meatless monday: fleur de sel butternut squash soup

I have my first cold of the season.  Normally, it takes longer than this to get sick.  I think I even made it until January or February last year before I had to invest in a life’s supply of kleenex.  Needless to say, I was miserable today.  Sneezy, sniffly, drowsy eyes, sneezing… yuck.  I was happy to get home and be able to have some nice, hot soup for dinner.  The only thing that would have made it better is the crock pot.

When I got home, I got to work cutting up 2 large butternut squash to start it roasting.  This step could definitely be done ahead of time to cut down on preparation on a weeknight.  The final product was so creamy and delicious, it was definitely worth the wait :).  Fleur de sel was the perfect addition to butternut squash.  It is the french sea salt that is commonly used in salted caramel flavored desserts, making it the perfect salt for a sweeter variety squash.  Per bottle, it is a bit pricy.  But I have been using the container I got at Williams Sonoma for almost two years and it was totally worth it.

Fleur de sel Butternut Squash Soup

• 2 large butternut squash
• 2-3 cups veggie broth, depending on thickness desired
• 1/8t-1/4t garam masala
• 1/8t-1/4t cumin
• 1t fleur de sel, or more to taste
• kale, optional
• optional topping: pepitas

1. Preheat oven to 425′.  Cut up squash in small cubes and roast for 45 minutes to an hour.

2. Once the squash is cooked, put it into a blender (in batches if necessary) with the veggie broth.  Puree until smooth.

3. Once the squash is all pureed, put into a soup pot and bring to a boil on the stovetop, adding the spices and kale.  Thin, if needed, with additional veggie broth.

4. Top with pepitas and additional fleur de sel.

This might be my favorite butternut squash soup.  I do love Trader Joe’s, but this one is 100x thicker.  This will definitely be made again this year!

Bring on more soup!  And more importantly, bring on the kleenex!

meatless monday: chickpea cider stew

I have said it before, but I will say it again, Fall is my favorite season.  The weather is perfect and the flavors are the best.  Apples and pumpkin are definitely high on my list of favorite flavors and they both make an appearance throughout my eats the entire year.  You know what they say, “An apple a day…”.  One thing that I don’t quite have the appetite for in summer is thick soups and stews.  It’s just not the same eating it in the air conditioning than it is when you’re eating it to help stay warm ;).

Well, today is an air-conditioning type day, but last week fall was upon us and my craving for all things apple came on full force!  Luckily we made a trip to a local apple orchard this weekend to stock up and we have our first bushel of apples in the kitchen.  Since it’s Meatless Monday, I thought (well, this was actually Kinley’s idea but I made it haha) that having apples as the center of a meal would be delicious.  In the past, we’ve made a crockpot stew featuring meat, but chickpeas became the star of the show tonight and they were incredible.

Chickpea Cider Stew

• 1 1/2 c dry chickpeas, rinsed and picked through in case of small stones
• 2 apples, cored and chopped
• 6-8 yukon gold potatoes, chunked into large pieces
• 5-6 whole carrots, sliced
• 2t salt
• 3 c apple cider
• 2 c vegetable broth

1. In a large crockpot, layer all ingredients from top-down.  I left the peels on everything and you would never notice.

2. Place crockpot on low for 8-10 hours, or until chickpeas are tender.

The chickpeas cook in the cider and soak up the delicious, sweet flavor.  The apples completely cook down so just their flavor is left and the potatoes and carrots are perfectly tender.  It was nice to start off with dry chickpeas (read: no prep) and end up with a deliciously cooked and flavored meal!  I was worried before I left that it was going to end up boiling over since it was so full – I even drove home at lunchtime to take a peek!  Luckily, it was for nothing (well, I got to see Croz for a couple minutes 😉 ).  The stew didn’t cook over, the chickpeas just displaced some of the liquid.  It was a perfect weeknight meal!  Extremely easy prep in the morning as well – you can even have everything chopped up and ready to throw together in the morning!   (Just be sure to NOT soak the beans in anything overnight – the cooking process is enough to rehydrate the dry beans).

latin monday

Can you believe it’s yet another Meatless Monday?!  This was the first real ‘weekend‘ after starting my new job so it was even more enjoyable – and even more depressing that it was Monday!  Although knowing there was a delicious dinner in store for tonight helped – except not when I found myself snack-less and hungry this afternoon!  We had a latin-inspired dish tonight that was taken from an idea in Appetite for Reduction, an awesome vegan cookbook.  Changes were made, per usual, and it was delectable.

Latin Lentils

• 1 cup dried lentils
• 2 small (or one large from the garden!) cut into 1/4″ cubes
• 8 kalamata olives
• chili powder & cumin, to taste
• 1/2T lime juice
• 1/4c salsa verde
• salt, to taste
• brown rice tortillas (or your favorite tortilla/wrap)

1. Cook lentils either on the stovetop or in a rice cooker.

2. Saute zucchini in a little olive oil (or on a nonstick pan) over medium-high heat.

3. Add the remaining ingredients and cook until heated through.

Serve on tortillas (like tacos) or serve with tortilla wedges for dipping!

