Secret Ingredients, part 2

I tried for another secret ingredient tonight. It's so secret, and in a soup, that you'll never be able to guess. For those of you playing at home I'll have to tell you what it is: roasted garlic. I made roasted garlic earlier this week because I'm reading Cooking Green: Reducing your Carbon Footprint in the Kitchen by Kate Heyhoe. I was making something else in the oven and felt I should make good use of it being on by roasting some garlic at the same time. I also have a lot of garlic from our recent camping trip near Gilroy, garlic capitol of the world so it seemed worthwhile. Of course now I have way too much roasted garlic. Never, you say? I'm kind of sick of delicious walnut bread with hummus and roasted garlic, myself, after having eaten it for three days straight. So tonight I thought I'd try a different way to deal with the garlic.



Inspired by a recipe in Veganomicon (still my current fave) I made a broccoli-rice soup with adzuki beans. I added the garlic to the soup, but after I had blended it and I admit, I was too lazy to get all the gear back out and blend again. So it's a secret ingredient on many levels this time since you can't taste it until you happen to hit a lucky piece.

Last night was a quinoa one-pot meal but of course I forgot to add the canned beans. Thanks to Veganomicon (Thanks Isa and Terri!) I made a quick dish of basic broiled tofu. I've never used my cast iron skillet in the broiler but that was so much fun I plan on doing it again. I also made a quick sauce to liven up the quinoa. It's so fast and easy I've listed my (vague) steps below.



Super Easy Almond Butter Sauce:
A small amount of hot water (less than 1/4 cup)
Couple of spoonfuls of white miso
Couple of spoonfuls of almond butter
Dash of soy sauce (to taste)
Mix it all up until it's a sauce-like consistency and serve on anything.

Sunday was Thai food take out because I got a flat tire on our bike ride home and was feeling cranky.

Saturday was the day to finally cook the artichokes we got on the camping trip. I tried roasting them in the oven but it didn't really turn out that well. They remained tough yet tasty. Perhaps they were already past their prime. I also made these amazing seitan cutlets, again inspired by a recipe in Veganomicon that I didn't have all the ingredients for. The cutlets were a huge hit, a tad messy, and so delicious. I will definitely be doing something like that again. Hooray for cutlets!