A few months ago, I picked up a box of Nueva Cocina Black Beans and Rice from Whole Foods.  I was there.  I needed a side dish for whatever it was I was cooking.  Black beans and rice is a favorite dish of mine, but one I can’t ever seem to get right.  This. Was. Awesome.  For a boxed food, this was really darn good.  It was spiced just right, the dehydrated seasonings and veggies plumped back up well, and the black beans were tasty.

Ever since picking this box up, I pick up another whenever I get a chance to go out to Whole Foods again.  In fact, I picked up another box the other day since I had none left in the house.  This little side dish is becoming my go to staple whenever I need a quick side dish.  I just wish I could make it from scratch instead.  But I can’t seem to find a decent recipe.

If you’re in the market for something different and you see this box of black beans & rice on the shelf.  Pick one up.  I’d definitely recommend it.

This post is not sponsored or in any way connected to Nueva Cocina.  I purchased the food item with my own money.

P.S. Today, I do have a most lovely bento to eat.  However, I’m not posting it until tomorrow.  I’m finding that posting my bentos a day or two after I eat them makes it less stressful to blog about them while so work-busy.  Less worry on my end means I keep up with everything a wee bit better here at Not Exactly Bento.

I’m not a huge fan of caramel, especially just plain caramel.  It isn’t a taste factor.  I quite like the taste.  It is caramel itself.  I don’t like how with a plain, soft caramel you chew and it seems as though it just grows and grows in your mouth.  Nope, I’m not much on caramel, so I tend to not it too much, unless it is paired with copious amounts of nuts and nougat.

 However, the last six months have barraged me with images, blog posts, and talk of caramels with sea salt.  And within those last six months, I happened to go into a local candy store, Choccolage (sing hymns of praise here!!) and found myself squares of sea salted caramels covered in chocolate decadence that made my eyes roll back in wonder and awe.  Let’s take a moment of silence for their wonderfulness.

I haven’t had an opportunity to get back to Choccolage.  It seems every time I am in the area, I’m there AFTER they have closed.  Bummer.  So, imagine my excitement when I happen to stroll through Whole Foods the other day and saw this box of French Caramels Fleur de Sel.  Now, noone would ever mistake me for an experienced cook, but I have picked up enough to know that fleur de sel is a type of sea salt.  I picked up the box.  I read the side note.

These wonderful caramels are made with natural creamery butter and blended with a sprinkle of Fleur de Sel, or “flower of the sea.”  This exquisite sea salt is hand-harvested in Guerande, France and adds a hint of mellow saltiness to the dense sweetness of the caramel…”

Well, I threw a box of these into my cart faster than you can say “ah-AH-ah-AHHHHH” and skedaddled them to the checkout counter with the rest of my goodies.  And those goodies contained a box of dark chocolate squares, quite like the milk chocolate ones I’d purchased some time back.  Delight danced through my mind.  The words “my precious” were starting to flit dangerously through my head.

Before I knew it I was home with my bounty.  I unwrapped a caramel.  I placed it on my tongue.  I let the caramel grow warm and start to melt in my mouth.  That wonderful butteryness that I associate with caramel hit first.  Ahhhh, loveliness.  And then I waited for that hint of saltiness to hit.  And I waited.  And I waited.  And it NEVER. FREAKING. CAME.

I felt jipped.  Completely ripped off.  Boo.

Never fear, I’ll just pair one up with a piece of dark chocolate in my mouth.  Tasty, yes.  Earth shattering wonderfulness as with that other candy?  No.  I came close to sprinkling a wee bit of regular sea salt on the piece or sticking a few coarse sea salt kernels into the caramel and trying it that way.  But I didn’t.

Instead, I just snapped the pictures, closed up the box, and set it aside.  It sits there int all its cuteness, unloved and untouched.  I think I’ll bring them with me to a family get together for Easter and share them with the caramel lovers in my extended family.

Verdict: For a basic caramel, this are just the thing for someone who loves caramel.  The box cost $3.99 and there are a fair number of individual wrapped candies in there.  I would deem them as a tasty-enough treat if you’re looking for a basic caramel.  But don’t expect to find that sprinkle of Fleur de Sel mentioned.  Stick with a true sea salted caramel or try to make them yourself (which is my next step!).

