Friday/Saturday: One Pot...Two Meals?!?

Okay, so how do you cook two different meals in one pot?

10 Bean & Vegetable Soup

1 cup 10 bean soup mix, soaked for 24 hours
5 cups water
3 medium red-skinned potatoes (cut into 1/2 or 1 inch pieces)
3 medium carrots (sliced)
2 bouillion cubes
1/4 cup dried mushrooms (the small broken bits from the bottom of the bag)
1 piece seaweed (I left this whole so I could pull it out later)
1 jalepeno (I left whole so I could remove it)

When I made this, I put all these ingredients in the crock pot and cook for 12 hours. But 12 hours later the beans were still tough! I don't know if they were a little old when I bought them or if cooking them on "low" was not hot enough. Luckily beans sink when they aren't cooked, so I pulled all the rest of the soup off the top and left the beans in with a little bit of broth.

So I was left with a savory, brothy vegetable soup. Served with cheesy toast that crispy almost like giant croutons...mmm! It actually reminded me a little bit of French onion soup for some reason; I think the mushrooms made it really rich in flavor, and the cheesy toast was delicious when it absorbed that broth.


I kept going with those beans...

1 cup 10 bean soup mix, cooked for 12 hours in a small amount of broth
4 additional cups water
2 tomatoes
1 jar heat & serve tomato soup
1 bag alphabet noodles

I added the extra water and the diced tomatoes and left it cooking for another almost 48 hours! Then I added the jar of tomato soup and the noodle and heated those for about 30-45 minutes and served.


Well, to be honest, this second soup did not turn out all that well. The beans were still slightly tough. I think they were old or something. I also cooked the noodles in the crock pot, so they got pretty mushy. I advise you and my future self to cook the noodles on their own and add to the soup just before serving. And toss the beans that don't seem to be cooking - they probably won't.

Friday Dinner: Soup & 2 sides

My parents were coming for dinner, and as usual I was already running out of time before I'd even started to make dinner. Also, I wanted something healthy and fresh. And I'd bought some random vegetables a few days before that I needed to use up. Oh, and I had some leftover rice from making sushi, and I wanted to use that, too. But my dad is a little picky - he'll eat what ever someone makes for him, but I actually wanted him to like it, too. Mexican is usually popular, so I wanted to combine the rice into something Mexican... I thought maybe I could mix into some soup, so I went to one of my old standbys: Vegetarian Soup Cuisine: 125 Soups and Stews from Around the World. I found a couple soup recipes that used rice, but didn't have the ingredients for either one. Instead, I combined them into a Mexican Corn Soup with Sweet Potatoes and Greens.

Mexican Corn Soup with Sweet Potatoes and Greens

2 sweet potatoes
2-3 leaves collards
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
1 cube buillion
3-4 cups water
1 can corn
serve with rice

Soup is always easy, and I try to make it even easier. Basically, chop the vegetables, boil those that take longer first, then add the others. In this case, cook the collards and sweet potatoes for 10-15 minutes (with boullion & nutritional yeast). Then at the very end add the canned corn. To serve, scoop into a bowl and put some rice on top.



Bean & Tomato Salad

1 very large and wrinkled heirloom tomato
1 container pre-mixed bean salad
6 leaves basil
6 sprigs parsley

I felt like we needed some protein, but as I looked through my canned beans nothing really sounded like ti would go with the soup. I thought about adding some white kidney beans, which would have been fin,e but didn't sound great. I also had a can of bean salad, and thought I could serve that with some herbs and tomatoes.

Basically, open the bean salad and out in a large bowl. Chop the herbs finely, and the tomato coarsely. Add to bowl, and mix everything well. Tada!

Brussel Sprouts

1 small bag brussel sprouts
2 small sweet mini bell peppers
white balsamic
butter
olive oil
brown sugar



I had the brussel sprouts, and those are not good when they are not fresh. For that reason, I wanted to use them up. I also bought them at the regular store, so I was already suspicious that they'd be bitter. (If you think you don't like brussel sprouts, try them fresh from the farm... they are a different vegetable). To make sure they weren't bitter, I decided to add butter and brown sugar :)

I also mixed in some white balsamic and olive oil, just to add some more depth. I cut the sprouts in half (so they'd absorb more in their leaves), added the butter, oil, vinegar, and sugar. Baked for 20 minutes in the oven at 350, covered with foil. In hindsight, I would have left the foil off to let them get crispy.



Everyone says: The brussel sprouts are the big winner.
Time: Maybe 45-60 minutes to prepare everything, plus another 20-30 while they cook.