Vegan (Eggless!) Broccoli Kugel

Ok, it's not the most frugal food in the world, but once in a while we eat broccoli kugel. Especially when I can manage to get broccoli for about 12 shekels/bag!

bought this for 12.90

And we love broccoli kugel, which posed a huge problem when we stopped eating egg based foods, since my old recipe was very egg-y. I adapted it, and came up with this vegan version.

Let me know if you give it a try!

(sorry, no pic of the finished product, I ran out of time, I'll try to get one next time I pull out the broccoli!)



Recipe:

4 Tablespoons ground flaxseed
2.5 cups boiling water
1/2 cup corn starch
1 cup flour
salt, pepper, garlic powder/granulated garlic, parsley flakes to taste
1 bag frozen broccoli (800 g), thawed and ideally chopped

Optional topping:
1/2 cup cornmeal
1/2 tsp salt
dash of pepper

Combine flaxseed and water in mixing bowl and allow to cool. mix in dry ingredients.

Arrange broccoli in a large baking pan. Pour batter over broccoli. Sprinkle topping over it, if desired.
Bake in 200C oven for 45 min - hr or until as done as you like it.

Enjoy!

Back to Posting Menus! Nov. 8, 2011

I've taken quite a long break from posting, but now I'm trying to get my life back in order, and that includes finding time to plan (and blog about) menus!
This week I'm back to trying to minimize the shopping (but can't pass up Mega's special - 2NIS/kg for avocados, pomelit, and bananas, so I'm going to have to get there tomorrow!)... I peeked into my freezer and realized that there's enough in there to keep us going for a while.

Here are some foods we made this week using the items already in the freezer, fridge, and pantry:

Red Lentil Soup - saute 1 small onion and 1 clove garlic in olive oil. when soft, add water, red lentils (sorted and rinsed), salt and pepper (optional: juice of a lemon. I like it lemony but my finicky family disagrees. You can always add lemon to the bowl!). This soup is my go to soup when we are all cold and I hadn't planned soup, as red lentils cook so quickly it can be ready to serve in about 15 minutes!

Chinese Vegetable Soup - this soup starts the same way most of my soups do: saute onion and garlic in olive oil. (you can also saute fresh sliced ginger with the onion and garlic, if you don't have any, you can use the dried ground version, just add toward the end of the cooking process) when soft, add your choice of vegetables - I used mushrooms, broccoli stalks (peeled and thinly sliced), carrots (scrubbed and thinly sliced), and snow peas (still had some in the freezer from when they were buy 2 get 1 free at Shufersal). You can also use bok choy, celery, and any other vegetables you have around that seem like they'd fit. saute it all. then add soy sauce and rice vinegar. Allow to simmer for 10 min. Add water to desired level. Add pepper (and ginger) to taste. garnish with green onion, if you have some!

Pasta with creamy sauce (I cheated and used up the leftover garlic and dill cream cheese as the basis of this sauce)

Pasta with tomato sauce

Baked Potatoes

Steamed Broccoli

Make your own Salad

Fruit Salad

These foods came together in different combinations to make several nights worth of suppers!
What have you been making?

Tuesday Night, May 31, 2011

No time to write today, so here's the menu:

Pita Crisps

Creamy tomato soup (saute onions and garlic in olive oil, add diced tomatoes and water or soup stock. bring to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer for 10-15 min. puree. add salt and pepper, honey (optional), and 1/4 tsp baking soda. add optional milk or cream and reheat gently)

Broccoli "burgers" - I had some odds and ends lying around. I put the following ingredients in my food processor: broccoli, walnuts, sesame seeds, oats, sauteed onions, process. transfer to a bowl, add salt and pepper to taste, and 1/4 - 1/2 c. hot water. mix well and let sit for 5 minutes. form patties and fry in cast iron frying pan. (I made these early in the day!)

