Cookbook Challenge Week 1: Veganomicon - Recipes #2 & 3
The Recipes: Broccoli-Millet Croquettes (p 51) and White Bean Aioli (p 62)
The Reasoning: Big bag of broccoli sitting in the refrigerator. I'm not a big fan of steamed broccoli. As far as the aioli, I see no reason to explain anything filled with garlic. It's almost always a good idea.
The Substitutions: Sit down...don't pass out. No substitutions on either recipe!
The Process: The croquettes would have been a lot more labor intensive without the food processor. Some days, I think I'd die without my food processor. I chopped the broccoli the day before and made the millet broccoli mixture in the morning in between showering/dressing/having breakfast. When I came home from church it was all cool and ready to make the croquettes. As the recipe warned, I must not have cooked the millet quite enough. The mixture was a little dry so the croquettes were falling apart in the pan. I ran a little water over and reformed the ones for the second pan full and they held together much better. I was also trying to skimp on the oil, so a little more oil helped. With, a thawed package of beans from my freezer and my handy-dandy food processor, the aioli was easy.
The Review: Besides being a little crumbly, the croquettes were really good. I'm guessing just because they were fried in oil, they were a little reminiscent of fancy tater tots to me (can you tell I don't eat much fried food?). They were crunchy on the outside and soft inside. I think I want to try to bake them next time.
The aioli was fabulous. I thought 6 cloves of garlic was going to be way too much. But for the garlic lover in me, it is perfect. It is some of the creamiest bean dip I have ever had. I have a feeling that I will be making it to go on everything soon. Served with roasted asparagus and roasted red/orange bell peppers (also dipped in aioli), 3 croquettes and 1/4 cup of aioli was a nice meal for lunch. When I ate leftovers for breakfast this morning without the vegetables, I was hungry pretty quickly after the 3 croquettes and aioli - must add some raw tomatoes/carrots/etc for a breakfast if it's gonna get me through the morning.
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Points information - 3 croquettes with 1/4 cup of aioli=8 points. I lost track of exactly how much oil I was using in the pan, but that's close. I figure if I bake them, it will be 4 croquettes with 1/4 cup aioli=8 points.
This is not figured or endorsed by Weight Watchers. I figured the points value myself using an online point calculator.
6 comments:
Those croquettes look amazing! I like your cookbook challenge idea.
Wowsers, they look fantastic, I am going to make 'em. I can't believe I have missed half the VCon week already.
It's not too late! The challenge is just to do 3 recipes per week from each book and there are several days left this week.
Can you tell I skim read the original post on the ppk, if it's only 3 recipes that should be easy enough, thanks!
I haven't made these yet! I think it's one of those recipes I look at and feel suddenly lazy :P I really need to make them though because I adore broccoli and they look amazing!
haha, Veg. Me too, and then I realized it's basically like making polenta or better yet the millet polenta from VWAV. I make that all the time.
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