Accidental Hedonist

I admit that I’ve been a bit passionless about lentils. It’s nothing to do with the recipes necessarily…it’s just that it’s…you know…lentils! The legumes for vegetarians. They’re so bland!

The recipe changed my mind. It’s so simple, yet the end result is wonderful! Pork fat, onion and sage…who knew that this combination would make such a wonderful combination.

• 2 Tbsp virgin olive oil
• 3 ounces pancetta, unsmoked if possible, diced
• 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1 small yellow onion, finely chopped
• 5 fresh sage leaves
• 1 3/4 cups of driedlentils
• salt and pepper (to taste)

In a sauce pan, bring one quart of water to a boil.

As the water is heating, in a skillet, heat olive oil and add pancetta. As the fat renders,add red pepper flakes and saute for 2 minutes. Add the onions and sage and cook for five minutes.

Add the lentils to the skillet and coat with the oil and fat from the pancetta. Cover with the quart of (now) boiling water. Lid and simmer (185 degrees F) for 45-60 minutes. The Lentils should stay whole and yet nearly all the water should be absorbed. Salt and pepper to taste.

The sign of a good soup is how well it goes with a slice of good bread. The one should compliment the other. This soup, from The Daily Soup (a book from the soup restaurant of the same name), passes that test remarkably.

And you better like lentils if you make this soup, because they dominate this dish. The one thing I have learned about lentils is that they are best when they deliver another taste. In this case, garlic, and lots of it.

As with most lentil dishes, this will improve with age as the lentils will imbibe the garlic flavors.

• 1 whole head of garlic
• 2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
• 1 large White Onion, chopped
• 2 celery stalks, chopped
• 2 carrots, peeled and chopped
• 2 teaspoons dried rosemary
• 2 Bay leaves
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 pound of french lentils
• 8 cups vegetable broth
• 1 28-ounce can of whole tomatoes, drained and chopped
• 3 Tablespoons Tomato Paste
• 2 Tablespoons Balsamic Vinegar
• 1 teaspoon minced garlic
• 1/4 Italian Parsley, chopped

Pre-heat your oven to 450 degree F. When it comes to temperature, loosely wrap the head of garlic in aluminum foil and place in oven for 15-20 minutes, allowing it to roast. Remove from the oven, and skin the cloves, placing the cloves into a food processor. Pulse to a near-paste. Set aside.

Heat the olive oil in a stock pot. When it appears to “ripple” in the light (It’s the point right before the oil begins to smoke), add the onions, celery and carrots. Coat the vegetables with the oil and allow to cook in the pot for 5-7 minutes. Add the rosemary, bay leaves, salt and pepper, incorporating them into the vegetables. Allow to cook for 2-3 more minutes.

Add the lentils, broth, tomatoes and tomato paste to the pot and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer (175 degrees F), and partially cover with a lid. Allow to simmer for one hour.

After the hour, stir in the roasted garlic past, the minced garlic and balsamic vinegar. Simmer for 2 more minutes in order to have the soup incorporate the new ingredients.

Remove bay leaves and ladle into bowls to serve. Top with chopped parsley.

Serves 12

This ended up being not one of my better recipes. It was…okaaayy…but it was still missing something for me. Part of me wanted to add red pepper flakes or anchovy sauce to the lentils, but I withheld, wanting to hold to the recipe as it stood. I may try differently in the future.

Two notes:
1) This dish is traditionally eaten on New Year’s Eve in Italy. It makes it the second New Years recipe I have on this site. Note that I have zero recipes for Thanksgiving or Christmas. I must consider this anamoly.

2) The Olive oil bit in this recipe is essential(and I don’t use that word lightly). Without it, the lentils dry up and give you a less than stellar dish.

• 1 lb Italian Sausage, links (cotechino if you can find it, but hot Italian sausage will do in a pinch)
• 1 white onion, chopped
• 1 bay leaf
• 8 whole black peppercorns
• 1 sprig fresh thyme
• 7 cups water
• 1 lb. dried, green lentils
• 1 white onion, quartered
• 1 clove garlic
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 large carrot, quartered
• salt & pepper (to taste)
• 4 cups water
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
• 1 bunch of chopped Italian Parsley

Take the italian sausage, and pierce it with a fork in several places. Place in the bottom of a stock pot, and fry for 2-3 minutes (do this to give the sausage some brown fronds that make the sausages sing). Add chopped onions, bay leaf, thymeand peppercorns. Fry for one more minute and then cover with seven cups of water. Bring to a boil and then reduce the heat to a simmer for 45-50 minutes.