Homemade French Fries

Make-your-own-salad

Monday Night, May 2, 2011

Today we commemorate Yom HaShoah. It is a day dedicated to the memory and heroism of the victims and survivors of the Holocaust. We pledge to never forget; to never allow history to repeat itself. We speak with our children about our history, and pledge with them to keep the memories alive.

We speak of people starving, being starved, being treated as subhuman. We pledge to treat all people with dignity and respect. Lessons we all want our children to learn.

We spend each day learning, but the solemnity of this day required that I say something particular. We learn, read, and more, and I plan our dinner. Nothing fancy, but enough to nourish.


Here's the menu:

Pita crisps
Minestrone soup (made with homemade pureed tomatoes. This time I roasted them in the oven before pureeing. yum)
Baked potatoes topped with broccoli and cheese
Make your own salad

Thursday Night, Post-Taanit Ester

Looks like I have a feast to prepare. Several of them!

I wonder if I can double-up some of the preparation, and serve some things more than once.

Here's how we'll be breaking the fast:

Vegetable Soup (my usual, saute onions, garlic, celery, carrots, and any other soup worthy vegetables. lower the flame and cook, covered, for 10 min. then add soup stock, spices, salt and pepper. simmer until you need to serve it. the longer it cooks, the more complex the flavor...)

Broccoli Quiche - if I run out of time, this will be a crustless quiche.

Baked Potatoes

Artichokes - love those dancing children! (see Tuesday's post if you're not sure what I mean!)


Salad - right now I have tomatoes, purple cabbage, cucumbers, and red peppers. perhaps i'll throw in a sliced carrot, too.

Wednesday night - March 2, 2011

I had a really busy day yesterday and the afternoon flew past me. So the kids and I decided together to just have pitot topped with olives and tomatoes, with cheese melted on top. I steamed some broccoli to get everyone to eat something green.

So for Wednesday, I'm planning a little better (I'm ok with my fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants dinner, after all, everyone needs to just take care of other things sometimes!)...

Minestrone Soup - since I use such a variety of veggies in my minestrone soup, I think I can sneak some of that cabbage into it without being noticed. And to my son who reads this blog - please don't tell your brother and sisters!

Broccoli Puff - this is a simple mixture of chopped broccoli, cottage cheese, shredded cheese, eggs, a little flour, salt and pepper, baked up till it's golden brown on top. Yummy, a favorite in this house!

Tomato & Mozzarella Salad - my kids love mozzarella cheese, so I just slice up tomatoes, drizzle with olive oil, and add some chunks of mozzarella and some fresh (or dried) basil. You can keep this frugal by using small chunks of cheese, and not so much. Really tomatoes are the star of this salad!

Spicy Roasted Potatoes - Mix olive oil with mustard, garlic powder, and ground black pepper. Cut potatoes into wedges and coat with olive oil/mustard mixture. Roast in a 400 F oven till crispy, golden brown. The kids like to dip them in ketchup....

Shabbat Parashat Vayakhel (Feb. 25-26, 2011)

Looking forward to a rainy Shabbat this week, if the forecast is right. We like watching the Kinneret fill up from the our mirpeset!

(I just hope all my laundry that is hanging outside dries before the rain comes...)

How do you stay warm on a rainy Shabbat in a poorly insulated house without a good heating system (it's a rental...)?
I know I have to serve warming foods (and be sure the urn is filled to the max!)...

Here's my Shabbat menu - most of it will be served both at night and for lunch (obvious exceptions being soup/stew):

Vegetable Soup

Pan-Fried Tofu, for my favorite vegetarian


Broccoli & Cauliflower Kugel - fill a casserole dish with chopped broccoli and chopped cauliflower. cover with a mixture of  (well-blended) eggs, mayonnaise (yes, sounds weird, but it works), flour, water, and spices (i use salt, pepper, onion powder and garlic powder). bake for 1 hour at 375 F

Carrot Kugel (from the freezer!)

Chicken - whatever kind I find in the freezer that is waiting to be used!

