While stocking up on one of my favorite ingredients, lentils, the other day, I came across pardina lentils. I didn’t know what they were at the time, but grabbed them anyway, later learning they are Spanish lentils, somewhat smaller and greyer than your basic brown lentil, that keep their shape, similar to French lentils. In fact, after having eaten them I can say they are somewhat like a cross between brown lentils and French lentils. I’m sure I would have found something to do with them, but I decided to just make the recipe on the back of the package, and it turned out well.

Old World Spanish Lentil (Pardina) Stew
adapted from the back of the Goya package

8 ounces pardina lentils
1/2 onion, chopped
1/2 green pepper, chopped
2 large or 4 small cloves garlic, minced or pressed
1/4 cup tomato sauce
1 bay leaf
1/4 tsp thyme
4 cups vegan “chicken” broth (or veggie broth)
1 link vegan chorizo

Note: I didn’t have any soyrizo on hand, but I did have Italian-style vegan sausages. So I used those and to the spices above added: 1 pequin pepper (a very hot dried pepper), 1/2 tsp ancho chili powder, and 1/2 tsp smoked paprika.

Bring a soup pot to temperature over medium heat. Add some olive oil, then add the onions and green pepper and cook until soft.

Add the garlic and spices and cook for one minute.

Add the tomato sauce and cook for another minute.

Slice the chorizo thinly:

Add the broth, lentils, and chorizo.

Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 40 minutes or until lentils are soft, then remove the bay leaf.

Serve!

An easy, quick, cheap, filling, simple meal. Good for the 106th straight evening of thunderstorms we’ve endured. Seriously, I love thunderstorms, but this is getting ridiculous. Last weekend I got on the pool, but I still haven’t gotten in the pool. I floated around on a raft last weekend, reading, but when I stuck my arm in the water, it went numb almost instantly from the cold. Fortunately, although it’s been stormy nearly every day, we did get a few warm days so the water temperature is rising, but the forecast just calls for more thunderstorms and cooler-than-normal temperatures, all of which is wreaking havoc on the pool and driving me crazy! I’m battling algae, which has never been a problem for me in the past, but it’s hard to take care of the pool when there are storms every single night and pool maintenance requires sticking a long metal pole into a large body of water, which I think is a recipe for exactly what you are NOT supposed to do during a lightening storm. Sigh. Hello, summer? Come in, summer? Where are you, summer?

Dinner preparations were a bit haphazard tonight as I got home late and encountered some issues that needed to be dealt with when I finally arrived. Likewise my photos are haphazard. Nonetheless, I worked out a theme for the meal and it turned out pretty awesome. The theme was French. That’s because yesterday I found some French beans at Wegmans and revolved the meal around them. What I did was basically throw things together and ask myself what flavors seemed French to me, which isn’t easy because I’m not well versed in French cuisine as it’s not known for being particularly vegan-friendly. I’d also bought a bag of lemons yesterday because, well, I love lemons. They’re on my list of Things About Which I Freak Out if I’m Not Well-Stocked With. Garlic’s number one and onions are a close number two, but I think lemons may be number three. Anyway, right now I have PLENTY of garlic, onions, and lemons, so I found myself wondering what sorts of things seemed French and lemony. And here’s what I came up with:

Lemon-Dijon Roasted Potatoes

2 lbs red potatoes, chopped into even but chunky pieces
2 Tbsp dijon mustard
1/4 cup lemon juice
zest of 1 lemon
2 Tbsp olive oil
4 cloves pressed garlic
1 tsp flaked sea salt, like Maldon
freshly ground pepper to taste
fresh herbs, to taste (I used rosemary and thyme)

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit.

Wash and chop the potatoes. How large you chop them will determine how quickly they bake.

Place the mustard, oil, lemon juice, zest, salt, and pepper into a small bowl.

Whisk together.

Place the potatoes on a baking tray or dish on which they will fit in one layer. Pour the sauce over them.

Coat the potatoes with the sauce by tossing them around in your (clean!) hands. Place in the oven and cook for half and hour. Remove and add the fresh herbs:

Herbs from my indoor herb garden that I haven’t yet killed!

Return to oven and roast and additional 10 minutes or until done.

Serve:

Lemony Garlic French Beans

1/2 lb French beans, trimmed
3 cloves garlic, minced or pressed
zest of 1/2 lemon
3 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
1/2 tsp shallot salt

Blanch the beans in salted, boiling water for 3 minutes.

