Ready In Seconds, Seriously! Homemade Mayo

I've had some people (particularly my friend John) interested in my homemade mayonnaise I've been using for our Whole30 cleanse so I made a quick video to share with you.

I follow the Everyday Maven mayo recipe because it has instructions for using an immersion blender, which gives amazing results pretty much every time.  And as you can see in the video, it's pretty much instant! 

Please forgive the shortness of the video, I recorded it with my phone and it tipped over before I was finished because of the immersion blender's vibrations on the countertop.  But as you can see, it turned to mayo in just a few seconds.  All I did to finish was to bring the immersion blender up to incorporate the oil sitting on top.  So quick! 

The most important thing to do is to use LIGHT olive oil.  Regular extra virgin olive oil is to olive-y and strong, what you need is a really light oil so it doesn't give too much flavor.   I would recommend a touch less salt, this was my first time using the Himalayan pink salt and this batch turned out a little more salty than expected.  If you're following Whole30, you should use plain mustard or mustard powder because Dijon mustard has white wine, which is not Whole30-approved. 

I've read that to make a smaller batch, you use just an egg yolk (save the white for your next omelet) and whatever amount of oil you want, like 1/4 to 1/2 cup.  But I say go for a whole 1 cup batch, this stuff is so good!  I eat it on everything these days. 

And I follow the advice that it lasts longer than one week, in my book it should last for as long as your egg.  I'm also using a farm-fresh egg that I bought at the farmers' market, really good quality. 

Makin' It At Home: Citrusy Kale-Quinoa Salad

This dish was inspired by a salad that my friend Chuck picked up at the deli for a party at his house.  I ended up eating a large portion of the salad (um, most of the container) and was determined to make my own since I enjoyed it so much.  At the party I snapped a photo of the ingredients list on the package so I could copy it, but of course now I can't find that photo.  Whatever, no biggie.  It was tasty, that's what really matters.  I love the crunchy nuts, the puckery citrus dressing, the earthy quinoa, the sweet fruit, savory onions, and tangy feta.  It all comes together in a great salad.

When I got home I did some searching online and found this recipe from The Kitchn that seemed really close, so I copied it and modified it to match the salad we had. So this recipe is for Chuck because he likes the salad too, and wouldn't it be nice to make it at home for less money?  Plus it's a flexible recipe, using what you might have on hand. 

This recipe comes together in four separate parts -- the onion, the quinoa, the kale & other stuff, plus the dressing. I made this two times, the first time I had walnuts and feta, the second time the feta was all gone so I added some additional lemon juice. Feel free to make it that way if you want a dairy-free/vegan version. 

Inspiration

The Kitchn kale quinoa salad with citrus dressing

Ingredients

Onion

• 1/2 onion, diced
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
• 1/4 tsp salt

In a medium skillet saute the onion for 20 minutes on medium heat.

beautiful caramelized onions.

Quinoa

• 1/2 cup quinoa
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 cup water
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp dried lemon peel (totally optional, I only added it because I had it)

In a small pot bring all of the ingredients to a boil, turn the head down to low, cover and cook for 15 minutes. Once 15 minutes is up, turn the heat off and let it sit 5 minutes to finish absorbing the liquid.

quinoa on to boil.

Kale & other stuff 

• 1 bunch kale, finely minced
• 1/2 cup dried fruit (I used raisins because that's what I had, but the original dish had craisins)
• 1/2 cup nuts, chopped and toasted in dry skillet (I used walnuts the first time and sliced almonds the second)
• 1/4 cup crumbled feta (optional if you want it vegan/dairy-free, but then add another 1-2 Tablespoons lemon juice for tanginess)

To prep the kale, remove the leaves from the stems and toss the stems if they're really tough. Then roll the leaves up the long way and cut them into fine ribbons.

Final salad with the walnuts and feta. 

Dressing

• 2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 1/2 tsp honey
• 2 Tablespoons olive oil
• salt & pepper

In a large bowl mix the first three ingredients together and taste for salt & pepper. Then as the rest of the ingredients are ready, add them to the bowl as well. 

Final salad with sliced almonds and no feta.

Verdict 

I preferred the version with feta, but the version without it was fine too.

Savory Flavor Enhancer: Miso Butter

I've read about miso butter a few times and originally thought it was some sort of special sauce, but I got really curious so I researched it and found it's literally just miso and butter mixed together.  Miso is salty fermented soybean paste, it's usually made into miso soup that you might have at a sushi restaurant or it's mixed into Asian dishes.  I finally decided to try it by having toast with butter and smear of miso paste. 

When I went to get my miso it was all dried out after sitting in the fridge with the lid off.  Oops.  Totally not my fault, the lid was really flimsy and I thought it was covered.  I still scraped some out of the least dried-up area and tried it.  Wow!  It's an amazing savory taste that I found myself really enjoying.  Actually, a few days later my mouth was watering over the idea of more miso butter on a crumpet for lunch.  So good!

Last week Sonny D and I went grocery shopping and I decided to buy a new container of miso.  I picked up a 13-ounce tub of Westbrae Natural unpasteurized white miso.

The tub of miso I bought.

Then I figured I should probably look up a more official recipe than just "a bit of miso with some butter".  I found a recipe that gave a ratio of 2 parts butter to 1 part miso, so I grabbed a small Tupperware container and combined 2 tablespoons butter with 1 tablespoon miso since I figured that amount would probably last me quite a while but wouldn't stick around so long it would go bad.  The only thing is that I keep it in the refrigerator, which means the butter is pretty much unspreadable.  I need to remember to pull it out of the fridge a little early to give it time to soften.

