it's not real worms. I was having so much fun with my rotary cutter that I decided to make a salad with it.

Essentially, I just took a zucchini, a carrot, and an onion and put them through the slicer, then mixed in a vinaigrette style dressing jazzed up a bit with a couple of teaspoons of cilantro chutney and a dried chili.

It's easy to do. Just cut a cylinder of the vegetable, hold the machine with one hand and turn the crank with the other. Then HEY PRESTO!

The carrot works the same way.

I just added the dressing and mixed it all together and added some whole grain toast spread with a mixture of crunchy peanut butter and Hoisin sauce.

Yum.

Next time I'll need to remember to shorten the cylinders. The strands were about 4-5 feet long and just a tad unwieldy.

Sweet Potato Latkes with Roasted Onions and Hummus

This was my dinner tonight.

Ingredients

• 6 small white onions
• 1 medium sweet potato
• 2 cloves garlic
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 1 Tbs flax meal
• 1 Tbs hot stock
• 1/4 cup chickpea flour
• Olive oil
• Chili powder
• 4 Tbs leftover hummus

Method

1. Heat oven to 350
2. Peel the onions, cut off the ends and slice them in half across the grain.
3. Crush and mince the garlic.
4. Mix the stock with the flax meal.
5. Peel and grate the potato.
6. Put the potato in a bowl and add the garlic, flour, flax and lemon juice. 
7. Mix well. (Add more stock if it doesn't hold together well.)
8. Oil a roasting pan.
9. Form the potato mixture into 4-6 patties and place on the pan.
10. Put the onion halves in the gaps.
11. Mist all the vegetables with an olive oil spray.
12. Dust the potato patties with chili powder.
13. Bake for app 20 minutes.
14. Broil for app 2-3 minutes to get a slight char (optional).
15. Pile hummus in middle of plate and arrange cooked items artistically around it.

I dabbed hummus on each bite of the latkes as I ate them. Delicious!

I should note that my sweet potatoes were not grated. I was given a spiral slicer as a gift, and used it to make this dish. The strands of sweet potato were two to three feet long.

Day 54/240: Lamacun

This is what I had for dinner last night.

Ingredients

• 4 small pitas
• 1/2 can tomato paste
• 1/2 cup TVP
• 1/4 cup dried mushrooms
• 3/4 cup stock
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp coriander
• 1 dried chili
• olive oil

Method

1. Heat the oven to 350.
2. Heat the stock to a simmer.
3. Dry roast the cumin and coriander in a skillet.
4. Grind them fine in a mortar or suribachi.
5. Mix the dry TVP, mushrooms, cumin, and coriander in a bowl.
6. Add the stock and mix well.
7. Grind the chili to powder.
8. Add the chili. tomato paste and a glug or two of olive oil to the TVP.
9. Mix well.
10. Coat a roasting pan with olive oil.
11. Spread the TVP mixture on each of pitas (don't bother to split them) getting it as close to the edge as possible.
12. Put the pitas in the pan.
13. Put the pan in the oven on the middle rack.
14. Bake for about 7-10 minutes.
15. Move the pan to the upper rack.
16. Bake until the outer edge of the crust starts to brown.
17. Let cool for a few minutes.
18. Serve.

A glass of unsweetened lemon water is good with this. If you have lettuce, celery sticks, or zucchini sticks, you can fold them into a lamacun and have a nicely balanced meal.

Mushroom Potato Soup with Miso

I'm feeling a bit better so I built myself something a bit more substantial than plain miso soup.

