Now You're Cooking! - Complimentary Protein Way to Go

Complimentary Protein Way to Go

By Jane Weston Wilson

At summer’s end, entertaining can still be savored. Last weekend sitting around the porch table with my friends Virginia and Michael, we watched sparrows by the dozen and squawky blue jays at the large bird feeder, and two buttercup yellow finch at their own smaller feeder.

As Michael was scarfing down my black bean salad at our amply laid table he said, “I just love beans and rice, and they are so, so satisfying. I could eat them everyday.” When I was growing-up, beans and rice were rarely served together. After all, meat and dairy were the mainstays of the American diet and our central source of protein. The fact that rice and beans, which provide complimentary protein, deliver the same protein power as meat and dairy, somehow escaped our knowledge to connect the two.

Diet for a Small Planet by Frances Moore Lappe changed all that when it was published in1971 changed all that.  This 26 year old baby boomer, who described herself as "toiling away at The University of California Berkeley in their downstairs library and typing at home on her Corona," was writing what was to become the book that changed not only the way we would eat, but we would learn through her meticulous research and dedication that feeding the world was not the problem, but the distribution of food in what she called the "seven myths of scarcity." Over the next 30 years her foundation Food First has had global outreach.  She has also written 15 books while her first book sold 3 million copies.

Her daughter, Anna Lappe, at 26 told her mother that it was time to write a new diet for a small planet for her generation. Hope’s Edge: The Next Diet For a Small Planet, published in 2002 was the result. Together they visited five continents. “What they discovered were practical visionaries who were making a difference in world hunger for some one village at a time.”  There is also a splendid recipe section to cook from.

Anna Lappe has since followed in the path of her activist mother. She has written two books Diet for a Hot Planet: The Climate Crises At The End Of Your Fork and What You Can Do About It, and Grub: Ideas For An Urban Organic Kitchen. Her website is www.eatgrub.org. 

I would be happy to start up a version of Grub as a once a month supper club for our Aging in Action members where we can share our interest in the connection of food, politics and life or what a university in Austin, Texas calls their group. “Changing the world one potluck at a time."

To join Grub, send an email to: aginginactionuws@gmail.com.

Recipes for Red Lentil Dahl and Basmati Rice follow here.

My experience with grains and beans in almost any variation steadies me and centers me, more than anything else I eat. My neighbor Liz agrees, so between us we take turns making our favorite Dahl and Basmati combination every week.

Red Lentil Dahl
Red lentils cook more quickly than beans, and Basmati rice cooks more quickly that most other rice. It takes only about 20 minutes.

Ingredients:
1 cup red lentils, thoroughly washed
5 cups boiling water or vegetable broth
2 Tab olive oil
2 tsp cumin
2 tsp curry
1 Tab fresh ginger, peeled and sliced thin with a vegetable peeler
3 scallions peeled and sliced in 1-inch cylinders
1 tomato, peeled and finely diced
2 Tab Lemon juice
1/4 cup cilantro, washed and finely chopped
 
Procedure:
1. In a 5-quart pot place lentils and boiling water, lower flame.
2. Skim lentils, let them cook gently over low to medium heat until water is almost absorbed, yet still a soft, soup-like texture.
3. In a medium size sauté pan, add olive oil, cumin and curry, stir.
4. Add ginger, scallions and sauté about 5 minutes.
5. Add tomato and lemon juice, cook about 2 minutes, add to lentils.
6. Remove from fire, serve immediately or cool and refrigerate.
7. At serving time, add chopped cilantro.

Basmati Rice
Serves 4

Ingredients:
1 cup Basmati rice washed and rinsed at least 5 times.
1 3/4 cups boiling water
1 Tab butter or oil 
1 Tab ginger, or fresh ginger peeled and sliced thin with a vegetable peeler
1 tsp coriander

Procedure:
1. In a 4 quart pot add oil, ginger and coriander, stir well.
2. Add rice.
3. Add boiling water, cover, cook over medium heat about 15 minutes, stir with a fork.
4. Turn off heat, let sit 10 minutes. Fork again so it does not clump.
5. Serve with Red Lentil Dahl.