Easy recipe.  Miso + butter = miso butter.

Verdict 

I love this and it's nice to have a pre-made batch so I can quickly spread it on my morning toast or throw some on veggies.  But this probably isn't for everyone since miso is salty with  'umami' (savory) flavor.  It kind of reminds me of fish without being fishy; that's probably the fermentation.  If you're interested in trying a new neat flavor, I recommend giving it a shot.  I want to try it on corn, seems like it would be a great combo.  Can't wait to see what else I can add it to.

The neat thing is that since my miso is unpasteurized, I'm also getting the benefits of probiotics.   Yay, happy digestion!

Dip An Apple In It: Greek Yogurt Peanut Butter Dip

I thought this Greek yogurt peanut butter dip would be great to send along in Sonny D's lunches for the week along with some apple slices. I whipped this up for dinner on Sunday night and it was super quick and easy. 

Inspiration 

Family Fresh Meals Greek yogurt peanut butter dip
FitSugar creamy peanut butter dip

I combined the two recipes as I was mixing it to get what I thought was the right blend of ingredients and flavors. I could have used plain yogurt, but I thought vanilla would be a better choice.  And I don't have maple syrup called for in one recipe, but I do have honey. 

Ingredients

• 6 oz vanilla Greek yogurt (one serving container)
• 1 Tablespoon peanut butter
• 1/2 Tablespoon honey
• 1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

Mix all the ingredients in a bowl.  Taste and see if you need to adjust any flavoring. 

Creamy peanut butter dip.

Verdict 

We ate this for dinner with apple slices.  Sonny D liked it, but declined when I offered it for his lunch the next day.  Oh well.  We finished it off with another apple the next night. 

I don't care for yogurt at all, but this was pretty good.  I'd rather eat apples without it though.  It reminded me of that potluck salad of grapes in a creamy dressing with chopped nuts sprinkled on top.  I absolutely love that salad but I'm sure the original isn't the healthiest with all the cream cheese and sour cream.  This dip would be approximately the same thing, but I would leave out the peanut butter and switch the honey for brown sugar.  

Oh, you could add some cocoa powder or chocolate syrup to make a choco-peanut butter version, that might be really good.  I've also got some caramel syrup meant for flavoring coffee, that would be good with peanut butter as well.  Oh, and some chopped peanuts would be a great way to expand the peanut flavor. 

I Double-Dog Dare You To Try It: Savory Oatmeal

I've been thinking about this concept for a while and yesterday I finally took the plunge and had my first bowl of savory oatmeal.  I grew up eating sweet oatmeal, topped with brown sugar and milk floating on top.  Since my re-discovery of oatmeal about 4-5 years ago, I've stayed with sweet oatmeal for breakfast and the occasional lunch. I do a lot more experimenting with fruits and seasonings though and it's always made completely from scratch, no instant packets here.  And a lot of the time what I make could be called porridge since it's not solely rolled oats, usually I mix it up with steel-cut oats, millet, bran, wheat germ, flax seed meal, buckwheat, quinoa, etc. 

But back to savory oatmeal.  I had never thought about eating savory oatmeal, the concept just never crossed my mind. But there's nothing inherent with oatmeal that makes it a sweet dish, it's neutral.  In my fanaticism for oatmeal, I check out any recipe I can find for oatmeal/porridge and I follow a few blogs (Oatgasm, Oatmeal Artist, etc.) that are solely about oatmeal.  Yep, I'm totally obsessed.   And in my explorations, I found mention of savory oatmeal.  Hmm... interesting idea.  And this Serious Eats post by Mark Bittman about savory oatmeal with scallions and soy sauce caused a big kefluffle.  Some people were absolutely disgusted, while others reminisced about the savory oatmeal dishes of their childhood.  And others, like me, were intrigued and willing to give it a shot.

Cooking It Up

For a few months I've thought about the concept and looked up recipes for inspiration, but yesterday I finally mustered up the courage to try it. I had several batches of pre-made plain oatmeal in the fridge, so if it was disgusting I had a fallback plan to throw out the gross experiment and try again with a sweet oatmeal or something from the pantry.  I didn't want to try this on a weekday morning for breakfast since it would take longer to make, so I whipped it up at home over my regular lunch hour at home.
 
My plan was to go with Asian flavors since we've got a lot of Asian ingredients (seasonings, sauces, etc.) and few other fresh ingredients.  I sauteed some sliced mushrooms, added some spinach, garlic and onion powder.  While that was cooking, I added soy sauce to the pre-cooked oatmeal until it tasted like the right amount and heated it up in the microwave.  I used a flat bowl (we call them pasta bowls) because I was going to add a soft-cooked egg on top. 

Mixing in soy sauce

I went back to the skillet and slid the mushrooms and spinach out of the way and cracked an egg in the middle.  I cooked it in my typical way, medium heat with the lid on for two minutes for a soft-cooked egg.  I slid all of that on top of the warmed up oatmeal and added some fresh black pepper and a sprinkle of salt since there wasn't much other seasoning.

I swear there's an egg under all that!

Verdict

I liked it well enough, but my first attempt wasn't thrilling.  I had to add several more drizzles of soy sauce on top because I hadn't seasoned it much.  I was busy browsing Pinterest while eating so I wasn't paying too much attention, but I should have added some spicy Korean bean paste, miso, or sriracha for an additional layer of flavor.  I'd like to take another shot at savory oatmeal but try making it completely from scratch so I can season the oatmeal when it's cooking and adding more flavorful toppings. 

