Moroccan Stew with Butternut Squash, Red Potatoes and Brined Green Olives

Photo by Deb Perelman of The Smitten Kitchen

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This week's farm share from Glade Road Growing includes butternut squash, so I thought I'd do another Moroccan stew.  The original recipe calls for preserved lemons, which, if bought prepared  are pricey.  Making them takes three weeks or four weeks, if you want to use this recipe or this one. Since Perelman says they're an acquired taste which she hasn't yet acquired,  I substituted lemon juice.

I also used a combination of lentils and chickpeas, rather than only chickpeas. While couscous is traditional,  it's a pasta.  I prefer to use quinoa, which is gluten free and higher in protein.

I also roasted the potatoes and butternut squash to deepen the flavor.  If you want to cut out this step, you can add them at the beginning of the boiling time. 

Serves 6

Ingredients:

1 and 1/2  cup  dried chickpeas, cooked
2/3 cup raw quinoa, cooked
2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, divided in half
1 onion, chopped
6 cloves of fresh garlic, smashed, peeled and chopped
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/8 teaspoon red pepper flakes
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
2 cups of  tomatoes, diced (canned is fine, if they are out of season)
3 cups water
1 pound butternut squash, cut in half, strings and seeds removed
3/4 pound small red potatoes, cut in half
1 1/2 cups green lentils, rinsed well
juice of 1/2 a lemon
1 cup brined olives, pitted. (Green Cerignolas are nice.  If you prefer, substitute Kalamatas.)
1/3 cup of fresh cilantro, chopped
1/3 cups of sliced almonds, toasted


Instructions:


1.  To cook chickpeas,  in a medium saucepan with a heavy bottom and a tight-fitting lid, cover with an 3 cups of water, and and bring to a boil.  Rinse.  Return to pot, add ½ teaspoon sea salt and bring again to a boil again.  Cover, reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Let stand over night or for at least one hour. Rinse a second time, add three cups of water and bring to a boil again and simmer on low heat until soft, about 1 hour.

2.  Preheat oven to 450 degrees, F. Coat the  squash and potatoes in one tablespoon of the olive oil and roast, cut side down  on a cookie sheet in preheated oven until soft, about 30 minutes.  Cook until you can handle and then dice.

3.  To make the stew, heat the oil in a medium pot over medium heat and saute onions and garlic few minutes until the onions are softened.  Stir in cumin, cinnamon,  sea salt, black pepper, red pepper flakes, and turmeric.  Cook a few minutes until spices are fragrant. Add cooked chickpeas, tomatoes, water and lentils.  Bring to a boil, then cover, reduce heat.

4.  To cook quinoa, bring 2  cup of water to a boil.  Add the 2/3 cup of  raw quinoa and return
to boil.  Take off stove and rinse well.  Add back in a scant 2 cups of water and return to stove and    bring to a boil.  Turn down to low.  Cover.  Cook 15 minutes.  Turn off heat.

5.  Add roasted squash and tomatoes to the stew mixture and cook for an addition 5 minutes or until lentils are fully cooked. Stir in lemon and olives.

6.  Fluff the quinoa with a fork and divide among six bowls.  Ladle the stew on top, garnished with cilantro, almonds and with greek yogurt, if desired.

This would be good served with steamed or braised greens, such as kale, tatsoi or spinach.

Curried Kabocha Squash Soup

Photo by Willow Arlen of Will Cook for Friends.

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This week's farm share from Glade Road Growing includes a sunshine kabocha squash. Rob Johnston developed this variety over the span of nearly twenty years of hand pollination and released it to the commercial market in 2004. In the 1970’s Johnston started by crossing two orange kabochas, the red kuri and golden nugget.  Later in the 1980’s Johnston crossed the most desirable offspring of this work with a green kabocha known as home delight, which was known to have a desirable sweet and dry flesh.

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Serves 4

This soup  will keep for about a week in the fridge, or can be frozen.

