Vegetarian Recipes and Meals

[ashmaster]

I need some recipes or ideas for something vegetarian that would completely fool meater-eaters. I'm giving a pro-vegetarian persuasive speech and through polling have found that most of the people in my class feel that it isn't possible to get protein and that it is nothing more than eating just vegetables. If I could blow their minds with something that tastes like meat and has a fair amount of protein, that would be perfect. My speech is this coming Wednesday, so hopefully someone can get to me before then. Thank you so very much in advance!

[rajsuman]

Hello ashmaster,

Have you considered using soya TVP or seitan (wheat gluten)? I tried a can of seitan recently, not really expecting it to be great, but I was amazed at how good and addictive it was. It's like very tender cooked chicken. In Indian cuisine we have kebabs made of brown chickpeas, which supposedly taste like meat.

All the above choices would satisfy the protein requirement and taste good too.

Please let me know if you need further details. I even have a recipe for making seitan at home if you're interested. There are some recipes using seitan in the Joy of Cooking.

Suman

[lovebenton0]

I need some recipes or ideas for something vegetarian that would completely fool meater-eaters. I'm giving a pro-vegetarian persuasive speech and through polling have found that most of the people in my class feel that it isn't possible to get protein and that it is nothing more than eating just vegetables. If I could blow their minds with something that tastes like meat and has a fair amount of protein, that would be perfect. My speech is this coming Wednesday, so hopefully someone can get to me before then. Thank you so very much in advance!

←

Here's two, ashmaster. I have posted these before (and in eGRecipe archives, but that's not up yet), will post again here just for you.

OK. Both of these employ eggplant - for a good reason, it is a great sub for non-meat dishes. Absorbs flavors well and has a good solid texture. I also grow a lot of it so we eat it often, very versatile veg. Let me know if you want my Eggplant Parmesan recipe too. You may not want to hit them with so much eggplant at once but these give you some choices.

Both are good to make ahead.

This first recipe makes use of Italian sausage (soy), and you can use the veg or mushroom stock/broth in this as suggested instead of chicken stock. My mr, a real "meat now" kind of guy loves this -- no complaints with the soy product at all. He didn't even realize he wasn't eating meat until I confessed.

Tomato, Eggplant, and Italian Sausage Soup

This is a nice garden soup anytime, great for end of the season harvest.

Serves 4-6 as a generous main course; 8-12 as a "cuppa" soup course

Ingredients

3-4 links Italian Sausage (I prefer the soy)

1 T olive oil

1 large sweet yellow onion, coarsely chopped

4 cloves garlic, minced

3 cups Ichiban eggplant, halved and sliced 1/4 inch, OR Italian eggplant, chopped

8 oz sliced mushrooms

2-4 sweet banana peppers, sliced in 1/4 inch rings, OR sweet red pepper rings, chopped

2 cups vegetable or mushroom stock/broth (OR chicken stock)

8 medium tomatoes, seeded and diced, or 2 lbs canned, diced

2 T each fresh oregano and basil, OR 2 tsp each if crushed dried

1/4 tsp crushed red pepper, or to taste (I like it spicier)

1/4 tsp salt, or to taste

6-8 ounces red wine (optional but really the best - and you can use NA red for cooking if that's a concern)

2 cups or more water

1/2 cup cooked pasta per serving; pick a nice shape

Method

Heat skillet over medium heat for a few minutes; spray with non-stick olive oil. Brown the sausages in whole links until nicely deep golden. Remove sausages, add minced garlic, sliced peppers, and chopped onion, with more non-stick olive oil spray, or 1 T of olive oil. Stir to coat while slicing sausage.

Slice sausages in 1/4 inch rounds, return to skillet with onion mixture, add sliced eggplant and mushrooms.

Stir and cook until onions and eggplant are slightly tender, about five minutes. Sausage slices should continue to brown as you do this.

Place all in your soup pot on medium heat. Add 2 cups chicken broth or vegetable broth and 2 cups water.

Add tomatoes and 2 bay leaves.

Cook just to a beginning boil, lower heat, add 2 T each fresh oregano and basil, 1 T each if dried and crushed.

Simmer, covered, at least 30 minutes. (Soup can simmer on low for hours, and is a good choice for your crock pot; may need to replace 1 cup or so water.)