I do have to say that it was really filling.  I had only a little something else with lunch (don't remember what, but it wasn't much) and I was satisfied for the entire afternoon.

So I dare you to try savory oatmeal and let me know how it goes.  Here are some inspiring links from my bookmarks.

• Martha Stewart savory oatmeal with a soft-cooked egg
• St Louis Post-Dispach The secret side of savory oatmeal
• Tea & Cookies Curried oatmeal with caramelized onions
• Penny De Los Santos sexed up savory oatmeal
• Serious Eats Mark Bittman's savory oatmeal with scallions and soy sauce

I could see a Mexican version working out really well with a bit of taco leftovers. I'm also in love with the simple combo of freshly grated Parmesan cheese and soft-cooked egg.   

Tempeh Nuggets: They Happen to Be Vegan

Sonny D and I made breaded tempeh sticks on Monday.  They're supposed to be served with buffalo wing sauce to be like buffalo wings, but wouldn't ya know it, we had only a tiny bit of Frank's buffalo wing sauce in the fridge and no extra bottles in the pantry.  Ugg.  I like to think of myself as a super-prepared gal, so it's amazing that I don't have 3 extra bottles on hand. No worries though, we've got a ton of condiments in our fridge so we made it work.

Let's start with tempeh.  Tempeh is fermented soybeans pressed together.   Tempeh looks like little blobs of tan cottage cheese pressed together, like a pale veggie burger, and has a nutty, earthy flavor.   It's a lot less processed than tofu, that's why I use it sometimes. Plus Trader Joe sells organic 3-grain tempeh and I've totally been brainwashed to think that pretty much anything Trader Joe's sells is amazing.  

You can use this recipe to bread pretty much anything, I'm thinking I might use it on shrimp next.  

Inspiration

Tastebook buffalo tempeh "wings" (made without modifications!)

Ingredients

• 8 oz package of tempeh (the Trader Joe's tempeh is 8oz)
• 1/3 c milk (I used unsweetened almond milk)
• 1/3 c flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp thyme
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• Freshly ground pepper to taste
• 1 cup Italian seasoned panko crumbs (I used whole wheat unseasoned)

Directions

I've heard steaming tempeh makes it less bitter, so at lunch time I sliced it into 12 pieces and steamed it for 20 minutes in the electric steamer.   Then I sprinkled it with some Bragg's liquid aminos (tastes like soy sauce) and rice vinegar to sit in the fridge for the afternoon.  Last time I thought it was my imagination, but now I'm quite sure tempeh plumps when you steam it.

When you're ready to cook, preheat your oven to 400 degrees. 

This recipe follows the standard 3-bowl breading method -- the first bowl is flour, the second is either milk or egg, and the third is the breadcrumbs.

Sonny D dipped each piece of tempeh in the flour and knocked off any extra.  He was seriously really good at it.

Sonny D doing an awesome job of
coating the tempeh slices with flour.

Then you dip each piece in the milk and then into the breadcrumbs.  Put the breaded pieces on a rack in a sheet pan.

Coated tempeh waiting to go in the oven.

I love my baking rack setup you can see here, it's the Cook's Illustrated/America's Test Kitchen recommended products of the Wear-Ever half sheet pan  and CIA chrome cooling rack.  I don't think they were designed to go together, but the rack fits perfectly in the pan.  It's great for baking breaded items so the air can circulate and ensure it stays crispy.  It's also awesome for French fries, they don't end up soggy. When I used to bake French fries on a flat cookie sheet I always ended up baking them for twice as long to ensure they got crispy.  Took forever!  And the sheet pan is big, I use it to roast veggies.


I sprayed the breaded tempeh with Trader Joe's olive oil spray to promote browning. Yep, more Trader Joe's products, I think I need to profile of my favorite TJ items.  Love that place!

Closeup of browned tempeh sticks.  Look at the one in the back where the focus is.

Bake for 10 minutes and then flip and bake for another 10 minutes. 

Another shot of tempeh sticks.

I served them with the last bit of buffalo wing sauce, hot sauce, ketchup, and Dijonnaise (Dijon mustard-mayo blend).

Interior shot, looks like a fish stick. 

Verdict 

Husband Jeff and I liked them well enough, he actually commented that he liked them a lot, which is good since he didn't really care for tempeh the first couple of times.  They were pretty good with  buffalo wing sauce, but I liked them best with creamy Dijonnaise.  Husband Jeff had his with Valentina hot sauce.

I was disappointed that Sonny D barely tried his.  I was hoping I could send the leftovers to school with him for lunch.  He ate one with ketchup, but not any others.   I ended up heating up the leftovers at work in the microwave the next day, not too bad.

They were pretty plain and I wish I had seasoned the flour a bit more and the breadcrumbs as well.  More marinade seasoning would have been good too.  And I think I would have preferred cutting each slice in half the long way because tempeh is pretty dense.  But I don't know if I'll be making this again, it's just not really my thing. 

Another Edition of "Put It In the Waffle Maker": Waffle Omelets

This recipe for waffle iron omelets has been on my radar for a while.  I loved how it turned out making French toast in the waffle iron and thought this might be good as well.  I've put it on several of our weekly menus but have skipped over it for various reasons.  Last night I made pancakes (blueberry and plain) while the guys made the waffle iron omelets. It turned out so awesome that I had to make sure to tell you guys about it immediately. 

Inspiration

The Gracious Pantry Clean Eating Mexican-Style Waffle Omelets

We didn't have the olives called for in the recipe and I don't like corn in dishes, so this was just eggs and seasoning, but you could add anything that is small pieces, such as sauteed diced veggies, ground meat or meatless crumbles, etc. 

