Try It Again: Non-chilly chili

Six years. Yeah, it's been a while since my last post. While the world's changed a lot in that time, people still have to eat. So I thought I'd restart this blog with - hopefully - better photography. We'll see.

2342 days ago I launched a feature called "Try It Again", where I'd redo one of my older recipes. So today, I'll refresh one of my classic recipes: non-chilly chili. The problem with my original recipe was unnecessary complexity: there were multiple steps. If any recipe cried out for just dumping all the ingredients in a pot it's this one.

Chili con tofu


Oil
1 Onion, diced
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 Chili pepper
1 tablespoon cumin
1-2 tablespoon(s) assorted chili powders
3 cans assorted assorted beans, drained and rinsed
1 can whole tomatoes with juice (28-ounce)
1/2 block frozen firm tofu, frozen for a few hours, thawed (takes about a day), pressed and crumbled

Sauté the onion in the oil for about 30 seconds to a minute. Add all other ingredients and simmer for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Serves 6

I like to have some black beans and chickpeas in the chili. The beauty of chili is its endless customizability. I put a half a cup of edamame this time and it worked out great. When I'm serving this at a dinner party I like to top it with some diced avocado.

Bonus Birthday Bean Blog Bonanza

As you have probably ascertained, this blog has fallen into a long sleep. More like a coma actually. There are several reasons for this, most of them boring and job-related, but the fact remains that this blog has basically shuffled off this mortal coil. However, it’s a reader and friend’s birthday today so I decided to post as a birthday present (a not particularly great present, granted).

So here’s a two-in-one blog post about the garden and a recipe. And what better way to harken back to days of yore than some absorption pasta with an ugly brown mess of beans on top of it?

Pasta with Fava Beans

1 cup pasta

2 cups water

shot of hot sauce

oil

1 cup fava beans

1 teaspoon soy sauce

1 teaspoon fermented black bean sauce

1 chili pepper, diced.

glass of nice Chianti (optional)

Cook the pasta using the absorption style method and add some hot sauce. Put the oil in a skillet on medium heat and add the beans, soy sauce, fermented black bean sauce. Mash the beans together with the flat end of a spatula. Cook for a few minutes and then add the diced chili. When the pasta has absorbed almost all the water, add the bean mixture and stir until it has a healthy consistency.

Serves 1.

The chili plant has grown even more robustly than it had in the last entry, even as my other plants have withered and died (the mother-in-law’s tongues are doing alright, natch).

Until very recently though, no chilies were produced. Then I did some research and found out that in order to produce chilies, chili plants need to pollinated by insects. To reproduce this effect (no pun intended) – I used a q-tip to move pollen from one flower to another. It knocked several of them off, but within a week I had several chilies – one of which has turned a beautiful orange.

And now, gentle reader(s?), I return the blog to its slumber.

My Garden

The observant reader may have noticed that the last three entries on this blog contained copious amounts of basil. Have I won some form of basil lottery that provided me with such bounty? In a way, yes. I have recreated my garden, this time in rooftop form.

This displays half of the garden: my chives, chili plants and parsley. The chili plants are, so far, the most robust. Yet, they have not produced even the smallest chili. I was ready to give up on them, until a few days ago when I spied a flower opening up. I've only used the chives and parsley as garnish. And I only use garnish when entertaining, which I have only done once so far in my new apartment. Still, even that means that they are pulling their weight more than the chilies so far, though hopefully that will change.

As mentioned, the basil is separately potted. One of the basil plants has done quite well; the other species shriveled and died. I blame society. Still, the basil has been the workhorse of the plants, in that it provides actual value add for stuff I'm cooking.

The garden is rounded out by some houseplants which have the rather evocative name of Mother-in-Law's Tongue or Snake Plant. They stand tall and apparently remove formaldehyde from the air. We'll see how they all work together to build a better tomorrow.

Salsa Cruda Pasta

Perhaps my favourite line from Mark Bittman's book was from his recipe for linguine with raw tomato sauce (and basil). You could use good-quality canned tomatoes, he said, "it won't be the same, but it won't be bad (do not, however, use dried basil, here or anywhere else). And since I have some basil plants and my parents gave me a thing of cherry tomatoes from the market, I knew I should use his recipe as a base for a meal.

Pasta With Raw Tomatoes

1/2 cup chopped tomatoes

1/2 tbsp olive oil

1 clove garlic, minced

2 tbsp basil leaves, tightly packed

salt

pepper

1 cup pasta

2.25 cups water
Cook the pasta – I used my absorption style method. Meanwhile, combine the tomatoes, basil, oil, salt and pepper and mash with a fork. With a few minutes to go on the pasta toss in the garlic. When the pasta is done, top with the sauce and serve.

Serves 1.

