Meal Plan: June 28- July 2- Chimichurri Acorn Squash Bowl

It feels like it's been a while since I've been in the kitchen, preparing my weekly recipe. Last week, I subsisted on weekend leftovers and my fave broccoli/rice/tahini combo.  I have been making some green smoothies to increase the intake of greens by a  little but that can hardly count as cooking/meal prep. I'm thinking they are enough to be snacks or dinner (a very light dinner) at best because they don't keep me full for long! Anyway, this recipe comes from the bowl section of Isa Does It. It consists of pasta and chimichurri sauce, black beans, and some pumpkin, although I opted to use acorn squash. This comes together pretty quickly. I've never made a chimichurri so I'm not sure that I got it fine enough. But it was fresh and green and very zippy from the red wine vinegar and garlic. I feel like I didn't puree it enough because it didn't coat the pasta the way a sauce would but it was still delicious. This week I spent about 27 shekels at the farmer's market just on the parsley, cilantro, some spinach (for smoothies) and a couple of sweet potatoes. I had bought the pepitas and pasta last week and the beans I already had on hand. You can find the original recipe here. 

Shabbat Cooking: Tamale Shepherd's Pie

I wasn't really planning on cooking this Shabbat. I was out for dinner and then home for lunch. The thought of simple rice and beans was perfect but then I had a friend over last minute and thought, I can't serve her rice and beans! The same friend has had all my incarnations of tofu so even though I had some in the fridge for the coming week's recipe, I decided to go with something else. Since the next couple of months I'll be cooking through Isa Does It, I looked there for a good recipe. I found this recipe in the Sunday Suppers chapter and thought it would be perfect. I have never made a shepherd's pie (even though I've really wanted to) because I always thought that it was wayyyy too much work. This recipe isn't quick, but isn't intimidating either and I took advantage of these long Fridays to put it together. 

Now, this recipe wasn't that cheap. I didn't have most of the things around, as I'm avoiding tomatoes and potatoes. I also needed some chips, some mushrooms and cilantro and wine. I think it turned out to about 20 dollars. But I also shopped at an overpriced convenience store. I will say that I was proud of my thriftiness in freezing the leftover wine in half cup portions instead of throwing it away. (I am not a wine drinker, not even a little bit!) I also used the rest of the overcooked black beans that I had frozen ages ago and some frozen corn I have on hand so I can say I shopped the freezer! Even though it was a bit pricey, I have tons of leftovers and will be having it for lunches the rest of the week instead of my usual salad and sweets, so that works out well.

I loved this recipe! I really really loved it! So so good! A layer of mashed potatoes on top and a mixture of mushrooms, corn, tomatoes and black beans with a Mexican flavor profile... Yum. A while back, when I was in the beginning of my plant based journey and trying my hand out with new recipes, I tried out a layered enchilada casserole recipe that had a similar profile. It flopped miserably. This pie recipe is everything that wasn't and a whole lot more! It holds together wonderfully when cutting and serving and is nicely filling. Served with a nice size salad and you have a perfect meal! 

Black Bean Brownies

Remember those mushy black beans I stashed in the freezer? Well, I figured it was time to put some of them to use, seeing as we're heading towards Pesach. While they're not strictly forbidden (only for the Ashkenazim among us), they gotta be used eventually. I was inspired to make Black Bean Brownies... actually, I'm not quite sure what triggered that thought process. In any case, I thought to make some and started doing some Googling, After a bit of searching, I came across this recipe from Oatmeal With a Fork. My hosts for my Friday morning Purim meal needed to delay the start of the meal by a bit which was fine by me as it gave me ample time to get this batter whipped up and in the oven.

I did adapt the recipe quite a bit, lowering the amount of oil, omitting the stevia, and adding a bit more cacao since after tasting the batter, the honey flavor came through stronger then the cacao. Oh, and I used cacao and not cocoa-- total risk, having no clue how it would interact with the baking soda. I think I did ok? I left out the chocolate chips as well since I don't keep those on hand.

These brownies don't look like any brownie I've ever made. They actually look like an earthquake hit them; not so attractive. I refrigerated them immediately as the recipe says that because they contain no binders, they need to be chilled to hold their shape. When I came home from my Purim meal, I gave them a taste. Although they are a bit crumbly, they held up the cutting just fine. The flavor was also quite different; not chocolate-y as I know it, but rather a deep, rich cocoa flavor. Pretty different, but pretty good. I would definitely say that they hit their mark. I carefully portioned the brownies out, wrapped them individually in plastic wrap and froze them. I think these will be good for a special treat, for dessert when I feel like I need a boost, or for a day that I'm up and traveling for work, such as tomorrow, and I'm not sure how much WFPB based food I'll be able to get my hands on. I will say that I have realized that I'm kind of a sugar addict (I guess I get it from my dad) in the sense that when I have a little, I want more. I don't keep sugar or candy in the house, but if I have it, it's bad news. I try to not have it as it doesnt lead to good things. In that sense, maybe having these brownies around werent such a bright idea. On the other hand, I could do A LOT worse. UPDATE: These brownies are so yummy out of the freezer! They are soft and melt in your mouth and are just like Devil Dogs to me in flavor! That's a win! Anyway, recipe after the jump.

Meal Plan- March 1st- March 5th: Yam and Black Bean Soup with Orange

The past few days have been quite a whirlwind! Purim is only a couple of days away and Ive been practicing hard to get my reading perfect. That coupled doctor's appointments and such and I'm already wiped out. This week's recipe is the Yam and Black Bean Soup with Orange and Cilantro from Appetite for Reduction. (Yup, I'm continuing to cook through it until the end of March; after Pesach, I'll be cooking with something else.