Ingredients

• 6 medium button mushrooms
• 1 leftover baked potato
• 3 cloves garlic
• 2 scallions
• 1/2 tsp mustard seed
• 1 Tbs chickpea miso or other shiromiso (white miso)
• 2-3 cups of cold V stock
• olive oil

Method

1. Grind the mustard seed coarsely.
2. Smash and mince the garlic.
3. Quarter the mushrooms.
4. Chop the scallions, reserving the green parts for garnish.
5. Peel the potato or scoop out the insides.
6. Mash the potato and miso with a little stock until well blended.
7. Put a saucepan on medium low.
8. Add olive oil.
9. When it sizzles add the garlic, scallions, mustard seed.
10. Stir.
11. Add the mushrooms.
12. Stir until cooked.
13. Add the potato mixture.
14. Stir some more.
15. Add the V stock.
16. Turn the heat down to simmer.
17. Cook until the soup is the desired thickness.
18. Pour into a bowl and garnish with scallions.

Serve with toasted rye bread.

Day 37/180: Deconstructed Baba Ganoush with Roasted Vegetables

The idea for this recipe came to me as I was looking at some seed catalogs. I was admiring the eggplant varieties when it occurred to me that the components of Baba Ganoush would work well separately.

Ingredients

• 1 small eggplant
• 1/2 red bell pepper
• 4 large button mushrooms
• 6-8 small white onions
• 2 tsp tahini
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 1 tsp balsamic vinegar
• 4 cloves garlic
• more olive oil

Method

1. Slice the eggplant into 1/2" thick rounds.
2. Place eggplant in a bowl and salt it.
3. Come back an hour later.
4. Heat the oven to 375.
5. Slice bell pepper into strips.
6. Peel the onions and remove the root and tip.
7. Slice the mushrooms in half.
8. Crush but do not mince 1 clove of garlic (the others are for the sauce).
9. Drain the liquid from the eggplant.
10. Add a couple of glugs of olive oil to the bowl.
11. Put all the vegetables (except the garlic) into the bowl and toss until well coated with oil.
12. Place vegetables on a shallow baking pan with the crushed garlic clove in the middle. (Optional: you can dust the eggplant rounds with a spice mix.)
13. Place pan on center rack in oven for 35 minutes.
14. Crush and mince remaining garlic cloves.
15. Combine the garlic with the remaining ingredients in a small bowl.
16. Mix well.
17. After 35 minutes, turn the oven off.
18. Put the pan under the broiler for about two minutes, or until the vegetables start to brown.
19. Let the vegetables cool for a minute.
20. Arrange tastefully on a plate.
21. Drizzle the sauce over the eggplant.

This was one of the nicest meals I've made.

Day 32/180: Shiitake Happens Soup

This recipe just jumped into my head. I had a good pot of V(egetable) stock on the stove. I can't remember everything that was in it, but there were two stalks of celery, the ends and paper of three yellow onions, about half a small hand of ginger, the roots and wilted leaves of about 10 scallions, a couple of carrot tops and tips, and (oddly) some leftover lima beans that my wife thoughtfully added. It had been brewing for a couple of days. In addition, someone had given me an abundance of dried shiitake mushrooms.

Ingredients

• 10 dried shiitake mushrooms
• 1 clove garlic
• 3 cups V stock
• 1-2 Tbs olive oil
• 1 Tbs flour
• 1/2 tsp curry powder

Method

1. Reconstitute 4 shiitakes in the stock.
2. Put remaining shiitakes into a food processor and pulse until you have primarily mushroom powder.
3. Add 1 cup V stock to mushroom powder in the food processor and pulse to mix well.
4. Chop the 4 shiitakes into small chunks.
5. Peel, smash and mince the garlic.
6. Put a small saucepan (1 qt) on medium low.
7. Add the oil.
8. Add the garlic.
9. Add the flour.
10. Add the curry powder.
11. Stir until it forms a nice roux.
12. Add 2 cups V stock to the saucepan.
13. Stir well.
14. Add the mushroom mess from the food processor.
15. Stir well.
16. Add the mushroom chunks.
17. Turn the heat to barely simmer and cook, stirring occasionally for 10-15 minutes, adding more V stock if needed.

