Pumpkin Chickpea Quinoa with Haricot Vert and Almonds

13 Apr


Oh hey, remember like half a year ago when I made my own pumpkin puree? And then I made mac n’ cheese with it? Yep. Me too.

Well I froze a few large yogurt containers-worth of puree. I let one thaw out in the fridge over night yesterday. And today I added a bunch to some quinoa, along with some sauteed onions and haricot vert, chickpeas, and slivered almonds (I also added about a tablespoon of nutritional yeast for some hidden protein).

Yum.

(I’m sort of sick of quinoa, though)

I promise that I will bake you something soon.

I promise that in addition to a tray of garlic-y rosemary roasted potatoes and cauliflower I will soon give you fresh-baked cookies.


I promise that I’ll stop posting about quinoa and find another grain to fall in love with (I have my eye on farro…).

Spare me, for now.


Pumpkin Chickpea Quinoa with Haricot Vert and Almonds

Serves 6

1 cup dry quinoa
2 cups water
1 small onion, sliced thin
large handful of haricot vert (green beans), cut into bite-size pieces
1 cup of pumpkin puree (or squash)
1 tablespoon nutritional yeast
1 teaspoon cumin
salt, pepper
1 can garbanzo beans
1/4 cup almonds, toasted and chopped
1/4 cup golden raisins
grated cheese (Pecornio or Parmesan)

1. Prepare the quinoa. Add 1 cup of dry quinoa and 2 cups water to a saucepan. Boil. Turn heat to low, simmer, cover, and leave it for about 15 minutes until done.

2. Saute the onion in olive oil until transluscent. Add the green beans and cook for about 4 more minutes. Add the pumpkin, nutritional yeast, cumin, salt, pepper. Add the cooked quinoa, garbanzo beans, almonds, and raisins. Grate cheese over the top.

Roasted Beets, Sautéed Chard, and Quinoa Salad with YUBA!!!

3 Apr

I’ve been trying to cook quick, healthy meals for myself. For me, and for you.

Well, ok, a balanced diet can allow a chocolate chip cookie with sea salt sometimes too, especially when I bought it at a HUGE bakesale with all of the proceeds going to Japan. Yum.

And ok, I believe that a balanced diet also allows a trip to Oakland’s newest mac n’ cheese hotspot, Homeroom. “Mac the Goat” (goat cheese and scallions) and Peanut Butter Pie. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. It was phenomenal.

Alright alright, back to quick healthy meals. Today I took a walk to the farmer’s market. I sat in the sun, I started to read a book for fun, and I bought some colorful items to cook for dinner.

Chioggia Beets (google image them, so beautiful!) aka Candy-Stripe Beets:

Red-Stemmed Swiss Chard:


Yuba aka Tofu Skins:

I roasted the beets with a little water for about 45 minutes to an hour. I chopped my beets and added them to my sauteed chard. I mixed everything together with some quinoa and black beans and topped it all off with my spicy yuba.

I now have a happy tummy. I’ve been needing this.

But really, can you please come over for dinner? I need some company and I want to cook for you AND I will do your dishes. Please. It will be fun, I promise.

Roasted Beets, Sauteed Chard, and Quinoa Salad with YUBA!!!

I listed all of the ingredients in italics before each step

Serves 4-6 (or 1 + leftovers!)

Beets, about 1 pound
salt
water
red vinegar

1. Roast your beets. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Wash and trim your beets then place them in a baking pan, sprinkle the beets with salt, and fill the pan with about 1/8th of an inch of water. Cover and roast for about 30 minutes to an hour, until a knife can very easily pierce the beets through to the center. Cool, peel (I used a combo of a paring knife plus my hands; its messy, don’t sweat it), chop, and sprinkle with salt and some red vinegar.

1 onion, chopped
1 bunch chard
salt
vinegar
water or broth

2. Saute the chard. Slice an onion and set aside. Wash your chard. Pull the leaves from the ribs. Trim the ends from the ribs and then cut them into thin slices. Cut the leaves into wide ribbons. Heat a pan with about 2 tablespoons olive oil. Add the onion and saute for about 5 minutes. Add the chard and cook until the leaves are tender. Add some salt. Add a little bit of water or stock if the pan gets dry and the onions begin to stick and brown.


