Month: March 2012

Vegan: Dhal and brown rice with a ginger honey garlic sauce

Aynaria 5 Comments

Vegan dhal brown rice

I love Indian food, over the years I’ve created numerous vegan and non-vegan dishes.  When prepared for others, I don’t have any complaints. Earlier today I prepared this wonderful dhal. The brown rice and the honey garlic and ginger sauce that was made yesterday, was added to the dish. It was simple, delicious, and nutritious.

Dried lentils

Dhal is a thick soup usually prepared from lentils. However,  I’ve also seen it made from peas or other dried beans. I make mine with lentils. Dhal makes a delicious base for the numerous types of dhal that I prepare. Dhal is commonly served with flatbread and over rice.

Today, I didn’t make any chapati (Indian flat bread which is quite simple to make) but I did add a twist (to the way I normally prepare this dish) I added a sauce. I have leftover dhal and rice, so perhaps I’ll make some chapati tomorrow?

With my old site, VeganMomma, dhal was one of the most popular dishes I’d make. Those posts received a lot of hits! It also brought about some interesting discussions from the various food bloggers that would stop by and comment about the types of dhal they prepared ( a few were from India) or eaten at restaurants. On that site, when it came to food I only wrote about vegan food. However the majority of my commentators were non-vegan.

I place Dhal in the ‘comfort food‘ category, simple, flavorful, and oh so satisfying.

Ginger honey garlic sauce over chicken and brown rice

Aynaria 6 Comments

Yesterday was one of those days…

Those who love to cook, might be familiar with it… you enter the kitchen with every intention of making a specific meal, but your creativity leads you in a different direction. Well that happened to me yesterday. It actually has happened quite often. I let the vegetables, spices, and yes… meats tell me what to prepare.

My daughter and father (mom was still in Texas) loved the dish so much, they ate every morsel of meat. The chicken had been marinated the night before in a sauce that I’d prepared, and the chicken made its final resting place in a honey ginger and garlic sauce. However, the only picture I have to show, is my daughter eating leftovers today.

Sauce Chicken brown rice 03 31 12

Of course, the above picture is beautiful. After all,  it features my daughter. But, it’s not quite the lovely photo I had in mind… I had a great presentation, but my daughter didn’t want to wait — and started eating the food before I could take the picture!

The brown rice had been cooked in a light herbal tea blend (I rarely cook rice in plain water) accompanied the dish. The rice was placed in a bowl, and the thick rich sauce was spooned over the chicken and rice. It made a lovely photo. To bad I didn’t take that picture. Ah well, next time…

What’s on my hook this weekend; crocheted Easter eggs…

Aynaria 3 Comments

Snoopy Easter Eggs

I’m still working on my crocheted Yo-Yo afghan, the Yo-Yo’s are piling up at an alarming rate. I do believe I’ll take a picture of them soon.

Spring break starts on Monday, and so today was my daughters last day of school for a week. Their teacher had a mini-Easter egg hunt for their third grade class. How nice was that? The children were limited the amount of eggs they were allowed to gather, thereby insuring the everyone received something.

Crocheted Easter Eggs

Earlier today I found this crocheted Easter egg pattern, at the time, I had no idea that the teacher was having an Easter Egg hunt for the kids at school. As far as my daughter was concerned, it was an added bonus… she collects the plastic Easter eggs. When she saw the pattern, she became excited, since she thinks they easily trump the plastic version.

While we watch Milo and Otis, this evening (for the 60 billionth time) I’ll be whipping (or should I write — hooking) up a few of the crocheted Easter eggs for herself, and a few of her friends.

I’m curious if we’ll even watch that movie today? There’s a ‘R.L. Stine hour’ which starts at 7:00. My daughter has read most  R.L. Stine’s books, so for her it’s a treat that the books come to life on TV. I find them fascinating too, and so while crocheting this evening, I’ll have one eye on the television and the other on my crochet project.

 

Just a few more bags; housecleaning

Aynaria 2 Comments

Our home is looking empty, after my decluttering a few weeks ago… Items we haven’t used in a long time, were either given to the Purple Heart or tossed in the trash.

Cleaning

This past week, I did collect a few odds and ends, that I must have overlooked. Since they were too battered, the only place for them was the trash. Our trash delivery, runs on Friday, and so I had one trash bag full of the ‘decluttered items’ I’d gathered. I ran into a slight problem… I forgot to set out the bag. Whoops! And so this afternoon I trotted the bag of trash to the local dumping zone. Since I’m local it didn’t cost me anything. Just my time and gas.

I haven’t done any cooking today, and I might keep it that way. We have leftovers. The day after I made the chicken fried rice, I made two types of burgers; chicken and black bean burgers. Perhaps I’ll get a chance to take pictures, and post them today, if not I’m sure I’ll be able to post them sometime this weekend.

