My New Obsession - Engine 2 Cheezy Chickpeas

I would eat these every day if I could, they're that good!

Here's the original recipe, written by Engine 2 coach Ami to the Engine 2 blog and also posted to the Engine 2 Seven Day Diet Rescue Facebook community:

TOP ENGINE 2 RECIPES: CHEEZY CHICKPEAS
Ingredients

• 1 15-ounce can no salt added or low sodium chickpeas (do not drain and rinse!)

• 1/2 cup nutritional yeast

• 1 teaspoons Bragg liquid aminos

• 1 tablespoon whole wheat flour

InstructionsDrain the liquid from the canned chickpeas into a small saucepan. Add the Bragg liquid aminos, then whisk in the nutritional yeast and whole wheat flour until well combined. Simmer on medium heat until mixture thickens, stirring constantly. Remove from heat, add chickpeas and stir to cover.
Serve over cooked brown rice, baked potatoes, whole wheat pasta or your favorite grain – and load it up with some fresh or steamed greens!Servings: 2

Well, on the FB version, Ami doesn't mention this is 2 servings, and AFAIK, all of us there who were making this eat the whole shebang ourselves in one sitting, many saying they double it. 

Using homemade beans won't work with this, because you need the bean liquid - a.k.a. aquafaba - to make it work. Water or broth just isn't thick enough. 

Although the recipe calls for wheat flour, I use Mary McDougall's preferred flour for gravy, rice flour. Never a lump in her gravy recipes or in this one. 

One can of beans makes enough sauce for an entire pound of broccoli, as seen here:

This is what I've been having for lunch a few times a week. I have to restrict myself to that because other days we have beans or lentils for dinner, and Dr. McDougall does limit us to an average of one cup of beans or legumes per day. But if he didn't? Oh, yeah, this would be my every day lunch!

Pinto Bean Soup

Back in January, Jeff Novick posted a recipe that his cousin Sheila's grand daughter developed using dehydrated dried pinto beans. It looked interesting so I nabbed the recipe but did nothing about it for a while because I had my basic monthly menu that I already used.

I was roaming through my soup recipe folder to rotate out some soups we were getting bored with and replacing them with not-so-familiar ones and rediscovered this a few weeks ago. I had a choice of buying the beans from a vendor through Amazon or buying direct from Harmony House. When I saw HH allows payment through your Amazon account, that's what I did. The shipping was the same no matter where I bought it from, but buying direct from Harmony House was a buck cheaper than from a vendor, I knew I would get the freshest stock, and I certainly trust Amazon for payment. The beans came, I put the jar in the pantry closet, and again forgot about it until last week, when planning this week's menu. Finally, I was going to try this recipe!

Pinto Bean Soup with Brown Rice and Veggies

3 cups Harmony House dried pinto beans (blend until all are broken up).
3 Bay leaves
Teeeeeny pinch of thyme.
1 - 3 tsp crushed garlic
2 tsp Mrs Dash Fiesta Lime
6 cups of water.

Bring water to a boil.
Add everything.
Cook on low stirring 20 minutes. Add water or cook longer for desired thickness.
Before serving add Cooked Birdseye Steamfresh Brown and Wild Rice with Broccoli and Carrots.

First step was to toss those beans in the food processor and break them down into tiny pieces. I pulsed them for almost 5 minutes and still had about a third of unbroken beans, a third of smaller bean pieces, and a third of bean powder. Good enough.

I never use bay leaves, so skipped that.

I used 3 Dorot garlic cubes, equal to 3 large cloves. I know I should stop using these, since they contain a bit of oil, but I stocked up before winter with a dozen packages and I'm still working my way through them all. Only 4 trays left, then they're gone.

The "teeeeeny" pinch of thyme grew to about 2 tablespoons as cooking and tasting went on on, the last whole tablespoon going in the pot immediately prior to serving. It could have used more. Same as the Mrs. Dash Fiesta Lime. I wound up with around 2 tablespoons of that, too.

I tried 3 stores and neither had the broccoli rice blend called for so grabbed another wild rice and veggie blend.

Here's where the directions get confusing. She wrote to add everything to the boiling water and cook, then add the frozen rice and veg mixture in before serving, yet in the photo on Jeff's page it shows a ladle of soup served over the separately cooked rice in a shallow bowl. I had bought 2 bags of the rice, assuming I was going to do as Sheila's grand daughter did in the photo (one bowl/bag for me, one for hubby), but even after letting the soup cook down for over an hour it was still very watery, so I just microwaved them and added both bags directly to the soup. 

