chicken n biscuits

Wow have I been a bad blogger.  I have just been completely blog lazy.

I've been blazy.

It's a real word.  Look it up.

Well it should be a real word....

I have had several people ask if I had a good recipe for leftover chicken.  This is my absolute favorite recipe for leftover chicken.  And now I will share it with you.  How lucky you are.

I usually will make a chicken soup and reserve half of the cooked chicken, tear it to bits with my hands which is really very therapeutic, and make this.  I love it because you can use whatever veg you have on hand.  If you have leftover chicken, the whole thing comes together so quickly it always surprises me.  But even if you don't have leftover chicken, it doesn't change the timing. You can sauté the chicken while the gravy thickens.  Sauté the chicken while the gravy thickens.  Say that ten times fast and you've got yourself a song!  Or does that only happen in my head?

Chicken and biscuits

4 tbs butter

1/4 c. flour

4 c. chicken stock, plus more if it looks too thick

3 c. chopped, cubed, or torn to bits chicken 

2 carrots, chopped

2 celery sticks, chopped

peas, corn, and parsnip also are wonderful in here

1 leek (white part only) or onion or 2 shallots or a few green onions...  chopped

biscuits:

2 c. flour

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4-1/2 tsp salt

2 tbs herbs- flat leaf parsley, chives, dill chopped

6 tbs chilled, cubed earth balance butter

3/4 c. soy milk, almond milk....  whatever milk you like

The first thing I do when I make this is cube the butter for the biscuits and pop them into the freezer.  You want them to be cold cold cold.

Preheat oven to 450ºF.

If you do not have leftover chicken, just use about a pound of chicken, boneless and skinless, cut into chunks, and sauté with some olive oil in a heavy pan over medium heat until cooked through, about 5-10 minutes.

In a dutch oven or other large saucepan, melt the butter over medium high heat.  Add the flour, and whisk until smooth.  Pour in the stock, raise the heat to high, and bring to a boil.  Cook, whisking every couple of minutes, until the mixture smooths out and thickens a bit, about 5 minutes.  Add chicken and vegetables.  Reduce heat to medium, and keep at an active simmer.

In a medium bowl, add the first biscuit ingredients: the flour, baking powder, and salt.  Mix well, and then add the herbs if using and then the butter.  Using a pastry blender or your hands, mix to combine, leaving it crumbly.  If you use your hands, don't handle it too much- you don't want the butter to soften.   Pour the milk in all at once and stir it together with a fork.  

Knead the dough against the bowl several times until the bowl is clean.  On a floured surface, dump the dough out, pat it down to about 1/2" thick, and using a biscuit cutter (if you're well stocked or organized or fancy or all of the above) or a plain ol' drinking glass (if you're not well stocked or organized or fancy or all of the above, i.e. me), cut out circles and gently place them on top of the stew.  Pop the whole thing into the oven and bake for about 10-12 minutes, or until the biscuits are all puffed up and nicely browned on top.  I will sometimes put it on broil to get the tops really toasty.  

Voila!  C'est tout!  Bon appétit!

buffalo barley stew

A few weeks ago, I subscribed to an organic delivery service called door to door organics.  They take fresh produce from local farmers, put it in a box, and ship it right to your door.  I used to get this a few years ago, but then when we moved I didn't set it back up.  I am so glad that I subscribed again!

This time around they have a whole shop section, where you can buy farm fresh items other than produce.  When I saw the buffalo stew meat, I just had to get some.  If you've never had buffalo meat, it really isn't that much different than cow.  It has a bit of a stronger flavor, and because it is much leaner, it tends to be a little tougher.  I thought it would make for a great slow cooked, stewed deliciousness....

I've said it before, I'll say it again.  I love soup.  It is so easy, fulling, nourishing, and just downright satisfying.  Of course, stew is the same; just chunkier, thicker broth, and a longer cook time.  And sooo good....

buffalo barley stew

Obviously, if you don't have access to buffalo meat, you can just substitute regular ol' cow.
This recipe is actually just my beef barley stew, modified.  I love to serve it with some good, crusty bread and a great big salad.

