Tofu Tikka Masala Kebabs

Tofu Tikka Masala Kebabs

These tofu tikka masala kebabs can be cooked on the grill or on a large wide skillet on the stovetop (a flat skillet or a fancier grill pan will do). They smell delicious while cooking, so be prepared to share some if you’re the odd (but very creative) vegetarian that is grilling out among meat eaters.  These are fast to make, present well, and contain basic flavors of most Indian dishes (garlic, ginger, asafoetida, cumin, red chili, fenugreek, coriander).

Personally, I think tofu and paneer share similar textures and can replace each other in many dishes. If you love paneer, use that instead. They cook fast so choose quick cooking veggies (bell peppers, onions, tomatoes, squash) or alternate vegetable and tofu skewers.

Have the tofu and veggies cut to the same size so they will cook evenly. Ideally, you should marinate the tofu for at least 4 hours, but an hour will do. This is a simple spice mixture to prepare, but feel free to omit hard to find ingredients (e.g. asafoetida, fenugreek).

I’m not sure I understand what tikka is, or for that matter where it really came from. I’ve seen chicken tikka and paneer tikka at Indian restaurants, but most Indians do not cook this dish at home, unless we’re cooking Indian food for non-Indians. Indians tend to cook two kinds of Indian foods. The first is the daily meals that we’ll eat and share with other Indians, and the second is dressed-up fancy Indian food that is similar to what one finds at an Indian restaurant (we'll share this too). We don’t mean any ill-will but it’s just easier because, really, we eat with our hands. The best foods are the daily foods.  I guess these are fusion tofu tikka kebabs. Go ahead, give them a try.

Ingredients:
½” piece of ginger, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
¼ tsp red chili powder
½ tsp coriander seeds and fenugreek seeds toasted and ground together (omit fenugreek if you can’t find it)
¼ tsp salt
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp paprika
pinch asafoetida powder (omit if you can’t find it)
3 tbsp yogurt (or heavy cream)
1-2 tbsp peanut oil. During cooking time the oil helps to keep the kebabs from sticking.
1 block of extra-firm tofu, quick drained, and diced into 1” cubes
1 bell pepper (I used red to impart a tikka feel to the kebabs) cut into 1” chunks
1 cup grape tomatoes
lemon wedges to serve
dozen skewers (soaked if grilling) see note at bottom of post

Directions:

1. Quick drain the tofu. See this post (2nd paragraph down).
2. In a small mixing bowl combine ginger, garlic, spices, salt, asafoetida powder, and yogurt. Taste to adjust seasonings. Add more red chili powder if you want it spicier.
3. Add the cubed tofu, coat evenly and place in a shallow pan in the fridge.
4. Cut up veggies and store them in the fridge until ready to use.
5. When ready to cook, skewer the veggies and tofu.

When ready to cook, heat up half the oil (about 2 tsp) in a wide skillet over medium-high heat. Once hot add in skewers and cook 2 minutes on each side. Add oil to the pan if you are cooking the skewers in batches. If grilling, grill skewers over medium-high heat and rotate a quarter turn every 2-3 minutes until golden. If skewers begin to stick on the grill, brush them with oil before rotating. 

Note: you can trim the skewers to fit in the pan, I had to trim mine.
Serve with rice, lemon slices, and yogurt, or top a salad with these skewers.

Mushroom and Arugula Garlic-bread Toasts

Tonight at dinner while Karl and I were savoring these mushroom-arugula-garlic bread toasts, we started talking about our favorite ingredients. These are the things you can’t live without, or just things you never think about, but you cook with over and over again. For me, garlic, onions, and olive oil are my top contenders.  My top 5 would be:  

1. Garlic
2. Onions
3. Mushrooms
4. Bell peppers
5. Olive oil

What are yours?

I felt inspired to make these mushroom toasts after I had tried a similar style dish (Nico, I will ask you to elaborate on what it was?) in Brussels while my in-laws were visiting. It was day-old toasted bread smothered with steaming hot sauteed mushrooms, parsley, and tomatoes. It was ridiculously delicious and simple.