Ingredients

Makes 4 omelets in our waffle iron

• 6 eggs
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 teaspoon chili powder

Heat up your waffle iron while you combine the ingredients.   Our waffle iron doesn't have any settings, just plug it in and it's on. The light turns off when it's at maximum temperature.

Sonny D using the whisk, his favorite kitchen implement!

Mix up the eggs and seasoning. Spray your waffle iron with baking spray (I use Trader Joe's olive oil spray but also like their coconut version) and pour in about 1/4 to 1/3 cup of the egg mixture and close the lid.  

Puffy egg.

The egg will puff up from the steam and push the lid up, so you'll have to use this first one as a test to see how much egg your waffle iron will hold. As you can see from this photo, we had extra egg come out the back on our first one. 

They were cooked in about 1 minute, but of course your iron will probably be different. Using a fork, delicately pull out the omelet and put it on a plate.  Husband Jeff put shredded cheese on top and folded them in half to melt the cheese.

Adding shredded cheese and then folding in half

Husband Jeff and I put salsa on ours. 

I elegantly dumped salsa on top.

Verdict

Sonny D had a great time making the eggs, he absolutely loves using a whisk.  It's always the first thing he wants to pull out to help me cook, so I have to explain that sometimes a different tool works better like the hand mixer.

The brown color was deceiving, it looked like a waffle but you had to remind yourself that you were eating eggs instead. I liked that the texture was solid.  Light and fluffy eggs are great too, but this turned it into something different.

Sonny D ate his with just cheese inside, it was solid so it was pretty easy for him to pick up like a sandwich.  I don't know if he catches on to the novelty of making eggs in the waffle iron, but he really seemed to like it. We had one extra folded egg omelet with cheese inside left over, so I put that aside for Sonny D's lunch today.

The only thing is that it might have been a lot of garlic powder and onion powder in the mixture, so you might want to go a little light on that, but even as written it's great.  I can't wait to try this with other ingredients.  You could keep the Mexican theme by adding a bit of leftover taco meat and similar things, or take it into classic omelet territory with ham and peppers and onions. 

The only drawback to using only eggs is that it deflates down to be quite flat, it just cosmetic though.  Adding ingredients to the omelet itself would remedy that. 

Quick Inspiration: Taco Bites

I'm just going to point you in the right direction because the concept for this dinner is flexible enough to let you make it your own thing.  Plus this is a weird combo of two different recipes that I am just dying to tell you about!  I didn't know if it would work out, so I didn't really document it. 

I started this dinner idea by wanting to use the 'heart smart' Bisquick baking mix we've got open and rarely use.  We used to use it for pancakes and other random things like biscuits, but I've found Kodiak Cakes flapjack & waffle mix, which I like better for pancakes.  It has whole grain wheat flour, oat flour, and just a few other ingredients, no weird chemicals with unpronounceable names.  But anyway, back to the Bisquick.  We might as well use it up in other dishes since we don't use it for pancakes.  There's a recipe from Better Crocker/Bisquick called impossibly easy mini cheeseburger pies that I wanted to try.  You use ground beef along with some other ingredients to make mini savory pies... and luckily we had some leftover ground beef!  Well, not so lucky when I looked in the freezer and realized it was very little meat, only about 1/2 cup.  Barely enough to do anything!  Certainly not enough for this recipe.  So then I needed to do a little problem-solving to figure out how to make this into a full dinner.  Some of the reviews for the mini cheeseburger pies said that the flavor was extremely boring, so I was happy to twist it to be taco pies instead to add more pizzazz. 

Shown in my hand for perspective, standard muffin size. 

You are totally not going to believe how I came up with enough filling to make these pies a meal... I remembered a recipe I had actually made fun of to my friend Chuck (vegetarian), Grape-nuts as taco filling.  I threatened to make him that for a taco feast, but after reading the positive reviews, I was intrigued.  How does an extremely crunchy breakfast cereal get turned into a savory Mexican meal?  Add salsa and taco seasoning, I guess. 

So I heated up my meager amount of pre-cooked ground beef, sauteed some peppers and onions, and added the salsa, taco seasoning, water, and cereal. As long as you didn't stir it too much, the granules of cereal stayed whole and actually looked like meat.  And even though Grape-nuts are sweetened, it wasn't sweet at all. I had Husband Jeff taste the leftover filling as he came in the door and he said it was great and I had to confess that it was Grape-nuts. 

I mixed up the Bisquick as indicated, added some chili powder and cumin to flavor it, and measured it out into the muffin pan.  I used my taco"meat" as the filling along with some shredded cheese.  Another dab of the baking mix batter on top and threw it in the oven.  Out came these adorable little filled savory muffins!   

A taco mini "pie", cold from the fridge, cut to show the interior.

They were great the first night, and just as excellent as leftovers for lunch the next day. 

Hot from the microwave with smashed avocado and salsa on top. 

I was so happy that they turned out so tasty and I was able to use up that little bit of meat and also find a new use for my Grape-nuts.  Plus Husband Jeff and I love Mexican food!  

You could probably make these in a mini muffin pan if you wanted to make them as an appetizer. I've also got a recipe bookmarked where someone used the same basic concept but made them into a mini handheld breakfast dish by putting various things in them.  Her family favorite was one with sliced banana in it and pancake syrup in the batter.  I want to try the same thing by mixing a little cinnamon, vanilla, and some mashed banana into the batter and add chopped pecans along with the slices of banana. 

So the moral of the story is to think outside the (cereal) box and give a new recipe a shot!  Don't be afraid to try a new concept, it might be your next great dinner! 

