Chickpea Curry

I was looking around for a quick vegan curry because I have discovered that cream sauces aren't agreeing with me right now (something that makes me incredibly sad every day) and I wanted a curry that was made to not have meat or dairy in it so I did not have to figure out weird substitutes. I came across a recipe for a chickpea curry that made some odd choices so I took the chance to refine it and came up with this tasty concoction.

Ingredients:

2 tbsp oil
3 cloves of garlic
1 large white onion
½ tsp salt
2 medium tomatoes
1 tbsp garam masala
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp coriander
1 tsp cardamom

½ tsp cinnamon
13.5 oz can full fat coconut milk
1 16oz can of chickpeas

¼ C chopped cilantro

Directions:

Finely dice the garlic and the onion and roughly chop the tomatoes. Heat the oil over medium heat until shimmering. Add the garlic and saute until lightly browned, stirring frequently, about 2 minutes. Add the onion and the salt and saute, stirring frequently, until translucent before adding the tomatoes and cooking until the tomatoes start to break apart. Sprinkle in all the spices and fry them, stirring constantly, until they are super fragrant.
Reduce the heat to low and pour in the coconut milk and chickpeas, bring to a simmer and cook, stirring occasionally, until thick and creamy. Add the chopped cilantro and serve, preferably over basmati rice.

Korean Spicy Pickles

When Evan and I went for bulgogi a few weeks ago, he introduced me to his favorite topping, spicy pickles. I used to not like pickles, and I still am not a fan of just eating pickles, but I love a good bread and butter pickle on a sandwich or a pit of relish on a good hot dog, and I especially love Korean spicy pickles on my bulgogi.

Ingredients:

2 mini cucumbers or pickling cucumbers
1 tsp salt
2 tsp rice vinegar
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp gochugaru
1 clove of garlic

Directions:

Slice the cucumbers as evenly and thinly as you can. Place in a bowl and sprinkle on the salt before tossing to make sure you have even coverage. Let the cucumber slices sit for 20 minutes to let the salt draw out excess water.

Pour off the water and then add the rest of the ingredients, stir well to combine. Cover and let sit in the fridge for at least 10 minutes and up to a week. The pickles will get less crisp but spicier the longer they are allowed to marinate.

Enjoy as a surprisingly refreshing snack or as a perfect compliment to some bulgogi.

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Breakfast Burrito

So when I started my diet I wanted to make something that I could consistently make and eat without getting bored. That meant it needed to have meat, it needed to have cheese, and it needed to be packed with flavor. It also helps that I can prefab a lot of the pieces so it doesn't take much time in the morning.

Ingredients:

2 scrambled eggs
28 grams grated cheddar cheese
56 grams cooked turkey sausage
50 grams avocado
⅛ tsp red pepper flake
1 flour tortilla*

Directions:

Right after you finish cooking your scrambled eggs, using whatever method you prefer, sprinkle on the cheese and lay on the sausage. I like to do this while the eggs are still in the pan so the cheese gets nice and melted on top** and the sausage gets warmed through.

In a bowl, combine the avocado and the red pepper flake and use a fork to beat into a paste. Spread your paste on one quarter of your tortilla then lay on the eggs, cheese, and sausage. fold over the sides and one end and roll into a burrito.

Enjoy with a smoothie or some fresh orange juice.

*I love using flavored tortillas for this since it adds some nice color and it's an easy way to work some variety into a routine

**I don't recommend mixing the cheese into the eggs first because it's not much cheese and it can get lost. I prefer the layer of flavor on top. Also, mixing the cheese into the eggs makes the eggs much more liquidy and more likely to make a drippy mess all in your lap, or in my case, my beard.

Miso Soup

Earlier I wrote about wanting to make my own ramen, which means I had to start with making dashi, a Japanese seafood stock. Once I'd made that, it was just a little bit more to make miso soup so I decided to try my hand at that too.

Like plenty of Japanese cooking, this isn't about using a lot of ingredients, it's about making the most from a few. It's about balance. In miso soup, you are balancing savory with salty and smooth with crunchy.

Serves: 1
Cook time: 10 min

Ingredients:

2 cups dashi
1.5 tbsp white miso
½ tbsp red miso
1 scallion
3 oz firm silken tofu

Directions:

Bring your dashi to a simmer and pour ¼ cup into a bowl. Add the red and white miso into the same bowl and stir well until all lumps are gone. Pour the miso mixture back into the rest of the dashi and heat on low to keep warm.

Cut your scallions into small slices and your tofu into small cubes and place in the bottom of your soup bowl, mug, or bucket. Pour the hot broth in and let sit for a minute to allow the tofu to warm up before enjoying with some sake or green tea!

