GARDEN VEGGIE OMELETTE BAKE RECIPE

With the holiday's around the corner we have been searching for some quick easy meals we can feed our guests. Specifically, breakfast. We never eat breakfast, outside of protein shakes, so finding something filling that wasn't pancakes or waffles was a must. John had been wanting to try baking an omelette, and  I thought this one might actually turn out alright. And it was beyond alright. So good. Can I get seconds please? I have to emphasize that this was John's brainchild, and he did all the work, I can take no credit for this one!

INGREDIENTS:

6-8 eggs

3 cups spinach, wilted

1 bunch green onions, chopped

1 medium red pepper. chopped

1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1/2 cup whole milk

2 oz goat cheese, crumbled

2 tbsp grated Parmesan

salt and pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat oven to 350. Wilt the spinach in a skillet. Scramble the eggs add milk. Chop the veggies, and stir into the eggs with the spinach and cheese. Grease glass baking dish, and pour in egg mixture. Bake for 20-25 min. Serves 4-6

HOMEMADE MARINARA FROM FRESH TOMATOES

One of my favorite parts off Autumn is harvesting our garden. We had some early frost warnings so a lot of our tomatoes were picked early, most were still green. I tried letting them ripen up in a bowl last year, but learned they do better in boxes and paper bags. So this year we corrected our error, and had a bounty of tomatoes all at once. We diced some for salads, made a round of Ketchup, and ate tomato-filled foods for a week.

Despite our tomato binge we still had 7 huge tomatoes left and they were on the brink of getting too soft.  I couldn't stand wasting them, and I wasn't about to dive into the deep abyss of vegetable canning, NO, not over 7 measly tomatoes. Long story short, I made this marinara sauce, and it was so good, beyond good even. You can actually taste the flavors, it was so easy that I will never buy the canned stuff again. Seriously, your mouth is gonna be like, WHAT?!

INGREDIENTS:

6-8 large tomatoes, chopped

2 small onions, diced

1 clove of garlic, diced

1/2 T fresh basil

1/2 T fresh thyme

1/2 T fresh oregano

salt and pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Chop the onions and garlic and saute in a sauce pan. When those have caramelized stir in  chopped tomatoes. Incorporate the fresh herbs. Let the sauce simmer stirring occasionally, the water from the tomatoes will cook off and you will be left with a thick, hearty sauce.

MUSHROOM BROCCOLI + RED PEPPER MELTS

I hope everyone had a fun Father's Day. We made this recipe as part of the "5 week vegetarian challenge" and again on Father's Day with some homemade sweet potato fries.  I enjoyed seeing the look on John's face when he thought I was preheating the oven on to 500 degrees in the middle of June. His exact words were, "I always wondered what broil meant." We are learning to be master chef's one day at a time... I hope you enjoy. It's pretty good.

Ingredients:

1 head broccoli, cut into small florets

1 tablespoon olive oil

salt and ground pepper

8 brown button mushrooms, or your favorite variety

1 red bell pepper

balsamic vinegar

4 thick slices of focaccia or ciabatta bread

4 ounces Gouda cheese, thinly sliced

Directions:

Heat broiler, with rack set 4 inches from heat. Slice mushrooms and peppers, cut up broccoli into florets  Saute veggies with olive oil for about 6-8 min.

Place bread on a work surface. Dividing evenly, drizzle with balsamic, and top with vegetables, then cheese. Place on baking sheet, and broil until cheese is melted and lightly browned, 2 to 4 minutes. Combine bread into a sandwich or leave open-faced and serve. 

5 WEEK VEGETARIAN CHALLENGE MEAL PLAN

We did it! We completed the vegetarian challenge, without breaking a sweat. I am so excited to share with you the meal plan and some recipes. For a printable version of the meal plan click here.

 It wasn't as hard as I had anticipated, and I only anticipated it being difficult because we would have to come up with a lot of new recipes for variety. But as soon as it began I welcomed the challenge. I really enjoyed trying new things, like making risotto for the first time. And I can tell you I feel better- not just because I know I was kinder to the environment- but because I feel like I have more energy, because I had fun cooking, and because I enjoyed not having to stress over "what's for dinner." We will probably keep this up for quite a bit. I plan to make a 5 week meal plan for each of the four seasons, so I always have recipes with seasonal fruits and veggies handy. For now we are happy flexitarians.