2 tbs olive oil
1 - 1 1/2 lbs stewing meat, cut into cubes
4 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
4 c. water
1 onion, chopped
3 carrots, roughly chopped
3 celery sticks, roughly chopped
2 parsnips, peeled and roughly chopped
large pinch of dried thyme
large 1/4 c. pearl barley
4 c. beef stock
salt and pepper
chopped fresh parsley

Heat oil in large heavy pot or dutch oven over medium high heat.  Sear the meat until well browned on all sides.  Add the garlic and water.  Give it a good stir, scraping up all of the brown bits in the pot.  Heat to boiling, reduce the heat to low, and simmer, partially covered, for about an hour.  Skim off the foam as it rises to the top.

Add the vegetables, thyme, barley, and stock.  Simmer, partially covered, until meat is very tender, about 1 1/2 hours.  If the soup becomes too thick, add water.  Cut off the heat and season with salt and pepper.  Add the parsley and serve.

roasted tomato bow ties with fresh pasta

In the beginning of the summer, my husband went to the plant store.  He came home with probably 7 different types of tomatoes, and 7 pots for each type.  At least.  I thought he was nuts.  Last year, we grew tomatoes, but we were not organized in the least.  We had tomato plants and tomato carcasses all over the place.  It was a mess.  I was so convinced that we would have a repeat year, so I gave him a pretty hard time over it.  Poor guy.

So we planted the tomatoes in June (geez, was it July?  We got a late start this year.  And I am really enjoying the use of the word "we"-  I didn't plant anything).  Every time I went outside, I questioned the whole tomato plan.  Where the #$%@ are the tomatoes??  I was so impatient to make fresh tomato sauce, and yet every time I went outside with my colander, I came up empty.

But it's like they say:  if you plant them, they will come....

 All of a sudden, they all came in all at once.  We couldn't eat the tomatoes fast enough!  And the broccoli. Oh man, I don't think I will ever really be able to eat store-bought broccoli again.  It is so tender and sweet and perfect when you grow it yourself.  The zucchini, eggplant, cucumbers, radishes, spinach, swiss chard, kale, and all the herbs we would ever need.  I love growing herbs.  And so do the kids- they pick off the leaves and pop them into their mouths.  The corn was ok- I had one stellar ear, but the rest were weird and thick skinned.  I've heard that it takes a couple of years for the corn to establish itself.  Who knows.  I am not the gardener in the family.

I was allowed to have a garden once.  It was a wildflower garden, where you just sprinkle a packet of seeds onto the ground and add water.  Yeah, it all dried up and the only plants that grew were prickly weeds....

So with all of our beautiful, sweet, fresh, totally unsprayed produce, I could make tomato sauce whenever I wanted!  Which was pretty often....  And what would really make the fresh tomato sauce? 

Fresh pasta, of course.  

I have been making it for a while now, mostly in the form of ravioli or spaghetti, but this time I decided to make little bow ties!  They were so easy to make and a perfect little size for my kids' little hands.  This was definitely a case where the extra "help" was actually helpful..

*Time management tip*

The thought of making fresh pasta may be a little daunting.  But just know that from start to finish, it takes about an hour, give or take.  But you can easily make the whole meal at the same time so that it gets to the table all at once.  Start to make the pasta after you put the tomatoes into the oven for roasting.  By the time the sauce is completely finished, after all the roasting and simmering, your pasta will be rolled, formed, and cooked and ready for the table!  And if some unforeseen circumstances occur (which are commonplace in my house), don't worry.  You can take the sauce off the heat and reheat it later if necessary.  Also, after the pasta is bow tied, you can let it sit and dry for however long you need.

To make the sauce, I didn't really measure anything.  I just took enough small halved tomatoes to fill a baking sheet.  I then drizzled it all with olive oil, some sea salt, a few sprigs of thyme, and put the whole thing into a preheated 400˚F oven.  I roasted them for about a half hour, until their juices oozed and they started to get browned on the edges.  I then heated some olive oil in a pan, sizzled in some chopped garlic, and put in the roasted tomatoes.  Because they had lost much of their juice, I took about 1 to 2 cups more tomatoes, put them into the blender for just a few seconds, and then dumped their juicy sweetness into the pan as well.  I set the heat to low, gave it all a good stir, and simmered for about 40 minutes.  If it gets a bit dry, just add some water.

Oh.  And I also added bacon, well....  because it's bacon!  

