Black Bean Soup with Hominy

It's a beautiful winter day here in the Hudson Valley. As I cook today, I'm watching live coverage of events as they unfold in Egypt and praying for both peace and justice for the people there. I'm also thinking about David Kato, the gay activist who was murdered in Uganda, and other courageous lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people who face persecution and violence around the world and here in the US. Keep loving each other, friends.

Today's soup is a spicy vegan black bean soup made extra hearty with the addition of hominy.

I began early this morning by cleaning & rinsing 2 lbs of dried black beans and then soaking them in hot water. I love the color of black beans which in a certain light are actually a very very dark purple. When they are wet they glisten like black jewels.



After a couple of hours, the beans were hydrated. I rinsed them again and covered them with fresh water. Cooking over medium heat, a slow boil, I added several cloves of minced garlic, and two large onions. I let the beans cook gently for a couple of hours and then I added a can of tomato paste, to help thicken the broth, and 2 chopped green peppers.

I seasoned the soup with Goya Adobo, liquid smoke, chili powder, ground cumin, black pepper and oregano. The flavor seemed a bit flat and a little bitter, so I brightened it with some vinegary juice from a jar of picked hot peppers and mellowed it a dash of sugar.

When the beans were nice and tender and the broth was rich and thick, I added 2 drained cans of white hominy.

It was ready to eat. I dished up a bowl for myself for dinner and garnished it with some grated extra sharp cheddar cheese (oops! not vegan anymore), some crispy fried onions, a squirt of sriracha sauce and some tortilla chips. The rest will go to Friends at Bulls Head Meeting tomorrow.

Sweet Potato Ginger soup w/ Peanut

I woke up early this morning to make today's soup to take to Bulls Head Meeting and it was -3F outside. While I was cooking a red-shouldered hawk was perched outside the window and the ice on the trees across the Hudson river was tinged pink in the morning sun. Ice covered the river completely until an ice breaker came through later in the day.

As soon as the soup was done, I ate some of it steaming hot for breakfast. It was savory and sweet. The aroma is bright with ginger and I garnished my bowl with some lemon zest, crispy fried onions, and chopped roasted peanuts. When it's this cold, soup is my favorite thing to eat. This is the third soup I've made this week!

I started by peeling and mincing about 3 Tbs of fresh ginger and peeling and dicing a medium-sized onion. I heated a little olive oil in the bottom of my soup pot and sauteed them until the onions were translucent. Then I added 2 cups of apple juice and let everything simmer while I prepared the sweet potatoes.


I peeled and cut into chunks a whole bunch of sweet potatoes. I lost count, but I think it was about 6 big ones. I rinsed them and added them to the pot with enough water to cover liberally. I let them simmer until tender.

While simmering, I seasoned the soup with spices. I'm guessing at the quantities here, because I didn't measure anything, but tasted it as I went along: 1.5 tsp ground ginger, 1 tsp nutmeg, .5 tsp cloves, 1 tsp allspice, 2 tsp black pepper, .5 tsp vanilla extract, salt to taste.

When the sweet potatoes were tender, I ran upstairs & borrowed my landlady's immersion blender. I blended the soup until it was nice and smooth and then stirred in about 3 Tbs creamy peanut butter. I wanted the peanut butter to add a little richness and flavor but not overpower the ginger and spices, so I added a little at a time and tasted until I got it right. I finished the soup with a generous squeeze of lemon juice.

Merry & Pippin's Onion Soup

My friends sometimes accuse me of being a bit of a hobbit, meaning I suppose, that I enjoy the simple pleasures, especially good food shared with friends. Anyway, that's what I tell myself, but they could mean that I'm short and have hairy toes. As I sit here holed-up in my warm, comfy home looking out on a nasty storm of 'wintery mix', I'm perfectly happy to be a hobbit today.

One of the hobbit's favorite foods is mushrooms. I love the scene in the Fellowship of the Ring when Frodo, Sam, Merry & Pippin stumble onto land where Frodo had been caught illicitly hunting mushrooms as a youth. After reuniting with the farmer, the hobbits are sent on their way with a basket of mushrooms as a token of forgiveness. I wanted to name this soup after the farmer, but would you eat it if I named it 'Maggot's Onion Soup'? I didn't think so.

This soup is similar to a French Onion Soup, but that soup relies on beef or veal stock for it's broth. In order to make a vegetarian version, I'm making a mushroom broth instead. The soup is vegan if you don't put the cheese on at the end, but I love the cheese. It adds a wonderful dimension. I'll call this one vegetarian.

