My Sister's Favorite Cornmeal Blueberry Muffins

These muffins are my sister's favorite. My mom made them for us when we were kids, and Lil' C would Freak Out. I wish I could say I made them for her while she was here visiting, but I actually made them for R's friends from Norway. But if my sister had been here, she would have Freaked Out when she saw them in that uniquely little sister way of hers.

These are delicious, easy little muffins. Little in that I make them in the standard muffin pan, which in the days of huge over-sized bakery muffins, means you can eat at least two before you feel like you're being indulgent. Delicious in that the cornmeal gives them a wonderful texture and flavor normally missing from cakier versions. And easy.

Blueberry Cornmeal Muffins
Recipes comes straight from my mother

1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1.5 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup milk, or buttermilk if you have that on-hand
1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
2.5 cups blueberries
2 tablespoons firmly packed brown sugar (you can use light or dark depending on what's around), for sprinkling on top, so measuring isn't that important.

Preheat oven to 375 and grease two muffin-tins. You'll use about 1.5 tins, so fill the cups you don't use with water when you bake them so they don't warp. You can also use muffin papers in the cups.

In a large bowl, using an electric mixer set on high speed, beat the butter until it's light and fluffy. Gradually add the sugar, continuing to beat until light, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the vanilla, baking powder and salt.

Using a rubbers spatula, fold in half of the flour, then half of the milk. Repeat with the remaining flour, all of the cornmeal and the remaining milk. Then fold in the blueberries.

Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin cups, filling each cup about 2/3rds full. Try to evening distribute the blueberries as you portion out the batter. Sprinkle the brown sugar evenly over the tops of the muffins.

Bake until the muffins are golden and pass the toothpick test, about 35-40 minutes. Transfer the pans to a rack and let cool for 15 minutes before turning the muffins out on a rack. Eat.

White Chocolate and Raspberry Tart

By most accounts, I was a pretty good older sister. I mean, I think my lil' C is lucky to have me. I like to attribute much of her success in life to the way I raised her. (Didn't you hear? Turns out siblings might have more impact on the way they're raised than parents! And I think I did a pretty darn good job.) But, I mean, I caused some damage, too. For example, you remember all the mnemonic devices kids use to remember things. My sister and I always got 'desert' and 'dessert' mixed up, so my mother told us that 'dessert' has two S's because it's 'So Sweet.' I immediately told my sister that actually, it was 'desert' with two S's because it stood for 'Sand Storm.' To this day lil' C has to stop and think about which is which, and even her best childhood friend remembers being confused about it as a result. (They got me back by ripping all the heads off my Barbies in an effort to find a more efficient way to change their outfits.)

Anyway, this little tart is definitely both dessert and So Sweet. Decadently so, in fact. I let R choose something for his birthday (which admittedly was a while ago) and to my surprise, out of a book dedicated to chocolate, he picked something mostly white, and mostly dairy. Granted, he's not the cookbook reader that I am, so I'm pretty sure he just saw the picture and pointed, without even reading the ingredients (imagine!).

The recipe comes from a thin little paperback put out by the Women's Institute in the UK (I have kind of a love-crush on these books lately). I've written about them before, if you want to know more. Suffice it to say, both things I've made from their books so far have turned out. Plus, there's just something about the British that's hard to resist!

White Chocolate & Raspberry Tart
Adapted from Sîan Cook's Best Kept Secrets of the Women's Institute: Chocolate

Pastry:
6 oz all-purpose flour
2 oz cocoa powder plus more for decorating
4 oz unsalted butter, diced into small pieces
4 oz caster or superfine sugar (if you can't find it, just use the same amount of sugar and give it a wizz in a food processor to make it superfine)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg yolk

For the Filling:
2 tablespoons or more (I went with more) raspberry jam
8 oz fresh raspberries plus more for decorating

For the Topping:
2 teaspoons gelatin powder
200g of cream cheese
200g of crème fraîche
200g of plain Greek yogurt
7 oz (200g) white chocolate, melted

Start with the pastry:
Sift the flour and cocoa together into a large bowl. Add the butter and rub it into the flour mixture until it resembled breadcrumbs. Mix in the sugar then add the vanilla and the egg yolk. Add about 1 tablespoon of cold water and knead until the mixture comes together like a dough. Wrap well and refrigerate for an hour.

