Sunday, March 27, 2011

Where's the beef? Back on my table!

So, the great vegan experiment has come to an end.  We are carnivores and that is just how it is.    I enjoyed our experiment with the plant based world, and fully plan to put meat free selections on our family menu, but the meat is back!    I have no problem eating a veg diet, but it is just no fun to cook!

Tonight I made Buffalo Chicken Risotto.  It was HOT and tasty.    The risotto was cooked with celery and onion with a little bit of beer and a mixture of chicken broth, hot sauce, honey and worchestershire sauce.  At the end I stirred in some rotisserie chicken.  Quite tasty.     

We had decided to go carnivore again after I did my shopping for the week, so our other selections include Oven baked Mac and Cheese,  Tofu, chickpea and sundried tomato salad (this was a Wednesday night staple for a loooooong time when we were doing South Beach) and Veggie Fajitas.  To be honest with you, the fajitas are so good, I may never make fajitas with meat again.   Portobello mushrooms make it as meaty as it needs to be.  Yummy!

So now that meat is back, I am going to break into some new recipes I have and I am pretty excited, so stay tuned!

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

A yummy week

Well,  I just realized I have not posted anything in over a month!  It has been pretty hectic and I guess I have sort of  forgotten my food raves.  This week saw some very yummy food!

I made some Millet Paella on Saturday.  The recipe I have for this needed some tweeking as it called for way less liquid than the millet needed to cook properly.  Millet is an often overlooked whole grain that is really pretty tasty.  The paella had kidney beans, edamame beans, kale (which I used to sub for the escarole that I couldn't find), onions and lots of peppers.   It is a very colorful dish.  There is seriously not one bad ingredient in this whole recipe.  Just pure wholesome goodness.

On Sunday I made Springtime Risotto.  The recipe is here: http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=50400000111149

I have decided that though risottos are a ton of work, they are worth every stir of my spoon.  Creamy and delicious.  This one has edamame and asparagus and instead of putting butter in at the end, you put cream cheese.   Then you top it all off with Fresh Thyme and shaved Parmesan.  Magnificent!  Pretty too.

And tonight, I made quite possibly the best vegetarian dish I have made yet!  Portobello burgers with bulgar pilaf.   In the past whenever I have made a portobello "burger"  I have just panfried my portobello whole.  Not this time.  These burgers had T.V.P. (textured vegetable protein), Provolone, CHOPPED portobellos, onion, zuchini and sundried tomato.   The flavor was absolutely wonderful.  The burgers didn't hold their shape really well, but the flavor was there to make up for the sloppy presentation.    Wow.  Just Wow.  And the bulgar pilar has bulgar, green onions and even more mushrooms.  Dinner tonight just made my taste buds so very happy. 

So I am getting into the groove on this vegetarian eating thing.  We just haven't been able to give up the cheese or half and half, so I guess we can't say we are 100% plant based (have I mentioned I have dubbed our version of the diet as a "Chegan" diet?).  I find more interesting recipes each time I flip through my collection of cookbooks.     I wonder what next week will bring...