Lentil and Quinoa Soup

It's Sunday. Normally on Sunday mornings I do a run, then have a protein shake and make appetizers for lunch / afternoon snacks but today was a little different. The weather went from getting nice (it is April) to a snow storm that hit overnight and I woke up to snowy -14 morning. I decided pretty early on that it looked more like a cooking day then a running day.

For lunch I made my Kale Soup with Spanish Chorizo and it was really good. I've been trying to eat a little better so I've had Lentils, Quinoa and a bunch of other precooked things in the fridge and with it being so cold I decided to make another soup from all this precooked goodness.

Ingredients:

1/2 - Onion, Diced
1 - Tbsp of Olive Oil
1 - Tsp Ground Cumin
1/2 - Tsp Paprika
2 - Carrots, Diced
2 - Cups Beef Broth
1 - Cup Cooked Quinoa
1 - Cup Cooked Brown Lentils
Salt and Pepper to Taste

Directions:

Dice up the onions and add to a pot over low-medium heat.

 Cook the onion for 5 - 7 minutes and once it has turned a nice golden colour, add the cumin.

Then add the paprika.

Mix together and simmer for 2 - 3 minutes.

Dice up the carrots.

Add the broth and carrots. Simmer for 15 - 20 minutes until the carrots have softened.

Add in the lentils and quinoa.

Simmer for another 5 - 7 minutes to allow the lentils and quinoa to absorb some flavor.

Scoop out and serve.

Note: Normally my recipes make 4 - 5 but since I had already made a soup this morning I didn't want to have a ton of left overs so this recipe make for 2 - 3 people.

Deep Fried Avocado Disks

Have you every seen one of those posts where it's a series of quick images that shows you how to make something and it looks super simple? Well so did I and this is what happened!

First, here is the video:

That looks super easy eh? So lets try it! Only one thing, it looks like she is making a Guacamole recipe but since I like mine so much better, I decided to use it instead of hers.

Ingredients (Guacamole)
5 - Avocado
1 - Tomato
2 - Green Onion
1 - Tbsp Lime Juice
1 - Tbsp Ground Cumin
A dash of salt and pepper

Ingredients (Disks and Batter)
1 - Medium white onion
3 - Eggs
1/2 - Cup Flour
2/3 - Cup Bread Crumbs
1/2 - Cup Oil for deep frying

Directions (Guacamole)
Cut up your Avocados and put them into a large bowl.

Dice up your tomatoes and put them in the bowl.

Chop up your green onion and put it in the bowl.

Add in the Lime Juice.

Add in the Cumin.

Mix everything together and the Guacamole is complete!

Directions (Putting it together)
Peel and onion and cut it into slices.

Lay the slices on a baking sheet covered in parchment paper.

Put the Guacamole into the onion rings.

Put the baking sheet into the freeze and freeze solid. About 2 hours.

Set out your egg wash, flour and bread crumbs.

Dip in Egg.

Flour.

Then this is when it started to fall apart. next is bread crumbs, back into egg and bread crumbs again. My hand got really messy and batter covered (that's why the photos pretty much stopped at this point). From here we put the disks into the deep fryer. I think I had the oil too hot as they were literally cooking the batter in like 3 seconds a side. So less than 10 seconds a disk. When they came out they were still really cold in the middle!!! What the Heck??? I feel like then needed to be cooking for 30 seconds a side but they were burning in the oil.

I set them out and they look pretty good but nothing like the video and because they were still cold inside... I didn't really like them.

If you have any tips on deep frying then let me know and I can try this again.

Vegetable Barley Soup

It's one of those cold winter days which is coincidentally one of the best times to make a hardy soup! I had some pearl barley in the cupboard and potatoes, carrots and onion in the garage. With those base ingredients I decided to go make a soup!

(That doesn't look like soup? Find out why down below)

Ingredients:
1 - Medium Onion
3 - Medium Potatoes
2 - Carrots
1/2 - Can of Diced Tomatoes
1/4 - Tsp Salt
1/4 - Tsp Pepper
1/2 - Tsp Paprika
1/2 - Tsp Parsley
1/2 - Tsp Thyme
1.5 - Cups Pearl Barley
5 - Cups Beef Broth

Directions:
Dice onions and add to a large stock pot with some olive oil or butter, cook over Medium heat.

Chop up potatoes into bite size pieces and add to the pot.

Do the same for the carrots.

Pour in the half can of diced Tomatoes.

Add the salt, pepper, paprika, parsley and thyme.

Rinse the pearl barley under water (this is a must or the flavor will be off).

Add to pot.

Stir everything together.

Add in the beef stock, bring to a boil, reduce heat, cover and then let simmer for 30 minutes. This will cook the carrots, potatoes, barley and to allow the flavors to combined.

After the 30 minutes, serve and enjoy!

Now, what happened to my "soup" and why does it look more like a pasta dish? After simmering for 30 minutes, I had to take my son to his hockey game. I turned off the stove, covered the pot and left. 2 hours later when I returned, I opened the lid to find that the pearl barley had absorbed all of the liquid! I dished out the "soup" for lunch as is and it was pretty good.

For next time I can reduce the amount of pearl barley from 1.5 cups down to 2 and add an additional cup of beef broth or water. As for the rest of my "soup", I have put it in containers but I will add 1/2 - 1 cup of water to it before heating it up to eat. I don't want to add it now just in case the barley decides to try and absorb it all over again :)