Please note: the combination of miso flavors is up to you. White miso is lighter in color and flavor but has good body and mild sweetness. Red miso is much more flavorful, but too much will have your soup tasting like soy sauce. This 3:1 ratio is my preferred ratio, but feel free to experiment to find what you like.

Dashi

Like most of my generation, I spent a lot of time in college eating ramen. Ever since then, I've wanted to make my own from scratch, which, for most ramens, means starting with dashi. Dashi is an extremely simple seafood stock that is the base of many Japanese soups, but it's also great for sipping on if you've got a cold or need something to warm you up.

This recipe is sized for a single serving and is about as small a batch as you might want to make. This means it should be easy to scale up for any application.

Cook time: 20 min.
Serves: 1

Ingredients:

2 cups cold water
1 gram kombu (approx 2"x4.5")
5 grams bonito flakes (about ½ cup)

Directions:

Place the kombu into a small saucepan and pour two cups of cold water over it. Put over medium heat and cover for about 10 minutes. Remove the kombu just before it starts to simmer. I wait for bubbles to form on the bottom and take it out just before they start to break. If the kombu boils, it can turn bitter.

When the bottom of your saucepan looks like this, it's time to remove the kombu.

Add the bonito flakes to the water and bring it to a simmer. Hold at a simmer for 1 minute. If it simmers for too long, it will make the stock cloudy as the flakes fall apart. After 1 minute, remove from the heat and let it steep for 7 minutes. Strain and add enough water to bring it back to two cups.

Use immediately or refrigerate for up to a week or portion and freeze for up to a month. Large portions can be used as a soup base while small portions can help fortify sauces and stir-fries.

Bourbon Maple Peppery Salmon

I think my favorite thing about crispy skin salmon is that it looks quite impressive, but it's actually quite easy. This recipe takes advantage of the fact that maple goes surprisingly well with all different kinds of peppers. I'm still using my amazing bourbon maple syrup, but don't worry, this one works brilliantly with regular syrup too.

Since I've already put up a more in-depth guide on how to make crispy skin salmon, I'm not going to bore you with repeating all the details (just the basics here). I'll simply leave a link to the previous recipe here in case you need a refresher.

Ingredients:

4-6 oz salmon filet with the skin on
Salt
Pepper
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp bourbon aged maple syrup
⅛ tsp red pepper flake
⅛ tsp ground white pepper

Directions:

Lightly score the skin of the salmon and salt and pepper both sides. Pour the olive oil into a cast iron or nonstick skillet over medium heat. While the oil heats up, mix together the syrup, red pepper and white pepper.

Once the oil is shimmering, place the salmon in the pan, skin-side down, making sure to lay it away from you. When the salmon is in the pan, give the pan a little shake to keep the skin from sticking.

Once the salmon is cooked about three-quarters of the way through, flip onto the flesh side and lightly brush the skin side with the peppery syrup. After 30 seconds, flip the salmon out onto a plate and brush the flesh side with the remaining syrup.

Mushroom and Sausage Stir Fry

The other day, one of my coworkers was complaining about how much she doesn't like mushrooms so I was inspired to make a mushroom centered stir fry. I promise it was nothing personal. I wanted to make this dish healthy so I decided to cook with chicken sausage for the protein.

One of the things I love about cooking with chicken sausage is that it tends to come in a wide variety of creative flavors. It makes it fun and easy to create some very flavorful combinations. While this recipe calls for a specific flavor of sausage, any savory chicken sausage should do the trick.

Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 20 min

Ingredients:

3 tbsp olive oil
¼ cup sliced maitake mushrooms
5 oz sliced shiitake mushrooms
8 oz sliced baby bella mushrooms
1 lb. garlic and herb chicken sausage
½ c chicken stock
1 tbsp worcestershire sauce
½ tsp rubbed sage
½ tsp dried thyme leaves
½ tsp salt
½ cup chopped scallion greens

Directions:

In a nonstick or cast iron skillet, heat the oil over medium high heat until it shimmers. Once the oil is hot, add the maitake mushrooms. Saute, stirring frequently, until the mushrooms start to brown around the edges. Add the rest of the mushrooms and cook, stirring constantly until they're browned as well before adding the sausage.

Saute the sausage until cooked through then deglaze the pan with the stock. Make sure you scrape any stuck on bits off the bottom, you don't want to give up on those flavors. Bring to a simmer and add the worcestershire sauce, sage, thyme, and salt and reduce to till the sauce thickens.

Remove from the heat and stir in the scallions before serving with rice, pasta, or quinoa. Enjoy!

Crispy Skin Salmon with Honey Mustard

As a fan of Gordon Ramsey's Hell's Kitchen, I have seen countless chefs screw up crispy skin salmon. I'd never had it but wanted to try making it... but I was a little nervous since I don't have too much experience with cooking fish.