Serves 4
For garlic bread:
3 tbsp butter
2 cloves garlic, chopped or grated
salt and pepper to taste
1 tsp chopped parsley
1 tsp chopped oregano (dried is fine)
8 large slices whole grain country-style bread
Preheat oven to 350 F

1 tbsp olive oil
1-2 shallots, chopped or ½ cup red onion chopped
2 cups mushrooms, quartered (cremini mushrooms, or any variety of mushroom will work)
2 tbsp parsley, chopped
1-2 tbsp white wine vinegar (more or less, you decide)
4 eggs, or substitute 1 14 oz can white beans, rinsed and drained)
2-3 cups arugula, washed and set aside

Directions:
1. Put the butter, chopped garlic, chopped parsley and oregano in a small bowl. Mash everything together until you have nice garlic butter.  Season with salt and pepper and set aside.  Preheat oven.
2. Heat up 1 tbsp of olive oil in a non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Once hot, add in shallots or onions and saute until fragrant (2 minutes). Add in mushrooms and continue to cook over medium-high heat for about 5 minutes. Meanwhile butter the bread with the garlic butter and place the toasts in the oven.
3. Turn heat down to medium and continue cooking the mushrooms until reduced or the edges begin to turn golden. Season mushrooms with salt and pepper. Sprinkle the white wine vinegar on top and cook another minute. Remove the mushrooms from the pan and set them in a bowl. Add a dash of olive oil to the pan and crack the eggs one by one into the pan. Cook them sunny-side up until done. I like to flip my eggs overs and get the yolks cooked.  You could use any kind of beans instead (or add beans along with eggs, why not) just heat them up.
4. Once the eggs are cooked, add the mushrooms back to the pan and heat it all up.
5. Once the garlic bread is golden brown, pull them out and place 2 slices on a plate. Top with mushrooms, eggs, and arugula. Serve immediately.

A chilled dry white wine is delicious with this meal (I would recommend a sauvignon blanc or a palatte cleansing slightly rosier beaujolais).

Part 3: Exam results

Today was a typical Belgian day. The sky was overcast and shortly into mid-morning it started to rain. The weather hardly bothers me anymore, in fact, I think it’s weird if it hasn’t rained in a few days.  Exam results were posted today - not online - but posted outside an office. The names on the list were those of us that passed. It was a bit nerve-racking, but I passed!

Honestly today, I did not care either way.  I got a call back for an interview. I sent off four applications last week and today I finally got a call back and more importantly a call back for an interview.  I am stoked. I have been putting so much into the job search effort here, and it seems like nothing ever works out (let alone an email or phone confirmation, it is totally an employer’s market).  Today was def a good day, I passed Level 1 of Dutch and I got myself a job interview.

This certainly calls for a celebration (er rather a toast).  I got two Westvleteren 12’s in the fridge.....

Fridays in the Garden: Jan 21 2011

This year, I started using the Google Tasks feature and linked it to my Google Calendar (thanks Hans!) My father-in-law was showing me how he organizes his working life (how he keeps up with multiple time zones is beyond me), and I thought it would be a nice tool to start organizing a gardening schedule.  

The winter months can prove to be long and boring to a gardener, but I recently found a local seed supplier, De Nieuwe Tuin, that specializes in carrying seeds of plants that will grow during a short summer growing season (and probably are adapted to growing at northern latitudes). I took an inventory of the seeds I had from last year, pooled my notes on what grew well and what didn’t, and came up with a schedule of setting things out this year. Yes, I made a spreadsheet! (viewable here)

Fridays are my new garden work days and since it’s Belgium, Tuesday and Wednesday will be back-up rain days.  The plan so far is to have containers and try out a lasagna-layering garden approach.  There is a 3 ft x 3 ft square and a much longer border (1 ft wide x 7 ft long) along the fence.  Today, I cleaned out pots and dumped out the soil, scrubbed and stored the pots, cleaned up the garden, came up with a plan to cover the beds for the next 2 months, and made a list of things to buy or borrow (e.g a shovel).

