A Week's Worth of Cooking

Remember how a few weeks ago I was obsessed with mangoes, and didn't cook anything without them? I fear the same thing is going to happen with me and plantains. They are like enormous bananas, only slightly orange and a little more tropically flavored, and thus infinitely more exotic. I'd never had one before today, for which I blame every single one of the people that I know who has had one but never insisted I try one. Feel free to blame them when I post a week's worth of nothing but Musa paradisiaca pictures (see, even the Latin name is telling you it's awesome).

Anyway, new obsession aside, I've been cooking a lot with lentils, as you can see from the pictures below. I haven't posted many recipes recently, so I'm going to overload you with not one but three, all of which feature simple ingredients that are easy to prepare.

Palak Ki Daal

This is just a fancy way to say "delightful lentil and spinach dish." I like to scoop it up with naan or hearty Austrian bread - it's kind of difficult to manage with soft breads so go for the denser, whole grain kind, which is better for you anyway.

Daal:
    ½ cup onion, diced
    1 tbsp ghee (or butter)
    1 cup moong daal (split yellow lentils), rinsed and sorted
    ½ tsp turmeric powder
    1" piece ginger, grated
    ½ lb fresh spinach (more if you're Popeye) chopped roughly

Tadka (Hindi for "yummy ghee seasoning"):
    3 tbsps ghee (or butter)
    1 tsp cumin seeds
    2 dry red chilis, broken in half
    5 cloves garlic, minced
    a pinch of asafetida (optional)
    lemon wedges & fresh cilantro for garnish

1. In a medium-sized pot on medium heat, heat 1 tbsp of ghee and sauté the onions until golden brown.
2. Add the lentils and cover with water, so that it comes up an inch above the lentils. Bring to boil, then stir in the turmeric and ginger. Cook until the daal is soft but not entirely mushy, about thirty minutes, and add more water if necessary to keep it at the consistency of thick soup.
3. When the daal is cooked, add the spinach and salt to taste. Reduce the heat to minimum.
4. In a small pan, heat the remaining ghee and add the cumin seeds, and fry until they stop sizzling (about thirty seconds; be careful since they're pretty hoppity, and don't burn them!). Add chilis, garlic, and asafetida; sauté until the garlic turns golden brown, and then stir in the tadka to the cooked lentils.
5. Transfer to a serving dish, and garnish with lemon and plenty of cilantro leaves.

Lentil, Wild Rice, & Plantain Salad

A variation on my oft-made black bean, quinoa, and mango salad - feel free to use any legume, grain, and fruit that you have on hand. It's a great way to use up leftovers that have been chilling in the fridge, since the lentils and rice don't have to be freshly prepared. If you're cooking for fewer than four people or lazy, like me, you can cook the lentils and rice in the same pot. Just follow the directions for the wild rice, only instead of ½ cup wild rice, it'll be ½ cup mixed wild rice and lentils.

Lentils:
    ½ cup green lentils, rinsed and sorted
    1 ½ cups water
    1 bay leaf
    ¼ tsp salt

1. In a small pot on medium-high heat, bring all the ingredients to a boil. Cover, reduce heat to minimum and simmer until the lentils are tender but intact (35-40 minutes). Drain, remove bay leaf, let cool.

Wild Rice:
    ½ tbsp butter
    ½ cup onion, diced
    2 cloves garlic, minced
    ½ wild rice
    1 ½ cups water
    ¼ tsp salt

1. In a small pot on medium-high heat, sauté the onion and garlic in the butter for a minute or so. Add the wild rice, water, and salt. Cover and bring to a boil, then immediately reduce the heat to minimum and simmer for 40-45 minutes, until the rice is a little split. Remove from heat, drain off any extra water, and fluff with a fork. Let cool.

Salad:
    1 cup finely diced bell pepper, any color you like (I saw violet the other day)
    1 cup chopped scallions (leave out the white part if you don't want it too oniony)
    ½ cup chopped celery or lettuce
    1 cup chopped fresh cilantro
    1 jalapeño or serrano chile, deseeded and diced fine (optional)
    2 ripe, mostly black plantains, diced*
    2 tbsp grapeseed or olive oil
    2 tbsp red wine or balsamic vinegar
    1 tsp ground cumin
    ¼ tsp cinnamon or nutmeg
    1 clove garlic, minced

1. In a medium-sized bowl, combine the pepper, scallions, celery, cilantro, plantains, and chile, if using. In a cup or small bowl, whisk together the remaining ingredients, and stir into the salad. Add the wild rice and lentils and mix until everything is all colorful and well combined.
2. Yummy, slightly more unhealthy variation: fry the plantains. Prepare the salad as described, omitting the plantains. Trim the ends off the plantains and cut in half, leaving the skin on, then slice each piece lengthwise and peel. Heat 2 tbsp butter in a medium-sized skillet until sizzling. Using tongs, add the plantains, and fry about two minutes on each side, until golden brown. Let them cool on paper towels to drain off the extra oil, then cut into bite-sized pieces.
3. Serve at room temperature or chilled - if you fried the plantains, serve immediately, since they're best fresh.

Zucchini Fritters

When the people loaning me the apartment went on vacation, they bequeathed me a small fortune in zucchini. I had no idea what to do with them, so I looked up a recipe for fritters. Because I'm a fool who can't distinguish between Italian words, a week ago I bought polenta instead of semolina, so I didn't have any flour on hand to make these, and substituted. Oops. This is the version using flour, so they'll look a little different from the ones I made.

Ingredients:
    2 large or 4-5 small zucchini
    2 eggs, lightly beaten
    ½ cup flour
    ¾ cup feta cheese, crumbled
    ½ cup onion, finely diced
    1 tbsp each of fresh mint, dill, and parsley, chopped
    1 tsp freshly ground pepper
    ¼ tsp salt

1. Grate the zucchini with a medium-holed cheese grater, and let the zucchini sit in a colander to drain for at least fifteen minutes. You can't skip this step, because otherwise the fritters won't stick together.
2. Prepare everything else while you wait - chop up the onions and herbs, mash the feta, measure everything else.
3. In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together the flour and eggs, then add everything except the zucchini. Mix well.
4. Back the zucchini: squeeze as much of the water out of it as possible, using your hands or wrapping it up in a dishtowel and squeezing that.
5. Heat a skillet over medium-high heat until a drop of water sizzles on contact. Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil
6. Fold the drained zucchini into the batter, mixing thoroughly, then use the batter right away! Otherwise it'll get runny and you'll have zucchini pancakes.
7. Using an ice cream scoop, a tablespoon, or ¼-cup measure, form the batter into disks and place into the sizzling, oiled pan. Leave enough room so that you can flip the fritters easily - that means cooking four or five fritters at a time, depending on the size of your pan. Fry each side of the fritters for 1-2 minutes, until browned. Remove them to a paper-towel lined plate and pat off some of the extra oil.
8. Adding 1 tbsp of olive oil before each round, repeat the frying process with the rest of the batter.
9. Serve hot, at room temperature, or chilled, with a side of freshly cut tomatoes, yogurt sauce, mustard, or all three.