Lovely lovely lentils

Am I the only one who thinks lentils get a bad rap? They are so often considered a boring staple in a vegetarian, or flexitarian, diet. No doubt, they are a blank canvas, without much flavor of their own to impart to a dish, but they are filling, low in calories, rich in folates, iron and protein, and the blankness of that canvas, means that they are versatile indeed, and can form the basis of many a dish. Unlike cooking with dried beans, there is none of that planning ahead to soak them overnight, and the "Will they ever cook" uncertainty, even when left bubbling for hours. I am all for canned beans.... However, lentils cook quickly, and what is more, you can easily buy ready cooked lentils in Trader Joes (in the produce department), which will keep in the refrigerator for weeks and make a fabulous salad (click here for recipe). 

And just in case you think that these are the only things you can do with lentils, some bored quarantined Russian has made an imitation of the Mona Lisa with them. Yes, lentils are artistic. I kid you not. Click here for the proof.

The recipe below (adapted from an original in the New York Times) is deceptively simple, but full of rich flavors that lend themselves beautifully to a lentil dish, and make for a comforting dish that is anything but boring. With some garlic bread on the side to mop up the lovely juices, and ward off vampires (bonus), it is the perfect bowl of goodness for a winter's evening. Tasty, easy, filling, good for you - what more could you want?

Lentils Cacciatore
Serves 4

olive oil
1 large onion, finely chopped
2 large carrots, peeled and cut into 1/4" pieces
1 red bell pepper, seeded and thinly sliced
salt and pepper
1/4 cup capers, drained
1/2 cup kalamata olives, pitted and quartered (not the tasteless canned kind!)
3 TBSP tomato paste
5 garlic cloves, minced
1 1/2 tsp fresh rosemary, finely chopped
1/2 cup red wine
1 14oz can crushed/diced tomatoes
3/4 cup red lentils

1. Heat the oil over medium high heat in a large dutch oven or saucepan. 

2. Add carrots, onion and bell pepper and season with salt and pepper. Cook stirring frequently until the onions are softened (5 minutes or so). 

3. Add the capers, tomato paste, garlic and rosemary and cook for a further couple of minutes, stirring to prevent the tomato paste from sticking. (The mixture should start to turn a darker red at this point).

4. Add the wine, and cook until the wine has almost completely evaporated.

5. Add the tomatoes, lentils and 2 1/2 cups of water and stir to combine. Bring to the boil, then partially cover, and simmer on a low heat for 20 minutes, by which time the lentils should be starting to break down and be nice and soft. Add the olives and cook for a further 5 minutes. Taste to check seasoning.

6. Serve with garlic bread

Going back to my roots, yeah!

 I was fortunate enough to grow up in Cornwall, the far south-western tip of the UK. It is England's beach country, beautiful beaches, some surf-pounded, some hidden calm coves, quaint working harbors, jagged cliffs marked with ruins of old tin mines, soggy moorlands with rocky crests, and windy, overgrown lanes leading tiny villages nestled in green valleys {insert wistful sigh}. 

Going back home is a treat, and one that sadly I haven't been able to indulge in for far too long (curse you Covid). But last week my son came up with an idea of an activity for the weekend - making Cornish pasties. (I suspect that his motivation was more directed at satisfying his appetite than soothing my homesickness, but what the heck, I'll take comfort wherever I can get it at the moment! And it isn't often that he wants to cook with his mother, so that was fun too!)

Cornish pasties are a traditional lunch that wives would make for their husbands who were off to work down the tin and copper mines or China Clay quarries in centuries gone by. It's a pastry shell wrapped around goodies all cooked within to beautiful perfection. Originally, the pasty was designed to have savory treats like meat and vegetables in one end, and something sweet in the other half, so that a hungry worker, eating from one end to the other, would get a whole meal in one package, including dessert. Nowadays, they are generally all savory. The most traditional filling is as shown here, with root vegetables, potatoes and beef. But these days, you can get all sorts of things inside pasties. In Cornwalls well-touristed harbor towns, pasty shops do a roaring trade, and people can be spotted chomping away on their wares on benches along the quayside, while cheeky seagulls wait in hope of dropped crumbs. 

This is by no means a quick supper, but it is a fun activity and way easier than it looks - the contents are all cooked in the oven within the pastry, so the only prep revolves around lots of chopping, and making the pastry. Even the latter could be skipped if you're in a hurry, and have some ready prepared pastry handy. The key is making sure that the veg is chopped uniformly and small; hard lumps of uncooked potato are no-one's idea of a good time. 

Whatever you choose to put inside, have fun with it, get the kids involved, and, if you are anything like us, make a HUGE mess in the kitchen, before enjoying the yummy fruits of your labor!

Cornish Pasties
Makes 6

Serves 4-6 people, depending on appetite :-)

For pastry:
3 1/4 cups AP flour
salt
8 oz cold unsalted butter
1 large egg, beaten

For filling:
12 oz skirt steak
1 onion, finely chopped
1 1/2 medium potatoes, peeled
1 large (or two small) purple-topped turnips, peeled
1 large rutabaga, peeled
whole nutmeg
salt and ground white pepper
olive oil

1. To make the pastry, put the flour in a large bowl, season with a pinch of salt, and rub in the butter with thumb and fingers until it looks like coarse crumbs.

2. Add 3/4 cup of water and use your hands to quickly incorporate it into the flour mixture. Bring the mixture together until it makes a smooth, but not sticky, dough, adding a little more water if needed. Be careful not to overwork it, as it will make the pastry tough.

3. Preheat the oven to 400F (220C). 

4. Cut the steak, potato, turnip and rutabaga into 1/3" cubes, no larger! It takes time, but it's worth it! Mix together in a large bowl and grate some nutmeg over to taste. Season with a large pinch of salt and some ground pepper. Drizzle in a little olive oil to moisten.

5. Cut the pastry into 6 equal pieces and then roll each into a ball. On a surface dusted with flour, roll each out into a circle, roughly 8" in diameter, an 1/4" thick. You can make the circles more exact by cutting them with a 8" baking tin.

6. Take some of the filling mixture and squeeze it together in your hands to compact it a little. Put each handful of filling over one half of each circle, leaving a 1/2" border around the edge. Drizzle a little more olive oil over the filling, and brush the edge of each circle with beaten egg. 

7. Fold the pastry over the filling and press the edges together then crimp them from one end to the other. You can do this however you want - the simplest way is to use a fork to seal the edges. But you can be as fancy as you like!

8. Brush each pasty with beaten egg and cook in the oven for 30-35 minutes until golden brown.