Entries from Recipes tagged with 'lentils'

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Dinner Tonight: Warm Sausage and Lentil Salad

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I've become rather enamored of lentils lately. They're cheap, versatile, and more nutritious than carbohydrates like rice and pasta (lentils are a legume, like beans). They're a go-to ingredient when you want to stretch a meal a bit further.

Lentils and sausage are a classic combination, often as a stew, probably because it's such an affordable way to serve a lot of people. The sausage becomes a seasoning, rather than the main event.

This recipe, from Stéphane Reynaud's Pork & Sons (previously a "Cook the Book" on Serious Eats), simmers the sausages in the same pot as the lentils so the flavors and fats infuse. The earthy lentils are then tossed with a balsamic-based vinaigrette that's fortified with a little bacon (which is never a bad thing), then topped with the sausage. The original recipe was more complicated and called for walnut oil, but I simplified, replacing it with olive oil, and was happy with the results.

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Eating for Two: Brown Rice with Lentils and Apricots

I’ve always been a little smug about avoiding anemia and iron deficiency. In my mid-twenties my primary care doctor would always explain that it was not uncommon in women my age, but that I was doing just fine. Chalking this up to my weekly hamburger and generally robust constitution, I patted myself on the back and felt a little sorry for wan girls who subsisted on undressed salad greens, thought of Tasti D-Lite as a treat, and had to pop vitamins to maintain enough strength to spend an hour on the elliptical trainer or to hoist their enormous designer bags.

Alas, My Iron Levels Are Sub-Optimal

Fast forward half a decade or so to today, when things are a little different. Now that I know more about meat production, hamburgers are a rare treat. My twenty-seventh birthday seemed to be accompanied by a flurry of articles about my decreasing bone density and fertility, and so I braved the baffling vitamin aisles of the health food store to pick up calcium supplements. Today, pregnant, I’m slightly embarrassed by the little club of pill bottles in my kitchen: prenatal multivitamin, calcium, folic acid, and DHA. Yesterday after I had some bloodwork done my doctor told me I need to add 50 milligrams of iron a day to the lineup, destroying my silly old self-satisfaction with my vibrant red blood cells.

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Sack Lunch: Beluga Lentils and Broccoli Rabe

Sack LunchChefs often say that diners choose entrées based on sides: for instance, anything paired with mashed potatoes moves faster than it otherwise would. At my house, though, I don’t pay much attention to the side dishes, maybe because there’s only one thing on the menu every night. Usually I’m rushing to steam broccoli or make a pot of rice to round out a meal.

Side dishes were not an afterthought, however, last week when I made Suzanne Goin’s brisket from Sunday Suppers at Lucques. As always this book reminded me that you can make truly amazing food in a home kitchen with the right inspiration and instructions. The brisket’s companions, beluga lentils and sautéed broccoli rabe, made an excellent lunch for the rest of the week: a fancified version of my sack-lunch standby beans and greens. With a slice of crusty bread and a piece of cheese, these leftovers, which are good either heated or at room temperature, would make one of the nicest lunches I can imagine.

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Cook the Book: Lentil Soup

ctb-beardonfood.jpgAnd so we've come to the end of the road with this week's installment of Cook the Book, the late James Beard's Beard on Food.

"Lentils," Beard wrote, "might have been devised for winter meals. They are a marvelously nutritious, satisfying, and economical food, and to me, their flavor is more interesting and distinctive than any of the beans, except perhaps the fava."

And while it's a probably a little early to start thinking about winter, I don't see why you couldn't make this soup on a chilly fall day.

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Cook the Book: Spinach Salad with Lentils and Crisp Warm Goat Cheese

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book_a-twist-of-the-wrist.jpgThe recipe that follows has been adapted from Nancy Silverton's A Twist of the Wrist. This is a recipe so easy and so elegant it was a huge hit at a recent dinner party my wife and I threw. And it looks good enough to be served at a fancy-pants restaurant.

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