Day 135 - Porcini-Wild Rice Soup, Mediterranean-Style Baked Lima Beans, and Whole Wheat Soda Bread with Millet and Currants

This was a banner day! I have to confess, I've been feeling a little ambivalent about this project. Yes, there have been major hits, but there have been misses too. Some I take full responsibility for, and some I blame on sloppy editing or merely tastes that don't line up with mine. But today... today was a game changer. I am reinspired!


First, I had Ryan over for some bread tasting (and home improvements). And then Marcy came for dinner. Double whammy!


Whole Wheat Soda Bread with Millet and Currants 

I do love a good soda bread, although I was skeptical that one could achieve a decent result with no buttermilk or cream. I also enjoy millet in baked goods. And currants. So this recipe held promise.

You'll want to start the millet cooking process well in advance of baking because it does take a while for the millet to cool down to room temperature, partially covered.

Once the millet is ready, the assembling of the ingredients is pretty simple and straightforward. I got my pastry cutter out again, and this time, I resisted mincing it to death. I went ahead and used a cake pan, although the instructions for using a cast iron pot intrigued me.

Confession: I had a lot going on while I was making this, and I missed a big step: the brushing of the top with soy milk, before and during baking. While I'm sure the top of the bread would have had a nice gloss, vs. the matte version you see pictured here, I'd like to believe there was no sacrifice in flavor or texture of the bread itself.

As for the end result, it was excellent! Possibly even an improvement on previous traditional (read "non vegan") soda breads. While a dry, crumbly soda bread might be the norm, I welcomed the moistness of this one. It was full of flavor and had a great texture, and dairy was not missed at all! Great recipe!

SFO: 10

Porcini-Wild Rice Soup

First of all, I would like it to be known that I did go on a mission for fresh chervil for the garnish for this soup, and I came up short. I have come across chervil in local markets on occasion, but the couple of times I've gone looking for it, no such luck. Ah well, parsley it is.

This is a terrific soup recipe, enhanced by my newfound favorite commercial vegetable broth, namely Whole Foods 365 Organic. This doesn't really make sense, but the end result of this recipe is a soup that can only be described as beefy. Crazy, right? I guess it's all that umami-ness in the porcini mushrooms. This soup tasted so complex and fabulous that we couldn't believe our taste buds! That last flash of grated carrots is a really nice touch. I've never seen that before. I like!

SFO: 10+
This gets a plus because it's a vegan soup that is completely convincing as beef-based.


Mediterranean-Style Baked Lima Beans

Lima beans are the main cause of my childhood bean-o-phobia (first runner up being baked beans), so I haven't been excited about the lima bean recipes. But I know Marcy has a special fondness for Gigantes, which are gigantic lima beans cooked in this traditionally Greek way, so I figured now is just as good a time as any to get this first lima bean recipe out of the way.

Cut to... 

Oh! My! God! This is possibly my favorite recipe in the book so far! 

First of all, the beans. I purchased a plain old bag of Goya-brand Large Lima Beans, and I wondered if they'd be the right ones because they just don't look that big in the bag. But after a night of soaking, they are appropriately gigante. And once cooked, they hold their shape beautifully. I didn't taste one before adding them to the sauce and baking them, but in the end, they taste AMAZING! Almost sweet! I'm hooked!!

And then, the sauce. Quite a few components to manage, but the extra work is so worth it. The sauce is perfection. Salty, tangy, unctuous, herby, slightly sweet. Heaven!

I really can't say enough about this recipe - it is magical!

SFO: 10
This is a perfect way to erase any "lima bean baggage" (as I+T have named it). Irresistible.