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| The final product, YUM! |
Once in awhile I come across a great cookbook. Now, all of my cookbooks are great in their own rights. I have my favourites and my most useful ones. I think I have found a new book to make it to those ranks, and it only took one recipe, which happened to be an exceptional one.
One way we can help the worlds food supply, our health, and so many other things is to go meatless sometimes. I don't mean we all have to be vegans and never so much as look at livestock again, but it is wise to consider a reduction in meat consumption. It's a topic I would encourage people to read up on, and draw their own conclusions and actions.
Regardless, I like (LOVE) vegetarian cooking. One thing I find though is it's not always easy to make a meal feel complete. It often feels like there is complexity or texture...just something missing...so you might say "duh! meat!" but that's not always the case, I've had plenty of meat recipes that were bland and missing something.
In any case, This is not that bland meatless meal!
Adam got me a cookbook for my birthday called the New Vegetarian Kitchen. It's a green colored cookbook out of the UK. It took me a bit of time to get into it but once I did I had that bugger bookmarked to kingdom come, and the first on my list was this recipe below. It was worth the effort and I would use this mole sauce for veggie or meat, again and again, it is that good! The chickpea pancakes were a departure for me, I've never used chickpea flour but you know what? They were delicious. An excellent accompaniment.
This recipe also has the potential to be gluten free and vegan with a couple of very minor ingredient tweaks (sour cream, chocolate, baking soda, etc). WOW. This is an ace for alternative and special diets!
BLACK BEAN MOLE (pron. moh-lay)
(adapted from the New vegetarian Kitchen, an excellent cookbook)
INGREDIENTS:
The mole:
3 1/2 C of diced butternut squash (recipe calls for acorn squash)
1 small onion pulverised (recipe called for 1 large onion diced)
2 large cloves of garlic, minced 2 TBSP of Chipoltle hot sauce (recipe called for 3 T of chipoltle paste)
1 thai green chile, fine dice (recipe called for 1 dried ancho chili)
1T of canola oil
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| The recipe, hey, mine looks just like that! |
1/2 t cinnamon
1/2 t allspice
1 t cumin
1/2 t of red pepper flakes
2 bay leaves
salt and pepper to taste
2 1/2 C of tomato puree 1 1/2 C of water
2 C of black beans (1 19oz can drained and rinsed)
1 1/2 oz semi sweet or dark chocolate chopped
3 T of blanched almonds
6T of sour cream |
| Some ingredients... |
zest and juice of 1/2 lime
1 avocado quartered and sliced thin
cilantro leaves for garnish (optional)
Chickpea pancakes:
2 1/2 C of chickpea flour
1 t salt
1 t baking soda
1 3/4 C water
2T of minced cilantro optional
THE METHOD:
- Make sure all of your spices are handy and measured, and all of your veggies are peeled and chopped and cans are open, it makes the execution much easier! You can do several of these steps in tandem as well. Read the recipe a few times.
- Preheat your oven to 150)- Whisk together your chickpea flour, baking soda and salt. Place a well in the middle and add the water. Let stand for 20 minutes.
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| Simmering away... |
- Meanwhile toast your almonds until golden, set aside to cool. Once cool place in a minichop and pulverise until finely ground.
- Place your diced squash in a steamer basket and steam for 6-7 minutes or until tender. Set aside to cool.
- Meanwhile, In a large pot heat 1T of canola oil over medium heat. Add your onion and cook stirring around until onion gets transluscent, about 6-8 minutes.
- Add your spices to the pot (cinnamon, allspice, red pepper flakes, cumin, paprika), chipoltle sauce, chile, garlic. Stir around until blended for about 2 minutes. (note, if it begins to catch, turn the heat down to medium low and add a dash of water)
- Add tomatoes, chocolate, grated almonds, and the 1 1/2 C of water, give it a good stir. Bring the heat back up to medium and let simmer for approx 10 minutes covered.
- Add the beans, again stir, and bring to a boil, turn down to medium low and simmer covered for 20 minutes (you can simmer for a bit longer if the timing of other items isn't working out.)
- Meanwhile, make your chickpea pancakes. You can optionally add the cilantro (I did with half of the batter) it looks pretty. Use a scant 1/4 C scoop on a hot oiled griddle (not too much oil people, try and make it a healthy oil besides olive, canola maybe?). Cook a few minutes a side until golden (for me it took more like 5 minutes a side, but this depends on temperature control as well). Work in batches and place reserved pancakes in your warm oven. These go pretty much exactly like typical pancakes (flip when bubbly ontop!). Makes about 12 pancakes.
- Add your squash to the mole mixture, give it a good stir and season with some salt and pepper to taste.
- Prepare your sour cream (do half if you are only serving 2). Take the lime zest and add to the sour cream and stir.
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| Pancakes, note the bubbles, just like regular ones! |
- Slice your avocado (again, use only half if you are only serving 2)
To serve:
Place a few pancakes on the plate, give it a good couple of scoops of the mole, top with avocado slices and sour cream, squeeze a bit of lime juice all over, and optionally top with some fresh cilantro.
This recipe goes great with a side garden salad, steamed veg would work well too!
Cooks notes:
I try my best to accomodate a recipe's original ingredients but I wasn't in the mood to hunt too much. I tried a few stores and couldn't find chipoltle paste or ancho chili, but I did have the chipoltle sauce already and reading the ingredients it was mostly chipoltles with a bit of vinegar and spices so I figured it was a good substitute. Another note is that you could use more squash in this recipe, I'd say a cup more and it would still be texturally awesome. This is a spicy dish as it is. If you want it spicier use more chili flakes and sauce! Another great veggie mod would be to use extra firm tofu chopped up and half of the squash.
Both Adam and I loved this dish just the way it came. It was delicious and as I mentioned earlier tasted very complete. Besides more squash I wouldn't change a damn thing about this. I just LOVED it.
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