Advent 2022- Fast Tracking #13

 

Today's Challenge: Fast from... all animal products.

Another vegan day today for which I've returned to what has become an old favourite since 2017 and my first £1-a-day food challenge, namely chilli sin carne with rice for supper. Away from the exigencies imposed by the £1-a-day ceiling, I make this with rather more vegetables - more onions, usually a big bulb of fennel, several red peppers and more tinned tomatoes.  

I finish it with a spoonful of dried epazote which is a Mexican herb of the amaranth family that grows like a weed. It has an unusual scent and flavour, sometimes described as reminiscent of turpentine. It's strong and you don't want too much of it but a small amount added at the end of the cooking time adds a subtle, aromatic depth to the finished dish. In Mexico, it's known as 'the bean herb' as it's believed to aid the digestion of beans. We rather like it. If you're in the UK, you can get it On Line here and if you're in the US, Walmart seem to stock it. 

In Mexico it's generally used fresh and I have, in the past, grown some myself, here in the UK. I don't have any plants still going in the garden at the moment so I haven't had any fresh leaves for today but in any case I've found the dried version a good substitute. The name is Aztec in origin - the herb has a very long pedigree of both culinary and medicinal use as an anthelmintic.

Breakfast

tea with unsweetened soya milk

apple juice

citrus fruit salad

oatcakes (made as per Day #3) with maple butter

Lunch

left over minestrone soup

baguette made from sourdough starter, yeast, flour, salt and water

Tea

black tea

multigrain seeded crackers

Supper

chilli sin carne made with dried, soaked and pressure cooked kidney beans, onions, carrots, fennel, red peppers, tinned tomatoes, hot chilli powder, homemade vegetable stock (including the water from cooking the kidney beans), salt, black pepper, and a teaspoonful of dried epazote added at the end after 4 hours baking in the oven at 170 ℃. As you can see from the 'tide-mark' in the pic, it's lost quite a lot of liquid in that time and become nice and thick. I leave the lid slightly ajar in the oven to encourage the evaporation process.

basmati rice and some parsley to finish it off. The parsley was frozen stiff this evening but seemed none the worse for it!

Marsala spiced prunes - a Nigella Lawson recipe in which you bake soft prunes in a mixture of tea and Marsala with star anise, cinnamon sticks, cloves and orange zest. Very nice with a splash of cream to finish although cream is, unfortunately, off limits today.

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