Variations

I play around quite a bit with the make-up of these tempeh balls. Keep the ratio of beans to tempeh intact and then experiment with the rest. A few past successes include:

• Spicy: If I’m going to go spicy, I tend to introduce a spicy component through something like this chili crisp. Opting for a drizzle of that in place of the ponzu. That said, you can absolutely spice the actual tempeh balls themselves if you like. Use a bit of chili powder, crushed red pepper flakes, or work a favorite curry paste into the mixture.
• Herb-filled: Swap out the cabbage for chopped soft, green herbs. A blend of chives, dill, cilantro, and basil are all good candidates. I like to trade out the onion for chopped scallions in this version.
• Super Green: Use finely chopped kale, spinach, and/or chard in place of the corn/carrots and cabbage.

What you See in the Photo

I pulled this bento-style lunch together primarily reaching for (leftover and make-ahead) items already in the refrigerator.

• Wild rice: I made a version of this ribollita with wild rice in place of the bread as a Sunday soup, used the leftover wild rice here.
• Hardboiled egg with spices: If you keep hard-boiled eggs on hand, make them special with a quick roll in a favorite spice blend. I used this red gomashio for this version, but there are a lot of other spice blend ideas in the Spice / Herb / Flower / Zest PDF that members get. Just about any of those are great here. Experiment!
• Baked quinoa patties: quite honestly I like these cold or hot and always bake extra so I have them for snacking. Here I’ve cut each in half and nested them into the box.
• Edamame: Sprinkled here with toasted sunflower seeds, pistachios, and a few dried chive flowers, seasoned with salt.
• Sliced avocado: heavily black peppered. I did a post years ago about how to slice pretty avocados.
• Pan-fried tempeh ponzu balls: recipe below

Pan-Fried Tempeh Ponzu Balls: Step-by-step

These are a breeze to make. The first thing you’re going to do is puree the beans and then combine them in a big bowl with the other ingredients (photo below). As I mention above, I used corn for this version because it’s in season, but you can use carrots.

The key to the next step is getting in there with your hands. You really want to mash and smash and squeeze the mixture together so it’s uniform and all the ingredients are distributed equally (see below).

To shape the tempeh balls, use a tablespoon and your hands. If things get too tacky or messy, rinse your hands and reboot. Keeping your hands damp and clean-ish throughout the process is helpful.

The last step is pan-frying the tempeh balls. My one pro-tip is to let them get a good amount of color on each side before you start to move them around the pan. This way the tempeh mixture is less likely to stick to the pan.

I typically serve these with ponzu sauce. It is quite salty, so I under-season the ponzu balls a bit. If you’re going to serve them with something else, something not as assertive on the salt front, go ahead and adjust the tempeh mixture with more, until it tastes good to you.

More Tempeh Recipes

• Tempeh Curry
• Tempeh Taco Salad
• Orange Pan-glazed Tempeh
• Spicy Tempeh Crumble Bowl
• Garlic Lime Lettuce Wraps
• TLT Sandwich (Tempeh Lettuce and Tomato Sandwich)
• all tempeh recipes

Continue reading Pan-Fried Tempeh Ponzu Balls on 101 Cookbooks

This isn’t a difficult tart to make, but it’s not a “throw it together in 15 minutes” situation either. There’s the pie dough to thaw, roll out, and par-bake. You pre-roast the scallions and tomatoes, which you can do up to a couple days ahead. The filling comes together in a flash after that. It’s the type of recipe to enjoy on a slow summer afternoon if you’re excited about making a beautiful tart and happy to spend some time in the kitchen.

The Ingredients

Let’s talk through a few details related to the ingredients.

• Scallions: First up – you want to deeply roast these. Go hard. In the recipe down below, I have you do it in the oven, but you could certainly do a version on the grill if that’s more convenient. See the color at the edges of these scallions? You might go even darker.
  

  
  You let them cool and crisp up, and then cut them into little flecks (pictured below). Half of these will get folded into your ricotta tart filling, and the other half will be sprinkled across the tart as a final touch.
  

  

  Cherry Tomatoes: You’re going to roast these as well, at the same time and temperature as the scallions. This will concentrate the flavor of the tomatoes, and allow them to release some of their water. The recipe tells you to halve the tomatoes, but if you get small ones its fun to leave them whole.
  

  

  Whole almonds: Might as well toast them at the same time as the scallions and tomatoes. You can see I cut each almonds into little chunks to maximize toasty crunch. Alternately, use another nut if that is what you keep on hand. Pine nuts would be great, hazelnuts are a good option, and I wouldn’t say no to pistachios either!

The trickiest part about making a tart like this one is sticking the landing on the crust. Timing is everything. I think a lot of people tend underbake the crust at both stages – the par-bake, and the fully assembled bake. So(!), look for light golden toasty color when you first par-bake the shell, before the filling stage. Let it cool completely. Then, once it is filled and placed in the oven you want the filling to set in the time it takes the crust to get deeply golden. If the crust looks beautifully browned, there’s a good chance you’ve nailed it. And one more idea to consider if chili crisp isn’t your thing. Do a nice, thin layer of good pesto across your crust before filling with the ricotta – an A+ alternative!

More Tomato Recipes

If your kitchen looks anything like mine this time of year, some other ways to use tomatoes might be helpful. Some favorite recipes: 

• Rustic Tomato Tart
• Roasted Cherry Tomatoes
• Roasted Tomato Salsa
• Simple Tomato Soup
• Five Minute Tomato Sauce
• Heirloom Tomato Salad
• Simple Bruschetta
• All the tomato recipes

Continue reading Cherry Tomato Tart with Burnt Scallion Ricotta on 101 Cookbooks

Building an Iced Sesame Noodle Bowl

Aside from boiling the noodles, nearly everything else here can be prepared ahead of time. It’s part of what’s great about this and what makes it a weeknight-friendly meal. I like to toss some chopped veggies (whatever is on hand – broccoli, asparagus, etc.) in the pasta water after the noodles come out, keeping the cooking to a single pot. To summarize, here are the main components of the meal:

• Noodles: Keep a selection of favorites on hand.
  
• Homemade sesame sauce: make ahead and refrigerate for up to a week. Recipe below. Also, consider experimenting with almond butter and/or peanut butter in place of the tahini or sesame paste for another variation.
• Toppings: I’ll list off twenty-plus favorites. Choose 4-5 for your meal.
• Side veggies: And easy boost! As mentioned above, grab something that can do a quick boil in your pasta water after you remove the noodles. More ideas below.

Let’s Talk about Noodle Options

I’ve done fantastic versions of this meal with all of the following. Think long and slurp-able on the noodle front. I also check my noodle labels to make sure they’re not wildly salted, to be honest, I’ve been caught off guard  on a number of occasions.

• Soba: I love the combination of buckwheat soba noodles and sesame and soba traditionally works well with sesame sauces similar to this one. Soba is a frequent go-to when I make this recipe and cold soba, in general, is summertime wonderful. More soba noodle recipes.
• Somen: These thin Japanese wheat noodles are a crowd-pleasing favorite. Especially if you have picky eaters that aren’t as receptive to brown noodles.
• Homemade pici: A hand-rolled Italian pasta, if you’re up for more of a project, cold pici really makes this whole situation something extra special.
• Spaghetti: Give whatever spaghetti you love a try. I love the Monograno Felicetti Farro Spaghetti for its texture and boosted nutrition profile (not sponsored, just a fan), and the farro plays beautiful with the creamy sesame sauce. Pictured here.

Sesame Noodle Toppings

Choose 4-5 different toppings. I feel like grated ginger is a non-negotiable here. So good. And I leave any spicy component out of the base sesame sauce so that each person can light up their bowls with whatever level of spicy they can handle.

