I'm coconuts

If you didn't already know, I'm completely obsessed with coconut oil.  Completely.  I know a lot of my other mom friends are equally as obsessed as coconut oil isn't just an excellent way to cut out butter in recipes - it's great for diaper rash too!  It's a good hair conditioner, solves tummy troubles...this stuff is magical. 

I've wondered how coconut oil would work for replacing butter or shortening in things like biscuits or pie crust.  Those two things can be kind of particular.  It's all about touching the dough as little as possible so your hands don't melt the butter or shortening.  But since coconut oil is almost impossible to work with when it's been refrigerated, I was a little concerned I'd finally found something coconut oil couldn't do.  Still, I had to try it.  I had to know.  I HAD TO KNOW.

It works, my dudes.  It works really well.  I'd dare say it works better than any crust I've made with butter or shortening.  Look how well that crust holds up to cutting!  That's the real test.

And with my first successful coconut oil pie crust, I decided to make chicken pot pie.  My parents had it for dinner the other night when we were visiting and I couldn't get it out of my head.  I decided to put my own spin on it and instead of using the traditional peas, carrots, and potatoes, I used asparagus, baby bellas, and carrots.  I wanted to use sweet potatoes instead of carrots but we didn't have any sweet potatoes in the potato draw, to my chagrin.  I was so chagrined, yall.

Chicken Pot Pie with Coconut Oil Crust

For the crust:
- 2 cups flour
- 3/4 cup coconut oil
- 1 tsp salt
- 2-3 tblsp ice water

For the filling:
- 3 boneless skinless chicken breasts, cooked
- 1 bunch asparagus, chopped
- 1 pkg baby bellas, sliced
- 2 carrots, diced
- 2 tblsp olive oil
- 2 cups chicken stock
- 1/2 cup flour
- 2 tsp sage
- 2 tsp dried rosemary
- 1 tblsp minced garlic
- salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

To make the crust:  In a food processor, pulse flour and salt.  Cut in coconut oil and pulse until the oil is mixed in and the flour looks like peas.  Slowly drizzle in ice water while pulsing, until a ball forms.  Divide the dough in half.  On a well floured surface, roll out the dough into two large circles.  Place one circle in the bottom of a 9" pie plate.  Set the other circle aside until you're ready to top the pie.

To make the filling:  Prepare your chicken breasts any way you like.  Poaching or baking is the low fat way to go.  I lightly fried mine in some olive oil in a skillet with some salt and pepper generously coating each chicken breast.  Or use leftover chicken.  Or use one of those rotisserie chickens they have prepared at the store.  It's your world!  Dice the chicken up in a bowl and set aside.

Over medium heat, heat olive oil in a non-stick skillet.  Add garlic and saute for about one minute.  Add mushrooms, asparagus, and carrots and stir around for a few minutes until tender.  Add flour and coat the vegetables well.  Slowly add chicken broth while stirring.  Continue to stir the mixture until thickened and bring to a boil.  Cover and reduce heat to low.  Let simmer for about 5 minutes.  Remove lid and add chicken, sage, rosemary, salt and pepper.  Cook over heat for about a minute.  Pour into prepared pie plate and cover with other half of the pie crust. 

Poke holes all through the top of the pie crust using a fork, to let steam out.  Bake on 400 degrees for 50 minutes. 

Go traditional, go crazy, but please try this crust! I can't wait to try it with apple pie over the holidays! PIE, YOU GUYS!  Pie...

Football, shmootball

As a girl who grew up in the south, you'd think it would be programmed in my DNA to love football.  I've lived in Baton Rouge, home of the LSU Tigers.  I've lived in Tallahassee, home of the FSU Seminoles.  I now live in Mississippi, home of both the Ole Miss Rebels and the MSU Bulldogs.  Lot of football, lot of big names in football, lot championship games in those towns I grew up in.  AND I COULD NOT CARE LESS.  Ok, ok.  I'll admit, particularly while I was living in Tallahassee, it was hard not to get into the buzz that went on around town during football season.  At the time I was there, the team was always ranked in the top 5.  Bowl games and National Championships all over the place.  But I don't think I've ever sat and watched an entire game.  And now that I'm married to a football addict, I think the day is coming that I might actually have to do it. 

This is already more football talk than I can stomach.

So how do I cope with all this sports mess?  Snacks.  Snacks and football are a match made in heaven.  And it's the only consolation I have.  Joe and I are both big fans of honey roasted peanuts, so when I had about 2 cups of peanuts leftover in the cabinet, I knew what I had to do.  No question.

Honey Roasted Peanuts

- 2 cups of raw peanuts
- 1/3 cup honey
- 2 tblsp coconut oil
- 2 tsp salt, divided
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 3 tsp raw sugar

Preheat oven to 325

In a heavy saucepan, melt coconut oil and add honey, cinnamon, and 1/2 tsp of salt.  Once melted and well combined, pour over peanuts on a foil covered baking sheet.  Stir nuts and honey mixture well, making sure to get all of the peanuts coated.  Bake in the oven for 20 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes to make sure peanuts do not burn.

Once cooked, remove from oven and stir.  Allow to cool for 1 minute and then ssprinkle with remaining salt and raw sugar.  Stir to coat.  After they've cooled for another 2 or 3 minutes, stir again to keep the peanuts apart.

Store in a ziploc bag or air tight container.


I have a feeling I'm going to have to eat a lot of these guys if I'm going to make it through the weekend long marathon of both college and professional football.  My life is so hard, you guys.