Any input, advice, or thoughts on what to do is more than welcome.

Are ashes from a fire pit good for the soil? 

Can I mix in last year's soil with brown and green compost materials to get the beds ready?

What is the best kind of light bulb for starting seedlings?

Here’s how the garden has looked:



After a bit of work:

Part 2

I have now completed the first level of Dutch!  Exam day 3 (and final) went much better than the previous ones. The exam was similar to previous in-class exams and was exactly what I was expecting.  Today’s exam was a 2 hour written test, and it took me the entire time to complete it.  Results should be posted next week.

This was an intensive language course, and regardless of outcome, I am quite happy with myself for being able to pick up things quickly.  Today, I also applied to a job where the preferred second language is Dutch or French, and since it’s located in Vlaams-Brabant (the region of Flemish Brabant is Dutch-speaking) I felt proud of myself regardless of either the job’s outcome or my grade.  I’ll keep you posted on the rest.  Here’s onto some more exciting things:

I got a package from my sister today, and went through a bunch of photos:

Letters, packages, post cards, anything from home is always the best:


Delicious foods brought to you by your amazing friends is another best; this is a Spanish cheese called queso de tetilla.  It, like its name suggests, looks like a teet.  It tastes a bit like smoked gouda, and is really good with fruits.


I made a new year’s resolution to bake more:


Grow your own shittake mushrooms:



A favorite breakfast. Is it a Dutch Baby or a German Pancake? Either way, it is considered baking!

Dutch for Beginners

I just got back from Day 2 of my Dutch exams.  I have a total of three exams this week, and it completes the first level of Dutch at the Instituut voor Levende Talen (ILT) on campus.  So far, I have to say I have found them (the exams) to be quite challenging and much more difficult than anything that we have done in class up until now. I think that the course moved very slowly in the beginning, and then moved quickly once the pace of the class had been established.  I think I fell behind somewhere and never managed to catch up with the new pace.  Learning another language as an adult has proven to be difficult.  I would have thought that I picked up some useful info from my previous class (I had enrolled and later dropped a Dutch course at UNC before moving here), and the exposure from living here would have helped.  

Honestly, I’m a bit embarrassed at how badly I think I have done so far.  Day 1 was holding a 15 minute conversation with a class partner (with cues from about a dozen note cards laid out on the table in front of us).  After this awkward conversation, the instructors asked us basic questions (e.g. how we like/dislike Belgium, how we liked/disliked characters on the class soap opera, etc).  It’s amazing that how much you read, write, speak, and try, that under stress and pressure your mind will draw a blank, and you’ll stutter, and your mind will think (wtf I need Google Translate right now).  Overall, the course really does help you in speaking, writing, and reading.

Today’s exam was broken into two parts. The first hour was listening, and the second hour was reading.  The listening part was fairly simple. The conversation was slow and simple. After listening to the segment twice, we got an hour to complete a 1-pager of questions.  Most of our class left after 20 minutes, but I took the whole hour!  I think I did well enough, and really tried to see if I got the correct sentence structures (since this is where I’ve had the most difficulty).  The reading part was much more difficult.  This was really upsetting to me because I feel like I’ve had the most exposure to reading (translating bills, emails, letters, bank statements, checking out Dutch books from the library, etc).  I have spent the past two weeks really learning and memorizing the rules (they have many, and none of them ever make sense), and today when it was time to write my answer, instead of drawing upon what I have spent months learning I freaked out and couldn’t think of the correct sentence structure to save my life.  Mostly, I just wanted to pound my head on the table and have it magically bounce the verb and subject into the correct positions.  

