Jill Murray

I got called ‘vegan anarchist’ at work last week, and actually, I was OK with that.

Soon after, a couple of opportunities to express my veganism and my anarchism arose.

The first was a “anything but Halloween” party, where guests were asked to dress for any day or holiday of the year, except Halloween. So I quickly painted the slogans “WORKERS OF THE WORLD, AWAKEN!” and “DUMP THE BOSSES OFF YOUR BACKS” on a cardboard sign made from pizza boxes and went as an anarcho-syndicalist flavour of Labour Day. It was a great party, and people were alternately amused and confused by my sign and festively proletarian uniform of jeans, blue shirt, grey hoodie, otherwise known as “what I wear every day”. It was also a wet party, because it poured that night, and my stubborn (or in this example, anti-bourgeois) refusal to ride in cabs combined with my lack of rain boots to produce dripping-wet pants from the knees down. And thusly, a need for soup was born.

Simultanously, in another part of the world– Boston & The PPK Forums– Isa Chandra Moskowitz was contemplating the need for a vegan adaptation of NaNoWriMo– National Novel Writing Month– a kind of contest where people try to write a whole novel in one month, and it’s competitive, and there’s a whole online community thing they check into for motivation and such. Isa was considering something along the lines of “make something new and write about it every day” or somesuch, and people started trying to come up with rules for it.

And that’s about the time I veered off to do my own ornary thing with the idea, which I actually really needed, because while every month is novel writing month here at JillMurray.com, cooking and the good eating that goes with it have been on a steady decline since June, when the Overwork Campaign kicked into swing. So I’m just going to start now instead of waiting until November, and I’m not going to promise to cook every day, let alone make something new, but I will do one cooking-real-food related thing every day, and I will write about it when I have somthing to say, probably weekly. Deal?

So yesterday, I got to go to the market, where local carrots and leeks were plentifully available, souper-cheap. I had a particular creamy carrot & leek soup recipe in mind, but once I started cooking, I decided I wanted something heartier, with more protein, that ate more like I meal. So I added lentils and skipped the puréeing step, and I have to say, the result was magic. So tasty and warm and just a little bit spicy with the curry powder. Totally perfect for late october. And it was really easy, so ’nuff said, I think you should make some.

The Recipe:

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon oil
• 1 medium onion, chooped coarsely
• 1 pound carrots, chopped
• 2 large leeks, sliced in half lengthwise, cleaned, then chopped
• 5 cloves garlic
• 1 tablespoon fresh ginger, grated
• 2 tablespoon curry powder, medium-spicy
• 1 cup green lentils, picked-over
• 6 cups water or vegetable stock
• 1 dash salt, optional

Directions

1. Sautee the onion in a large soup pot over medium heat while washing the carrots.
2. Chop carrots into 1/4″ to 1/2″ rounds and add to onions. Stir. Let them sautee while washing the leeks.
3. Cut off the root and the thick leafy green part of the leek, leaving only the tender white part. Cut in half. Remove outer layer. Wash. Chop into 1/4″ to 1/2″ half rounds. Add to pot. Sautee while preparing garlic.
4. Peel and coarsely mince garlic. Add to pot. Sautee while preparing ginger.
5. Peel and grate ginger. Add to pot. Sautee until leeks are tender. (Carrots should still be slightly firm.)
6. Add curry powder and stir so vegatables are evenly covered with curry powder.
7. Add lentils and 6 cups water or vegetable stock. Cover and bring to a boil. Then reduce heat to low and simmer until lentils are tender.
8. Add salt to taste. If you are using a vegetable broth that is already salted, this may not bee neccessary.

If you use Master Chef or Mac Gourmet, you can download the recipe here to save yourself some typing. Just right click, save, then import:

• MacGourmet
• MasterChef MXP
• MasterChef Mac