Meet Adam. We look nothing alike.

Luckily, I'm friends with Adam, my fish monger. Adam and I spent an evening cooking various kinds of seafood, a lot of his tips made it into my mussels recipe, and one of the things I asked him to teach me was how to make crispy skin salmon.

Because this recipe is a bit trickier, and is something I don't think many people have tried, I'm including some more in-process shots for reference.

Ingredients:

2 salmon filets with skin on, about 3-4 oz each
Salt
Pepper
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp honey
1 tsp dijon mustard

Directions:

Flip your salmon filets over so they are skin-side up and cut shallow lines, not much deeper than the skin, diagonally along the length, about 1.5 inches apart. Then liberally salt and pepper both sides.

My knives were a bit dull, so we ended up slicing deeper than intended.

Heat a cast iron skillet or griddle over medium heat and pour on the olive oil, making sure to evenly coat the pan. Fish sticks really easily so you want to make sure you have a good non-stick surface. While the skillet is getting to temp, in a small bowl, mix together the honey and dijon mustard until smooth.

Once the griddle is hot, place the fish, skin-side down, in the pan. Leave it there. 90% of the cooking is going to be done with the skin side down.

Herein lies the tricky bit. How done do you like your salmon? I'm a risky fellow and I like mine to be a little raw in the middle, so I want a hotter pan so the skin gets crispy with a shorter cooking time. My wife, on the other hand, wants hers a little more well done, so for her I need a cooler pan that won't burn the skin over the longer cooking time.

How do you know when to flip? Well you can actually just watch the side of your salmon. The flesh changes color as it cooks, so if you want your filet rare, once it gets about three quarters of the way up, flip it. If you want it well done, wait until the color reaches almost all the way to the top

Once you have flipped it, lightly brush the honey mustard onto the skin. Let the salmon cook skin-side up for about 30 seconds. Remove from the pan and flip, skin-side down, onto a plate before brushing the remaining honey mustard onto the top.

Let the fish rest for about 5 minutes before serving. Enjoy with a side salad for lunch or with a salad and some quinoa for a filling dinner.

Spicy Asian Style BBQ Sauce

This is a sauce I have been making for a while, usually by just throwing some stuff together until it tasted right. This is actually one of the first things that convinced me to make this blog, because it was something pretty original that people really liked. And, now that I'm starting to put together some healthier recipes, I figured this would be as good a time as ever to showcase it.

Prep time: 5 min
Makes: 2 servings
Calories: 47 per serving

Ingredients:

1 tbsp dark brown sugar
1 tbsp ketchup
2 tsp hoisin sauce
1 tsp rice vinegar
1 tsp low sodium soy sauce
½ tsp Worcestershire sauce

½ tsp Sriracha sauce

¼ tsp fish sauce

Directions:

Combine all of the ingredients in a jar with a lid and shake to combine thoroughly. I recommend pouring over two cooked chicken breasts cut into cubes, and then serve on a kaiser roll garnished with some spinach. Paired with a fruit and veggie smoothie, it makes a great healthy lunch.

Customize it:

You like honey bbq? Why not switch out the brown sugar for some honey. Need it mild? Leave out the Sriracha. While I recommend chicken for this sauce you could use it in pulled pork (though that wouldn't really be healthy living at that point), or maybe even marinate some tofu for a great noodle dish. Don't let my suggestions limit how you use this versatile sauce.

Curry Flavored Roasted Almonds

Almonds are a great source of fiber, protein, and vitamins. These are oil roasted almonds which makes them slightly less healthy than raw almonds, but this is my meal plan and I need some flavor. Whether eating raw or roasted almonds, serving size is key; only ¼ cup is about 170 calories, mostly from fat. If you're roasting your own almonds, the sky's the limit on flavors, so feel free use this recipe as a base or jumping off point to your own combinations.

Ingredients:

1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp sesame oil

1 lb raw almonds

½ tsp salt
1 tsp curry powder
½ tsp ground ginger
½ tsp garlic powder

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350
In a non-stick skillet pour in the olive and sesame oil and heat until shimmering. Add the almonds and cook, stirring frequently, for about 5 minutes or until lightly toasted.

Pour your almonds into a large mixing bowl and sprinkle on the salt, curry powder, ginger, and garlic. Stir to thoroughly coat the almonds. Lay your almonds out on a baking sheet, making sure they are in a single layer.

Bake the almonds for 10 minutes, until toasted. Put the pan on a cooling rack and let them cool for 30 minutes before moving into air-tight containment. Enjoy my first Healthy Living recipe in moderation!