Vegan MoFo: Southern-Style Split Pea Soup and Greens

Dazee, known by many of you as Kittee's man-wife, was in town for a few days, and although I think we ate only a handful of meals together (he was downtown on conference for much of his visit), we talked about food a bunch a bunch.

I think it was Sunday, but it could have been another day, we were walking down my street to the coop, and Dazee puts the idea in my head to break out our ham tube (really a brick, but the name stays) and make a traditional-type split pea soup with ham. Oh yes, it was Saturday, cause it was the member discount day at the coop, and I took the opportunity to buy a bunch of green split peas, one of the few types of split peas I do not have. Except for masoor dal cause we're OUT!!!

As Kittee pointed out, blogging (and most interesting cooking) kinda stopped once Dazee got here, and not even for any particular reason. Just cause. Well, on Sunday I made some mac and cheese and some ham tube sandwiches with chipotle mayo (cause the ham tube was defrosting for the soup!), though that wasn't exactly a health-supporting meal, and sure enough, Monday I woke up all sicky. Not cause of the food of course, but had I known, I would have made the soup and greens I made today a couple days earlier.

Yesterday, we were all talking about cookbooks and "low brow" vs. "high brow" cookbooks (this came out of a discussion about fiction and film, first) and we were suggesting different contenders and Dazee says "I think Kittee's zine is highbrow." I pull it out to have a look-see, and out pops the recipe for collard greens, saying "So easy, even Dazee can make it without help." That made us laugh.

So, Dazee on the plane (I hope he got there in time!) and us getting a little hungry and me being home from work and still feeling ragged, I walked to the coop to pick out those collards for easy greens making. But I wanted to make 2 bunches cause I wanted a whole wack of greens, and they were running low but were expecting some more later in the day (farm direct! wooh!) but I wanted some now, so I picked some mustard greens, too.

Then I walked a little further to the mexican store for canned chipotles. My thinking was I'd make a morph of a Joanna tester split pea soup and a couple split pea and ham soups designed for ham-eating folks I found on the internets, and then add more vegetables like more carrots, celery, and potatoes, also some shallots, too, and have at. While the split pea soup cooked, I sauteed the ham in some oil and tamari and in another pot, I cooked the mustard and collard greens, using the Papa Tofu recipe, also found here!

The split pea soup we made was awesome -- we added lots and lots of extra chipotle peppers, liquid smoke, smoked paprika, and lots of nice and soft veggies for that healthy and comforting mush-bowl I was going for, and the cubed fake ham added that special somethin' somethin'. The greens were awesome, of course. Our fakin' bacon packet is beyond expired and it just didn't matter, that good. FAKE MEAT FER LIFE@@!!@@

Not that I've ever really been to the south save for a yucky trip to Fort Law-duh-dale way back when (and that doesn't count, besides), but I think this was authentically southern, to my imaginary southern sensibilities, at least.

I wonder who else would find this post interesting other than Kittee, but I put it out there, and sign off.