Spinach Ricotta Pie with Homemade Ricotta Cheese

This week we prepared a dish from the Moosewood Cookbook.  This spinach ricotta pie is similar to a quiche, but with more ricotta than eggs.  The recipe calls for one pound of ricotta cheese, so we decided to experiment in making our own cheese for the first time.  It was surprisingly easy, although you do have to own a cheesecloth.  If you don't want to take the time to make your own ricotta, this recipe still tastes delicious with store-bought cheese.  Next time we're thinking about using goat's milk in the cheese, for a little more flavor.

How to make Homemade Ricotta:  There are simple instructions on this website:
http://www.recipegirl.com/2010/05/17/how-to-make-ricotta-cheese/

Ricotta Cheese

Ingredients for the Spinach Ricotta Pie are available here, on Mollie Katzen's website:

http://www.molliekatzen.com/recipes/recipe.php?recipe=ricotta

spread sour cream to the corners of the pie

dust with paprika

Rosemary Focaccia and Black Bean Bell Pepper Soup

Although it's April, Bellingham still has a few stormy days in store.  To combat the rain, we made some warm comfort food: hearty black bean and bell pepper soup with lots of toppings, and very easy rosemary focaccia bread.

Black Bean Bell Pepper Soup


Ingredients:
1 medium onion, diced

4 cloves garlic, crushed

1 red bell pepper, diced

1 anaheim pepper, diced
cilantro leaves, roughly chopped

1 chipotle pepper (canned), minced

3 cans black beans, drained but not rinsed

1 can crushed tomatoes with green chiles

1 cup chicken broth (or vegetable broth)

salt and pepper

olive oil

turmeric
cayenne pepper

lemon juice from ½ lemon

Fry onions at medium heat in olive oil until translucent; add turmeric.  Add garlic, anaheim and bell peppers and sauté.


Add chicken broth, black beans, and salt and pepper to taste.  Simmer and stir in chipotle pepper, lemon juice and cayenne.  Both chipotle peppers and cayenne can be very spicy, so it's up to you how you want to balance these two spices.  Allow the soup to simmer and thicken, covered, for about a half an hour.  Before serving, stir in fresh cilantro leaves.

Top with:

Cilantro, sliced and salted avocado, grated cheddar cheese, and sour cream.

Rosemary Focaccia

For the focaccia, we cheated a bit and used a bread maker to prepare the dough.  If you have a bread maker, this is really simple: follow your bread maker's directions for preparing pizza dough.  Ours called for:
1 1/8 c. warm water
1 1/2 tbs. olive oil
1 1/2 tsp. salt
3 1/3 c. all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. sugar
1 1/2 tsp. yeast

While the dough is rising (it takes about an hour), you have plenty of time to cook the black bean soup.  When the dough is ready, sprinkle with cornmeal and spread it across a pizza stone or pizza pan to about 1/2 inch thickness.  

Press indentations into the dough with your fingers, and drizzle the dough with olive oil.  Sprinkle with dried rosemary and salt (we think ground salt crystals taste the best on this, and Trader Joe's pink salt looks pretty!)

Let the dough rise for 20 minutes.  Bake at 400 degrees until golden brown.  Enjoy!