Tempeh? Absoluteleh!

Heh – forgive the title.  This was my first attempt at cooking tempeh – I don’t eat a lot of meat, but need to keep my protein up, so I’m trying to break out of the tofu rut and experiment!  I started out with a funky grainy block of soy, and ended up with a pretty yummy meal.  We had plenty of bok choy from our farm share to use, so I developed this dish…

Rice, pasta, any grain – I used the new Trader Joe’s Mixed Grain blend, with orzo, mini garbanzo beans (!) and quinoa

about 2 cloves garlic – again, I used the bizarre one-clove heads they sell at TJs, and used about 1/2 of that

fresh ginger and turmeric

1 package tempeh, diced to bite-sized pieces

about 3 Tbsp tamari or soy sauce

1 large head bok choy, or other leafy green

pepper to taste, cilantro to sprinkle

I had mixed luck when trying the TJ’s grain blend on the stove the other day, so I tried it in the rice cooker this time and it turned out great – a nice basic compliment to the salty dish.  Heat some olive oil in a large skillet or wok and saute the garlic until golden.  Grate the ginger and turmeric (added bonus: yellow fingers!) and add to the pan.  Once you start to smell the flavors, add the tempeh and tamari and saute until the tempeh is browned nicely.  Add the bok choy stems and cook until almost tender, then add the leaves and cover.  In about 2 minutes, you’ll have a steamy mixture – it’s at this point that I started to hear “Man, that smells good” from the living room. 

I seasoned this with a little pepper and fresh cilantro from the garden, and spooned it out on top of a big bowl of grains and had a really good one-dish meal – I realize that I’m setting up a bit of a pattern… grain, protein, greens – I’ll have to break out of that this weekend and try something different.  These are often my favorite go-to dinners, though – easy, healthy and delicious.  A little of this stuff went a long way because the tempeh is such a dense addition, so we had leftovers for days!  Well, since Chris just had dental work, I had leftovers for days, and he had soup and juice for days.