Add 1/4 tsp each crushed red pepper and salt, adjust to your taste. Now add 6-8 ounces red wine.

Let soup simmer on low heat, covered, for another 30 minutes or so.

Shortly before you want to serve cook some pasta al dente; pick an interesting shape, the pennes, rotinis, and small "horns" do well with this soup. 1/2 serving pasta per person (1/2 cup).

Ladle the soup generously over pasta in the bowl. (The pasta is prettier, and will not lose its shape and if you keep it separate until serving soup.)

Serve with fresh grated parmesan and or romano cheese, and garlic toast.

A hearty sandwich.

Smush Sandwich Delight

Halve, slice and then saute squash and eggplant in olive oil with garlic, basil, and a sweet and a hot pepper, both minced, or use crushed red pepper (even some black pepper would do), until almost mushy. (One red Anaheim or small red bell pepper and one HOT banana or other pepper.)

Add one chopped fresh tomato and cook down to smush. You may add a Tbsp or two of water, during cooking, if needed.

Salt to taste.

Let it cool a bit while you preheat oven to 400 and lightly butter bread as if you were doing grilled cheese, outside only (I used spray butter).

Then pile about 1/2 cup veggie mush onto one piece of bread, sprinkle generously with mozzarella cheese, and top with other piece of bread.

Bake for about 10 minutes (350-375) or until the bread is slightly toasty and the cheese is melted.

This will make a few large slice-sized sandwiches, just double or triple (2 or 3 eggplant/squash instead of one) if your group is larger. For a tasting a half would do well per person.

You can save the rest and use again chilled from the fridge, just start sandwich cold, it will heat up plenty in the oven. I had made sourdough and it was wonderful -- a denser bread like that is better.

[ashmaster]

Wow, you two are fast! I was thinking of giving up and just cutting up some Quorn chicken nuggets, but these ideas are much better.

Suman, I would definitely love to hear some recipes using seitan. I've never used it myself, mostly because I lack the knowledge of how to do so.

Judith, that soup sounds absolutely amazing! I love eggplant, but every time I've attempted to make it, it has turned out abominably. I may have to work up the courage to attempt an eggplant dish again with this as my guide.

One thing I should have probably mentioned before is that it needs to be a relatively portable dish. I have to haul it across campus and not slosh it all over myself, quite the task considering my level of grace. Anyway, thank you both so much. You've definitely set my mind back into action. More suggestions are certainly welcome!

Ashley

[Malawry]

Hi Ashley, welcome to eG.

I'm going to weigh in on the opposite side here, and suggest you not try to mimic meat with your vegetarian dish. I was a vegetarian for close to a decade, and I found that most omnivores were quite squicked by the idea of "fake meat." They'd often tell me that they wouldn't eat any kind of fake meat if I was cooking for them, because they thought of soy foods like tofu especially as quite disgusting. Rather than try to convert them to fake meats, I'd try to wow them with a terrific vegetarian dish that didn't rely on such products.

Unless your speech focuses on a vegan diet, I'd lean towards something containing egg and/or dairy. These foods are familiar to most omnivores and are easy to make in forms that are transported across campus. For example, a quiche with blue cheese and pears, or a spinach-ricotta lasagna were two of my potluck standards in those college vegetarian days. The infamous tomato-zucchini tart, showered with basil and parmegiano-reggiano, or perhaps a caramelized onion-gruyere tart strewn with fresh thyme would be delicious as well. I've seen very few people turn up their noses at such dishes.

I like to cook with beans, but I think they're a little harder to "get" for your average college-age omnivore. White beans with sage and roasted garlic, mashed into a dip with olive oil and smeared on toasted baguette, are an easy entry to the ways of bean-eaters. Vegetarian chili with cheese, sour cream and chips is also an accessible bean dish.

If you really want them to try some kind of fake meat (which was not widely available during the first years I was a vegetarian, and which I therefore didn't even seriously consider when delivering a similar speech to my public speaking class), you can still bring Quorn nuggets. Better yet, pick up a couple kinds of veggie burgers and bring them in for taste-testing. Don't forget ketchup and mustard.

Let us know how it goes.

[Moopheus]

Suman, I would definitely love to hear some recipes using seitan. I've never used it myself, mostly because I lack the knowledge of how to do so.

←

This book is a good introduction to making and using seitan. Making it is vastly cheaper than buying it premade.

