Today is one of those chilly, grey and rainy autumn days here in Ithaca.  It is a common theme in upstate New York as summer ends. The perfect day to laze about the house, and to catch up on reading. With the cold and damp weather outside, I found myself wanting to make something warm and comforting for lunch. I flipped through my little cookbook and came across a recipe for sour brown lentils. It looked simple enough to make, and I already had everything I needed. I used canned brown lentils instead of dried, but the original recipe describes soaking and then cooking them in a separate pot.  I think using canned lentils made everything come together faster with canned, but it might taste better with dried.

The best part about today being Saturday is that Mr. EastHill Vegan is home all day. Good excuse for making lunch together, not something we do often enough. While I was making the lentils, and Field Roast frankfurters, my S.O. steamed some cauliflower, and made a delicious pesto.  True to his style of cooking, he didn’t bother with chopping, but steamed the cauliflower as one piece.  The pesto is made with cashews, lemon juice and of course basil.  Everything went together wonderfully, and really hit the spot.  The lentils had a nice creamy texture, with a slightly tart flavor.

Recipe

• 1 15oz can brown lentils or about 1 cup dried lentils, cooked in veggie broth.
• 1 onion
• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 tbsp flour
• 1 cup red wine
• 3 tbsp red wine vinegar
• 2 tsp liquid smoke
• 2 tsp dried thyme
• freshly ground pepper

Directions

Peel and finely chop the onion.  Saute the onion with a dash of salt until soft.  Sprinkle with flour and continue to cook until browned.  Add the wine, vinegar, liquid smoke, and lentils, simmer until most of the liquid is evaporated.  Season with thyme, pepper as desired.