In an effort to use every last vegetable from our vegetable box this week (and some other cupboard staples), I whipped up this soba noodle dish.

It was pretty good. The recipe that I found online didn’t call for peanuts or peanut butter, but I really think it needed some serious peanut action. I found the original sauce too orangey.  I think this recipe has a lot of potential if I can figure out the perfect peanut sauce for it.

Boyfriendly rating: 4/5

Ingredients for the peanut-ginger sauce 

• 1/2 cup fresh orange juice
• 2 1/2 tablespoons hoisin sauce
• 2-3 tablespoons natural peanut butter
• 2 teaspoons reduced-sodium soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger
• 1 teaspoon Thai chili sauce

Ingredients for the Stir Fry

• 3 ounces buckwheat soba noodles
• 2 teaspoons sesame oil
• 6 ounces extra-firm tofu cut into 1/2-inch cubes
• 4 green onions sliced on the diagonal
• 2 garlic cloves minced
• 2 grated carrots
• 1/4 pound snow peas
• 1/2 red bell pepper thinly sliced
• 6 ounces mushrooms, sliced
• 4 ounces baby spinach (about 2 cups)
• Lime wedges
• Peanuts

Method

1. Combine all sauce ingredients in a small pan, using chili sauce to taste. Heat to a simmer and cook for 1 minute. Set aside.
2. Cook the soba noodles 1 minute less than directed on the package, drain and set aside.
3. Heat the sesame oil in a nonstick skillet or wok over high heat until hot.
4. Stir in the tofu, green onions, garlic, carrots, snow peas, peppers and mushrooms.
5. Stir fry for 2 minutes
6. Lower the heat to medium; add the sauce.
7. Stir in the spinach and soba noodles.
8. Cook just until the spinach wilts.

Serve immediately, garnished with peanuts and lime wedges.

In the quest to use up all of our carrots, I found this recipe for a carrot casserole.  It was easy to put together and fulfilled my two main requirements: carrots and cheese.  In the end, I think it was too eggy.  It tasted ok, but I don’t think this is going to become my staple carrot sidedish.  The search continues.

With so so many carrots remaining from our veggie box, I really needed a way to use them up. After some googling, I came across a healthier version of carrot cake. Unfortunately, I think the recipe was *too* healthy. I wasn’t in love with these muffins and they turned out to be more of a cream cheese icing transportation system. Not bad, not ideal. I wonder if more flax would have helped?  I think a bit more spice was needed too - they were a tad plain.

I didn’t use their icing recipe instead I went for this:

• 1 package light cream cheese
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 tsp brown sugar
• dash of ginger
• 1/4 cup icing sugar
• Candied ginger pieces for decoration

Boyfriendly rating: 3/5  Edible, but not quite right.

We did use up our carrots!

With two golden beets remaining from last week’s veggie box and leeks from this week’s delivery, I decided to use them for a beet soup. It had a really interesting flavour - sort of a mix between a carrot and parsnip soup. Very easy and in the end, very delicious.

Boyfriendly rating: 5/5

Roasted Golden Beet Soup

• 2 large golden beets
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 cup thinly sliced leeks (white and light green parts only!)
• 1 clove garlic
• Approximately 4 cups vegetable stock
• Plain yogurt for serving
• Salt and white pepper
• 1 tsp tarragon
• 1 tsp thyme

Method:

Preheat oven to 400F. Peel beets and slice into quarters. Wrap beets tightly in tin foil and bake for 1 hour. Remove and let cool. Slice into bite size pieces.

Add oil to a large saucepan (I used a dutch oven) over medium heat. Add the leeks and saute for 3-4 minutes. Add garlic and cook for one more minute.

Add beets and vegetable stock. Bring to the boil. Cover and simmer for 10-15 minutes.

Using a handblender, blend soup to desired consistency.

Serve in bowls with a large dollop of yogurt.

Serves 4.

Sometimes a recipe is so good, you don’t even have to think twice.  With red kale in our veggie box this week, we relied on our trusty kale and lentil soup.  Sequels can be good!

I was really stumped about what to do with golden beets from our veggie box. I knew they’d taste delicious roasted in the oven, but hey, I can do that with regular old red beets. I needed to try something unusual. I knew there were lots of recipes for beet risotto, but not many using golden beets. And you know what else? No one cooks with apricot beer. You can see where I’m heading with this… golden beets meet apricot beer!

It starts off like a basic risotto - soften onions and garlic in some oil, mix in risotto, stir, mix in beets! Add broth, stir, add broth, stir, repeat.

Then you mix in the cheeses in the last five minutes and voila… golden beet risotto!

Boyfriendly rating: 4/5 “It’s pretty good. Can I have seconds?”

Golden beet and apricot beer risotto

• 1 cup arborio rice
• 1 cup apricot beer
• 1 onion - finely chopped
• 1 clove garlic - minced
• 1 cup grated golden beet (I only needed to grate one beet)
• 2 Tbsp olive oil
• 3 cups chicken stock
• 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 cup Feta cheese
• 2-3 tsp. tarragon
• salt and pepper

Finely grate the beet and set aside.

Heat oil in a pan over medium heat. Cook onions and garlic until soft (about 3 minutes). Add rice and stir to coat in oil. Add in the grated beet and stir.