• grated ginger: peel ginger with a spoon and grate with a microplane grater into a small bowl. Key topping!
• something spicy: favorites for this recipe include Calabrian chile oil, chile crisp, tobanjan
• toasted seeds and/or nuts: za’atar, traditional gomasio, I also make a red gomasio-ish (pictured above) that I’ll post the recipe for soon, toasted peanuts, etc.
• tomatoes: specifically, these roasted cherry tomatoes
  
• crunchy bits: for example,  fried shallots or crispy jalapeño pieces (WB brought these home from TJ’s a few weeks ago)
• pesto: a little dollop of pesto in your bowl along with the sesame sauce is pretty great.
• lemon zest or chopped, preserved lemons
• makrut lime leaves: thinly slivered
• kale chips
• chives
• chopped scallions
• grated carrots
• hard boiled eggs, quartered

And as we move into later summer and early fall, and the weather is still hot enough for cold noodles, but the seasonal ingredients are shifting, here are a few other ideas:

• thinly sliced, crisp apple
• toasted pumpkin seeds
• simple cauliflower
• roasted cauliflower: This variation is next on my list, iced sesame noodles plus roasted cauliflower and some of the other ingredients in this recipe as toppings – mint, arugula, chopped dates, red onion, and a spice blend of toasted pine nuts, sesame, cumin, coriander, and red pepper flakes. It’s gonna be good.
  
• Also! For the iced noodle bowl (above), play around. Add thin citrus slices – Meyer lemon, rangpur lime, kishu mandarin, orange, key lime are all recent favorites. You can also add fresh herbs or lime leaves or use a cold broth. I have a cold mushroom broth that works really well. The recipe for that one is in Super Natural Simple, in the back.

While You’re At It: Add a Side Veggie!

Broccoli florets, asparagus tops, green beans, yellow beans, corn – these are just a few of the vegetables I’ve cooked in a flash after cooking the noodles for the bowls. Boil for a mint or so, strain under cold water and serve on the side. Everyone loves to work the vegetables into their noodle bowls as well.

More Noodle Recipes

• Walnut Miso Noodles 
• Ten+ Popular Noodle Recipes
• Vegetable Noodle Soup
• Sriracha Noodle Soup
• 20 Fantastic Noodle Soups
• Favorite Rice Noodle Stir Fry
• Fire Broth Noodle Soup
• Spicy Coconut Curry Noodles

Continue reading Iced Sesame Noodles on 101 Cookbooks

Ingredient Notes

A few notes related to the main ingredients in this soup.

• Beans: I cooked both the beans and the lentils from dried here. I wanted both to retain structure and a bit of firmness throughout the cooking and simmering of the soup, and that’s never going to happen using canned beans or lentils. The Santa Maria Pinquito beans were calling to me as I scanned the pantry, and they held up wonderfully. Their bean broth combined especially well with the mushroom powder to form the base of the soup. Other types of beans I suspect would work well with this soup: Alubia Blanca beans, cannellini, cranberry or borlotti beans, Good Mother Stallard.
• Lentils: The key here is choosing a lentil that will its shape. A lot of lentils really break down over time, especially in a soup that will be reheated. I rarely go wrong with French green lentils / Lentils du Puy, and this was no exception. I cooked them in their own pot, and then drained the remaining broth before adding along with the beans to the soup.
• Mushroom powder: You can buy mushroom powders, but I tend to make my own by blending dried mushrooms in a grinder or high-speed blender. I tend to use a lot of porcini mushroom powder in particular, and it’s the mushroom I went for here. I wanted an assertive mushroom broth that could stand up to the tomatoes, beans, lentils, and kale and not get lost.
  
  As a side note, related to turning ingredients into powders, Andrea Nguyen turned me onto one of my favorite kitchen appliances when I was telling her I was struggling to get a true powder when grinding chiles into powder. She sent me a link to the Cuisinart SG-10 Electric Spice-and-Nut Grinder and I’ve never looked back. Turns everything to the consistency of baby powder.
• Kale: Use what you have. A combination of lacinato and curly kale, stemmed and chopped well worked nicely here. Add it toward the end of cooking so it keeps some structure and brightness.

Other Soups & Stews Like This

Here are a few other soups and stews that are freezer-friendly and full of all the things you want in a one-bowl meal. I make this ribollita every other month or so, using day-old sourdough, it freezes nicely. The fragrant saffron and fennel combination in this white bean soup make it special, just a tad offbeat and unexpected (in a good way!), it also freezes well. And if you just want to poke around a bit, here’s a list of all the soup recipes. 

One rule of thumb I follow is I don’t usually freeze soups with noodles or pasta in them. The pasta just tends to get overcooked on reheating. And all of these welcome a poached or fried egg on top as a bonus!

Other Freezer-friendly Staples

• This mushroom ragu is a bit of an effort, but makes future pasta nights easy.
• Load up on summer basil and keep this pesto in the freezer year-round.
• Keep pie dough at the ready for easy pies, tarts, galettes, and hand pies.
• Related, peach hand pies, mushroom hand pies, and apple cinnamon hand pies – ready to bake from the freezer.
• This mushroom lasagna freezes well. The instruction are on the page.

Continue reading Bean and Lentil Soup with Kale on 101 Cookbooks

Green Bean Salad with Peaches: The Ingredients

Here are a couple pointers as you’re sourcing ingredients for this recipe.

• Green Beans: Look for tender green beans. I used green beans here, but I also look forward to making it with the beautiful yellow string beans we are starting to see at the market this time of year. Either will work beautifully. If I have extra time, I like to trim the tops and tails from the beans, cut them into bite-sized segments, and (extra credit) split them in half along the length. See photo above.
• Nuts: You see toasted pine nuts used here. Toasted almond slices are also wonderful along with the peaches, and I can imagine toasted walnuts or pecans working well if you shifted into a late summer version of the salad. You could swap in roasted tomatoes for the peaches, etc.

• Peaches: Aim for ripe, flavorful peaches that aren’t overly soft. You want them to maintain structure when tossed with all the other ingredients.
• Fresh oregano: You can also substitute fresh marjoram if that is what you have.

The Garlic-Oregano Oil

This is the magic component here. I have you make more of this oil than needed because you’ll never want to be without it. It’s perfect drizzled on just about everything. Drizzle on grilled vegetables, quesadillas, tacos, baked pastas, fresh pastas, bean dishes, green salads. I could literally go on forever.

More Salad Recipe

• Spicy Sesame Coleslaw
• Coconut Corn Salad
• Quinoa Salad
• Cucumber Salad
• Heirloom Tomato Salad
• Summer Fruit Salad
• more salad recipes

More Peach Recipes

• Peach Cobbler
• Peach Salsa

Continue reading Green Bean Salad with Peaches on 101 Cookbooks

Why I Love Cooking with Oats

The reasons to embrace more oats in your cooking are numerous. They’re good for you, sure. A fiber -rich, whole grain, hearty ingredient of the first order. They’re also an affordable pantry workhorse. There are different types ranging from steel-cut oats to oat flour made by blending rolled oats into a flour you can introduce into your baking projects for added depth, sweetness, and rustic vibes.

1. Baked Oatmeal Cups

   Baked oatmeal cups are the perfect on-the-go breakfast staple. These are made with oats, bananas, and lots of berries, then baked into golden deliciousness.
   

2. Oatmeal Peanut Butter Cookies

   Classic peanut butter cookies flecked with oatmeal and baked until golden. Double down on the peanut front with hand-chopped peanuts and chunky peanut butter.
   

3. Oatmeal Muffins

   A rich, crumble-topped oatmeal muffin recipe made with an oatmeal and yogurt base. Golden-topped, wholesome, and a fantastic pocket treat.
   