Marriage tips

Whoever it was that said "The key to a man's heart is through his stomach", wasn't kidding.  I've used that line when giving relationship advice to my sisters, to my friends, and I've used it on myself.  If we're having an off day or he's stressed out or (yes, this actually happens sometimes - like, maybe, 3 whole times) I just want to do something nice because I love the dude, cooking something and feeding that guy will make rainbows and puppies appear.  But if I want to add some unicorns and hugs from baby bunnies, I go for making food he's liked since he was a kid.  Comfort food is what they call those, I think.  Recipes that are similar to his mom's or catfish and hush puppies.  The good stuff.

So, this is one of those 3 times that I just wanted to do something nice for Mr. Harrison.  Football season started last weekend, and while I could give a flying flip, Joe has sat through marathons of Flipping Out and Project Runway and has managed to do it with little to no complaint.  Headphones, yes, but no complaining.  As a reward for surviving those hot, miserable, football-less months, I made him some appropriate football snackage.  There was chips and dip and nachos.  But most importantly...

...there were homemade nutty buddy bars.

Homemade Nutter Butters (aka access to husband's credit card...butters)

- Chocolate Almond Bark
- Waffer Crackers (you can use any type of cracker, but choosing a cracker that is really thin is the best bet.  I found Nature's Crisp Crackers at Wal-Mart)
- Creamy Peanut Butter

In a small sauce pan, on low heat, melt almond bark.  While almond bark is slowly melting (6-8 minutes), prepare crackers and peanut butter by spreading a thin layer on peanut butter on a cracker, adding another cracker, more peanut butter, and topping it with the last cracker.  Cracker, pb, cracker, pb, cracker.  Add as many layers as you'd like.  I've found that less layers are easier to handle.  Using a pair of tongs, dip peanut butter crackers in chocolate and coat them completely.  Shake off the excess and place on a sheet of wax paper.  Once you've dipped all of your peanut butter crackers, place in the fridge to cool completely for about 10 minutes. Serve and ENJOY.


So, what have we learned?  Nutter Butters are as good as currency.  Or that's what I've learned, anyway. 

Hurricane soup

Just a quick note to all my friends on the coast (including one of my closest friends since I was 12), I hope you're all safe and dry.  I'm thinking about you all.  If Issac wasn't bringing on both the noise and the funk, I'd be down there, cooking for you all.  Because I love you.

While we don't get hurricanes this far inland, we are just close enough to get a lot of the wind and rain.  And it's well on it's way.  I think we're supposed to see rain until next Thursday.  I've said it before and I'll say it again: Rain equals soup.  It's just that simple. 

On Saturday, Joe, out of the blue, had a major craving for tomato soup.  I, myself, have never been a tomato soup fan.  I think it's because when my brother was little, he LOVED tomato soup, but he'd add ketchup and baby tomatoes to it.  And that made me want to gag.  Does that make my brother seem gross?  he's not gross.  He's awesome.  Whatever.  He's doesn't read my blog.  So I guess he's not that awesome.  I'm kidding.  He's the best.  ANYWAY - I looked up recipes and got a general idea of how to make tomato soup and discovered it's incredibly easy.  Like, done in 30 minutes easy. 

After making it over the weekend, I did some tweaking and turned this soup into a vegan tomato basil bisque.  The results were creamy, rich, and full of flavor.  This is not my brother's ketchup, baby tomato, canned soup.  No sir.

Tomato Basil Bisque

- 1 tblsp olive oil

- 2 large tomatoes, diced (4 cups)

- 1 medium onion, diced

- 2 tblsp minced garlic

- 2 cups vegetable stock

- 3 tsp clove

- 1 cup basil leaves

- 3 tblsp coconut oil

- 3 tblsp flour

- 2 tsp honey

- salt and pepper to taste

In a large pot, heat olive oil over medium heat.  Add garlic and sautee until fragrant (about a minute).  Add diced tomato and onions and cook until onions are translucent and tender (about 5 minutes).  Add vegetable stock, clove, and basil and bring to a boil.  Once boiling, reduce to a simmer for about 20-25 minutes.  Remove soup from heat and carefully pour into a blender and blend until completely smooth.  Set aside.  In the same large pot, heat coconut oil until melted.  Then add flour and whisk constantly for about 5 minutes.  It's really important to whisk constantly, otherwise the oil and butter will burn and will be unusable.  Once you've mixed your oil and flour for about 5 minutes and they're starting to thicken, slowly pour in your tomato soup mixture while whisking the whole time to avoid lumps.  Add honey and salt.  Stir over heat until you've reached desired thickness and then remove from heat and serve.

Note:  It's easy to make your own vegetable stock.  I use about 8 cups of water, 3 or 4 carrots roughly chopped, an onion chopped, 3 or 4 celery stalks roughly chopped, corn cobs, and any other vegetables i might have lying around with no purpose. This is a good way to use up otherwise unusable things, like the tops of celery or corn cobs.  Put the water and veggies in a large pot, season with salt and pepper, bring to a boil, and then simmer for about 2 hours.  Strain the liquid into a jar or air tight container and use it the next time you need some rainy day soup!

Yeah, that's a grilled cheese sandwich made on that french bread I gave you the recipe for, with some goat cheese, ricotta, and Parmesan.  NO BIG DEAL.



They call it stormy Monday

It poured here in Mississippi ALL....DANG....MORNING!  We haven't had a lot of rain this summer so 5 hours of rain was definitely welcomed.  My little garden was so thirsty! 

With all the rain and gray skies, I immediately thought about how it was an ideal soup day.  It's really hard to find a good day for soup in the summer, so you've gotta take your opportunities when they come!  "The time to hesitate is through!"