Thursday will be the final part of the exam, a 2-hour written test.  So far, I have been really stressing out, but even if I don’t pass this week-long exam I will have gained a new level of fluency.  The course at ILT (it has been 6 hours per week) has improved upon my fluency and literacy.  I am able to write in complete sentences, and can use conjunctions to link an independent clause with a dependent one.  When I go shopping, I rarely speak in English and am able to get by pretty well (this means that while speaking, I am spoken back to in Dutch/Flemish and the speaker doesn’t automatically flip to English).  That’s success, right? Yes, I make dozens of mistakes all the time, but I’ll never improve if I don’t take the risk of sounding like an idiot.

Learning a new language has made me think differently about English and Gujarati.  A native speaker of English (or any language) isn't going to be thinking of where verbs go, why adverbs are used, or what conjunctions and prepositions actually do in a sentence.  Now, I actually think about those rules that were long forgotten.  Naturally, these concepts are confusing in another language and it helps illustrate how much time and effort it takes to be fluent and literate (I write this as an adult-learner).

While fluent in Gujarati, I never cared enough to be literate. This may sound stupid, but this language was rarely used outside of the home, and when given the opportunity to learn how to read and write it, I always overlooked it.  Growing up, our family often operated in both languages and would switch back and forth quickly, but they never forced us to learn how to read and write.  I imagine that my parents thought it would delay our language learning abilities.  This is going to sound weird, but by learning another language, I have focused on how to say things correctly in Guju. I speak English much better than I speak Gujarati. Maybe in a year, I will speak Dutch as well as I speak Gujarati.  

Potato, Goat Cheese, and Shittake Mushroom Galette

This savory galette comes together quickly and makes an impressive meal.  The prepping and baking time takes about 2 hours.  We ate this galette to ring in the new year.  Bring a pot of water to boil while you prepare the galette dough. Once the water is boiling parboil the potatoes for 10 minutes.  While the galette dough is resting, chop the herbs and prep the mushrooms.  Any mixture of mushrooms will do, if you don’t have green onions, use leeks, or a mixture of both.  

Ingredients:

1 recipe for galette dough crust (see here)
4-5 medium potatoes, peeled, partially boiled, and kept whole
2 tbsp olive oil
6 medium shittake mushrooms, wiped clean
2 tbsp olive oil
1 and ½ cups whole white or brown mushrooms, wiped clean
1-2 tsp white wine vinegar
1 bunch green onions, chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped
3 tbsp parsley, chopped
½ tsp salt and fresh cracked black pepper
4 oz goat cheese (about less than ½ cup)
¼ cup heavy cream

Preheat oven to 400 F (or do this once you are half way through these directions)
Directions:

1. Bring a large pot of water to boil over high heat.  Once boiling, add the potatoes and turn heat down to medium.  Simmer for about 10 minutes.  Drain the potatoes in a colander so they can cool down.
2. Prepare the galette dough (see instructions here).  The hand made crust makes the dish feel and taste very rustic. It is worth making from scratch.  Cutting up the butter into small cubes helps the butter integrate with the dough.  Let the dough rest in the fridge while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.
3. Heat up 2 tbsp olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Once hot, add in the mushrooms.  Turn heat down to medium after 3 minutes.  Continue cooking mushrooms for another 5 minutes.  Add 1-2 tsps white wine vinegar and toss the mushrooms around the pan while everything sizzles.  Cook another 3 minutes and turn off the heat.  
4. Cut up potatoes in ¼” slices and add them to a large mixing bowl.
5. Add chopped green onions, parsley, garlic, salt and pepper.  
6. Once mushrooms are cool enough to handle, slice them up, and put them into the mixing bowl with the potatoes.  Stir in goat cheese and extra cream, season with more salt and pepper.

Assemble galette:
Roll out the dough as best you can to make a 14 inch circle. Set a cookie sheet upside down and have it close and ready. When the dough is rolled out, fold it gently into thirds and put it in the middle of the upside down cookie sheet. Unfold the dough, the dough should hang off the edges. Put the filling in the middle of the pastry crust and continue filling and gently speading it out. You should leave 2-3” at the border. Now fold the remaining dough over the filling as pictured above.  Brush with milk, or a little remaining cream and bake for 45 minutes at 400 F, or until golden brown. Serve once cooled.

