Zucchinni and Sun Dried Tomatoes

Tonight I took dinner over to Nana’s house so that my wonderful husband could watch an NBA play-off game on TV. (We have the most basic cable channels you can get. They are a “package deal” with the high speed internet service we have.) Nana doesn’t cook very often since most nights she is eating at our house so I had to use my imagination to create a meal which required very few pans and/or spices. I decided tacos, refried beans and some stir fried zucchini would fit the bill – especially since I already had made guacamole and salsa. The trick was to figure out an appealing way to prepare the zucchini without any interesting spices. (Since Nana doesn’t cook, her selection of spices is not only VERY limited, it’s also VERY old – and probably not very tasty.) So, I quickly grabbed a yellow pepper, an onion, the zucchini and some sun-dried tomatoes that had been looking at me very accusingly for quite a while. I love sun dried tomatoes – just right out of the bag – and had bought some quite a few weeks ago at our old produce market. I had eaten a few and then forgot about them – until today. So, once at Nana’s I sliced the pepper and onion, water sautéed them until tender. Next, I added the zucchini and some salt and pepper. I occasionally stirred the zucchini until it just started to turn tender, and then I added the chopped sun dried tomatoes. Boy, not only was it delicious but it was also very colorful. Sometimes a little creative ingenuity is all that is needed to make a new dish that every one loves.

Yellow Squash Casserole - easy as pie!

I just stepped out of the kitchen after preparing a wonderful yellow squash (crookneck squash) casserole. The whole house is full of the delicious smell of sautéed onions and mushrooms and Italian seasonings. Normally, I sauté all of the ingredients together in one pan, toss in the bread crumbs and vegan cheddar style cheese, mix and then slide it into another casserole dish to bake for a little while. Not tonight. I decided to use my largest cast iron skillet and bake it in the oven in the same pan I did all of the sautéing in. All of the taste, with less of the clean up. And, since the cast iron skillet is larger in diameter than my casserole dishes, it should bake in a fraction of the time. My children are already asking how long until daddy gets home. I think the smell has perked up their appetites as well – or it could be that my son just wants some help from dad with the capture and breeding of his favorite toads!

The casserole is really easy to prepare – simply sauté a sliced onion, add 8 ounces of mushrooms and sauté a little more. Then add sliced crookneck squash (about 3-4 medium sized ones). Let the ingredients cook for a few minutes until the squash softens up. Then, turn off the heat, add some Earth Balance (about 2-3 Tablespoons), ¼ cup of cheddar style vegan cheese, 1 teaspoon of Italian Seasoning and enough bread crumbs to make it all the right consistency. Top it with cracker crumbs or some more grated cheese and bake it in a 350 degree oven for about 20 minutes. Pretty easy – and the family will think you slaved over it for hours. I normally make it the center dish and tonight we are having spinach with garlic and speckled butter beans on the side. Should I dare say what we are having for dessert? Warm sautéed pears – my daughter’s absolute favorite!

The value of persistence and repetition!

Last night we had our Pasta Fagioli that I made the day before. Some soups just really taste better when they sit for a day. I recently changed the recipe on the website to include directions for what I do when I am using my pressure cooker. It also makes enough for several meals. Remember, cook once, eat twice! I had planned on having a nice salad on the side but I had also just cut up a delicious cantaloupe. Yes, Florida Cantaloupes are just coming on the market and we are gorging ourselves on them. Right now, they are dropping in price and increasing in taste. There’s just something about getting a lope from the fields only 2 hours away, versus getting one from a country half a world away! You might not be near Florida but as the warmer weather spreads through the country, the fruits and vegetables make their march too. Soon, we will be enjoying Georgia fruits and veggies, and eventually by the end of the season, we will be munching our way through New Jersey produce. We always try to really enjoy and overly indulge in the fruits and veggies that are more local – somehow they just taste better. We also try to stock up and freeze what we can while the prices are lower. Frozen cantaloupes taste great in smoothies and as the price drops, we will be busy slicing and freezing. The funny thing is last night I served my darling daughter cantaloupe instead of a salad and she was rather disappointed – and I was rather surprised! It was just a few months ago that she would rather eat just about anything than a tossed salad. Then I discovered two things – the beauty of a chopped salad and how important it is to serve a dish MANY times before I expect the children to like it. Now, she likes salads. I guess I am never too old to learn the value of persistence and repetition!

Five minutes to spare!

Wow – It’s almost 5 o’clock and I am actually getting to sit down at the desk for a couple of minutes! Today was a good day – actually got quite a bit done – including school with the children. I also made fresh bread (which is baking in the oven now) and Pasta Fagioli (for dinner tomorrow – it always tastes better after it sits for a day.) Tonight we are having some Tofukey bratwurst that I bought on sale and we all love. I’m also planning on some sweet and sour cabbage and some leftover lentils. We tend to eat quite a bit of cabbage – probably because it’s not only incredibly healthy, it’s also normally pretty inexpensive. Our local produce store normally sells cabbage for about 45 cents a pound or less – and that’s a great price for budget conscious healthy eaters. When shopping and planning for our meals, if I can find fruit or vegetables for 99 cents a pound or less – we get them. Just the other day we found D’Anjou pears for only 99 cents a pound. This has been a great year for tasty pears and we eat them plain, diced on our salads, sautéed with a tiny bit of Earth Balance and brown sugar, and we enjoy them in pies and cobblers. Cobblers are what I call desert when I am too lazy to make a crust and just top the pears with the crumbly topping I normally put on our pear pie. With my pressure cooker, I can get the sweet and sour cabbage ready for the table in less than 5 minutes. I don’t know what I would do without my pressure cooker – except not have time to sit and blog for 5 minutes so close to dinner time.