Ingredients:

1 kabocha squash (about 2 lbs)
2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil or coconut oil
1/2 medium yellow onion, diced
3-4 cloves garlic, smashed, peeled and finely chopped
1 tablespoon of fresh ginger, finely chopped
1/4 tsp. ground cumin
½ tsp. ground coriander

1/2 tsp    cardamon

1/8 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp. ground turmeric

 1/8 tsp.  mustard

 1/8 tsp.   red pepper flakes

2 cups water
1/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
sea salt, to taste
fresh cilantro, for garnish
wedges of lime, for serving

Greek yogurt for garnish (or coconut milk for vegan version)

Instructions:

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2.  Remove the stem, and cut the squash into wedges. Scoop out the seeds and stringy insides, and discard them. Place the wedges cut-side up onto a foil lined baking sheet, drizzle with 1  tablespoon of olive or coconut oil, and sprinkle with a generous pinch of salt. Roast the squash for 30-40 minutes, or until tender. Remove from the oven and let rest until it is cool enough to handle, then scoop the meat away from the flesh.

3.  In a large pot or dutch oven, saute the onion with 1 tablespoon of oil for 5-7 minutes, or until translucent. Add the garlic, ginger, spices and a pinch of salt, and cook for another 1-2 minutes, or until the spices are fragrant.

4.  In a blender, combine water with coconut and blend until smooth.  Add squash and spiced onions and puree until smooth. You may need to do this in batches. Return to the pot and add additional liquid as needed to reach the desired consistency.

5.  Serve with fresh cilantro, drizzle of yogurt or coconut milk and and wedges of lime.

Spaghetti Squash Ramen

Photo from Anarchist Kitchen.

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1 spaghetti squash, halved and de-seeded
2 carrots, cut in half lengthwise and cut into sticks
1/2  # mushrooms, sliced
2 cups arugula (or kale, chard  or spinach) chopped
2 green onions, chopped
1/2 cup of cilantro, chopped
1 tablespoon of fresh ginger, finely chopped
4 cloves of garlic, smashed, peeled and finely chopped
4 tablespoons of miso, thinned with water
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
2 tablespoon of demerara sugar
1 fresh lime lime
sea salt to taste
4 tablespoons of toasted sesame seed oil
8 cups of water
4 hard-boiled chicken or duck eggs, peeled and halved

Directions:

1.  Preheat oven to 400 C.  Cut squash in half and remove seeds.  Place face down in baking dish with some water and bake for for 40 minutes.

2.  In a skillet, add about 1 tbs sesame seed oil. Sautee half the mushrooms with the carrots and half the grated ginger and garlic. When carrots look soft take everything out of the skillet and set on a plate.

3.  In the same skillet, add the greens and remaining garlic and saute them. They will wilt quickly. Once done add them to the cooked veggie plate.

4.  To make broth, bring water to boil in the skillet with the rest of mushrooms and ginger, oil,  pepper flakes and sugar.  Let broth cool until it's warm, stir in the miso and the lime juice.

5. Take spaghetti squash from oven and use fork to remove insides in strands. Divide the squash among four bowls, add broth, and place veggies on top and garnish with onion greens, cilantro and hard boiled eggs.

Fennel-Apple-Winter Squash Tart

Photo by McKel Hill for her blog Nutrition Stripped



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This week's farm share is slated to include fennel and I thought I'd do a recipe for a tart to celebrate.  With it being apple and winter squash season, why not combine all three? My recipe uses delicata squash and an onion, while butternut squash is pictured.  You could even use sweet potatoes instead.


This tart features a gluten and soy free vegan crust. If you'd prefer a conventional butter crust, see my recipe here.  I also have a recipe for a crust that includes corn meal and cheese here.  You can make the rice and the quinoa flours called for in this recipe by chilling the grains and then running them through a blender.

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Serves 6 - 8

Crust:

½ cup brown rice flour
½ cup quinoa flour
¼ cup cornstarch
8 tablespoons coconut oil, chilled
6 tablespoons ice water
¼ teaspoon sea salt

Filling:

1 delicata squash, unpeeled and halved, (or 1 half large butternut, peeled and quartered), seeds and strings removed and then sliced thin. 
1 large Granny Smith apple, quartered, cored and sliced thin
1 fennel bulb, end trimmed, sliced thinly (reserve the greens and stems for another purpose)
1 large onion, peeled, end trimmed, sliced thinly
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon dried sage or 1 tablespoon fresh sage leaves chopped
1 teaspoon of dried rosemary or 1 tablespoon fresh rosemary, whole leaves
1 teaspoon sea salt
¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
¼-1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes

1.  Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.