Pantry's Empty? Make Tuna Patties

I needed to make dinner for Sonny D and myself while Husband Jeff was away one night for a work meeting.  I figured I would make something that Sonny D likes that Husband Jeff wouldn't typically eat, canned tuna.  Husband Jeff eats it but doesn't prefer it. 

Inspiration

Green Light Bites simple tuna burgers, Food.com tuna-patty burgers, and LaLoosh pan seared tuna patties

I had these three tuna patty/burger recipes bookmarked so I combined them to make my version.  My blend was based on what I thought sounded good along with what Sonny D might eat, that means no obvious vegetables like bell peppers.  Plus I didn't have any bell peppers, carrots, scallions, etc. 

Ingredients

makes 4 patties

• 2 5oz. cans of water-packed tuna, drained
• Sprinkle onion powder
• 1/2 clove garlic, minced (1/4 tsp from a jar)
• 2 eggs
• 40 grams of oats, ground up (or about 1/3 cup crushed crackers, any flavor)
• juice of 1/2 lemon (1-2 tablespoons)
• Sprinkle paprika (optional, add your own choice of spices)
• black pepper to taste
• 1/4 teaspoon celery seed, optional
• 1 tsp oil (olive, canola, etc.) or cooking spray

Directions

Mix all ingredients and shape into patties.

Sonny D mixing it up.

Heat a skillet to medium-high medium heat (medium-high was too hot on my stove) and add oil or cooking spray.  Wait until it's hot before putting the patties into the pan.

Shaped into patties.

Cook for 3-5 minutes per side depending on how brown and crispy you want it.

Patty on top of my salad greens. 

Verdict

Boring canned tuna turns into something even better, and I'd say classier. 

I like canned tuna well enough but this recipe turned out way better than I thought it was going to be. I ate mine on top of salad greens with light Parmesan peppercorn ranch dressing and the last few cherry tomatoes. Sonny D had his plain on a plate.  He probably would have eaten the whole thing but I snuck a few bites since I was sad mine was already gone. I also tried it dipped in a little buffalo sauce and that was delicious as well. 

I'm totally going to make these again, and soon.  They would be perfect for lunch. I would consider making them smaller, four patties out of this made them quite large, 4-5 inches across. Smaller seems like it would be thinner and crispier and just generally more enjoyable.  But if you do make it into 4 patties (approx 1/2 can of tuna each) they're definitely big enough to fit nicely on a bun if you want to eat them as a sandwich. 

The only thing is that medium-high was too hot on my stove. Mine were quite dark (just shy of almost-black in spots) by the time 3 minutes as up on the first side. Next time I would switch it to medium heat to hopefully achieve a crispier outside and hotter inside.

---

I only made two of the four that first night since my skillet didn't have room to cook all of them at once, so I had leftover tuna patty mixture for later.  The next day for lunch I split a single serving of the mixture into two smaller patties, pan-fried them and put them on another salad in a repeat of the previous night's dinner.  So good!  Even at medium heat the skillet was too hot to really leave them in for 3 minutes on the second side.  Not that they were burned, but a little darker than you might like.  I'm not sure how to fix it other than cook for less time and put a lid on to ensure they get hot enough. 

Vegan All The Way: Tempeh BBQ Sandwiches

I like tempeh (fermented soybeans) a lot.  Husband Jeff will eat it and says it's ok, but recently he told me definitely prefers something else.  I said we could give it one more try and if he didn't like it after this BBQ tempeh recipe, I would only make it occasionally and offer him a different variation.

Inspiration

Oh My Veggies BBQ tempeh sandwiches
Vegansaurus tempeh steaming instructions

Ingredients

• 1 package tempeh (we use Trader Joe's organic 3-grain)
• your favorite BBQ sauce (We use local favorite, Smoky Jon's)

This is a multi-part recipe that involves planning ahead.  First you need to steam the tempeh.  Then marinate it.  And then finally heat it up in the BBQ sauce.

Our favorite tempeh, Trader Joe's organic 3-grain.

Cut tempeh into pieces and steam or boil for 15-20 minutes. The tempeh seemed to puff up a bit after steaming.  You can do this step ahead of time, I did it over my lunch hour, but you could even do it a day or two ahead.

Tempeh in the steamer, before steaming.

Marinate for a couple hours in your desired sauce.  I used the same BBQ sauce we were going to cover it with later.

Marinated and cooked and sauced tempeh.

Then when we got home, we dumped the container of marinated tempeh and some additional BBQ sauce into a skillet and heated it up over medium heat until it was warm.  I served this on hamburger buns.

Verdict

I liked it a lot and I think I won Husband Jeff back over into liking tempeh. Sonny D loved it and ate several pieces.

The flavor of the BBQ sauce didn't really seem to permeate the tempeh during the marinade step, so next time I would marinate in something more liquidy like a soy sauce and vinegar combo, etc. It might be neat to use some taco seasonings to make strips for fajitas.

Vegetarian for All: Chickpea Pesto Soup

I made up this soup for a work potluck event.  I wanted it to be vegetarian so anyone could eat it. I don't really have any photos other than the onion and garlic sauteing, but picture a red soup with chickpeas and some green pesto on top. 

If you leave out the pesto or make it without cheese, this can be vegan.