1 cup dry quinoa
1 cup water
1 cup broth

3. Prepare your quinoa. I used 1 cup of quinoa (rinsed), 1 cup of vegetable broth (leftover from making my polenta earlier this week), and 1 cup of water. Combine everything in the pan, boil, then reduce heat and simmer for about 15 mintues.

Everything in steps 1-3 + black beans + yuba

4. Assembly. Combine the beets and the chard. Dump the quinoa into the mix. I added black beans because I had some left over from earlier in the week. Salt, pepper, vinegar (I used red), and top with yuba, or cheese, or nuts, or whatever the heck you feel like.

>15 Minute Dinner. Melty Goodness in a Pinch.

29 Mar

>
Roasted broccoli. Sliced cherry tomatoes with a pinch of flaky Maldon sea salt and a drizzle of balsamic. Creamy avocado and sprinkle of black beans. Melty cheese sandwiched between two corn tortillas all grilled up in my cast-iron skillet. 15 minutes. Ready, set, go.

Roasted Broccoli

1 head broccoli, chopped
Olive oil drizzle
Salt and pepper

1. Heat oven to 475 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment and place your cut up broccoli on the pan with a touch of olive oil, salt, and pepper. 15 minutes. Go.

Corn Tortilla Quesadilla

oil (I used olive oil)
2 corn tortillas, or enough for however many quesadillas you want to make
Cheeeeese! (I used mozzarella and Pecorino)
sprinkle of black beans
sliced cherry tomato
avocado
salt

1. Heat your cast iron skillet (or any skillet that you fancy). Add a touch of oil. Place one tortilla on the pan. Sprinkle your cheese mix and a few beans, 4 baby tomato halves, and 3 small avocado slices. Place the other tortilla on top. Cook, flip, you get it. Melty goodness. It’s hard to just have one.


Don’t forget to eat those fried cheesy bits leftover in the pan. To-die-for.

Mushroom Etc. And Sausage Ragu Over Polenta

28 Mar

What a great weekend. French-style brunch by day, Scottish pub by night. Work making pastries by early morning, homework by early afternoon. Stretching in downward dog at yoga class and running out my pent-up energy in the overcast, beach-style weather.

I’ve made a mini-goal for myself. I am going to try to cook dinner BEFORE I get too hungry. That way, when I am actually hungry I will have dinner made and I won’t snack the entire time I cook.

In addition, I want to save time by prepping my fruits and vegetables right after I buy them. I put my breakfast in a tupper-ware and take it on-the-go most days of the week, so I decided to make my own fruit salad to add to my yogurt or oatmeal. With a sprinkle of cinnamon, my fruit salad was complete. Now I can just eat as much as I want out of the big bowl in my fridge whether it is with breakfast, after dinner, or as a mid-afternoon pick-me-up. I also chopped my celery and carrots into easy to eat pieces and I can just put them in a ziplock baggie to take with me for lunch.

Fresh Fruit Salad

serves 4-6

2 kiwis
1 banana
4 large strawberries
1 pear
1 fugi apple
2 teaspoons cinnamon

Chop all your fruit. Mix everything in a large bowl. Sprinkle with cinnamon and stir. Spoon some fruit salad over your morning yogurt, oatmeal, or eat it on its own. YUM!

After my grocery run this evening, I cooked up a filling, healthy, hearty dinner that made leftovers for lunch tomorrow! I took this recipe I found in a CookingLight magazine and gave it a little twist. Thus I call this a Mushroom Etc. And Sausage Ragu Over Polenta.

Before I started heating any pans, I made sure that I had everything that I needed for this dinner chopped and ready. Then I began sauteing my chicken sausages in a nice hot pan until browned.


Once browned, I took the sausage pieces out of the pan and set them in a bowl.


Next I sauteed some onion and once the onion got soft I added my mushrooms.

After they got nice and browned and soft, in went the garlic, followed by some chopped asparagus and halved cherry tomatoes.

While everything was simmering I was working on the gorgeous creamy polenta. Then it was time to EAT!

Mushroom Etc. And Sausage Ragu Over Polenta

adapted from CookingLight **MY ALTERATIONS ARE IN BOLDED PARENTHESES

Cook the polenta while the ragù simmers so everything will be ready and hot at the same time.