I mentioned last friday that I purchased the food grinder attachment for my KA stand mixer.  I knew the first thing I was going to do was grind up meat to make my own hamburger meat.  I must say that prepping for this first grind left me a bit confused.  I didn’t find all that much information on the internet to help me in my journey.  Or at least not a good pictorial like I wanted.  There was a decent one at instructables, but it had information different from other websites I visited.  After much thought, I purchased a huge pack of chuck roast at Sam’s Club, attached the grinder to the KA and prepared for the first grind.  Seriously, why  not just dive in feet first?  I don’t often do that.  It was time.

Step 1: I trimmed the chuck roast of as much fat as possible. Next time, I’m definitely purchasing a leaner cut of meat. Then, the roast was cut into small cubes or strips. After everything was trimmed, cut, and cubed, I placed the meat (covered with aluminum foil) into the freezer for 40 minutes. I didn’t want the meat to freeze. The purpose is to firm the meat so that it goes through the grinder easier. Or so I read. And trust me, I found out this was ESSENTIAL.

Be sure to check your meat in the freezer in 10 – 15 minute increments. 40 minutes might be too long for you or not enough. Oh, and in case you are wondering, the 5 and 1/3 pounds of chuck roast I purchased made about 4 lbs of ground meat after trimming.

Step 2: Once the meat is nicely firmed, it’s time to begin the grind. For hamburger meat, use the coarse blade of the KA food grinder. Place strips of meat in the tube of the food grinder. Turn on the KA.

Step 3: Using the plastic food stomper (or at least I think that is the term), push the meat down the tube towards the grinding, twisted metal at the bottom. This is what will churn up the food (or so I think).

Step 4: Marvel at the fact that you’re grinding your own hamburger meat (or whatever it is you choose to grind up).

Step 5: Continue to place food in the food grinder and push it down with the stomper to grind up all the meat until none is left.

Step 6: HA! Look at that, you’ve finished grinding everything. But you’re not finished yet.

Step 7: Season your meat however you wish. Mix it well into the ground meat. Then, place it all back into the freezer to firm back up (after the next step). Grinding the meat will warm it up enought to where it is no longer firm enough to do the second grind. The second grind is needed to help distribute the fat better through the meat as well as to tenderize the meat more. It has the added benefit of distributing seasoning throughout the meat well too.

Step 7 continued: Place your ground meat onto freezer paper, roll the freezer paper around it and press all along the meat well.

Step 7 continued, again: This will roll your meat into a nice log shape, making it easier to cut into segments, once firmed in the freezer, to place down the food grinder tube. Be sure to go back after the first grind and firm the meat up by placing it in the freezer for a bit before regrinding it. I didn’t think to do this with my first batch and it gunked up the grinder. I firmed up the rest, and the grind was much easier.

As well, you can do this butcher paper trick to shape the meat for permanent freezing.

Step 8: Once the meat is firmed up again, place it all back through the grinder. Since there is a bit of a time delay between the two grinds (30 – 40 minutes) I washed my food grinder well so that the dirty food grinder didn’t just sit there, exposed to the elements. As my second grind completed, I segmented the meat into 1 pound batches. The batches became kibi burgers (yet to be shown) and meatloaf.

If anyone reading out there has suggestions, tips, or sees that I did something really wrong, please let me know.  This was my first attempt and by no means an expert tutorial.

I am a big fan of the Nutrition series of nut mixes that Planters provides.  It has nothing to do with overall nutrition really.  I like them because they are normally unsalted.  I find that nut mixes are normally way too salty for my liking.  It’s for this reason I’m always on the lookout if a new, unsalted nut mix finds its way to my local grocery store’s shelves.  While at a nearby Albertson’s recently, I found this one.  I picked it up not because I need digestive help (and if I did, I would gross you out with that on my blog).  I picked it up because of what the  mix contained: almonds, pistachios, bits of pecans, dried cranberries, dried cherries, and granola bits.   It’s all the best parts of trail mix with out the parts I don’t like: peanuts & raisins.

And writing this simple post gave me an opportunity to pull out one of the new white ceramic ramekins I picked up (less than 90 cents a piece) on my recent excursion to the restaurant supply store.  It wasn’t until I went to take this photograph that I realized I completely forgot to take pictures of these ramekins for the post.  I knew I was forgetting something!  Ah well, now you get to see them along with this lovely nut mix.

Verdict: Deliciousness.  It’s not salted which I really like.  I prefer my nut mixes with no salt, but a nice roasted flavor when I can find it.  The cranberries and cherries are just sweet enough and tart enough to be enjoyable but not overly so on either end to send me packing this up to give to someone else who would be willing to eat it.  My only compliant would be the price: $6.50+ for a can.  It’s not something I’d regularly buy if it wasn’t on sale.  I mean really…is it that expensive to create a nut mix like this without salt and such?  I have a sneaking suspicion it’s not.  And it gives me a great idea to make my own darn mix!

