Scrambled Eggs with Peppers and Onions

This is one of my favorite breakfasts. I have been making this for years, and I just love it. Scrambled eggs without veggies are good, but they are just not nearly as good as ones with random veggies.

So, this one has both red and green peppers and onions, and you just throw in the eggs once the veggies are soft, and scramble the eggs for a couple more minutes.

Here's what you'll need:
about 1/4 c. chopped onion
1/2 red bell pepper, chopped
1/2 green bell pepper, chopped
1 tbsp. butter
6 eggs
1/4 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. pepper

• Heat butter in skillet
• Add onion and pepper and cook about 5 minutes until vegetables are soft
• Add beaten eggs, salt & pepper, and cook until eggs are set

Mulligatawny Soup

I've heard of mulligatawny soup before, but it was one of those words I'd heard while never really knowing what it was (like vissisous). Apparently it's an Indian dish that made it's way over here a long, long time ago. I looked it up on Pinterest and all the recipes used lentils, but Fannie's uses meat, listed as an optional ingredient. With or without meat, she doesn't mention lentils. Since I was trying to make a FF recipe, I followed hers rather closely, with the exception of using a red pepper in place of celery, since I don't have celery and it would be criminal to buy a vegetable at this point, with my counters overflowing with homegrown organic veggies of all sorts (except the celery variety).

Here's my adaptation for this:

Ingredients:

4 tbsp butter
1 diced onion
1 diced carrot
1 diced green pepper
1 diced red pepper (or a couple stalks of celery, which I didn't have, so I used peppers)
1 diced apple
1 jalepeno, minced (or 1/8 tsp. cayenne)

1 lb raw beef
1/3 c. flour
1 tbsp. curry powder
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
6 c. water (or use beef broth if you have it)
2 crushed cloves
1 large tomato, chopped
salt & pepper to taste

3 c. cooked brown rice

optional garnishes: slivered almonds, cashews, or chilled banana slices. I didn't use any of these. I used some plain yogurt for garnish, because it's what I usually eat with Indian food.

Directions:
Melt 2 tbsp. butter in large pot

  Add vegetables and meat (everything down to the flour) and cook 15 minutes on low heat, stirring often.

 Add other 2 tbsp. butter, flour, nutmeg & curry powder and cook 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Add water, cloves, tomato, salt & pepper and simmer 30 minutes.

Serve in bowls atop rice, with preferred garnish.

I'm not a huge fan of Indian curry, so I wasn't crazy about this, but it was okay. My husband liked it well enough, and my son ate it one day as well. Since it makes a big pot of soup, we ended up having it for dinner a couple times, though my son requested a cheese sandwich the second night we had this. It's a good soup if you like curry. Otherwise, I'd skip this one.

Creole Tomatoes

I made this quick side dish to go with the revoltillos I posted yesterday. It was alright, but of the many tomato recipes I've tried, this one was pretty forgettable. It wasn't bad, it just wasn't anything special. Which I guess is okay for a side dish. It gave us some extra veggies and no one complained about it. If you're drowning in tomatoes, like I am, go ahead and make this. It's just not the best tomato recipe out there (so far during this challenge, that goes to the salsa).

Here's what I used:
2 tbsp. butter
1 onion
1 green bell pepper
6 medium tomatoes
dash of cayenne
1 tsp. thyme (or more if you have fresh)
salt to taste
2 tbsp. fresh parsley, for garnish

Here's what I did:

• heat butter in medium cast iron skillet
• chop onion and add to skillet
• chop pepper and add
• cook 5-10 minutes on low heat, stirring frequently
• while onions cook, core and quarter tomatoes
• when onions are translucent, add tomatoes, cayenne, thyme & salt
• cook 5 minutes, stirring occasionally
• garnish with parsley 

Like I said, this wasn't the star of the show, but it did a good job filling its role. Couldn't compete with the strongly-flavored revoltillos. This needs to be served with something bland like baked chicken.

Revoltillos

I was looking through Fannie Farmer for a stove-top recipe that uses ground beef when I ran across this one. It looked really weird, but I thought I'd try it.  I made it for a dinner with my sisters, and when I told people what I was making (I pronounced it in what I imagined was the Spanish way, ray-VOL-tee-ose), my sister said, "You're making something called 'revolting o's'?" I couldn't defend it too staunchly, since frankly, the recipe did sound a little gross (Olives and raisins? Who came up with that combo?). So I let it slide when everyone called it Revoltio's all week, pronounced like Spaghetti-O's.

Since it had raisins, and sounded vaguely curryish, I used ground lamb instead of ground beef for it. I'm guessing this is a Spanish food, seeing as it has olives and bay leaves in it, but I really have no idea. I do know that it was surprisingly delicious.

Unfortunately, the pictures aren't too lovely, as I forgot my HTC phone, and my iPhone camera is worthless. So if it looks especially ugly, don't let that deter you. It's actually quite good.

Here's what I used:
1 c. brown rice
2.5 c. water
1/4 c. olive oil
3 medium onions
3 green bell peppers
3 cloves garlic
1 lb. ground lamb (Fannie calls for 2, and if I had it, or made it again, I'd use 2)
5 bay leaves
3/4 c. ripe olives
3/4 c. raisins

Directions:

• rinse rice, then add it to a sauce pan with the water, simmer on very low heat for about 40 minutes or until the water is absorbed and the rice is tender. If the water is all absorbed and the rice is still chewier than you like, add more water and cook longer.
• while rice is cooking, heat oil in large cast iron skillet with lid
• chop onions and add to skillet
• chop peppers and add to skillet
• cook about 5 minutes, or until onions are translucent, stirring often
• mince garlic, add to pan and cook about 1 minute, stirring constantly to keep it from sticking
• add ground meat and cook until browned 
• add bay leaves, olives and raisins
• cover pan and cook on low heat 15-20 minutes, stirring once or twice. If it begins to stick reduce heat or remove from heat if it's been at least 15 minutes.

I served this with creole tomatoes, which don't really go with it so well, but I have sooo many tomatoes that I wanted to make a side dish with them. Shockingly, despite the weird name and ingredients, everyone enjoyed the revoltillos. My sisters (even the picky one) said it was good, my mom, husband and brother in law all ate it, and even my son finished his plate, though he thought the meat tasted funny since he's used to ground beef. I served these with creole tomatoes, which everyone also ate without complaint, though I don't think it was a very good match for this dish.

Overall, I'd definitely call it a success.

Okra, Tomato and Corn Saute

This is a really tasty vegetable side dish. It would go great with just about any meat dish, but I'd probably pair it with pork or beef and cornbread, or something similar.

This was another recipe I cut in half, approximately, just because I didn't want to end up with a whole bunch of veggies in containers in the fridge. Fannie says the whole serves six, so this was just right for 3.

You will need (to
serve 3):
1 tbsp. butter
1 small onion
1 small green pepper
1/2 lb okra
1 medium tomato
1/2 c. corn kernels
pinch of fresh oregano (dried if you don't have fresh)
salt & pepper to taste

Melt butter in cast iron skillet. Add onions and peppers, finely chopped. Cook 3-4 minutes, stirring often.

Add okra, cut in 1/2 inch pieces, and cook for 2 minutes, stirring often.

Add tomato, chopped, along with corn and oregano. Cover and cook 10 mins over low heat.

 Add salt and pepper to taste and enjoy. This was so good. All the flavors blended really well, and you can alter the amounts of any of the veggies according to what you have.