Red Cabbage and Wheat Berry Salad

I made a new friend  over spring and we continued to hang out over the summer, best Mpls summer yet! I remember going to her house for the 2nd or 3rd time and she had just whipped up this incredible spread of food. Red cabbage and wheat berry salad, hummus, home made pita-fresh from the oven, this zucchini and something-or-other dish; it was amazing!!

Craving the wheat berry salad later that week, I scoured the net for a similar one. I ended up finding Mark Bitman's book-How to cook everything  Vegetarian and made the salad that day.

There' s something really amazing about the heartiness of the wheat berry with the lightness and crunch of the cabbage, the coarse mustard dressing is  really perfect. This is a great summer salad or a perfect side to a heavier dinner over the winter.

Ingredients:

• 4 cups finely chopped or shredded red cabbage
  
• 2 cups whole wheat berries
  
• 1/2 med red onion - thinly sliced
  
• 1 to 2 carrots - shredded
  

Dressing:

• 2 tablespoons coarse mustard
  
• 1/2 cup Extra virgin olive oil
  
• 2 tablespoons red wine or other vinegar (apple cider)
  
• Salt and fresh gound black pepper

Toss ingredients in bowl and set aside. Whisk mustard, oil and vinegar together, add a little salt and a good 1/2 tsp of fresh ground pepper. Mix into cabbage and enjoy!

A few tips and tricks, if you have too much cabbage after chopping the entire head, bag it up and store in the fridge. It will last a decent amount of time (couple of weeks?). I also do not yet have a pressure cooker, oh.. I so want one but am going to hold off until I can get the super deluxe type. I have a huge fear of blowing up a pressure cooker in our kitchen. I digress, if you do not have a PC like me, cook a good batch of the wheat berries (really easy) and throw in two cup portions in the freezer. Add your berries to soups, chili, tacos, burritos, you'll be surprised at how many things you can use these in.

The links listed above provide info on wheat berries and how to cook them, they really are a great addition to any diet. I promise that you will love this salad, eat it alone, throw it in a pita, add apple or walnuts, use different cabbages or grains; the options are yours for the taking.

Gemm-Bought? Italian Sausage, Peppers and Onions

This is my healthy, vegetarian version of an Italian classic. In my family this is called Gemm-Bought and I have no idea of the correct spelling or if this another made up Muccianti family word?

There are a few questionable words and phrases floating around my family. Let's say my Mom (that really is my Mom, amazing huh?!?) Anyways, let's say she dropped a glass of water, you'd hear "son of a cock-a-datch" and within the past few years she's added "sa-bash-tcha". For a great angry Italian sounding swear word- Sonofacockadatch, Sabashtcha; I think it says it all.

This is a ridiculously easy rustic dish and can be eaten in a variety of ways. You can make a sandwich with the sausage, pepper, onion mix, serve over warm polenta or as is. Make sure to get a variety of colored peppers, yellow, red and green; the colors together are really fabulous.

update: I've obtained the correct spelling and meaning from the big man, Papa Palladino; my Mom also sent the real family recipe  (the unveggie kind).

Ingredients:

12 cloves garlic - whole, peeled
4 assorted peppers, red, yellow, green, orange
1 really large or 2 med onions, sliced
1-2 potatoes, partially peeled, cut into chunks
2 Tbsp melted coconut oil
1 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp fresh ground black pepper
Basil - couple of shakes
Oregano - couple of shakes
4 Vegetarian Sausage of your choice (Italian type is perfect)

Preparation:
Preheat oven to 425 degrees

In a large bowl, combine garlic, peppers, onion and potatoes. Pour melted coconut oil into bowl, add salt and pepper, tossing to coat.

Pour veggie mixture onto a cookie sheet and sprinkle with basil and oregano. Cook for 20 minutes, tossing veggies around mid-way through.

Pull veggie sheet out and add sausage, stirring veggies around with sausage. Cook until brown (about 20-25 minutes) stirring veggies and turning sausage midway through. Tip: if you like your sausage really browned; when your veggies are done, finish off the sausage in the broiler.

As we say, Gah-Bless and Mangia!

Granola Bars; Not Candy Bars

My friend Holly, is an amazing woman and totally inspirational. She's a wonder in the kitchen and a wiz on the bike; anyways this recipe came from her, from Joyful Abode. Shout out to Hausfrau in the Kitchen!

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups oats
• 3/4 cup wheat germ
• 3/4 cup ground flax
• 3/4 cup sunflower seeds
• 1 cup peanuts, crushed
• 3/4 cup honey or agave
• 3/4 cup almond butter
• 3 tsp vanilla extract
• A couple of turns of sea salt (if using grinder)
• aprox 8 oz dried fruit

Stuff:

• Wax paper
• Bigish bowl
• Small pot

Mix oats, wheat germ, flax, sunflower seeds and crushed peanuts in a baking pan. Place in the over for about 5 - 10 minutes, stirring a few times to  roast up dry mix.

While dry mix is in the oven; in a small pot dump honey, almond butter, vanilla and salt, turn heat on low. Pull dry mix from oven and let cool off. Once cool, dump in bowl and line same pan with wax paper, cut a second sheet the same size for later use; set aside.

Raise flame on "sticky" mix, stirring constantly until it gets liquidly. Once mixture looks like it has thinned out, pour into bowl with dry mix and add fruit. stir your brains out, super important to get all dry stuff with sticky mix so your bars don't fall apart (no worries if they do, then you'll have yummy granola)

Once mixed dump into lined pan and spread mixture out; place second sheet of wax paper on top and start smushing down. Once you think you've gotten in flattened pretty well, put pan on floor, place a book over top (still lined with wax paper of course) and stand on the book. The goal is to get your bars as flat and packed as possible.

