Empanadas, Green Lasagna, Iman Bayildi, Valentine Brownie

 Baked Salmon Florentine Empanadas
Not exactly a Latino filling, but hey! it was what Sally wanted for Valentine's Day Dinner!   The following made about a dozen empanadas.

2   7oz. Salmon Filets
4 oz.  Goat Cheese Crumbles
2 oz Feta Cheese Crumbles
1 box frozen, chopped Spinach
1/4 cup Pine Nuts
2 tsp Smoky Tomato Spice Blend or minced sundried tomatoes
1 package frozen Empanada 'skins'

Poach the salmon -- put the thawed filets in a pot of boiling water, bring back to a boil, turn the heat off, cover and set aside for 15 minutes.  Skin the fish and put the flaked meat in the freezer to chill for a few minutes.  

Thaw the spinach and squeeze it as dry as you can.  Toast the pine nuts.

Put the fish, spinach pine nuts and spice in a bowl, and using a fork break up the spinach and fish into small pieces.  Add the cheese and incorporate it into the mixture.

Bring the skins close to room temperature.  

Place 2-3 Tbsp of filling in the center of a skin, brush the edge with water and fold it up into a half moon.  

Pinch the edges together, lay the empanada down, and seal the edge with a fork.  Poke a fork-worth of holes in the upper surface, and place on a parchment paper covered baking sheet.

Repeat until you run out of skins or filling.   

Brush the tops with beaten egg.  Bake the empanadas at 400F for 20-30 minutes until golden brown, or a little less time if you like your empanadas to have a softer skin.

Serve with your choice of sauces, salsas or whatever you prefer.

Green Lasagna
This is one of those Forks over Knives recipes.  Not bad tasting, but so rich and unctuous!  Needs something sharp to give it some definition. 

As written by FOK, and shown below, the ingredients make only one-half of a 9x9 baking dish – NOT a whole 9x9 lasagna! Enough to serve four as a small main dish with a side salad or some such. Otherwise double up the ingredients and quadruple the amount of herbs and spices.

1/3 cup raw Cashews
6 dried whole wheat lasagna noodles !!! Ha! Ha!
4 Swiss Chard leaves, thick stems removed
8 oz. thin fresh Asparagus spears, trimmed (about 20 spears)
1-1/2 cups frozen Peas
8-oz. pkg. Sliced Cremini mushrooms
1-1/2 cups unsweetened, unflavored Plant-based Milk, such as almond, soy, cashew, or rice
1/3 cup Chickpea Flour
1 Tbsp Lemon juice
1 clove Garlic
½ tsp Black Pepper
¼ tsp Salt
¼ tsp grated Nutmeg

Preheat the oven to 375°F.

In a small bowl combine the cashews and boiling water to cover. Let stand, covered, 20 minutes; drain. Rinse and drain again. Reserve.

Meanwhile, cook pasta according to package directions. While noodles are boiling, use tongs to plunge the chard into the pasta water until wilted. Remove and drain. During the last 2 minutes of cooking pasta, add the asparagus and peas. Drain. Rinse. Separate noodles, asparagus, and peas.

In a skillet cook the mushrooms until browned.

To make the sauce, whisk together the milk and chickpea flour until smooth. Cook and stir just until bubbly, remove from the heat. In a food processor combine the soaked cashews, milk mixture, and the remaining ingredients. Cover, pulse, then puree.

Now it's time to layer. The original instructions call for you to put only two noodles side by side and build your stacks on that – that's what you see in my photos.   That is, only one half of any square 9x9 baking dish that I know of!  As I said, it was enough to feed the two of us and have a lunch leftover for Sally.

Basically layer noodles, sauce, half the mushrooms and the peas. Then noodles, more sauce, the chard and the remaining mushrooms. Lastly more noodles and the last of the sauce. Top with a layer of side-by-side asparagus spears as shown.   My advice?  Cut the asparagus into 1" lengths -- those spears look pretty by they're dang near impossible to cut through when laid up like that!

Bake, covered about 30 minutes until hot – 165F in the middle.

Iman Bayildi
A dish from the old Ottoman Empire.  Originally made with whole roasted eggplants stuffed with onion, garlic, tomatoes, and spices.  The version I learned years go is more of a stew --   with eggplant, lamb, onion, garlic and tomato.  I haven't made the dish since we've "gone pescatarian/vegetarian", so this version includes a sort of a faux-lamb made with Impossibletm Burger, the last half of a 1 pound package that I bought a couple weeks back. 

3 Chinese/Japanese Eggplant, sliced into 1/2" rounds
1/2 large Red Onion, sliced long and thin
8oz heirloom Cherry Tomatoes (about a dozen), halved
4 cloves Garlic, minced
8 oz.  bulk Impossible Burgertm or Boca Crumblestm
2 tsp Cavender's Seasoningtm
1-2 tsp ground Cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground Cloves
dash of Salt & Pepper and Sweet Paprika
10-12 Medjool Dates, halved

Brown and crumble the 'meat substitute' with the Cavender's seasoning in a splash of olive oil.  Reserve.  In a good amount of olive oil start cooking the eggplant rounds.  Dust them with some Cavender's and sweet paprika.  

After five minutes or so, toss the eggplant to get the other sides cooking, and add the onion and garlic.  Simmer for another 5-6 minutes, then add the tomatoes, spices and a cup or so of water.    Continue simmering until the eggplant is starting to break down.  Return the faux-meat to the pan, add the dates, and toss to combine. 

Simmer until the liquid is reduced at least by half, then serve. 

This is a really excellent use of a faux meat -- being fairly heavily spiced during cooking, it adds a real flavor element to the dish.  I've said before that Cavender's added to ground pork as it's cooking almost gives you the flavor of gyro meat.  Same thing here.

Raspberry Truffle Brownies
I was going to make a chocolate and something cake for Sally's Valentine's Day dinner.  But she decided she's like to try these instead.  From a FOK recipe that actually works "as is".  

4 oz Semi-sweet Chocolate, drops or chopped bar
½ cup Raspberry Jam
½ cup Cane Sugar
½ cup Unsweetened Applesauce
2 tsp Vanilla Extract
½ tsp Almond Extract
1½ cups Whole Wheat Flour
¼ cup Unsweetened Cocoa Powder
¼ tsp Baking Powder
½ tsp  Baking Soda
¼ tsp Salt
1 cup fresh Raspberries, separated and frozen on a tray at least overnight before using

Preheat the oven to 350ºF.
 
Line an 8 x 8 or 9x9 baking dish with parchment paper or use a  nonstick/silicone dish.

Melt the chocolate.  Set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk mix together the jam, sugar, and applesauce. Stir in the vanilla, almond extract, and the melted chocolate. Fold in the frozen raspberries.

Sift in the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Fold carefully (to avoid breaking up the frozen berries) until a stiff dough forms. 

Spread the mixture into the prepared pan. It will be very thick -- very thick! Use wet fingers to spread it out in the pan.

Bake for 16 to 18 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool completely. Especially good and fudgy after being refrigerated for a few hours.  Stays remarkably soft, not particularly "brownie-like", even uncovered in the fridge for two days.  

Delicious none the less!