#LovePulses
May 5, 2016 5:13 PM   Subscribe

Did you know that 2016 is the International Year of Pulses? Better not miss all the fun!

Enjoy some delicious pulses and celebrate a low-cost, versatile, high-protein foodstuff with your own personal Pulse Fest at home (for example, try these chickpea cutlets at your next pulse-themed party.) Look back on past years, or begin planning now for other International Years of Whatever!

Related.Related.
posted by blnkfrnk (26 comments total) 18 users marked this as a favorite
 
How appropriate. I just made a big pot of lentil soup for dinner. I was celebrating without even knowing that I was celebrating. Woot!
posted by Splunge at 5:19 PM on May 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Can this be a thread where we share our favorite recipes? I'll start.
1.5 cups lentils
.75 cups brown rice
5.25 cups water
1 teaspoon salt
1-3 onions
Swirl some olive oil in a pan with a lid (I use a big saute pan) over medium heat. Add rice and let it toast a little. Add lentils, salt, and water, stir and turn heat up to high.
Once it boils, turn it to a gentle simmer and set the timer for 45 minutes. Put the lid on, but stir every once in a while. While it cooks, slice up the onions and caramelize them in another pan. After 45 minutes, stir the onions into the rice/lentils. Serve with cheese, yogurt, or sour cream to top it. This dish is incredibly tasty and filling, but very unattractive - my husband and I call it "glop".
posted by skycrashesdown at 5:24 PM on May 5, 2016 [6 favorites]


I was secretly hoping it would become a recipe thread. I'm also pretty excited about pulses, not gonna lie.
posted by blnkfrnk at 5:27 PM on May 5, 2016


I've been living the Pulse dream since January 1st - Hopping John of course.
posted by Ashwagandha at 5:34 PM on May 5, 2016


I'm cooking lentils & spinach right now! For once I'm not behind the curve!

(And, yes, I had Hopping John on 1/1 too)
posted by moonmilk at 5:39 PM on May 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I learned a new word from this post; looking up "pulses" on google. I have made lentil and other dried bean soups but did not know the word "pulse" before seeing it here. Hope more recipes will follow.
posted by mermayd at 5:40 PM on May 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


I love a lentil, DID YOU KNOW that Canada is the world's largest exporter of lentils? You do now, and there's no escaping that knowledge. I just made a part of your brain be about lentils.
posted by the uncomplicated soups of my childhood at 5:40 PM on May 5, 2016 [9 favorites]


skycrashesdown, I make something pretty similar all the time except I usually add sliced-up smoked sausage, and I haven't done the caramelized onions, an oversight I shall remedy at the next cooking. I parcel it out into small containers and grab one from the fridge on my way out the door to work and heat it up for lunch. It has become known in my office as "Kat's People Chow," but "glop" is another excellent name.
posted by Kat Allison at 5:41 PM on May 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


Puts finger to wrist: mmmmmm, delicious!
posted by grumpybear69 at 5:41 PM on May 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


ha ha joke's on you, my brain is already 10% lentils
posted by BungaDunga at 5:41 PM on May 5, 2016 [5 favorites]


Two of my favorite pulse recipes are: Yellow Split Pea Dal from Mollie Katzen's Still Life With Menu, and Red Lentil Dal with Coconut Milk from Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone. Served over rice with a salad on the side, they're a tasty, filling, inexpensive meal. They also are perfect "make on Sunday, portion, and freeze, for a week's worth of meals" recipes.

Pulses are a cornerstone of frugal, easy-to-make, filling and nutritious eating!
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 5:50 PM on May 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Fun thing: you can make fritters exactly the same as falafel using cooked lentils instead of chickpeas. Lentil hummus-ish too!
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 5:53 PM on May 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


I made Korean bean sprouts side dish for dinner tonight, so yay #teampulses! Probably not what you usually think of when you think pulses, but it counts, right?
posted by drlith at 5:56 PM on May 5, 2016




Kushari

Mujadarah

Khichdi

And although I'm pretty sure buckwheat isn't counted as a pulse, kasha varnishkes
posted by 43rdAnd9th at 7:04 PM on May 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


I love love love roasted chickpeas. As in I go through a can or two a week. I roast 'em in the oven with olive oil and a little salt. Or olive oil and ranch dressing packet. Or oil and a little Cajun spice mix. Or some coconut oil or honey and some cinnamon around Xmas. Since they lose crispness a little fast I'll throw them in the dehydrator sometimes, especially if I'm taking them backpacking. I also love what I call lazy hummus, when I put some canned chickpeas (washed with the skins off), olive oil, lemon juice, and a wee bit of chopped garlic all together in a jar, shake the hell out of it, and then just eat it with a spoon or throw it on top of spinach or whatever.

