Pasta Tradizionale, by Cheryl

This is so simple and soooooo good! Typically, pasta tradizionale (Traditional Pasta) consists of spaghetti with an oil sauce made of garlic, salt, and red pepper flakes. It really is the easiest dish to make that packs so much flavor in each bite. The key is to infuse the oil with the garlic, salt, and red pepper flakes for about 30-60 minutes beforehand. The amount of ingredients you use also depends on your tastes. If you want it really spicy then add more red pepper. If you want less of a garlic flavor than don't use as much garlic. You get the idea. It's so good and has become a part of our rotation! Yum!

Ingredients:

Pasta (any kind will be fine, but I like either spaghetti or rotini)
Approximately 1/2 cup of olive oil (more or less)
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
a couple of teaspoons of salt
a couple of teaspoons of red pepper flakes

Directions:

1) In a bowl combine all ingredients except pasta. Let sit for 30 minutes - 1 hour stirring once or twice in between.

2) Cook pasta according to box directions.

3) Heat oil in a pan. Add cooked pasta and stir until coated. Enjoy!

Spinach, Bacon, and Chickpea Stuffed Portobellos, by Diane

I have never made portobello mushroom caps before, lets alone stuffed portobello caps. But I found a recipe online that looked interesting, tweaked it, and a great set of weekly lunches was created! This recipe is fairly easy, and you can remix the ingredients and spices (as I did) or just follow along with the recipe posted. I am posting my version, and you can see the original version here.

Warning- this recipe is only for 2 caps, so I doubled the quantities below to get 4 for the week.

Ingredients:

2 tbsp EVOO
2 large portobello mushroom caps
1/4 of a medium leek, cleaned and sliced (green and light green/white parts are ok!)
3 small shallots, sliced thinly
1 clove garlic, minced
9 slices of thin-sliced bacon (or less for thicker bacon; I used turkey bacon)
Sea salt and pepper to taste
Pinch of each of the following: thyme, oregano, rosemary
2 large handfuls spinach, washed
1 can chickpeas, drained


Directions:

1. Wipe mushroom caps with a damp cloth (they will soak up the water if you wash them and become soggy).

2. Preheat oven to 425. Meanwhile, grease baking sheet and bottoms of the mushroom caps with 1 tbsp EVOO. Place gill side up onto the baking sheet.

3. Mash chickpeas in a large bowl, leaving some chunky pieces behind. Set aside.

4. In a saucepan, heat 1 tbsp EVOO on medium high. Add in leeks, shallots, garlic, and bacon and cook, stirring often so garlic doesn't burn, for 2-3 minutes. Add in salt, pepper, and herbs and cook another 2-3 minutes. Add in spinach and cook until just wilted.

5. Combine the spinach mixture with the chickpeas and adjust seasoning if necessary. Stuff the mixture into the mushroom caps (it will be stacked over the edges).

6. Bake for 20 minutes until the top of the filling is golden brown.

Immunity-Boosting Chicken Stock, by Diane

This recipe comes from a book called Ancient Wisdom, Modern Kitchen that was given to me by a friend who practices Chinese medicine. As I previously mentioned, I am a broth addict, and am always looking for good recipes for homemade anti-inflammatory soups. This is a version from the recipe, and is a major immunity supporter via ginger, garlic, dried mushrooms, and chicken bones. I added in turmeric for it's anti-inflammatory properties, along with some salt and poultry seasoning. I also saved the mushrooms and chicken (I used a rotisserie chicken instead of just bones) to go in the soup for later. What I was left with was three enormous containers of healing broth that is great for fatigue, illness, cold and flu season, or simple digestion and warming. They are all ready to go in my freezer and I can pull them out when I need them! WAY better than store bought soups or broths in the pantry. :)

Note: the original recipe also calls for an herb called astragalus, but since I did not have this on hand I omitted it. It's purpose is also for immunity.


Ingredients:

1 2-inch ginger, sliced 1/8 in. thick
3 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
1 medium leek, washed and sliced
1 pound chicken bones
4 dried or fresh shitake mushrooms
12 cups water (I used 16)
Season with: sea salt, herbs de provence, bay leaf, dill, pepper, poultry seasoning

*for an extra immunity boost, I like to add a pinch of cayenne as well!

Directions:

1. Place all ingredients into a large soup pot and bring to a boil. Lower heat and simmer covered for 2 hours.

2. Strain the broth, and skim off fat along the top as it cools.

3. I added back in the chicken and mushrooms, throwing out the bones and ginger.

Homemade Vegetable Bouillon Cubes, by Diane

I am a broth ADDICT. Broths do everything from flavoring and moistening my favorite recipes, making soup when I'm under the weather, and aiding in digestion when I drink it alongside a meal. I am always looking for healthy bouillon or pre-made broths that are natural and healthy, but I always come up short. All store bought brands, especially bouillon, contain MSG along with flavorings, gelatin, and other chemical ingredients. Not to mention an outrageous amount of sodium! It has never once occurred to me that I could make my own, until I came across a blog post today. What a genius idea!!

