More Curry for Kids: Meatless Cookbook Recommendation

 As we are still raving about our O Mango experience from the weekend, I decided to put a curry dish on the menu for the week. I took the reciepe from my current favorite cookbook, Peas and Thank You: Simple Meatless Meals the Whole Family Will Love by Sarah Matheny. I grabbed it from the library shelves a few weeks ago, enamored by a healthy-foods cookbook written by a mom with two little kids and filled with pictures of both the recipes and the little food testers with ingredients (and other things) smeared on the faces. I have made quite a few things from this gem recently. Last night's entree was "Curry in a Hurry." It was a delight. Chopping any veggie dish takes time, but it wins points for the number of raw vegetables the kids eat before sitting down to dinner as they walk through the kitchen. Anna, the carrot eater, delights in grabbing a whole long carrot any time she can. I'm still surprised that little William likes strips of sweet peppers, but he certainly does. Erik was going to have a carrot, too, until he changed his mind and went for an apple instead. Guess I can't complain. Jamieson walked in the door and said, "It smells great in here!" The main challenge was keeping everyone from grazing on the tofu and cashews everyone sat down. 

This meal was essentially veggies in a curry coconut-milk and spice sauce. (I don't even like coconut, but the flavor was all gentle spice and veggie -- no coconut.) It was served over brown rice and topped with the broiled tofu and cashews, the drizzled with fresh lime juice. Another kid eating surprise: William and Anna really like eating lots of brown rice. It goes over better than the white rice, which is a very good thing. I had to dash off to choir practice before eating much of the dinner, so I can also report that this reheats very well at a later time. 

Bringing the dog in from her evening "out" before bedtime, Jamieson again commented on the curry smell in the house. That's a good thing in his book. He also said there's a taste difference in cooking with curry as opposed to just sprinkling it on the food, which he often does since he likes a hotter curry than the rest of us. I could only say that this recipe called for cooking the curry in the pan till it became aromatic before returning the sauted veggies to the pan. That wasn't something we had done before but it worked well. 

                           Veggies a-cookin'                                

Curry, ready for eating complete with yummy marinaded & broiled tofu

Other recipes from this book that we have enjoyed have included bean burgers, teriyaki tofu, tempeh chili and an amazing falafe and tzatziki sauce, which topped my previous from-scratch falafel. The kids still mostly love eating the pita breads on falafel night but they have learned to enjoy the flavors of the tzatziki and tahini sauces. There are quite a few more recipes that I'm looking forward to trying, including a lot of mouthwatering desserts, as well as a follow-up cookbook by the same author. As long as the recipes or cookbooks have a tone than respects the reality of cooking for a family, I find the eating in a healthy way really is a bit of a fun adventure. Who knew?