Although I did my regular shopping on Sunday (it was a madhouse!), I didn't get around to making this soup until Monday night. I had about a serving of leftover split pea soup from Shabbat that I didnt want to go to waste so I had that instead.

My grocery bill this week was only 80 shekels, which is pretty good considering it included two jars of raspberry jelly (each thirteen, down from the usual twenty) and a bag of sugar (for the hamentashen that I'll make tomorrow). I also got peppers, cucumbers, some tomatoes for the soup, corn, potatoes, sweet potatoes for the soup, orange juice (which I'll use for the hamentashen as well) and carrots.

The soup was pretty easy to make and pretty hands off, considering I made it in the Instant Pot. My, I love that thing! I started by sauteing some red onion eventually adding some sriracha and garlic. To that I added some freshly chopped tomatoes. I added most everything else and then set the pressure cooker to about seven minutes at pressure. The sweet potatoes were perfectly cooked. I opted to puree the soup with an immersion blender, but I was sure to leave a bit of texture in there. Added the orange juice and beans and voila! (I left out the cilantro.) The soup was pretty good. (I wonder if the flavors will have developed just chilling in the fridge.) The orange gives it a bit of a zing and I like the addition of the black beans. I thought this was a rather different soup and I enjoyed it. A salad would definitely be appropriate with it.  As per usual, I omitted the oil in the recipe.

Black Bean Spew and Impromptu Burgers

Riding high on my first soup success in the Instant Pot, I decided to give it another go. I had recently bought dried black beans and thought I'd cook them and freeze them in advance of needing some for next week's soup recipe.

Yesterday morning, before I left to work, I soaked the beans. When I came home, they were ready to cook. I got the Instant Pot set up, covering the beans with about two inches of water. I was cooking a lot of beans though so there was a lot of water in there.

How long to cook for? So here was where I wasn't quite sure. Some places said about 5-6 minutes for the soaked beans. I made the mistake of following the Instant Pot manual (never doing that again!) and cooked them for about 11 minutes at pressure. When the machine went off, I forgot to unplug it, so that it was accidentally continuing to cook. Eek! I finally remembered to unplug the machine. Then came the question of the pressure release. I started to release it.... until I remembered that there were black beans in the pot and that the liquid that was coming out was black. All over my white walls. Black. Bean. Spew. Eek! (Yes, there was counter climbing involved to clean it up!). I left it to sit for a bit before realizing that I was going to have mush on my hands if I didn't get the pressure out. I covered the pot with a towel and let the rest of the pressure out. I opened the pot and to my surprise (not!) I discovered.. mushy beans. What a bummer. I drained them and decided that they'd be perfect for burgers. I think I previously mentioned that my burgers always fall apart because the beans aren't mashed enough. Well, here's the solution-- mushy, easily mashed beans! I pulled out The Everyday Happy Herbivore and made a double batch of the easy burgers. The rest of the beans were portioned and frozen for future burger ventures.

I definitely have more to learn about this pot. The ability to cook beans fast was pretty much what led me to invest in it, so I definitely won't be giving up on it soon. Fingers crossed for a more successful cook next time. And cleaner walls.

Meal Plan: Jan 18th-Jan 22nd- Sweet Potato and Black Bean Enchiladas

Growing up, we never had Mexican in the house. I'm kind of making up for it now as Enchiladas is something that I've been wanting to make for a while. Thug Kitchen has a recipe for them and as I'm cooking with that book this month, that became this week's meal plan. I don't think they'll get me all the way until Thursday; in that case, I'll supplement with simple beans, brown rice and salsa, which I already have on hand.

My supermarket bill came out to 61 shekels- I bought some more peppers and cucumbers, canned corn (because the tomatoes are still looking sad), more potatoes, oregano, tortillas (ten shekel for a pack of twelve!), a large sweet potato, carrots and garlic. The avocados were hard as rocks! Oh, well.

I'm moving on to my second five pounds of oats so no purchase necessary there but my berry supply seems to be dwindling. :(

I decided to make the sauce ahead of time, on Friday, just in case it flopped. I didn't want to get to Sunday night and have nothing for dinner! I'm glad I did that because the sauce needed some extra work. I could tell by looking at the original recipe that it would be too thin and I knew that would not be good. I ended up adding more tomato paste to the recipe to make the initial mixture a bit thicker. When I saw that even at a boil, it wasn't thick enough, I went ahead and added a tablespoon of cornstarch and brought it to a boil once again. Success! The sauce thickened even more after it was chilled so we had a home run in that sense.

Once the sauce was out of the way, the filling was pretty easy from there. My supermarket was out of zucchini so I just used more sweet potato that I steamed in the microwave. (I thought to add a chopped red pepper but nixed that.) I water sauteed some onions and garlic with some spices, added the beans and sweet potato and some agave. I think I could have bulked this up with another can of beans, or half can, at least. 

People who have made enchiladas in their life (not me!) know how to make them so I won't describe that process. I made about twelve from the mixture and fitted them into a 9x13 pan. I covered and baked them and then uncovered them to finish the cooking.

I gotta say, I really liked these and would definitely make them again. The only thing is.... enchiladas get soggy. Apparently this is normal if using wheat tortillas. If I make them again, I would probably follow the advice from someone on FB and cook the enchiladas separately until crisp before adding the sauce that's been heated or make the effort to make homemade corn tortillas. I think that would make these a real winner.

(Adapted) Recipe after the jump.