Sometimes when I cook dinner and I’m really hungry, I get into a Sveeedish Scheff-like herndy-herndy-bork-bork-borkfrenzy and just start bunging things into a pot and eating the resultant mess.
Sometimes, the result is actually way more delicious than it has any good reason to be, and last night’s pot-of-random-hot-food was one of those serendipitous meals.
Last night I got home RAVENOUS. My lunch at work was a failure. Somebody snaked my last veggie burger pattie out of the freezer, so all I had was an 8-oz lemon yogurt and a grapefruit. On my ride back home, I completely lost the bunny right where Central Avenue and James Street intersect. For the last half mile or so back up to the house I was running on empty, and all up-hill! So of course by the time I got home, I was completely ravenous.
We had a couple of cans of garbanzo beans in the cupboard and frankly, I was considering just eating plain beans, but I realized that was kind of a dumb (also selfish) idea, since Joel would be coming home in time for dinner. So I decided to make a sort of garbanzo-based goulash to serve over rice.
While the rice was cooking, I minced a large yellow onion very finely and sautéed it in olive oil. Then I pureed a can of stewed tomatoes and added it to the sautéed onions along with a couple of minced cloves of garlic. Then I put in a couple of teaspoons of chili powder, a goodly squirt of Siracha sauce, two 12-oz cans of garbanzo beans, a diced stalk of celery and a teaspoon of Better Than Bouillon paste. I let the whole mess simmer for about 15 minutes, by which time the rice was ready.
It wasn’t a beautiful dish, but it was very tasty and it totally hit the spot. Plus, since I made such a vat of it, Joel and I were able to take the leftovers for lunch today. With all the protein and fiber in this kind of meal, it really sticks with you. Instead of getting snacky at 3:00 p.m., I was still going strong when I clocked out at 5:00!
I’m thinking of other beans-sauce-and-grain dishes that I will concoct soon. I want to make more lentils, since they cook quickly and also I really like them. I’m thinking of serving things on quinoa or bulgar sometimes, too. Might as well experiment since this kind of cooking is so easy.