When I buy bacon, I find that I will use about a half a pack at a time.  I'll take the rest and put it into a freezer bag, squeeze out the air, and pop it into the freezer.  It freezes beautifully, and whenever I need to use it (for a sauce, for example) I just take it out and chop it while still frozen.  So that's exactly what I did here.  I cut the frozen piece with scissors (this piece was actually half of a half, since I had already dipped into my bacon cache), it was about 1/4 cup uncooked bacon.  I crisped it up in a pan and scooped it out and put it right into the sauce.  The smokey flavor of the bacon (or prosciutto if you have it) pairs so wonderfully with the sweet and tangy tomato sauce.

fresh pasta

2 cups all purpose flour, plus about 1/2 c. extra for dusting

1/4 tsp salt

4 eggs

2 tsp olive oil

I have made pasta all by hand before, but it really is just so easy to do in a food processor.  Put the 2 c. flour and salt into the bowl of the processor and pulse a few times to mix.  Then add the eggs and oil, and pulse until it comes together in a ball.  Generously flour your work surface, and turn out the dough.  Knead the dough for 10 minutes, and you really have to stick it out for the full 10 minutes.  It doesn't really start to come together until minute 8.  

It will be sticky at first, so you have to keep adding flour, a sprinkling at a time, until it is tacky, but not sticky.  In the end, the dough will be smooth and elastic, and a bit tacky.  And keep in mind, that the more flour you add, the tougher it will be in the end, so add the flour sparingly.

Take the dough ball and cut it into quarters.  Put the whole thing underneath an overturned bowl.  You need to let the dough rest for 15 minutes to activate the gluten.  

I have a pasta machine, which is really just a roller with a crank.  It also cuts it into spaghetti if you like.  If you do not have a pasta machine, you can roll it out with a rolling pin.  The basic premise is this:  take one quarter of dough, sprinkle it with flour, and put it through the largest setting on the machine (1), or roll it flat with the rolling pin.  If it is still sticky, fold the flat dough into thirds, sprinkle with flour, and roll again.  When the dough gets a nice elastic smooth consistency, then you can just keep rolling until you get it to the right thickness.  If you use the machine, put it through the 1 size, then take it down to 2, then 3, then 4, and then to 5 for cut out pasta shapes or 6 for spaghetti.  This all sounds like a lot to know, but once you make it, it's really easy to see how tacky and smooth it needs to be.

When you are finished making the shapes with one quarter of the dough, put the formed pieces onto a dish towel and let sit until you finish with all of the dough.  Do one quarter at a time, and keep the remaining dough underneath the bowl.  If you take it all out at once, the dough will dry out.

*forming the bow ties*

When the dough is smooth and rolled out, take a pizza cutter or knife, and cut the dough into 1x2-inch pieces.  To make a bow tie, you want to slightly roll the centers of the long sides in, and then pinch them together in the middle.  Sound confusing?  Maybe a visual is more helpful.

Maybe another?

How about one more?

Bon appetit!!

summer's pasta

I love pasta.  I'm sure I've said that before.  And making your own pasta sauce is really not that much more difficult than opening a jar, provided you have the ingredients on hand.  The best part is that by the time your pasta is cooked, the sauce is done.

During much of the year, I always have a few cans of good diced or whole peeled tomatoes, lentils, and white beans in my cupboard for a quick sauce or lentil soup.   In the summer, I simply go outside: swiss chard, tomatoes, and basil freshly picked from the garden.  Toss it with some olive oil and add some crispy bacon or prosciutto, and you have a fresh, delicious dinner.

It really doesn't get much better than that.  Well.. maybe.

A while back, I heard that in some parts of Italy it is common to serve pasta with potatoes in it.  I don't remember where I heard this or even IF I heard it.  I may very well have dreamt it.  I don't know.  What I do know, is that when getting together my dinner ingredients, I found some red skin potatoes.  And I had bacon in the freezer.

Everything just tastes better with bacon....

I used the bacon grease to cook the potatoes.

