I promised when I started this blog that I’d let you know about the ups and downs of cooking at home, so here I am, telling you about a culinary adventure that wasn’t all I hoped it would be. I got this recipe from an old issue of Vegetarian Times, which is typically pretty reliable–but sadly, while this soup looked great, it was a bit of a disappointment, taste-wise.
Pho is a traditional Vietnamese noodle soup, and authentic Pho is definitely not vegetarian. It typically uses a beef broth base, and some kind of meat. We made this one with vegetable stock and tofu–admittedly not the tastiest of ingredients, but there was enough prep that I thought it might turn into something delightful. In fact, the broth itself was a pretty lab0r-intensive process. I simmered for an hour in store-bought vegetable stock: a bunch of garlic, ginger, mushrooms, a cinnamon stick, fennel, basil and cilantro, soy sauce and a bit of sugar. After this was done, I poured off the solids and reserved the liquid, which did smell pretty nice. I then poured this broth over cooked rice noodles and the tofu (which Josh fried and sliced), and topped it all with green onions, basil, cilantro, and sugar snap peas.
The results were…well, bland. I tried adding a bit more soy sauce to my bowl, but this (unsurprisingly) just made it saltier. So, a disappointment. I’m trying to figure out what would have made it better (other than beef stock, obviously)…more sugar? More broth? Fewer basil leaves on top (which have a really strong and slightly overwhelming taste on their own)? What do you think? And while we’re on the subject, do you have a favorite vegetarian version of a traditionally meaty dish?
I’ve mentioned before how much I love Mexican food. I should add, with this post, that this love encompasses all foods even vaguely Mexican, including Tex-Mex, Fresh-Mex, and tofu-centric Mexican spin-offs. This recipe is an adaptation of the 
The rest of the garden (with the exception of the broccoli, which I’ll come to in a minute) continues to do well. The collard greens in particular seem to be thriving, and we plan to eat some spinach soon. We may also consider picking the collards a bit early, rather than risking their untimely end due to a killing frost…but I’m unsure of whether this would be a good idea. If anyone has experience with cooking/eating young collards, let me know. My hunch is that it would be fine–and perhaps even better than fully developed collards, which are usually so tough that they require quite a lot of cooking.
The broccoli, as I said, aren’t looking so hot. They’re trying, bless their hearts, but until whatever critter in the yard (who apparently likes broccoli as much as I do) stops munching on them, I fear they won’t amount to much. I realize that this is probably something that I, as gardener, should try to take care of…but short of covering the entire garden with chicken wire (which, let’s face it, is not going to happen), I’m not sure what can be done. For a time, I was using Dewey as a living scarecrow, but it’s unclear how well this worked–given her general disinterest in birds, who I believe to be the culprits–and I’m dubious on its future prospects, since Dewey appears to feel the same way I do about being outside when it’s cold and rainy. As always, suggestions are welcome. Especially if they involve minimal effort.
Something is eating my broccoli. I am not pleased! Neither, however, am I sure what it is. This particular shot makes it look like the work of insects, but other pieces–chewed down to nubs–look like they’ve been attacked by any of the millions of birds that are constantly flying around my backyard. I have yet to put anything on them, in part because I’d prefer not to do the pesticide thing, and in part because (as you may recall) this is a minimal-effort-and-money garden project, so I haven’t even looked into possible fixes. At the moment, things aren’t looking so good. At least for the broccoli.
The collards and spinach, on the other hand, are doing very well. In fact, it looks like the spinach (on the right) may be ready for a salad harvest in the next week or so. The collards are still quite small, so I’m not sure how long we have left with them. Hopefully they’ll make it through the cooler weather we’re expecting later this week (highs in the mid-upper 50s and lows in the mid-upper 30s!). I would love love love to make some nice Southern-style greens to bring in the fall!
In other garden-related news, the carrots seem to be moving right along, though it’s difficult to say for certain, since almost all of their growing happens below the surface. We do know that whatever is happening is a long way from being edible though. Today marks 4 weeks since planting, and the carrot growing season supposedly clocks in at around 120 days, so–provided they don’t all die before then–we have at least 3 months left. Much closer is the cilantro, which has done a shocking bit of maturation over the past week. My favorite part of any growing season is at this stage: when the sprouts, like puppies or infants, show signs of becoming what they are. 
In the case of other living things, it might be a new facial expression or a way of moving–something that moves the new life out of the realm of generic youth and gives a sign of its unique personality. I like to think that the Cilantro is right there now, moving from life as a generic sprout to life as a cilantro plant, with its miniature maple-shaped leaves and fantastic smell. I’m so proud of these little ones–they grow up so fast!
Well, the temperature dropped into the mid-low forties this weekend (that’s somewhere around 8 Celsius, for the Canadians in the audience), and I was worried we might lose these little guys. Fortunately, they’re trucking right along, and I’ve now remembered how well my Cilantro did in Nashville’s early spring days (until, that is, the freakish April Fool’s Day snowstorm of ’07). Anyway, as long as things stay above freezing, it seems like these will be ok, so I am hopeful for some fresh Cilantro to be in my life very soon.
Well, things are continuing to move along! Everything has sprouted, and I’ve begun to thin the broccoli and collards, even if it doesn’t look like it in this photo. I always feel a bit heartbroken at the prospect of thinning my plants–it’s so difficult to make myself rip out perfectly good sprouts, even though I realize that it has to be done, if any of them are going to have a shot at living. The philosopher in me finds this task to be incredibly difficult, actually, because as I squat in the garden, I replay over and over again the lifeboat thought experiment and the 
some Cilantro in a pot, which has also finally yielded a sprout (fortunately, this little guy isn’t yet competing with anyone else, meaning that I have a plant-thinning reprieve, at least temporarily). I’m very, very excited about the Cilantro, which has recently become one of my favorite herbs–despite the fact that only 3 years ago, I refused to eat it unless it was basically pulverized in a mixture of other strong flavors. I realized at some point that its incredibly unique flavor (somewhere between lemon, mint, and laundry detergent, I think) pairs so, so well with the spicy foods I love, like Mexican and Thai cuisines–which is why it’s usually found there, of course. So I obviously didn’t “discover” Cilantro, but I’m happy to making it a bigger part of my life. Let’s hope the feeling is mutual.