I should probably give a note on the water/pasta ratio. Because I was using fusilli instead of a more tightly packed together pasta my cup overfloweth, as they say. As is I wont, I measure out pasta by filling a plate with the dried stuff. The ratio does not scale up, 2 cups of pasta for 4.5 cups of water would leave excess water (though again, that's not necessarily a problem).

Try It Again: Tofu with Basil and Chilies

Today, I launch a new feature "Try It Again". This involves me giving something that didn't quite work a second chance. On sunday, I vowed to vary up the Tofu with Basil and Chilies recipe and here is the exciting conclusion.

Tofu with Basil and Chilies, Again

Oil

3 cloves garlic, minced

4-6 [!] chili peppers, finely chopped

Salt

100 gm firm tofu, cubed

1/2 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp lemon

2 tbsp water

1 tsp sugar

pepper - 2 pinches

Large handful of basil leaves

Heat a wok or pan on high and then add the oil. Before the oil is smoking, add the chilies, garlic and salt. Stir-fry for about 15 seconds and then add the tofu. Mix the soy sauce, sugar, pepper, lemon and water together well, and add to the pan after the tofu has been stir-fried for a minute. After another minute, tear the basil leaves with your hands and add.

Serves 1

This was better but, honestly, still isn't worth it. Conventional basil really isn't doing any value-added here. If you're going to make this I'd suggest upping the soy sauce to 2 tsp or 1 tbsp and reducing the lemon down to 1 tbsp. There are plenty of better things to do with tofu and chiles though. While this is a bit of a downer start to the TIA series, I'm glad I gave it another go. From now on though, my basil is just going to go into pizza and pastas. Due to Canada Day plans, there will be no post next Sunday so this one subbing in for that.

Tofu with Basil and Chilies

I've been thinking about recreating that type of Cambodian tofu for a while. Now that I own some basil plants, I decided to try it out using this Thai tofu recipe as a base.

Tofu with Basil and Chilies

Oil

3 cloves garlic, minced

4-6 [!] chili peppers, finely chopped

Salt

100 gm firm tofu, cubed

2 tbsp soy sauce

1/4 cup stock or water

1 tsp sugar

pepper - 2 pinches

Large handful of basil leaves

Heat a wok or pan on high and then add the oil. Before the oil is smoking, add the chilies, garlic and salt. Stir-fry for about 15 seconds and then add the tofu. After a minute, add the soy sauce, sugar, pepper and water. After another minute, tear the basil leaves with your hands and add.

Serves 1

This recipe didn't work out that great for me. First, no kidding on the "large" part of the "large handful of basil". It wilts. A lot. Second, there was too much soy sauce for me and it overwhelmed the other flavours. Third, sweet basil is not really a substitute for thai basil. Fourth, the chili peppers I bought could have been hotter (the outsides almost tasted like conventional red peppers, though the innards and seeds still packed a punch). Fifth, the sugar didn't really mix as well as it could've, so there were some bites that were sweet and others not affected.

I could stop here, but I'm not going to.

That's because, I'm going to redo this dish and post how it goes! I know, I know: the suspense is killing me too.

Restaurant: Zen Gardens

I used to be a card-carrying vegetarian. The card was from the University of Western Ontario's Purple Veggie club. The card was, appropriately enough, purple and offered a 15% discount at, inter alia, Zen Gardens. Much like Simon's Wok the focus is on fake meat dishes. Simon's Wok has, I think, better food but Zen Gardens is a far more elegant restaurant.

Normally, I'm not a huge fan of restaurant elegance but I needed to find a place for a big family dinner in London and I thought it would fit the bill. The restaurant is not licensed, but has a wide variety of teas. The tea was excellent and was stored on top of candles to keep it hot. We started with an order of dumplings and then ordered for the table.

We had two different fried rices: one curried and with avocado. The Curried Fried Rice had a solid curry flavour, very different than everything else on the menu. While it was somewhat unusual, I liked the Avocado Fried Rice though several of my aunts loved it. Kung Po Soy Chicken were chewy and tasty and came with a nice medley of vegetables. The Schezuan Style Spicy Tofu were good, but not as spicy as the title might imply. There were also other dishes not displayed in the photo above. The Lo Han Chai Chow Mien had the right mix between crunchy and savoury and I am informed that the Spicy Eggplant was good (don't care for that vegetable myself). Finally, there was the Veggie Fish with Black Bean Sauce which was beautiful enough for its own picture:

I can't really remember what fish tastes like, but the meat eaters and the pescatarians at the table said this tasted like fish. It seemed so realistic I half expected to find fake bones. I liked it, but not as much as some of the other food.

I realize it's been a while since I've posted an actual recipe; hopefully now that I'm settled in and the traveling has paused I'll return the blog to its roots.

Zen Gardens Vegetarian Restaurant
344 Dundas St., London