I had a cup of this a while ago and it is rich. I'm saving the rest for dinner which I'll flesh (so-to-speak) out with a cherry tomato, sliced zucchini, and peapod salad tossed with olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

Day 31/180: Stuffed Portobellos and Baby Potatoes

Simple thing today. Two large mushroom caps stuffed with a mixture of breadcrumbs, herbs, garlic, and minced mushroom stems, placed in a roasting pan with 6 tiny potatoes and roasted at 375 for 35 minutes. A small lettuce and cherry tomato salad on the side with an olive oil and tamarind chutney dressing.

Day 29/180: Easy Stir Fry

I still had snow pea pods, scallions, carrots, ginger, etc. left from the stir fry the other night, so I made it again. I added reconstituted dried shiitake to supplement it since I wasn't using seitan. I served it over brown rice cooked in water containing a little tumeric.

Day 28/180: Seitanic Stew

Two things to get out of the way.

1. Yes, I know this post should be labeled Day Twenty Late. Sorry. I wish I could promise that it will never happen again but I'd be lying if I did.
2. No, I will probably never get enough of making silly puns on the word "seitan".

That's out of the way, so let's talk food. The smallest batch of seitan that I've made uses a cup of gluten and makes about eight good-sized pieces. That means that, since I only used two pieces of the curry seitan for my stir fry on Day 27, I had to find some ways to use up the rest.

So I fried some up as steaks for breakfast leaving me with four to go. So I put two of them in a plastic bag and put them in the freezer to see how that worked. While I was trying to find room, I noticed a bag of thick slices of raw butternut squash that I'd left there a few weeks ago, and two solutions popped into my head. If I took out the squash there'd be room for the seitan and, with a frost on the ground, it was a great night for a stew. I had a good idea for the recipe.

Seitanic Stew
Ingredients

• 1/2 lb (more or less) butternut squash
• 2 seitan steaks (mine are about 6" x 3" x 3/4" so increase or decrease accordingly)
• 1 medium yellow onion
• 1 large potato or 3 small ones
• 2 Tbs curry powder (I ran out of Bolst's which is my favorite so I ended up using a namby-pamby Madras-style) 
• Peanut or some other cooking oil
• 1 tsp cumin seed
• 1 tsp mustard seed
• 1 dried chili
• Water or vegetable stock

Method

1. Dice the onion and squash.
2. Put a small amount of oil in a saucepan on medium heat, and fry the onion until translucent.
3. Turn the heat to barely simmer.
4. Add two cups of water or V stock.
5. Add curry powder.
6. Add the squash.
7. Add enough additional water or stock to cover the squash (if necessary).
8. Cover pot.
9. Cook for a few hours.
10. Mash the squash with a fork (or put it through a food processor and return it to the pan).
11. Slice the seitan into strips.
12. Cut the potato into 1" cubes.
13. Add seitan and potato to the squash.
14. Continue to cook on barely simmer for another hour or so.

Just before serving:

1. Dry pan roast the cumin and mustard seed in a small skillet.
2. When the mustard starts to pop pour the seeds into a mortar or suribachi.
3. Add the dried chili.
4. Grind well. 
5. Add 2 Tbs of oil to the skillet.
6. Add the spices to the oil.
7. Sizzle very briefly. (Don't let it burn!)
8. Serve the stew with a drizzle of the spiced oil. (Don't overdo it, there should be enough oil for three bowls or more.)

If you know Indian cooking you'll recognize the last section as being a kind of "tarka", a topping usually used with dhal (lentils). It works well with other dishes too.

I need to write up a shopping list. I have a sudden craving for papadums.

Day 27/180: Seitan's Stir-fry

I should have done this on the 31st, just for the sound of it. I'm not going to make this a formal recipe since it was made up as I went along.

First the seitan. I used the standard recipe, but reduced the amount of water in the dough so the proportions were 1 cup gluten to 7/8 cup water. I also added about 3 Tbs of curry powder to the dry gluten before mixing. I used about four cups of water, a vegetarian bouillon cube and about 3 Tbs of light soy sauce for the boiling mixture.