I’m not affiliated with Planters in any way.  New-to-me posts are a way for me to share my experiences with new foods, both homemade and commercial, and recipes as I discover and try them.  All ingredients in my NTM posts are paid for out my own pocket (unless otherwise noted) and my honest opinion given.

I’m not one much on frozen things that you heat, steam, stir fry, or what not to get a meal. They just never seem to work out quite right for me. For this reason, I tend to avoid most steam in the bag things, and just purchase the regular frozen vegetables I use in my bentos: corn, peas, and green beans. Carrots are normally always purchased fresh, unless I’m buying a bag of frozen mixed vegetables.

This weekend while shopping at the grocery, frozen veggies were on sale, including some of the steam in the bag sort. This one caught my eye: Garden Vegetable Medley by Green Giant. It caught my eye because of what was in the bag: potatoes, sugar snap peas, and red peppers. The thing that gave me pause was the “garden herbs.” I could tell from the picture things looked a wee bit saucy. Vegetables in some type of sauce always give me cause for concern. I’m not big on unknown sauces of the herby variety. They are another thing that I’m not crazy to try.

This was a pleasant enough surprise though. Three minutes in the microwave steamed the vegetables in their bag.  However, be forewarned that this bag does not open as easily as the the instructions say it should.  I ended up having to get out a knife to make a small slit where the “pull and split” seam was.  Pulling and splitting that seam just wasn’t happening, plus there was the whole heat factor.  Burning myself with hot, steamed, saucy vegetables was something I wanted to avoid. 

There was enough vegetables to split into two bentos.  I could have split into more bentos if I wasn’t using so much in a single bento.  My bentos are very a wee bit of this and a wee bit of that. Things were tasty enough, though a bit on the sweet side with both sugar snap peas and red pepeprs in the mix. It wasn’t so overly sweet that I didn’t like it though. The potatoes helped to balance out the sweetness a bit. The sauce seemed unnoticeable, like it wasn’t there. Mainly, I just tasted vegetables. These were tasty enough, though not anything I’d buy again unless on sale since the regular price for such an amount seemed a bit high normally.

Verdict: Not bad, but I’d like to recreate it on my own. Though I wouldn’t hesitate to pick it up again on sale.

New-to-me is a series on Not Exactly Bento featuring new foods, techniques, and products I’ve tried.  In my bento adventures and the expansion of my culinary knowledge (which started at zero), I’ve had to try many new food items, cooking techniques, and products.  In August 2009, I decided to start chronicling my new-to-me experiences more formally as a weekly post on Tuesdays.  Any posts featuring brand name foods or products are unsolicited and have no affiliation to the company which produces the product.  All opinions are solely those of the owner of Not Exactly Bento, Jenn.

Recently, I wanted a snack while at work. I took a quick afternoon break, and trotted down to the Walgreens close to work. While there, I grabbed a bottle of water and looked for a quick snack. Honestly, I was just going to grab a bag of chips and go back to work. As I walked down the aisle, I noticed this popcorn on sale.

I’m not one much for anything cooked in a kettle. I’m not a fan of kettle cooked chips and I once did have kettle corn. I wasn’t impressed. I am also not a fan of pre-popped bagged popcorn. Normally, it doesn’t have much taste. Or you get something covered in a type of powdered cheese that tastes just horrible. This is what I think of Smartfood White Cheddar popcorn. Blech. I tried that in the last few months. Not. Good.

All this is to say, that I didn’t have high hopes for this popcorn when I picked it up. But it was on sale and the red bag caught my attention. And in all honesty I didn’t really want chips. Popcorn sounded like a better idea.

I went back to work with the bag of popcorn and a bottle of water. I sat back down to my computer with my treat thinking I was going to have a few wasted calories that I would wish I hadn’t wasted. However upon first bite, I was instantly hooked. I have lost count of how many bags of this popcorn I have consumed as I’ve tried this stuff again and again. Oh, let’s just be real. I’m not trying it anymore. I’m actively seeking it out at Wal-Mart and plunking down my $2.78 for a big bag of this stuff. Holy hell. Good stuff. It is a truly sweet, salty, buttery snack that is just DANG GOOD. I highly recommend it.