Let bars rest on counter with book and heavy pan full of stuff to give it some weight. Bars will be ready to cut in 2 1/2 to 3 hours. You can let them sit overnight on the counter if you're cooking int he evening and happen to fall asleep on the couch-whoops.

Once you cut bars, wrap each in plastic wrap or store in container.

To make gluten free, use GF oats and omit wheat germ.

A New Thanksgiving Tradition

I've been planning our Thanksgiving menu in my head for sometime now. I want to find the perfect balance of sweet and savory, filling yet still lite (so we don't feel bogged down by food) and find the perfect spread to satisfy both vegetarian and non alike. I'm going to test our Thanksgiving dinner this year. We've been invited to my Aunt's house where I'll bring a bounty o'food. This will give me a good read for how the non-veggies do.

We don't normally eat "mock" meat, being a former meat eater this stuff will never come close and it's rather eww ( I've tried mock bologna, salami and turkey all totally gross, blah!) However, there are a couple of exceptions and Quorn products are certainly at the top of my list.

Here's ze menu (in planning)

Main: Quorn Turk'y Roast

Sides, I'm thinking:

• Apple Wild Rice served with Shitake Mushroom Gravy (may or may not stuff into winter squash)

• Succotash of Fresh Corn, Lima Beans, Tomatoes and Onions

• Whole Wheat Stuffing, packed with onion, celery, green pepper, mushroom and spices

• Spice-roasted Butternut Squash with Smoked Sweet Paprika

For Dessert, I'm thinking:

• Sweet Potato Layer Cake

Most Importantly:

And for our new family Thanksgiving Tradition, we're going to sponser a turkey; isn't that sweet! We'll go through the Adopt-A-Turkey Project, a Farm Sanctuary for commercially rasied Turkeys.

Here's (soon to be ) our Turkey; Gideon

Happiness Muffins!

Another great breakfast for the little dude and me. My favorite part of this is that it's a great base (like the banana bread) and can be mixed and matched however you'd like.

Silly title I know but, it does make me super happy to have a healthy, protein, omega rich muffin. By adding raisins you can grab some vitamin B, calcium, potassium and iron; all great beneficial vitamins and nutrients especially for us veggies and vegans!

This is also super easy and takes 15 minutes to whip up!

Ingredients:

• 1/4 refined coconut oil, melted plus more for greasing muffin tin
  
• 2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
  
• 1/2 cup sucanat
  
• 1 Tbl Ener-G egg replacer (or one egg)
  
• 2 tsp baking powder
  
• 1/4 tsp fine sea salt
  
• 1 1/4 cup rice milk (or whatever "milk" you use)
  
• 1 tsp vanilla
  
• 1 cup fresh or dried fruit, diced or chunked if necessary
  
• 1/2 cups chopped nuts (optional)

For Zucchini Raisin Muffins:

Combine shredded Zucchini and raisinis for the fruit and omit the nuts. Add 1t cinnamon and 1/2t ground ginger to the dry ingredients. (I used 1 1/2 shredded zucchini and 1/3 of a large carrot shredded. I put in a hanful of golden raisins and 1/2c chopped walnuts.)

Preparation:

Heat oven to 375. Grease muffin tin or use liners.
In a large bowl combine dry ingredients, including egg replacer if using. In a medium bowl, whisk rice milk, oil, and vanilla. Add milk mixture to the flour mixture, stirring until barely combined. Stir in fruit and nuts. Transfer to muffin tin. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Remember those orange cubes that you didn't want to eat....

It's what's in your mac n' cheese! Good thing Dominic can't read yet, otherwise I'd be busted! My new favorite thing is to puree veggies that he's not into at the moment and mix them into his dinner. Dom loves mac n' cheese and I love my food processor so it's a perfect match.

Last week I made him pop tarts with a blueberry and spinach filling, he was non the wiser. For dinner I made him some pasta with homemade gravy / sauce (this is still a rather large family debate) Is it gravy or sauce? I digress.. and threw in another 1/4 cup of the spinach blend. Tonight he had some mac n' cheese with pureed sweet potato- na na na naaaaa na, I win.

Ingredients:

1 sweet potato, peeled, chopped and steamed
Box of whole wheat pasta shells
Whole milk mozzarella and cheddar
Rice Milk

This one is pretty easy, boil as much noodles as needed and drain. Steam sweet potato, zip in food processor and add some water, start with 1/4 cup of water and go from there.

Add cheese and some sweet potato puree to the noodles, if mixture seems think add some rice milk.

Voila - Sweet potato macs!

p.s. Same recipe for Spinach macs. Steam spinach, zip in processor add to noodles. Note: there's no powdered processed or liquid processed cheese and no butter and, a whole lotta goodness; it will make you smile!

Awesome Banana Bread (super easy!)

My sister brought this recipe to me about a year ago, I really didn't have to change anything, but I couldn't help myself and added the vanilla, nutmeg and cinnamon.

Super easy and a great base. Get creative and add whatever you have around, dried fruit, nuts, zucchini etc.. you can also make into muffins.




Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup natural, organic applesauce
• 1/2 cup honey or agave (agave is better)
  
• 2 eggs
• 1 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 4 mashed bananas
• Lots of raisins (optional)
• Sprinkle of nutmeg and cinnamon (optional)
  

Preheat oven to 325.

Mix applesauce, honey, vanilla and eggs (add one at a time); stir in mashed bananas.

In a small bowl: combine flour, baking soda and salt

Add to banana mixture with 1/4 cup hot water. Sprinkle nutmeg / cinnamon

Grease bread pan lightly with coconut oil, pour in mixture and bake

Cook at 325 for 55 - 60 minutes.