All the small things

So I was thinking in order to help me keep the posts going, I'm just going to post even all the small things going on in life. I used to just want to post big-picture things and thoughts, but that will just stop me from posting. So here we go...

So when I drove back to Fullerton, after the Christmas break, I went to stock up on groceries. I like to cook as much as I can to kind of control what food I'm putting in my body, and just to minimize the amount of money I spend eating out. Over the break, I had some lentil soup at Outlanders in SF (44th and Judah). My friend was saying that lentils are super cheap and a good grad student food. All I knew about lentils were that they are good for you and you often find them in curries in Indian and African (Ethiopian food). Turns out lentils are legumes (beans) and are high in protein.

Following my friend's advice, I looked up recipes on lentil stew. I adapted the recipe from all recipes ) Lentil Stew).



Lentil Stew
3 medium potatoes, cubed
1 (14 oz) can, diced tomatoes
1 medium onion, chopped
1 tablespoon, minced garlic
~1 lb of pork sausage
1 small can of tomato paste
~1/2 cup of frozen veggies (corn, carrots, peas)
8 oz. of lentils
salt, pepper, basil to taste
several slices of jalapenos (with seeds) to spice it up

Directions
1. Place the potatoes, tomatoes, onion, garlic, tomato paste, jalapenos, frozen veggies in a large pot and add enough water to cover the top, and heat until boiling. Let the water boil for about 20 min.
2. Cook the sausage in a separate pan, when meat is almost all well done add meat to pot that is set to boil.
3. Stir lentils into the pot, add more water if necessary. Bring to a boil and reduce heat to medium, and let boil for another 20 minutes while stirring occasionally.

Notes
- I cooked the sausage separately to minimize additional oil added to stew
- Skim the foam from the stew during boiling period
- Other cooks noted that the stew tasted better the next day or if there was more simmering time. I let the stew sit in a hot pot for about 4-5 hours.
- Serving size depends on the amount of water you use. I tried to cut the recipe in half and it was still a lot of stew.

This is something I would make again, and possibly try to perfect just because it's nice to have a hearty stew during the winter months. I'll try to post a picture when I can take a nice one.