When you remove the pastry, allow it to warm a bit at room temperature. In the meantime, sprinkle a clean surface and a rolling pin with a little cocoa powder and powdered sugar (or just cocoa powder). Roll out the pastry dough so that it will fit a greased 10" tart pan with a removable bottom. Transfer the pastry into the tin and trim off any excess, which you can use for patching if needed. Press the dough so that it fits the pan, then prick it all over with a fork to allow air to escape while it bakes. Return to the refrigerator for another hour.

Preheat the oven to 350F just before the pastry comes out of the fridge. Line the pastry in the tin with a sheet of parchment paper and fill with dried beans to keep it from puffing. Bake for 15 minutes, remove the beans and paper and bake for a further 10 minutes. Allow the cooked pastry to cool on a wire rack in the tin.

For the filling:
Sprinkle the gelatin over 2 tablespoons of cold water in a microwave safe bowl and let sit for a moment. Dissolve the gelatin by microwaving the bowl on high for 20 seconds. Set aside and allow to cool.

In the meantime, thoroughly beat together the cream cheese, crème fraîche and yogurt. Add the gelatin as you beat, then fold in the melted white chocolate. Mix well.

Once the pastry is completely cool, spread it with a layer of raspberry jam and a layer of fresh raspberries. Mound the white chocolate mixture on top and spread it so it completely covers the raspberries. Chill until set.

Before serving, sprinkle some cocoa powder over the top if you wish, and decorate with more fresh raspberries.

James Beard's White Free-Form Loaf

"Good bread is the most fundamentally satisfying of all foods; and good bread with fresh butter, the greatest of feasts." So says James Beard, that uniquely American food writer, in the introduction to his book dedicated to the most basic of food groups. (Bread is its own food group, right? I mean, seriously. Staff of life and all that.) Even in the 1950s he was lamenting the "spongy, plasticized, tasteless breads, presliced, doctored with nutrients and preservatives" that lined grocery store shelves. I make it a practice not to knock prepared bread, since I realize not everyone has the time or urge to make a sponge, leave it overnight, add in more flour, kneed it, leave it to rise, punch it down, leave it to rise, punch it down and form it, and leave it to rise yet again. So if you're not into bread because you just don't want to, no judgments here.

However, if you're not into bread because you're afraid, we need to have a talk. Bread? Not that hard. Seriously, and I would admit it to you if it were. I'd say, 'see this loaf? It was so very, very difficult, but I did it anyway. I hope you're impressed.' But I won't, because it wasn't. Bread, like everything else, is just about following steps and saving the task for a day during which you'll be able to occasionally check in and give it a good smack down. I've failed at a lot of thing in the kitchen. Things that are supposed to be easy and basic. For example, I have yet to cook rice that doesn't slightly burn at the bottom. But I haven't yet failed with bread. Maybe because bread is so good that it's good almost no matter what.

But anyway, this is an easy loaf, and it doesn't require any machines. It doesn't even require a tin, since it's free-form and you just kind of mound it on a baking sheet. James Beard does suggest lining your oven with tiles, by which he means unglazed quarry tiles, which act as baking stones. I have yet to find them in NYC, but they're supposed to be inexpensive and magical. I did, however, have a pan I could fill with boiling water and place in the bottom of the oven to help with that great crust. So here it is, a basic loaf from a quintessential food lover.

By the way, I'm sending this over to Wild Yeast for Yeastspotting because, yumm, Yeastspotting. Check it out!

James Beard's White Free-Form Loaf
Adopted from Beard on Bread

Day 1: Make the Sponge

2 packages active dry yeast (it's more afraid of you than you are of it!)
1/2 cup warm water (just warm to the touch, not too hot, That's about 100-115F)
2 cups flour, King Arthur is good for bread, or get dedicated bread flour if you can find it
3/4 to 1 cup water, more or less

Put the warm water into a large mixing bowl and dissolve the yeast in it. Let the yeast proof, which means it should kind of bubble, for a few minutes. Next start adding the flour along with enough water so that it's quite a soft dough. Mix the sponge well so that everything is Incorporated, then cover it with cling-wrap and refrigerate it for one to two nights.

Day 2: Make the Bread

3 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 cups flour, plus 1/2 cup or more for kneading
1 tablespoon coarse salt (kosher, for example)
Cornmeal for spreading on the baking sheet

Remove the sponge from the refrigerator, punch it down (it will be sticky, don't worry about it) and place it back in its large mixing bowl. Combine the 2 cups of flour and the salt and set aside for a moment. Add the oil, and then gradually add the buttermilk and the flour mixture as you mix. You'll end up with a soft, sticky dough.