I agree with Malawry--don't emphasize substituting for meat, emphasize good tasty food. Protein doesn't only come from meat. Talking about basic nutritional issues (like how much protein you really need to eat, and where it comes from) would be good.

[markovitch]

Check the Millenium Restaurant cookbooks. Those recipes will blow anyone's mind.

[Toasted]

However if you do want to make a tasty seitan dish here's one:

Not Beef Stew

2 cups diced seitan

2 cups diced onions

1/2 cup sliced celery

1 cup diced carrots

1 cup cubed potatoes

1 bay leave

2 or more cubes Knor vegetarian vegetable cubes

1/4 cup flour

2 Tbsp. or more Gravy Master (it's vegetarian)

Vegetable oil

water

Saute seitan in about 2 Tbsp. veg. oil. When brown, add flour and cook until seitan is coated in flour and looks a little crispy. Set aside. In a large pot saute all vegetables in about two tbsp. veg. oil for about 5-10 minutes. Add seitan, 2 veg. cubes, bay leaf, Gravy Master, salt and pepper, and about 1/1/2 cups water. Bring to a boil and then let simmer, stirring occasionally for about an hour. Taste for seasoning and add more Gravy Master, salt and pepper or another veggie cube if needed- also more water if it's too thick. Add 1/2 pkg. frozen green peas if you want. I usually serve this with rice, or noodles, or sometimes polenta.

[kiliki]

Malawry's answer is exactly what I was about to write. I'm a former vegetarian also who has always detested those "fake meat" products. The only people they will fool is those who haven't eaten meat in some time-vegetarians get used to the different taste and texture of the fake meats, while meat eaters usually notice the difference instantly (unless the fake meat is a minor part of the dish). I guarantee you that if you make a fake meat dish and introduce it to hardcore meat eaters, you will reinforce their current ideas and definitely not "blow their mind."

And again I agree with Malawry, make something delicious based on eggs/cheese/beans/grains-there are THOUSANDS of wonderful veggie entrees you could make. I'd recommend looking through Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone or The Greens Cookbook. My ultra carnivorous boyfriend does not miss the meat at all when I make pasta primavera, polenta gratins, fritattas, etc, because they are so delicious and satisfying.

If you are still wedded to the idea of fake meat, bury it in the dish. Make a quiche with fake bacon (which isn't terrible, though it does not have the same flavor as bacon) as one ingredient-don't make the fake meat the star.

[lovebenton0]

I agree with all of you!

No -- the Italian Sausage soy product (or any other soy sub for meat) is not something I would serve as the main ingredient or a solo item. The thing to remember is to brown whole first, then brown again sliced as you cook. I think the reason it works as an addition to this soup is that the sausage herb flavorings are there and after it is "twice-cooked" it holds shape and texture well, very unlike alot of soy -- certainly nothing like tofu. The soup is also spicy.

If nothing else if you do eat meat the recipe is wonderful with the real thing.

I was a vegetarian for several years -- not vegan -- and cooking with beans, cheeses, pastas, rice, eggs is always great. I assumed those would be on an "already got that" list. Mushrooms also are good as a main ingredient, as they absorb flavors so thoroughly and are very versatile. Mushroom stock or broth is good and wine, beer, etc., makes most any sauce a little finer.

Along those lines something easy and delicious, and quite portable, would be Spanish tortillas, not necessary to have any meat. And so much Tex-Mex food is cheese and bean based making that a natural option for me when I need to feed vegetarians.

[Pontormo]

Vegetarianism crops up as a topic periodically in a number of forums, such as Going Vegetarian where posts range from practical advice to the philosophical. In threads devoted to pantry food or keeping costs down, we advocate dried beans or alternative sources of protein.

There are threads devoted to cookbooks, vegetarian or otherwise, where the names Anna Thomas, Madhur Jaffrey and Deborah Madison frequently appear as sources of inspiration for those of us who like vegetables, fruit and noodles but also eat anchovies, bacon and duck.

Especially during recent controversies surrounding Johan Mackey and lobsters or Charlie Trotter and foie gras, there have been impatient comments made about vegans and the Raw Food movement, but in this week's food blog, Erik (eje) takes us to a favorite lunch spot where he says the raw, vegan fare is really, really good.

For those who sometimes ask for help when a vegetarian is coming to dinner, there is a special eGCI Course by Malawry.