Ohh my!

summer's pasta

1 box of pasta
4 slices of bacon, cut into pieces (I had my bacon in the freezer, so I just sawed it from the frozen hunk.  As it turns out, frozen bacon cuts very nicely!)
3-4 red potatoes, chopped into little bits
2-4 cloves garlic, roughly chopped (I didn't have any garlic for this dish, and although it was delicious, I really missed my garlic)
1-2 c. chopped tomatoes (I used grape tomatoes and large tomatoes, since we had both)
handful of swiss chard, chopped (or any other hearty green like spinach or kale)
small handful of basil, chopped
good olive oil

Put a pot of water to boil.  Meanwhile, heat a skillet on medium high heat and cook the bacon until nice and crispy.  Do not toss the bacon grease- pour it into a mug or other heat proof vessel.  Leave (or add) about 2 tablespoons of bacon grease in the skillet.  Add the potatoes, spread them so that they are in a thin layer, and cover the skillet with a lid.  Cook, flipping occasionally, until the potatoes are crisp, about 10 minutes.  Add the garlic, and cook until fragrant, about 2 minutes.  Add the tomatoes, give it all a good stir, and add the swiss chard and basil.  Cover the skillet, reduce the heat to low, and cook until the greens are wilted, about 3 minutes more.  Drain the pasta and add to the sauce.  Stir it all together, and finish it off with a drizzle of good olive oil.

fried quinoa, sort of

Ok ok, yeah I know.  Everyone has been going to the farmer's market for years.  I have been kind of slow to jump on that boat.  My first real trip to a farmer's market was two weeks ago.  My second trip was yesterday.  So I now have a new thing.  Farmer's market on saturdays.  My goal is to go to Eastern Market in Detroit, but with two kids who aren't the easiest to wrangle into the car in the morning, and a mama who can herself be a bit slow in the morning, I'm keeping it a bit more local.  For now.




















I have to say that I am really loving it.  Last week it was the asparagus, spelt flour, sunflower seeds, pickles (I so happily discovered my new favorite pickles- Perkin's Pickles), and whipped cinnamon honey.  This week it was the eggs, cinnamon basil (with beautiful purple stems and flowers), mushrooms, scallions, rhubarb (I can't wait to go strawberry picking this week and make some pie!), more pickles, and blueberries (which disappeared rather quickly at the park following the market).


















When I started thinking about dinner, I realized that I had a lot of bits and pieces, but nothing that really shouted "Make me!  Make me!"  I remembered the swiss chard in the garden and when I scoured my cupboards, I found the quinoa.


















Quinoa is not part of my repertoire, but the light bulb went off.  Fried rice with quinoa.  Fried quinoa.  Well, sort of.

My husband came in and asked what I was making for dinner.  When I told him, he said, "I don't know about this quinoa.  It sounds a bit too healthy for me."  Meanwhile, he ended up eating three servings.  Go figure.


















fried quinoa, sort of


2 c. uncooked quinoa
4 c. chicken broth
extra virgin olive oil
1 boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into bite size pieces
2 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
1 c. crimini mushrooms, roughly chopped
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 carrot, chopped
1/4 c. roughly chopped baby corn
1 c. swiss chard or other hearty greens, chopped
2 scallions, chopped
3 eggs

sauce:
2 tbs soy sauce
1 1/2 tbs worcestershire sauce
1 tbs fresh lemon juice

I feel like I cooked this kind of weirdly, but it really worked for me.

Bring the chicken broth to a boil.  Add the quinoa, and cook according to package directions.  I cooked it covered for 10 minutes, gave it a stir, turned off the heat, and let it sit until I needed it.

Heat some olive oil in a large pan over medium high.  Add the chicken and sauté until browned and cooked through, about 5 minutes.  Remove to a plate.  Add another tablespoon of oil and heat until hot.  Toss in the mushrooms and ginger, sauté for another 5 minutes or so, or until they get nicely browned. Mushrooms soak up a lot of oil, so I kind of added another tablespoon here or there. Add the garlic and cook until it just starts to brown.  Remove to the plate with the chicken.  The reason I did this is to keep the mushrooms nice and garlicky, but to prevent the garlic from burning.  I am notorious for serving burnt garlic.  I am trying to remedy this problem...

Add another glug of oil, and then throw in the vegetables: the carrots, mini corn, swiss chard, and scallions.  Toss well in the oil and cook for about 5 minutes.  Return the chicken and mushrooms to the pan, stir it all together, and let cook for several minutes.

Meanwhile, mix the sauce ingredients together and set aside.

Push the food to the edges of the pan, so that you have a cleared center.  Crack the eggs into a bowl and then add them to the center of the pan.  Scramble the eggs, and when cooked, give everything a good stir.  Add the cooked quinoa, and then pour on the sauce.