Mushroom Barley Stew


I'm also planning to make something with chick peas, and something with cabbage (I bought some cabbage for 1.89nis/kilo and now I have to find a good use for it)...

Brownies and Peanut Butter Cookies

Let me know what you're serving!

Tuesday Night (Feb.22, 2011)

My house keeps turning into a sick house, and it's not fun. Everyone says this is part of the "klita" (absorption) process. I hope this part of our klita ends soon!

I'm going to have to keep our food simple and suitable (at least somewhat) for the sickies...

On the way to the table tonight:

Garlic Toast (I'll slice a baguette, brush with olive oil and sprinkle with garlic powder or brush with roasted garlic)

Vegetable Soup (with a little extra garlic, to boost the immune system)

Rice

Stir-Fried Veggies (I have broccoli, red peppers, and mushrooms - should combine well!)

(And something else, I don't know what, so my husband will feel like it's a real meal...but I'll let him figure that out!)

Sunday Night, Feb. 20, 2011

It's so gray and dreary out - looks like rain. I know we need the rain, and I'm looking forward to lots of it - I just prefer that it rain at night...

Anyhow, this rain is making me think of split pea soup - one of my favorites. And I just discovered another bag of split peas tucked into a corner of my freezer (yes, I keep all my grains and legumes and flours in the freezer (I have a BIG freezer!). A lesson learned in Texas after one too many bug infestations...).

Here's what we'll be eating tonight, keeping in mind all those foods I have to use up:

Split pea soup - onions, garlic, celery, and carrots sauteed in olive oil, cover the pot and cook over low for another 10 min. Add split peas and soup stock. Season to taste. Bring to a boil and then simmer for at least 1 hour, or till thoroughly cooked.

Pasta Alfredo with steamed broccoli

Roasted Onions, Tomatoes, and Zucchini with Basil - if this was just for me, I'd roast them all together. But I have to keep in mind the picky kids, and I'm actually going to roast each vegetable on its own. Then they can be eaten individually or mixed together. It's really not much extra work - just a couple of extra pans to wash, and if it gets the kids to eat, its worth it!

Chocolate Cupcakes (leftover from Shabbat!)

Are you working on clearing out your pantry yet? Please let me know!

Sunday Night, Feb. 6, 2011

Shavua Tov! I had a very relaxing Shabbat in Yerushalayim. It was great to see family and friends whom we rarely get to see.

It's a new week, and in the past, Sunday night supper has snuck up on me and often caught me off guard. Now, I have a plan! (This meal planning thing is great! I am stretching my shekels so much further, and feeling much less stressed out!)

Here's the menu, using only things that I have on hand (not sure if I will make it to the store or not early in the day - I haven't planned my grocery run, yet!):

Green Bean Soup
Broccoli or Spinach "Puff"
Couscous
Chick Pea & Tomato Salad

Some notes about these dishes:

Green Bean Soup works very well either with EXTREMELY fresh green beans (garden or farm stand), or frozen ones (these are usually harvested and frozen the same day, so they are very fresh). It does not work well with supermarket "fresh" green beans. Here's what I do: Sautee onion and garlic in olive oil till translucent. Add green beans to the pot, stirring and heating till they are bright green. Add water or soup stock. Heat through, puree, add milk or rice milk to make it "creamy", and season with salt and pepper.

Broccoli or Spinach Puff: (Yes, these are slightly less frugal than the other menu items, but we all have to add some variety and remember to not be so thrifty as to never make our kids' favorite foods. My 3 yr old loves anything with spinach and my 12 yr old loves anything with broccoli. I know, go figure...) Mix the following ingredients together and bake in a deep casserole dish at 375 F for 1 hour: 16 oz. cottage cheese, 2 eggs, 4 oz. shredded cheese of your choice, 2 T. flour, 2 c. chopped broccoli or chopped spinach, salt and pepper to taste.

