Ginger Carrot Soup

I'm a bit of a computer game addict, and Diablo III came out last Tuesday.  As a result, most of my meals have been either take out sushi or something I can make really fast so I can spend more time sitting in my dimly lit computer room punching demons in the face.  The meals I make when I'm in game addict mode don't make very good blog fodder since most of my fastest recipes are old ones that I've been making forever.  But, I managed to try a few new things, including this ginger carrot soup.  It's healthy, quick, and very tasty! If you make this soup, I definitely recommend an immersion blender, it makes it a lot easier. It's a creamy, slightly sweet soup with a small kick of ginger. It's vegetarian and vegan. It's also a pretty color and tastes like it takes a lot more work to make than it really does.

Definitely break up the orange with something green like a mint sprig and serve with a side salad.

Quick Side Dish: Zucchini with Golden Raisins and Pine Nuts

I'm trying to find more quick, easy vegetable side dishes to serve at meals.  Right now, I don't have many in my regular rotation.   I think this zucchini dish will make it onto my list.  It's from Claudia Roden's New Book of Middle Eastern Food.  I served it with some baked falafel.  The combination of pine nuts and raisins is, according to the book, something that the Arabs brought all the way to Spain and Sicily.  The sweetness of the raisins and the nuttiness of the pine nuts go well together. I used a little extra of both.  Normally, I think more lemon juice is the proper solution to any cooking problem.  But, in this case, I think that there could have been less.  I used about 1 Tbsp of lemon juice and next time I'd use maybe half that.  This side dish took less than 15 minutes to make, including prep time! 

Smoked Chorizo with Red Cabbage and Asparagus Salad

It's spring, and dammit I am going to make colorful food!  If I make a pretty salad, it'll keep the nasty cold weather away and I can go running in clothes that are not insulated tights, two shirts, gloves, and my hiking socks. 

Ok, now that I got that out of my system, on to a colorful spring salad!  This salad is easily made vegan, simply omit the grated grana padano.  I'm not a fan of feta cheese, so I substituted grana padano on this salad, and although I enjoyed the saltiness it added, it's definitely optional and without it, this salad is vegan.

I wish I had made this earlier in the week when I was playing Dragon Age II, it's a quick dish!  Later this week, I plan to make an experimental apple and red cabbage slaw.  The original idea was to make a fennel and red cabbage slaw, but Wegmans was out of fennel.  So, I decided that an apple might work.  Anyway, I needed a way to use the other half of the red cabbage, so I found this recipe for red cabbage and asparagus salad.  Normally, I'd make this as an entree if I was trying to eat healthy. Sure, 1 Tbsp of tahini is about 90 calories and a good bit of fat, but it's just 1 Tbsp divided between 2 people.  So, no big deal!  Given that each head of red cabbage weighs approximately 600 lbs, this could have been an entree. 

But Wegmans has a sausage bar!  So I bought two smoked chorizos and decided to grill them in my grill pan and serve them with the last of my trio of mustards that I brought home from my trip to Paris: Maille Chablis and Morel Dijon.  If there was a Maille store in DC, I'd be bankrupt.  Since the sausage didn't need any prep work, this meal didn't take very long for two people to prepare (there is a lot of chopping involved so for one person it'll take longer). 

This salad definitely could work as a vegan or vegetarian entree!