What I thought might be of value is a supplement to the Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner threads that document vegetarian meals that we enjoyed or regretted. The reason I said "supplement" is because quite a few of the meals in these threads are vegetarian and I would like to emphasize that this is not an Anti-Dinner Thread.

It might also be useful to have a place to turn to for inspiration whenever we feel like a change, or if our brother marries a vegetarian and moves back to town.

While there's less in the market place for many of us now that winter draws close here in the north, there are still winter squash, root vegetables and sturdy greens. Here's a place to show us what you got and what you did to feature produce in a meatless meal. If the thread proves of continuing value, it would be good to return to old posts to find ideas for seasonal, vegetarian dishes.

Whether traditional or newly invented, vegetarian food is always wonderful when it is simply inspired by ingredients rather than a pale reflection of the meal you would have served if only meat were an option. However, sometimes the substitution of a vegetable-based broth for hearty chicken stock works and sometimes it doesn't. There might be an adaption of a favorite dish for a vegetarian diet that you'd like to share. For example, I love Shepherd's Pie made with thawed, frozen tofu while I would never bother to replace meat with tempeh.

[Chufi]

Pontormo, great idea. A lot of my meals are vegetarian, sometimes this happens without my even noticing it. For me, eating vegetarian dinners is a way to enjoy the vegetables of the season more, to be creative with vegetables, and to keep the costs of my dinners down. Also, when I do eat meat I like the meat to be free-range/organic, and sometimes I don't have access to that kind of meat, and my dinners turn vegetarian. I hope this thread will be an inspiration for those days.

[OnigiriFB]

i'm looking forward to this I'm trying to incude more vegetarian dishes to my diet in hopes that balance out the gorging we tend to do at this time of the year.

[cacao]

I was vegetarian (ovo lacto) for many many years. In all that time, I found the 'limitation' of vegetarian eating led me to explore and learn much about other culture's foods, and so I became a very exploratory cook, first by necessity? and then for the joy of it.

In the San Francisco Bay Area, we are blessed with great Farmers' Markets, produce stores, and restaurants that excel at utilizing the bounty. One of my favorite cookbooks is from the vegan restaurant, Millennium, in San Francisco. The cookbook (their second one in particular) is even better than the restaurant, IMHO (though I do enjoy the restaurant, too). There's a great recipe in that book for an 'appetizer' that I serve as an entree; it involves beets shredded and blended with spices and made into cakes that I then oven bake with some drizzled oil, and served with eggplant sauteed in pomegranate molasses and an Indian spiced mung dal. Kind of Middle Eastern inspired. Colorful, flavorful, inventive.. the kind of cooking I enjoy. That's just the first dish that sprung to my mind this morning when I read this post.

-Cacao

[vinelady]

I made a white bean with kale, potato and smoked garlic soup yesterday.

[markemorse]

Great idea, Pontormo...while I completely agree about enjoying vegetarian dishes for their own goodness, it's true that I do often find myself trying to cook vegetarian versions of the meat-centric cuisines I enjoy cooking most (Mexican and Spanish), so hopefully there are others in this same boat...

Wish I had pictures of this: I engineered a completely vegetarian DIY tamale/mole night for 6 this past weekend which I'll write up the recipes for eventually, until then feel free to ask questions about substitutions/approaches (or PM me). The full menu was:

+++

chips/homemade salsas/guac

Sopa de platanos (green plantain soup)

Three tamales: fresh corn/smoked cheese/poblano; black bean/chipotle/calabaza/goat cheese; wild mushroom + herbs.

Two moles: mole poblano + mancha manteles

Maple syrup + pecan ice cream

+++

The idea was that people would build their own tamales using whatever filling they wanted to and add some mole as well (or not). Tamales were served with salsas, optional extra mole, and a simple young leaf (I've forgoten what this is called in English) green salad.

Anyway, pretty great stuff...the mole is still getting better every day (yes that's 5 days straight of eating mole)...

ETA: brief word on the substitutions: butter for lard in the masa; a mix of walnut oil and light (not Asian) sesame oil in the mole itself to replace the lard; chipotles and a dash of pimenton for smoke/pork emulation; roasted vegetable broth to replace chicken broth.

Edited November 17, 2006 by markemorse (log)

[Pontormo]

I'm so pleased there are responses so soon.