4. Coconut Baked Oatmeal

   An extra special baked oatmeal – banana, coconut, vanilla, coconut milk, and some winter citrus, all baked into fragrant, golden-topped magic.
   

5. Peanut Butter Granola

   Using a short ingredient list of pantry basics, this peanut butter granola is incredibly good. It features a peanut butter and maple syrup coating that bakes beautifully into crunchy oat clusters.
   

6. No-bake Energy Bites

   An alternative to ultra-processed energy bars, these homemade, no-bake energy bites are a great late afternoon snack. The best part is they’re simple to make, and you’re in control of the ingredients.
   

1. Coconut Baked Oatmeal

   An extra special baked oatmeal – banana, coconut, vanilla, coconut milk, and some winter citrus, all baked into fragrant, golden-topped magic.
   

2. Baked Oatmeal Cups

   Baked oatmeal cups are the perfect on-the-go breakfast staple. These are made with oats, bananas, and lots of berries, then baked into golden deliciousness.
   

3. Oatmeal Muffins

   A rich, crumble-topped oatmeal muffin recipe made with an oatmeal and yogurt base. Golden-topped, wholesome, and a fantastic pocket treat.
   

4. Oatmeal Porridge Pancakes

   If you love oatmeal, these need to be your next pancake adventure. They’re like a delicious oatmeal porridge in pancake form. Made with toasted walnuts and blueberries – dairy-free, egg-free batter.
   

5. Toasted Four Grain Cereal

   A hot, filling, four-grain breakfast cereal that you can make extra-special with all sorts of different toppings. If you love oatmeal, this is a way to level up.
   

6. Better Breakfast Cereal

   This is going to make your mornings better. Combine entire boxes of healthful cereal into your biggest bowl, add extra oats, oat bran, ground flax seeds, and freeze-dried berries. Now you have plenty of breakfasts ready to go.
   

7. Multigrain Waffles

   Poppyseed-flecked and made with a blend of barley, oat, and rye flours, these multigrain waffles are buttermilk-moist with a golden crust and a hint of tanginess.
   

8. Blueberry Muffins with Lavender

   Everything you love about a classic blueberry muffin, but with a hint of lavender and buttery oat streusel tops people inevitably eat first.
   

1. Oatmeal Muffins

   A rich, crumble-topped oatmeal muffin recipe made with an oatmeal and yogurt base. Golden-topped, wholesome, and a fantastic pocket treat.
   

2. Multigrain Waffles

   Poppyseed-flecked and made with a blend of barley, oat, and rye flours, these multigrain waffles are buttermilk-moist with a golden crust and a hint of tanginess.
   

3. Oatmeal Porridge Pancakes

   If you love oatmeal, these need to be your next pancake adventure. They’re like a delicious oatmeal porridge in pancake form. Made with toasted walnuts and blueberries – dairy-free, egg-free batter.
   

4. Blueberry Muffins with Lavender

   Everything you love about a classic blueberry muffin, but with a hint of lavender and buttery oat streusel tops people inevitably eat first. I also posted a sampler of great muffin recipes here.
   

1. Oatmeal Peanut Butter Cookies

   Classic peanut butter cookies flecked with oatmeal and baked until golden. Double down on the peanut front with hand-chopped peanuts and chunky peanut butter.
   

2. Whole Wheat Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

   I’m posting this recipe not because these are the best oatmeal chocolate chip cookies ever of all time. They’re good, but…I’m posting the recipe, because they make amazing ice cream sandwich cookies. And it’s prime ice cream sandwich season.

   

3. Nikki’s Healthy Cookie Recipe

   A remarkable healthy cookie recipe. And SO popular! Banana-batter, shredded coconut, dark chocolate chunks, and oats. The recipe is butter-less, flour-less, egg-less, and potentially sugar-less cookies make great after school or after work treats. Healthy cookies!

   

4. Thinnest Oatmeal Cookies

   An easy cookie to bake. Made from rolled oats, they’re razor thin and lacy, golden, freckled with poppy seeds, plus an anise accent from crushed fennel seeds.
   

5. Healthful Double Chocolate Cookies

   A nut-free (school-friendly), double chocolate version of one of the most popular cookies on my site. Made with a banana-batter, shredded coconut, dark chocolate chunks, and oats. Butter-less, flour-less, egg-less, and potentially sugar-less cookies make great after school, travel, or post-workout treats.

   

6. Mesquite Chocolate Chip Cookies

   Mesquite flour adds a wonderful accent to these oat and walnut studded chocolate chip cookies. If you’ve never baked with it, this is your encouragement.
   

1. Peanut Butter Granola

   Using a short ingredient list of pantry basics, this peanut butter granola is incredibly good. It features a peanut butter and maple syrup coating that bakes beautifully into crunchy oat clusters.
   

2. The Perfect Healthy Granola (Low Oil & Naturally Sweetened)

   There are a few different granola camps. This one falls squarely in the great, everyday, healthy granola category. Midnight black and deeply chocolate-flavored with dark black cocoa and cocoa nibs, this granola is packed with heart-healthy oats and seeds. Naturally sweetened, clumpy, and crunchy, the recipe calls for just a small splash of olive oil, and leverages a secret ingredient to bring it all together.
   

3. Sourdough Granola

   This sourdough granola is the way to go if you love huge, golden, oat clusters. It’s maple-sweetened, cinnamon-kissed and a great way to use up a good amount of sourdough discard.
   

4. Rose Petal Granola

   A variation on the granola from my book, Super Natural Every Day – this time with rose petals, walnuts, currants, and black pepper.
   

5. No-bake Energy Bites

   An alternative to ultra-processed energy bars, these homemade, no-bake energy bites are a great late afternoon snack. The best part is they’re simple to make, and you’re in control of the ingredients.
   

6. Nikki’s Healthy Cookie Recipe

   A remarkable healthy cookie recipe. And SO popular! Banana-batter, shredded coconut, dark chocolate chunks, and oats. The recipe is butter-less, flour-less, egg-less, and potentially sugar-less cookies make great after school or after work treats. Healthy cookies!

   

7. Healthful Double Chocolate Cookies

   A nut-free (school-friendly), double chocolate version of one of the most popular cookies on my site. Made with a banana-batter, shredded coconut, dark chocolate chunks, and oats. Butter-less, flour-less, egg-less, and potentially sugar-less cookies make great after school, travel, or post-workout treats.

   

1. Cheddar Jalapeño Oatmeal Bread

   This oatmeal bread wins the award for best toast. It’s a hearty oat-flecked loaf with a buttermilk base studded generously with melty cubes of cheddar cheese and punctuated with thin slices of jalapeño pepper. Where the cheese touches the pan it turns to golden-crispy perfection.
   

2. Easy Little Bread

   The simple, easy little bread you should make right this minute – yeast-based, farm-style, made from rolled oats and a blend of all-purpose and whole wheat flours.
   

3. Oatmeal Crackers

   Snappy, substantial, homemade oatmeal crackers – made with rolled oats and rye flour.
   

4. Savory Power Bars

   These homemade power bars are based on the recipe I published years ago in Super Natural Cooking. The main difference here is I made these savory with toasted walnuts, crumbled kale chips, and oil-cured olives.
   

1. Strawberry Rhubarb Crumble

   A simple spring crumble – rhubarb, strawberry, and a splash of port wine with a buttery black pepper, pine nut and oat crumble top. Sounds a bit fancy, but really, it couldn’t be easier to make.