I liked this popcorn so much that I decided to try a few other flavors. The Smoked White Cheddar was interesting but the smoked taste made me think more of bacon than cheddar cheese. It was almost like eating bacon-flavored popcorn. Not quite what I was expecting and a bit too pungent for me.

I also picked up a bag of the Movie Theater popcorn. This one was too buttery for me. Way, way too buttery. This one I didn’t care for at all.

My plans are to try the Sea Salt flavor next. I hoping I’ll really like that one.

(As with all of my NTM posts, this one is unsolicited.  I have not been compensated for my opinion nor have I been in contact with the company that manufactures this product.  But hey, if they find me, they are welcome to send me some popcorn!  LOL!)

Cous Cous is a “grain” that I’ve never tried before. I quote the word grain since I’ve read couscous isn’t actually a grain, but extremely tiny pasta. In fact, before I started cooking for myself and learning more about the great world of food, I didn’t even realize cous cous was a grain-like substance you could cook with. I thought couscous was the thing my great grandmother ate. Little did I know, until now as I researched it for this blog post, that what she ate was actually spelled cush cush or couche couche. My great grandmother was Cajun French, and enjoyed this dish of cornmeal cooked and mixed with milk. Though for some reason, I remember her enjoying it with coffee too. But my memory is muddled there. Maybe if my mom stops by and reads this post she’ll make a comment below to clarify anything I’m getting wrong.

Anyhow, back to the regular cous cous. In early 2008, I tried couscous with a not so great outcome. I didn’t really like it all that well. Plus, the sight of it cooked sort of grossed me out. Little white balls that made me imagine this must be what caviar is like (I’ve never had caviar before). I felt like I was eating the eggs of some fish or insect for sure.

Then I discovered, there isn’t just one type of cous cous. Apparently, the one I had picked up and tried was an Israeli form of couscous. This type of cous cous I picked up several months ago at Whole Foods looked completely different. I brought home my little bit of cous cous, placed it in a food storage container, and have looked at it in my pantry ever since.

I was afraid to mess up again, so there it sat waiting for me to grab it to use in a recipe and be fabulous. As the old cliche goes, “Necessity is the mother of invention.” My need for a grain the other night had me turning to couscous, and the result was beyond fabulous.

I’ve had an idea in my head for 2 months to make black bean burgers and spanish rice for my bento box. Spanish rice is something I adore every time I go to a Mexican restaurant. In fact, I like the whole slate of offerings at a Mexican restaurant: enchiladas, fajitas, burritos, chimichangas, sopapillas. There is a restaurant near work that I frequent a little too often.

I was finally ready to try my hand at my idea this past Sunday. I searched the Internet for a recipe and found one that sounded simple on Recipezaar. I began to prep my ingredients in order to take pictures as I went along. Unfortunately, I realized during prep I had no rice left in the house. I’m not quite sure how that happened, but apparently I used the last of my rice recently. I forgot to pick some more up. I couldn’t leave the house because I had something in the oven. What to do? My eyes fell up on the container of couscous in the pantry. I decided, “What the hell. Let’s give it a try.” I pulled it down from the shelf, adjusted the recipe a bit to accommodate the cooking requirements of couscous, and plunged forward. As the couscous cooked, I began to worry. Would it work? Would I like it? 10 minutes later I had my answer. It was FABULOUS. I loved the way it tasted. It was awesome. And, it took only 10 minutes of cooking time to complete. I couldn’t ask for anything more than that out of a side dish! And it only took 1 dish to cook. I did it all in my rice cooker. I was so happy I had taken pictures to share with all of you.

Spansih-spiced CousCous (modified from a Recipezaar recipe)

Ingredients needed:
1 1/4 cup of cous cous
1/3 cup of plain tomato sauce (plus a bit more if you think it needs it)
3/4 cup of vegetable stock
1 tablespoon of butter or margarine
1 1/2 teaspoons of chili powder
3/4 teaspoon of oregano
1 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon of garlic powder
1 teaspoon of cumin
1/2 cup frozen peas
1/2 cp frozen corn

Grab your rice cooker’s interior pot. Make sure everything is all nice and clean (always a consideration when I’m getting ready to cook, since I don’t use the thing all that often. Sometimes I must wash out a layer of dust.

Pour in the cous cous.

Dump in all your spices.

Add your frozen corn, frozen peas,and butter (cut into smallish squares)

Add in the stock. Note: If you prefer to use chicken stock, I’m sure that would work fine. I prefer the taste of vegetable stock.