Mark, I had forgotten you were a vegetarian. Your dinner party sounds like a feast. Slightly off-topic, but I am a bit curious about European enthusiasm for Mexican food. Care to share, along with some more information about the green plantains?

Soup, of course, is perfect for the weather at this time of year.

So, for my semi-vegetarian, easily adaptable dinner tonight I had:

--Buttercup squash soup with red lentils

--Crepes aux Poireaux

--Roasted golden beet salad with toasted walnuts

--The remains of an orange (it matched)

The soup was prepared earlier in the week with a purée of ancho chilies to add depth to the sweetness of carrots, onion, parsnips and squash. (It does have chicken stock, but it could easily have been water.) Sprinkle of scallion rings and dab of drained yogurt on top. (I am new to making my own yogurt and am still rather gleeful about the process.)

Some time ago, I bookmarked this recipe for Breton leek crepes from Saveur when there was a crepe cook-off and I was starting my campaign to eat more things in the cupboard like the buckwheat flour. The only adjustment I made was to combine Neufchatel cheese (lower fat cream cheese, NOT the real thing) with a little of the thickened yogurt in the final stages of cooking since I had no creme fraiche. Quite good, though it took a while to get the batter to spread out as thinly as I wanted it to get.

I prefer spending a lot of time shopping during the weekend to the daily routine that many eGullet members follow, and any meat I don't turn into a meal by Monday gets wrapped and frozen. If I'm not in the mood to thaw it or soak dried beans, I often turn to quick vegetarian options. Just happened to have enough leeks in the fridge to make half of the recipe.

ETA: to change to past tense.

Edited November 17, 2006 by Pontormo (log)

[Grub]

...However, sometimes the substitution of a vegetable-based broth for hearty chicken stock works and sometimes it doesn't...

←

Inspired words. Very cool -- this is a creative, and constructive idea for a thread. I think this would be a great supplement to the Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner threads. You don't have to be a vegetarian, in order to like vegetables. I know I'm not as knowledgeable as I could be, or you know -- diverse in my use of vegetables. Onions, carrots and taters. I'm a fucking hobbit. Lets see some great vegetarian meals, here! Those leek crêpes sound really good.

[markemorse]

Mark, I had forgotten you were a vegetarian.  Your dinner party sounds like a feast.  Slightly off-topic, but I am a bit curious about European enthusiasm for Mexican food.  Care to share, along with some more information about the green plantains?

Ha...I can see how my forgetting English names for things might lead one to believe that I am European, but no, I'm American. I just haven't seen American groceries in awhile...

And...I'm not really a strict vegetarian either, I just cook that way most of the time....primarily because many of our friends/dinner guests are vegetarians, and I got tired of feeling like I was cooking the "pale reflections" you mentioned above. Thus I decided to "get good" at cooking vegetarian.

To answer your EuroMexican question (even though my enthusiasm for Mexican food is completetly non-European): "Real" Mexican food is making progress over here; I just saw my first fresh-frozen corn tortillas (frozen) in an "international grocery" last week. The downside of this building momentum is that the food marketing people have latched onto it as well...resulting in "Mexican" pizza; some McRib kind of thing called "The Mexican" at the local Turkish snackbar, etc. But this is also a subject I can (and do elsewhere on eG) talk about for days, so in the interest of remaining remotely on-topic I'll end there and maybe let an actual European answer your question...

And the green plantain soup is actually a Cuban/Puerto Rican recipe...my result was closest to the recipe at the bottom of this page, which is a nice article about plantains (including tips on how to peel the green ones). I doubled or tripled the cumin and used a roasted garlic broth instead of the chicken broth.

Edited November 17, 2006 by markemorse (log)

[Chufi]

Our vegetarian dinner: A really thick, silky smooth leek & potatosoup. Garnished with a big heap of panfried chestnut mushrooms.

Quesadillas with refried beans, chillies, cilantro, cheddar, sour cream.

I love the combination of leeks and mushrooms. Mushrooms, dry-fried so they give up their moisture, end up with that savoury chewy bite that I need even more when there's no meat on the plate. It's all about textures and contrasts.

