Meatless Monday: Eggy Barley Bread

We had a beautiful sunny weekend, but today looks like a chilly rainy day again, so lunch is vegetable barley soup and fresh-baked eggy barley bread. You don't get much more warm and cozy than that!

I'm a big fan of barley, which for some reason does not get the attention today that it did in the previous century. As a whole grain, it's got a chewy, hearty texture and wholesome flavor that is the perfect accompaniment to soup; you can also make risotto with it instead of rice. As a flour, it brings a lovely rich warm flavor and a creamy softness to breads.

This is a good recipe for the bread machine, if you have one. If you don't, you should get one! I don't often bake my breads in the machine, but I do when I'm busy and it still churns out hot, delicious, crusty fresh-baked bread with only five minutes of effort from me. It's cheaper than storebought bread, as well as fresher and more delicious. So get you a bread machine post haste, and then make...

EGGY BARLEY BREAD

1 cup water
1 egg
1 1/4 cups unbleached white flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup barley flour
1 1/2 Tbsp butter
1 1/2 tsp sugar
1 1/2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp yeast

Get the water in your measuring cup and then crack the egg in. Beat the egg and water together slightly, then pour into the bread machine. Sprinkle the flours over so that they float on top of the water. Cut up the butter into chunks and drop it into two corners of the machine, then add the sugar to another corner and the salt to another. Make a little well in the middle with your finger and pour the yeast into it. Switch the machine onto its basic setting and let 'er rip.

Come back when it's done, and transfer the loaf to a wire rack to cool. Make sure you cut a big slice for yourself (and anyone you like) and butter it while it's still hot. Have that slice with vegetable soup. Watch the rain fall as you eat and think about how much you love life.

When life hands you lemons...

...salt 'em up.



Over the holidays, my dad gave me one of my new favorite cookbooks, Well Preserved: Recipes and Techniques for Putting Up Small Batches of Seasonal Foods by Eugenia Bone. I love canning, but even I sometimes get sick of jam, and there's always the question of what you do with the stuff in those jars once you're ready to use them. This book solves both problems, with amazing recipes for unique, delicious preserves as well as multiple recipes for utilizing each one.

For example, there's a recipe for salty brined Meyer lemon preserves. Once those are done, you can use them in soups or tagine, or in the cookbook's recipes for Preserved Meyer Lemon Risotto or Chicken Cutlets with Preserved Meyer Lemons and Parsley. The possibilities are endless since salt and lemons go with just about everything!

Now is the time to get in on Meyer lemon action; they're at their best if you can find them at a farmers' market or a good co-op. You can use regular lemons, but you'll need to juice more of them and they won't be as good. Trust me, if you haven't tried cooking with Meyer lemons, they make a world of difference - the skin is thin and flavorful, almost all zest with very little pith, and the flesh is sweet and succulent and oh so juicy, like a fresh-picked heirloom tomato. You want to put up some of these now so that you'll have salty lemon goodness to go with all your spring asparagus and cucumber salads later.

To start: Take two half-pint canning jars and run them through the dishwasher, keeping them very hot until you're ready to use them. Or boil them in a large pot of water to sterilize that way. Simmer the round flat lids to soften the rubber seal (you don't have to sterilize the rings).

You will need 10 Meyer lemons, and 1/2 cup of salt. That's it.

Juice four of the lemons, getting as much of the juice out as you can, and set aside. Trim the stem-ends off the other six lemons, then quarter them into wedges. Sprinkle a little salt in the bottom of a jar, then cram the lemon quarters into it, packing them in however they fit together with as little space as possible. Sprinkle salt in there as you go, so that the salt is evenly distributed, and do both jars so that you wind up with 12 lemon wedges and 1/4 cup of salt in each one. Pour half the juice into each jar and knock it around, tilt it, run a knife around the edge, whatever you need to do to make sure there are no air bubbles. Put the lids on - not super-tight - and set aside on the counter.

Mark your calendar for two weeks from now. Every couple of days between now and then, pick up each jar and roll it all around. Don't shake it, but mix it all up so that the salt dissolves evenly into the juice. (It'll take it a couple of days to dissolve completely.) Let them ferment for the full two weeks, and then they're ready. Move them into the fridge at that point; they'll be good for six months if they last that long!

Meatless Monday: Eggplant Stew

I'll be honest. I love red meat. LOVE IT. I was a strict vegetarian - no animals whatsoever, not even fish - from age 11 to 23, but when I began eating meat again it was the beef I went for. However, meat is not meant to be the basis of our diet, and most people in Western society eat far too much of it. The excessive consumption of meat has led to such gross outrages as factory farming, heart disease and other health problems, and (perhaps the worst part) low-quality meat.

Far better to only have meat every once in awhile, using it as Thomas Jefferson did, as "a condiment for the vegetables." Enter the Meatless Mondays movement. Aimed at improving the public health, the idea is to encourage people to go vegetarian one day a week. (Besides, if you only eat meat rarely, you can afford better quality meat.)

So here's an old standby from my younger days: Eggplant Stew. You'd be surprised how delicious this is. My ex, a dedicated carnivore, loved this and called to ask for the recipe the day after we broke up. It takes about half an hour to put together, and it goes beautifully on top of baked potatoes, mashed potatoes, rice, or polenta. Fast, cheap, hearty, and delicious - you'll never miss the meat!

EGGPLANT STEW

Olive oil
1 small onion, sliced thin
3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
1 large eggplant, peeled and diced
1 or 2 carrots, scrubbed and sliced
1/2 cup dry wine (can be red or white)
1 to 2 cups tomato sauce
2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
Salt & pepper to taste
Rosemary, oregano, and/or basil, to taste
Parmesan cheese (optional, if you want to keep it vegan)

Heat a little olive oil in a large, deep skillet or a wok; add the onion. Saute until the onion softens, then add garlic and eggplant. Continue to saute until the eggplant softens and begins to darken. Add the carrots and keep cooking it up until the carrots soften up a bit and the eggplant is mostly cooked through. Pour in the wine, and stir for a bit so that the eggplant soaks up most of the wine.

Stir in the tomato sauce now. Depending on how big the eggplant was, and how saucy you want this to be, you'll need about a cup or so. You can use spaghetti sauce or pizza sauce for this, but you can also use the plain kind of tomato sauce (note to Australians: I do not mean ketchup!) and just season it with a bit more herbs. In the summer you can use fresh chopped tomatoes - yum!

So stir the sauce in, add a splash of balsamic, and season it up with salt and pepper, rosemary, oregano, basil, what have you. Turn the heat down to a very low simmer, cover, and give it at least five minutes to mingle over the heat. If your potatoes, rice, polenta, or whatever you're serving it over is taking awhile, this can simmer for up to 30 minutes or so. But when the base is ready, spoon the stew on top, and garnish it with Parmesan if you like.

This keeps well, by the way, and tastes great cold. So if there are any leftovers, take them to work for lunch the next day!