Tag: vegetarian
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Red Lentil Soup with Ginger
After visiting a newly opened Indian store I was inspired by rows and rows of lentils they have for sale and endless spices where many of them were new to me. It was incredible to learn and see in one place how many varieties of lentils exist. The quick lentil soup I usually make is…
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No-egg Dairy-free Dough for Pirozhki
This year I’m making yet another attempt to observe the Nativity Fast. During this fast one cannot eat anything of animal origin. That means no omelette until Christmas (!), no milk in my morning coffee (!!), no butter on a toast (!!!), and no roasted chicken. 😦 Imagine how challenging it is for a person…
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Pink Summer Salad with Gooseberries and Mozarella
It’s Saturday, it’s summer and the sun is shining in Zurich. Because I live alone these days, I hardly ever cook anything interesting (except for parties, when things get too hectic to make pictures). When I do cook, my most favorite thing to cook for just myself is a salad. I become a painter who…
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Carrot Relish
There are people who don’t like cooked carrots, my beloved husband included. But even he absolutely loves this carrot relish. He loves it so much that he always offers his muscle power to grate carrots which I hate to do myself, just to convince me to cook it. After his generous labor input the kitchen…
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Shiitake and Lentil Pilaf
Today’s recipe is a vegetarian pilaf as satisfying and rich in flavor as mom’s Lamb Pilaf. Imagine the aroma of mushrooms and garlic, the rich taste of lentils and the nuttiness of wild rice punctuated by tiny nuggets of spice stored in the green peppercorns. You have to pay for this richness, though, by using…
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Beet Smoothie Soup
This recipe has been brewing in my mind for awhile – a smoothie and a cold soup in one. The best part – it is almost no-boil, where most of ingredients are fresh vegetables. And the best best part is – the proportions are quite arbitrary, just flow with your desires and you will be…
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Ah… Sangria
It’s Saturday. I sip ice-cold sangria, and outside it’s hot, hot, hot. The heat is so unusual, that the streets of Park Slope and Carroll Gardens in Brooklyn are blissfully empty. A few passerbys, perilously close to the melting point, saunter on the shady side of the street, looking lost. I wish I could take…
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Mushroom Soup Russian Style
The first rays of the sun are piercing the crowns of Siberian pines… A mооsе family trotted afar, and disappeared in the morning fog… An early lizard darted onto the stump, and froze, catching the sunshine… The air is fresh and brisk… I am walking along the path overgrown with blue moss… I am looking…
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Vinegret – Jazzy Holiday Salad
Without vinegret, a winter vegetable salad, Russian traditional table is missing one of its important components. As far as I remember my precious self, vinegret (please do not confuse it with vinaigrette – a dressing made of oil and vinegar)was always in my mama’s festive winter menu, especially on New Year’s eve. Colorful, refreshing and…
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Pickled Mushrooms
Pickled mushrooms are traditional to Russian cuisine, especially as a winter treat. They could be used in salads, pies, as a side dish, as is, and as a perfect zakuska (snack) for vodka. There are several methods to prepare pickled mushrooms, but two main ways are marinated and salted. Marinated mushrooms are prepared with salt and vinegar(and sometimes…
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Quick Pickled Cucumbers
Sometimes a normal person has cravings for sweet, sour or salty, and many other things. Don’t get me wrong, but I think it’s very healthy to follow your cravings, otherwise you will get depressed and plain unhappy, and there is nothing good about it. Am I not right? Quick pickled cucumbers are one of my summer cravings.…
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Classic Beets Salad
Out of the Russian gastronomic stereotypes (apart from cabbage, which is also German, and vodka, which is really quite popular around the globe) beets is one of the most persistent. And yes, we are truly beet-eaters. Beets are a proud ingredient of many traditional Russian dishes. Nothing to be shy about. Beet root is known…
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Savory Zucchini Muffins
Remember my recipe for Squash Pancakes? I love these pancakes, but striving to live a healthier lifestyle, I always think about less harmful ways of cooking. So the idea of baking instead of frying those pancakes has been brewing in my mind for quite a while, and only negative influence of my very conservative other half was preventing…
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Jilo
I live in the area where due to some mysterious immigration tendencies there are many Portuguese speaking people, some are from Brazil, some from Portugal. Those from Europe are a little scornful of those from South America, but both are very friendly and hard working people. They keep bakeries, restaurants, and little shops with Brazilian specialty foods. A…
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Soup with Puff Klezki
A soup with klezki, one of the simplest Russian dishes, must have been handy during the time of empty shelves in the Soviet supermarkets. I barely remember those times, they left in me no bitter sediment, and this soup has left me nothing but warmth. There are other variations on klezki, most notably the German kößchen, but the klezki I…
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Poor Man's Caprese
Most people who’ve paid a few visits to Italian restaurants know caprese, a traditional Italian salad composed of just 5 ingredients: tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, basil, balsamic vinegar and olive oil. It is lovely, satisfying, complete, but as a history of restaurant-going has proved, caprese is not the surest item on the menu. It leaves nothing…
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What Is This?..
What do you think you are seeing? Raw pork? No. Pink peach wedges? No! Unripe watermelon? No!! If somebody showed it to me some time ago and said it’s potatoes, I wouldn’t believe it. But the truth is it is potatoes. Freshly dug out and almost young potatoes was my last weekend happy find at one of…
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Squash Pancakes
Now when vegetables are growing in excess in nearby farms, I cannot help but create various dishes (and their variations) with them. Squash pancakes being one of our favourites evokes the time when Alex and I were dating. I cooked squash pancakes at our friend’s dacha (a small country hut) where we had a very romantic weekend. Since then Alex ate squash only…
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Classic Borsch
A staple of East European kitchen, this bright beet soup is healthy, delicious, and worth every bit of trouble… If you know of Russian food, you’ve heard of Borsch. It is popular not only in Russia, but also in Ukraine – its motherland – and in a number of East European republics. Naturally, this dish…
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Zucchini with Wasabi Cream
Among squashes like pumpkin or butternut squash zucchini has a rather bland taste when used alone. So very often it is mixed with other vegetables in stir fries or used as a side dish. Zucchini of a bigger size has better more distinctive taste, but for some reason growers do not allow this vegetable to mature…
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