We have been driving for the last two days so we wanted to make something easy with ingredients that we had. Since we had brought a head of broccoli with us from home and we always have a can of tuna and some pasta around, this was an easy and tasty dinner to make.
Penne with tuna and broccoli
We are on our way to Utah today. October is a lovely time in St. George with sunny warm days and cool nights. A special bonus is that our son is coming for a long weekend starting on Thursday next week!
We stopped in Tehachapi for lunch at a local cafe. It is fun to try out non-fast food places! I could not resist a tuna salad sandwich.
Tuna salad sandwich on whole wheat toast with dill spear (and cole slaw that I did not eat)
First thing I did was remove that creamy cole slaw off my plate. It was totally unappealing to me. Next I deconstructed my sandwich taking off the top two pieces of toast which I put with the coleslaw. Then I ate the pickle. Finally I used a knife and fork to eat my deconstructed sandwich remains. It was still pretty evil with all that mayo but I cannot be perfect all the time!
Chicken Parmesan with cellentani
Hiding beneath the tomato sauce in the foreground is half of boneless, skinless chicken breast and a super slim slice of cheese. John sous vide the chicken and I made the sauce. I like making interesting forms of pasta. This is 2oz. of cellentani, a corkscrew kind of pasta. This is so much more exciting then our usual chicken, vegetable, starch!
Artichokes are easy and the perfect food when trying to lose weight. They take so long to eat and are delicious!
Steamed artichoke made in the microwave
I wrapped this artichoke in plastic wrap and put it in the microwave for 5 minutes (maybe 4.5 minutes would have been better) and then I let it sit on the counter for an equal amount of time still in its plastic wrap. I ate it with some lemon, salt, and faux butter spray. You can eat the stem too after peeling the outer layer off. It tastes like the heart. BTW an easy way to attack the choke is with a grapefruit spoon with a serrated edge.
If you are looking for a quick vegan/vegetarian vegetable soup, here’s an easy idea.
Quick and easy vegetable soup
This easy vegetable soup can be made with almost anything in your pantry and fridge. Today I used leeks, mushrooms, carrots, celery, broccoli, parsley, and broken pieces of whole wheat spaghetti. Here’s how I make it.
Put a teaspoon of olive oil in a pan on low. While that is warming cut up the leeks (or onions) and toss them in the pan. Then cut up the mushrooms and put those in with the leeks add seasoning and turn up the temperature to medium. While those sizzle away cut up your next hardest vegetable, in my case carrots. In they go followed by the celery and broccoli. Lastly add the parsley. Next add your vegetable broth (or chicken broth) and let the whole thing cook at a simmer for five minutes. Turn up the heat to high. When you have a good boil put in the pasta (another choice might be to leave it at medium and put in some canned beans.) Cook for about eight minutes or until the pasta is al dente. Serve with sliced scallions, parmesan cheese and a drizzle of oilive oil (or leave them off!)
The whole key is, after sautéing the onions and mushrooms, build your soup from the most dense vegetable to the fastest cooking. By the time you put your last vegetable in it is almost time to eat!
I have been through a week of doctor’s appointments after getting a physical on Tuesday, blood tests on Wednesday, and a CT scan on Thursday. Try as she might, my doctor cannot find anything significant wrong with me. There are a couple of things though. First she wants me to lose weight and exercise more. Duh. And, I have a vitamin B12 deficiency and will need injections. So I should eat better and more B12 friendly food. I guess this means I need to eat more protein.
Lamb chops with leek and mushroom broccoli, and combo mash of root vegetables
Mixing a standard vegetable like broccoli with leek and mushrooms made the broccoli more exciting to eat. Combining butternut squash in with rutabaga made the rutabagas sweeter. I enjoyed both of these jazzed up vegetables. I ate one of the lamb chops. Two was one too many. I am not used to eating a lot of meat.
We had friends over for lunch today and I served Autumn Soup (again!) and a Caprese salad with burrata rather than mozzarella and pound cake with strawberries. Since that is about 10 times more than I usually have for lunch I went with a small dinner of a veggie burger with lettuce and tomato. Huh, just realized it was a vegetarian day!
California style veggie burger
Since this blog’s tag line is “It’s what I eat!” I can only truthfully report exactly what I eat. However, even I can see that my choices have become dull and repetitive. So my October’s resolution will be to find some new ideas for dinner. In the meantime…
More spaghetti!
Out in the foodie world there are a lot of people with a lot of opinions. And all of the opinions are true to the people who hold them. Add less fat, add more fat, no carbs, more carbs, no, only complex carbs, be an omnivore, a pescaterian, vegetarian, vegan! It is endless. Here I shall put my oar in, how about trying some balance in your life. My recent post “Eat what you like” got a lot of views. It tells me that people would like to do exactly that.
Sometimes I eat meat, real red meat, but not too often. Sometimes I make a meal of fish or shellfish but not every day. Other times I am a vegetarian and even a vegan. Finding the right balance for you will help in staying healthy and satisfied.
Today was a vegetarian breakfast, a carnivore lunch, and a vegan dinner.
Salad
Dinner started with a salad. I do not particularly like making or eating salads and only have them occasionally. I feel like they are a lot of work for minimal satiation.
Autumn soup
Salad was followed by a bowl of leftover autumn soup. It is comprised of a lot of root vegetables puréed with some vegetable stock. It also has some cayenne pepper for a spicy zing.
It’s my favorite. I love pasta. I love eating at home. I love eating it on our trips to Italy. I am fond of vegan and vegetarian pastas and I am a sucker for a meat sauce. I ate this last week and the week before and ….
It started with a sauce made from our daughter’s tomatoes. I cooked them down with onions and garlic. I had a lot of tomato skins and seeds left over. I put the whole mixture in a colander and strained out the skins and most of the seeds.
Tomatoes cooking down for spaghetti sauce
I had to work to get the right balance of acid, sweetness, and umami. A little tomato paste and fish sauce helped with that since the tomatoes were quite sweet.
I browned some seasoned ground beef and folded it into the tomatoes. I cooked the sauce and meat together until they were flavorly incorporated. A lot of oregano really made a difference. I served it over some spaghetti. Yum!
Spaghetti and meat sauce
Omnivore 