   

More Whole Grain Recipes

There are endless ways to work diverse and flavorful whole grains in to your cookie. Here is a short list of favorite ideas:

• Farro Salad with Olives, Walnuts and Pecorino
• Rye Chocolate Brownies
• Quinoa Patties
• Multigrain Waffles
• Swedish Rye Cookies
• How To Cook Quinoa
• How To Make a Sourdough Starter 
• Rye Crepes

Types of Oats in Recipes

There are a number of different types of oats to buy. Let’s talk through a few of them:

• Rolled oats: Likely the oats you’re most familiar with, rolled oats, also known as old-fashioned oats, are steamed and flattened oats used in cookies, muffins, and other baked items. They’re also a middle choice between thinner, flaky quick cooking oats, and long-cooking steel-cut oats.
• Quick oats: The fastest cooking oats to use in oatmeal and porridges, but I typically skip this type of oat. Rolled oats have a superior texture and structure and are well worth the extra few minutes of cooking time.
• Steel-cut oats: These are oat groats that have been chopped into pieces but blades keeping the bran, endosperm, and germ intact. They take quite a bit of extra time to cook and lend a completely different texture to morning oatmeals. Their chewy texture have won them many fans.
• Oat flour: You can easily make oat flour by blending rolled oats into a powder. It’s a natural GF flour (if your oats are labelled GF) to use it in cookies, muffins, waffles, pancakes, etc. It will bring a bit of nutty, rustic flavor to your baking, start by substituting 10-20% and take not of the difference. Oat flour absorbs water a bit more slowly than all-purpose flour so allow your doughs and batter to sit for a few extra minutes.

FAQ

• Are oats gluten-free? Oats are naturally gluten-free but if processed in a place that also works with other flours, contamination can happen. Check labels and look for the GF symbol if you’re avoiding gluten.
• Can you make oat flour out of rolled oats? Yes absolutely! Process rolled oats in a blender until you have a uniform, powdery flour.
• Can you swap in steel-cut oats for rolled oats in a recipe? Probably not. While they both come from whole-grain oat groats, they are processed differently, resulting in different shapes requiring different cooking times and resulting in completely different oat texture when cooked.

Continue reading Oat Recipes: 25+ Favorite Ways to Cook with Oats on 101 Cookbooks

Not joking, I enjoyed the leftovers for days. Initially, I served the corn as a side to a simple fried rice made with leftover rice and a quick omelette, shredded and folded in. The next day I channeled bruschetta vibes, spooning it onto slices of blistered sourdough rubbed with olive oil and topped with a bit of extra goat cheese. It also was right at home in a couple lunchtime grain bowls alongside sliced avocado and extra roasted vegetables. It keeps well for a few days, so if you’re a meal-prepper, take that into consideration.

Can I use frozen corn?

Yes, you can make this with frozen corn when fresh corn isn’t available. Start with 3-4 cups of frozen corn. Add the olive oil, corn, and salt to a cold skillet. Place the skillet over medium high heat and cook until hot – you don’t want to overcook the corn, so really keep an eye on it. From there, proceed with the rest of the recipe as written.

Variations:

There are so many ways to riff on this corn based on what you have on hand. A few ideas:

• Dates: Add 3-4 Medjool dates, pitted and sliced into long slivers. The sweetness is nice against the spiciness of the crisp.
• Stone Fruit: Nectarines, peaches, and pluots arrive at the market alongside corn. Cut them into bite-sized pieces and add alongside the herbs.
• Green Chile Version: I love the combination of green chiles and corn. Finely chopped a serrano or jalapeño and add it along with the crisp. If you’re chili crisp runs hot you may need to dial back the amount. Another idea – make a green version of Chile crisp and start there.
• Mediterranean-ish: Use toasted pine nuts in place of the toasted pepitas, maybe add some chopped black olives as well.
• Add Beans: A couple or two of cooked white beans or chickpeas make this corn even more substantial turning it more into a meal.  

More Corn Recipes

• Coconut Corn Salad
• Miso Corn Chowder
• 11 Ways to Cook Corn on the Cob
• Skillet Cornbread
• Summer Corn Salad
• Sopa Verde de Elote

More Summer Salads

• Simple Red Fruit Salad
• Summer Melon Salad
• Summer Fruit Salad
• all salad recipes

Continue reading Chili Crisp Corn on 101 Cookbooks

You can make these crackers just about any shape you like. You can cut them into wide strips, thin ribbons, precise squares, or simply bake them off in big sheets. They go nicely with homemade labneh, this hippie spread, or this artichoke dip . They’re also great crumbled over a good salad.

I’m going to list of a bunch of suggested toppings in the head notes of the recipe, but I’d love to hear your suggestions as well. Someone always comes up with a brilliant idea or approach in the comments that I’d never think of. For my next batch I’m planning for lemon zest, poppy seeds, black pepper, and Parmesan.

More Cracker Recipes

• Oatmeal Crackers
• Homemade Cheese Crackers
• Crispy Piadina
• Grissini
• Buckwheat Cheese Straws

Continue reading Olive Oil Crackers on 101 Cookbooks

I think there’s a lingering hangover from the leaden, hippie-style baking of the 1960s and 70s. There was a lot to admire from that era (an enthusiasm for local, whole foods, home baking), but we’ve come quite a way since then. Whole grain baking today can be very nuanced, unexpected, and deeply flavorful – with a range of wonderful textures – not just the heavy, earnest sort many people still associate with whole grain baking.

Making brownies with whole grain rye flour brings depth and maltiness that rides shotgun naturally to a good-quality bittersweet dark chocolate. It’s robust enough to stand up to it. Salt counterbalances everything, and you end up with brownies that will suck you straight into the chocolate vortex. And if you’ve never baked with rye flour before, brownies are a perfect place to start. You don’t need to worry about gluten development, hydration, or any of the other variables that give rye a bit of a temperamental reputation.

Rye Brownie Variations:

A few directions you can go with this brownie base:

• With nuts: add some chopped, toasted walnuts with the flour mixture – 1 1/2 cups or so. Classic match made in chocolate heaven here.
• With dark coconut sugar: I tested a batch of these brownies using coconut sugar (it was Big Tree Farms Organic Brown Coconut Sugar), just to see how the brownies would hold up to a less refined sweetener, also lower glycemic index. At first I was skeptical because the batter was much thinner and runnier – I just wasn’t feeling it. But they baked up beautifully, and the sweetness was rounder with noticeable caramel notes. This is a long way of saying, if I happen to have the coconut sugar on hand the next time I bake these, I’d absolutely use it. That said, the version with dark brown sugar (cane), is excellent as well.

If I had a bakery, I’d do the coconut sugar version with 100% rye flour, and 70%+ chocolate, and not skimp on the salt. That’s my brownie.

Step by Step: How to Make Rye Chocolate Brownies

One of the great things about these brownies is that there’s no need to get a big mixer out. You basically combine the chocolate and butter in a heat-proof bowl (pictured below), and stir it together until it’s nice and smooth.

You combine the eggs, sugar, and vanilla in another bowl, and the flour and salt in a third.

You fold the chocolate mixture into the egg mixture, and then sprinkle it with the flour. You can see what it should look like at this stage in the photo above.

Keep folding the ingredients together with a spatula or wooden spoon until it looks something like the above photo. And then transfer the batter into the prepared baking dish.

Here’s what they should look like after baking and cooling (below). I highly recommend letting them rest for a few hours, more on that below.

Brownie Storage

Ideally, allow these to cool out on the counter and then transfer to a refrigerator overnight. You can eat them shortly after baking, but they really hit all the right notes after they’ve cooled and set. These brownies also freeze incredibly well. I like to freeze them individually on a parchment-lined baking sheet, then transfer to a freezer bag.

More Rye Recipes

And if these brownies make you even more rye curious, here are some other recipes to explore.

• Rye Crepes
• Swedish Rye Cookies
• How To Make a Sourdough Starter (with Rye Flour)

Continue reading 100% Rye Chocolate Brownies on 101 Cookbooks

The color is a knockout – bright, vibrant green. And the flavor is surprisingly dynamic beyond the main base ingredients. There is the sweetness of corn and peas off-set by a spike of green chile, a finishing dollop of creme fraiche, and generous squeeze of lime. You get crunch from pepitas, fragrant green citrus notes from a shower of cilantro, and, as a bonus, it’s a soup that comes together quite quickly.