Yield: 4 servings (serving size: 1 cup polenta and 1 cup ragù)

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
  • 8 ounces hot turkey Italian sausage (I used about 2-3 Italian Chicken Sausages from Trader Joe’s)
  • 1/2 cup chopped onion (I used a red onion)
  • 1 pound cremini mushrooms, sliced
  • 2 large garlic cloves, minced
  • 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt, divided
  • 1 (14.5-ounce) can no-salt-added diced tomatoes, undrained (I used fresh rainbow cherry tomatoes)
  • 2 1/2 cups fat-free, lower-sodium chicken broth (I used veggie broth)
  • 1 1/2 cups water
  • 1 cup uncooked polenta
  • 4 ounces 1/3-less-fat cream cheese (I used 2 tablespoons plain yogurt, a pinch of mozzarella, and a generous grating of Pecorino cheese)
  • 1 tablespoon butter

Preparation

1. Heat a skillet over medium-high heat. Add 1 1/2 teaspoons oil to pan; swirl to coat. Remove sausage from casings and chop into bite-sized pieces. Add sausage to pan; sauté 3-5 minutes or until browned, stirring. Remove sausage from pan.

2. Add 1 tablespoon oil to pan; swirl to coat. Add onion; sauté 3 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add mushrooms; sauté 4 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add garlic; sauté 1 minute, stirring constantly. Stir in sausage, asparagus (if using), 1/8 teaspoon salt, and tomatoes; bring to a simmer. Reduce heat to medium; simmer gently for 15 minutes.

3. Bring broth and 1 1/2 cups water to a boil in a medium saucepan. Add polenta, stirring well. Reduce heat to medium, and simmer 20 minutes or until thick (mine took about 10 minutes or less), stirring occasionally. Stir in remaining 1/8 teaspoon salt, cheese, and butter. Serve with sausage mixture.

Nutritional Information

This is if you use the CookingLight recipe without my adaptations, but it should still be quite similar regarless

Calories: 428
Fat: 18.7g (sat 8.4g,mono 8.5g,poly 1.4g)
Protein: 18.2g
Carbohydrate: 46g
Fiber: 4.6g
Cholesterol: 53mg
Iron: 3.3mg
Sodium: 821mg
Calcium: 74mg

Orange Cornmeal Cake

24 Mar

I love olive oil cakes. Love them. With cornmeal/polenta, with citrus. They are so easy, no fussing with softening butter, melting butter, or having to turn a blind eye when you see how much butter is actually in the cake that you are about to make and then eat way too much of.

Olive oil cakes are sophisticated. They are rustic and fruity and crumbly. This Orange Cornmeal Cake is made with whole wheat pastry flour, which makes it a bit dense, but I like that. Last night I ate this cake spread with orange fig preserves while sipping the most scrumptious blood orange mandarin tea. This morning I ate more cake with a cup of coffee while reading the newspaper. What a treat it is to read the actual newspaper than to stare at my computer screen and read the news online.



Orange Cornmeal Cake

**NOTE: You can use extra virgin olive oil in this cake. It will be more fruity and flavorful (which I quite like) vs regular olive oil’s milder flavor. EVOO is also slightly more expensive. I struck a balance and used 1/4 cup of EVOO and 1/4 cup of canola oil. You can also use vegetable oil if you wish.

2 eggs
1/2 cup of olive oil (see note above)
3/4 cup of sugar + 2 tablespoons sugar
zest of 1 large orange (I used CaraCara pink oranges, because it was what I had on hand)
1/2 cup orange juice
1 1/4 cups whole wheat pastry flour (or all-purpose)
1/2 cup finely ground (I used medium ground because I like the bite) cornmeal
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt (I used Kosher salt)

  1. Preheat oven to 375F and spray an 8-inch round cake pan (I used a spring-form pan) with nonstick spray.
  2. In a large bowl, whisk together eggs, oil, 3/4 cup sugar, orange juice and orange zest. In a small bowl, combine flour, cornmeal, baking powder and salt. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and whisk lightly until just combined.
  3. Pour batter into prepared pan and sprinkle evenly with remaining 2 tablespoons sugar. Bake for 30 minutes or until cake pulls away from sides and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.
  4. Cool the cake in pan for 20 minutes. Run a knife around the edge and invert onto a plate. Re-invert cake onto a rack to cool completely.
  5. Serve with marmalade, and a warm drink.

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