To make it easier for readers I tagged all of the recipe posts with the label "5 week vegetarian challenge" and you can find most of these recipes by clicking here. You can see the term "leftovers" in the meal plan, I set it up this way for 2 reasons. The first being, if we had leftovers they got eaten, and the second reason was to offer a "free space" each week. For example, if a social engagement came up on a Monday we would just swap that day with the leftover day from that week. The same goes for "salad," I stuck that in to help us eat the rest of the raw veggies we usually have lying around. We eat a large veggie salad at least once a week anyway, so that really worked for us.

BASIC RISOTTO WITH CAULIFLOWER

I was a risotto virgin before we made this recipe- John had made it before, and I had indulged in some great varieties at restaurants. But I had been wanting to try my hand at making risotto, and our five-week vegetarian challenge gave me the best excuse. I adapted this recipe from this Simple Risotto recipe found here.

 If you need a basic risotto recipe that you can add mushrooms or other veggies to, this one makes a great base. I was surprised at how well this recipe turned out considering everything I had ever heard about making your own risotto.

Ingredients:

1 head cauliflower

2 tablespoons olive oil

1/2 teaspoon salt

7 cups vegetable broth (you could probably make this work with 6 cups if you had to)

2.5 tablespoons butter

1 large shallot, diced

3/4 cup dry white wine

1.5 cups Arborio rice

2 to 4 cups spinach leaves

1 cup parmesan cheese

1/2 tsp salt

 pepper to taste

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 450°F.

Place broth in a medium sauce pan and heat to a simmer; reduce heat and keep warm.

Cut the cauliflower into medium small florets. Toss the cauliflower, olive oil,and 1/2 teaspoon of salt in a bowl. Place cauliflower on a parchment lined baking sheet and roast for 30 minutes in the oven. You can stir them about halfway through baking. When they are tender and slightly browned they are done.

While the cauliflower is roasting, mince the shallot. In a large skillet add the shallot, butter, and 1/2 teaspoon salt, and heat to medium high. Once the butter is simmering, reduce heat to medium, and cook until the shallot is translucent.  Stir in the rice, coating it with the butter mixture.  Now you can increase the heat to medium-high and leave it there for the duration of the cooking process. Refer to the images above when adding your liquids.

Add  the white wine, I like to use Sauvignon Blanc when cooking. Stir the wine and rice constantly until liquid is almost evaporated. At this point, you can start adding the broth. Add the broth in 1/2 cup increments, and stir frequently until broth is almost absorbed. Repeat until rice is tender, but still al dente, you shouldn't let the rice absorb all of the water once it is ready because you want to have a bit of "sauce" left.

Stir in the parmesan cheese, and the cauliflower. We added spinach leaves because we had them, but you could also substitute kale or mustard greens. Keep stirring the ingredients until they are all incorporated and your greens have begun to wilt. Remove from the heat and season to taste.

PORTOBELLO SANDWICH WITH TZATZIKI

We made this recipe on Sunday, because we had some leftover tzatziki sauce and I was worried it was going to go bad. Being on our 5 week vegetarian challenge has made us a lot more creative in the kitchen, and has really gotten us out of our usual dinner rut. I can't wait to share the whole meal plan with you- only two weeks left! What has probably surprised me the most on this menu is how we don't really miss some of the old meat dishes we usually ate. I was sure I'd be craving a burger by week three, but this sandwich rivals some of the best burgers I have ever eaten!

Grilled Portobello Sandwiches

Ingredients
2 portobello mushrooms
2 tablespoons aged balsamic vinegar (I love Nappa Valley Naturals brand)
2 tablespoons olive oil
Focaccia bread
Tzatziki sauce (see below)
1 Red onion
4 oz Feta crumbles

Directions

Preheat your grill to medium-high heat. (We don't have a real adult grill so I did this on the George Foreman, which is what we use for paninis as well).

Lightly drizzle your mushrooms with olive oil. I also used balsamic vinegar because I have been putting it on almost everything lately, and it makes the flavors really stand out. Brush on for an even coat and let marinate.

Make the tzatziki sauce, see below, then slice the onion.

Grill the mushrooms for 4-5 minutes on each side.

Slice the focaccia bread, and drizzle a bit of balsamic. Add a dollup of tzatziki, and layer on some onions. Cut the mushrooms in half, and lay one of the halves on each sandwich. Then add the feta crumbles, and the other half of bread. Serves 4

Tzatziki Sauce

Ingredients
1 cup plain Greek yogurt
1 cup diced cucumber
1/4 cup fresh dill – minced
1/8 cup lemon juice
1 garlic cloves – roasted
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper

Directions
Combine all ingredients in a medium bowl check for seasoning. Add more dill, lemon, garlic or salt/pepper if you wish! Serve immediately or store in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.

