Recipe #16: Acorn Squash and Black Bean Casserole

Last night's recipe was Fat Free Vegan's Pumpkin and Black Bean Casserole with a few small alterations.

This recipe layers the pumpkin with a layer of black beans, corn, bell pepper, tomatoes, and spices. I added chopped green chiles because I didn't have spicy diced tomatoes, and I only used normal chili powder because I couldn't find any of the fancy ones. (The chili powders are what I searched for at Whole Foods that I couldn't find.) I used acorn squash instead of pumpkin.

This is a picture of the bean layer...

and here is a layer of acorn squash on top of the bean layer. The layers went squash, bean, squash, bean, squash. On top of the final squash layer, there was a sauce of milk, corn starch, nutritional yeast, and spices.

Let's take a moment to recognize how awesome that casserole dish is. At some point in the not to distant past, I decided to make broccoli casserole for a pitch-in. Broccoli casserole is frozen broccoli, cream of mushroom soup, rice, and lots of cheese. I realized I didn't own a broccoli casserole dish.* I called Mom, who was properly horrified, and she gave me this dish. It's the dish I remember using when I was growing up, so I'm a little worried about what Mom must be using for her broccoli casserole. I try not to think of her using something new that is not avocado green.

The casserole baked for half an hour with the lid on, and then another half an hour with it off. The sauce became thick and bubbly, and the whole casserole was creamy and really, really delicious.

I love that this casserole reminds me of a cheesy potato casserole while it is neither cheesy nor potato-y. It's much healthier.

I also love that I was able to use my immersion blender and the chopper attachment for said blender. I was right when I said that everything I make should involve using this gadget. It's an excellent time.

Andrew wasn't a big fan of this because he's also against onions.** It would be easy enough to leave the onion out and put in more bell peppers, but it's also okay that he just doesn't like it.

This casserole makes an awful lot (2 quarts, some might say), so I think I'm going to serve it tomorrow night at my Vegiversary Extravaganza. I've been a vegetarian for a year. Happy vegiversary to me!

*Some people would call a broccoli casserole dish a "2 quart baking dish." That's not how I was raised. I'm actually a little surprised you can cook anything in that dish besides broccoli casserole. It feels sacrilegious somehow.

**He's not as opposed to onions as he is to mayonnaise, but he'd rather they weren't in his food. Since chopping the onions even with the chopper attachment made me cry, I don't mind leaving them out of most things.

Edited to add: I just found a good description of nutritional yeast. I didn't know that one reason it's used is because of its similarity to cheese. No wonder this casserole reminded me of cheesy, potato-y goodness.

January Socks and My Post-Sweater Scarf

Today I have two finished items to show you.

These are the January socks from my sock club. Yes, I know it's the end of April. I only get sock club shipments every other month, so technically I'm only one shipment behind. Since the January socks are now finished, I'm not even really behind. Ha ha! (she shouted triumphantly)

Anyway, these are toe-up, which I find difficult. I am not very good with toe-up, and they turned out too big. I'm probably going to have to give them away, but I haven't resigned myself to that yet.

Pretty, yes?*

Cascadia pattern (ravelry link), Happy Go Lucky colorway
January 2010 Blue Moon Fiber Arts Rockin' Sock Club

The scarf that I cast on while deep in the throes of sadness over the death of my beautiful sweater is also finished.

Entrelac Scarf (ravlery link),
Noro Silk Garden, 252 colorway

I love this scarf. I have knit this pattern four times now, but this is the first one that I've kept. Andrew bought me the yarn for Christmas (or my birthday, neither of us can remember), and it's just fantastic. I feel like I'm part of some special club. I've now knit with Noro.

*Ignore the bad photos. Someday maybe I'll take the time to learn how to avoid that. Perhaps.

Karma Chameleon

One of our neighbors has awesome furniture on her front porch. She has one pink and one orange plastic adirondack chair and a bright blue table in between them. We saw her on her porch one day, complimented the chairs and asked where she found them.

She told us that she found them at the grocery store quite close to us. We went there, but they were already sold out. Sad.