[mrbigjas]

our vegetarian dinner last night:

sarson ka saag, punjab-style mustard greens (which i actually made with turnip greens, because that's what i had).

served of course with makki di roti, which are kind of like tortillas but made with corn flour instead of masa--i use goya masarepa for it. i have no idea if it's right, but it works for me.

and dal and rice of course. the dal i make, from what little i know, is more south indian style than the punjab stuff above (like the recipe here), but i like it.

oh and some cucumber raita.

this is a good meal. it has everything i like in it. greens. plenty of starchy things in the cornmeal and rice. hot, aromatic, spicy things. yogurt. and it's not hard to make at all (except for the makki di roti, which are pretty tough to deal with because they're cornmeal and have no gluten to hold them together). i really recommend it.

[racheld]

I made a terrific Ma Po Tofu the other night, sans pork, and my Chris, who has the carnivorous propensities of a T Rex, merely said, "Put a LOT of tofu on MY rice---I like LOTS of tofu."

I don't do no-meat meals very often, but we like a pot of good old Southern Pinto or Northern beans, cooked low and soupy with garlic and some onion fried gently brown in some peanut oil, and added, oil and all. Cornbread, a fresh cold slice of sweet onion, with rice in the bowl if it's Pintos. Or the whole bean burrito-quesadilla-taco thing with all the cheese, lettuce, cilantro, salsa, sour cream piled atop.

And we both could get through several weeks of the Summer at Snowangel's house: corn and tomatoes for supper every night. We'd alternate buttery golden ears with grilled-almost-caramel in the shuck, with his own concoction: cut corn with the milk stripped into the cooking pot, lots of butter, just a thought of sugar, salt, cooked bubbly, thick and rich, and served in a nice big bowl alongside a couple of sliced tomatoes. Or stewed tomatoes and okra in a second bowl.

Okay, so I'm not very good at getting all the proteins complete. I'm accustomed to starting meal planning with some form of meat, THEN adding in all the accompaniments. But I myself could go for WEEKS without it, enjoying a plate of cooked vegetables, raw ones, combinations in salads, gratins, stews, oven-packets, roast-in-the-pan ones. And maybe there could be just ONE burger out there maybe every couple of months, on a toasty bun with a thick slice of Vidalia. I'm not converting; I'm just enjoying.

I'm looking forward to all the good combinations and recipes.

[Gifted Gourmet]

Originally posted at the beginning of September in another thread:

My vegan daughter came into Atlanta from California for the weekend to celebrate my mother's 95th birthday. I was worried about making a vegan meal but, surprisingly, found it not too terribly complicated after all!

Appetizer salads:

pickled jicama-carrot combination

Thai peanut cold noodle salad

Potage course:

Potato-Vidalia cream soup (using "Silk" soymilk)

Main courses:

Butternut squash ravioli and roasted pepper ravioli and vegetarian potstickers all with the 365 Whole Foods Roasted Vegetable Tomato Sauce (for her)

Poached chicken breasts with the same sauce for my husband and me

Fresh cranberries poached in port

Dessert course:

homemade Peach-plum tarte

Wines, but no challah, because vegans don't eat eggs ... so we had some leftover schmura matzo for Hamotzi ...

The result pleased my daughter enormously and I found the meal not uninteresting at all ...

The next night, for the birthday party, I ordered a deep dark chocolate vegan cake from a local bakery which only cost $35! ... it was truly splendid!

[C. sapidus]

Pontormo: Excellent idea! In the spirit of this thread, and to purge excess protein after last night’s chili cook-off, I made chayotes al vapor for lunch. This is the sort of Mexican mostly-vegetable fare that I lived on for many years. For me, adding beans, cheese, eggs, a little meat for flavor, and/or lots of spices avoids the feeling that “something is missing” after a mostly-vegetable meal. I would cook this way more often, but the rest of the family is relentlessly carnivorous.

The chayote was quickly seared with chilies and onions, covered and steamed in its own juices for a few minutes, and then uncovered and cooked until al dente. I topped with cilantro, feta cheese, and a squeeze of lime. Cooked this way, chayote has a nice texture and comports well with a wide variety of flavors.

[Chufi]

Tonight we had the green plantain soup that markemorse linked to upthread.. sort of. When I looked at the recipe I thought that it was just a pureed vegetable soup, which I make all the time, but with green plantain as one of the more unusual ingredients. So I just simmered the plantain with some leeks and carrots in broth, added some bay and cumin, and pureed. It was very good, rich and creamy.

I also made pizza with red onions, rosemary and gorgonzola.