TOASTED GOUDA QUESADILLAS

Our Vegetarian quest continues. This recipe is primarily why I couldn't be a vegan- I have pretty much given up dairy except for cheese, its my food weakness. You can't make a tasty quesadilla without cheese. We had family from Germany visiting us last week, one evening for dinner we had a great cheese plate- but so much smoked gouda left over. So this smoked gouda quesadilla recipe was born out of necessity.

INGREDIENTS:

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 1/2 large onions (white or yellow)

1 1/2 tablespoons water

1/2 cup barbecue sauce

6 ounces smoked Gouda cheese

1/4 cup chopped cilantro

1/4 cup Italian parsley

4 flour tortillas

DIRECTIONS:

Slice the onions. Chop the cilantro and parsley. Grate the cheese.  In a large nonstick skillet, heat the olive oil, and add sliced onions. Saute for about 5 minutes, until soft. Add barbecue sauce and water; stir until the onions are completely coated. Turn off heat.

Spread onion mixture, cheese, and greens on half of each tortilla, and then fold in over, this way you can toast 2 at once. Place the quesadillas back in the skillet.  Cook until toasted and the cheese is melted, about 3 minutes per side. Cut quesadillas in half, and serve. I added a bit of avocado to mine, and John added hot sauce and salsa. We both loved them!

QUINOA AVOCADO CHICKPEA SALAD

John and I decided to try out being vegetarians for a few weeks. Because we do our grocery shopping one day per week now, I decided to make a simple meal plan. That way we could make multiple dishes, with similar ingredients, so fresh fruits and veggies wouldn't go bad before we could get to the market again. (We live a block away, and tended to go everyday- which is great for having fresh food- but we wasted so much time!) This week we had dishes that included tomatoes, cilantro and basil. We created a 5 week plan, so I'll share a few recipes from each week, and at the end of the plan I'll share a printable file of the plan so you can try it out too! Last night's dish was this salad, it was filling and I loved how the lemon dressing brought out all of the flavors of the veggies.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup dry quinoa

2 cups water

1 can chickpeas, rinsed

1 cup cherry tomatoes cut in half

2 avocados diced

2 cups spinach

1 bunch cilantro

1/4 cup onion

2 small cloves garlic

For the dressing:

1/3 cup lemon juice

2 tsp. mustard

1 tsp. agave nectar or similar sweetner

2 tsp. olive oil

1/2 tsp. cumin

salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Make your quinoa first. Add quinoa to the water and turn on the heat to medium high.  Let the quinoa come to a boil, then reduce heat to medium and allow to simmer. Cook quinoa for about 15-20 minutes, until the water is absorbed.  Remove it from the heat, but keep the lid on.  Set it aside.

2. Finely chop your spinach and cilantro. Add the greens to a bowl, and set aside.

3.  Next take your onion and garlic and finely dice those, and add to the greens mixture. Next add your chickpeas and diced tomatoes.

4. Dice your avocados, and add them to the bowl. I like to cut the avocado in half, remove the pit and slice them while they are in the skin (it's a lot less messy). Then stir in quinoa, and mix all of the salad ingredients.

5. Make your dressing by whisking all the ingredients together. Pour over salad, and mix until combined. I like to put it in the refrigerator for about 10 min. I think it tastes better slightly chilled.

ROASTED BRUSSLES SPROUTS

I was craving brussels sprouts this weekend, which isn't a phenomenon I am accustomed to- So I picked some up at the market thinking I would try roasting them so the leaves crisp up like my kale chips. I was going blind here just hoping this was going to work- It must have been a long week because I didn't even think to k to Google "recipe for roasting brussels sprouts."  It took a little guessing on the time but I think I got it just right at 20 min. with a turn of the sprouts halfway through.  They taste so good this way, if you aren't a sprout fan you should really give them a second try. I'm hooked. 

Ingredients

1 1/4 lbs brussels sprouts

2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil

Salt and pepper to taste

Directions

Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.

Trim and halve sprouts. In a bowl toss sprouts, 2 teaspoons oil, and 1/4 teaspoon each salt and freshly ground black pepper to evenly coat. Place on an aluminum foil or parchment lined jelly-roll pan, roast 10 minutes, then turn them, and roast for 10 more min.