I had several corn on the cobs in my freezer from the farmers market and one large zucchini (when I say large, by the way, I mean it was almost as long and as round as my arm.  Yeah.  I mean large.) from my sister in law's garden.  I've been really into roasting my veggies, so a roasted corn and zucchini soup was kind of a no-brainer.

Creamy Roasted Corn and Zucchini Soup

- 2 large ears of corn

- 1 zucchini

- 2 or 3 cloves of garlic, minced

- 1 tblsp olive oil

- 1 jalapeno (remove seeds for less heat)

- 1/2 tsp salt

- 2 cups vegetable stock (or chicken stock)

- 1 cup water

- 1 sprig of rosemary (optional)

- 1/3 cup barley (or rice, brown, white, wild, whatever!)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Remove corn from cob by slicing the kernels off, downward, with the cob standing on a cutting board, vertically.  Put corn on an aluminum foil lined baking sheet.  Reserve cobs.  Dice jalapeno and toss together with garlic, corn, olive oil, and salt, on the baking sheet.  Roast in the oven for 25-35 minutes. 

Meanwhile, add vegetable stock, water, corn cobs (snap those in half for a better fit in the pot), barley, and rosemary (if you're using it), in a medium sized pot.  Bring to a boil and then simmer while corn and peppers continue to roast, letting the barley cook through.

Once corn and peppers are roasted, remove the cobs and rosemary sprig from the broth.  Stir in roasted corn and peppers.  Using an immersion blender, puree the soup until creamy and smooth.  You can also (carefully!) pour soup into a regular blender and blend until smooth.  Reserve 1/4 of roasted corn for garnish, if you'd like.

And that's it!  This soup is sweet, salty, garlicy, and has a little punch of heat.  It's so rich from the sweetness of the corn and it's kind of hard to believe this doesn't have a whole cup of heavy cream in it or something.  It doesn't have cream in it...does it???  Nope.  I just went a re-read the recipe.  Ok.  It does not.

I'm from the s'th and I'd like some s'p

Mitch Hedburg reference in today's post title!  High five.

So, as you probably know by now, I live in Mississippi.  And Mississippi is in the south.  And if there were a "survival list" that we southerners had to compile for the very basic needs in order to survive down here, it would read something like:

1. Oxygen
2. Water (make that sweet tea)
3. Fried Chicken

That's right.  Fried Chicken is a means of survival.  It's just how we live.  My first vivid food memory is my great grandmother's fried chicken.  I can remember being 5 years old and pacing the kitchen just waiting for a plate full of drumsticks (making my great grandma really annoyed.  She had no patience for children.)

But this blog is about a healthy spin on food and also about easy, family friendly recipes.  So I modified my great grandmother's recipe.  Which seems a little sacrilegious and is definitely something Grandma Murray would've whacked me with a ruler for.  But I gotta do me.

These are baked chicken tenders.  But they're coated in cornflakes, flour, and spices, the way God intended.

Baked Corn Flake Chicken Tenders

- 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

- 2 cups corn flakes, crushed

- 1 egg yolk (if you're making sweet potato fries with these, save the egg white - you'll be using it then)

- 1/2 cup flour

- 1/4 cup milk (you can use 2%, skim, soy, or even left over corn milk, like I did!)

- 1/8 tsp cayenne

- 1/4 tsp paprika

- 1/4 tsp garlic powder

- 1/4 tsp salt

- 1 tblsp olive oil (or olive oil spray)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Cut chicken breasts into 2 or 3 strips, per breast.  Place strips in a shallow baking dish.  Beat egg yolk and milk and pour over chicken breasts.  Set aside for 10 minutes.  Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper.  Mix together crushed corn flakes, flour, cayenne, paprika, garlic, and salt, in a bowl.  Once chicken has soaked in egg wash, take each strip and coat it in the corn flake mixture, pressing it firmly on the chicken to make sure it sticks.  Place strips on the covered baking sheet, drizzle (or spray) lightly with oil, and bake at 400 degrees for 20-25 minutes. 

And who doesn't want fries with their chicken tenders?  Come on.  We're all a big fan of the "happy meal" approach to life.

Baked Crunchy Sweet Potato Fries (adapted from Naturally Ella)

- 1 medium sweet potato

- 1/2 tblsp olive oil

- 1 large egg white (use the one leftover from making chicken tenders!)

- salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Peel and cut sweet potatoes about 1/4 of an inch thick.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.  Toss sweet potatoes in olive oil.  Whisk egg white in a bowl until frothy.  Pour egg white over sweet potatoes and toss to coat. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Make sure, after coating, that the fries are in a single layer and not touching.  This just helps make sure they cook evenly. 

Cook fries for 20 minutes.  Remove from oven, flip fries to the other side, rotate the pan, and bake for another 20 minutes or until crispy.

Blammo!  We just healthified fried chicken and fries!  I think coating chicken in corn flakes and baking it, seals the deal that I am a total mom (just in case the whole giving birth thing didn't seal said deal).



When I dip, you dip, we dip

I'm not proud of that title.  But it's the first thing that popped in my head.  So there ya go.

Coming up with new things to make every week is a challenge I've started to enjoy, thanks to starting this blog.  Prior to getting into cooking, Joe used to joke that I had two food groups: nachos and pizza.  That makes me sound kind of gross.  It is also accurate.  This blog possibly saved me from overdosing on nachos and pizza (aka dying from heart failure). 

I've started to write down a running list of ANY ideas that pop into my head or recipes I see in magazines or on websites or just food I really enjoyed when I was out to eat somewhere.  But today I didn't rely on that list.  Today I woke up with spinach dip in my head.  I just wanted something creamy and snacky.  Something rich and garlicy and fresh.  Spinach diiiiiiipppppp.