I cooked it for an hour and took the seitan out to cool. I used the remaining liquid to make a small pot of couscous and mushrooms.

After it cooled and drained, I sliced the seitan into thin strips and stir-fried it with 2 minced cloves of garlic, 1 Tbs minced fresh ginger, 4 baby carrots cut in thirds, 1 small zucchini sliced with a rolling cut, three scallions, and about 8 snow pea pods. At the end I added a corn starch soy sauce and water mixture to make a gravy.

It was excellent.

I think my next seitan experiment may be to use chili powder in the mix.

Multi-cultural Portobellos

I had a plan ... but it somehow got a little bit twisted. It was to be stuffed Portobellos for dinner, but it ended up being a romp through the atlas.

Ingredients

• 2 large portobello mushrooms (Italy or France)
• 3/4 cup seasoned breadcrumbs (Italian seasoning)
• 4 Tbs olive oil (Greece)
• 3 Tbs hummus (Lebanon with miso from Japan)
• 4 small purple potatoes (Peru) 
• 1 dried bird chili (Thailand)

Method

1. Start heating oven to 350.
2. Mix breadcrumbs, 2 Tbs olive oil, and hummus in a small bowl.
3. Oil a baking pan.
4. Stuff mushrooms with contents of bowl.
5. Place on baking pan.
6. Grind chili to flakes or powder.
7. Dust chilis on mushrooms.
8. Cut purple potatoes in half.
9. Toss potatoes with olive oil.
10. Place potatoes on baking pan cut side down.
11. Place pan in oven for 30 minutes.
12. Serve, but let it rest a bit because the stuffing takes a while to cool to an edible temperature.

Add in the cup of Lapsang Souchong (China) that I had while I was cooking and the glass of single malt from Scotland that I'm sipping as I write, and I feel every inch the world traveler.

Day 19/180: Roast vegetables with kasha

It is a cold, wet, and gray day here in New England. Yesterday the leaves were just starting to turn, today it looks like they're gone. There's a blustery wind outside flinging handfuls of raindrops at my window and a damp chill pervades everything.

A good day to use the oven.

Roast Vegetables With Kasha
Ingredients

• 6 small potatoes
• 18 fresh Brussels sprouts
• 4 slices portobello mushroom
• 1 large carrot
• Olive oil
• Balsamic vinegar
• 1/2 cup kasha
• 1 cup v. stock 
• 1/3 cup dried mushrooms

Method

1. Heat the oven to 400
2. Cut the potatoes in half.
3. Cut the carrot into app 4" lengths, then quarter it lengthwise making thick carrot sticks.
4. Trim about 1/8th" off the stem off each sprout an strip off any wilted leaves.
5. Remember to put all trimmings into the stock pot.
6. Cut each sprout in half across the stem.
7. Put the potatoes, carrots, and sprouts int a large bowl.
8. Douse the vegetables with olive oil and toss well.
9. Add balsamic vinegar and toss some more.
10. Arrange in a flat bottom roasting pan cut side down.
11. Gently coat the mushrooms with what's left of the marinade.
12. Add them to the roasting pan.
13. Put the roasting pan into the oven for 30 minutes.
14. Put a large saucepan on medium.
15. Add the olive oil.
16. Add the kasha.
17. Stir until kasha sizzles and is fully coated with oil.
18. Turn the heat down to simmer.
19. Add the dried mushrooms.
20. Add the stock.
21. Stir.
22. Cover.
23. Turn the heat off under the pan and let it sit while you wait for ...
24. When the vegetables are done, put a mound of kasha in the middle of the plate.
25. Arrange vegetables around it.

I added a little puddle of tamarind chutney and another of cilantro chutney just to keep my tastebuds tickled.

Obviously this can be tweaked to your own preference or vegetable availability. Zucchini or summer squash would work well. Eggplant would take a little more prep.