When IMBB #19 was announced so many vegan recipes came to my mind, but I wanted to make something that I have never tried before. Something that I should experiment, and make my own. Most of what I have categorized as vegetarian in this blog is vegan, but I have never thought about being a vegan.

Recently I have discovered agar agar; the vegetarian jelly made out of seaweeds. I wish I have known this years ago! So many mouth watering recipes have been eliminated over the years just because they contain gelatin. Nevertheless I still used jello in various occasions, limiting it to the minimum. Now I am back to experimenting desserts that can be fun!

Idea of filling in the oranges should not be new to you. Recently I have seen them filled with orange sorbet and served chilled. Didn’t have a chance to taste it though..

For this post, I used the following:

1. 3 oranges
2. 5 tablespoons of agar agar
3. 1 cup of water
4. 1/4 cup of sugar
5. a hand chopper/blender
6. mint leaves (optional)

How I made it:

1. First I put 5 tablespoons of agar agar flakes into 1 cup of water, and let it sit while I got the oranges ready
2. I cut the oranges in half, or 3/4 from the bottom. Later I ran a parer knife through edges to make it easy for me to take out innards of the orange, and I found myself using a dessert spoon to scoop out the orange bits. When all were clean, I washed them up and turned them upside down to dry a bit
3. I didn’t want to just put chunks of oranges back into the skins. Reached over for my hand chopper and ran it through them on and off. When I strained them I only ended up having about a cup of orange juice; the rest was pulp. Pulp is saved to be eaten independently



4. Started heating up the agar agar and let it dissolve into that one cup of water only. After boiling it took another 5 mins or so to make sure it all dissolved. Then I added 1/4 cup of sugar and a cup of strained orange juice, and mix all together well
5. To make sure my orange halves sit still I put them muffin tins, and just filled them up. Just as I was about to finish filling them up I 6 – 7 mint leaves into the orange + agar agar mix and ran through the chopper again. And that mix went into rest of the orange cups
6. And I had to wait for them to set. Agar agar does not take too much time to set, so in about 2 hours I was about to turn them over and nothing seemed to be moving ;)

Now time to enjoy them! Want to have the whole half or slice by slice?

Result: the minty ones are definitely better. I simply like the mint contrasting with orange. But the pure orange one looks way better! I guess one can chop the mint by hand to avoid the dark colored mix.

Tagged with: IMBB # 19 + Vegan

It was inevitable to make this dish after my post on how to preserve the grape leaves. In fact, since then, I ended up making 3 batches for 3 different occasions. It is one of those dishes that you cannot get enough of, especially when you want an elegant finger food.

This delicious dish is easier to make than you think. If you never had a home made one, but still like the taste of the store bought one I suggest you allocate some time for this dish and prepare a feast.

Unfortunately all the restaurants (Middle Eastern or Greek) I had them here in US could not do a good job in making the filling. Such a shame and waste of the ingredients. You can even find them in tins, sold in Middle Eastern stores. Well, I made a mistake once and bought one of them. Was a total waste. Could not even finish one.

Again, if you like them, make yourself a favor and prepare them home. Better yet; find a friend to chat with while making the rolls. Later you will have a feast to share, too!

Oh, the name “dolma.” Many think it is a Greek food. No need to argue who made it first. For all I know there was a Greek, Arab and a Turkish lady in the kitchen and came up with this. But there is one thing I know for sure; the name “dolma” is derived from the verb “dolmak” which means “to be filled”, “to get full” in Turkish. Case dismissed!

You also can see it called as “yalanjee” or some spelling variation close to this. Especially in Arab restaurants. This again is another Turkish name for this wrapped grape leaves. It actually is spelled “yalancı” in Turkish (/c/ is a hard /c/) and means “lier” or “fake.” Since a similar dish is made with meat stuffing, this one is considered to be the “fake” one.

Enough of language and culture lesson? Let’s get to the recipe.

The ingredients I am listing below are ballpark. If you like more currants put some more. Not have enough pine nuts home, no problem. Also using carrots for this recipe is not that common either; my mom has been using them so I used too. Along with the currants they give a bit of sweetness which contrasts the grape leaves’ taste. Once you know how you like it, you can experiment with more ingredients as well.

The same filling can also be used to fill bell peppers, small eggplants (real tiny ones that you can purchase in Middle Eastern or Indian stores) or even the squash blossoms. For the squash blossoms what you have to keep in mind is that you should collect them when they are fully open in the morning (once it heats up, they close), and be gentle with them.

