Chickpea Artichoke Rice with Lambsquarter Greens

This is a hearty brown rice dish featuring protein-rich chickpeas, tasty artichoke, savory herbs and spices, wild-foraged lambsquarter greens, and a dash of zingy fresh lemon. Hands-off and great for a weeknight meal, this is a healthy and delicious way to introduce picky eaters to brown rice and foraged greens (or spinach!)

Do you ever forage for wild plants? I really love to incorporate treasures from our backyard in our meals and each year I try to include more. We have an abundance in our woods that offer themselves at various times of the year. Highbush cranberries, red currants, horsetail, many wild edible flowers, bolete mushrooms, spruce tips, fiddlehead ferns, chickweed, wild raspberries, and lambsquarter. These are just a few; Alaska has so much to give!

I remember foraging lambsquarter with my grandmother and eating it. “Tastes like spinach!”, she used to say. And she was right, it does taste like a mild spinach. It’s very recognizable and has a white powdery substance that coats it. Anything you forage should be washed well and of course it’s vital to be absolutely 100% sure you know what you are picking.

If you’re not able to harvest any wild greens where you are, spinach will work just beautifully in this dish or feel free to just omit the greens completely if you prefer.

What kinds of things do you forage?

Chickpea Artichoke Rice with Lambsquarter Greens

By Kathleen Henry - Produce On Parade

This is a hearty brown rice dish featuring protein-rich chickpeas, tasty artichoke, savory herbs and spices, wild-foraged lambsquarter greens, and a dash of zingy fresh lemon. Hands-off and great for a weeknight meal, this is a healthy and delicious way to introduce picky eaters to brown rice and foraged greens (or spinach!)

Ingredients

• 1 cup uncooked long-grain brown rice
• 1 15 oz can diced tomatoes
• 2 cups + 2 tbsp (thereabouts) vegetable broth
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 small brown onion, diced small
• 2 large garlic cloves, minced
• ½ tbsp paprika
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• ½ tsp dried oregano
• ½ tsp seasoning or table salt
• dash of white pepper
• 1 15 oz can chickpeas, drained
• 1 15 oz can quartered artichoke hearts, drained
• 1 cup unpacked foraged lambsquarters leaves or spinach
• 2 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
• ½ lemon, zested and juiced

Instructions

1. Add the dry rice to a rice cooker. Drain the diced tomatoes, reserving the juice in a liquid measuring cup; add in enough vegetable broth to equal 2 ¼ cups of total liquid (for me this was about 2 cups and 2 tbsp of broth). Add to dry rice, and cook according to your rice cooker. Brown rice takes about 1 hour to cook.
2. While the rice cooks, heat the oil over medium-low heat in a large rimmed frying pan. Add the onion and garlic, sauteing for about 5-8 minutes until the onions are translucent. Stir in the spices, herbs, salt and pepper; cook for an additional 2 minutes.
3. Stir in the chickpeas and artichokes; simmer over low heat for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat and cover; allow to rest until rice is cooked.
4. Wash the greens well. When the rice is done cooking add the greens to the pan and stir until wilted. Add in the rice, parsley, and lemon juice and zest; stir well to combine.
5. Serve hot and topped with additional parsley and lemon zest if you like.

Prep time: 5 minutes
Cook time: 1 hour 5 minutes
Total time: 1 hour 10 minutes
Yield: 4

Wild Blueberry Crisp

“Become loyal to your innermost truth. Follow the way when all others abandon it. Walk the path of your own heart. ”

— Unknown

I made this crisp a few days ago, with the blueberries leftover from last year's late harvest. If you want to see exactly where my berries came from see this post from last year, and this one from last week. There's some gorgeous Alaskan photos!

I'm not at all ashamed to admit that I ate half this pan of crisp the day I made it, and the other half the next day. This is why I don't post a lot of dessert recipes on the blog, in case you ever wondered. Dreams of this crisp still fill my head at night.

