Fragrant buckwheat with celery root “bacon” and sauerkraut

Yes, again my favourite combo of buckwheat and sauerkraut! 😀

This time the buckwheat is a teensy bit more fancy – I cooked it with allspice (one or two pieces will do) and a bayleaf, which I removed afterwards, you really don´t want to bite into those!

I sauteed a minced onion on some oil with a pinch of salt, added shredded white cabbage and water to cover maybe about half of the cabbage and then I simmered it under a lid until the cabbage got soft. I seasoned it with caraway seeds, marjoram and black pepper. Towards the end I mixed in also some ready-made sauerkraut and simmered together a bit longer.

I mixed the grain with the vegetable and topped them with mock bacon made from celery root – super easy to make! Just make tiny cubes of the celery root, place them into a fair amount of cold oil with a pinch of salt, turn the flame on and sautee while stirring often until the cubes become golden and look a little like bacon bits 😀

Roasted red beet, zucchini and tempeh with quick “sauerkraut”

I don´t often make meals with red beet as beets contain some oxalic acid, nevertheless I do like a roasted beet from time to time. I find they take very long to become soft when just baked in the oven…so it´s best to first steam your beet chunks for some time until they´re semi-soft. Then toss the chunks with similar-size chunks of zucchini (I had yellow one) and tempeh (I used marinated, so better cook yours with some soy sauce first to give it flavour) in a bowl. Stir in olive oil to coat and then some salt, dried basil, oregano and thyme. Transfer into a baking dish and bake for about 45 minutes on 200°C, stirring at times and checking that the veggies don´t burn.

Meanwhile finely shred cabbage (I used both white and red cabbage) and cook in a pot with a lid and a small amount of water, on a low to medium flame. Don´t forget a pinch of salt. You might need to use a flame tamer and stir at times so the cabbage cooks evenly. Halfway add a splash of vinegar (I had apple cider vinegar) and caraway seeds if you like them – in the traditional Czech sauerkraut they are mandatory 😀 Cook long until almost completely soft, and near the end add a splash of mirin. After this step your “sauerkraut” will become done quickly.

I served these dishes with millet and gomasio.

Cabbage stew with dill and Winter simmer

As a grain I had  a pressure cooked rice/amaranth mixture (soaked 24 hours beforehand). The first vegetable dish is a stew with layers: the bottom layer is about 1 tsp of thinly spread ume paste, then halfmoons of onion, shredded young white cabbage, coarsely grated carrot and finely chopped fresh dill. To that just add about 2-3 cm of water (the veggies should not be covered), cover pot with a lid, bring to boil, and then simmer on a low flame about 20 minutes. Mix through.

The second dish is “Winter simmer” from Kristina Turner´s Self-healing Cookbook. First I boiled about half a cup of water, then added half of a smaller butternut squash cut into cubes, about 10 cm of dried wakame torn into pieces, halfmoons from half of an onion and half of a sliced celery stalk. Season with about a teaspoon of tamari. Simmer the stew for 20-30 minutes, until the squash is tender, and mix through.

Baked filled cabbage leaves

Sometimes all you need is to stumble across a very simple idea – you know, the one where you slap your forehead in a “why didn´t I come up with this myself?” sort of way. Like for example using cabbage leaves as a wrapper for grains and veggies 🙂

You can either just wrap the filling in the steamed leaves and eat as is, or bake the rolls in the oven for about half an hour until they turn a bit golden and crispy.

I mixed a rice/sweet rice mixture with water-sauteed veggies (carrot, leek, green beans, parsnip, celery stalk and fresh parsley leaf) and a tablespoon of tamari. The filling needs to be quite salty, otherwise the dish will be a bit bland.

Then take white cabbage leaves (as large and unbroken as possible, and previously steamed so that they become flexible), spoon the mixture on them and roll up, as well as you can manage 😀 My leaves were unfortunately too broken and small, so it was a bit messy, but it worked 😀

Millet-cauliflower mash with Tangy cabbage and Tofu in lemon and shoyu

For millet-cauliflower mash (macrobiotic fake “mashed potatoes” :-D) just boil together 1 cup of millet with 3 cups of water, a pinch of salt and one small cauliflower half, for about half an hour, then mash together with a potato masher, or anything else suitable…Sprinkle with gomasio.

I love cauliflower leaves, so I also blanched those.

The Tangy cabbage is a recipe from Kristina Turner´s “The self-healing cookbook” which I am reading at the moment. Just crush one umeboshi plum on the bottom of a small pot and spread it across the bottom, then add 1/3 cup of water and thinly sliced onion (I used a red onion for the contrast colors). Place thinly shredded white cabbage on top of the onion, cover with a lid, and simmer slowly for about 15 minutes.  Mix through. The umeboshi gives a really wonderful flavour to this subtle dish!

As a “protein” I made tofu slices simmered in a frying pan under a lid with one tablespoon of shoyu and one tablespoon of lemon juice (for 4 slices of tofu).