You could add anything else you’d like on top as well – such as tomatoes, lettuce, more salsa… pretty much anything you’d put on a taco you can put on here.  So good.  I loved the bites with the olives ;).  Such a delicious dinner after a hectic Monday!

chickpea reci{peas}

I absolutely love chickpeas.  Or garbanzo beans.  Whatever you’d like to call them.  I have even started eating them straight out of the can – well, after draining at least.  Is that weird?  Even if it is, I don’t care.  If chickpeas are in something, you can guarantee I’m going to love it.  Chickpeas have often popped up here from time to time…

Whether it was a trio of {hummus recipes}…

In a beans grain green recipe {honey-mustard millet & Beans}…

Served on top of Injera at an {Ethiopian restaurant}…

Added to the delicious {Strawberry Pesto Pasta Salad} by Daily Garnish…

Let’s not forget how good it is on {gluten-free vegan pizza} either…

And last but certainly not least how awesome chickpeas made Oh She Glow’s {Heat Wave Summer Salad}…

Obviously, we go through a lot of chickpeas, and this recipe makes them go quite fast as well.  It does slow you down from just eating them from the can however ;).

{Spicy* Baked Chickpeas}

• 1 can chickpeas (sometimes referred to as garbanzo)
• 1T grapeseed oil (or olive oil)
• 1/2t paprika
• 1t cumin
• 1/8t cayenne pepper
• 1/4t black pepper
• 1/2t salt

*The recipe wasn’t actually that spicy, so adjust the spices accordingly.

1. Drain the chickpeas.  Place into a plastic bag.

2. Add the oil into the bag and toss to coat.

3. Sprinkle in the spices and roll around until all the little chickpeas are covered.

4. Bake in a 400* oven for 30-45 minutes, turning occasionally.  Make sure to not burn them.  Mine burnt due to a too high of oven (the temp is adjusted here), but they were still all eaten within a matter of days.

Feel free to play around with the spices to change the flavorings or spicy-ness.  You really can’t go wrong.

Oh my chickpeas.

easy vegan pizza toppings

What’s better than an easy to throw together pizza for dinner on my first day of work?  Nothing that I can think of anyways.  I think I’ll put together a post of my favorite things at work so far tomorrow, but I want to keep tonight’s post relatively nice + simple.  And oh hey, it’s Monday so it’s time for another Meatless Monday idea!  Remember my Veggie Fried Rice or my Meatless Monday on the Grill?  Well, it’s just gotten a whole lot simpler!

Without having gluten in my diet, pizza is one thing that I have missed, especially for busy days where all I feel like is ordering up a delivery pizza.  Luckily, I found Sami’s Bakery.  Their Millet & Flax goodies are absolutely delicious and there is a store nearby that carries a lot of their products, such as bread, bagels, wraps and PIZZA CRUST!  They come frozen so I can have them on hand at any time.  Now, it’s not exactly like regular pizza crust, but it’s not extremely thin either, which I think a lot of gluten free crusts end up being.  And I am not a thin-crust kind of girl, I much prefer the hand-tossed variety.  Well, no matter what crust you end up getting you can still make a delicious vegetarian (and even vegan!) pizza on a busy meatless Monday in your home!  (Or even as a late-night pizza snack if that’s what you’re up for.)

BBQ Chick’n Pizza

• bbq sauce (such as Bone Suckin’ Sauce)
• chickpeas
• pineapple
• broccoli
• zucchini

1. Prepare your crust accordingly.

2. Drain the chickpeas and toss in some bbq sauce.  Also spread some extra bbq sauce on the crust itself.

3. Top the pizza with the chickpeas + bbq sauce and the rest of your toppings.  Why the random toppings on this pizza?  Well our garden is just flourishing!

4. Feel free to top with any cheese or non-dairy cheese, or even just some nutritional yeast.  I ate it as-is and it was extremely delicious!

5. Bake according to your crust directions until done (pretty exact, I know 😉 ).

Other topping options?

• pizza sauce (Trader Joe’s)
• peppers
• onions
• tomatoes
• spinach
• olives
• mushrooms
• tofu
• tempeh
• fried eggs (no, I am not kidding)

You can really have fun with this meal, especially if you have friends or kids around.  Just have a handful of toppings and sauces available for them to be able to choose their own combination!