I Love Tofu

Have you ever visited the Foodgawker website?  It is a serious collection of food photography from many talented food bloggers.  I spend hours searching through the images and coming up with lists of foods I want to prepare, and it has introduced me to many creative bloggers.  This recipe and blog post from Beyond Kimchee, invited me to fall in love with tofu again.  Such a simple, perfect, delicious recipe.  Karl and I have made this at least five times.  We always eat so quickly, briefly pausing between our next bite, to remark how perfect the tofu tastes, and how delicious and fresh the sauce tastes.  It’s made of soy sauce, garlic, red chili, sesame oil, chives, and sesame seeds, but it makes you feel like you are eating so much more.

This is perfect to serve as a starting appetizer, or to be served over rice as the blog author suggests, or really however you wish. We cook up some Chinese-style noodles, then saute red bell peppers, mushroom, snow peas or Napa cabbage, and add the golden pan-fried tofu on top and spoon the sauce over all of it.

First we were ga-ga over Mainly Veggie's spinach veggie burgers, now it’s all about Korean-style pan-fried tofu.  Click the links to take you to the author’s sites. I will write what I did with the recipe here, but the pictures should be pretty obvious, eh?

Pan-fried tofu served with some sauteed vegetables on top of noodles. 

Tofu waiting to be golden. 

Golden pan-fried tofu

Chinese-style noodles
Ingredients:
1 block extra-firm tofu
3 tbsp soy sauce (I used 2 tbsp plus 1 tbsp water)
1 green onion, chopped
1 tsp sesame seeds, toasted
1 clove garlic, chopped
1 tsp toasted sesame oil
1 tsp red chili flakes
½ tsp shrimp powder (I used ½ tsp Thai panang curry paste)
2 tbsp peanut oil to fry up tofu

Prepare these ingredients with directions from Beyond Kimchee’s blogpost. Her pictures are really wonderful.  

I followed her directions exactly, but I served them with a vegetable stir-fry over noodles. 

More ingredients:
1 tbsp peanut oil
1 cup mushrooms, wiped clean and cut up however you want
1 red bell pepper, cut into strips
1 cup snow peas, or 2 cups Napa cabbage chopped (or include both)
12 oz uncooked pasta (such as Chinese noodles, or linguine), or prepare rice instead of pasta.
water for pasta

Directions:

1. First, you can toast the sesame seeds in a non-stick pan without any oil over medium heat. Watch them closely so they won’t burn.  While you are cooking the sesame seeds, prep the tofu (drain, cut it up, then salt it lightly).
2. Bring a large pot of water to boil.  Add the noodles to the boiling water once you start cooking the tofu. The veggies will take about 15 minutes or less, and the tofu will also take about 15 minutes or less.  This way you’ll have hot noodles.
3. Remove the seeds and add them to the sauce.  Turn heat up heat to medium-high, and add 1 tbsp of peanut oil to the pan. Once hot, add in mushrooms and saute 5-7 minutes.  Jerk the pan in small controlled horizontal movements to toss the mushrooms around. Continue doing this when you add a new ingredient to the pan. You can also stir them around, but it looks more sexy doing it this way (especially if you are wearing an apron).
4. Next, add in bell pepper strips, and continue to saute for another 3-5 minutes. Add in cabbage and snow peas and continue cooking another 3-4 minutes. Then remove to a plate, and prepare the same pan to cook up the tofu.  You can start heating up 2 tbsp of peanut oil while you go get the tofu, and start pan-frying it up.
5. Once you have cooked the tofu, you can add the sauteed veggies to the pan to heat them back up. Remove all of this to a plate. Meanwhile, drain the pasta, reserve ½ cup of boiling water.  If the noodles stick, add about a teaspoon of oil to the noodles along with the water. Divide them up between 4 plates and add about 1 cup of veggies plus 4 pieces of tofu on top. Pass the sauce at the table.

