Dumi & Joan's International Apartment of Cuisine: January

New Year's Day Pancakes:



Being the middle-aged (in spirit) woman that I am, I made pancakes at 8 am on New Years' morning.  Dumi and I have a bunch of great flours and grains in the kitchen, and with finals, we won't have enough time to make good breakfasts this week - so I decided to make some pancakes to put in the freezer, to be toasted in the morning in these next two weeks when I don't have enough time to do something as time consuming as, well, making pancakes. (it's not that time consuming, 30 minutes all in all)

In a bowl, combine: 3 cups whole wheat flour, 1/2 wheat germ, 1/2 cup oat bran, a few spoonfuls flax seeds, 1 tsp baking powder, 1 tsp baking soda, 1 tsp salt, 1 tbls sugar.  Then add and whisk: 2 egg whites, 1/4 cup vegetable oil, 1 1/2 - 2 cups water (as needed) and 1/2-3/4 cup skim milk (as needed).  Head a spoonful of oil in a pan, and make pancakes with about 2 spoonfuls of your mix.  Can we wrapped in aluminum foil and kept in freezer for probably 2 week.

Lentil Salad, Finals-Style

In an attempt to have good food around during finals, as well as rid the kitchen of stocked goods before the semester break, I have thrown together a quick, protein-for-brain-power lentil and tuna salad.

bring to a boil 3 cups lentils with 3 cups water, then simmer for about 15 minutes.  place in bowl with 1 can tunafish, black olives, 1-2 cups roasted red peppers, 2 cloves minced garlic and black pepper and salt.  I added labnah, as you can see, to counteract the saltiness with some creamy goodness!

now I just have to study...

Broccoli Mucver:

These are so tasty! and you can make them with most vegetables of your liking. 

In a bowl, mix together 1/2 cup flower, 3 eggs, chopped up white cheese (optional), salt and pepper. Then add in your vegetables, mucver is most commonly made with shredded zucchini, but you can make them with broccoli, mushrooms, carrots?  Mix this combination pretty thoroughly - adding in flour as needed until you have a thin pancake-like mix.

heat up a (large) skillet with a few tablespoons oil and place two spoonfuls of the mucver mix on skillet, put a few on there at once if you can!  After about 2-3 minutes, flip, and cook other side for about a minute.  Serve with plain yogurt. mmmmm :)

Dumi's Dolma with Bulgur, Carrots and Mushrooms:

http://almostturkish.blogspot.com/2008/04/stuffed-grape-leaves-with-groundmeat.html

"replace meat with mushrooms and carrots. or any other veggies you might like. I also used bulgur instead of rice, but the traditional recipe is with white rice. it works either way." -Dumitrita

thank you for substituting the veggies for the meat, Dumi. The bulgur also worked out wonderfully.

Red and Green (Christmas??) Curry Thai Noodles:



In a sauce pan, heat 2 tbls oil and sautee minced garlic.  add bean sprouts, 1-2 stalks chopped up uncooked broccoli (snow peas, water chesnuts, green or red peppers, whatever else you want to throw in there!) and sautee/stir fry for about 15 minutes.  When the veggies have cooked for about 15 minutes, pour in a can of coconut milk and put in another can of water.  Then throw in 1-3 tbls red or green curry (depending on how spicy you like it.  Also, I mixed red and green curry and it turned out great).  Cook this on medium high for about 10 minutes. 

In a pot, bring water to a boil and cook rice noodles for 6-8 minutes.  Pour curry/veggie mixture on top of noodles, add soy sauce if you like and enjoy.