Arugula Salad with Chickpeas from Vefa’s Kitchen

Eight days without cooking.

Our winter holiday in Cancun, Mexico begins tomorrow. We will hop on an airplane where temperatures hover around -20°C and hop off the airplane at +28°C. Sounds wonderful to me. I will gladly trade white snow for white sand – even at Christmas time.

With all the pre-Christmas baking, socializing and eating I have felt quite stuffed. Literally stuffed full of “Christmassy” food. I think I may have hit my saturation points with regard to fruitcake, cookies, gooey bars, and tarts. As a result I have been craving lighter fare. Perhaps too, with our warm weather holiday only a day away, I have been getting into “dietary sync” and craving the fresh lighter food of warm weather days.

Last night I pulled out one of my favorite cookbooks, Vefa’s Kitchen. EPC and I received this as a wedding present from an old roommate/friend of mine and his wife. If you are in the market, I highly recommend this book. It is a weighty tome and is chock full of recipes separated into the standard sections of salads, vegetables, poultry, seafood, desserts etc, and also includes a section on seasonal recipes and one containing recipes from famous chefs. Oh, did I mention it is a Greek cookbook?

We received Vefa’s Kitchen this past summer, so I have only just begun to try the recipes. Of course, it did keep me occupied many evenings before bed as I browsed through the myriad of traditional Greek recipes and made a mental checklist of the ones I wanted to try. This is the second time I have made this particular salad. Sadly, I did not use arugula either time (EPC is not a fan of spicy greens), but used a baby spinach spring mix instead. This substitutes nicely, as you still get a dark green leafy bunch to drop the cucumbers, carrots and chickpeas.

Arugula Salad with Chickpeas

330 g arugula
2 carrots, coarsely grated
1 small cucumber, julienned
1 cup of canned chickpeas, rinsed well

Dressing
4 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice (I cheat and use Real Lemon)
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 small clove of garlic, chopped finely
10 drops of Tabasco sauce (I use a generous sprinkle of cayenne)
salt and pepper to taste

• Cut arugula leaves into large pieces (Or you can use a spring baby greens mix) and place in serving dish
• Place the grated carrots, cucumber, and chickpeas on top.
• Put all the dressing ingredients into a jar with a screw top lid and shake well.
• Pour the dressing over the salad just before serving

Vegetarian Black Bean Enchilada Bake

I had a friend ask for one of my recipes this past weekend.  I figured what a better way to get started blogging than with a “real” recipe request.  Afterall, that is the purpose of Cookbook Cooks – sharing recipes!

She and her partner stayed with us for a couple of days while they were getting some work done on their place.  Since she is gluten-free, I rummaged around in my unorganized recipe binder (sigh – I really need to do something about that!) to find a hearty and substantial recipe that was different and delicious while meeting her dietary requirements. Not that cooking gluten-free is difficult or implies that we need to make sacrifices, but I wanted to make an effort and cook something that  I thought she would enjoy (and that would make enough so we could all take some in our lunch the next day!).

I came across a recipe for Vegetarian Black Bean Enchilada Bake that I had found on About.com.  I  made it once before when my husband’s brother (a non-vegetarian) was visiting. He and my husband both loved it and each ate two large helpings, so I figured I would make it again.  If it was a success once, I figured it would be safe bet this time too.

Vegetarian Black Bean Enchilada Bake is easy and quick to put together, but is by no means a gourmet or elegant meal.  It tastes great though, and isn’t that what really matters?

Vegetarian Black Bean Enchilada Bake

Preheat oven to 350°C
1 large onion, chopped
1 red pepper, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup salsa ( I like to use Pace medium salsa)
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1/8 – 1/4 teaspoons cayenne pepper (I like to use McCormick’s)
2  540 ml cans black beans, drained and rinsed
12  6-inch corn tortillas
3 cups Monterey Jack and Cheddar blend cheese shredded ( I like to use the Kraft Tex-Mex shredded cheese mix)

• Saute the onion, pepper and garlic in a large skillet for 3-5 minutes until tender.
• Add the salsa, cumin, cayenne and  black beans and bring to simmer over medium heat. Cook, stirring often for 3 minutes.
• Arrange 6 tortillas in bottom of 9″ x 13″ baking dish overlapping them as necessary. Spread half of bean mixture over tortillas and sprinkle with half of cheese. Repeat layering process with remaining tortillas, bean mixture and cheese.
• Cover dish with foil and bake 20 minutes.

Enjoy!