Lentil Soup

Recipe from AllRecipies.com

• 6 cups chicken stock
• 1 pound red lentils
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 tablespoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/2 cup chopped cilantro
• 3/4 cup fresh lemon juice

Directions

1. Bring chicken stock and lentils to a boil in a large saucepan over high heat, then reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, heat olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. Stir in garlic and onion, and cook until the onion has softened and turned translucent, about 3 minutes.
3. Stir onions into the lentils and season with cumin and cayenne. Continue simmering until the lentils are tender, about 10 minutes.
4. Carefully puree the soup in a standing blender, or with a stick blender until smooth. Stir in cilantro and lemon juice before serving.

My modification:
I cooked garlic and carrots and cabbage (because that's what I had) and blended it together. It made it super thick, so if you want a more soup-like soup, add more broth or fewer lentils. The recipe says that it serves 8, but really it could easily serve 2 or 3. It's a good basic soup recipe, and you can put whatever spices in to get whatever flavor you want (I didn't have any cumin so I just went with the flavor of garlic). :)

Hummus

Here is something you can eat with your pita bread!

1 can garbanzo beans drained and rinsed.
2 tbsp creamy peanut butter
2-3 tbsp lemon juice (or 1-1.5 tbsp lime)
2 tsp cumin
3 cloves garlic minced finely
Olive oil (variable)

Puree beans (ie with a food processor)
Mix in all other ingredients.
Blend more if needed.
Add olive oil until right consistency.
Garnish with parsley.

Serves 4-5
Consume in large quantities. :-)

Pita Bread

Ingredients

• 1 1/8 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 1 1/2 teaspoons white sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast

[With a bread machine simply combine everything and have it mix it as well as a rise in the machine]

For us normal folk....

Mix water with yeast and sugar.
Add oil to water/yeast/sugar.
Combine salt with flour.
Begin mixing flour/salt into the liquid mixture.

Kneed until smooth and elastic. [Kitchen Aid can speed this up a bit]

Place in a greased bowl and allow to rise for 1-3 hours OR until doubled [OR until you've lost patience ;-) ]

On a floured surface:
Roll into a snake/rope and cut into same size pieces. I'd suggest 8...cut it in half and then each half in half and in half again.

Roll into 6-8 inch circles [and if you're Simon as thin as you can make it :-) ]

Allow to rest for 20 minutes on a floured surface while the oven is heating.

Preheat to 500 degrees F. (260 C)

Either bake on a (preheated) tray or on the rack directly. (rack toward the bottom of the oven)

Bake three or so at a time.

Bake 4 minutes, flip and bake 2 min.

Gently push down puff when pulled out of the oven.

Cover with a damp paper towel, or place in a bag (this allows them to soften slightly).

Store in the fridge or freezer to increase longevity (a few days-- a couple months in the freezer)
[I've never tested long-term storage...we ate them too quickly.]

Fresh Tomato Salsa

Tomatoes, finely chopped (6-8 roma tomatoes or equivalent of tasty tomatoes)

Onion, finely diced (1/2 or a whole onion--depending on how strong a flavor the onion has--if too strong, rinse onion lightly with water)

Jalapeño, (one is sufficient if it's spicy and be careful of the HOT seeds )

Cilantro, fresh and finely chopped, to taste (1/2 cup-ish)

Lime juice, to taste (1 tbsp or two-ish)

Salt and pepper to taste

Rolls

The New Era, Nov. 2004

Grandma’s Rolls

In a saucepan, combine:
2 cups milk
1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup sugar
Bring to a boil, then cool.

In a small bowl, combine:
1 cup lukewarm water
2 heaping Tbsp. yeast
2 tsp. sugar
Set aside and let dissolve.

2 1/2 tsp. salt
3 beaten eggs
7–9 cups flour

When the milk mixture has cooled to lukewarm, pour into mixer. Add a cup of flour, all of the yeast mixture, salt and three beaten eggs. Beat until smooth. Add flour a little at a time while mixing until dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl but is not stiff.

Place dough in a greased bowl, cover with plastic wrap that has been sprayed with cooking spray, and let rise in a warm place until dough has doubled in size. Punch down, cover, and let rise again until doubled in size.

After dough has risen a second time, divide in half. Place on a floured board or counter. Roll out until 1/2 inch thick, and cut into circles. Place on a greased cookie sheet so rolls are almost touching. Let rise about 30 minutes.