I generally only ever eat something like spinach dip, at holiday parties or some sort of get together.  It's a go-to appetizer.  And that's because spinach dip has cheese or cream or ranch dressing or something else fatty and delicious.  If I'm going to make spinach dip for just a regular old Tuesday, I feel like I gotta make it healthy or I'm just going to cry into the bowl while I eat it alone in my yoga pants and an over sized t-shirt.   I can't be that person.  I just can't. 

But don't think making spinach dip healthy, doesn't mean it's not every bit of creamy, snacky, rich, garlicy, and fresh as the fattier stuff. 

Creamy Spinach Avocado Dip (oh yeah, and it's vegan!)

- 6 cups of fresh spinach (or one box frozen spinach, thawed and drained of excess water)

- 2 avocados

- 2-3 tblsp minced garlic

- 2 tblsp olive oil

- 1/2 of a yellow onion

- 1 tsp honey

- 1 can white beans, drained and rinsed (try cannellini beans, navy beans, or try 1 cup greek yogurt if you wanna just go vegetarian)

- 1/4 cup nutritional yeast (or 1/4 cup grated parmesan)

- 1 tsp salt

In a medium skillet, heat 1 tblsp of oil.  Add onion and saute until tender, about 5 minutes.  Add honey and 1/2 tsp salt and continue stirring onions until they start to caramelize.  Remove from heat and put onions into a food processor.  Put skillet back on the heat, and add remaining tblsp of oil.  Add garlic and stir until fragrant, about one minute.  Add spinach, one handful at a time and cook until wilted (you'll probably have to do this in batches).  When all the spinach is cooked, add to the food processor, with the onion.  Add avocado, nutritional yeast, beans, and remaining salt to the food processor. Pulse until smooth and serve.

I made a fresh, homemade loaf of french bread, and cut several thin slices, brushed a little olive oil on them, sprinkled them with salt, and toasted them up.  You could eat it with crackers, chips, bread...whatever! 

You could also smear this stuff all over some bread and make a sandwich, with some grilled chicken and tomato.  Get crazy, man.



"You need a really small stool to milk a corn kernel"

That quote is from my dad.  When I mentioned I was going to make corn milk the other day, that was his response.  He seemed impressed with his joke.  So I thought I'd make mention of it here.  Which is probably dumb because now I'm just encouraging these oh so sophisticated jokes.

Do you watch Master Chef?  It's on Fox on Monday and Tuesday evenings.  It's a cooking competition between home cooks.  These folks haven't worked in restaurants or been chef's anywhere.  So it's more relateable.  Well sort of relateable.  I doubt I'll ever be able to butcher anything and those guys can.  Last week they had a challenge of making a desert using corn.  One of the contestants made corn milk and then used that to make a corn shortcake.  I had it stuck in my head all week and eventually looked up what I thought would be a long, messy task in the kitchen. 

Google "Corn Milk"

Reading, reading...

Oh, it's just cooked corn off the cob and a cup of water, blended and strained?  Welp...

Yeah thats really all it is. 

Corn Milk

- 1 large ear of corn (or 2 smaller ears, about a cup of corn if you're using canned corn)

- 1 cup of water

Blend corn and water together and strain liquid through a fine sieve.  If you want it thicker, perhaps to replace whole milk or cream, add more corn. 

Here's a few facts about using corn milk.  It's a great milk substitute.  It can be used in both sweet and savory dishes.  But don't use it in hopes of saving calories.  It has the same amount of calories, cup to cup, as 2% milk.  However, it has less fat.  It does have sugar, but it's natural sugar.  And, my favorite part is this - you know where it's coming from.  You know you don't have to worry about hormones or poor conditions for animals (I mean you still have to worry about those).  Corn is easy to find locally in most places within the US.  Support your local farmers and make you some corn milk!  (Or get your cows milk from local farmers - that's a really good thing too.)

Moving on to a yeasted corn bread, perfect for sandwiches.  It's a tasty way to shake up the regular sandwich.  It's a little on the sweet side so I paired it with spicy additions like black bean hummus with jalapenos and grilled turkey coated in some Emril seasoning.  Balance, baby.  Balance.

Sweet Corn Yeast Bread

- 1 pkg active dry yeast

- 3/4 cup warm corn milk (test warmth on your wrist.  You can use water or regular milk if you prefer.)

- 1 tblsp honey

- 1 tsp salt

- 1 tblsp olive oil

- 1 cup cornmeal

- 2 1/2 cups unbleached all purpose flour

In a bowl, mix milk and yeast a few times with a wooden spoon and let sit for about 5 minutes.  Stir in honey, salt, and cornmeal.  Start adding flour, 1/4 of a cup at a time, and mix in well.  Continue to add flour until dough pulls away from the side of the bowl and starts to form a ball.  Dust a cutting board with flour and knead dough until its smooth and elastic, adding any remaining flour to fight off stickiness. 

Place dough in a oiled bowl, roll around in the bowl to coat, and cover with a towel and place in warm place for about an hour, or until dough has doubled.

Once dough has risen, knead dough for a few turns and then form into a loaf.  Place on a baking sheet, cover with a towel, and let rise for another 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  When bread has finished rising, bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown.  Let cool before slicing.

Now let's make a sammich. 

As I mentioned, I made my sandwich with spicy black bean hummus, turkey, avocado, and tomato.  I liked the heat mixed with the sweet.  But you could try this with anything.  You could even make a breakfast sandwich with it, using a fried egg or just some jam!

But if you wanna make it like I did, here's my recipe (well it's really dad's recipe) for black bean hummus.