Flour a clean surface and turn the dough out onto it. This is where that extra 1/2 cup flour comes in. Knead the dough for about 1o minutes, adding more flour as you do so that it get less sticky as you go. Do this until the dough is smooth, elastic and bounces back when pushed on.

Oil a large bowl and put the dough inside. Turn the dough around in the bowl so that it becomes coated with the oil. Let the dough rise until doubled, about 1.5-2 hours, maybe more. Put the dough back on a floured surface, and knead again for another 2-3 minutes, adding more flour if needed. Place it back in the bowl and allow to rise a second time, about 1 to 1 1/4 hours, until doubled again.

Punch the dough down one more time, and let it rest for 2-3 minutes while you get the baking sheet ready. Just spread some of the cornmeal on the ungreased baking sheet, actually. Shape the loaf into an oval and put it on the sheet. Let it rise in a warm place one more time for 1-2 hours. It might spread a little, but that's why we call it free-form.

When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 425F and get a pan of water boiling. Brush the loaf gently with cold water and make a few 1/2" deep slashed in the top without deflating it. Let it rest for one final 5 minute period. Place the boiling water on the bottom rack of the oven, and the bread on its baking sheet on the upper rack. Right away, lower the oven temperature to 375F and bake for 20 minutes. Brush the loaf again with cold water and continue baking for 40-50 more minutes. The bread should be browned and hollow sounding when tapped. Cool completely before slicing and serving.

Kale, Sausage and White Bean Stew

You know what's fun? When you slave over a big pot of delicious stew (and by 'slave over' I mean slap together in about 45 minutes including cooking time) and your husband says something like, 'this soup is delicious, especially this sausage. I love the sausage.' But you can't take credit for the sausage because, like I said, this is a 45 minute deal, not a stuff-your-own-sausage deal. In other words, you bought the sausage, and it's the only thing you can't really take credit for.

Then again, who the heck cares, because this soup is wonderful and fast and perfect for autumn. Oh, and speaking of autumn? Pancha (the pup) just comes back to life in the autumn, after the heaviness of summer starts to lift and she can breath again without panting. Want proof? Here we are in Central Park having a sniff around in the grass.

Oh, and speaking of Central Park? Nothing better than Central Park in the fall.

So anyway, this soup was originally meant to be made with escarole, a green, as the yellow Gourmet Cookbook says, that looks like a head of lettuce but is actually in the endive family. It's in season now, and supposedly not hard to find at a well-stocked grocery store. And if I had a well-stocked grocery store nearby, this very well could have ended up being an Escarole, Sausage and White Bean Stew. But I make a point not to go running all over the city for specific kinds of greens. Especially not when the idea behind the stew is fast and easy. Kind of defeats the purpose.

So this stew ended up being made with kale instead. Since I love kale. I mean, I love it with all of my heart. It's perhaps my favorite green in the whole wide world. And in my opinion, you cannot beat the deep, jewel-like green of the kale simmering away in this soup. If you were ambitious, you could use dried beans soaked overnight and cooked. In all honesty, dried beans are so far superior to the canned kind that they really should be used when possible. But come on, this is the real world here, and if someone judges you for using canned beans, they need to find a more interesting hobby. Like running all over the city looking for escarole.

Kale, Sausage and White Bean Stew
Adopted from The Gourmet Cookbook (the yellow one)

Oil for the pan
1 pound Italian sausage, sweet or hot, whichever kind you like, cut into 1-inch pieces
5 large cloves of garlic, passed through a press
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes, more or less depending on how you're feeling about it
1 bunch kale, the leaves broken into 2-inch peaces and removed from the tough center ribs
3 cups cooked or canned white beans (great northern, navy etc). If you use canned, please rinse them. That goopy canned stuff is gross.
3 cups chicken or vegetable stock
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano, and extra for serving
2 medium tomatoes, diced (don't bother skinning)
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
Salt and pepper to taste

Heat the oil in a deep 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat. The oil should shimmer when it moves around the pan, but not be at the point of smoking. Add the sausage and brown on all sides for 7 - 10 minutes. Add the garlic and red pepper flakes and continue to cook and stir under the garlic and softened and fragrant, about 2 minutes more. Add the kale and stir until it's wilted, about 2 more minutes. Add the beans, keep on stirring, and cooking for 1 more minute.