Chick Pea & Tomato Salad - don't forget to soak the chick peas overnight, and cook them early in the day (or use canned - but that costs a lot more per unit, and then you also have to deal with the question of BPA in cans. I prefer to soak and cook them myself.), as these chick peas should be completely cooled before combining with tomatoes and green onions for this salad...

As usual, let me know what you think!

Monday Night

Aside from the frugal aspect, I'm looking for easy meals. We usually have busy days, and since I homeschool my 4 kids, I really don't have much downtime...ever.

For Monday evening, I'm looking to incorporate leftovers into the plan (I've been trying harder not to have to throw those out. If you have tips to make sure that leftovers get used up, please share! My kids sometimes groan when they see a food served "AGAIN".).

I just took stock of the fridge, and while most of our Shabbat food actually got eaten (and the leftover barley went into the freezer), we have plenty of vegetable noodle soup left!

(By the way, I'm really big on soup right now. It's winter, and we live in a "warm" location in Israel, which means we have a poorly insulated house and not-so-efficient heaters. And it's raining - a good thing! In other words, sometimes it's colder inside our house than out, and I'm too frugal to heat the place all the time!)

So here's what we'll be eating (it's a vegan menu!):

Vegetable-Noodle Soup
Sloppy "Sams" in pitot
Steamed Cauliflower and Broccoli
Oven-crisp Roasted Potato Wedges
I rarely do dessert during the week, but maybe I'll even bake muffins! I have a few wrinkly apples to use up.

Some notes about these foods:

The soup is the same one from Friday night. I keep all my Shabbat soups pareve, so I can use them again during the beginning of the week.

Sloppy Sams are Vegetarian Sloppy Joes. I'm making these with drained and crumbled tofu (I buy these at Kimat Chinam; if you buy 3 tofu cubes at a time, they are 3/23.99 NIS. Does anyone have a better deal to share?), browned in olive oil with diced onion and peppers, cooked with tomato paste, water, and spices. We still haven't worked out the perfect combination of Sloppy Sam spices, so if you have any TNT recipes, please share!

Cauliflower and Broccoli - the cauliflower was on sale for 1 NIS/kilo, so we'll be going heavy on the cauliflower, light on the brocolli. The best price I found for broccoli was 8 NIS/kilo at Yesh. Kimat Chinam was 14 NIS/kilo and Rami Levy something like 17 NIS/kilo. My kids love broccoli, so I figured I would have to continue to buy it and stretch it with the cauliflower...

For the Potato Wedges, I usually combine olive oil, mustard, garlic, salt, and pepper. Mix well with potato wedges (just scrub and cut - leave those peels on so you get the vitamins and trace minerals!), and bake in the oven at 400 F till crispy and turning brown. The kids like to eat them with ketchup...

Today's Menu

Today seems to be a "Pantry Challenge" Day. If you're not familiar with the idea of a pantry challenge, I'll give you a quick explanation:
A pantry challenge is when you challenge yourself to cook meals only using the food you already have in your house - pantry, fridge, freezer - without running out to the store. (There's a Yahoo group I've been a member of for several years devoted to this practice. People get really creative!) Some people do a Pantry Challenge when their budget is too tight, and they really cannot afford to shop anymore till the next paycheck, some do it because they simply aren't able to get to the store (that's me!), and still others do it as a "test" - to see if they are stocking up on the right things when they shop. This has lots to do with emergency preparedness, and also everything to do with bargain hunting.
I haven't been to the supermarket since 9 days ago (no good reason, really), so the food situation in my house right now is interesting, to say the least.

For now, my menus are going to focus on Supper (or Dinner).
I found a bunch of wilting broccoli at the back of the fridge that must get used - or thrown out, and that would be a shame - so I'm building my supper around that:

Minestrone Soup
Crustless Broccoli Quiche
Baked Potatoes
Cut veggies with dressing (all that's left are tomatoes and orange peppers, so that's what it is!)