I wish I had taken a picture of this amazing dish, but it was sooo good that it went super fast! My boyfriend has been in town for a few days now. Our routine for meals consists of a lot of eating out and me cooking a few times during his visit. We had my parents over for spaghetti with "meatballs" one night and had a lot of left over pasta. As we were coming home from church last night, I decided to have a "whatever you can find in the pantry for dinner" kind of night.

So here's what I used...

The leftover linguine from spaghetti with my parents (whole wheat linguine)
1/2 zucchini, sliced and cut in half
About 4 fresh mushrooms, sliced
1 tablespoon of vegan butter, Earth Balance
A little olive oil
Garlic powder
Pepper
Salt
Parsley
Dash of lemon juice
Lemon pepper
1 spoonful of garlic chili sauce
MorningStar Meal Startes Chik'n strips
Frozen Brussels sprouts
Frozen cauliflower

Here's what I did...

1.) Reheat pasta in a sauce pan, add butter, olive oil, parsley, pepper, garlic powder, pepper and stir.
2.) In a small skillet, sautee mushrooms and zucchini in a little olive oil.
3.) Add sauteed mushrooms and zucchini to pasta and stir.
4.)  In the same small skillet, add a few chik'n strips according to directions. Then add to the pasta.
5.) Add 1 spoonfull of the garlic chili sauce and stir.
6.) Add lemon juice, salt and stir.
7.) Meanwhile, heat frozen veggies in microwave according to package directions. Add lemon juice and lemon pepper then toss.

Again, I really wish I had taken a picture of this dish because it turned out really great! My boyfriend, "the meat-a-tarian" said he was really impressed with the chik'n strips. He also said that he would request this dish in the future. I knew then that I had to write it down!

Enjoy!

Alison

My usual schedule for the summer consists of waking up, working out, coming home and eating something super healthy for lunch. Today, I decided to use some of the things I had on hand to make lettuce wraps.

So here's what I used:
Iceburg lettuce
1 can of kidney beans
1 can of garbanzo beans
1/2 a cucumber chopped
1/2 a green bell pepper chopped
1/2 tomato chopped
1/2 avocado sliced
A few mushrooms chopped
A little olive oil
A little lemond juice
Salt and pepper to taste

So here's what you do:
1.) In a bowl, combine beans, cucumber, tomato, green bell pepper, mushrooms.
2.) Drizzle a little olive oil and lemond juice on top and toss.
3.) Add some salt and pepper to taste.

To serve:
1.) Place a scoup of bean and veggie mixture on to a piece of lettuce. Top with avocado and roll up like a burrito.

Here's how it turned out...

**A tip for canned beans...
I like to pour the entire can of beans in a strainer and rinse the beans before I eat them. You'll notice when you do this that all the preservatives and other gunk that they keep in the can will come off. It's kind of gross.

Enjoy!

Alison

Yes, another vegan recipe, but I am not vegan. However, I like the idea of not cooking with eggs. Bananas act kind of like eggs, which I think making these muffins "vegan" super easy.

I took a rather long nap around 6 pm last night and couldn't go back to sleep when I woke up. So, I decided to bake. I had a couple bananas on my counter that started looking kind of interesting. Those bananas soon became my inspiration for my baking.

I looked online for a good vegan banana muffin recipe that matched the ingredients that I already had on hand. I found several, but none of them matched my ingredients. Some called for 3 ripe bananas... well I only had 2. Others called for nutmeg, which is not a spice I keep on hand. I decided to just go ahead and do a combination of recipes that I found. Now, doing this I wasn't exactly sure how my muffins would turn out.

So here's what I used...

2 bananas smooshed with a fork
1/4 cup vegan butter ( I used Earth Balance)
1 cup sugar
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
A dash of vanilla extract

So here's what you do...

1.) Preheat oven to 360 degrees Farenheit
2.) In a bowl, combine smooshed bananas, sugar and butter and mix together.
3.) In a seperate bowl, combine flour, salt, and baking soda and mix together.
4.) Pour the flour mixture into the banana mixture and mix together.
5.) Add a dash of vanilla and mix again.
6.) Using a 1/3 measuring cup, scoop banana batter into an already lined cupcake pan. Repeat until all batter is used.
7.) Place in oven for about 25 minutes or until you test with a fork and it comes out clean. (I only put mine in for about 20 minutes, so just keep an eye on the muffins.)
8.) When finished, let cool on a cooling rack.

