Monthly Blog Patrol-April: One Pot Wonders

Coffee of The Spice Cafe has decided to pass on the baton for hosting her Monthly Blog Patrol aka MBP event because of her work commitments. So I'm going to be your guest host for this April's edition of MBP and the theme for this month is One Pot Wonders.

With the hectic schedules all of us keep, one pot meal ideas are a must to have in our culinary repertoire. So for this month, hop around the blogosphere, find your favorite one pot meal, cook it and post it on your blog.

Here are the rules:

• One Pot Meal should be made in only One Pot. It could be a soup, pasta dish, rice dish or even a dessert. You might even want to also use a crock pot or a slow cooker.
  
• Make your favorite one-pot meal from fellow blogger (it definitely has to be from a fellow blogger, not from any other cooking site.)
• Post a picture of the final recipe on your blog linking it to the parent blogger (whose recipe you made) . You can either post just the final picture or the entire recipe. You might want to highlight the changes/ substitutions you made to the original recipe. One final picture and a link to the original recipe is a must.

To send in your entry for the event:

• Email me at cookshideout@gmail.com with your
• Name
• Blog Name & URL
  
• Entry Name & URL
  
• Parent Recipe's URL
• No need to send the pic (I'll get that from your post)

• Any number of entires are allowed from one blogger.
• Deadline for the event is April 25th.

Thank you Coffee for this opportunity.

Tofu and Broccoli Fried Rice

It has been a little hectic getting used to the baby’s daycare and my work schedule. It is going to be even more hectic for the next couple of weeks with my husband off on a business trip. I’m taking it one day at a time. I generally think of at least 2-3 weeknight meals ahead of time. But now I leave it to my little prince to think and decide what mommy should do.

Yesterday he was very cooperative and slept on his way back from day care. I let him sleep in his car seat and started prepping for my fried rice. Well I couldn’t complete the whole dish before he woke, but at least it gave me a head start. I made some extra pesto for a future meal in the next two weeks. Recipe is from here.

This is how I made it:
Ingredients:
For the Asian Pesto:
Ginger – 2” piece, chopped
Garlic – 3-4 cloves
Cilantro – 1 ½ cups, roughly chopped
Raw peanuts – ½ cup
Red chili flakes – ½ tsp
Sugar – 1tsp
Soy sauce – 5tbsp
Rice vinegar – 1tsp
Toasted sesame oil – 2 tbsp
Onion – 3 tbsp chopped (I used half of a very small onion)

Other Ingredients:
Cooked Brown Rice - 3 cups
Extra firm Tofu – ½ of 16 oz. block, cubed
Onion – small, thinly sliced
Broccoli – 1 bunch, cut into florets (about 3cups),
Carrots – 2 medium, chopped
Frozen shelled edamame – ½ cup
Salt and Pepper – to taste

Method:

• Grind the pesto ingredients to a smooth paste with very little water.
  
• Microwave broccoli, carrot and edamame with little water till tender but not mushy.
  
• Heat 1tbsp oil in a pan, add tofu and stir fry till they turn golden brown. Add the boiled veggies, ¼ cup pesto and brown rice. Mix well, season with salt and pepper. Enjoy!!
  

* I think the Asian pesto would taste good in any stir-fry as well.

* I left my veggies in the mw for a little longer than I wanted and my broccoli completely mushed up on me when I added to the rice (you can see that in the pic). Well, right now I’m just glad that I’m having my dinner without hearing the baby cry in the background.