I began by rinsing a large handful of dried shitake mushrooms and soaking them in hot water. As they hydrate, the soaking water will turn into a mushroom 'tea' that will flavor the broth.



I peeled and sliced 5 large onions. In my soup pot, I heated a little bit of olive oil and threw in the onions. I let the onions cook over medium heat until they were caramelized - a nice toasty brown. I let this take a good long time, like about 20-30 min - there's an ice storm outside, I'm not going anywhere. Then I added a half pound of sliced fresh baby bella mushrooms and continued caramelizing the mushrooms and onions together.


When they were sufficiently brown, I poured in a half-cup of dry red wine and stirred it around to get up all of the deliciousness was starting to stick to the bottom of the pan. Then I poured in the soaking liquid from the shitakes.

I seasoned the broth with Bragg Liquid Aminos, black pepper, and one cube of Knorr vegetable bouillon and added some more water.

I made some croutons by slicing some day-old baguette rolls, sprinkling them with olive oil and toasting them in the oven at 350F. After about 6 min, I flipped them over to let them brown on both sides.

To finish the soup, I dished it into a bowl, topped it with the croutons and then grated some aged provolone cheese on top. This went under the broiler for about 3 minutes until the cheese was melted and toasted.

A few years ago, scientists reported that in addition to the 4 tastes the tongue could discern - salt, sweet, sour, & bitter - a fifth taste had been recognized, umami. Umami is sometimes described as savory or earthy. If you want to experience umami, try this soup. With the mushrooms, the caramelized onions, the Bragg's, and the cheese, this soup is rich with umami.

Any soup blog that begins with hobbits must end with umami.

Vegan Minestrone

This week's soup is a vegan minestrone, full of lovely vegetables, fragrant with Italian herbs, and hearty with Roman beans and whole grain pasta.

I started by soaking a pound of dried Roman beans. You could also use pink beans, cranberry beans, light red or dark red kidney beans or really just about any kind of reddish bean. After the beans were fully hydrated, I drained and rinsed them and then returned them to the pan, covered with fresh water. I cooked them over medium low heat until just barely done.

To add liquid to the soup I added a large can of whole peeled tomatoes, which I broke into pieces with my cooking paddle, a large can of diced tomatoes, and a small can of tomato sauce. I added a bit more water so I would have enough liquid to cook the rest of the ingredients and still have a broth. I added a chopped onion and 3 cloves of chopped garlic for flavor and turned up the heat to med high, so I'd have an easy rolling boil.

Next I chopped up my vegetables into bite-sized pieces and added them: 4 carrots, 2 stalks of celery, a big handful of red cabbage, 2 green bell peppers, and 2 green zucchini squash. I put them in the pot in this order because it takes the carrots longest to cook, followed by the celery and so on. Finally I threw in a half a bag of frozen chopped spinach that I had leftover from my dinner a couple of nights ago.

While the veggies were cooking I seasoned the broth by adding a couple Tbs of sofrito cooking base, some Sabbathday Lake Shaker Italian seasoning which includes garlic, basil, fennel seeds, oregano, parsley, & thyme, oregano, black pepper, Adobo seasoning, Bragg Liquid Aminos and a shot of the juice from a jar of pickled banana peppers. I'm not giving the quantities of these seasonings because I believe in tasting instead of measuring. If you aren't confident doing this, a big pot of soup is good to practice on. It's very forgiving and you aren't likely to overdo the seasoning if you have a large quantity of food to work on. Taste as you go! It will start out bland, and as you add each flavor, you'll learn what taste it brings to the mix. Get a little of everything in there, and then add a little more of this or that until it pleases you. Your tongue is the most important tool in your kitchen.

When the carrots were cooked, I threw in a box of whole grain rotini pasta and let it cook until it was just barely done. I'm taking this soup to meeting tomorrow so it will need to withstand overnight storage and reheating and I don't want the pasta to get mushy.

In the picture, I garnished my soup with a little pecarino romano cheese, so the photo isn't vegan. If you leave the cheese off, the soup is though.

P.S. I love it when people post comments. If you try these soups or if you have suggestions based on your own experiments, I'd love to hear!

Hoppin' John

Today's offering is a New Year's tradition that I grew up with, black-eyed peas a/k/a Hoppin' John, served here with collard greens and garnished with Sriracha sauce.

I just hosted a potluck with Friends and we had lovely foods such as smoked trout, veggie chili, a mixed berry pie and chocolate to go with it. Tomorrow, the rest of the black-eyed peas will go to Bulls Head Meeting to be shared with Friends.