I mention it in the headnotes below, I’ve taken a few liberties with the recipe over the years, not something Diana would approve of, I’m sure. But the original recipe calls for tomatillos, which are easy to find at some points in the year, and not so easy at others. When I strike out with tomatillos, I do a version like this one, substituting zucchini. Different, but, I’d argue, equally tasty. xo -h

More Soup Recipes

• Rustic Cabbage Soup
• Tortellini Soup
• Roasted Tomato Soup
• Lively Up Lentil Soup
• Split Pea Soup
• Miso Soup
• Wild Rice Soup
• all soup recipes

Continue reading Sopa Verde de Elote on 101 Cookbooks

A lot of my cooking is naturally fiber-forward, but rather than chasing fiber grams, I focus on meals built around ingredients that happen to bring a good amount of fiber to the table. These are the sorts of foods I genuinely love to cook with (plant-forward and pantry friendly, and often quite affordable) especially if you buy staples like beans, grains, and lentils in bulk. 

Below you’ll find a selection of my favorite high-fiber recipes including breakfasts, salads, soups, grain bowls, bean recipes, lentil recipes, and more. They’re wonderful on many fronts – satisfying, colorful, big flavor – with the bonus that they’re bringing  fiber to the party as well. Enjoy!

1. Three Cheese Pizza Beans

   Inspired by the internet-famous Smitten Kitchen Pizza Beans highlighted in Rancho Gordo’s new book, this wintery version has all the much-loved components – tomato, melty cheeses, and giant beans – along with pumpkin, feta, black olives and kale. A favorite one-pan make and bake meal.
   

2. Chickpea Salad Sandwich

   The chickpea salad sandwich filling to make in bulk for easy lunches and snacks all week. A perfect vegetarian or vegan sandwich option.
   

3. Coconut Red Lentil Soup (Esalen Ayurvedic Dal)

   A vibrant red lentil soup (or stew) that is always hugely popular. A friend turned me onto this Ayurvedic dal recipe from the Esalen Cookbook years ago. Red lentil based, curry-spiced coconut broth with back notes of ginger and tomato, with slivered green onions, and a finish of cilantro or kale. A high-fiber recipe all star.
   

4. Baked Oatmeal Cups

   Baked oatmeal cups are the perfect on-the-go breakfast staple. These are made with oats, bananas, and lots of berries, then baked into golden deliciousness.
   

5. Health Nut Vegan Chili

   A special, triple-bean, vegan chili inspired by Jess Damuck’s new cookbook. It’s bold, flavor-packed and uses a technique to achieve the best texture of any chili I’ve eaten. It’s time to schedule a big chili night.
   

6. Quinoa Salad

   A favorite quinoa salad punctuated with crunchy cucumbers and toasted cashews. There’s creamy feta, wisps of arugula, flecks of red onion and herbs, and a special ginger-curry dressing. So delicious!
   

7. White Bean Soup with Garlic and Olive Oil

   This white bean soup is rustic, silky, and built around plump beans simmered in a saffron-tinted broth. A squeeze of citrus, crumbled feta, and chopped olives makes each bite special.
   

8. Kale Chips

   There are just a couple details to get right for the perfect kale chips. This is how I make crispy pom-poms of kale everyone loves to snack on.
   

1. Bran Muffins

   Not your basic, bland, bran muffin. The thing that makes these special is their flavor. They’re buttermilk based with a tender crumb and toasted, craggy top. Perfect smeared with a bit of butter and your favorite marmalade. A high-fiber recipe classic.
   

2. Chocolate Chia Pudding

   The chocolate chia pudding of your dreams. Silky, deeply chocolatey, crunchy on top — dessert vibes with breakfast credentials.
   

3. Triple-Oat Breakfast Cereal

   if you’re trying to work more oats into your diet, make this a go-to. The big-batch thing here is the magic.
   

4. Coconut Baked Oatmeal

   An extra special baked oatmeal – banana, coconut, vanilla, coconut milk, and some winter citrus, all baked into fragrant, golden-topped magic.
   

5. Chia Breakfast Bowl

   A summery chia breakfast bowl – soak the chia seeds in your favorite nut milk, top with smashed berries, fresh passionfruit juice, pepitas, and big flakes of toasted coconut. A bit of bee pollen adds a boost and some pretty.
   

6. Peanut Butter Granola

   Using a short ingredient list of pantry basics, this peanut butter granola is incredibly good. It features a peanut butter and maple syrup coating that bakes beautifully into crunchy oat clusters.
   

7. A Glow-promoting, Luminizing Breakfast Beauty Bowl

   Highlighting a few skin-friendly superstars in this Luminizing Breakfast Beauty Bowl – a mixed berry and chia smoothie base topped with a rainbow of seasonal ingredients.
   

8. The Perfect Healthy Granola (Low Oil & Naturally Sweetened)

   There are a few different granola camps. This one falls squarely in the great, everyday, healthy granola category. Midnight black and deeply chocolate-flavored with dark black cocoa and cocoa nibs, this granola is packed with heart-healthy oats and seeds. Naturally sweetened, clumpy, and crunchy, the recipe calls for just a small splash of olive oil, and leverages a secret ingredient to bring it all together.
   

9. No-bake Energy Bites

   An alternative to ultra-processed energy bars, these homemade, no-bake energy bites are a great late afternoon snack. The best part is they’re simple to make, and you’re in control of the ingredients.
   

10. Baked Oatmeal Cups

    Baked oatmeal cups are the perfect on-the-go breakfast staple. These are made with oats, bananas, and lots of berries, then baked into golden deliciousness.
    

11. Better Breakfast Cereal

    This is going to make your mornings better. Combine entire boxes of healthful cereal into your biggest bowl, add extra oats, oat bran, ground flax seeds, and freeze-dried berries. Now you have plenty of breakfasts ready to go.
    

1. Three Cheese Pizza Beans

   Inspired by the internet-famous Smitten Kitchen Pizza Beans highlighted in Rancho Gordo’s new book, this wintery version has all the much-loved components – tomato, melty cheeses, and giant beans – along with pumpkin, feta, black olives and kale. A favorite one-pan make and bake meal.
   

2. Chickpea Salad Sandwich

   The chickpea salad sandwich filling to make in bulk for easy lunches and snacks all week. A perfect vegetarian or vegan sandwich option.
   

3. Health Nut Vegan Chili

   A special, triple-bean, vegan chili inspired by Jess Damuck’s new cookbook. It’s bold, flavor-packed and uses a technique to achieve the best texture of any chili I’ve eaten. It’s time to schedule a big chili night.
   

4. Chipotle Cinnamon Slow-Cooked Coconut Beans

   Tender, slow-cooked beans in a red broth tempered with coconut milk toward the end. The broth hums with a strong cinnamon, chipotle, and tomato foundation punctuated with cayenne pepper and Thai chiles.
   

5. White Bean Soup with Garlic and Olive Oil

   This white bean soup is rustic, silky, and built around plump beans simmered in a saffron-tinted broth. A squeeze of citrus, crumbled feta, and chopped olives makes each bite special.
   

6. Crispy Chickpeas

   Crispy roasted chickpeas are one of my favorite ways to add crunch and a bit of protein to salads, bowls, and roasted vegetables. There are a few tricks to getting them extra crispy crunchy, and not sad.
   

7. Ribollita

   Ribollita, a beautifully thick Tuscan stew made with dark greens, lots of beans, vegetables, olive oil, and thickened with day-old bread. One of my high-fiber recipe favorites. And it freezes beautifully.
   