When Grandfather had the deck redone at the cabin so one could sit on it without fear of death, we once again thought about outside furniture. Grandfather mentioned colored adirondack chairs, and I set myself on an epic Internet search in an attempt to find them. I could not.

A couple years pass. This past weekend, Andrew stopped at the grocery for milk and called me from the store. They had the chairs!

Last night, we bought six chairs--two for our house and four for the cabin. They are lovely.

Now, before we go farther on this story, you need to know that Andrew and I met while working retail to earn money for college. Think of the largest, most soul-sucking big-box store you can. Got it? That's where we worked. I believe it is God's attempt to keep me humble. "How did you and your partner meet?" "Um, well..."

While working at said store, we used to get great amusement out of the people who bought giant televisions and then tried to fit them into their compact cars.

You see where this story is headed.

The thing about these chairs is that they don't bend. They're not gigantic chairs, but they are very awkwardly shaped. We were in the parking lot of the grocery trying to fit the chairs into the back of our Vibe, which has a pretty big cargo capacity, letitbeknown. Two chairs in. Two chairs out. Three chairs--nope, won't fit. Two chairs back in. Two other chairs attempted at a 90 degree angle--nope. This went on for awhile.

A minivan pulls up beside us, and the driver calls out the window, "Do you live far?" We start to laugh, knowing we've become the people with the TV and the Smart Car. She says kindly, "I just don't think you're going to make it with those chairs."

Four chairs go into the back of her minivan, and two go into the back of our car. She, her husband, and her two children follow us home and unload. After we thank them profusely for rescuing us, we ask if they will take any compensation. The husband replied, "No. Just do it for someone else when you have a bigger car than they do."

The kindness of strangers.

This nice family created a lot of good karma. Not only did they help us out of a ridiculous scenario, but we'll both remember their kindness when we see someone trying to put a TV into their Smart Car. Instead of laughing, we'll offer to transport it for them.

Well, if I'm honest, we might still laugh, but just a little.

Geriatric

I'm sure everyone has things that make one feel old.

• I see tweens wearing '80s inspired clothing, and I realize they've never seen the 80s.
• My niece is old enough to start 4-H and sell geraniums.
• Alanis Morissette is identified as a 90s artist instead of the musical genius she is, and I realize that this is how my mom feels about artists from the 60s.
• My friend's son becomes a teenager.
• Reaching the age at which I need to start taking calcium supplements because my body is unable to stockpile it
• Taylor Swift--anything at all about Taylor Swift

Sunday afternoon, I willingly did something else that made me feel old.

I bought a pill case. I take a lot of vitamins in the morning, and it seems stupid to open every bottle every morning. I'm a lot more likely to actually take everything if I have it in one place. Pill cases also appeal to my Type A-ness. I love me some organization.

But I still feel old.

Wardrobe Woes

Recently, as I got dressed, I tried to figure out what shoes to wear. It wasn't an "I have so many shoes I can’t pick a pair." It was more of an "I’m wearing black pants and my black Dockers are really too big and the other black shoes are heels (and therefore out) and the only other ones are heavy quilted ones."

So I put on a pair of purple generic Converse and went to work.

It occurred to me that a 32-year-old woman should not have to wear purple sneakers to work unless she chooses to. Often, I choose to. Sometimes, I think there should be a less purple way. (To be fair, I also considered pink sneakers and sneakers with sequins.)

When I examined my outfit further, I found I was wearing black slacks I’ve never particularly liked that I bought off Lands End Outlet. I’m also wearing a button-up shirt that I DO like—from Lands End Outlet.

Moving further down this wardrobe train, I have two button-up short-sleeved shirts, one brown and one white, that I wear nearly every week in the spring and summer. That’s 40% of my work days in two shirts. That also seems less than adult and professional. Sad as it is, there is no uniform in this job.

I resent the time that shopping takes, and I sure as hell resent the money. Hence, outlet shopping online. I resent having to think about what I'm going to wear, so I tend to buy the same article of clothing in multiple colors. I decided perhaps I needed to develop a new strategy.