Add the stock and bring the liquid to a gentle boil. Next stir in the butter, cheese, tomatoes and half of the parsley until the butter is melted and everything is heated. Season with salt and pepper, and serve with a sprinkling of Parmesan cheese and the rest of the parsley.

Plum and Cardamom Compote for Yogurt or Ice Cream

It's plum season! Plum season, plum season, how I love you plum season. (You should probably be reading that with a rhythm, or even a little melody. I find children's songs are good to commandeer when you want to sing a little ditty about plums.) Anyway, for the last two years I've been making German plum cakes every Autumn. And how I love my German plum cakes, this one especially, which is an heirloom recipe passed down through my family from my great-grandmother who immigrated to the US from Germany way back when. If you haven't tried it yet, it's been getting great reviews, at least from readers who report back. Gotta love that.

But this post isn't about German plum cake at all. It's not about German anything. It's about a compote I found in a little soft-cover from the series Best-Kept Secrets of the Women's Institute. The Women's Institute, at least according to their website, was founded in 1915 with the aim of invigorating rural communities and encouraging women in their endeavours to produce food during World War One. They're now the largest women's organization in the UK. So, that's pretty cool. If you've been reading around here for any length of time, you might have picked up on the fact that I'm pretty pro-women in general. I mean, we are pretty great, after all. And I think it's important that we all support each other. Don't worry, I'm not going to get any more soap boxy than that. Back to the compote.

It comes from the book Puddings & Desserts, which, as I said, is part of the Best-Kept Secrets series. And y'all? (I'm totally not even Southern, but I hate the practice of saying 'you guys' no matter the audience.) This stuff is good. It is so good. It's good enough to eat with a spoon, which you'll probably end up doing if you pour it over ice cream or yogurt. But I mean, it's good enough to eat by itself with a spoon. And it takes advantage of the beautiful plums now in season, and it doesn't take that long, and it's not much effort at all. Originally it was meant for that very English dessert, the fool. But I don't really tend to have custard around, so I just poured it on Greek yogurt. Easy.

Plum & Cardamom Compote for Yogurt or Ice Cream
Adopted from Sîan Cook's Best-Kept Secrets of the Women's Institute: Puddings & Desserts

1 3/4 lbs ripe purple plums, stone removed
4 oz caster sugar (caster sugar is superfine sugar. If you don't have it on hand, just whizz regular white sugar in a food processor for a few seconds, which will help it to dissolve quickly and completely)
3 cardamom pods (Indian grocery stores are a good place to look for whole cardamom pods)
3 tablespoons fresh orange juice
Plenty of Greek yogurt or ice cream

With a mortar and pestle, crush the cardamom pods until you can remove the seeds from the shell. Discard the shells and continue to crush the seeds until they're pretty well crushed.

Put the plums, cardamom seeds, orange juice and sugar into a saucepan and bring the mixture to a boil. Turn the heat down to a simmer, cover, and cook it gently for at least 30 minutes. The plums should be cooked and very soft.

Strain the plums into a bowl and set aside. Allow the fruit to cool as you return the juices to the heat and bring them up to a boil. Reduce the liquid for about 3-4 minutes, until you have about 3 tablespoons left.

Put the plums and the reduced liquid into a blender, and blend until very well puréed. Chill in the refrigerator for at least an hour. It will continue to thicken as it cools. Serve over ice cream or yogurt.

Nutella Swirl Pound Cake

I really like the idea of unexpected guests dropping by unannounced. And of me throwing my hands into the air and thinking, whatever will I feed these rogue guests who didn't even give me enough time to bake them a cake? The unannounced guest. It's almost a cliche at this point, when you're trying to drive home the point that whatever you're describing is easy to make and will surely satisfy: "this is the perfect thing to have in your arsenal for the unexpected guest." But seriously. If you drop by unannounced, you're probably going to get a class of water and whatever fruit I happen to have lying around. Or we'll just go to that great little French place down the street and order crepes. Easy and sure to satisfy.

But if you give me a little time, and perhaps hint that you'd like something sweet and blog-worthy (the blog-worthy part always gets me), then you might be lucky enough to get something like this. A luscious pound cake with a ribbon of Nutella running through, appearing when you slice it like the sly smile of someone who just shows up and expects cake. The nerve.