No matter what topping you decide to go with, it will be delicious and such a nice option for any meatless weeknight meal!

meatless monday on the grill

Around three weeks ago now, I shared with you an easy peasy meatless monday meal with the thought that I would attempt to do a dinner every Monday that highlighted something easy, meat-free and delicious so you can celebrate Meatless Monday as well!  Well, three weeks passed and I never gave a second thought to it – whoops.  Obviously there was the 4th of July that was distracting and who knows what was happening last Monday haha (actually it was the day after Kinley’s 1/2 so I think our minds were both somewhere else!).  Thanks to Kinley for remembering my original plan, I am back at it this Monday!  Well, I should say she is back at it since she made dinner last night after a quick bike ride to the grocery store to pick up a few items.

The best part about this meal?  It only requires a handful of ingredients that are easy to have on hand for any quick weeknight meal.  And not only a few ingredients, but CHEAP ingredients!

Grilled Baked Bean Potatoes

• baked potatoes
• vegetarian baked beans
• nutritional yeast (a cheesy tasting topping found in the health food aisle – it might look scary, but it’s delicious!)
• salad (or other vegetable)
• any other baked potato toppings you desire

1. Preheat your grill and wrap the (washed) potatoes in aluminum foil.

2. Bake on the grill for about an hour, moving around occasionally until baked through.  Take off the grill.

3. Heat up the baked beans on the stovetop.

4. Unwrap the baked potatoes and place on a plate.  Cut a slit in the top and fill with nutritional yeast and the baked beans (or you can eat on the side if you wish).  Serve with a salad or any other side vegetable – possibly one from your garden!

You can obviously make a ton of alterations to this idea.  Different beans, vegetables, bbq sauce, ketchup, earth balance, salt, etc.

And since the grill is heated up already, you might as well put on a few Chocolate Marshmallow Stuffed Grilled Bananas for dessert.

Enjoy!

easy peasy meatless monday

Kinley is convinced she started the Meatless Monday craze.  She has been following it (almost constantly) for close to a decade – who knows where she comes up with these things?  Just recently I noticed two communities who are taking on a day without meat – whether or not it’s on a Monday it still has a positive effect on our environment (and waistline – their words, not mine)!  Aspen, Colorado is the first city in the US to adopt Meatless Monday.  Restaurants, hospitals, schools and organizations are coming together to make this happen!

Ghent, Belgium has adopted Meatless Thursdays for over the past two years – with the town council proclaiming (although not mandating) living a day without meat.

Ghent has obviously been successful in their attempt, and hopefully Aspen will follow suit.  Aspen’s initiative just started this month and I feel that the more restaurants they get on board, the more popular it will become.  I will never preach to anyone that they have to become a vegetarian, it’s not how I roll.  I certainly do not like to be told what to do so would never do that to anyone else.  I will however share amazing and meatless meals on my blog because they are delicious and it’s how I eat.  So if you’re up for trying out just one meatless meal (or day) per week, this should be on your menu ;).

Veggie Fried Rice recipe adapted from Daily Garnish

• 1/2c – 1c dry brown rice (I only had 1/2 cup so that’s all I used, so depending on how many people you’re serving increase the amount 1/4c per person)
• 1-2T oil, divided
• 2 medium carrots, diced
• 2 cups frozen peas and carrots
• 1/2 cup frozen lima beans (or edamame)
• 2T liquid aminos (or soy sauce)
• 1 egg
• salt (to taste)
• sesame seeds, optional

1. Cook the dry rice in either a rice cooker or on the stove top.  You can even do this the night before and keep in the fridge until you’re ready.

2.  Place half of the oil in the bottom of a large non-stick pan headed over medium-high heat (I used one shaped like a wok, but use anything you have!)

3. Into the pan, add the rice and cook for a few minutes to give it a ‘fried’ texture.

4. Add the carrots and frozen veggies and cook through.  It took awhile to get my carrots cooked, so if time is an issue and you don’t want crunchy carrots, pre-cook them for a few minutes.

5. Mix in the liquid aminos (or soy sauce) as well as the sesame seeds.  Create a hole in the center of the rice mixture.

6. Add the egg to the center and scramble it into the rice mixture.

7. Serve with chopsticks!

Worried about protein while eating vegetarian?  Don’t be.  The rice along with the peas creates a complete protein, and the addition of the egg increases it even more!  If you were to use edamame, that is considered a complete protein in and of itself as well.  I actually think I eat more protein now than when I used to include meat in my diet, mainly because I am more conscious of it and love experimenting with combinations of different grains and beans!

what i ate wednesday #3

WIAW is making weeks go WAY too fast… haha.  It seems like I was just eating last week’s food!  Unfortunately, storms were in the forecast throughout the day today so my pictures had to be taken inside – so please forgive their darkness!  I tried to find all of the natural light I could get ;).