Brush or spray a large skillet with olive oil. Add garlic and lemon zest, stir for 20 seconds. Add the beans and stir.

Pour 1/4 cup water into the skillet, as well as the lemon juice and shallot salt; stir to mix. Cover, reduce heat, and steam for 5 minutes.

Serve:

Basic Lentils

I know I was going for a vaguely French theme here and I do in fact have French lentils, but honestly, I love your plain ole, every day brown lentils more than any other and that’s what I’ve used here. I could eat them every day.

4 cloves garlic, minced or pressed
2 cups dry green or brown lentils
4 cups vegan stock
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp shallot salt

In a heavy-bottomed pot, bring some oil (you need very little) up to temperature, then add the garlic and stir for 30 seconds. Add the lentils and stock; bring to a boil. Add the thyme and shallot salt, adjusting the amounts to suit your tastes. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 40 minutes.

To serve, dress the lentils generously with fresh-squeezed lemon (I used 1/2 a lemon on my portion alone).

To be enjoyed with red wine and followed with dark chocolate. Trés français! If only I’d managed to incorporate a grapefruit so I could throw around my favorite French word. (Though I’m also fond of bibliothèque.)

Now for an explanation of tonight’s post’s title. If you’ve read my about page, you’ll know that part of the reason for the name of this blog comes from Invader Zim. I don’t remember the episode, but in one of them, Zim shrieks, “sweet, lemony-fresh victory is mine!”, which is something I have taken to shouting when things go my way. Dinner tonight did go my way, and it was lemony fresh. I have no idea how French it actually was.

Lentils never fail to remind me of The Young Ones. I don’t think Neil, who was in charge of cooking, ever managed to make a lentil dish that didn’t end up on the floor or with washing powder in it, but he was vegetarian. So this soup is dedicated to poor downtrodden Neil. At least my lentils are edible.

No preparatory photos tonight, I’m afraid. I wasn’t planning to make a post as I was just experimenting and was also very tired from a long and arduous swim. But I quite enjoyed the results so I figured I’d write the recipe up if for no other reason than to remind myself what I did the next time I decide I want lentils, or Neil, Vyvyan, Rick, and Mike come over for dinner.

I’d been thinking I wanted to do something involving both lentils and bulgur, and searches for those ingredients led me to several recipes for Turkish wedding soup, or ezo gelin, so I guess this was inspired by that, although I didn’t use mint, which seems to be an important part of ezo gelin, and I did use a black lemon, which may or may not be used in Turkish food (I’m really not sure). It is a Middle Eastern ingredient. I mostly used the black lemon because I have them and had no idea what else I was going go do with them, so in the pot one went. It turned out to be a great touch. Black lemons are little, black, shriveled-up items that might actually be limes and not lemons. Figure that one out. You can just omit it if you don’t have them. I’m excited to experiment further with them though.

Lentil Soup for Neil

1 sweet onion, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
4 cloves garlic, pressed or minced
6 cups water or broth (I used 1 Tbsp Better Than Bouillon vegan “chicken” flavor)
1 1/2 cups lentils, red or brown (I used brown, which Neil seems to prefer)
1/4 cup bulgur
1/4 cup tomato paste
1/2 tsp smoked paprika (if you have it)
1 Tbsp sweet paprika
1 black lemon
1/2 tsp cayenne
freshly ground sea salt and black pepper, to taste
lemon wedges for garnish

In a pressure cooker if you have one (or a large pot if you don’t), heat a bit of oil then add the onions and sauté for 5 minutes. Add the carrots, celery, and garlic and sauté for another 5 minutes. Add the water or broth, lentils, bulgur, tomato paste, and spices except the salt and pepper. If using a pressure cooker, cook at high pressure for 20 minutes, otherwise, cook until lentils and bulgur are soft (about 45 minutes). Season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve with lemon wedges. Don’t try to be all artistic like me and stick the lemon wedges IN the soup because then it’s messy when you go to squeeze them over the soup.

I quite liked this. When I took the lid off the pressure cooker and stuck my spoon in for a taste, I was surprised how good it was, which is when I decided to go ahead and post it even without photos. As far as the black lemon, I think you can grind them up and use them as a powder, but I wanted to find out what happened if I just tossed it in whole. It eventually softened and deflated, then began to disintegrate. The taste it added was tangy without being as tart as lemon juice. I’m going to think of more things to do with the remaining black lemons. If it weren’t nearing 1 a.m. and if I weren’t completely depressed from watching Control, I’d take a picture for you, but we’ll save that for tomorrow, shall we?