I'm staunchly anti-cobbler. Not sure why, really. You know how sometimes you just plain and simple don't like something when you know you should but you just don't. It's like that. I'm the same way with root beer floats and donuts. Every few years I will try a root beer float to see if I'll like it. Nope. Still hatin' on them for 20 straight years. Crisp is far superior to cobbler in every way. 

However, crisp can be a very fastidious and personal dessert. It might not seem that way with regards to how easy it is to throw to together, I know what you're thinking. But some people like it dry, and some like it soupy and sloppy (like me). Some like it sweet, and some not-so-sweet. I love the tartness of a little lemon juice to cut through the flavors, but others won't have it. It really depends on your preference.

Then there's the ice cream debate. I'm in the no-ice-cream crowd. Ice cream should be consumed all on it's own...in my opinion. 

To make thing worse, berry crisp can have a dramatically different texture if made with frozen berries or non-frozen. A different flavor, if using supermarket berries or wild. Whether the berries are super ripe and sweet, or underripe and tart will influence the taste. And finally, whether or not the berries are juicy will affect the amount of liquid in the crisp. Yep, it can definitely be a roll of the dice sometimes. 

Let's be real for a second though. Blueberries, maple syrup, oats, butter, pecans, and spices all mixed together will never ever be a bad thing, no matter how it turns out. You need this delightful end-of-summer crisp. There's even a little flax thrown in. Vegans are obsessed with flax. 

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Wild Blueberry Crisp

by Katie @ Produce on Parade August-15-2014

A fresh, wild blueberry crisp with lemon, maple syrup, flax, and pecans. You won't be able to resist it's deliciousness!

Ingredients

• Non-stick cooking spray
• 1 lb. 4 oz. frozen, wild blueberries (keep frozen)
• 3 Tbsp. ground flax seed, divided
• 2 Tbsp. maple syrup
• 1 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
• ½ tsp. vanilla extract
• ½ cup whole wheat white flour
• ½ cup packed brown sugar
• ½ cup old-fashioned rolled oats, dry
• ¼ cup whole pecans
• ¼ tsp. kosher salt
• ¼ tsp. ground cinnamon
• dash of freshly ground nutmeg
• ¼ cup chilled vegan butter, rough chopped

Instructions

Spray an 8x8 inch square glass baking dish with a nonstick cooking spray and preheat oven to 375 F.In a large bowl, add the frozen blueberries through and including the vanilla, using 2 Tbsp. of the ground flax. Mix well and spread evenly in the baking dish.In a food processor, add the flour through and including the nutmeg, using the remaining 1 Tbsp. of the ground flax. Pulse a few times to mix. Now, add the butter and pulse several times until it resembles a coarse meal and the butter chunks are no bigger than a pea size. Spread the mixture over the berries evenly.Bake in the oven for 40 minutes. I like to place a baking sheet under the crisp in case it boils over, but it rarely happens. Remove from the oven when the liquid is boiling around the edges and the top is browned.Once done, allow to rest for 10 minutes. This is very important, especially if you’ve got a soupier crisp. In addition, the leftovers will firm up quite a bit. Serve warm.

Details

Prep time: 10 mins Cook time: 40 mins Total time: 50 mins Yield: 6

After half a pan of bluberry crisp on a dark and blustery evening, it felt right to just lay in bed and read. #noshame

German Word of The Day

Blueberry --> Heidelbeere (Highdel-bearah)

Good Deed of The Day

This is absolutely heartbreaking. Palm oil producers are poisoning pygmy elephants. Help take a stand. Call on the Prime Minister of Malaysia to protect the unique wildlife and stop the further destruction of rainforests, and restore the forest corridors to allow elephants to wander their remaining habitat. As a consumer, vote with your fork. Stop contributing to these monstrosities by refusing to buy products with palm oil. Many peanut butters, butter spreads, and snacking chips along with many other food products contain palm oil. 