Add in the tomato sauce. Stir everything around really well and place your rice cooker’s interior pot into the rice cooker. Close the lid. My rice cooker only has a few options: steam, white rice, and brown rice. I clicked the white rice option and set a timer for 7/8 minutes. I then checked the couscous. It looked pretty good. I then fluffed it all, mixing it around with a fork. After fluffing, I left the lid open allowing the dish to steam for another 2-3 minutes. Once the couscous seemed cooked and tasted fine, I removed it all from the pot.

Deliciousness. I added a handful of shredded cheddar cheese and mixed that in at the end of the cooking time (forgot to take a picture of that!).

If you try this, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did and let me know how it turned out for you!

I have a little chocolate fiend that sits on my shoulder and convinces me to try chocolate treats.  He’s very persuasive and we get along very well.  Or at least that’s the excuse I use as to why I have some much chocolate around this house!  LOL!  Trying chocolate delights has got to be one of my absolute favorite things to do.  It’s one of the reasons the recent Scharffen Berger press event was a real highlight for me.

Dark chocolate is something I greatly enjoy, but not necessarily in great quantities.  I like its bitterness and its bite.  It’s a fun chocolate to eat.  To me, good dark chocolate must be what good liquor is like.  Something to be enjoyed in small quantities, slowly and with purpose.

Green & Black chocolate is a brand I’ve wanted to try for some time now.  I like the sound of their flavor offerings.  A few weeks ago, I decided to give it a whirl and picked up a bar of the Cherry.

I don’t know what percentage of cocao is in the dark chocolate I enjoy from time to time.  Nor do I really understand what it meant when this bar states it has a 60% cocoa content.  I could go and read up on what that all means.  In all honesty, I don’t really care.  I just care what it tastes like.  What this chocolate tastes like is interesting to describe.

For the first week I had this chocolate, I called it “dirt chocolate.”  I didn’t like it.  I thought I could taste dirt as an aftertaste.  Does this mean I think the bar had something wrong with it?  No.  I suspect is has something to do with the cocoa content.  In all honesty, it wasn’t really the true taste of dirt as much as the chocolate had a real “earthiness” to it.  I’m not adverse to eating food that has that “earthy” taste.  Black beans have become a favorite food and they definitely fit into that category.

No, this chocolate was really far out of the realm of my normal cocoa comfort zone.  At first, I thought I was going to dispose of the bar.  I had that adverse of a reaction…at first.  I set the chocolate to the side and ate a piece.  What kept me coming back were the cherries.  They were very tart.  Very.  And worked well with that indescribable earthy element of the chocolate itself.

Each day as I ate a piece.  I grew to admire this chocolate more and more, until the end when I decided I liked it after all.

Verdict: A good if unusual and different chocolate for my palate.  I liked it.  Be forewarned.  It might be an acquired taste.

This product review is not solicited in any way.  I have no affiliation with Green & Black and have not been compensated in any way for my opinion on the product.

I like dried apples.  They show up in my bento or on my plate now and again.  I find them a nice pick-me-up as part of my lunch or mid-afternoon snack.

One of the few things I don’t like about dried apples is sometimes they can be a bit rubbery and spongey.  It’s a texture I don’t overly mind, but sometimes I wish they were crisper.

Bare Fruit’s Dried Fuji Apple Chips fit that bill.  The apples seem to be very thinly cut and dried, skins on.  Fuji apples are one of my favorite types of apple, which prompted me to buy this bag of chips.  I liked them enough that I decided to order them in bulk from Amazon grocery.  While this gives me plenty for my snack bentos, I will think before ordering them this way again.  They seem to be a bit too crushed for my taste in the way they were package from Amazon (large clear ziploc bag filled with a 1lb of chips).

Back to Nature is a brand that I have enjoyed for some time now.  They used to make a granola bar with cherries that was absolutely delicious.  I would buy several boxes at a time from Wal-mart since they always seemed to be out.  Then, one day, I could no longer get them.    I think BTN stopped making them.

Nearly everything I’ve tried by this brand I like.  These two items were no exception.  The fudge mint cookies are hands-down a must get.  If you like Girl Scout cookie Thin Mints, you might like these.  They remind me of those cookies.  Really good, and available year-round.

The honey graham sticks were delish as well.  I actually preferred them to Honey Maid’s version.  These two have found a nice spot in my pantry.

Verdict: I pretty much liked it all.  No big surprises here, but fun things to try for the first time.