2.  To make the crust, combine all the rice and quinoa flours and corn starch in a large mixing bowl.  Start making small balls or chunks of the chilled coconut oil that you'll be working this into the flour and gradually adding in the ice cold water 1 tablespoon at a time. At this point, the dough will look very crumbly. Work your hands into the dough bringing it together- use a pastry scraper to help get the dough off the the sides of the bowl. Spread the dough out in a well-greased cast iron skillet, making sure that the dough comes all the way up to the top of the sides so that you will have the option to fold it over..  Chill for 5-10 minutes in the refrigerator.  If you don't have a large skillet, you can roll the dough out on a piece of parchment paper on a baking sheet instead.

3.  To make the filling,  combine in the sliced squash, apples, onions and fennel in a large mixing bowl. Add olive oil and seasoning and gently toss.  Arrange in layers until the entire crust is full. When the crust is warm enough to work, gently fold the edges on top of the sliced filling. Drizzle entire tart with additional olive oil and sea salt.

4.  Bake for 40 minutes at 400 degrees F or until crust is golden brown.

5.  If you'd like you can serve each slice with a dollop of  Greek yogurt, a crumble of goat or feta cheese, soy sour cream or McKel Hill suggests cashew spread ( I prefer Molly Patrick's recipe because it avoids the brewer's yeast, but you may want to spice it up with fresh garlic and Dijon mustard.)  In addition, or instead, you can also used a few of the fennel fronds torn apart for a garnish.

Spicy Carrot Soup

Photo by Karsten Moran for the New York Times.


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Hail got Glade Road Growing's chard this week (sigh), but there will still be carrots and onions in the farm share.  With the cold weather, I though soup would be good.  (And when the warm weather returns, this one is also good chilled.  If you would like this to be heartier, for a main course, you can add two cups of cooked white beans or garbanzos. 

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Serves 4


Ingredients:
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil,  coconut oil, or ghee
2 medium onions, thinly sliced (about 3 cups)
1 tablespoon fresh ginger, finely chopped
4 cloves of fresh garlic, smashed, peeled and finely chopped
1 tablespoon turmeric
½ ground coriander
⅛ teaspoon red pepper flakes
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
2 pounds young carrots, peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces
8 cups of water
1 cup of dried white beans or garbanzo beans, cooked (optional)
1 bunch or hakurei turnips or one small daikon radish, peeled, halved lengthwise and sliced 1/4 inch thick (about 2 cups) (if using turnips, reserve the greens for another use)
1 teaspoon mustard seeds
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
Cilantro or basil leaves, chopped, for garnish (optional)
Lime wedges, for serving
Greek yogurt or tofu sour cream for garnish (optional)

Directions:

1.  If you are adding beans to make this a main dish, the night or at least two hours before, in a medium saucepan with a heavy bottom and a tight-fitting lid, cover 1 cup of beans with 2 cups water, and bring to a boil.  Rinse.  Return to pot, add ½ teaspoon sea salt and bring again to a boil again.  Cover, reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Let stand over night or for at least one hour. Rinse a second time.  Add two cups of water and bring to a boil again and simmer on low heat until soft, about 1 hour with 2 bay leaves.



2.  In a heavy-bottomed, lidded  soup pot, over medium-high heat, add 2 tablespoons of the oil.  When it is hot enough that a drop of water turns to steam, add onions saute, stirring, for about 5 minutes, or until lightly browned. Add ginger, garlic, turmeric, coriander and cayenne and cook for one minute more, or just until fragrant. Season with salt.

3.  Add carrots and water. Raise the heat and bring to a brisk simmer, then put on the lid and turn heat to low. Cook until the carrots are tender, about 15 minutes. Remove from stove and let cool slightly. If you would like this to be a main dish, add two cups of cooked beans.  Purée in a blender in batches, then return to soup pot.  Thin with water as  necessary, as the soup should not be too thick. Set aside.

4.  While soup is cooking, steam the turnips or daikon until tender, about 5 to 6 minutes. Drain and keep warm.

5.  Reheat the soup over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Meanwhile, heat remaining tablespoon of  oil in cast iron skillet over medium-high heat. When hot, add mustard seeds, cumin seeds and red pepper flakes. Cook for one minute, or until spices are fragrant and beginning to pop. Pour the entire contents of the pan into the soup and stir to combine. Taste for salt and adjust.

6.  Divide daikon pieces among four bowls and ladle over a cup or so of soup. Garnish with cilantro or basil leaves, if using, and give each bowl a squeeze of lime.   Add a dollop of yogurt or tofu sour cream, if you desire.