This is a super fast weeknight meal and I’m sure it will be among your favorites.

Nieuwjaarsdrink

The city of Leuven (including many other Belgian cities) welcomes the new year with a reception, called Nieuwjaarsdrink, at the historic city hall.  The city hosted an open house by serving refreshments in the form of delicious iced cakes, warm and cold beverages, and an endless supply of ice cold and fresh Stella Artois pintjes (small pints).  It always makes me appreciate the opportunity of living here, and it also strikes me that anywhere else (probably in the world) this kind of free alcohol consumption would be met with a mass storm of people trying to consume as much as possible.  But not Belgians, they will get everyone around them a pintje, and then drink as quickly (and calmly) as possible to queue up for the next round.

I am still surprised and amazed at how beer is a vital part of any public celebration (I am 100% positive that free beer consumption at a public event would not be allowed in the US, so this still surprises me).  While it is usually not free, festivals always have beer and cava bars.  Many of the festivals are aimed at families, not just younger people.  As a beer lover, this never gets old to me.

Because AB-InBev is headquartered in Leuven, it often sponsors many festivals or city events (like this one, where the beer is free; I also wrote about another time where beer was included in the reception here).  I haven’t toured InBev yet, but it is on the list of things to do and see before leaving.  I think it should also be mentioned that their were almost a dozen sponsors of this event, but of course, the product placement isn’t as obvious.

Now that we’ve welcomed the new year, and have completed a year here, we look forward to enjoying the city where we can look forward to the events, and also look forward to warmer days.  Below is a list of things missed, hated or loved from the perspective of an optimistic transplant (obviously, we like living here a lot).  It’s always a topic of conversation among fellow ex-pats or among new friends, but what is it that we really love, miss or can’t stand.

1. I love the biking. I have noticed two types of biking culture, the first is using biking as a method to get around all the time, the second are hard-core cyclists (mostly men).  Helmets are rarely seen, even on young children, and students are the most egregious and rebellious (careless) bikers.  Yes, I miss having a car, and I think cars makes life much easier, but our experience here has taught us how to make-do with bikes for daily life.  You may hear Belgians complain about the bike lanes, and probably the student bikers, but most Americans are always surprised to see how well the biking works.
2. I miss the ubiquitous use of credit cards.  If you are a responsible credit card user the perks of some reward programs are amazing.
3. What is the deal with expensive tap water?! I am not a fan of restaurants that charge you for tap water.  Even if you are ordering other drinks, very few restaurants will actually bring you table water.  If you ask for it, you are usually charged.  I ask, and I’ve never gotten a satisfactory answer from any local (Taxes? Social norms? Belgians don’t drink water? What is it?).  Now we drink up before leaving the house, and always carry a bottle with us (that is how most Europeans spot the Americans, well that, and wearing running shoes with jeans).  However, we’re used to it, we’ve adapted, and now we just drink beer!
4. I miss burritos, tacos, and dosas! While I love trying the food here, I still miss Mexican food.  Finding ingredients isn’t hard, but sometimes you just need a burrito, or you need Indian food, and you want them now, and without a kitchen mess.  Belgian fries are a perfectly fine substitute.
5. Travel.  A huge reason why moving here was high on the list.  To this list, I might add train infrastructure as well as in-city metro planning.
6. There is no equivalent of Netflix. Sure, there are plenty of video rental places, but nothing that compares to Netflix.  Netflix has to be one of the best business ideas of the past decade.
7. I miss Amazon and other online shopping sites. Surely, there is interest in having a European Amazon site?! Routine: find item I want on US Amazon site, then search on German, French, and UK Amazon sites, then eventually give up.  So much for one-click checkout.
8. I do not miss seeing people of all ages donning their allegiance to various university sports or other sports teams.  Wearing university or team clothes is rarely seen here in Belgium, unless you work for the university or you have some sort of official affiliation.  Wearing team or university gear is a standout just like bulky athletic shoes, water bottles, and jeans.