When I was growing up, the black-eyed peas were cooked with ham hocks. Some southern recipes call for bacon and bacon fat. This version is vegan but does not sacrifice any flavor. The smoke pork products provide 3 things to the dish: fat, salt and a smokey flavor. I compensate for their absence with liquid smoke, a dash of sesame oil, soy sauce and Adobo seasoning.

Hoppin' John is very easy to make. Start the night before by soaking dried black-eyed peas in water. First, it's a good idea to look them over closely and pick out any non-pea debris that you find. It's common with dried beans to find some inedible bits in the bag that didn't get sorted out in the packaging process. I used 3 lbs of dried beans for this batch but that is a LOT. Usually 1 lb will feed a family with left overs.

The next day, drain the peas into a collander and rinse with cold water. In the bottom of your dry soup pot, heat a little oil and then brown 1 large onion, sliced longitudinally, for each pound of peas you're cooking. Stir the onions frequently as they caramelize. When they are a nice toasty brown, put the peas into the pot and add water until they are covered plus a couple of extra inches. Bring the pot to a boil then reduce heat and simmer. After about 1/2 hour, add your seasonings to taste: liquid smoke, soy sauce or Bragg Liquid Aminos, sesame oil, Adobo seasoning, black pepper and rosemary. Taste the broth!

When the beans are not quite done - you can bite them but not pleasantly, stir in 3/4 cup of brown rice for each pound of peas you're cooking. Allow to cook until the rice is done. The peas will be done then too. You may have to add more water as the peas and rice soak it up.

I like to garnish my peas with some heat, either Sriracha sauce or Tabasco sauce and serve it next to some collard greens, cooked as I described in this blog post. I love the earthy down-home taste and feel of this meal. It's healthy too!

Tofu Erotica

Let's face it, when you hear the word 'tofu', you probably don't think 'erotica'... yet. This dish is complex in taste and texture and just so luscious that it has earned its name.

Before I tell you how to make it, I want to tell you the story of how this dish came to be. For me, it's a highly personal story that reflects many phases of my life.

Many years ago, I checked out a book from the library called Mrs. Chiang's Szechwan Cookbook. This book has been tremendously influential on my cooking for two reasons: 1) it taught me many of the secrets of Chinese cooking, and 2) it was a library book so I had to take it back and that gave me the freedom to improvise on what I had learned rather than continuing to reproduce Mrs. Chiang's food. One of the dishes in the book that I loved was Anise Chicken, which became the seed of what over about 20 years eventually evolved into something entirely different, Tofu Erotica.

Each time I made Anise Chicken, I changed it a little. I added more mushrooms and more hot peppers. I added different kinds of mushrooms. It became one of my favorites.

One year, after I had recently come out, my life was in a lot of turmoil and I found myself living in a new town and alone at Christmastime. On Christmas eve, I knew that rather than feeling sorry for myself I needed to do something special. I went to the store and found all the ingredients, went back home and made Anise Chicken, just for me. After a lifetime of cooking for a family and always thinking about the tastes of others, it was a revelation that I could take the same care and cook something special just for me. It wasn't a traditional holiday food, but I wasn't having a traditional holiday experience - or rather, without realizing it then, I was creating one for myself.

For the next several years, even though I had more and more people around me in an extended, chosen family, I would make Anise Chicken sometime near Christmas to remind me to take care of myself. One time, I had some friends, John Nanci and Penny Jacobs over and they tasted it and I think it was Penny who said, "This is so good you should call it Chicken Erotica."

The next year, I was hosting a large gathering of family, friends, lovers, and lovers of lovers for a holiday we made up called "Winter Warmth Day". I believe in starting one's own traditions. Winter Warmth Day falls somewhere between the winter solstice and Christmas. The food ritual is to make and eat what you like without regard to other traditions. For me, at the time, that meant Chicken Erotica. One of the guests was vegan and I wondered if I could make a vegan version of the dish. I tried using tofu instead of chicken. Not only did it work, it was so much better! The tofu picked up the subtle flavors of the sauce better than the chicken and the texture in the mouth contrasted with the mushrooms in a way that was, well - best described as erotic. I've been making it with tofu ever since, not as a substitute for chicken, but an improvement. Tofu Erotica was born!

I still make this every year for my personal Winter Warmth Day.

When you first read this 'recipe' it will seem like it's full of exotic ingredients. While many of them can be found in the bigger, urban grocery stores, a trip to your local Asian market will be a fun outing and you will find everything in this recipe much cheaper there. You will find that you'll have more of some ingredients than you need. The star anise and peppers will keep for a long time in the freezer and you can also share with friends.