Ingredients

• 1/2 onion, diced
• 5-6 cloves garlic, minced
• 28 oz can diced tomatoes
• 15 oz can tomato puree
• 8 oz water
• 2 15oz cans garbanzo beans (chickpeas)
• 2-3 stalks celery
• heavy shake of your favorite herbal blend (I use Penzey's Mural of Flavor)
• salt and pepper 
• 1/4 cup pesto (I used my own that I froze)

Saute the onion over medium heat for 5 minutes.  Add the garlic and saute for 1-2 minutes.  Add all of the rest of the ingredients through the salt and pepper and cook on low for 6-8 hours.  When you're ready to serve, add the pesto on top.

Verdict

Simple but hearty.

This was so thick that I would call it more of a stew.  I liked the flavor, cooking in the slow cooker is so nice for developing rich, complex flavors.  

Maybe next time I'd add barley, not because it was missing but mainly because I have some that I want to use up.  To do that, cook the barley separately so it doesn't absorb all of the liquid of the soup and add it in towards the end.  You could cook the barley in chicken stock or with a bouillon cube to add flavor.

Baba Ghanoush: Take 2

Let me start off by saying this dish isn't the most appealin-looking. When I pulled it out the other day, Husband Jeff asked if I was eating cold ground beef.

My first batch of baba ghanoush was fine, but the sesame oil made it taste "too Asian", so I wanted to try again.  I made this recipe with more eggplant from our garden.

Inspiration

baba ghanoush

Rachael Ray roasted eggplant dip

I didn't change anything other than the amount of eggplant (I used what was ripe at the time) and the cooking method since the original cooked it whole. 

Ingredients

• 3 small-medium eggplant
• 2 Tablespoons olive oil
• 1 tsp rice wine vinegar
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 tsp lemon juice (I use bottled)
• Salt and pepper to taste

Directions

 Do NOT cut the eggplant into rounds, it will be a complete pain in the butt to try to remove the skin after it's roasted.  I ended up having to cut it off each individual piece.  I recommend you cut the eggplant into quarters, top to bottom. 

Roast the eggplant at 400 degrees for 30-45 minutes on a cookie sheet.   

When the eggplant is done, scoop it out of it's skin and put it into a food processor along with the remaining ingredients and process until smooth. 

Eggplant dip

Verdict 

Decent, but kind of bland. I might prefer the Asian version instead. 

I think next time I would increase the amount of vinegar, lemon juice, and garlic to give it more punch, it was rather boring.   Maybe it could use some hot sauce?  Or smoked paprika?  I always think of baba ghanoush as the eggplant version of hummus, so maybe it would work well with hummus flavors like roasted red pepper?

I like having this for a morning snack at work or to supplement my lunch or dinner.  I have it with slices of bell pepper, so it's a good way to eat veggies. 

Wrap It Up: Breakfast Fajita Enchiladas

This recipe doesn't come from any website, I made it up as I went along.  I called them breakfast fajita enchiladas -- "breakfast" because they've got scrambled eggs and "fajita" because there are peppers and onions. 

Make them dairy-free by leaving out the cheese.  If you want to add meat, add shredded chicken or ground beef.  Or breakfast sausage to keep the breakfast theme.  

Ingredients

• 7 eggs
• 1/2 cup shredded zucchini, optional
• 1 15.5 oz can black beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 4 oz. can chopped green chiles
• 1/2 cup frozen pepper stir fry (peppers and onions)
• hefty handful of spinach, sauteed
• 20 oz (two 10 oz cans) green chile enchilada sauce (you can use red if you prefer)
• 13 corn tortillas
• 1 cup shredded cheese

Instructions

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Whip up your eggs and scramble them over medium-low heat until just barely done.  You'll finish cooking them in the oven, it'll be fine. 

Colorful enchilada filling.

Put the scrambled eggs through spinach (and any other veggies you want) and half of the shredded cheese to a large bowl and stir in a couple tablespoons of enchilada sauce to keep it moist. 

Add a couple of tablespoons of enchilada sauce to the bottom of your baking dish.  I went with three smaller baking dishes so I could freeze one after it was done cooking. In another one of the baking dishes, dump most of the rest of the enchilada sauce, you'll use this to dip each your tortillas before filling them. 

Tortillas filled and rolled.

Dip each tortilla into the enchilada sauce on both sides, place a moderate amount of filling into the tortilla, roll it up, and lay it seam-side-down in the baking dish with enchilada sauce on the bottom. Repeat dipping, filling, and rolling the tortillas until all the filling is gone. 

Drizzle the remaining enchilada sauce on the tortillas to ensure there are no dry spot.  Sprinkle the remaining cheese on top of the enchiladas.  If your baking dish has a glass lid, use that, otherwise cover with aluminum foil. 

Bake for approximately 30 minutes, until the sauce is bubbly and everything is hot.  Remove from the oven let them sit for 5-7 minutes to cool down.  By waiting a bit, you prevent them from being super sloppy when you take them out of the pan. 

Top with sliced black olives and taco sauce.

Finished enchiladas.

Verdict

Tasty Mexican-inspired dish, I would love to start my day with these!  

These were so good!  Husband Jeff and I love Mexican food and could eat it several times a week, but Sonny D doesn't go for it.  I couldn't even tell you what Sonny D even ate for dinner when we had this, I only remember eating these and enjoying them a lot.  I was excited to have the leftovers for lunch and I quite possibly might have not pointed them out to Husband Jeff so he wouldn't take them. 

Silky Baba Ghanoush

We grew eggplant in our garden this year and I have found I love it!   The eggplant Parmesan was great, I made it two times in one week.  So I wanted another dish that involved eggplant, and you can't get any more "pure eggplant" than baba ghanoush since it's eggplant puree, similar to hummus.