Breakfast:

OIAJ “Oatmeal in a Jar”

The creamy and chunky peanut butter jars from the PB&J Bar were almost gone, so Kinley and I both got to have our oatmeal in one!  Hers in the creamy jar, mine in the chunky.  This is seriously the most delicious thing ever.  Steel-cut oats with chia and a cut-up banana mixed in after cooking, topped with Quinoa Granola (Kinley made this, I’ll see if she wants to do a guest post on it in the near future, or make a batch myself 😉 ).

I also had a glass of Green Plant Juice from Trader Joe’s.  As long as you can get over drinking the color, you can only taste the fruit juices in it and get all of the added benefits of green superfoods!

Mid-Morning Snack:

Fuji Apple

Lunch:

Leftover Mexican Lime Millet Succotash

Baby Carrots + Smoothie (made this one but subbed unsweetened chocolate almond milk + added spinach)

Afternoon Snack:

Peanut Butter & Jelly Lärabar and an Orange

Dinner:

Potato and Kale Enchiladas from the Veganomicon cookbook and Trader Joe’s Refried Beans

Not only was my day entirely dairy-free, it was completely wheat/gluten free as well!  Kind of a mexican-inspired lunch and dinner combo, but they both tasted entirely different – and really, there’s nothing wrong with too much mexican food, right?

mexican mash-up

I much prefer baking to cooking.  It has everything to do with the measurements.  I love following directions and measuring and scooping according to the recipe.  Most good cooks, well, inventive cooks, do not typically rely on recipes to make their dishes and have delicious outcomes.

I’m trying to better myself.  I made a dish last night that did not have a recipe.  I admit, I was kind of freaking out because what if it turns out horribly?!  Well, it didn’t.  And it’s very simple, so no freak outs required for you.  I’ll list ingredients and measurements, but if you choose to find your inner chef, please, be my guest and make any substitutions or changes you see fit.

Mexican Lime Millet Succotash

• 2 cups cooked (or canned) beans.  I used adzuki beans for the first time (we got them dried and I cooked them in the rice cooker, I’m pretty sure I cooked them way too long so mine were somewhat a mix between whole beans and refried beans)
• 1 cup uncooked millet
• 1/2 cup baby lima beans
• 1 1/2 cups frozen corn
• 1 bag Trader Joe’s fire-roasted bell peppers and onions (If you don’t have a TJ’s near you, you can either use a bag of frozen green peppers or cut up and cook your own with onions if desired.

Sauce

• 1T honey
• 1.5T rice vinegar
• 1T grapeseed oil
• 1T lime juice

In a saute pan, heat up the millet on medium-high heat for a few minutes, stirring frequently until they begin to pop.  Remove from heat and cook the millet (1 cup to 2 1/2 cups water) in a rice cooker or on the stovetop.  My rice cooker took 30 minutes, but use your own specifications for this part.  Once done cooking, let sit with the top open for 20 minutes.  Fluff with a fork.

In the same saute pan used for the millet, heat the frozen lima beans, corn and green pepper mixture.  Cook until everything is well combined and no longer frozen.  Remove from heat.

To the rice cooker (still on the warm setting), add the beans (drained if you’re using canned) as well as the vegetable mixture.

In a small bowl, combine the ingredients for the sauce with a whisk and toss in the rice cooker with the other ingredients.  Keep on warm until you and your family members are ready to eat!

veggie pizza remix

I love veggies.  And I also love pizza.  Veggie pizza?  Oh man, this used to be one of my downfalls at any gathering that had it.  Typical veggie pizzas call for crescent dough rolled out into a “crust”, topped with cream cheese with something mixed in and then topped with the only actually healthy part – the veggies.  I am guessing the small proportion of veggies to the other components is one of the reasons it is so popular for a ‘vegetable dish’ ;).

I have not had the previously mentioned veggie pizza in quite some time, as I no longer eat dairy and crescent rolls are pretty low on the list of nutrient-filled foods.  Thus, I was extremely happy when Kinley compiled the following concoction to recreate a veggie pizza for my grad party!  First, she turned to The Gracious Pantry for her Clean Eating Thin Crust Pizza.  If you subbed out the honey in the crust for agave or some other non-honey sweetener, this entire pizza would easily be vegan.

Once the pizza crust was baked and cooled, she topped it with Non-Dairy Cream Cheese and also mixed in dried garlic and dill.  This was my first tasting of non-dairy cream cheese, and boy was it ever better than any cream cheese I remember!  Even the relatives who initially turned their nose up at “tofu cream cheese” licked the container clean…

The final component?  Shredded carrots and chunked up broccoli, but do what you’d like here.  There are infinite possibilities.

This was a hit.  It was gone less than 2 hours after the party started.  No lie.  And no one knew it wasn’t actually cream cheese.

This picture has nothing to do with veggies or pizza… but it was another one of the beautiful flower arrangements out at my party.  Thanks Aunt Jody for putting these all together with the two bunches of flowers I picked up at Trader Joe’s!  I just love hydrangeas.