Spicy Black Bean Hummus

- 1 can black beans, rinsed and drained

- 4 or 5 slices of jalapeno

- 1 tsp salt

- 2 tsp garlic powder

- 2 tsp cumin

- 1 tblsp olive oil

Pulse all of the ingredients in a food processor until smooth.  Store in an air tight container.

You can use that hummus as a condiment or just eat it as a dip with chips or on a tortilla all rolled up!

And just in case you were wondering, I did end up copying Master Chef and making shortcake using this recipe, but replacing milk with the corn milk I made.  And it was too good to even talk about.

Carbs are my friends

They are my friends.  They are my super mean friends that make me feel fat and bloated, but also happy and satisfied.  Just like real friends should.

I've been trying to limit my carb intake to one meal a day, as I've mentioned before.  So I gotta make those carbs meaningful and delicious, otherwise, what's the dang point?  It's my payoff for exercise doing torture poses in yoga for an hour. 

The other day I got my carb fix from pasta.  I've been wanting to try udon noodles in a dish.  Mostly because I'm fascinated by them.  Udon noodles are generally seen in Korean cuisine and are made from wheat flour.  They're thick but they only cook for 2 or 3 minutes and not a minute more.  Which is kinda awesome.  I'd read about different eggplant purees and decided I wanted to make one into a "cream" sauce in place of actual cream.  Trying to make this carb dish as guiltless as possible. 

I went vegan with this dish, but you could add parmesan in place of the nutritional yeast.  I roasted the eggplant for extra flavor, and the heat from roasting the eggplant should melt the parmesan right into this sauce. 

This is ridiculously satisfying and delicious.  Try it with any leftover veggies you have sitting around.  You can also use whole wheat linguine noodles or spaghetti noodles instead of udon.  I think I really just wanted to say I used udon noodles.  You can find them at Kroger in the Asian food section.

Asparagus, Portabella, and Udon with Roasted Eggplant Cream Sauce

- 1 bunch of asparagus

- 5 or 6 baby bella mushrooms

- 1/2 pack of Udon noodles

- 1 medium sized eggplant

- 2 tblsp nutritional yeast (or 1/4 cup grated parmesan)

- 2 or 3 cloves of garlic

- 1 tblsp olive oil

- 1 tsp sesame oil

- 1 tblsp grated ginger (or 1 tsp powdered ginger)

- 1 green chili, sliced

- salt to taste

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Slice eggplant, lengthwise, and place, cut side down, on a foil lined baking sheet.  Cook until skin is blackened, about 25 - 30 minutes. Set aside and cool.

When eggplant is ready, bring a large pot of water to a boil (if using udon noodles, don't salt the water).  While water is heating up, scoop out the insides of the eggplant, pulling away from the peel.  Place eggplant in a food processor and pulse with nutritional yeast, garlic, and a pinch of salt. Set puree aside.

In a medium skillet, heat olive oil and sautee 1 clove of minced garlic and ginger for about a minute.  Add sesame oil, asparagus, and baby bellas.  Sautee veggies for about 3-5 minutes or until tender. 

Meanwhile, once water is boiling, drop udon noodles in the water for 2 minutes (seriously, don't go over 3 or the noodles get mushy.  Yuck.).  Drain noodles.  Add noodles to the veggies and stir in the skillet.  Stir in cream sauce and serve.

This is some really amazing stuff.  And, once again, it's pretty guilt free, it's fresh, and it satisfies the carb monster.  We all have one. 



50 shades of purple

I really have no idea what I'm doing when I title posts sometimes...
I almost hate starting a sentence with "I saw this recipe on Pinterest", just because it's used so much it almost makes my head spin.  I love Pinterest and it's such an amazing source for inspiration.  But errrrrrrrrrrrbody is on Pinterest and it's becoming so big that I rarely go a week without hearing or saying the phrase "Oh, I got it from Pinterest!".  But I did get this idea for a recipe from Pinterest.  I am part of the phenomenon.  I'm cool with it.

I had some beets that had been forgotten (poor beets) in the back of my crisper and was so excited to try the beet hummus I'd seen.  But I only had 2 or 3 small beets. So I tweaked the original recipe I'd seen and roasted the beets I had and then combined them with the usual chick peas.  It's a hybrid!

Roasted Beet Hummus

- 2 or 3 small to medium sized beets, rinsed
- 1 tblsp olive oil for roasting
- 1 can garbanzo beans (chick peas)
- 2 or 3 cloves of garlic
- 2 tblsp tahini
- 2 tblsp olive oil
- 2 tsp cumin
- 2 tsp turmeric
- 1 lemon, juiced
- 1/4 cup plain greek yogurt (optional.  I like to add it just to make the hummus extra creamy.  Yum.)
- salt to taste

Preheat oven to 400.  In a baking dish, place rinsed beets and drizzle with olive oil.  Cover dish with a lid and bake for 35-40 minutes.  After beets have cooled, remove skin.

In a food processor, pulse roasted beets, chick peas, garlic, tahini, olive oil, cumin, turmeric, lemon juice, yogurt, and salt until well combined and smooth.

Serve with homemade pita bread (recipe here), veggies, or chips.


Not only is this hummus SO pretty to look at, but it's sweet and roasty and divine.

Stop asking me for chips!

Have I mentioned to you that my kids don't like sugar?  It's weird.  And they didn't get it from me.  In their 2 and a half years they have winced and spit out ice cream, chocolate, cupcakes, whipped cream, peanut butter, jam, candy, and rice crispy treats.  What the crap is up with these little people?!  I'm sure, at some point in their lives that will change.  But as it stands, they have no interest in sweets. 

