james test

Tempeh-skeptic Fiber recently went wild for Buffalo tempeh "wings" and we were keen to give them a go. However, getting some wing sauce going here in Australia proved to be a bit of a challenge. It's composed of only three ingredients - Louisana-style hot sauce, ketchup and butter - so it seemed important to get all the components right. However, I've never seen such hot sauce on sale and a bit of internet research indicated that it wouldn't be realistic to try to make it myself. Instead I decided to make our favourite Chinese style barbeque sauce - it looked like having the necessary consistency and zing, if not the right ingredients or origin. Tempeh is a funny one. It has a substantial, almost meaty, density to it but it's a bit dry. I had high hopes here but even the sauce didn't provide sufficient moisture for me. We were rather taken by the crumbing though, and Michael suggested that we could try it with tofu - after all, it works great for...

For reasons that will soon become apparent (i.e. after the next post), we went looking for a Caribbean themed meal on Sunday night. Preferably something straightforward. Luckily, Moosewood came through with the goods. These wraps are remarkably easy to put together and have at least a hint of the Caribbean about them. The biggest problem involves the need for collard greens - we tried Piedemontes , but were forced to settle for chicory, which was probably a bit of a stretch. Anyway, that aside, the whole process took about twenty minutes and served up a filling, healthy and thematically appropriate meal. Like a lot of Moosewood recipes, it was probably a little on the bland side for my tastes - but a sprinkling of jalapenos was all it took to resolve that problem. Ingredients 1 cup diced onion 1 garlic clove, minced 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme 1/2 teaspoon allspice 1/2 teaspoon salt 4 cups of greens (chicory in our case, collard greens in the original recipe) 1.5 cups cooked black b...

We needed a better excuse for our trip to Preston Markets than just the nearby bakery, so before we set off we dug up this fennel leek soup recipe from our Moosewood cookbook for Sunday night's dinner. It was loaded up heavily with vegetables and seemed like it would be a decent winter's dinner. The recipe took a bit longer than I anticipated - you basically end up making your own stock for the base of the soup - and the final product was a little short on flavour (at least partly due to my forgetting to put pepper in), but still heavy, warming and satisfying. The thin-sliced radishes were a fine accompaniment, as were the croutons that Cindy made up from the fresh bread we'd picked up at the markets, but the whole package was just slightly short of flavour. It's something to work on - maybe up the leek content for next time. Fennel leek soup (courtesy Moosewood Restaurant's New Classics) 1 fennel bulb, trimmed 3 leeks 2 carrots, peeled and chopped 4 large potat...

It's been a while since we entertained anyone in our home, but some newcomers to my workplace provided a good reason to pull out the biggest saucepan and buy an extra 6-pack of beer. Tracy and her partner Lee are the latest Brisbane migrants to Melbourne's inner north and from even further afield (the Northern Territory!), Beth has now taken up residence at a desk adjacent to mine. On Wednesday evening they gave me an hour or so head start from the office to cook up a Mexican-themed dinner at home. On my previous night's planning, I made the decision to keep this weeknight meal quite casual and low-stress. This meant no-fuss appetisers and desserts, and a serve-yourself main course. Michael had picked out some perfectly ripe avocadoes and it didn't take too long to mash them with a very juicy lime and stir in some finely chopped red onion and a bit of sour cream. Voila! Tangy guacamole. I brought out the Chilli Factory salsa as a spicy side, and there were Corona...

I'm getting psyched up for autumn and winter eating ahead of schedule and a symptom of that was the batch of non-sausage rolls that I made for dinner on Wednesday night. Usually Michael slathers his with chilli sauce, while I go for the more conventional Heinz tomato. But this time we put together some Chinese-style barbeque sauce from our Moosewood cookbook. With both tomato and chilli pastes involved it's something of a compromise sauce, but it's a compromise where we both gain more than we sacrifice: it's sweet, salty, hot and tangy in almost equal parts. As well as pouring it on the usual pies, sausages and burgers, I reckon this might make a good tofu marinade. Chinese-style barbeque sauce makes about a cup In a bowl, combine: 1/2 cup tomato paste 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger 2 tablespoons sesame oil 1/4 cup apple juice 1-2 teaspoons chilli paste 2 tablespoons soy sauce 2 garlic cloves, minced 2 tablespoons brown sugar 2 tablespoons rice vinegar 1/2 teaspo...

You know in Blondie comics, how Bumstead is always trying to construct huge triple sandwiches to feast on at midnight? Or do you remember that Simpsons episode where Homer takes home a 10 foot hoagie from a company picnic, hiding it from Marge like a secret lover when the mayonnaise starts to turn? I've never understood that devotion to sandwiches. Maybe for a burger with just the right herb and sauce combination, but only if there were some top-notch chips on the side, right? An unheated, unaccessorised sandwich couldn't really engender that kind of feeling on its own, could it? On Saturday I found one that hit that kind of mark. Michael and I planned a visit to Yarra Bend Park for a walk and some very amateur bird watching. We wanted to be there around dusk and so sorted out a little picnic for dinner. The main feature of this picnic was the French-Style Roasted Vegetable Sandwich from Moosewood's New Classics cookbook. Sweet, tangy and creamy, it was good stuff...

Given all the spare time I’ve had while waiting to start my new job, I’ve been trying to come up with some vaguely interesting things to cook for dinner. Our discovery of a Spanish/Mexican deli nearby prompted me to scour our recipe books for meals containing black beans and chipotles . While nothing was quite what I was after, I decided to combine a black bean and sweet potato hash from our Moosewood book with a tortilla stack recipe from one of Kurma’s books. The meal itself was pretty straightforward – sweet potato cubes are cooked up with black beans, onion, garlic and cumin and then served on shallow-fried tortillas with salad and sour cream. The hash mix was supposed to include jalapenos, but I substituted in some of the sauce that the chipotles (which I’ve just discovered are actually smoked jalapenos – you learn something new every day) came in (called adobo sauce). This gave the whole mix a faint of spicy-smoke flavour – reminiscent of hot salami more than anything else. I ...

This was originally intended to record both our cooking and our dining out adventures, but the lack of kitchen facilities has so far been fairly limiting. After three straight days eating every meal out, Tuesday was my chance to christen our spacious new kitchen with a home-cooked meal. To counter the tail-end of the Melbourne winter, I opted for a hearty soup. The recipe came from our Moosewood recipe book and was billed as a fusion between Asian and Australian cooking. It was a fairly simple unblended soup of leeks, garlic, spinach, rice, lemon juice, coconut milk and vege stock along with a few spices. To make sure it filled us up, I picked up a sourdough baguette from one of the local bakeries. The lemon juice and coconut milk gave everything a bit of a Thai-style flavour, while the leek, garlic and stock were more reminiscent of a traditional European soup. Even with the rice, the whole thing was a little insubstantial and we managed to polish off a fair chunk of the bread as wel...