This recipe is incredibly easy, and you can mix in any flavor (chicken, beef, veggie, mushroom) you would like along with any herbs and spices. I created my own, opting for a veggie-based cube. Another thing- you can either keep the bouillon fresh or choose to make it into a powder or cubes. I opted for cubes simply because I thought it was neat. If you choose to keep it fresh (way less time consuming), keep some in the fridge if you plan to use it soon, and freeze the remainder because it will mold otherwise. For cubes, follow the recipe below, and for powder simply grind the cubes at the end. Another option is how to dehydrate the cubes, I chose an oven at 150 but you can also use a dehydrator or the sun if it's not humid outside. The trick is to make sure that ALL of the moisture is gone from the cubes, otherwise they will mold.

Once you have customized your mixture, make sure to taste them (they should be extra strong just like store-bought bouillon since they will be diluted into something else later). If using this recipe (powder or cube version), store in an airtight container for 6 months.


Ingredients:

2 large carrots, roughly chopped
2 large celery stalks, roughly chopped
the center of 1 leek, roughly chopped
2 cloves garlic, smashed
2 ounces each dried shitake and oyster mushrooms
1 tbsp poultry seasoning
1 tbsp garlic salt
As you like: turmeric, ginger, dill, and/or any other combo of dried spices/herbs


Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 150.

2. In a food processor, blend first 4 ingredients until chopped very finely. Let the ingredients dry out for a bit on paper towels.

3. Add in remaining dry ingredients, and mix until a ball forms. Roll the ball out until it's a flattened square, then cut into cubes.

4. Place the cubes on a baking tray and bake for several hours, until completely dried out inside.

Tropi-Kale Juice, by Diane

This is my new summery juice fave. It tastes like the tropics in a glass, and I can barely finish juicing everything before I've downed the whole giant mason jar. I originally created it as part of a juice fast, and I had no problem downing both the jar in the forefront and the background all day long. Yum! I've also added papaya juice to this combo and it's even more heavenly!


Ingredients:

1/2 pineapple
4 large kale leaves, including stems
5 minneola oranges (they taste more towards a combo of an orange and a tangerine)
1-2 cups coconut water


Directions:

Juice away! :) Add an umbrella for flair!

Gobi Makhani, by Diane

One of my fave Indian dishes is makhani, which is a buttery tomato gravy. I found a version online that was vegan and light (makhani is loaded with fat and calories!), and converted the veggie/protein ingredients to other favorites in Indian dishes. I then adjusted the cooking so that I could do it in a crockpot, and the whole thing took no more than 10 minutes! In the future, I would suggest cooking the sauce according to the directions, as I think the toasting of the spices and charring of the onions and garlic would have given this already flavorful crockpot version even more flavor, but this came out FANTASTIC and it will definitely be made again! Any possible veggie or protein can go in this sauce, but I am posting my combo because it is amazing!

A note on this photo- I decided I wanted cauliflower to be the main ingredient so I bought two heads. I saw purple cauliflower next to the white and decided to buy one of each. There is no flavor difference, but the purple version is more nutritionally charged than it's white counterpart thanks to anthocyanins, which are cancer-fighting, blood lipid and sugar-stablilzing, weight loss compounds. So those weird purple blobs in the photo are this type of cauliflower, which simply made it more nutritious and colorful!

A photo of the crockpot fully loaded- with the gorgeous purple cauliflower on top!

 Another first for me in this recipe was making a vegan sauce with cashew flour/powder, which I see a lot as a substitute for dairy (i.e. in fettuccine alfredo). I didn't get the substitute as I could not imagine that cashews could even come close to a milk or cream, but lo and behold it really did! The cashew powder (which I simply created using my nutribullet milling attachment and a handful of whole roasted cashews) when added to a liquid instantly develops into a creamy, thick, rich sauce. And it adds an amazing flavor that is subtle but really good. Although this sauce was vegan and therefore contained no butter and no cream, the coconut milk and cashew powder really made it come close- and in my opinion added two more complex flavors to round out the gravy. I will absolutely use these two in the future to create a lowfat and nutritious vegan sauce!

And finally, a note on the spices. Many of these such as coriander and fenugreek can be found in both whole/leaves and powder forms. For this recipe, my local whole foods only had the opposite of what was listed (fenugreek powder instead of leaves, and whole coriander instead of ground). A great rule of thumb for this and any other similar spice situation is 1 tbsp whole/leaves = 1 tsp powder. I simply used this conversion and all went well! 

Recipe from: http://www.veganricha.com/2013/06/gobi-musallam-whole-roasted-cauliflower.html


Ingredients:

For the makhani sauce:

2 teaspoons oil (omit this if you are doing a crockpot version!)
1/2 medium red onion chopped  
1 inch ginger chopped
5-6 cloves of garlic chopped  
1 dry red chili or chili flakes to taste
3 medium tomatoes chopped (I used one can of tomato sauce and it worked really well)
1 teaspoon garam masala  
1/2 teaspoon cumin powder  
1/2 teaspoon coriander powder
1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder  
1 Tablespoon dried fenugreek leaves  
3/4 cup coconut milk (from can)  
1/4 cup ground cashew or 1/3 cup soaked cashews
3/4 teaspoon salt  
1/4 teaspoon raw sugar or 1/2 teaspoon maple syrup


Veggies/Proteins:

2 cauliflower heads, chopped
1 small bag frozen peas
4 large carrots, chopped (I had a bag of shredded carrots leftover so I used those but next time would use whole)
1 can chickpeas, drained

Directions for the sauce are on the original website. For this crockpot version, throw all ingredients into the crockpot (sauce ingredients last!) and cook on low for 4 hours, stir and cook on high for 30 minutes.