Stir together until incorporated.

moo goo gai pan, with children

Stir fries are fun.  Is that right?  Stir fries?  As in french fries?  Hm.  That seems really strange to me for some reason.....  Anyway, those things with a meat and veg and some sort of sauce cooked at a high temp in a huge sled of a pan, are fun.  I found this recipe here and made some changes.  Replace sesame oil with expressed peanut oil.  Include coconut oil because I am rather addicted to the stuff these days.  Maple syrup instead of sugar.  I don't know why, it just seemed like a good idea.  And it was, by the way.

This was the first of two unsuccessfully successful food items of the evening.  (The other was pudding with really old marshmallows, but that's for next time)..

Everything was moving along quite swimmingly.  All of a sudden... One baby calls, and then the other, one needs her shoes, the other needs a shirt, oh and right now please, why aren't they sleeping they are supposed to be sleeping, the sauce gets darker, the mini corn starts to get crispy, no not those shoes the other ones, no I don't want pants YES I want pants, the food desperately needs a stir but doesn't get one, everything starts to get sticky, oh no the rice I forgot about the rice, forget about the pants we have no time for pants, get your own shoes, the sauce starts to resemble tar, mama mama mama hold me, mama mama I need a hug,  run downstairs holding 60 pounds of children- correction- 60 pounds of screaming children, laughing children, squealing children, who knew running downstairs in mama's arms would be so much fun, drop one child (gently of course), grab the spoon, give the pan a stir, oh...

And so it is, cooking with children.

The sauce is dark, the sauce is sticky, and the bottom of the pan is getting pretty thick.  But it smells sweet, and tangy, and fresh, and fantastic.  Everything is carmelized, the chicken has such a lovely golden color.  The rice is a bit dry, so I add a drop of water to the pan and replace the lid.

I would have preferred that the sauce wasn't so sticky, or have that hint of a char to it, but no one else seemed to notice.  Every last bit was devoured.  Unsuccessfully successful.


















moo goo gai pan

1 lb boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into bite size pieces
2 tbs canola oil
1 tbs coconut oil
1 carrot, chopped
handful of snow peas/sugar snap peas (I really don't know the difference- the fat ones)
about 1/4-1/3 cup of baby corn, roughly chopped
1 cup button mushrooms, roughly chopped
2 scallions, chopped

marinade:
1 tbs soy sauce
1 tbs mirin
1 tbs cornstarch

sauce:
1/4 c. chicken broth
1 tbs soy sauce
1/4 tsp expressed peanut oil
1/2 tbs maple syrup
1/2 tsp (roughly) ground white pepper
1 tbs mirin
1 tsp cornstarch

In a bowl, combine the marinade ingredients until fully incorporated.  Pour over the chicken, give it all a good mix, and set aside.

Heat pan over medium to medium high heat (you don't want the heat as high as a normal stir fry because the coconut oil has a lower smoke point than other oils).  Add the oils and let get hot. When it is nice and hot, add the chicken, and let cook, stirring occasionally, for a couple of minutes.  If the sides of the pan start to darken, use the chicken to kind of wipe it clean.  That adds a nice carmel-ly flavor.  Remove the chicken when it is no longer pink.

Add the carrots, peas, and corn, give it a good stir, and cook for a couple of minutes.  Add the mushrooms and scallions and cook for a couple of minutes longer.

Return the chicken to the pan, mix well, and pour in the sauce.  Give it a good stir, reduce the heat to medium-medium low, and cover the pan.  Cook for a few more minutes (or several more minutes, depending on the distraction levels at the time), until the sauce has thickened.  Goes extremely well with slightly overcooked, dry rice.

while the pasta cooks...

Sunday is usually pasta night.  I don't often go to the grocery store on the weekends, and by the time Sunday comes along, I am, to be honest, just plain lazy.  To provide for these lazies (or to satisfy a hankering for yummy soup), I always try to keep at least two 14 oz cans of diced tomatoes, several cans of beans, and a variety of lentils in my cupboard.

Last night was no exception.  And with two sick children, I really didn't want to spend a lot of time on this.  I used red lentils because they cook up a lot quicker than either brown or green.  And truth be told, I am always looking for an excuse to use them.  Aside from the fact that they are full of protein, fiber, folate, iron, blah blah blah, they are such a beautiful orange, and so delicate; I really love sticking my hand in the bag and letting them run through my fingers... 