But back to housecleaning…

Am I missing the items I parted with? Not really, those that were in good condition went to people that could really use the items. The rest were recycled, and tossed in the trash.

Question: Have you been staying on top of your housecleaning?

Creating a meal from leftovers; Chicken fried rice

Aynaria 6 Comments

Yesterday, I told my daughter I was going to make chicken pot pie for todays dinner. I still had leftover chicken breasts from the meal I’d prepared for her this past Sunday, and I thought that placing the breasts in a crust, along with some veggies, would make a great dinner.

Today in Maryland, the temperature was over 70 F, and so I changed my plans. I decided to make something much lighter; chicken fried rice (and for myself vegetable fried rice).

Cooked chicken breasts

The cooked chicken breasts were chopped into small chunks, and set aside.

 

Olive oil

A bit of olive oil was added to a heated skillet.

Brown eggs

Two eggs, and some seasonings, were added.

 

GreenOnions

Next, chopped green onions were included, along with coarsely chopped broccoli.

Brown rice

Cooked brown rice was added, and I stirred everything for a few minutes. I then included the chopped chicken breast, and the sweet corn. I sauteed the chicken and corn for a bit longer, and set aside my newly created meal from leftovers.

Chicken Fried Rice 2 03 28 12

Besides the eggs, green onions, seasonings,  and oil everything else was leftovers, but together they made a great meal! Of course, I made a vegan version for myself; vegetable fried rice.

Should I have done something differently? Well, I love garlic, and it would have complimented this dish. Also for a bit more color (and added sweetness), I could have added slivers of carrot and red bell pepper.

However, even without these additions, I was pleased with how it turned out, and the fact that a lot of the chicken fried rice was eaten, was a great indicator that my daughter and father enjoyed their meal. I loved my veggie fried rice too, unfortunately I ate my dish before I remembered that I was supposed to take a photo. Whoops!

My mother is still out of town, and so I’ve been preparing my fathers meals. When it comes to cooking, he’s the stereotypical old school American dad. He doesn’t really cook that much. Which is fine, my mother loves to cook, and so do I. Cook for my dad, whenever mom’s away? Sure, no problem!

 

Chicken Fried Rice 1 03 28 12

Inspiration for this dish came from the wonderful blogger, Suituapui. A few days ago he’d made a fried noodle dish. Reading his post, I realized I hadn’t made a fried dish in a while. Since my daughter and I love fried rice dishes… I thought that was the next best thing.

Do you want to know what’s hilarious? Right after I made this dish I logged onto his site, and he had made a fried rice dish too, but not the same thing, his fried rice dish has fermented shrimp (first time hearing about them — but sounds fascinating) and he added other delicious ingredients.

Quilts; Global Missions Sunday

Aynaria 19 Comments

Quilts Global Missions Sunday 6

During the lenten season, my Lutheran church has a Global Missions Sunday. Ours was held on 03/11/12.

Global Missions Sunday, wasn’t our typical church  service. It was nice hearing music from different cultures, listening to people translating verses into different languages. After the church service, people were treated to samples of food from various cultures. Each small group ministry made a dish from a certain country.

Quilts Global Missions Sunday 1

Just look at these quilts! Aren’t they beautiful? This small group ministry has many talented ladies! I’m one of the main machine sewers, so I’ve sewn many of the quilts featured here. Some of our quilters enjoying piecing the quilts together, and by looking at the quilts you can see they do excellent work. The material needed to make the quilts are mainly received through donations.

A few of the ladies, make hand-sewn quilts. They’ve occasionally brought in those quilts to show. They’re beautiful.

Quilts Global Missions Sunday 4

The day before the event, our quilting group set out the quilts we’d made, 136 were made in time for Global Missions Sunday. Early Saturday morning you could find me at church helping the other ladies in our quilting group, spread the quilts out on every church pew.

After the second church service ended the quilts were folded, and set aside to be taken to the next day to Lutheran World Relief. They have an office in Maryland. The quilts that we made are distributed to poor people in other countries.

Global Missions Sunday was a great experience, and I’m looking forward to it next year. The day was a great time to fellowship, recognize and honoring each others culture, cultural unity!

Photography: Flowers; Pink Hyacinth

Aynaria 5 Comments

Flower Pink Hyacinth 1 03 23 12

Remember the flowers I posted yesterday? Well, they’re Hyacinths.

I thought that was what they were, but for some reason the purple flowers didn’t look like the ones I had last year? Hmm…  However after reading Karen’s comment, and actually taking another trek outside and looking at these pink flowers, which are the same type but growing at a faster rate — I agree with her.

Many thanks Karen, and if you get a chance stop by her lovely hand sewn quilting website.

Monday mornings, I normally go to a quilting group (which is part of one of the many small group ministries offered at the Lutheran church where I’m a member).

I’m unable to attend today, early this morning, I received a last minute writing assignment from a friend. I most likely would have passed it off to one of my writing pals, if it were a complete stranger since I have so much to do today.