8. Quinoa Power Bowl

   A quinoa power bowl makes the perfect working lunch. The base is simply quinoa and mung bean, and the magic comes from the deeply sautéed and spiced celery. This bowl welcomes as many, or few, toppings as you like – roasted cherry tomatoes, salted dill yogurt, quick pickled red onions, chopped olives.
   

9. Baked Cabbage Sliders

   Crisp on the edges and packed with beans, quinoa, cabbage, cottage cheese and other good stuff on the inside, these make for an easy, fiber and protein-packed meal everyone can personalize with toppings.
   

10. A Really Good Chana Masala

    There are a lot of chana masala recipes out there that are perfectly good, but this is the chana masala you should make tonight – a Technicolor version of chana masala.
    

11. Pan-Fried Beans with Kale

    Golden crusted pan-fried beans are made extra special by loading them up with kale, Parmesan, lemon, walnuts, and nutmeg. So many great variations in the comments as well!
    

12. Ultimate Veggie Burger

    The ultimate veggie burger recipe made with a secret trick, garbanzo beans, cilantro, onions, lemon zest, eggs, and bread crumbs.
    

13. Lemon Gigante Beans

    If you’ve never cooked with giant beans, now is the time. In this dish baby fennel, plump Greek gigante beans, and sliced lemon tangle with a honey-kissed white wine sauce, all finished with a shower of chopped dill. A perfect side.
    

14. Giant Chipotle Baked Beans

    A riff on Laurence Jossel’s famous NOPA beans – plump, creamy beans baked in a bright, chunky chipotle tomato sauce, topped with crunchy breadcrumbs, plenty of oozy queso fresco, and an emerald drizzle of cilantro pesto.
    

15. Turmeric Chickpeas with Garlic Tahini

    A quick lunch. And a compelling reason to always keep turmeric chickpeas on hand! And if you really love chickpeas, here’s where all the chickpea recipes live.
    

16. Instant Pot Chickpea Cauliflower Korma

    An Insta-friendly riff on the Chickpea Cauliflower Korma recipe in Jennifer Iserloh’s The Healing Slow Cooker – chickpeas, cauliflower, combined with a not-shy simmer sauce.
    

1. Garganelli with Kale and Lentils

   This one-pot, garganelli pasta is an easy weeknight win. It’s pasta and lentils simmered in crushed tomatoes and finished with lots of chopped kale, saffron, swirls of tahini and chopped almonds.
   

2. Lentils with Wine-Glazed Vegetables

   These simple, wine-glazed lentils, from Deborah Madison, saw me through my twenties, and then my thirties. I made them often in my first solo apartment in San Francisco. If you’re looking to level up on the high-fiber front, this is a recipe to try.
   

3. Coconut Red Lentil Soup (Esalen Ayurvedic Dal)

   A vibrant red lentil soup (or stew) that is always hugely popular. A friend turned me onto this Ayurvedic dal recipe from the Esalen Cookbook years ago. Red lentil based, curry-spiced coconut broth with back notes of ginger and tomato, with slivered green onions, and a finish of cilantro or kale.
   

4. Lentils folded into Yogurt, Spinach, and Basil

   Have you seen the little book, Lunch at the Shop: The Art and Practice of the Midday Meal? It’s great on many fronts, and I made these Lentils folded into Yogurt, Spinach, and Basil from it.
   

5. Lively Up Lentil Soup

   This quick lentil soup recipe delivers layer after layer of flavor. The tang of the tomatoes plays off the earthiness of the lentils, and the fragrant bolt of saffron yogurt brightens each bowl.
   

6. Green Lentil Soup with Curried Brown Butter

   A favorite green lentil soup topped with a curried brown butter drizzle, and pan-fried paneer cubes.
   

7. Red Lentil Dumplings

   Red lentil dumplings flared out with roasted cherry tomatoes, and a simple smoked paprika and garlic oil. I love these for travel and as a main component in bento or bag lunches.
   

8. Lentil Almond Stir-Fry

   A good cold-weather stir-fry recipe. Tiny potatoes, Brussels sprout wedges, toasted almonds and lentils are served with a drizzle of mint and a bit of thinned-out, salted plain yogurt, and a sprinkling of chopped dates. Another twist to make this a different high-fiber recipe is to swap in pan-fried artichoke hearts.
   

9. Vegetarian Lentil Burgers

   Tasty, hearty vegetarian lentil burger recipe. Slathered with saffron yogurt and stuffed with avocado, lettuce, and onions.
   

10. Palak Daal

    A palak daal recipe from Kasa’s Anamika Khanna – a hearty pot of spinach, lentils, and spices. Kasa is a favorite Indian restaurant in San Francisco.
    

1. Carrot, Dill & White Bean Salad

   Warm, coin-shaped slices of pan-fried carrots, white beans, and herbs tossed with a tangy-sweet lemon shallot dressing. It tastes good the day you make it, even better the day after.
   

2. Spicy Sesame Coleslaw

   Feathery green and red cabbages along with carrots, apples, and scallions tossed with a spicy, creamy sesame dressing.
   

3. Genius Kale Salad

   There is a special kale salad recipe in the Food52 Genius Recipes cookbook. A single kale salad that ran the gauntlet, beating out all others, for a slice of limelight.
   

4. Quinoa Salad

   A favorite quinoa salad punctuated with crunchy cucumbers and toasted cashews. There’s creamy feta, wisps of arugula, flecks of red onion and herbs, and a special ginger-curry dressing. So delicious!
   

5. Broccoli Apple Salad

   A dreamy broccoli apple salad made from all-star ingredients. Bright broccoli florets, crisp apples, crunchy fried shallots, candied nuts and slivered red onions are tossed in a honey-kissed, creamy, almond dressing.
   

6. Tassajara Warm Red Cabbage Salad

   Inspired by a recipe in The Complete Tassajara Cookbook, a warm winter salad made from sautéed shredded red cabbage. Feta, balsamic vinegar and golden raisins make it sweet and salty, rich with color, texture and flavor.
   

7. Raw Tuscan Kale Salad

   A beautiful, shredded, raw kale salad tossed in a vibrant, lemony-pecorino dressing. From Melissa Clark’s cookbook, In the Kitchen with A Good Appetite.
   

8. Summer Fruit Salad

   A summer fruit salad featuring berries, peaches and pluots. It is drizzled with a citrusy lemongrass and honey dressing, topped with toasted walnuts, and lots of mint. Double down on the berry component to make this an even higher fiber recipe.
   

9. Niçoise Salad

   Everyone can find ingredients to love In this vegetarian take on Niçoise Salad! Beans and artichokes take the place of tuna (or anchovies) here alongside tender potatoes, hard-boiled eggs, cherry tomatoes, and green beans.
   

10. Apple Salad

    The sort of hearty apple salad I love. It has heirloom apples, shaved celery, and toasted nuts of your choosing. The dressing is creamy and spiked with rosemary, garlic and champagne vinegar.
    

11. Saffron Raspberries

    Raspberries are loaded with fiber and these simple raspberries are extra special. Beautiful raspberries are tossed with saffron brown sugar, vanilla paste, olive oil, and toasted almonds. Really delicious.
    

1. Farro Salad with Olives, Walnuts and Pecorino

   This quirky yet delicious farro salad tends to leave a big impression. Green olives, chives, toasted walnuts, and honey combine with a few other ingredients into bold make-ahead grain salad perfect for parties and potlucks.
   

2. Double Broccoli Quinoa

   For the broccoli lovers out there (or anyone who strives to be), this is your recipe. Cook up lots of broccoli, and puree half of it into a pesto. The other half is cut into little florets. Toss the broccoli with some quinoa, sliced avocado and a drizzle of feisty chile pepper oil.
   

