Carrots with Cumin and Mustard Seeds

I have this pet suspicion that anyone who says they don't really like vegetables must be thinking of the boiled, steamed, or canned variety.

As soon as you toss a carrot or bean or zucchini in some olive oil and put it over high enough heat to start browning, transubstantiatory and addictive things start to happen. We've definitely tucked away a full pan of oven-roasted root vegetables in a single evening between the two of us, and a single vegetable cooked on the stovetop really doesn't stand a chance of making it to the leftover phase. So if you feel a certain dispassionate aloofness toward the carrot, try cooking this. It may be that underneath your calm and cool exterior, you love them, deeply and madly.

Ingredients
Carrots (preferably fresh, carroty ones from a farmer's market or CSA box), cut into sticks
Olive oil
A spoonful of black mustard seeds
A small spoonful of cumin seeds
 



Heat the olive oil in a pan over medium-high heat. When hot, add the mustard and cumin seeds, stir once, and add the carrots. Use tongs to toss the carrots with the seeds until they are evenly coated, then add a tbsp or so of water, cover the pan, and turn the heat to medium.






Continue cooking, adding a spoonful of water from time to time if the pan gets too dry and turning the carrots occasionally, until they're just tender and starting to caramelize a nice goldeny brown color on the bottom (you'll want to adjust the heat up if they don't seem to be browning, and down if they start to brown too quickly). Sprinkle with a pinch of salt, and serve.

Best. Chickpeas. Ever.

At some point last week, I decided it was about time to learn to soak my own beans. Now, if you've soaked beans before, you probably think this is about as momentous an announcement as someone declaring they've decided to stamp their own envelope in the old-fashioned, lick-it-yourself sort of way.

But, if you're like me and tend to assume beans grow in cans in the supermarket aisle, you may not yet know that home-soaked beans (or home-grown beans, as my husband dubbed them after noting that they grew to twice their initial size after soaking and had therefore been grown, in the home -- can't argue with that) are (a) simple to prepare (kind of embarrassingly simple, actually, in light of the fact that I had never considered doing it before), (b) way cheaper, especially for anyone moving their culinary practices in an eat-food-mostly-plants sort of direction, and (c) way tastier. This last one nobody told me, which has me slightly irked because I'm pretty sure I would have done this sooner if they had. Although maybe I wouldn't have believed it could make that much of a difference. But apparently home "grown" beans have an entirely different taste, and texture, than their canny canny cousins.

So, I soaked some cannellini beans last week, and got hooked, and yesterday morning found me trying my hand at chickpeas. Which were again incredibly easy. If (like me) you have no clue how to do this, here's a cheat sheet:
1. Rinse a bunch of dried chickpeas, checking through them carefully for stones
2. Throw in a pot of water (the water should be several inches above the beans, because they'll expand quite a bit), bring to a boil, and boil for two minutes
3. Turn off the heat and let them to soak for about two hours (you can also just let them soak in cold water overnight, instead)
4. Drain and rinse the beans, then add them back to the pot with some fresh water and a few whole peeled cloves of garlic, and simmer them for another 60-80 minutes until they're tender
5. Drain and stick in the fridge until you're ready to use them

6. Optional, but highly recommended: Make the following recipe. Which turned out to be...well, what the title says.

Ingredients
3 cups cooked chickpeas (soaked and cooked yourself, else canned)
1 Meyer lemon, zested and cut in half
2 cloves garlic, pressed
Salt & pepper
Ñora pepper (optional)
1 yellow onion, chopped
3/4 cup black Forbidden rice (could substitute brown basmati rice & adjust the cooking time)
Saffron threads
Scant 1/2 tsp cumin seeds (or two generous pinches)
Scant 1/2 tsp yellow mustard seeds (or two generous pinches)
1/4 cup broth or water
3/4 cups cooked chopped spinach (frozen works: thaw for 2 minutes in the microwave and then drain. If fresh, blanch, drain, then chop)
1/4 tsp ground turmeric
Aleppo or other hot pepper, to taste
Pinch or two ground cumin
Pinch or two sweet paprika


Whisk the juice of half the lemon with a generous glug of olive oil in a bowl. Add the garlic, a pinch of salt, and some black pepper and ñora pepper if you have it. Add the chickpeas, stir to coat, and marinate in the fridge for about half an hour.

Saute about a quarter of the chopped onion in a small pot over medium heat until it softens. Add the black rice and a pinch of saffron and cook, stirring, for a minute or two, then add a little less than one cup of water. Cover, bring to a boil, then turn heat down and simmer for 20 minutes or until done. (If there is extra liquid left at the end, uncover, turn heat to medium, and cook for another minute, stirring to evaporate the water.)

Meanwhile, heat about 2 tbsp olive oil in a wide pan over medium-high heat. When hot, add the cumin and mustard seeds and toast until they start to pop (about 10-20 seconds). Immediately add the rest of the onion and cook, stirring, for several minutes. Just as it starts to brown, add the chickpeas (and a little more olive oil if it's too dry) and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 3 more minutes.

Next, add the spinach, turmeric, a pinch or two of salt, pepper, and Aleppo. Cook, stirring, for a few more minutes, adding the broth as it starts to get dry. (Depending on how cooked your chickpeas were to begin with, you may want to cover the pan and let it simmer for a couple minutes at this point.)

Add the cooked rice, stir, and cook for a minute or two until heated through. Then dust with a bit of cumin and just a little paprika. Add the lemon zest, cook for about 30 more seconds, and then turn off the heat. Cover pan and let sit for 10 minutes to blend the flavors. Adjust salt and pepper to taste.

Serve hot or at room temperature, garnished with a lemon wedge. Goes well with roasted carrots with cumin seeds (below).

Serves 3-4 (or 2 for dinner with some leftovers)

Lentils with Parsley and Thyme

Ingredients
2 1/4 cups yellow lentils (half chana dal and half toor dal works well, because the smaller toor dal cooks to mush and automatically thickens the lentils)
2 cups chicken and/or veggie broth
1/2 tsp ground turmeric
1 onion, chopped
Minced jalapeno pepper and/or Aleppo pepper, to taste (depending on how hot the pepper is and how hot you like your food)
1 1/2 tsp finely chopped fresh thyme leaves
1 1/2 tbsp finely chopped flat leaf parsley
Olive oil
3/4 tsp cumin seeds
2 garlic cloves, pressed


Rinse the lentils well, pick through them to check for rocks, and drain. Add them to a pot with 2 cups broth and 3 cups water and set over medium heat. Just as it comes to a simmer, add the turmeric and turn the heat down to low (make sure it doesn't boil over -- if it comes to a rapid boil, the lentils will get all frothy. If this happens, turn the heat down and skim the froth off the top). Cover and simmer for 30 minutes.

Stir in the onion, pepper, thyme, and parsley. Cover and continue to simmer for 10-20 more minutes, or until the lentils are tender. (If it's very liquidy, leave the lid ajar to let some of the water evaporate. If it's too dry, add a little more water. The lentils need to be in some liquid in order to cook, but I don't like my lentils very soupy, so if I'm not using toor dal, I puree 1-2 cups of this near the end to thicken it up a bit.)

Turn off heat. In a separate pan, heat 2-3 tbsp olive oil over medium-high heat. When hot, add the cumin seeds and toast in the oil for 10-20 seconds. Turn off the heat and immediately add the garlic, stir for a few seconds until it turns yellow or golden, then pour the mixture over the split peas and stir.

Serve with a scoop of basmati rice (underneath or on top) and vegetables on the side (carrots or greens stir-fried with mustard seed and ginger tend to go particularly well).

Serves 3-4