Here’s something fun for the summer that is based mostly on ingredients indigenous to the Americas, as well as ingredients which are relatively low-impact in terms of carbon emissions and water use. I mostly cook by sight (sorry), so use proportions to taste.
Steph Tai
Ingredients
Dumplings
- Store-bought Asian dumpling wrappers
- Dried red lentils (soaked at least four hours)
- Finely diced onions
- Finely diced garlic
- Finely diced tomatoes
- Sunflower oil
- Allspice
- Chili powder (at your preferred spice level)
- Salt
Pesto
- Dandelion greens
- Sunflower seeds
- Lemon juice
- Salt
- Olive oil
Preparation
- Boil the soaked red lentils for at least 20 minutes (or until tender), and then cool.
- Sauté the onions and garlic in sunflower oil until browned, then add tomatoes and continue to brown until the consistency is a light paste.
- Add the red lentils and mix with allspice, chili powder, and salt, and continue to brown until the texture is not too wet for a dumpling filler.
- Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F and grease a baking sheet.
- To make each dumpling, use your fingers to brush the edges of each dumpling wrapper with water. Then, put some of the lentil filling into the dumpling and fold and form a half circle. Crimp the edges to help the wrapper stick together. Repeat for each dumpling.
- Either lightly toss the dumplings in sunflower oil or use spray sunflower oil.
- Put the dumplings on the baking sheet and bake at 325 degrees F on one side for 10 minutes, and then flip and bake for another 15 minutes (this may vary with your oven, so really just watch until both sides are browned).
- For the pesto, lightly blanch the dandelion greens (about 15 seconds at most in boiling water). Remove, drain, then puree in a food processor with sunflower seeds, lemon juice, salt, and olive oil to taste.