3. Baked Cabbage Sliders

   Crisp on the edges and packed with beans, quinoa, cabbage, cottage cheese and other good stuff on the inside, these make for an easy, protein-packed meal everyone can personalize with toppings.
   

4. Macro Bowls

   The macro bowls featured in Joe Yonan’s Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking – nutty brown rice, a rainbow of vegetables, and a miso-tahini dressing you’ll want to put on everything.
   

5. Baked Quinoa Patties

   Great served hot or room-temperature, these quinoa patties are packed with herbs, kale and creamy feta cheese. Adult and kid-friendly, and perfect for lunches on the go.
   

6. Quinoa Salad

   A favorite quinoa salad punctuated with crunchy cucumbers and toasted cashews. There’s creamy feta, wisps of arugula, flecks of red onion and herbs, and a special ginger-curry dressing. So delicious! And if you love quinoa, here’s where all the quinoa recipes live.
   

7. Peanut Butter Granola

   Using a short ingredient list of pantry basics, this peanut butter granola is incredibly good. It features a peanut butter and maple syrup coating that bakes beautifully into crunchy oat clusters.
   

8. The Perfect Healthy Granola (Low Oil & Naturally Sweetened)

   There are a few different granola camps. This one falls squarely in the great, everyday, healthy granola category. Midnight black and deeply chocolate-flavored with dark black cocoa and cocoa nibs, this granola is packed with heart-healthy oats and seeds. Naturally sweetened, clumpy, and crunchy, the recipe calls for just a small splash of olive oil, and leverages a secret ingredient to bring it all together.
   

9. Quinoa Power Bowl

   A quinoa power bowl makes the perfect working lunch. The base is simply quinoa and mung bean, and the magic comes from the deeply sautéed and spiced celery. This bowl welcomes as many, or few, toppings as you like – roasted cherry tomatoes, salted dill yogurt, quick pickled red onions, chopped olives.
   

10. How To Cook Quinoa (and 20 Quinoa Recipes)

    How to cook quinoa perfectly, every time. You can use it in everything from salads and bowls, stews and sourdough, or any of my 20 favorite quinoa recipes highlighted below.
    

1. White Bean Soup with Garlic and Olive Oil

   This white bean soup is rustic, silky, and built around plump beans simmered in a saffron-tinted broth. A squeeze of citrus, crumbled feta, and chopped olives makes each bite special.
   

2. Rustic Cabbage Soup

   Hearty, healthy, and satisfying – this cabbage soup recipe is super simple to make. Slice a cabbage into thin ribbons and cook it down in a simple pot of sautéed potatoes, onions, beans, garlic and flavorful broth. Finish each bowl with a generous drizzle of great olive oil, a couple dollops of sour cream and a jolt of something spicy.
   

3. Simple Farro & Bean Soup

   The sort of hearty, timeless, comforting soup that helps in times like these. The foundation ingredients are flexible and straight from the pantry – grains, canned tomatoes, beans. There’s chopping to do, which keeps the hands busy and mind focused. And if you have a lot of produce that needs to be used, a soup like this is perfect – eat some, freeze some.
   

4. Persian New Year Noodle Soup (Ash Reshteh)

   An amazing Persian New Year Noodle Soup (Ash Reshteh) inspired by a version in Greg & Lucy Malouf’s beautiful book, Saraban. At its core, this is a celebratory bean and noodle soup featuring thin egg noodles swimming in a fragrant broth spiced with turmeric, cumin, chiles, and black pepper. Loaded with spinach and herbs, you serve it topped with walnuts, caramelized onions, and a dollop of something creamy. It’s amazing.
   

5. Lively Up Lentil Soup

   This quick lentil soup recipe delivers layer after layer of flavor. The tang of the tomatoes plays off the earthiness of the lentils, and the fragrant bolt of saffron yogurt brightens each bowl.
   

6. Green Lentil Soup with Curried Brown Butter

   A favorite green lentil soup topped with a curried brown butter drizzle, and pan-fried paneer cubes.
   

7. Broccoli Cheddar Soup

   A simple, everyday broccoli soup made special with crusty, mustardy croutons and cheddar. Perfect for days when you need extra nutritional punch.
   

8. Ribollita

   Ribollita, a beautifully thick Tuscan stew made with dark greens, lots of beans, vegetables, olive oil, and thickened with day-old bread. One of my favorites.
   

9. Spicy Instant Pot Taco Soup

   Taco Soup, a weeknight winner. A hearty melding of beans, and corn, and taco spices, and quinoa. Finished with avocado and pepitas and a squeeze of lime.
   

10. Coconut Red Lentil Soup (Esalen Ayurvedic Dal)

    A vibrant red lentil soup (or stew) that is always hugely popular. A friend turned me onto this Ayurvedic dal recipe from the Esalen Cookbook years ago. Red lentil based, curry-spiced coconut broth with back notes of ginger and tomato, with slivered green onions, and a finish of cilantro or kale.
    

1. Roasted Broccoli

   The bonus part of this roasted broccoli is the creamy tahini under-dressing along with the scallion-peanut sprinkle. Inspired by a sheet pan recipe in Alison Roman’s Dining In, this broccoli is on repeat. But here’s where you can also find more broccoli recipes.
   

2. Cauliflower Caponata

   This deeply flavorful caponata recipe cleverly trades out traditional eggplant for roasted cauliflower and uses an oven in place of deep-frying. The idea comes from Easy Wins by Anna Jones and has become an absolute favorite.
   

3. Double Broccoli Quinoa

   For the broccoli lovers out there (or anyone who strives to be), this is your recipe. Cook up lots of broccoli, and puree half of it into a pesto. The other half is cut into little florets. Toss the broccoli with some quinoa, sliced avocado and a drizzle of feisty chile pepper oil.
   

4. Roasted Cauliflower with Tahini

   A special roasted cauliflower inspired by Sara Forte’s new cookbook. It’s wildly delicious – loaded with herbs, dates, nuts, roasted red onions and tossed with a tahini dressing.
   

5. Braised Artichokes with Orange

   Braised artichokes baked for an hour, covered in an unctuous slathering of olive oil, white wine, olives, mint, garlic and orange zest. Make them on a Sunday night and use throughout the week to make your sandwiches and pastas fantastic.
   

6. How to Cook Artichokes

   A primer on how to cook artichokes, particularly the baby ones. A lot of people are intimidated by the process, or they think it’s not worth the effort. But with a little patience, salt, and fat – you can absolutely cook some of the best artichokes of your life.
   

7. Baked Artichoke Dip

   This simple artichoke dip hits all the crowd-pleasing notes of the classic version, but cuts way back on the mayo-bomb aspect. And guess what? No-one can tell the difference. I still use a bit of mayo, but incorporate some silken tofu and greek yogurt.
   

8. Pan-Fried Beans with Kale

   Golden crusted pan-fried beans are made extra special by loading them up with kale, Parmesan, lemon, walnuts, and nutmeg. So many great variations in the comments as well!
   

9. Heirloom Bean and Mushroom “Carnitas” Casserole

   A favorite Rancho Gordo heirloom bean casserole recipe. The smell of garlic and herbs baking alongside the beans, simmering tomatoes, and mushrooms will bring neighbors in off the sidewalk.
   

10. Instant Pot Chickpea Cauliflower Korma

    An Insta-friendly riff on the Chickpea Cauliflower Korma recipe in Jennifer Iserloh’s The Healing Slow Cooker – chickpeas, cauliflower, combined with a not-shy simmer sauce.
    

Continue reading 70+ High-Fiber Recipes on 101 Cookbooks

You can see my folding technique in the close-up photo just below.They’re actually quite quick to pull together, and they freeze incredibly well. Make some, and freeze some for mid-week dumpling nights.