Inspiration

Slender Kitchen baba ganoush (eggplant dip)

This recipe normally calls for tahini (sesame paste), since I had to recently throw my super-expired jar out, I figured I would replace it in the same way I did when I made homemade hummus, by adding sesame seeds and sesame oil, but in this recipe it didn't work so great.

Ingredients

• 1 eggplant
• 1Tb sesame seeds
• 1Tb sesame oil (I wouldn't use this, made it too "Asian")
• 2Tb lemon juice
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 Tb EVO
• 1/2 tsp salt
• Fresh black pepper

Directions

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.  

spritzed eggplant in the oven.

The recipe calls for throwing the whole eggplant in the oven, but I was afraid it might blow up even after poking it with a fork, so I cut them into quarters lengthwise and put them on a baking sheet.   I thought they might need a little help to brown, so I added a spritz of coconut oil.

Browned eggplant.

Roast the eggplant for 20-25 minutes or until it's soft and gushy.  Scoop the flesh out of the skin and put the eggplant innards into a food processor with the rest of the ingredients.    Process until smooth.

Eggplant puree.

Verdict

Creamy and good, but too Asian.

I liked it, but the sesame oil was too much, it was quite "Asian" in flavor.  I've already browned my eggplant for my next batch and I will definitely leave out the sesame oil.  I eat the dip with slices of red bell pepper, it's a fresh and healthy snack and surprisingly quite filling.

Another Low-Carb, Gluten-Free Adventure: Cauliflower-Crust Mini Pizzas

Using my recipe for the cheesy cauliflower "breadsticks" as my guide, I made mini pizzas.  Here's a photo tour of what I did.

Once again, I got too excited about mixing everything together and completely forgot the step where you cook the cauliflower and then squeeze out all the liquid.  I skip ahead to the part where you add the egg, cheese, and seasonings, and then I try to microwave it a tiny bit (but don't cook the egg!).  These still turned out pretty good even with that error.

If you want to make this vegetarian, definitely use vegetarian-friendly toppings.  

The ingredients.

This time I couldn't find an important part for the chute attachment on my food processor like I used for the breadsticks, so this time I used the cup part and chopped up the cauliflower that way.  It works quite well! 

I jumped the gun, that's not cooked cauliflower!

A big bowl of cauliflower mixture.

Even though I forgot the step of cooking the cauliflower before adding the cheese and egg and seasoning, I went ahead and scooped out spoonfuls of cheesy, seasoned cauliflower mixture.  Flatten them out a bit but try to ensure all the pieces are touching so they form a cohesive structure when the egg cooks.

shaping out rounds

Pre-cook the cauliflower crusts for a few minutes (until lightly browned).  I really don't recall how long, but it was longer than I expected.  Probably because I missed that first step in the microwave and left the mixture too wet! 

After some initial cooking, add sauce.

Add sauce and toppings after that initial stint in the oven.  Pick your favorite ones and customize! We used chopped up pepperoni, onion, bell pepper, black olives, shredded mozzarella, and sliced pepperjack.  Oh, and mushrooms on mine. 

cute mini pizzas waiting to go back in the oven.

Put them in the oven for a few minutes until they're done to your liking and the cheese is melted.

Browned and waiting to go in my belly!

Verdict

Sonny D barely touched his, he might have had a single bite, but I don't think it was because he was suspicious about what it was made of, but rather because he's a toddler and sometimes they just don't eat much.  Husband Jeff and I ate them and enjoyed them, but I'm sure they would have been better if I had done the first steps properly so they would brown up more and be a bit more solid.  I can't believe I did it wrong twice (for the breadsticks and for these mini pizzas)!

There is barely a touch of cauliflower-ness to them.  I like cauliflower and so it wasn't an issue, but if you served this to a cauliflower-hater, they might not like them much.  But really, it's a vehicle for the toppings.  I would definitely stick with stronger-flavored toppings, like sausage, pepperoni, etc.  If you went with something bland, the cauliflower flavor might come through even more.

I have to recommend NOT chopping up an entire head of cauliflower, because it ends up being way more than you think it will be.  I ended up freezing the remainder of the chopped up cauliflower mixture and putting it into other things. 

Sugar Cookie Tea-Infused Oatmeal

I don't remember where I saw this first, probably The Oatmeal Artist blog, and I thought it sounded neat.  This past winter I bought "sugar cookie" herbal tea and saved the last couple teabags to make infused oatmeal.  Well, this week I finally got around to making it!  This was several months late since I made this in the middle of summer with a winter tea, but it was still tasty. 

I went the route of making tea and then used that water to make oatmeal. 

Ingredients

• 2 teabags of "sugar cookie" herbal tea (use your favorite flavor)
• 3/4 cup water (if you're not letting this soak overnight, you'll want to use only 1/2 cup water)
• 1/4 cup oats
• 1 Tablespoon chia seeds (totally optional, but this is what I used)
  

Directions

Heat the water up in a bowl as if you're making tea and add the teabags.  My microwave has a 'hot water' setting where you enter the amount of water and it uses sensors to measure the amount of steam given off. For 1 cup of water it ends up being about 1 min + 30 seconds in my 1200-watt microwave and it comes out at the perfect hot temperature.  Hot enough to be hot, but cool enough to drink right away and not burn your mouth.  
 
Steep for the maximum amount of time recommended (7 minutes for mine), taste to ensure it's strong enough/not too strong, and then remove the teabags.  You don't want to infuse for too long, it can get bitter.

Teabags starting to soak in one of my oatmeal bowls. 
Yep, I have bowls that I pretty much only use for oatmeal.

Add the oatmeal and chia seeds. 

Oats, tea water, and chia seeds.

