Tofu Tibs Recipe

• tofu
• bell peppers (red, yellow, green)
• onion
• tomato
• bebere
• evoo

1. heat pan with evoo
2. cut tofu into strips
3. sprinkly a couple spoonfuls of berbere (if you have a girly tongue maybe 1 or 1/2 spoon)
4. cut peppers and onions into strips
5. cut tomato and rip out center
6. throw garlic and onions into pan and heat until onion is translucent
7. throw in tofu and give it some time to cook with onions and garlic
8. throw peppers in the pan and let them brown slightly
9. tomatoes in after a few minutes
10. Spice if you like with paprika, ground black pepper, salt, more berbere ;)
11. Serve on injera

My inspiration was what I had at Queen of Sheba in Atlanta pictured here:

Tikil Tofu

I made this this week after cooking up some habesha dishes and desiring something with tofu. It definitely added some color and made the dish more filling as well.

Ingredients

• a spoonful tikil gomen
• cubed tofu
• 1T evoo
• 1T berbere

Steps

1. Rub the tofu in berbere and then cube it
2. Throw the cubed tofu in a pan with evoo
3. After a few moments of sizzling throw in a spoonful of tikil gomen and spread it around
4. Once the tofu has a crispier exterior (or cooked to your content) remove from heat
5. Serve and enjoy

Oh-Ehm-Gee Curry Lentils

This is what I shall call this dish. OMG-curry lentils. I just had a bowl of it and I still want more.
Ever since Kim left back home, I've been craving Thai-Ethiopian food. I have 2 packets of curry paste - green and red. I was going to make some curry dishes for Kim, but never got around it, so I decided to use some of that curry and see waht I can make.

What came out was: OMG.

You will need:

- Lentils (some...lol!)
- Curry paste (I used the red. It looked less spicy by the ingredient list. I don't like spicy)
- Tomatoes
- Lime
- Cilantro
- Onions
- Salt
- Veg. oil

Boil "some" lentils. Until soft - just follow instructions. Once lentils are ready - drain them in a colander (I use the one with fine mesh to make sure all the water is out).
Heat up a flat skillet with some oil. Dice up onion and let it start cooking. Once the onions are almost done - throw on the lentils. Stir frequently, lower the heat - don't let the lentils burn.
Now the curry paste was tricky - it was very...pasty. I dropped just a half of teaspoon in there, and I could tell the taste is going to be phenomenal. I stirred and stirred until all of the paste got dispersed throughout the food.
Then I squeezed half-lime worth of lime juice. Threw some cilantro in and some salt.
Turn off the heat.
Dice up tomatoes, remove the mushy middles. Use roma tomatoes, or anything that's hard, basically. Dice up, and throw in. Let the tomatoes be cold, but the rest hot.



EAT!
I guarantee you will love it. Kim, let me know if you cannot find this kind of paste, and I will sent you some from here. Oh, and it does also taste a bit like Ethiopian food.

Tikil Gomen

This is actually one of my favorite yummies on the ole veggie platter at your local habesha restaurant. I was so excited to make it last night and even more excited to share it with you today. If you make it at home post a picture in the comments section or let me know how you liked it. I have never been an enormous fan of cabbage, but after this - I just may be.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 4 sliced carrots
• 1 onion
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 spoonfuls of berbere (if you dont have berbere you can substitute pepper, cumin, tumeric, and chili powder)
• 1/2 head of cabbage
• 5 potatoes cubed

Steps

1. Heat olive oil in large (i mean large) pot on medium heat
   
   
2. Add carrots and onions and cook for 5 minutes
    
   
3. Add spices and cabbage and cook for 20 minutes
    
   
4. Add potatoes
   
   
5. Cover and cook for another 30-40 minutes until potatoes are soft
   
   
6. I would continue to check on this pulling the juices up to the top with a spoon and moving the potatoes and veggies around
   
   
7. Once the potatoes are soft remove from heat
8. Serve on injera
9. Enjoy!

Misr Wot

In case you don't stalk all of my blogs, you may not know that my adorable hubby and I are adopting from ethiopia . In the process and to help our patience through the long wait to be matched with a child, we are learning what we can about the Ethiopian culture. And being fond of eating we are especially taken with Ethiopian foods. And myself being a vegetarian - and Ethiopian food being full of vegetarian options - it is definitely my new favorite food. The problem? Well we are saving every penny for the adoption and can't afford to visit queen of sheba every week. The solution? Learn to cook habesha (ethiopian) food ourselves! errr... myself... :)

Misr Wot is a pureed lentil spicy concoction. It is meant to be serves (as all ethiopian food) on injera. In this particular situation I had no injera so we used flatbread. I did have berbere (an ethiopian spice) but if you do not have it you can substitute pepper, cumin, tumeric, and chili powder or or order berbere here

Ingredients

• 1.5 cups red lentils (i used yellow and that worked too)
• 2 cups water
• 1 chopped onion
• 2 T olive oil
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 2 T berbere

Steps

1. cook lentils in 2 cups of water for about 30 mins on medium/low in a pot
   
   
2. saute onions and garlic in olive oil until transparent in pan
   
   
3. put in 2 T berbere and some water and mix around in pan
4. add lentils
   
   
5. cook and mush for another 30 mins on medium/low
6. continue to mush around and add water when it gets too sticky
   
   
7. after about 30 mins the lentils will have pretty much disintegrated and it will be done
8. you can add paprika if you want to deepen the color red
9. Serve on injera (or any flatbread type thing if you dont have injera)
10. Enjoy!
    

Injera and veggie sautee

This one is a left-over delight. I still have a bunch of Ethiopian injera left and I must say its great with pretty much anything. So I made myself some faux ethiopian food last night.

1 Injera
1/2 of a large tomato
1 slice of a large (red) Bell pepper
1/2 red onion
Salt/pepper to taste
Herbs

Pretty much any veggie you like

I usually start with peppers and onions, because those take longer to saute. Dice them up, throw them in a skillet with a little-bit of olive or veggie oil. Saute until they soften and "golden". The onions will start getting clear. Also, if you slow-cook them, they will taste much better.
Then throw in the softer veggies, diced. I usually scrape the seeds out of the tomatoes before dicing them up, to avoid the mushiness as much as I can. Also, if you are picky about the tomato skin (it peels once the tomatoes are cooking), then pr-peel them (you know how to do that right?).
Tomatoes don't need much time, watch for yellowing - if they yellow too much, they are done. Otherwise they become very sour and gross.
Then I just toss some herbs, salt, pepper, whatever else spices.

Then just dmp stuff on top your nicely-layed out injera, and you got yourself a delicious, veggie, and exotic dinner!