For any dumplings you don’t cook, you can see how I’ve arranged my dumplings on a parchment-lined baking sheet. You can freeze them directly like that (or transfer to a plate that will fit in your freezer). Then, once frozen, drop them into a freezer bag for longer storage. You can cook them directly from the freezer without thawing.

More Dumpling Recipes

• Wonton Soup
• Green Curry Dumplings
• White Bean Soup with Pesto Herb Dumplings
• Red Lentil Dumplings
• Momo Dumplings

Continue reading Quick Ricotta Dumplings in Tomato Broth on 101 Cookbooks

Spicy Chickpea Pasta Bowls: Ingredient Notes

• Harissa: This is the one I’ve been using – a rose harissa. I bought a jar when I had lunch at Mayfield a while ago, and never looked back. Use whatever harissa you like enough to keep on hand.
  
• Pasta: I’ve cooked variations on this recipe with a range of pastas and noodles, and have some thoughts. Short, sturdy dried pastas work best. They stand up to the stirring and mixing that happens as you’re coating the pasta with the sauce better. Fresh pastas are a lot harder to get right here, and the whole situation can get, I dunno, gloopier. It still tastes delicious, but the dried pastas are easier. You can see a version I made with fresh ramen noodles (pictured below), it was good – but was more challenging to keep clump-free. Good results have happened with: penne, ziti, reginatti, and the paccheri you see in the photos.
• Feta: I tend to like sheep’s milk feta, and prefer the kind sold in blocks. This allows you to break off different sized bits and pieces versus pre-crumbled feta.

The Sauce

You can see what the sauce looks like in the photo below. There are just a few ingredients that you puree. I find the easiest for clean-up is to use a hand blender, but you can use a standard blender or food processor if that is what you have in your kitchen.

Variations

This is the sort of meal that begs to be adapted to whatever you have on hand. My initial inspiration was actually a photo I saw of an Ottolenghi ramen dish made with tuna and gochujang. I loved all the colors and the overall ingredient mash-up, but as a vegetarian tuna isn’t in my cooking palette. That said, I was still inspired, and used the overall vibe as a jumping off point – incorporating chickpeas and other ingredients I had on hand. I’d encourage you to do the same! For example, play around with another herb – basil is amazing, dill could be interesting. I’m going to a version next week using roasted broccoli and delicata squash in place of the cucumber. Anyway, have fun and let me know how it goes!

More Pasta Recipes

• Harissa Spaghetti
• Penne alla Vodka
• Spaghetti with No-Cook Sauce
• Pasta with Smashed Zucchini Sauce
• Mediterranean Pasta Salad
• Pici
• Cavatelli
• Pasta with Crushed Creamy Walnut Sauce
• Baked Ziti
• more pasta recipes

More Chickpea Recipes

• Crispy Chickpeas
• Chickpea Salad Sandwich
• Chickpea & Rice Soup with Garlic Chile Oil
• Turmeric Chickpeas with Garlic Tahini
• A Really Good Chana Masala
• all chickpea recipes

Continue reading Spicy Chickpea Pasta Bowls on 101 Cookbooks

Cottage Cheese Wraps

Cottage cheese wraps are a breeze to make, but you do have to be mindful of a couple details the first few times through the process to avoid issues:

• Don’t over-process the mixture in your blender. 15-20 pulses does the job, resulting in a smooth batter.
• Yes, you need to use parchment paper.
• Spread the batter across your sheet pan gently, to a uniform thickness. Too thin, it is more likely to crack.
  
• Bake until the wrap is very golden on the bottom, this is right around 30 minutes in my oven. This is the color you’re after, or even a bit darker!
  
• After removing from the oven, let the wrap set for a bit. Roughly 3-5 minutes is about right. It’s less likely to break apart as you’re filling and rolling.
  

The Ingredients

To make the wrap component of cottage cheese wraps you need three things: cottage cheese, eggs, and a bit of salt. You can accent from there with abandon. I tend to spice my batter with whatever spice blend I’m fixated on at the time, but herbs, peppers, and pastes are also favorites.

• Cottage Cheese:  For this recipe I always use low-fat cottage cheese. Typically 1.5%-2% I’ve found that different brands of cottage cheese impact the thickness of the batter, sometimes it is more runny than other times. If you feel like your batter is regularly too runny, use 2 eggs instead of 3. If you feel like your batter is too thick use 3 eggs in place of 2. I find two eggs usually gives me a nice consistency that is easy to pour and work with on the pan.
• Eggs: Good quality, large.
• Accents: Some favorites include chopped chives (pictured), chopped serrano chile, a couple pieces of turmeric plus freshly ground black pepper, madras curry powder, toasted onion powder.

Cottage Cheese Wrap: Variations

The variations here are endless. A few ideas to flavor the wrap component:

• Furikake: add a couple teaspoons of citrus furikake to the wrap mixture prior to baking.
• Turmeric & Black Pepper: add 1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric and a few cranks of freshly ground black pepper to your batter.
• Double allium: Add some good onion powder along with a bunch of chopped chives to your batter.
• Za’atar: add a teaspoon or two of za’atar to the batter. This goes especially well if you use labneh as a spread filling.
• Olives: Finely chopped black olives work well here, just make sure to chop them extra fine, and stir them in after blending.

Cottage Cheese Wrap Filling Ideas:

My goal when I make these is: one wrap meal. I’m going for an all-in-one situation. Filling the wraps with something green is usually where I land.

• Kale Salad: I like to stem and chop a half bunch lacinato kale. Massage with 1-2 teaspoons of good-tasting vinegar, and 1-2 teaspoons of olive oil, and a bit of salt until it collapses, add some avocado, toasted seeds, cherry tomatoes, etc. and use for your wrap filling.
  
• Broccoli and Winter squash: Pictured below is a wrap smeared with chive-flecked labneh, and topped with simple oven-roasted broccoli, thin crescents of delicata squash, sliced green onions, and a smear of sriracha. Calabrian chili paste is a good alternate here on the spicy front. Also, a few toasted pumpkin seeds. To roast the vegetables, toss them in a bit of olive oil, sprinkle with salt, and roast in the 350°F / 176°C oven until golden brown. You can do this at the same time you are baking the cottage cheese mixture. It’s the wrap also pictured in the lead photo.
  
  
• Labneh: Use a smear of labneh (homemade labneh is the best!) across the wrap before adding other fillings and rolling. You can see labneh used as a spread in the lead photos here.
• Chili crisp
• Roasted cherry tomatoes
• Pesto
• Pan-blistered artichoke hearts

More Cottage Cheese Recipes

• Cottage Cheese Muffins
• Cottage Cheese Pancakes
• Lemon Ricotta Pancakes

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You can take this in plenty of directions depending on what you have on hand. Pecorino or crème fraîche work well in place of the Parmesan, and toasted almonds are a good stand-in for pistachios. Basil or dill are great alternatives to the mint.

If you want to make more of a meal out if it, pile everything onto bruschetta with a thick slather of ricotta or goat cheese. And come to think of it, you can cook this pizza dough with a slather of ricotta, goat cheese and/or mozzarella, and use the favas to scatter across the pizza once out of the oven. Also, while it’s not at all the same – you can do a version of this using edamame.

A couple quick fava tips before jumping into the recipe. Fava beans change dramatically throughout the season, and you start to get a feel from them over time. A lot of people love the smallest favas, they sometimes have skins tender enough to leave on. I tend to look for medium-to-large fava beans, but not so large they start to get starchy and hard. There’s a sweet spot and eventually you’ll start to recognize it.

More Recipes Featuring Fava Beans

• Vegetarian Paella (with favas)
• Citron Noodles with Miso Garlic Butter (and favas!)
• Dried Fava Soup with Mint and Guajillo Chiles
• All recipes with fava beans

Continue reading Fava Beans with Mint, Lemon & Pistachios on 101 Cookbooks