The recipe comes from Lauren Chattman's great little book "Cake Keeper Cakes" which specializes in the kinds of simple baked goods that can sit on your counter, under a glass cake keeper dome, waiting for people to pass by and sneak crumbs off the sides.

Nutella Swirl Pound Cake
Adopted from Lauren Chattman's Cake Keeper Cakes

4 large eggs, at room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 13oz jar Nutella, although you may not use quite all of it, I didn't. Not quite.

Oven preheated to 325F. Grease or spray a 9x5" loaf pan (grease it well), sprinkle with a little flour and set aside.

Lightly beat the eggs and vanilla together and set aside. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt, and set that aside as well.

In the bowl of your mixer (standing or hand-held), cream the butter and sugar on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy. This should take about 3 minutes. You'll probably need to scrape down the sides of the bowl a couple of times with a spatula.

Turn the mixer to medium-low speed, then pour the egg mixture in, in a slow stream. Chattman recommends a glass measuring cup for this. Turn the mixer down once more to slow, and add the flour mixture about 1/2 cup at a time, scraping down the sides as necessary After the last addition, mix for 30 seconds more. This last step is important, as it gives a structure to the batter, which, I think, helps it to support the Nutella.

Pour 1/3 of the batter into the prepared pan, smooth it out, then layer 1/2 of the Nutella on top of that. Pour another 1/3 of the batter over the Nutella, then the final layer of Nutella, and ending with the final 1/3 of the batter. Plunge a butter knife into the batter and run it through in order to create the swirl.

Bake on the center wrack of the oven for about 1 hour and 15 minutes, until the cake is golden and it passes the toothpick test. Let it cool for about 15 minutes in the pan, then invert it twice (so that it's right side up) onto a wire wrack and let cool completely.

NOTE: The bottom layer of the Nutella sank down into the crust, and from the picture in the book, and reviews of this recipe I've read, this is not an experience unique to me. I also don't think it's anything to worry about, but you've been warned.

Jill Dupleix's Crash-Hot Potatoes

So here's the thing about being married to a Norwegian. He flippin' loves potatoes. No seriously, I have never seen anyone love potatoes that much. For him, it's not a real meal without them, so I guess we eat a lot of non-meals around here. I, on the other hand, tend to kind of forget about the potato unless I find those amazing little purple ones at the store, and then I think to myself, why in the world are those potatoes purple? And keep moving. The potato, in other words, is not my go-to food.

But I've had this recipe in the back of my mind for a while. After I first saw it on the Pioneer Woman who has kind of commandeered them. But they're Jill Dupleix's idea, and her recipe. If you're in the US, you might not be all that familiar with Dupleix. She's an Australian food writer, with a monthly column in the food magazine Americans only wish we could get, called Delicious. In fact, whenever I travel internationally, or go to a book store with a large magazine selection, I always look for Delicious as a special treat. Love that magazine. And Dupleix writes a monthly column for them.

So Dupleix has written her fair share of cookbooks, but this recipe can be found easily on her website. They are amazing little potatoes. A cross between the tenderness of a baked potato and the crispiness of a french fry, but with very little fat. Actually, it's quite genius. Genius enough to even impress a Norwegian.

Adapted from Jill Dupleix's Crash Hot Potatoes

16 small, round potatoes
Drizzle of extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
fresh ground black pepper
A sprinkle of caraway seeds if you'd like (I did)
A few rosemary sprigs, broken into pieces

Preheat the oven to 450F (yea, screaming hot). Put the unpeeled potatoes into a pot of salted, boiling water and simmer them for about 15 minutes. They should be tender enough to take a fork, but not falling apart. Make sure they're not overly soft.

Drain the potatoes and spread them out on a lightly oiled baking sheet. Use a potato masher, and press down on each potato until it's flat. It should be about twice its original size.

Brush the potatoes with olive oil, sprinkle with salt, pepper and the caraway seeds, then lay the rosemary over the tops. Bake on the top shelf of the oven for 20 - 25 minutes, or until they're very crisp and golden brown. Serve right away.

Lentil Chili Burgers

So let's say you made Mollie (with an "ie") Katzen's Lentil Chili, like I did the other night. But let's also say that you live in a family of two and didn't bother cutting the recipe down. You might be thinking, what in the world should I do with all of that chili? I've learned to admit to myself that things which end up in the freezer tend to stay in the freezer until out of desperation I throw them away. So freezing's out (although Katzen does say the chili freezes beautifully). Eating lentil chili for every meal for the entire rest of the week is also out because nothing is good three times a day.

