Nana's Lemon Bread

My grandmother has the gift of hospitality. Her house is known as "the house of five desserts", a very good thing for those of us with a sweet tooth :) This is one of the treats I always associate with Nana, and even after a couple tweaks (coconut oil instead of margarine and less sugar) tastes just as good!

Nana’s Lemon Bread
(Aka Shaker Lemon Bread)

Ingredients for the bread-
1/3 c. coconut oil
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 ½ cup all purpose flour
1 ½ tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. salt
½ cup milk – divided
Grated rind of 1 lemon
½ cup chopped pecans or walnuts optional (I don't remember eating it with nuts, will have to try it sometime!)

Ingredients for the glaze-
½ cup sugar
juice of 1 lemon

Heat oven to 350 degrees

Cream the shortening and sugar until light and fluffy.
Add eggs one at a time. Beat well after each addition. Mix together dry ingredients. Add 1/3 to egg mixture followed by 1/3 milk. Repeat twice more.
Fold in lemon rind and nuts, if used. Spoon into well greased 9x5x3 loaf pan. Bake 45 to 55 minutes or until done.

Combine glaze ingredients. Mix well. As soon as bread comes out of the oven, spoon on the glaze. Cool before removing from pan.

*This was really yummy served with tomato jam!!

Vegetarian Taco Filling

These are some seriously delicious tacos!

Lunches in our home are always rice and vegetable curry. However, our dinner menu varies. Dinner may be Indian food-with a North Indian flare of paneer and naan-or it may be Italian, Mexican, Slovakian, etc.

For our taco dinner, I wanted to make the protein filling to be something other than beans. Beans are good, but slightly boring. And definitely predictable as far as taco fillings go. 

This recipe is far from boring. Mmm, this recipe has revolutionized our taco night! We may never go back to beans again!

Ingredients for filling (enough filling for 15 tacos)

3 portobello mushroom caps

1 small red onion

1 carrot

1 cup soy granules (Nutrella is the brand we find at the Indian grocers, it's also known as TVP-textured vegetable protein)

2 Tbs taco seasoning (*I looked up a recipe online to make my own)

1 handful walnuts

1 Tbs oil

Other ingredients

taco shells

various toppings (suggestions) tomatoes, lettuce, green onions, cilantro, jalepeno peppers, shredded cheese, Greek yogurt or sour cream, salsa

Process

 Put soy granules in a bowl and cover with water. Microwave for 90 seconds and allow to soak while you prep the rest of the filling ingredients (5-10 min)

 Wash the veggies. Cut the mushrooms and onion in quarters, peel and quarter the carrot as well. Toss these veggies in the food processor, add the walnuts, and process until finely minced.

 Dump the mixture into a bowl. Drain the soy granules, rinse with cool water, and squeeze to remove excess water. (I have a fine mesh strainer that I use to do this.) Add drained soy granules to the mixture and stir to thoroughly combine. 

 Heat oil in a large skillet and add the mixture. Cook on medium heat for 7-10 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent burning.

Place taco shells in an oven safe dish, fill with 2-3 Tbs of filling and heat according to instructions on package. Top with desired toppings, 

and prepare to eat the best bean-less vegetarian taco EVER! 

Upma

This is a staple breakfast in a South Indian home. You can substitute other grains for different variety of upma.

Vermicilli
Roasted upma rava
Sooji
Cracked wheat/bulgar

made with roasted upma rava, served with coriander -green tomato chutney

The next on my list to try is quinoa.

To make 4 servings (or 3 generous servings, with a little left over...)

1 red onion, chopped
2 tomatoes, chopped
1 carrot, shredded
1 Tbs minced ginger
1 green chile, sliced down the middle, but left intact
2-3 Tbs peanuts or cashews
2 cups grain of choice
4 cups of water, more or less depending on grain used

Dry roast the peanuts or cashews and set aside. If using sooji or vermicilli, roast the grain first before adding. Just add 1Tbs of oil or ghee to the pan and toast on medium heat until color changes and you can smell the roasted aroma. Set aside.