Ingredients:

Filling:

1. 1/4 cup pine nuts
2. 2 cup finely chopped onion
3. 2 cup rice
4. 1/4 cup currants
5. 1 cup shredded carrot
6. 1/2 cup olive oil
7. 1 tsp cinnamon
8. Salt, pepper
9. 1 cup warm water
10. 1 bunch of parsley (and/or dill optional)

For assembly and cooking:

1. grape leaves (16 oz jar should be sufficient for this amount of filling)
2. 2.5 cups water
3. 1/4 cup olive oil
4. 1 – 2 lemons to decorate

Preparation:

1. Heat ¼ cups of olive oil in a large pot, and add onions and pine nuts stir them until they are lightly brown.
2. Add the rice, currants, and shredded carrots, salt and stir them well. Cook for about 2 – 3 mins. Add a cup of warm water, cinnamon, salt and pepper to taste. Stir and close the lid, turn the heat down and let it cook until no water is left.
3. If you have any parsley and/or dill you can chop them finely and add them to your filling. Do not discard the parsley stems.



4. Prepare the grape leaves by soaking them in the warm water for couple of minutes. If you have a chance to use fresh leaves, group them and cook them briefly in salty boiling water
5. Take a leaf, put the shiny side down, and pinch the stem – do not discard but put the stems aside. Also, while wrapping the dolmas if you come across to a leaf that is torn or not useable, do not discard, keep with those extra stems.
6. Put about 1 – 2 Tbs (depends how big the leaf is) of filling and start rolling them as in the pictures
7. All those stems or faulty leaves you have been collecting can be put at the bottom of the pot to help not burn the dolmas while cooking
8. I usually wrap the dolmas, and stack them on a dish until there is 2 cups worth of filling left in the pot. Then I transfer the filling to a smaller bowl, and put the collected stems at the bottom of that pot, and start stacking the uncooked stuffed grape leaves, layer by layer. No need to wash the pot; you just cooked the filling there.
9. If you are left with extra filling, you can either freeze them or stuff a small bell pepper. If the filling was not enough for your grape leaves, put the extra leaves back to the brine.



10. Put a plate on top of the dolmas and pour ¼ cup of olive oil and 2.5 cups of warm water.



11. Close the lid, put dish upside down to hold the dolmas down and cook on very low heat for about an hour. Make sure to check if the water is enough at least half way through cooking. You can check if they are cooked by pinching one of the leaves and see how easy it is to tear it.



12. Let it cool in that pot.
13. Transfer cooled dolmas to a serving dish, after each layer, put some lemon slices. Cover them so they do not dry out. Put in the fridge and let it cool for at least 4 – 5 hours.

(yukarıdaki logo, freecycle.org sayfasından alınmıştır ve oraya bağlantı verir)

Evinizde zamanında beğenerek aldığınız, bir şekilde hediye edilen ya da kimbilir ne şekilde edindiğiniz ama artık kullanmadığınız ve de atmaya kıyamadığınız, “bir ihtiyacı olana gitse” diye düşündüğünüz bir çok şey vardır eminim.

Yaklasik son bir senedir bir yahoo gruplar zinciri buldum ki acayip mutluyum; FreeCycle. Geridönüşüm (Recycle) ile Bedava (free) kelimeleriyle oynayıp bu kavramı geliştirmişler. Dünyanın her yerinde de yerel paylaşımları sağlamak için yahoo gruplarını kullanıyorlar. Bur organizasyonlar zinciri 2003 Mayısında başlamış ve şimdi 50den fazla ülkede, binlerce yerel gruptaki bir milyondan fazla üyelerle devam ediyor.

Özellikle tüketim toplumu olan Amerikada çok iyi işlediğini düşünüyorum bunların; en azından benim üye olduğum iki grup öyle.

sadece elinizdekileri vermek değil amaç aslında. Diyelim ki bir şeye ihtiyacınız var, alacak durumunuz yok veya o kadar para harcamak istemiyorsunuz. Oraya yazıyorsunuz ve paylaşmak isteyenler size cevap verebiliyor.

Neler neler paylaşılıyor aklınız durur; eski kıyafetler filan artık çok basit kalıyor, hava kompresörleri, koşu bantları, tava tencere takımları, bahçesini düzenlerken artan çicek soğanları vs vs. Sizin aklınıza ne geliyorsa, evinizde ne kullanıyorsanız bir gün orada bir ihtiyacı olan ya da elinden çıkartmak isteyen olacaktır eminim.

Hatta diyelim ki bir şeye ihtiyacınız var ama sadece kullanıp geri vermek istiyorsunuz. Oraya yine yazmak mümkün. Yardım etmek isteyen kişilerle dolu gruplar; bir elini uzatan bulunuyor. Geçenlerde birileri evde yapacakları bir düğünde kullanmak üzere şık bıçak ve kek servis spatulası istemişlerdi mesela.

Sizler de bulunduğunuz yöreninkine üye olmak isterseniz http://www.freecycle.org/ adresine gidip en yakın grubu bulun ve üyelik isteyin. Yaşadığınız şehirde yok mu? Belki siz başlatabilirsiniz?

Türkiye’de sadece İstanbul’da varmış http://groups.yahoo.com/group/freecycleistanbul/

19 Ekim 2005 Güncelleme: artık Ankara’da da açılmış http://groups.yahoo.com/group/freecycleAnkara/

Konu komşunuzun bilgisayarı, internete erişimi ya da böyle şeylerle uğraşacak vakti yoktur; siz belki aracı olursunuz?