TORTELLINI SOUP

I'm a huge advocate of eating soup in the winter, its easy, its affordable, and best of all it warms you up! We have been loving this simple tortellini soup recipe, because you can toss any savory veggies you have on hand right in and it always tastes great. I have made it on the stove or in the crock pot, its so easy and will impress any dinner guests.

INGREDIENTS:

2 celery stalks, chopped

3/4 cup sweet onion, chopped

2 large cloves garlic, chopped

3 spring fresh thyme

1 (15 oz.) can organic diced tomatoes and juice

4 cups low-sodium vegetable broth

10 oz. fresh tortellini

a handful of fresh parsley or spinach

Salt and pepper, to taste

DIRECTIONS:

In a large pot saute celery for about 3 minutes, stirring often, Add the onion and cook for 3 minutes before adding the garlic and cook for another minute. (You could also add corn, or carrots to the soup if you have them on hand)

Add the thyme, tomatoes and broth and bring all to a boil. Add the tortellini to the pot and cook according to the manufacturer package directions. Remove the soup from the heat, mix in your parsley or spinach (I usually use parsley because I have an aversion to cooked spinach) Finally, season with salt and pepper if necessary. Makes 4 large servings. 

KALE CHIPS

This weekend we tested out a recipe that I was a little bit leery about. It was homemade kale chips, and it seems like everyone is making them these days. I have a serious aversion to kale, I am not a fan. I only eat it when I put it in vegetable juice and it is hidden behind stronger flavors like, carrot and apple. But, I was pleasently surprised. In fact, we devoured these within minutes of making the first batch. And it only cost about $2.00. You have to taste these for yourself.

INGREDIENTS

1 bunch kale

1 Tbsp olive oil

1/2 tsp ground salt or seasoning salt to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Rinse and dry kale leaves. Remove kale leaves from stems. Place the leaves in a mixing bowl and drizzle with olive oil. Massage the kale until the olive oil is evenly coated onto the kale. Place kale directly onto a baking sheet and sprinkle with sea salt or seasoning. Don't cut the Kale or trim it down, the leaves will shrink dramatically in size so they can overlap on the baking sheet. Place the baking sheet in the oven and bake for 10-15 minutes or until crisp, moving the chips around and flipping them half way to ensure that they are evenly baked.

With an oven it is trial and error, you just have to keep checking them to see when they are done. If you have a food dehydrator you could use this recipe and dehydrate at 115° for 8-12 hours.

QUINOA STUFFED PORTOBELLOS

A few years ago, while waiting patiently for John to grind his natural peanut butter at the grocery store, out of boredom, I discovered something called “Quinoa” in the bulk food section. I had never heard of it, and wasn’t even sure how you would prepare it. I researched it a bit and found that Quinoa grains were actually seeds from a goosefoot plant, and they contain amino acids like lysine. They also contain more protein than any other grain, and they have good quantities of calcium, iron, and phosphorus. I also discovered that it is pronounced “Kin Wa,” like a fool, I had been calling it “Key-Noah” – go figure. Once I had "discovered" this miracle food I figured it would be fitting to make a meal with it, and see if they hype was worth the taste. This is what I chose to make: Quinoa Stuffed Portobellos. I love this meal now, and it have become a comfort food for both of us.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup(s) quinoa, rinsed
• 1 1/4 pound(s) brussels sprouts
• 4 teaspoon(s) extra virgin olive oil
• 4 large portobello mushroom caps
• 1 teaspoon(s) fresh thyme leaves
• 2/3 cup(s) frozen corn
• 3 ounce(s) feta cheese, crumbled (3/4 cup)
• 1/2 teaspoon(s) ground cumin

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. In 2-quart saucepan, combine quinoa and 3/4 cup water. Heat to boiling on high; reduce heat to medium-low. Cover and cook 15 minutes or until liquid is absorbed.
2. Meanwhile, trim and halve sprouts. In an 18-inch by 12-inch jelly-roll pan, toss sprouts, 2 teaspoons oil, and 1/4 teaspoon each salt and freshly ground black pepper to evenly coat. Roast 10 minutes.
3. While sprouts cook, brush mushrooms with remaining 2 teaspoons oil and sprinkle with 1/8 teaspoon salt. Finely chop thyme and add to medium bowl along with corn, feta, cumin, and cooked quinoa.
4. When sprouts have roasted 10 minutes, push to one side of pan and arrange mushrooms, gill side up, on other side. Divide quinoa mixture among mushrooms; roast 10 minutes or until mushrooms are tender.