Tofu Peanut Stir Fry

Whipped this up for dinner tonight. Tofu, various veggies, black pepper sauce, soy sauce, and peanuts over some thin noodles. I had honey roasted peanuts so used those and they mixed really well with the black pepper sauce. Yummy and enough leftover for a great lunch tomorrow, too!

Rosemary Red Potatoes

I had picked up a bag of red potatoes last week with no real agenda for them. Tonight I was craving a green bean dish but alas those had gone bad when I went to prepare them. So I heated up the oven, quartered some potatoes, splashed them with olive oil, sprinkled liberally with rosemary, and roasted them. Probably could have roasted a bit longer but I was so hungry since my darn oven takes so long to preheat I had to have them! Was a nice second choice dish but I still want those spicy sesame green beans I was going to make.

Split Pea & Parsnip Soup

This slow cooked soup was SO good and simple to make. Perfect texture, perfect consistency, and wonderful flavor. Everything just broke down perfectly towards the end of the slow cooking except a few soft parsnip pieces here and there. I will definitely be making this again. I love a good split pea soup and this one hit the mark.

Rediscovering My Slow Cooker

It's official, I have fallen back in love with my slow cooker. I hadn't used it for quite a while up until a few weeks ago when I decided to make a Dal. It came out great so therefore inspired me to start using it again. Last weekend I made maple baked beans on Saturday and then my old standby of Almost Irish Stew on Sunday. Both came out great and gave me nice leftovers for the week.

It's raining today and we have a wet week ahead in the forecast so I wanted to make a soup. After debating between a black bean soup and a lentil soup, I ended up making neither and currently have the ingredients for a split pea & parsnip soup in the slow cooker for tonight. I will probably roast some brussel sprouts as well and might even remember to take pictures to share the yummy goodness.

Another Stir Fry

Basically the same thing as last night but this time I added tofu and the noodles are chow mein.

Quick Stir Fry Dinner

Just got done enjoying this easy, and late, dinner. Stir-fried a frozen mix of broccoli, carrots & water chestnuts, added some slivered almonds, splashed in some garlic sauce and tossed it all on a bed of Udon noodles. Pretty tasty and super quick!

Berries

Threw together a couple snack packs of berries for work tomorrow. One is raspberries and blackberries and the other a mix of strawberries and blueberries. Yummy! Hope I don't eat them all up tonight!

Veggie Burger & Onion Rings

Had some veggie burgers in the freezer so I picked up some of those thin buns I've been seeing around to give them a try. Was really good though I found the buns to be a bit flimsy when I set the burger down or picked it up. Baked some onion rings for a side (not from scratch, unfortunately). Seemed like an appropriate Memorial Day weekend lunch!

Box

Forgot to take pictures of the box today. My game plan to do so isn't going so well! :-) I'll be making lots of salads and a stir fry as I got: leaf lettuce, radishes, carrots, cucumber, cherry tomatoes, broccoli, and zucchini. I also received a couple of apples, 2 oranges, another lemon and a pint of strawberries. I feel like there was something else but it's escaping me.

I haven't been eating the best this last week so I hope to use all this yummy produce and change that.

Today's Box

Decided to start taking pictures of my produce deliveries. Hopefully I'll get better at grouping it all together for pics but here's a couple shots.

I was not expecting the kiwis or onion as they were substitutes for the avocados and sweet potatoes I did not want, but happy to have them! I love the color of the spring red onions' bulbs. Two of the lemons are Myer and the other is Eureka. I have another lemon too so I really need to figure out something to make with them all now. Will have to peruse my cookbooks. Probably use most of the produce in a stir fry and fajitas/tacos this week.

"Cleaning the Fridge" Stir Fry

Noticed I had some veggies that needed to be used in the near future earlier today so I grabbed some rice noodles to make a stir fry with. All these items were from my CSA box almost two weeks ago and kept very well!


Everything chopped up and in the wok.


I should have thrown the onions in first instead of with everything since a couple didn't cook as well as I would have liked by the time everything else was ready.


Splashed in some garlic sauce along with the noodles. And viola! the final product.


Yummy, and I have leftovers for two meals to boot!

This Week's Bounty

Came home from work today to a box of: 2 oranges, 2 tangerines, 2 apples, a lemon, pint of strawberries, 4 potatoes, red chard, asparagus, cauliflower, 2 small artichokes, and leaf lettuce. I'm going to start taking pictures of everything next delivery as it sure does look lovely all laid out when I unpack the box.

Broccoli and Cauliflower Au Gratin

I have been wanting to make this dish again and finally did when I got a head of cauliflower in my CSA box. Here it is in all it's cheesy bread crumby goodness.

And this would be the first of two servings I helped myself too. So tasty, but yea, kinda rich.

This Week's Box

Today brought my second CSA box since rejoining. Love coming home to it on my doorstep! This week's box consisted of: couple of apples, couple of oranges, couple of tangerines, a lemon, carrots, celery, green leaf lettuce, red chard, collard greens, cauliflower and flat leaf parsley. The parsley was a replacement item for red beets (not a fan).