Add cup of apricot beer and stir until liquid is nearly absorbed. Continue adding chicken broth 1 cup at a time and stirring until liquid is absorbed. This process takes 20-25 minutes.

Add the parmesan, feta and tarragon. Continue cooking until everything is melty and smooth. Season with salt and pepper.

Serve in bowls and top with additional parmesan.

After finding this recipe for apricot beer bread I thought that it would be the perfect recipe to incorporate our favourite McAuslan apricot beer. The kitchen opens at five - bread service at eight. Stay tuned!

Much later…. the result:

Is it supposed to be this … um.. stumpy? It tastes fine and almost cake-like. I’m just not sure this recipe was tweaked enough for the bread machine. I think I should have used the bread machine to do the kneading and popped the loaf in the oven.

It’s ok and edible, but I guess I expected it to be more… well… bready.

The quest to use up all of the vegetables from our veggie basket continues with a basic cauliflower and broccoli casserole.  When dinnertime rolled around, there were three main requirements for this meal: we needed to use up a head of cauliflower, a head of broccoli and there had to be cheese.. lots of cheese.

A quick Google search turned up this Cauliflower and Broccoli Cheesy Bake.  It easily fit all of my criteria.  Yay!

Putting it all together was pretty quick and painless.  Not.  On Sunday, I turned into Betty Butterfingers and dropped everything.  In the morning, I broke the bottle of maple syrup and dropped an egg on the floor.  For this recipe, I dropped cauliflower bits all over the floor as I tried to empty them into the garbage.  Disaster after disaster I tell you.

In the end, it looked great as it went into the oven.  And topped with homemade bread breadcrumbs to boot.  That new bread machine is the best toy ever.

And the final result?

Cheesey and gooey with a crispy topping.  I think it could have used more flavour.  It’s probably my fault - the recipe called for a sharp cheddar and I only had a mild cheddar on hand.  I also used cinnamon rather than nutmeg.  (After the potato muffins, I think nutmeg and I might be breaking up.)

Boyfriendly rating: 3/5  “cheesy, but probably not a keeper recipe” 

The quest to use up our potatoes continues with a basic potato muffin recipe. The recipe claims it is a “PEI potato muffin” recipe and it could be with one minor change, it’s definitely a “PEI potato muffin recipe from the 1800s”. Why do I say this? There is hardly any flavour. If you want to pretend you’re some sort of PEI settler with a bare cupboard, these muffins are for you.

Sure, they looked great, but that’s about where the compliment train stops. The taste? Well… to quote the boy, “it tastes like potato”. No false advertising here. Personally, I didn’t enjoy the nutmeg - maybe I’m just anti-nutmeg (I didn’t like it in the pumpkin lasagna either).

My mother suggested adding some dried cranberries or orange zest.  I think these additions would have really helped these sad little muffins.

Boyfriendly rating:  2/5 “Tastes like potatoes”

“Turn of the century” PEI potato muffins

• 2 cup  Unbleached white flour
• 2 Tbsp  sugar
• 3 tsp  Baking Powder
• 1 tsp  Salt
• 1/2 tsp  Baking Soda
• 1/4 tsp  Nutmeg
• 1  Egg
• 1    cup  Cold, mashed potatoes
• 1 1/2    cup  Buttermilk
• 1/4    cup  Melted butter

Preheat oven to 400F. Grease 12 muffin cups (I used a non-stick muffin pan and omitted this step). Measure flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt and nutmeg into a large mixing bowl. Stir with a fork until mixed. In another small bowl, beat egg, then gradually stir in mashed potatoes, buttermilk, and butter. Mixture may not be smooth. Then, pour into flour mixture, stirring just until combined.

Spoon batter into muffin pan. Bake in centre of 400F oven until golden, about 20 to 25 minutes. Turn muffins out onto a cooling rack. Serve warm.

I haven’t been managing our veggie basket very well and we’ve fallen behind on our veggie consumption. There were a lot of things going on last month (Cherry Pie, Sandy Hill craft show and the Ladyfest Holiday Craft Sale). Mostly, we haven’t been eating our potatoes. Call it irony that the girl from PEI (aka the potato province) isn’t eating enough potatoes. With the last craft show complete, I sat down on Sunday to settle the score with these tubers.

First, I tried making a herby potato bread in the bread machine using this recipe as the base (with a few changes).

Well, it looked great.  And smelled great as it baked away.  I regret not putting the full amount of oil in - it was a bit dry.  Overall, it was good as lunch-type bread and maybe even a sandwich bread.  Is it going to win Miss Bread 2007?  Probably not.

Boyfriendly rating: 3/5.  Not bad, not awesome.  Just average.

Herby potato bread recipe 

• 1/2 cup Mashed potato
• 1 large egg
• 4 Tbsp vegetable oil
• 3/4 cup water  (I used leftover potato water from cooking the potatoes)
• 3/4 tsp  Dried thyme, rosemary, Oregano, or basil OR combination  (I used a trifecta of herbs)
• 2 1/2 cup Unbleached white flour
• 1/2  cup Quick-cooking oats
• 1 tsp  Salt
• 1 Tbsp Brown  Sugar
• 1 Tbsp  Active dry yeast  (this seemed like a LOT of yeast… it rose quite high)

I set my bread machine to “light” and 1.5 pound loaf, but considering the size, the 2 pound setting would probably have been better.