What Do Vegans Bring Backpacking?

“To the lover of wilderness, Alaska is one of the most wonderful countries in the world.”

— John Muir

John had it right. If you haven't had the profound pleasure of visiting Alaska, come on up already! And when you make it up here, give us a holler, we'll show you around.

Blueberry picking is my favorite thing ever.  Period. I cannot put into words how deeply I yearn to go on our adventures to pluck those juicy, sweet little orbs. It's on par with Christmas. For real. That magical feeling swells and swirls in my heartstrings in anticipation of mid-August when the blueberries are ripe and perfect. I think about it all year long. 

Vegan + Prius = Level 100 Eco-Hippy. 

We like to pick our berries up at Sheep Mountain, in solitude. It's a vast place that's dominated mostly by four-wheeling hunters (Boo! #sorrynotsorry), but never really see anyone. People aren't generally backpacking where we go. Reason number one, the water situation is less than ideal. I mean, we got water, but we had to bushwhack the same amount of time we actually spent hiking up to our campsite. Reason number two, stupid four-wheeler noises in the distance day and night. Reason number three, it's out of the way. Way out of the way. 

On the plus side, there's lots of berries. The night before, we dehydrated a noodle recipe that I unfortunately wasn't able to document and do a post on. Maybe next week? But, I can give you some insight into what foods vegans bring backpacking. Or, at least the kinds of things that Todd and myself bring. Here's what we brought on this trip. Maybe it will give you some ideas!

• 2 servings of homemade, dehydrated Teriyaki Pasta
• 1 bag of falafel chips
• 1 tub of hummus
• 4 Prime Meatless Jerky strips
• 2 Nutz over Chocolate Luna Bars
• 2 Fruit Leathers
• 1/2 Endangered Species dark chocolate bar
• 1 box of Hot Tamale candies
• 2 servings of homemade oatmeal packets
• fresh blueberries picked for our oatmeal
• 2 Starbucks Via coffee packets
• 1 single serving Silk Very Vanilla soy milk
• 1 single serving almond milk caramel latte
• water
• small concentrated Crystal Light bottle (in case you filter some funky tasting water, it happens)
• snacks for the road trip up included Annie's Chocolate Bunny Grahams, Original Sun Chips, Gatorade, Monster Energy Drinks (don't judge), and Justin's dark peanut butter cups.

Our backpacking adventures may or may not also kind of be a junk food adventure as well. We don't eat a lot of processed foods at home and so when backpacking, we tend to go a bit crazy.

It can be heavy and cumbersome to bring fresh fruits and veggies, ensuring that they are properly prepared and packaged so they don't get damaged. I did try to bring some fresh foods. Okay, so I bought some apples...that we left at home....

In case you're wondering, yep, Bob has his own pack. It's the best thing ever. Also, please don't judge me based on this photo. I am just now realizing how absurd I look.

I know you're not supposed to cook next to your tent (I did work at REI afterall), but it was super windy we we got to the top and at that very spot on the right of the tent, was the only place of calmness. 

Regrettably, we were a bit early on the bluebs. Next week they'll be perfect. I only picked a small amount, until I finally felt bad and quit. Some bushes had ripe berries, a few were totally green, but most were somewhere in between and I felt pretty guilty picking them. 

Last year we went super late (not really thinking of picking berries) and hit the motherload up at this spot. However, a lot of the berries were seriously past their prime and tasted fermented almost! See last years trip in this post.

Bob did a little doggy meditating in the sun the next morning, when the wind was gone. I almost brought my yoga mat, but I only had my heavy one at home. It would have been a most epic yoga practice though!

Todd snapped some early morning pics while I was still sleeping in the tent with Bob. There's a few more fun photos on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter that you won't want to miss. Like the time we had to eat with twigs...#mybad.

Yep, I think it's settled that we'll be heading up there again very soon. I can hear those little blueberries calling my name! Bob can too.