All the items listed in this post were purchased by me. I received no compensation for this post nor do the companies even know I am posting about them.  Good thing I had nice things to say huh?  LOL!

After last week’s Dear Tofu post, I received alot of information from readers about the type of tofu I was using.  Maida and Kim both urged me to give tofu another try.  There was much discussion about the type of tofu I had tried and how it wouldn’t give me the consistency for which I had hoped.  They convinced me to give it another whirl.  The following day I happened to be a the grocery store.  I found the type of tofu they suggested and purchased a pack for $2.50.  Then, I saw the tempeh.  And I spent another $2.50.  I decided for $5 it was time to have the ultimate, last soy product showdown (or at least for this type of soy product. Soy milk and I love each other).  The only thing I could find was this 5 grain style Tempeh.  The original style was out.  Apparently, there are people in Baton Rouge that really like tempeh.  I figured, “Hey, grains.  I like those.”  So, I went home with a package of this stuff.

Upon returning home, I set the tempeh in the refrigerator and sat down to have a moment with Bittman.  I figured his book might give me some suggestions on what to do with this stuff.  I found a recipe that seemed simple enough: Crunchy Crumbled Tempeh, page 674.  This is basically just cooking tempeh in a small amount of oil to crisp it up.  Seasoning is black pepper and salt to taste.  This seemed simple, easy, and would give me the best idea if I liked tempeh.  More seasoning or other flavorings could always be added later.

Opening the package was an interesting experience.  A smell immediately wafted out from the package: bread.  This stuff smelled like bread to me, i.e. yeast.  I’m not sure if this is a natural smell of the tempeh itself or the grains that are embedded in this particular tempeh.  In all, it wasn’t an unpleasant smell.

The tempeh was sliced to get it ready for cooking.  It was at this point I nearly stopped and consulted the cookbook again.  I kept thinking this would be nice to fry up just like this.  But I plunged forward and kept going, cutting the tempeh the opposite way to cube it.

Tempeh went into a pan with a small amount of oil to cook, and then things got really interesting.  This was like trying to cook popcorn in an uncovered pot.  As I would stir the tempeh around, all of sudden something would making this small popping sound and fly out the pot.  Adventurous cooking indeed.  I have a feeling there was an excitable grain in there.

Once the tempeh was browned, I removed it to a napkin-lined plate to drain.  The taste wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t there.  My immediate thought was, “Sauce.  This stuff needs some moisture or sauce.”  And here is where my culinary inexperience gets me in trouble from time to time.  Though, I’m not sure if it was that or something else. Anyhow, the only sauce in the house was BBQ sauce.  I’d recently seen on Maida’s website where she had used BBQ sauce with tofu.  I thought maybe I could use it here.

I cooked down some finely diced onions and garlic.  Once cooked, the tempeh was placed back into the skillet, mixed with the onions, and a small amount of BBQ sauce was added to the mix.

To accompany this BBQ tempeh, I quartered two flour tortillas to make wedges.  In a small skillet, I heated a bit of canola oil and quickly fried the tortilla wedges in the oil.

Once it was all cooked, while tasty looking, trepidation set in and I began to worry.  This was only okay, with something off about the taste of the dish.  It was a bit cloying in the sweet sense.   And there was this underlying taste I wasn’t sure of.  I don’t know if the taste was the tempeh itself or the BBQ sauce used (Budweiser brand which is a new one for me).  Putting it into the flour tortilla and eating it seemed to balance it somewhat.  Trying to eat it alone though was a no go.  I have to admit that this is one dish that hit the garbage the next day.

Another issue is that this meal felt heavy in my stomach.  Really heavy, in an uncomfortable way.  I don’t know if this was the tempeh, the grains in this particular tempeh, or the way it was cooked.

Verdict: I won’t say I didn’t like the tempeh.  I’ll just say I didn’t like this preparation of it.  Or maybe it was the tempeh with grains.  I’m unsure what the issue might have been.  Tempeh has the most significant element in a meat substitute I like: consistency.  It’s a solid piece of food, with substance and body.  Cooking it plain, I wasn’t adverse to its flavor at all.  I just felt it needed that elusive “something” I seem to always seek but never find.

Tempeh remains on the “to try” list.  Sometime in the future, I’ll purchase it again.  I’ll try another recipe and see how it turns out.  Next time, I’m purchasing plain tempeh.  Honestly, the first thought that came to mind was I wanted a tomato based sauce for this, but BBQ sauce was all that I had on hand…thoughts for round 2 circulate.