When serving:
I like to reheat the muffins for about 10 seconds in the microwave then cut in half and add a little vegan butter and serve! I only got 11 muffins, but I probably could've stretched it to make 12.

So here's how they turned out...

Beautiful and delicious!!! I think next time I might add another banana. The original recipe called for 3 bananas... well I only had 2. However, they turned out really delicious... I should pat myself on the back for improvising with what I had. Also, the original recipe did not call for vanilla, but I think it added a little extra excitement!

Enjoy!

Alison

 

Looks delicious doesn't it???

I normally cook for one, which means when I buy a box of couscous, I don't eat it all and a lot of it goes to waste. While at the grocery store, I stumbled upon a jar of couscous. I can measure out however much I want and I don't waste any. Problem solved.

With that said, I put two of my favorite dishes together. Steamed veggies and couscous. I'm a genius... I know.

So here's what you'll need:

For the veggies:
1 zucchini, sliced and cut in half
1/2 orange bell pepper, sliced
A handful of fresh spinach
Lemon juice
Perfect Pinch - Original All Purpose 

For the couscous:
1/2 cup couscous
1/2 cup water
Garlic powder
Salt
Pepper
Parmesan cheese

What you do:

For the veggies:
1.) In a steamable bag, add a little water, sliced zucchini, bell pepper and fresh spinach.
2.) Steam in the microwave for about 2 1/2 - 3 minutes.
3.) Carefully open the bag and put a little lemon juice and sprinkly on some Perfect Pinch. Shake the bag to coat.

For the couscous:
1.) Boil water in a sauch pan. When water is boiling, add couscous and let stand for about 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork.
2.) Sprinkle on some garlic powder, salt and pepper to taste.
3.) Top it with a little parmesan cheese.

*Optional: If you love lemon just as much as me. Add some lemon pepper to both the veggies and couscous.

Pour the couscous in a bowl and top with the steam veggies!

Enjoy!

Alison

I know it's been a few days since I've posted, but I've been out of town and super busy. However, I'm here and ready to inform you of my lastest findings.

Eggplant... I've always loved eggplant, but I recently determined that I should use eggplant more. While visiting some friends last weekend, I was worried to tell them that I was trying the whole vegetarian thing. I didn't want anyone to have to go out of their way to do anything extra special just to fit my needs... I'm not that type of person. However, they were so gracious enough to make a little something different for our meals.

The big meal was fajitas. Well, I'm very ok with grilling zucchini, squash, bell peppers and throwing in some black beans and corn in my fajita, but they sliced up some eggplant, grilled it and that was the basis for my fajita. It was surprisingly great! So that gave me an idea....

While searching through my new vegetarian cookbook. I came across a vegetarian lasagna. Well who doesn't just LOVE lasagna? Breezing through the list of ingredients, I thought in my head, I can totally make this dish 100 times better. The original recipe just called for eggplant, zucchini, mozzarella and parmesan cheese with some kind of weird sauce. Well, here's what I did differently...

What you'll need:

olive oil for brushing
1 eggplant, sliced
1 zucchini, sliced
1 yellow squash, sliced
1 orange bell pepper, sliced
1 red bell pepper, sliced
fresh spinach
grated mozzarella cheese
grade parmesan cheese
1 can of tomato sauce
1 package of no pre-cook lasagna noodles
salt and pepper to taste
garlic powder
parsley and marjoram

What you do:
1.) Brush the bottom of a cassarole dish with olive oil. Place the sliced eggplant in the dish and broil it for about 8 minutes until golden brown.
2.) Meanwhile, sautee the sliced zucchini, yellow squash, bell peppers and spinach. Add a little garlic powder, marjoram, and parsley.
3.) In a large casserole dish, layer lasagna, eggplant, sauteed veggies, a little tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese. Repeat and top with lasagna, remaining tomato sauce, mozzarella and parmesan cheese.
4.) Bake in the oven on 400 degrees Farenheit for about 30-40 minutes.

I didn't get to take a picture, but I was pretty impressed with how it turned out!!

Enjoy!

Alison