I took a deep breath and asked my friend Rachel if she'd go thrift store shopping with me. I reminded her that a) I am a bitch while clothes shopping, and b) I am a bitch whenever I get near a Goodwill. Although I would try very hard to be on my best behavior, I couldn't promise I wouldn't need talked down.

Rachel, ever brave, and I went thrift store shopping on Saturday. We went to three Goodwills, and it took about six hours. Luckily, I had been prepared earlier in the week for the startling and horrifying fact that clothes are not grouped by size in Goodwill stores. (Madness.)

I had to take some items back yesterday, but the net haul was 5 skirts, 2 long-sleeved dress shirts, 4 jackets, 3 short-sleeved shirts, 2 pair dress pants, 2 shirts I'm giving as presents, and a few additional pieces of clothing that fit but would fit a lot better if I lost another 5 pounds. (We call those "incentive.") The average cost was $4 per piece of clothing.

I still hate shopping with a fiery passion, but this seems to be the way to go. I reminded myself that I donate clothes to Goodwill a lot, and I don't donate icky things. I donate things that don't fit or that I don't wear. I'm sure that's true for the things I purchased as well.

I washed everything yesterday. This morning I stood in my closet looking at my new clothes and trying to figure out what to wear. I put on my cute new jean jacket and....

pink sneakers. Damn. Perhaps I need to go shoe shopping next.

Perfect Date

Last night I had a fantastic date. You can, too! Follow these simple instructions:

1. Marry someone awesome. Date him.

2. Order pizza delivery.

3. Eat pizza and breadsticks on couch while watching baseball game.

4. After finishing dinner, knit on Socks That Will Not End while date surfs internet. Continue to watch the game.

5. If possible, be sure that baseball team of choice wins game.

Andrew, pizza, baseball, and knitting. It's a quadfecta* of awesome.

*Totally made up word.

Recipe #15: Curried Tempeh Salad

This recipe is based on Vegan Thyme's recipe. The changes I made aren't because of any careful culinary consideration, but rather because a) I like fake bacon, and b) I didn't have some stuff and had to substitute.

Tempeh and I--how do I describe our relationship? Honesty is best. The only time I've cooked with it, it looked, tasted, and felt very, very much like a suet cake that I put out for the birds. It was like eating a giant cake of seeds held together with fat.

Vegan Thyme says that the problem is that I didn't boil and marinate the tempeh. I want to like tempeh, so I decided to try another recipe and do the boil and marinate bit.

My food isn't pretty. I'm beginning to accept that.

I do not in any way regret becoming a vegetarian. There are, however, a handful of dishes that I miss. One of those is the chicken salad sandwich from a local cafe. Their version has chicken, mayo, bacon, and not much else, and they serve it on homemade sourdough bread. It's delicious.

In honor of that sandwich, I added veggie bacon to this. Turns out, you can't taste it at all because the spices are so strong. Ah, well.

See the original recipe for all the info. I substituted lime juice for lemon because that's what I had. I didn't put in raisins or nuts because I didn't want to. I used light mayo instead of vegan mayo (vegetarian, not vegan).

I began cooking this at 9:00 Tuesday night and it took about an hour. I let it sit overnight in the fridge and we ate it Wednesday. By "we," I mean a friend and me. Andrew has a bizarre and freakishly strong hatred of mayo in any form. It predates me, and I have been powerless to do anything about it. I made this recipe knowing he wouldn't eat it.*

Here it is on top of a sandwich thin alongside a grilled portobello. I didn't mind the tempeh at all in this form, so boiling and marinating must be the way to go. I find that pretty exciting in and of itself since it opens up another avenue for getting good protein. I may try this recipe again without the curry and see how that is. The curried version is good, but it isn't something I could eat every week. The fact that this recipe lends itself to variations is a bonus.

For all those keeping track at home, I'm now 60% finished with my New Year's resolution of cooking 25 new dishes in 2010.

*Let's be honest: He's probably relieved to just put a hamburger on the grill for himself. I've gotten really weird about food during the past year.