Cooking Through “The Prevent & Reverse Heart Disease Cookbook” – Georgie’s Soup

Georgie’s Soup from page 87

I have to say, this soup has quickly become a favorite in our house. I have made it three times already and I’m about to make it again.

Anytime a recipe calls for red lentils, I get excited. Although, this soup does not have a lot of red lentils, it’s still really tasty. Unlike brown or green lentils, the red ones fall apart when cooked well. In this soup, they are pretty much undetectable. The just seem to thicken the soup while adding a nice protein hit.

Sorry guys…I couldn’t find the recipe online anywhere.

This soup calls for ingredients that you may not always have on hand, but I promise, it is worth a trip to the market. It’s not often I make a dish calling for sweet potato, leek, fennel and mushrooms all at once, but my, oh my, this is just too good not to try.  Look at this deliciousness.  Can’t you just taste it?

Don’t let the fennel make you nervous. While raw fennel does have that beautiful anise taste that I love, it mellows out considerably in the soup and adds a depth of flavor to the soup that is just remarkable. While I often do sub out ingredients in a recipe based on what I have on hand, I don’t think it would be wise to skip the fennel in this dish.

The recipe calls for a pound of mushrooms, but does not specify which type. I take this to mean that you can use what you like. I am sure you could even leave them out if you didn’t like them. One time I used all cremini, another time I used a mixture of cremini and shitake, and the last time was all shitake.  I like to use shitake mushrooms when I can since they are a medicinal mushroom and are used in Chinese medicine to support the immune system.

The recipe also calls sweet potatoes, but you could use what you have. Sweet potatoes obviously make the soup sweet, but I’ve also used a mixture of sweet and red potatoes because, well, you guessed it, that’s what I had on hand.

As in many of the PRHD recipes, it calls for cilantro. I have just used a bunch of spinach and it was lovely. I just added the spinach to the pot after the soup was done cooking and voila.

There is a little bit of prep work here. Cube the potatoes, chop the veggies. It’s all so therapeutic to me, all that chopping. I don’t mind. The one veggie I don’t like chopping is mushrooms, so I splurge here and buy the already sliced mushrooms.

The recipe says that it serves 6 to 8. We got about 6 large servings.

Prep time was about 20 minutes. Total cooking time was about 30 minutes – 10 minutes sautéing and 30 minutes simmering.

NOTES:

• Instead of cilantro you can use parsley, spinach, collards, chard, etc.
• Fresh or dry thyme works here. I’ll use fresh when I can grow it.
• Add more red lentils for a heartier soup.
• You can peel the potatoes…I do not.
• The recipe calls for 1 TBSP of balsamic. I do not use my Grand Reserve for this. I just use the regular balsamic from the grocery store.
• The recipe calls for shredded carrots. I used them the first time and forgot the second time. We didn’t miss them. They didn’t seem to add anything special to the soup.
• The soup was even better the next day.
• This can easily be served with rice or quinoa to stretch it out if need be.
• This was so flavorful that I did not add any salt at all.
• I made this on top of the stove, but this can easily be made it the Instant Pot.

Cooking Through “The Prevent & Reverse Heart Disease Cookbook” – Smoky Little Devils

Smoky Little Devils from page 132

I cannot say enough good things about this simple recipe.

You can find the recipe here: Smoky Little Devils

I found nice, small red potatoes that were perfect for these. They did have a bag of little, uniform red and yellow potatoes, but they were very expensive.

I already had the hummus made, so I just nuke the taters and cooked them off. In hindsight, I should have steamed the potatoes earlier and cooled them in the refrigerator. But we decided last minute to have these and well…I did what I needed to do.

I did this as simply as I could since we were hungry. I did not add the optional kale nor the scallions to the top. I did put a pinch of smoked paprika on top and it pulled it all together visually. They actually looked pretty good.

Well, they can look nice and all…but it’s the taste that matters, right? We thought these little gems were the bomb. Creamy from both the red potato and the hummus. A taste explosion from the scallion hummus…which has become my new favorite.

The only thing that both Chris and I noted was that, since there was no salt in the hummus, we were looking for a little bit because of the potato being such a blank canvas. We did end up adding a little sprinkle, but we both agreed that adding a touch of good quality sea salt or Himalayan salt to the potato before adding the hummus would work out better. I would prefer to add a tiny sprinkle to the food instead of adding it to the hummus. By itself, the hummus did not need the salt.

This dish is definitely company worthy. It is not one of those things that people will be apprehensive to try because it’s vegan. It is potatoes and hummus. Everyone is familiar with those two food items. Nothing weird here. Just good food.

If I were to make this for company, or a bbq, or something, I would splurge on the uniform potatoes, I would steam the potatoes and I would use a piping bag with a star decorating tip to add the hummus.

Overall, a keeper of a recipe that can be pulled together at a moment’s notice if you keep the cooked ingredients at the ready.

NOTES:

• Make the hummus and the potatoes ahead of time and cool in the fridge.
• I bet adding the scooped out potato to the hummus would be good.
• I didn’t top the devils with scallion since there was already plenty in the hummus.
• Add a touch of salt to the potato before adding the hummus.
• Next time, I will try adding the kale.

Product Reviews – Ronco Chip-Tastic Microwave Potato Chip Maker

I could not love this gadget more than I do. I wasn’t really sure if I would find this to be worth the $13.99 I paid for it on Amazon (oh, how I love my Amazon Prime).

Click here to go to the product on Amazon.

Well, let me tell you…when I can go from craving potato chips to eating potato chips in 10 minutes, I have a winner.

There are a couple of reasons that I think this is a winner. First, I’m a McDougaller (in my world that IS a word) which means I eat starches. Lots and lots of yummy starches. Potato chips made from whole potatoes with no oil at all is such a lovely, starchy treat!

I’m not just opening up a bag and stuffing my face. This takes just a little bit of preparation and BAM!!! We have the best chips. Healthy chips. Just potatoes. Seasoned exactly the way we want. What’s not to love?

The little slicer that came with it was a joke, so we just use our mandolin to slice the potatoes. Although, in hindsight, we probably should have used the slicer at least once to see what the thickness was supposed to be. I tried to do it in my food processor, but they came out too thick. 

I wasn’t sure if we would have a problem with the chips being curled, but it really wasn’t an issue. The tray forces you to fold the potato slice to put it in the slot. This allows for more chips than other items like this that I have seen.

After slicing the potato, we place them on paper towels to absorb some of the moisture and to allow us to season. We did some with just a little Himalayan Pink Salt, some we did with the salt and some chipotle powder. Depending on the thickness of the slices, it took anywhere from 6-10 minutes in the microwave for the chips to be done. All microwaves are different and everyone is going to slice potatoes differently. You need to keep an eye on them until you have your thickness consistent and your timing down right. When you see them browning up, they should be done. There really is a fine line between crispy and burnt here, so just keep an eye on them. 

We also made tortilla chips with success, which only took about 3 minutes using the Ezekiel tortillas.

We’ve been enjoying potato chips guilt free nearly every evening. I’m starting to wonder how we ever got along without this gadget.

This is so worth the money. I see plenty of healthy potato chips in my future.

If you have this, tell me….what type of chips are you enjoying?