Add 1 Tbs oil to the pan and make popu with
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp urad dal
1/2 tsp jeera
1/4 tsp turmeric
1 tsp salt, more or less to taste
6-8 curry leaves
Once mustard seeds begin to sputter and dal is nicely golden, add the ginger and green chile and allow to fry for another minute. Add the onion, carrot, and tomato and fry for another 2-3 minutes until the onion is translucent. Add the peanuts or cashews.  Now add the water and bring to a boil. Once the water boils, add the grain. Stir to completely combine, lower the heat and allow to simmer until grain is cooked and water is fully absorbed. (You can add a pre-cooked grain, like bulgar or quinoa. If you do, then water will be considerably less, maybe only 1/2 cup is required to cook it to a nice consistency.)

Garnish with coriander leaves, shredded coconut, and a lemon slice. Squeeze lemon juice on prior to eating for nice tang. Eat it plain, with pickle, or with yogurt. Anyway you choose, you are guaranteed to love this healthy breakfast!

Baked Oatmeal

This is a favorite recipe from camp Seneca Hills. Toppings definitely make all the difference, but are not required. It's a hearty breakfast that can easily be made the day ahead-refrigerated and rewarmed = just as yummy!

4 cups quick oats (I've used old fashioned oats before with good results)
2/3 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup melted butter
2 tsp baking powder
2 cups milk
2 tsp cinnamon
2 cups diced apples or peaches

Mix all ingredients together. Put in a greased 9x9 pan. Bake at 350 for 35 min or until browned.

Suggested toppings:

chocolate chips (camper favorite!)
blueberries or other berry
dried cranberries or raisins
additional apple or peaches, or other chopped fruit
whipped cream
peanuts or peanut butter, walnut or other nut/nut butter

Anything else I'm missing? Try it out and let me know!

Beetroot curry

Like many vegetable curries, you can use one vegetable as the base and add one or more additional vegetables to vary the recipe. Beetroot curry is no exception. My favorite is curry made with only beetroot and mixed with 1-2 Tbs shredded coconut. But, when you only have one beetroot and are trying to make lunch for 2 people, you have to add other filler veggies :)

Today's lunch was a nice combination of beetroot and golden carrots. Although of course, once the carrots were cooked with the beetroot, no longer looked very golden!

Ingredients & Process

1 beetroot, diced
1 cup diced carrots

1/2 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp bengal gram
1/2 tsp urad dal
1/2 tsp jeera (cumin seeds)
1/4 tsp turmeric
1/2-1 tsp salt (to taste)
6-8 curry leaves

Add 1Tbs oil to a pan, add popu (mustard seeds, bengal gram, urad dal, jeera, turmeric, curry leaves) and salt. Add diced vegetables and stir to combine. Add 1/2 cup water and cover with lid, simmer over low flame, about 20 minutes. Check periodically to prevent burning. If water dries up and the beetroot is still not tender, add little more water as required.

Countless other varieties can be made as well...I often add one (or more) of the following to the beetroot

-1 chopped onion
-1 cup shredded carrot
-2 Tbs grated ginger
-1/2 cup cooked bengal gram

Garnish with 1-2 Tbs cilantro and/or shredded coconut (optional, but highly recommended!)

Tomato Jam

We have gotten so many beautiful, delicious tomatoes from our garden. Brandywine. Beefsteak. Celebrity. Rutgers. We actually were afraid we were losing our crop mid-season. I really can't thank my husband enough for hand-picking off all those nasty army worms. One of his best traits is his persistence. Thanks to that, we have been enjoying juicy tomatoes all summer long. I've canned spaghetti sauce, frozen tons of tomato puree, made a huge tray of mutter paneer for our daughter's 1st birthday party (used about 12 lbs of our tomatoes for the gravy). And then this recipe.

My mom forwarded this tomato jam recipe to me, and ever since I read it, I was intrigued. I only had a couple pint jars, but was so fixated on making it, I decided to just half the recipe and see what happened.

Love is what happened.

I plan on stocking up on jelly jars and making more next year for sure. Now I have the pleasure of discovering the many ways and recipes for enjoying this tomato jam...

This is the recipe. Simple and delicious.

This is my finished product. My husband said it can pass as strawberry jam.
Yes. It's that good!

So far I have eaten it in the following ways:
1.) straight off the spoon (no shame!)
2.) tortilla wrap with cream cheese, tomato jam, and fresh basil leaves
3.) whole wheat crackers topped with tahini and tomato jam

And I am dreaming of lemon bread with tomato jam. Seems to me that would be a delightful combination.

What are other ideas for serving this jam? Please leave your suggestions in the comments, I would love more inspiration!!