They do, however, love fruit.  Nature's candy.  Why can't I just be satisfied with that?  They also LOVE chips.  Can't get enough of'm.  I get asked for chips on a daily basis.  And I say no plenty of times, but it is the one bit of junk food they eat.  They've still never had fast food (fast food isn't fast in the country, y'all), they don't eat anything fried at home, what a couple of chips now and then?

And then, out of nowhere, I remembered one of my favorite things to eat when I was a kid:  Apple chips.  Oh yeah.  Sweet and tart and crunchy.  So good and not a thing wrong with them.  They satisfy your chip craving while also keeping away medical professionals!  I love it!

It's like little apple pie chips, is what it's like.  My kids LOVE apples. And they LOVE chips.  Apple Chips?  This is going to be like Christmas in July! 

They wanted nothing to do with them.

They looked at me like, "Mom, this doesn't look like an apple OR a tortilla chip?  Stop yankin' my chain."  But had they at least tried them, man would they have been in heaven.  Whatever.  Sometimes kids are weird.  Or, rather, sometimes my kids are weird.  They don't like rice crispy treats!  Obviously they're weirdos.

Adorable weirdos.

What's this post about?  Oh yeah - Apple chips.

Cinnamon Apple Chips

- 3 firm apples (I used Fuji.  Try Gala, Granny Smith, or Pink Lady apples if you'd rather)

- 1 lemon, juiced

- 2 tsp cinnamon

- 2 tsp raw sugar (optional)

Preheat oven to 200 degrees.

Slice apples with a mandolin or a paring knife, about 1/8" thick. 

In a bowl, mix apple slices, lemon juice, and cinnamon, until apples are well coated.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.  Place apple slices on the baking sheet, making sure they aren't touching.  Bake for about an hour and then flip the apple slices so that they cook evenly, and cook for an additional hour or more, until they are crispy.

Note:  Apple chips will be a little flimsy when they come out of the oven, but after cooling they'll crisp up completely.

These are one of my favorite snacks still.  I mean who doesn't love chips you can eat all day and not feel bad about?  No one.  That's who.

Cold as ice

I don't wanna harp on summer heat too much.  Everyone does it.  I do it.  It's hard not to.  IT'S FREAKING HOT.  Ever since I was a teenager, summer was the ideal time for me to lose some weight because it was so hot I couldn't even eat.  It was just carrot sticks and apples and spinach salad.  I grew up in Florida and the humidity was like being hugged by a sumo wrestler.  Buh.

So that's what brought me to making salad for lunch all this week.  After a rainy couple of weeks, where things seemed to cool off, it's back to raging heat.  I may as well take advantage of this appetite suppressing weather and eat like a bird.  I got some ROCKIN' green dream pants for my birthday and while they technically will go on me, they are far too tight.  Mayhaps the heat will have me in my dream pants by fall!

(Don't worry...I eat like a bird for breakfast and lunch...but by dinner, the temp has dropped and I is ready to chow.  Come'ere kit kats!)

Do you know about jicama?  I think I heard about it on Chopped, maybe.  It's kind of like a cross between a carrot and a pear.  Slightly sweet, nice a crunchy, packed with water.  I've seen it in fruit salad just as much as I've seen it paired with veggies.  It's at The Pig in Batesville, but if you don't have it around, you could use parsnips or turnips even.  It's a salad.  You can use whatever you want!

But I recommend, no matter what your salad consists of, that you try this kiwi vinaigrette.

Kiwi Vinaigrette

- 3 ripe kiwi (the kiwi should have a little bit of give to it when you squeeze it)

- 3 tablespoons of rice vinegar (or cider vinegar, or white balsamic)

- pinch of salt

Blend all of the ingredients in a blender or food processor until well combined and serve.  Store in an air tight container.

You could also try this with mangoes, strawberries, or blackberries.  Just a thought.  A delicious thought.

Getting rid of the Monday's

Pancakes are a tradition in our house, on the weekends.  Pancakes pretty much guarantee that all four of us will be around the table at the same time, sharing a meal.  Joe works in the evenings and I'm running around like a crazy person, trying to keep all the plates spinning, so Saturdays and Sundays are pretty important when it comes to family time, particularly meal time.  We did our traditional pancakes together on Saturday and I guess they really stuck with the kids this time, because Charlie asked me for pancakes first thing this morning.  They're easy to throw together and I thought "why not?".  I'm out of eggs and as I started thinking about it, I kind of wanted to avoid another heavy breakfast for them.  It's really a once a week kind of thing.  Yeah, I'm annoying.  And then I was starting to get things together and I thought I'd go crazy and take out all of the dairy products.  Replace the butter with coconut oil and the milk with soy milk.  Now it's healthier AND it's something I can share with niece, who has to eat completely diary free.

I have to say, after making all these changes...these pancakes tasted EXACTLY THE SAME as any other pancake.  Looked the same.  They're the same.  Crazy.

Here's a big tip I've discovered along the way of vegan baking.  Letting your batter for cakes or breads or pancakes, rest for 5 to 10 minutes, after you've mixed the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, will help everything bind together...which is the point of eggs in most baking recipes.  When I first mixed this batter together it was incredibly runny.  After sitting for 5 minutes, it was thick like batter should be. 