But as much as I love pulses at home, THE TRAIL is where pulses are to be devoured. I'd say between 75-90% of my backpacking recipes have some kind of pulse as their base, particularly chickpeas and lentils. I have various kinds of trail hummus which, dehydrated, are just so excellent by themselves, on some spinach tortillas or pitas if weight's not a problem, and don't need to be heated up - just add water. So great for lunch or for not getting out the stove! I'm particularly fond of hummus on tomato chips. For the last few months I've been experimenting, trying to make logan bread or bannock bread with chickpea flour - almost there, not quite.

Let us also celebrate the humble pulse as wonderful for crop rotation due to their nitrogen fixing abilities which are great additions for soil!
posted by barchan at 7:07 PM on May 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Another fun fact! If you like profiteroles but have celiac, substituting chickpea flour 1:1 by weight in a choux recipe works fine! (Better in savoury applications for the most part.)
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 7:21 PM on May 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


Lately, I've been trying recipes from the official Saskatchewan pulse-farmer producer group's cookbooks.
Saskatchewan Pulse Growers, which is funded by a check-off deduction pulse farmers pay every time they sell pulses, has a Canada-wide marketing campaign promoting lentils, peas, chickpeas and beans. In addition to the lentils website, there are print cookbooks, they do school visits and education, they have a celebrity chef who develops recipes and does promotional events. They have recipes and articles in all of the ag publications and partner with the Canadian International Grains Institute to develop pulse flours and various pulse products. (CIGI being one of the cooler institutions in ag in Canada, if you ask me, but that's another FPP.) They attempt to provide feedback to producers about market signals too.
Their marketing and their initiative are quite frankly amazing in the fusty atmosphere of ag marketing in Canada. The disconnect between producers and consumers is huge, and SPG is at least trying to educate the public, promote pulses, and align producers' growing preferences with consumers' eating preferences. It's a little clumsy but they're actually trying on the consumer side, whereas some of the other grain grower funded groups don't do much.
(Unfortunately, the recipes I've tried are a little dull, flavour-wise, but the recipe ideas are solid. So uh get some ideas for pulses from the website but double the sauce and seasoning on anything you make.)

Um, so in summary, yay pulses! And yay for Saskatchewan for growing lots of them!
posted by bluebelle at 8:15 PM on May 5, 2016 [3 favorites]


Sounds like you've had enough!
posted by Confess, Fletch at 8:20 PM on May 5, 2016


I learned a new word from this post; looking up "pulses" on google.

A few years ago, the following question appeared in the King William's General Knowledge Paper: "In which tale was insomnia due to a deeply hidden pulse?"

I was sure the answer was "The Tell-Tale Heart". But no; it was "The Princess and the Pea".
posted by aws17576 at 10:21 PM on May 5, 2016 [7 favorites]


Not only do I find pulses delicious, I find dried pulses to be very aesthetically pleasing. Have you ever looked, I mean really looked, at a lentil du puy, particularly after rinsing them? And thanks for the mujadarah recipe, 43rdand9th! I've been looking for a good one.
posted by mollweide at 5:31 AM on May 6, 2016 [1 favorite]


I must admit I too read the post as saying that this was the year for celebrating people who aren't dead. Which I thought was a low bar, even for Years Of. The lentil thing makes more sense, I suppose.
posted by Grangousier at 6:48 AM on May 6, 2016


Count me in as another person who made it to adulthood before encountering this word as anything other than a heartbeat. I think it's just not a word Americans use.
posted by rabbitrabbit at 6:56 AM on May 6, 2016


You know what I look for in lentil soup? A pulse.
posted by Splunge at 10:50 AM on May 6, 2016


I love a lentil, DID YOU KNOW that Canada is the world's largest exporter of lentils? You do now, and there's no escaping that knowledge. I just made a part of your brain be about lentils.

WE ARE THE PULSEMASTERS.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 11:37 AM on May 6, 2016


Jeebus. Just call them beans. Or legumes. Stop trying to make "pulses" happen.
posted by Cookiebastard at 12:12 PM on May 6, 2016


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