What to do, what to do... Here's a hint. Remember when I complained that whenever I deal with lentils they suck up all water with which they come into contact, making it difficult for me to keep them in a soup or stew? Well if you have a similar problem, you can take your greedy little lentils which have soaked up all of their broth, and make them into pre-seasoned, already cooked burger patties. Genius. You can even include the tomato and onion chunks. Here's how you do it.

Lentil Chili Burgers
Original Recipe, or at least, original idea

2 1/2 cups leftover Lentil Chili, which has absorbed all of its liquid
3/4 cups rolled oats
3/4 cups bread crumbs, I used panko, but if you make your own, use them
Fixings for burgers, you know the drill

Give your rolled oats a wizz in the food processor to grind them. Combine the ground rolled oats, the bread crumbs and the lentils. Use your hands to form the lentil mixture into nice round patties.

Heat a pan over medium, then pour in a little olive oil to coat. Place each lentil patty in the pan and cook on each side for 1-2 minutes, depending on how hot it is. Remove and serve, maybe with a bun, tomato and lettuce, or plain with some A1 sauce. (I'm a sucker for A1 sauce.)

Mollie Katzen's Lentil Chili

It's autumn officially now I believe. The last day of September, or perhaps by the time I publish this post, the first of October. Kids are back in school, I'm back in school, I might even be TA'ing for some of your older kids if they happen to go to a certain university. If I am, sorry for not giving out very many 'check pluses' on the last response paper. Best of all, my favorite TV shows are back. My beloved Bones (I love Dr Brennan so friggin much), my also-beloved Criminal Minds (I love Garcia so friggin much), even Glee (oh Sue, I love you too). Basically, if you have a compelling female character (or three! I'm looking at you CM, at least I was before I finished this last episode. What the heck?!) I probably love you. Helps me pare down tv shows pretty quickly, unfortunately. But that's how I roll. Love the leading ladies.

So between watching great TV, working on my dissertation, and grading your little darlings' papers, I also have a part-time job. And in the middle of the day while at that part-time job, I get to have a lunch break. A real, honest to goodness lunch break, the way adult people do. So sometimes I get a salad, sometimes a sandwich, and often I get a bowl of lentil chili. Which made me think, 'why in the world am I buying lentil chili when I could just make it?' Enter Mollie (with an "ie") Katzen.

This is her lentil chili, but I have some caveats. First: there just never seems to be enough liquid whenever I deal with lentils. Maybe mine are particularly thirsty? Or just greedy? Either way, I added far more liquid than she required, and still the chili was bordering on a lentil mash rather than a stew. I'm going to reproduce the recipe I actually made below, but in the future, these are the things I would do differently:
* Cut the amount of lentils in half
* Keep the liquid the same, the tomatoes the same and probably the seasonings about the same, but you'd have to adjust them to your taste.
* Same amount of onion, too, since I love onion.

Mollie Katzen's Lentil Chili
Adopted from Mollie Katzen's Still Life with Menu Cookbook

4 cups dried lentils (any kind, really)
2 cups tomato juice (can replace with just water if you want)
4 - 5 cups water
1 1lb can tomatoes, undrained, but broken up (which you can do with your spoon once they're in the chili)
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
10-12 medium garlic cloves (don't worry, it's not overpowering)
1 largish onion, chopped
2 teaspoons salt
Pepper to taste
6 tablespoons tomato paste
1-2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
Crushed red pepper, to taste

Put the lentils, the tomato juice and 4 cups of water into a large pot or dutch oven. Bring the liquid to a boil, then put the lid on only slightly askew so some of the steam can escape. Lower the heat and simmer for about 30 minutes. Start chopping your vegetables.

Add the tomatoes, cumin, paprika, thyme, garlic and onions. Stir until everything is combined, then return the lid to the position it was in before and simmer for another 45 minutes, and up to an hour, if that's what it takes for the lentils to become tender. Stir occasionally, scraping along the bottom of the pot to prevent sticking. If you notice the water level going down too much, add some more.

Add the salt, pepper and tomato paste and stir again. Continue simmering until the lentils are very soft, maybe even 30 minutes more.

Just before serving, stir in the vinegar and red pepper. Adjust the seasonings if necessary and heap into big bowls.

UPDATE: Have lots of leftover chili? You could try this idea for turning your leftovers into Lentil Chili Burgers!