Cook the oatmeal in the microwave for 1-2 minute on high, then left it sit overnight to absorb all the water. 

It looks like this the next morning. 

My recipe is never the same thing twice since I like to add random things like oat bran, wheat bran, wheat germ, flax seed meal, other rolled grains, etc.  So if it ends up being too thick, I add a little more water the next morning and finish heating it up. This is how I used to make oatmeal at night to eat the next morning.  I liked being able to customize each bowl based on what I felt like eating, but now I need to save time with a toddler in the house so I make a 6-serving batch every few days.  It's definitely quicker to make a big batch and divvy it up into containers and throw them in the fridge.  Sometimes Sonny D has one of those servings, other times they're all mine. And they don't last long, it seems like I'm always making a big batch of oatmeal since I'll occasionally eat one for lunch.  Yep, two servings of oatmeal in one day. 

Verdict

Pleasing, subtle flavor.

I could barely tell this was flavored since it was really similar to my plain cinnamon oatmeal, but it was really nice. The next time I think I'll use one of my stronger herbal teas, like tangerine-ginger. 

Savory Zucchini-Cheddar Muffins with Quinoa

This is yet another recipe I've had my eye on for a while.  I attempted to make it a week or two ago, but I didn't have the plain Greek yogurt it needed.  Then after I bought the Greek yogurt, the more I looked at the Cook For Your Life recipe I realized I didn't like the amount of oil they used (only 1/3 cup, but still seemed like a lot), so I combined a couple recipes. I used the All Recipes one for the muffin base, and I followed the Cook For Your Life recipe for the spices and quinoa. 

Sonny D helps me cook sometimes, so this is one occasion where I really got him in on the action.

Inspiration

All Recipes savory cheddar zucchini muffins (base savory muffin recipe)
Cook for your Life zucchini, cheddar, and quinoa muffins (spices + quinoa idea)
Instructions for cooking quinoa

I replaced all of the butter from the All Recipes version with plain Greek yogurt.  And I removed some of the flour and replaced it with cooked quinoa.  I don't really know how much shredded cheese I used since it was an already open bag, that's why the calorie count varies.  If it was more like 3/4 cup of shredded cheese, then it would be at the low end, but if it was the full 2 cups, then it would be 135 calories per muffin.  I also skipped the Parmesan and bacon because I didn't think they were going to need it and I was too lazy to pull out even more ingredients.

Ingredients

makes 12 savory muffins, approximately 100-135 calories each

• 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour (white all-purpose flour would probably be fine too, I used this because I had it)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• freshly-ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon dry cilantro
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup plain Greek yogurt
• 1 egg
• 1 cup milk
• 1/2 cup cooked quinoa (I made 1 cup dry which cooks up to approximately 2 cups of cooked quinoa.  The rest went into containers in the freezer.)
• 1 cup shredded zucchini, squeezed dry in a kitchen towel
• 1 clove garlic, minced (from a jar)
• 3/4 cup shredded cheddar (I had a partial bag, no idea how much I really used)

Directions

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Spray a 12-cup muffin pan with non-stick spray.  Definitely don't skip this part.  I forgot to spray mine and put the first one in and it stuck a bit, and that was in an essentially non-stick silicone pan. So if you're using a metal pan, you most definitely have to spray it. 

It helps to have a shirtless toddler assistant, makes them taste better! 

In a medium bowl mix the dry ingredients, flour through salt.  Luckily it didn't matter if he stirred this a lot, because this got "splashed" and mixed around as much as he could.

The dry ingredients mixed by a child's hands.

In a large bowl mix the wet ingredients, yogurt through shredded cheese.

The wet ingredients.  Gosh, that really is a beautiful hand model!

 My zucchini was huge, I had to cut it into about 4 pieces to get reasonable sized chunks to shred up.  All the rest of it went into a couple freezer bags to be frozen for later use, ya know, like when you get a hankering for random zucchini items (ok, really to boost the veggie quotient in dish). 

Some shredded zucchini before squeezing dry in a kitchen towel.

Zucchini in the wet mixture.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients a little at a time (I split mine into three rounds) and gently combine.  Pour into the sprayed muffin pan.

 Bake for 30-35 min.

I always forget to take a picture before they go in the oven!

Let the muffins cool in the pan and then remove.  I ran a knife around mine to ensure they weren't stuck and then after they had cooled somewhat, tipped them on their sides to finish cooling to ensure they didn't get all soggy from steaming themselves in the pan. 

Cheesy muffins.

Verdict

Reminiscent of the awesome homemade cheesy crackers I used to make in high school! 

We first ate these warm from the oven with our dinner and I was totally in love!  They totally gave me flashbacks to the many batches of homemade cheesy crackers I made in high school.  I ended up eating two the first night because I loved them so much even though I was already super-full from the rest of dinner.  I don't know if I even paid attention to whether Husband Jeff really liked them because I was caught in my own pleasant high school thoughts.  I guess he must have said he liked them because I packed them for his lunches and snacks the next couple of days.  Sonny D wouldn't even try them, but I feel like he would love them since it seems really child-friendly.

I had a couple coworkers each try a chunk of one because I was trying to talk them into making them. 

I wish these muffins were a little puffier, don't know if that was because the batter was a little wetter than it was supposed to be or if they need more baking powder.  It doesn't really bug me though since they taste great.  The only things I would change for next time is to see if I can add more zucchini, add maybe 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper, and maybe season the quinoa as it cooks.  But they were awesome as written, too. 

Since I've got so much zucchini, I might make this one again.  I've also got my eye on a lemon zucchini muffin that sounds pretty cool.