With me doing prep and our son cooking, we put together a fine meal on our first cooking night in Utah. Since eating at home is so much more economical as compared to eating out, splurging on scallops was a delicious way to kick off our home-cooked meals.
Pan-seared scallops, roasted potatoes, and kale with corn
Our son, Jon, uses a lot more oil and butter than we do. It surely makes everything delicious!
Our son has offered to make an Ethiopian dinner. Everyone in the family has been trying to duplicate dishes from one of our favorite restaurants, Zeni, in San Jose. Their food is so delicious and the atmosphere seems authentic. We love to go there and often take out-of-town guests there to sample their wonderful dishes.
Ethiopian lentils, flank steak, kale, and white rice
Tonight we are having lentils in a berbere sauce, Ethiopian spiced flank steak, and kale. I think I like the lentils the best. I cannot post the recipes because while my son cooked, I was busy chopping up vegetables and so do not know the exact ingredients that went into each dish. The spices, though, were warm and inviting. I would suggest you try some recipes from the internet. Since injera, the bread of Ethiopia, is hard to procure, I would suggest serving everything with rice.
We had this dinner on Friday night before our trip to Utah on Saturday. It takes about 10 driving hours to get to St. George and all we did was get some sushi for dinner on Saturday. It is much colder here than we expected and we have experienced a little rain as well. At least it makes for some beautiful vistas!
View towards Snow Canyon
Before we left, though, we made a wonderful chickpea stew. It was full of vegetables, chickpeas, spinach, and small pasta. Totally vegan, I would be happy to eat this any night.
Chickpea stew
We are still embroiled in the vote count so we just made a quick pasta dinner. As long as you do not eat too much pasta, orecchiette is a fine food plan dinner to have. The sauce which is made up of onions, mushrooms, garlic, and broccolini stems and florets, is tossed with the pasta and about half of a cup of pasta water.
Orecchiette with mushrooms and broccolini
Hummus, tabbouleh, olives, tomatoes, and golden beets on salad mix
We are still watching the returns drip in from the U.S. election. There is no clear winner yet although Biden looks more promising (in a lot of ways) than Trump. It is important that every vote be counted so it may not be settled until Friday or beyond. In the meantime we have to eat so I whipped up this salad-y dinner. Here it is November and I think we should be eating heartier cool weather fare but it is still in the 80s here.
I bought a pre-made hummus but made the tabbouleh myself. It is very parsley forward and not so much bulgur. In addition there is lots of lemon, a little olive oil, scallions, mint, and garlic. While I made the tabbouleh the golden beets were roasting in the oven (45+ minutes in a 400F oven depending on the size of the beets.) The olives and tomatoes were mostly for decoration. A drizzle of our good olive oil finished off the plate.
Since we wanted to watch the U.S. election returns, John and I made our Chana dal in the Instant Pot during the afternoon. I love this dish! We still do not know who will be our next president but I do know that Chana dal is a real winner!!
Chana dal over white rice garnished with cilantro
Today I met my weight loss goal!! I have lost 60 pounds in a little over a year, about a pound a week. (That is a total loss of a little more than 27.2 kg.) As you read through my blog this past year you will see exactly what I ate to accomplish the loss. John, who has been my helpful partner all through this, lost 50 pounds or 22.6 kg. I feel so much better and now my cholesterol and blood sugar are within healthy parameters. Also I was able to throw out my blood pressure pills because my blood pressure is on the low normal side after losing the extra weight.
So of course we celebrated on Monday evening with a steak, baked potato, broccoli, and cake. And we started off with popcorn and wine. Now I have to eat sensibly for the rest of the week to get back to my goal weight! I am planning on eating plant-based meals until we leave for our little vacation.
Grilled flank steak, baked and grilled potato half, and broccoli with onions and mushrooms
This was not quite the traditional full English breakfast. I was careful to stay within the parameters of my healthy eating for weight loss plan. My Breakfast For Dinner was delicious, easy to prepare, and filling. I made scrambled eggs, veggie breakfast patty, sautéed mushrooms and tomatoes, and rye toast.
Scrambled eggs, sautéed mushrooms and tomatoes, veggie breakfast patty, and rye toast
I have an abbreviated menu this week since some of us are going out of town for a week starting either Friday or Saturday. I will be posting what we are making but I do not know what that is yet!
Sometimes Saturday’s LFD means Leftovers For Dinner and other times it’s Lunch For Dinner. Either way Saturday’s dinner means a casual meal. It is certainly a good way to relax after a busy cooking week.
Kale, cabbage, and white bean soup plus egg salad and Romaine lettuce in a whole wheat pita
Luckily I was experimenting with a soup recipe earlier in the week and had plenty of this kale, cabbage, and white bean soup to serve for dinner tonight.
CABBAGE AND KALE SOUP WITH WHITE BEANS
This soup turned out very well. It was like eating soup from a trattoria in Florence. The original recipe from Food and Wine Magazine called for farro and pancetta instead of white beans and turkey sausage. Serving size 2-3. Cooks for about an hour.
Olive oil spritz
2 oz. turkey sausage
⅓ medium onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
¼ tsp fish sauce
I 15 oz can cannellini beans (including some of the goo)
¼ head of cabbage
Some kale (no stems)
1 large chopped carrot
1 quart chicken stock
½ cup water (use it to rinse the bottom of the cannellini can)
3 sprigs thyme
½ sprig rosemary
A Parmigiano-Reggiano rind
Salt and pepper
Garnish with good olive oil and grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
In a large pot heat the olive oil spritz. Add the turkey sausage and cook over moderate heat until the fat is rendered, 3-4 minutes. Add the onion and garlic and cook until softened about 5 minutes. Add the fish sauce nad cook for 30 seconds. Add the white beans and stir in. Add the cabbage and kale and cook, stirring until just wilted.
Add the chicken stock, water, thyme and rosemary sprigs and the cheese rind and bring to a simmer. Cover and simmer for 1 hour. Adjust seasoning. Garnish with additional Parmigiano-Reggiano and good olive oil.
Omnivore 