Ok, I didn't eat or serve this many pancakes at one time.  That would be ridiculous.  Well, it would be ridiculous for me to SAY I would eat this many pancakes at once.  What I say and what I do, on rare occasion, don't match.  All of that is to say, I would eat 5 pancakes in no time flat.  But here's what's nice about these pancakes - you're cutting out eggs, butter, and milk.  That's a lot of fat you're cutting out.  I did the math and these pancakes are 107 calories a piece.  Add a teaspoon of honey (I hate maple syrup, by the way.  The smell, the taste, all of it.  But you can use it if you're brave), some strawberries and blueberries and it's about the same as a bowl of granola and yogurt.  You could make a big batch, freeze what you don't eat, pop them in the toaster on the morning you wanted one, and boom - you gots pancakes.  It's a nice shake up in your breakfast routine.  

I'm making such a big deal out of the easiest thing in the world to cook.  But it's nice to have a healthy, tasty spin option.

Egg Free, Dairy Free, So Good Pancakes

- 1 cup unbleached all purpose flour

- 1 tsp cinnamon

- 2 tsp baking soda

- 1 cup soy milk

- 1 tsp honey

- 1 tblsp vegetable oil

- 1 tblsp water

- 1 tsp vanilla extract

- 2 tblsp coconut oil

Combine all dry ingredients together and mix slightly.  Add milk, oil, water, and vanilla.  Stir together until just combined, being careful not to over mix (over mixing makes your pancakes flat-so).  It's ok if it's lumpy - it should be!  Set the bowl aside to rest for a few minutes.

Melt the coconut oil on a skillet over medium heat.  Once melted, pour the oil into the batter and stir into batter.  Return the pan to the heat.  Once pan is good and hot, pour about 1/4 cup of batter onto pan and let it cook until bubbles start to form on the surface.  Carefully flip onto other side and let cook until both sides are golden brown and cooked through. 

Add fruit, nuts, or chocolate chips to the batter if you like.  Or split your flours in half, using 1/2 cup white flour, 1/2 cup wheat flour, and have whole wheat pancakes!

Get rid of them Monday's!



Cloudy with more than a chance of meatballs

It actually IS cloudy!  And there is more than just a chance that I'm going to give you a meatball recipe!  I'm pretty excited that post title worked out so well.  It's the little things.

So yesterday, while I was making my pesto, I also decided to put the large mound of tomatoes to good use and whip up some homemade spaghetti sauce.  I basically wanted to spend Monday putting together these bases for other dishes.  Between pesto and spaghetti sauce, I can do pasta, pizza, spaghetti and meatballs, grilled chicken and veggies in pesto, eggplant Parmesan, the list goes on.  Dedicating one morning to making those two things, basically did all the menu planning for me.  Sweet! 

Homemade spaghetti sauce is something I recommend everyone try.  Especially right now while tomatoes are so delicious and ripe and perfect.  It's something you can freeze for those pink tomato months, also known as winter.  It takes a little while to cook, but doesn't require a lot of hands on time.  The smell is amazing and stays in your house for a good day in a half.  Which is pretty nice for me.  I'd much rather have my house smell like Little Italy than diapers, is all I'm sayin. 

Tomato Basil Spaghetti Sauce

- 8-10 medium ripe tomatoes

- 3 tblsp olive oil

- 1 onion, chopped

- 1 bell pepper, chopped

- 4 cloves of minced garlic

- 2 carrots, chopped

- 1/4 cup chopped fresh basil

- 1/4 tsp oregano

- 1/4 cup red wine

- 1 bay leaf

- 2 stalks of celery

- 2 tblsp tomato paste

Bring a large pot of water to boil.  Have a large bowl of ice water ready.  Place whole tomatoes in the boiling water and let sit for 1-2 minutes.  Remove with a slotted spoon and place immediately in ice water.  Let rest until cool enough to handle.  Remove the peel and squeeze out the seeds.  Chop  6-8 tomatoes and puree in a blender.  Chop the remaining tomatoes and set aside. 

In a large pot, over medium heat, cook garlic, onion, bell pepper, and carrots in olive oil until tender, about 5 minutes.  Pour in pureed tomatoes, chopped tomatoes, basil, oregano, and wine.  Place bay leaf and whole celery stalks in the pot.  Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low, and simmer for about 2 hours.  Stir in tomato paste and simmer for another hour.  Discard celery and bay leaf and serve.

Zucchini noodles are incredibly easy and delicious.  They get rid of those carbs you'd feel guilty about with regular pasta, they have a nice crunch to them, and they add such great color and flavor to the otherwise traditional spaghetti.  There are several ways to make these noodles.  You can use a vegetable peeler and get long ribbons of pasta, you could use a mandolin, a julienne peeler (which would be the best tool here...I don't have one, but if you do, go crazy with it!), or just cut the noodles with a knife, which is what I did. 

Zucchini Noodles

- 3-4 medium zucchini

- large pot of salted, boiling water

Bring salted water to a boil.  Cut zucchini lengthwise, into four parts, getting rid of the middle of the zucchini, where the seeds are.  Use a peeler, a mandolin, or a knife, to cut long noodles.  After noodles are prepared, drop in salted boiling water for 1-2 minutes and drain and serve.

For the chicken meatballs, I used the Martha method I talked about here to turn my chicken breast into ground chicken.  But you can use ground turkey or chicken already packaged from the store.  I just didn't have it, so I had to get creative.

Lean Chicken Parmesan Meatballs

- 1lb ground turkey or chicken

- 1 large egg

- 1/2 cup bread crumbs or panko (I used panko...cuz I love me some panko, dawg)

- 1/4 cup grated Parmesan

- 1 tsp garlic powder

- 2 tblsp chopped parsley

- 2 tblsp olive oil

Combine chicken, egg, bread crumbs, Parmesan, garlic, and parsley in a bowl.  Heat olive oil over medium heat in a non-stick skillet.  Once the oil is good and hot (when the oil gets fragrant), roll chicken mixture into golf ball sized balls and fry in the oil on all sides until cooked through.  Drain on a paper towel and serve.