As you see, the soup was still so watery the heavier vegetables and rice sunk to the bottom, and I only filled this bowl about a third full.

My husband and I had a debate over this soup. He liked it just fine, after the addition of all the extra spices, whereas I still found it quite bland. He told me my tastebuds must be messed up. He could be right - my sinuses had been acting up this allergy season. The leftovers did taste better the next day, but still on the bland side to me.

So, would I make this again? Well, since I only have 1 cup of the dried beans left I would have to buy more of them first. And decide if I want to buy another quart or go for the gallon size this time. Would I make this soup enough to make the larger purchase worthwhile? I'm not sure. I can always just use canned pinto beans and pulse them in the food processor for a while and greatly reduce the water. It would make a thicker soup, for sure. And I can always cook up a Lundburg wild rice blend and add my own vegetables, too. Of course, doing it that was would negate the "fast food" quality of the recipes Jeff usually shares with us. I'll have to think a bit before adding this one to our usual recipe rotation.

Jeff, if you see this, please tell Sheila to thank her grand daughter, and tell her to keep experimenting and sharing these recipes that fit into your Simple, Nutritional, and Affordable Plan. :) 

Farmer Fred Does Fresh Broccoli in the Instant Pot

I'm one of those people who constantly over-cooks vegetables. Just this morning I put one of those giant bags of Bird's Eye California Mix into the IP at 3 minutes and it still came out like mush. The first time I tried I did it for 10 minutes - not a pretty sight!

Farmer Fred mentions how he also had problems getting the timing right for his produce. In this video, he lops off a head of broccoli right from his garden and shows how to make perfect steamed broccoli. Maybe I'll try this next time instead of liquefying yet another bag of frozen.

Pasta with Garbanzo Broccoli Sauce

I get tired of making tomato based pasta sauce week after week and made this one for a change. It comes from The McDougall Program for A Healthy Heart book.

Garbanzo/Broccoli Sauce
SERVINGS: 4
PREPARATION TIME: 15 MINUTES
COOKING TIME: 10 MINUTES

1 medium onion, cut in half and thinly sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup water
1 bunch fresh broccoli, cut into bite-size florets
2 cups Vegetable Broth
1 15 1/2-ounce can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
1 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 1/2 tablespoons cornstarch mixed in 1/3 cup cold water

Place the onion and garlic in a pot with the water. Cook and stir until the onion is translucent, about 3 minutes.

Add the broccoli, broth, beans, and soy sauce. Cook over low heat about 7 minutes until the broccoli is crisp-tender.

Add the cornstarch mixture, and cook and stir until thickened.

Serve over pasta or potatoes.

From The McDougall Program for a Healthy Heart, page 325

As usual, I used the brown rice pasta. For the broccoli, I used a one-pound bag of frozen chopped broccoli.

Sorry about the picture. I was finishing up my bowl when I realized I didn't take a photo. My husband had already finished his first and seconds, emptying the pot. Good thing I had enough first time around and didn't want more myself! 

After all these years I'm still discovering recipes in the old books that are new to me. Makes me wish there were more days in the week to make them all.

Interview with Alan Goldhamer of True North

Howard Lyman, author of The Mad Cowboy, did an interview with Dr. Alan Goldhamer (co-owner of True North Center and co-author of The Pleasure Trap with Doug Lisle, PhD).

The first page is an introduction to Dr. Goldhamer and water fasting, and the links to the three parts of the interview are at the bottom of the page. It's an excellent interview and explanation about this way of eating, even though the emphasis here is on water fasting. 

The last page of the interview includes mention of the first cookbook Dr. Goldhamer put out called Simply Good: Recipes and More from C.C.C.T. (Center for Chiropractic and and Conservative Therapy, Inc.). This book came out long before The Health Supporting Cookbook and Bravo, the other books filled with WFPB, no SOS recipes. You can't find it for sale any more except used through vendors, but I found it for free in PDF format HERE. Many of the same recipes are in The Health Supporting Cookbook, too. 

Get Out Your Ground Mustard!

I'm one of those people who always uses frozen veggies, especially broccoli and cauliflower. Dr. Greger explains in this video how we lose some important nutrients eating frozen, but get those back if we sprinkle mustard powder on them before eating.

 

I'm glad I just bought a fresh jar just this week!