Recipe: Chayote Soup!

I finally got around to making another batch of my currently favourite soup! One of the things I love most about this soup is that it's really thick and creamy but with little fat and far fewer calories than comparably types. Depending on how you season the soup, it can sometimes taste like KFC gravy! You need to blend it all in the end, so make sure you have a blender or food processor available.

You can't usually get chayotes at typical grocery stores. I suggest going to more specialized ones. I've found them at Asia Food Mart, in London, Ontario for 50 - 69 cents per chayote. The recipe below allegedly makes 4 servings, but for us it's more like 2.

So you will need:

Onion

Red Pepper

Garlic

Coriander

2 Chayotes

Pepper

Water

Chicken Stock

Butter (or oil)

Generally, I'm not going to tell you how much of each to use because that's up to you! Just look at the pictures for guidance. :)

Step 1:

Put about 2tbsp of butter in a large pan. You can probably make due with one but I like my butter. Turn the burner on to medium-high and chop the onion, garlic and red pepper while the butter melts. Then toss it in the pan and let it cook for about 3 minutes.

Step 2:

During this time chop up the Chayote. I tend to remove the seeds. Some people also remove the skin but I haven't noticed a difference and just leave it on.

When done, toss in the chayote and shake up the pan. Let it cook for about 4-5 minutes still on medium-high heat.

Step 3:

While the veggies are cooking, mix 2 cups of water with 2tbsp of dry chicken broth. Chop as much coriander and you want and add it. I find the more you add, the more it tastes like KFC gravy. If you want to use it as gravy just cut down the water to make it thicker. Add pepper to taste. Again the more pepper, the more like KFC gravy. If you want to make it like gravy just seriously over-season it.

Turn the burner down to low and add the chicken broth mix and coriander. Now cover with a lid and let the entire thing simmer for about 30 minutes. You don't even need to stir it! Remember the lid, without it you won't have enough water to make soup in the end.

Step 4:

Turn off the burner and let everything cool for about 5-10 minutes (so you don't get burnt and your glassware can take the temperature). Now you have to put it all in a blender. I find moving stuff from a pan to blender to be incredibly difficult. I tend to get something like a spaghetti scoop to get out the solids first. Then over a sink a pour in the liquids. It usually dribbles a bit. As a general rule the liquid should be level with the top of the veggies.

Blend until smooth and your done. Many people prefer to chill chayote soup in the fridge, but I like it just as much warm. It's completely up to you. I also tend to end up with a brown coloured soup instead of the usually green. I'm not sure if it has to due with the green skin turning brown or a tendency to slightly overcook the entire thing. Maybe because I use fresh red pepper instead of red pepper flakes?

Enjoy!

Recipe: Herb Crust Pizza

I don't think I've done a recipe post before but I figured I'm cooking all the time now so why not. The last four years of my life have been spent mostly heating up pre-made food. Now that I've graduated and I'm only working part time, I've discovered two things.

(1) Good food isn't cheap
(2) I have free time

The combination of the two has resulted in adventures into new and relatively easy to make recipes. Today we'll be having pizza for dinner so I figured why not chronicle it. We used to eat 1/2 the pizza each but now have about 1/4 at a time so I figure it serves 4 people (maybe 6). I'll focus on the crust because topping preferences vary considerable. So without further ado, let's begin.

Dough:

There are a tonne of different dough recipes out there but this is based on the one that has been the easiest for me to make and the most consistent after cooking. You need:

2 cups water
4 cups white flour
1 cup soy flour
2 tsp sugar
4 tbs oil
1.5 tsp yeast
2 tsp salt

Parsley, Basil, Spinach (as much as you're comfortable with, I use spinach as a topping too)

Now put the two cups of water in the blender with the sugar and herbs/spinach and blend until mostly liquid. Visually it's nice to have larger herb pieces but the dough doesn't tend to stay together as well. I favour more workable dough and blend for a while. The water should feel relatively hot when you are done. Now place in the bowl and mix in yeast. Let the mixture sit for about 15 minutes (a bit longer tends to be better). There will be a bunch of foam on top so make sure the yeast is in the water and not just sprinkled on top.Toppings:

While this green, almost radioactive mixture is sitting, grate some cheese and chop up your vegetables. This part is completely up to personal taste. We enjoy our pizzas loaded with toppings. Instead of telling you what to put on, I'll just include a picture of our chopped delights. I put them all on plates and leave them in the fridge until needed.
If you have the time, you can also put some oil over the baking sheet. We put down aluminum foil because our sheet is old and the pizza tends to stick a bit (usually about 15% of the bottom sticks which is just enough to annoy us into using aluminum foil).Dough:

When the radioactive green mixture has finished it's 15 minutes of shame, you can add the flour, salt and oil. Now you can use 5 cups of white flour if you would like, but I switch out 1 cup for soy flower for two reasons:

(1) Defatted soy flour is 53% protein (James is vegetarian)
(2) Soy flour is gluten free, so if you use more than about 20% the dough won't hold together well.

I believe defatted soy flour also has slightly less calories, but this is a pizza covering an entire baking sheet so I don't think I'm going to go there. I find the soy also adds a bit more depth of flavour. I also removed the salt from the dough recipe because there will be more than enough in the pizza toppings.Now you have to kneed everything together. But first I would recommend putting down a dusting of flour on the surface you'll place the dough on. If the dough mixture seems really dry, you can add some water. This will make the dough more workable but also much more sticky so it's a bit of a trade-off. I tend to add a bit more water but then it sticks to the baking sheet.

When the dough looks relatively evenly kneeded, it's time to shape it into a ball. You can see here that mine is really sticky. I scrape off as much as I can and add it back to the dough then just wash my hands. If you have arm hair make sure to wash the attached dough out. If it dries in it can be uncomfortable to pull out. ;)
Now I just flatten it a little with a dusting of flour and toss it on the oiled baking sheet. Then I put the entire thing in the fridge until closer to dinner time. I find the cooler dough easier to roll out and less sticky.
Break. Time to contemplate if the last few minutes of your life have been spent wisely. If you are reading this, then I would assume so. ;)

Back to Dough:

When ready, take the dough out of the fridge and drizzle some oil on top. Set your oven to 450F so that it heats in time. Then roll the dough out with a rolling pin to fill the entire sheet. Remember, the more oil, the more delicious! You can go overboard though so don't put too much on. The only reason I even started to put it on top was so that it wouldn't stick to the rolling pin. It does however improve the overall taste.

Now Toppings Again:
Add some sauce and toppings. I've made it with both tomato sauce and creamy salad dressing. I would love to try it with an alfredo sauce but haven't yet. If you are using cheese, don't put it all on at the same time. I would recommend using half of it, putting on the other toppings, and then finishing off with the rest of the cheese. This prevents the topping from drying out. I noticed a huge difference with olives in particular.
Place the pizza-like object into the preheated oven and allow it to cook for about 20 minutes.

When it looks done (which again is personal taste) remove it from the oven and let it cool for a few minutes. Don't cut the pizza on the baking sheet as this will probably damage it. If at all possible, remove it and cut it somewhere else.
STUFF FACE!

I hope you enjoyed this recipe. It has evolved over the course of two months (about 8 pizzas). If you have any suggestions or tips, feel free to comment! Oh and the pictures are from two different pizzas so if you caught that it is now time to pat yourself on the back.