How to Make It

Begin by rinsing about 10 whole dried shitake mushrooms and soaking them in 3 cups of boiling water. It's important to rinse them first, because the tea-like liquid that results from the soaking will also go into the dish. In a separate vessel, soak about 1/4 cup of dried tree ear fungus in about 3 cups of boiling water.

Next, do a bit of preparation at the cutting board before starting to cook. Rinse and slice a 2 inch piece of fresh ginger cross-wise into pieces about 1/4 inch thick (no need to peel). Rinse and trim a bunch of scallions (a/k/a green onions - about 12) and cut both the white and green parts into 1 inch long pieces. Slice 1 pound of fresh mushrooms. These could be portabella, baby bellas, garden-variety button mushrooms, or a mixture. It's ok to buy them already sliced to save yourself a bit of work. Cut up a 14 - 16 oz block of extra firm tofu into 1/2 inch squares x 1/4 inch thick. Precision is not necessary, it's just tofu and will break up a bit as it cooks.

It's time to start cooking. Heat a couple of tablespoons of good high-temp oil, such as peanut, in a wok over high temp, then add the sliced ginger, 10-12 whole dried red hot peppers, and 8-10 whole (or equivalent pieces) star anise. It's helpful to count the number of each that you use - you'll see why later. Keep everything moving with a cooking paddle and pay attention! These ingredients are mostly dry, so they don't have water in them to bring down the temp of the oil and can scorch easily. If you scorch it, throw it away and start over. What you are doing is extracting the aromatic molecules from these ingredients and infusing them into the oil.

After 30 sec to 1 min, throw in the green onions and keep everything moving.

When the green onions begin to wilt, throw in the fresh mushrooms. You can breath a little now, because the mushrooms have enough water in them to moderate the temp of the wok, but don't leave your post. Stir-fry the mushrooms until they've released much of their water and reduced in volume.

Add the tofu and stir everything together. You can relax a little now, because there are enough watery things in the wok to bring the temp down to 212F. Let this cook for about 10 minutes, stirring gently occasionally.

Remove the shitake mushrooms from their soaking water and pour the liquid into the wok. Add 4 Tbs soy sauce. Add 1/4 cup of Chinese shao shing wine. If you can't find this kind of wine, dry sherry will do or you can leave it out.

Slice the shitakes into strips. If they have tough stems, cut them off and discard them. Put the strips into the wok and stir it all together.

Reduce heat and let it simmer, uncovered for about 40 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Employing a great deal of patience, pick out the peppers, star anise, and ginger slices. This is why it was helpful to count the number of pieces you put in earlier.

Drain and rinse the tree ear fungus. Pick or cut out any woody bits, then slice into strips and add to the wok.

Stir in 1 tsp sugar.

Dissolve 1 Tbs corn starch in 1/4 cup of cold water. Drizzle half the corn starch mixture into the wok and stir well. It should make a sauce the consistency of a thick gravy. If necessary, stir in the 2nd half.

Finish the dish by stirring 1 Tbs of sesame oil.

Serve with rice or rice noodles and garnish with sliced green onions, if you like.

This dish is even better the next day. It's best served warm rather than piping hot.

Festive Red Cabbage

Tomorrow is our annual holiday potluck at Bulls Head Friends Meeting, so instead of making soup, I'm making my contribution to the potluck.

Our potlucks tend to be rather heavy on desserts and carbs and rather light on protein and vegetables, so I'm making a healthy veggie dish, Red Cabbage.

The cabbage I have is a big purple-red one and is one of the long-storing vegetables from my last CSA share this year. This is a simple, easy, and cheap dish to make.

I started by slicing a large onion into julienne strips, the I sauted the onion in a big of olive oil in my wok until it was a lovely golden brown and smelled like the good part of the county fair. While the onions were browning, I cut my red cabbage up into thin strips. My cabbage was bigger than my head, so I only used about 2/3's of it. The rest I'll save for something else. When the onions were caramelized, I put the cabbage into the wok and stir-fried them together. The big challenge was getting all that cabbage to stay in the pan - I ended up getting another paddle and gently tossing the veg with both hands. When it was still crunchy, but warmed through, I added 1/4 cup of apple cider vinegar, a good squirt of soy sauce, and a dash of liquid smoke. I reduced the heat, covered the wok, and let it simmer/steam for about 10 minutes. When the cabbage was tender and crisp at the same time, I stirred in about 2 Tbs of sugar, turned off the heat and let it sit uncovered for about 5 minutes.

The cabbage will absorb the taste of the vinegar and sugar while it waits in the fridge until I take it to the potluck tomorrow. Right before we eat, I'll warm it up just enough to take the chill off before I put it on the table.