Bake at 375° F for 12 to 15 minutes until golden brown.

Janet Thomas, "The Family Secret," The New Era, November 2004.

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=024644f8f206c010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=ad7f85f10e6fb010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____

Bagels

Bagels are actually pretty easy, a little time-consuming to make. Although they take a while, here is a great recipe we found online. The web address is at the bottom of this post. I annotated it with my thoughts placed in brackets. We've enjoyed a few Sundays together making bagels. We hope you enjoy a similar experience! For the history of bagels, see wikipedia or google history--very interesting.

And now, Bagels!!!

4 cups bread flour [Regular flour works too]

1 Tbls sugar

1 1/2 tsps salt

1 Tbls vegetable oil

2 tsps instant yeast

1-1/4- 1-1/2 cups of warm water.

Mix all the ingredients in a bowl. You don't have to worry about soaking the yeast when you use instant yeast (most yeast sold these days is instant yeast). The dough should feel stiff, but add the extra water if it's really stiff, or you can't get all the dry flour incorporated.

Plop the dough down onto the counter, and knead for about ten minutes, or until the dough is uniform and smooth. [You can kneed for about half the time using a Kitchen Aid.]

Cut the dough into 8 equal sized balls, and let rest for 10-20 minutes. [Or cut into more balls if you want smaller bagels.]

Preheat your oven to 425.

Now, take each of the dough balls and using two hands, roll it into a little snake on the counter. When the snake is longer than the width of your two hands, wrap it around your dominant roiling hand. The dough rope should be wrapped so the overlapping ends are together at your palm, near the start of your fingers. Now take the two overlapping ends, and use your palm to squish/roll these two ends together. Once the dough is fused, you should have a perfectly circular bagel-to-be! This is the only part of the process that can take a little practice before your bagels will look really professional. Don't get discouraged if they don't look perfect, it just takes practice!

Let your bagels rest on the counter for about 20 minutes, and meanwhile, bring a pot of water to boil, and grease a large baking tray lightly. You can just rub a splash of vegetable oil and rub it around.

After the 20 minute wait, your bagels will start to look puffy, and it's time to get them boiling! Add them as many at a time as you can to your boiling water without crowding them. Boil for about a minute, turn them over, and boil for another minute. Take them out a let dry for a minute and then place them on your oiled baking tray. Repeat until all the bagels are boiled.

Add the tray to the oven, and after 10 minutes, flip the bagels over, bake for another ten minutes; and they're done!

Let them cool for at least 20 minutes, get the cream cheese ready, and feast on what's got to be one of the best weekend brunch treats possible!

You can add any toppings you like to these. To make sesame, onions, poppy seed, caraway etc. etc. bagels just have a dry plate ready with the seed or spice topping spread out on it. After the bagels have come out of the boiling water, place them face down onto the seeds, and then place the seed side up onto the baking tray. Bake and flip as for plain bagels.

[My favorite toppings include cheese, crushed garlic, and sundried tomato. For cheese and the sundried tomato bagels, incorporate into the dough before letting sit as a ball (or right afterward).]



Credit:
http://hubpages.com/hub/Homemade_bagel_recipe_Make_great_nadrolled_water_bagels__its_as_easy_as_baking_a_loaf_of_bread

French Peasant Bread

1 package dry yeast (or 2 1/4 tsp.)

2 Cups warm water

1 Tbsp. sugar

2 tsp. salt

4 Cups flour

Oil

Corn meal

Melted butter

Oregano (and thyme? Or basil?…I probably added thyme. Yum)

Place yeast, water, sugar and salt in warm bowl and stir until dissolved. Add flour and stir until blended. Do not knead. Cover and let rise one hour or until doubled in size. Remove dough from the bowl and place in 2 rounds on an oiled cookie sheet sprinkled with corn meal. Let rise an additional hour. Brush the top with melted butter and bake at 425 degrees for 10 minutes. Reduce oven temp. to 375 degrees and cook an additional 15 minutes. Remove from oven and brush again with butter. Serve hot out of the oven.

This bread has also been dubbed as the "Macaroni Grill Bread"- if you've been to the restaurant you know what that means....this bread is delish!

(Or just brush with butter before and put on seasoning on and then bake)