Note:  This recipe will make 15 or so meatballs.  You can freeze the leftover meatballs on a parchment lined baking sheet and pull out a few anytime you want to make this dish.  Look at that.  I just gave you awesome leftovers.  You're welcome.

Pesto is the best-o

Yeah.  I just wrote "pesto is the best-o".  And I don't care how lame that makes me.  I've made my peace with it.

On Sunday's, our little group of four usually travels to Joe's parents or my parents house for the day.  Just some family time, usually spent running around outside, with food and stories about our week, always interrupted by the kids and their adorable antics.  This past Sunday we spent with my mom and dad in Batesville.  As I've mentioned, dad has gone vegan, so eating over there these days means we'll be getting our required vegetable and fruit intake for the day and then some.  It was a pour down rainy day all day so it was perfect for comfort food.  Dad whipped up this vegan spinach, basil, and walnut pesto with some summer veggies over pasta.  Dad always makes the best food.  And with one bite I let him know I'd be stealing that recipe for pesto and posting it on the blog.  I also told him I'd give him credit. This is dad's recipe.  There. 

This recipe calls for nutritional yeast.  I don't want to post recipes with ingredients I can't get in rural Mississippi.  And nutritional yeast is something you can't get anywhere around here.  For those who aren't so rural and have access to Whole Foods or Trader Joes, you can easily find it.  And for my fellow country folk, you can purchase nutritional yeast from Nuts dot com for $7/8oz bag.  I've purchased through Nuts.com and they are speedy and reliable, with super awesome packaging (which always gets my attention).  A little goes a long way, so I recommend starting with 8 ounces.  It's a powder that is used as thickener for soups, or can be added to sauces or other recipes for a cheesy flavor.  It sounds really weird, I know.  But just try it.  I'll give you the $7 if you want.

And, look, you can use Parmesan cheese instead. 

Let me just show you the picture of the pesto before you get too weirded out by nutritional yeast...

Fun Fact:  You might know this, you might not.  Dad was telling me he went with spinach in his pesto because he's trying to incorporate low calorie, high nutrient and vitamin enriched vegetables into his diet, more.  Spinach has 7 calories per cup.  Know how many carbs it has?  One.  A carb.  A cup of spinach has a carb in it.  Cray cray.

Anyway. So there's that.



Spinach Basil Walnut Pesto

- 4 cups spinach
- 1 cup basil
- 1/2 cup of walnuts
- 2 or 3 cloves of garlic minced
- 3 or 4 tablespoons of olive oil
- 2 tablespoons nutritional yeast (or 1/4 cup grated Parmesan)
- salt to taste

In a food processor or blender, pulse all of the ingredients until smooth.  Add more garlic and salt to your taste.

Store in a jar or air tight container.  Mix in with warm noodles and sauteed vegetables, coat chicken breasts in pesto and bake, or spread on flat bread for pizza. 

This pesto is creamy and garlicky and bright. It's a comfort food you'll never feel bad about.  Get your vitamin A, K, C, and B on!

Snack attack

I made some super tasty veggie burgers yesterday (recipe to come...I gotta tweak it a little) and I needed a side.  Fries are the obvious choice.  But darn it all if I didn't have a single potato in my house.  Not one!  There's a never ending list of fries made with every vegetable imaginable.  Green beans, eggplant, carrots, asparagus...seriously it goes on forever.  And when I found this recipe on A Cozy Kitchen, I almost started chewing on my laptop.  Which I think goes against everything the manual would tell you to do.  Don't chew on your puter.

So I will rarely do this, but I'm just going to share this recipe exactly as it is.  I try to come up with my own stuff or put my own spin on recipes, but this is so perfect that it would just be silly to change a thing.  Polenta Fries.  Insane.  Have you had polenta?  My mom used to make it all the time.  It's so incredibly simple.  It's just milk and cornmeal, heated and stirred in a pot until it's thick.  Mom used to use it in chili pie recipes.  You can cool the mixture though and it makes a little cake.  This is what you'll do for the polenta fries, along with baking them until golden and crispy. 

Get ready to chew on your computer.

Baked Polenta Fries

- 4 cups whole milk
- 1 cup water
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 2 1/4 cup cornmeal
-1/2 cup grated Parmesan
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt, and more for sprinkling
- 2 tablespoons olive oil

Spray non-stick cooking spray on a baking sheet (or casserole dish). Bring milk, 1 cup water and butter to boil in heavy large saucepan. Gradually whisk in cornmeal. Reduce heat to low and cook until polenta is very thick and starts to pull away from sides of pan, stirring often, about 8 minutes. Remove from heat.

Stir in cheese and salt. Add more salt if you like. Immediately transfer polenta to prepared baking sheet, spreading mixture to a 1-inch thickness. Mine filled up half of the baking sheet. No biggie. Wrap with plastic wrap and refrigerate until cool and firm, about 1 hour. (You can totally do this a day ahead. Just be sure to cover and keep refrigerated.)

Cut polenta lengthwise in pan into three-inch-wide rectangles. Cut each rectangle crosswise into 3/4-inch-wide strips. Set polenta strips aside.

Preheat oven to 450F. Transfer polenta fries to lined baking sheet. Sprinkle with about a teaspoon of kosher salt and some olive oil. Bake for 20 minutes, flipping the fries at the 10 minute mark. Fries, when done, will be slightly golden brown at the edges

Recipe via A Cozy Kitchen


Visit A Cozy Kitchen for a recipe for Chili Lime Mayo to dip these suckers in.  Or just do what I did and hit that classic ketchup.  Yeah, man.