Lazy Sunday Lentil Pasta

whole wheat pasta, 1/2 box

2 tbs olive oil

3 cloves garlic, roughly chopped

1 14 oz can diced tomatoes

large handful (about 1/3 cup) red lentils

few sprigs of thyme, leaves stripped from the stems

few springs of oregano, roughly chopped

handful of basil leaves, roughly chopped

handful of baby spinach, roughly chopped

Bring a pot of water to boil and cook pasta according to package directions, or to taste.

While the pasta cooks, heat olive oil in a pan over medium heat.  Add garlic, and cook for a couple of minutes, or until it just starts to get toasty.  Dump in the tomatoes all at once, and stir until it all quiets down.  Reduce heat to low.

Put some water (about 1/4 full) into the tomato can, give it a swirl, and pour it into the pan.  Add the lentils, thyme, oregano, and basil.  Cook, covered, for about 10 minutes, or until the lentils are tender. 

Take off heat, add the spinach, replace the lid, and let sit for a few minutes to let the spinach wilt.

Season with salt and pepper and serve! 

It's a great day for lentil soup...

Oh, how I love soup.  It is so fresh, healthy, easy to make, and it really just warms the soul.  Not to mention, it is the best way to use up all of the stray veg you have waiting around in the fridge.

This evening had all of the ingredients for a perfect soup.  It was an easy, sunny, lazing around outside kind of a day.  I wasn't able to go to the store, and our fridge was full of condiments and randomness at every turn.  And I was just plain downright tired.  I looked in the pantry and found everything I needed.  I always keep lentils and at least 2 14 oz cans of diced tomatoes on hand, in case I want to make a quick tomato sauce, or like tonight, soup!  Perfect.

The prosciutto in this recipe lends the soup a salty, smoky note which I love.  It can be substituted with bacon or turkey bacon if you don't want the red meat.  Or you could leave it out, which incidentally is what happened this evening..  If you do choose to leave it out, you might want to add a bit more salt, just a half teaspoon should do it.  I am not a big salter (unless of course it is garlic salt; I can't seem to get enough of it), so to be honest, I have no idea how much salt you would want.  I would add salt a bit at a time though, as you don't want to over salt.  What a shame that would be, with this beautiful soup...

If you would like a nice hearty lentil soup with rice, just add 1 cup basmati rice at the same time as the lentils.  Follow the recipe below, but after bringing to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 20-40 minutes, or until the lentils are tender.

I like to serve this with pita chips (which are just pitas, quartered and pulled apart, slathered with earth balance dairy free butter, sprinkled with a relatively heavy hand of garlic salt, and put under the broiler for 3-5 minutes), but alas, with the absence of pita in my bare pantry, the oyster crackers sufficed nicely.

Lentil Soup

2 tbs olive oil, give or take
2 oz prosciutto, chopped or cut into bits with scissors
1 onion, chopped; and/or leek, white and light green bottom part, halved lengthwise and sliced (in the case of tonight's soup, half of a leftover onion and a whole leek)
3 carrots, roughly chopped
3 celery sticks, roughly chopped
3 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped (I like to keep larger chunks of garlic in the soup)
2 cups of lentils
1 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp dried cumin
8 cups of water
1 14oz can diced tomatoes and their juice
juice from one lemon (or about 2-4 tbs)
1 tsp salt
large handful of spinach, sliced into ribbons

Heat the olive oil over med-high in a heavy bottomed pot or Dutch oven.  Add the prosciutto and cook, stirring often, until nice and crispy.  Add the onion, leek, carrots, celery, and garlic, and cook for about 5 minutes.  Add the lentils and stir.  Add the thyme and cumin, stir until incorporated, and cook until fragrant, about a minute.  Add the water and tomatoes with their juice.  Give it all a good stir, and set the heat to high.  Bring to a boil, and then reduce the heat to low and cook at a simmer.  Here, the cooking time will vary.  The end result is that you want to cook until the lentils are tender.  If you use red lentils, you can cook for 20-30 minutes, brown lentils, 30-40 minutes, and french green or puy lentils, 1 hour.  Once everything is tender, cut off the heat and add the lemon juice and salt.  Give it a good stir and then add the spinach.  You don't actually have to cook the spinach; it will wilt nicely in the hot soup and will enhance the soup canvas if you will, with beautiful flecks of bright green...