In a seperate pot (3 quart soup pot), add the lentils, quartered onions, garlic, bay leaf, carrot and salt & pepper. Cover with water and also bring to a boil. Cover, reduce the heat and simmer for 40-45 minutes or until lentils are soft. Add more water if needed.

When lentils are complete remove onion, garlic, bay leaf and carrot. Spoon lentils onto a serving dish and drizzle with olive oil (This is the important part I told you about up top). Slice up pieces of Italian sausage onto bed of lentils.

Sprinkle with chopped parsley and serve.

Serves 4-6

Amaze your friends! Stun your family! Answer a question or two on “Jeopardy!”. Here’s the latest basic tips and trivia for Lentils!

• Lentils (Lens culinaris) are a small legume of the pea family with round, flattened seeds in pods.
• The Latin name for lentils, ‘lens’ gives us the name for the lentil-shaped piece of convex glass.
• 1 cup of dried lentils = 3 1/2 cups soaked
• You can freeze dried lentils indefinately
• Lentils do not require soaking, as opposed to other legumes.
• Wait until lentils are done cooking until you add acidic ingredients (tomatoes, lemon, vinegar, etc).
• You can soak lentils if you want to lower your cooking time.
• Lentils require 12 minutes to cooked if pre-soaked, 20 if cooked dried.
• The Lentil is most likely the oldest cultivated legume, and is believed to be native to southwestern Asia, perhaps northern Syria. Seeds have been found in Egyptian tombs dating from the 12 Dynasty (2400 B.C.), and there is also evidence of their cultivation as early as 6,000 B.C.
• Lentils are rich in protein and carbohydrates, and are a good source of calcium, phosphorus, iron and B vitamins. Lentils are found in various colors, white, green, red, yellow, brown, and orange, and are sold dried, like beans.

Alas, it’s time to move on to another food topic. As much as I love apples, I can’t have this food blog be too apple-centric. There’s too much food lovin’ and learnin’ to get to.

So we move to lentils(Lens culinaris medik), the democrats of the food set.

They were well known in ancient Greece as a poor man’s food. A popular saying applied to the nouveau riche at the time was “he doesn’t like lentils any more.” They are now known as a vegetarian’s food, being a good source for protein that one needs in order to, you know, live and stuff.

Lentils are seeds of an herbaceous plant, the “lens esulenta”, of the pulse vegetable family, characterised by a climbing, branchy stem, which reaches a height of approximately 50 cm and whose pods contain 2-3 round, squashed seeds like small coins.

Lentils are quite possibly the oldest cultivated lugume, having been around forever. Well, not for ever, but certainly were a major crop back in 6000 B.C. where they could be founf in the agriculture of Greece, Southern Bulgaria and Crete.By the Bronze Age they were known in Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Switzerland, Germany and even France. they also migrated east into India and China at a very early stage. The earliest finds of lentils in India have recently been discovered at the Neolithic site at Chirand in Bihar State dated between 2500 and 1800 B.C. It’s the bean(?) that allowed vegetarianism to thrive in India.

When you eat lentils, you are eating history.

Okay, that’s not true, but it certainly sounds catchy, eh? Perhaps the Lentil farming organization should use it in promotional materials.

Other Lentil slogans?
- Lentils. We’re sorry you can’t afford peas.
- Esau gave up his birthright for lentils. Shouldn’t you?
- Tofu is for wimps. Eat Lentils.
- 1 billion people can’t be wrong. Eat Lentils.

…but I digress.

Lentils are available throughout the year. They are classified according to their size, the color of the seed coat and the color of the inside. There are three common forms:

• large-seeded types with pale green seed coats
• Smaller types with darker seed coats (brown or nearly black)
• Small (frequently split) bright orange or red lentils from which the seed coat has been removed.

There are two basic types of lentil, both of which are grown worldwide, and which have been developed from ancient times. They are:

Chilean – a large-seeded type, e.g., Laird

Persian – a smaller-seeded type, e.g., Eston

Laird is a Chilean variety of lentil. It is considered by many lentil importers and consumers to be the prima donna of lentil. It is the most widely-grown variety, and is considered an extra-large seeded type, nd thus will be greener in color.

Eston is a Persian variety of lentil. Eston lentil is small-seeded and thus is more colorful.

From these two varieties, there are many sub-varieties.

One more Lentil slogan.

-Lentils. We’re sorry we’re not as tasty as apples.