I'll be making salads and picked up some extra fixings to go along with the lettuce, celery & carrots. Got some more potatoes to make my medley of greens again with the chard & collard greens and I will make that yummy gratin with the cauliflower. Of course, I still have quite a bit of the Chard & White Bean Soup I made the other day so I'll probably make salads to go with that and try to eat the rest in the next couple of days and try not to end up with a bunch of different leftovers. Though that gratin has been sounding pretty good for a couple of weeks now!

Chard and White Bean Soup

Finally made this soup tonight; have been wanting to ever since the recipe came in my CSA box last week. It was simple to throw together and tasted good. Just chard stems & leaves, white beans, garlic, broth and salt & pepper with some Parmesan thrown in at the last minute.


And yes, I did top it with a little extra cheese. :-)


It should keep well so I'll be set until I get my next produce delivery on Tuesday. I did good with this last box; just the turnip went bad (because I forgot I had it) and a little of the leaf lettuce wilted, no biggie. Looking forward to more greens and fruit along with some cauliflower I plan to make that gratin with.

CSA!

So, thanks to my tax return, I am caught up financially and was able to restart my CSA service this week. Yay! I received: kale, chard, leaf lettuce, broccoli, onions, oranges, a tangelo, apples, & a pear.

Tonight I made a Medley of Greens with Potatoes and Leeks. Just as delicious as I remembered. I used fingerling potatoes and it was actually a medley this time since I used both kale and chard! Ate two servings and put the rest up for tomorrow.

I plan on using the broccoli in Broccoli and Cauliflower Au Gratin.

Might grab a bell pepper and whip up some fajitas to use the onions. Can chop up some lettuce for that plus make a salad or two.

Getting Back on Track

It appears I've fallen off the cooking wagon but I will be getting back on track this week. I wasn't feeling well for a couple weeks and got in a habit of eating easy; soup, take-out, what have you. Went grocery shopping today for the first time in a few weeks, and yes, it was expensive as I was out of a lot of sauces and staples. What's coming up on the menu is: fajitas, stir-fry & brown rice, Almost Irish Stew, and Enchilada-Inspired Polenta Pie. I realize these are basically fall back recipes but hey, they're tasty and good for me. :-) I plan on slow cooking the Almost Irish Stew tomorrow for dinner so lookout for pics!

Enchilada-Inspired Polenta Pie

A new recipe I tried from Robin Robertson's Fresh From the Vegetarian Slow Cooker. To get the polenta going, I minced an onion, sauted it in some olive oil, threw it in the cooker with some chili powder, salt, cornmeal and boiling water.


A few hours before it was set to be done, I threw together the other ingredients to let the flavors mingle and meld. Ingredients consist of: pinto beans, corn, chunky salsa, green chiles, red onion & chili powder. Recipe also called for olives but I don't care for them. Mixed that all together, threw some Saran wrap on the bowl and in the fridge it went.


Now, this being my first time cooking polenta from cornmeal, my expectations were off. I expected it to firm up. It did become thicker but never firm like I figured it would. I had to reference another cookbook to read up on polenta and from what I read, the texture and consistency were right on. So I threw in the bean mixture on top of the polenta and set the timer for 30 minutes. Chopped up some cilantro and waited for some yummy goodness.


As you can see, the polenta is still not firm, but the dish was very tasty. I figured it would all blend together when I got it out of the cooker to store for leftovers, and it did. And that's alright; I don't mind it all mixed together instead of the beans sitting on top of a firm polenta base like I imagined because it tastes mighty good. And isn't that what really matters? :-)

Macaroni & Cheese

I have been trying to make things that are economical and that will yield leftovers I can eat for a while. Mac & cheese fell into that category.


I used the recipe in Nava Atlas' book, The Vegetarian 5-Ingredient Gourmet. Simple enough: elbow macaroni, a little flour, milk, butter and cheese. The recipe had an alternative to bake it once done, so I did that as I like crusty baked things. :-)


It was good but a bit bland. I used a white cheddar so perhaps next time I will try a more flavorful cheese; sharp cheddar, smoked gouda, something along those lines. I added a bit of freshly ground pepper upon serving.


Had a lot of leftovers that reheated well. I used a bit of salt to try & bring out some more flavors and it didn't seem to help so I went by my weird stand-by for leftover mac & cheese: a splash of Italian dressing.

Pasta with Vegan Italian Sausage

Made this quick tasty dinner tonight. The sausages (not homemade) are made of wheat gluten, eggplant, fennel, red pepper, and spices and highly compliment pasta and Italian dishes. I have tried an Apple Sage variety of the same brand of sausage that is also fabulous and grills up great. But back to this.

I slice the sausage and fry it in a bit of olive oil while the pasta cooks. Since one sausage is a bit much for me with a serving of pasta, I usually measure out 2 servings of pasta and sauce to make. When it's all heated through, I divvy it up, half goes in my bowl and gets sprinkled with Parmesan cheese, and the other half goes in my glass container for leftovers. I had a bad habit of eating more than a recommended serving of pasta and have found that using the suggested amount actually is the perfect amount and fills me up without stuffing me. Imagine that!


Now, off to add a splash of milk and honey to my decaf vanilla chai tea that has been steeping while I write this post. Yum...