Chickpeas with Peanut Sauce

I cooked up some chickpeas earlier in the week so when I came home from work and needed a quick recipe this was perfect. The sauce is really tasty and was so yummy on top of sauteed greens.

Ingredients:
2 cloves garlic minced
1 tomato chopped
2 cups greens, I used collard greens
2 cups cooked chickpeas
For the sauce:
1 tbl peanut butter
1 tbl apple cider vinegar
1 tbl soy sauce

Heat skillet and add garlic.

Saute for a minute and then add chopped tomato.

Add greens and cook until wilted.

Prepare sauce in a bowl by combining ingredients and whisking until smooth. Pour sauce on chickpeas and stir to coat. Server beans on top of greens. Enjoy!

Saurkraut Soup

I know it might sound strange but this Eastern European dish is quite popular, especially among vegetarian/vegans. I have been wanting to make this for a while and decided to make my own homemade saurkraut for the recipe. It was pretty much a basic veggie soup with saurkraut. The original recipe says to cook it with the saurkraut in it but I didn't want to kill any beneficial bacteria so I added it on top once finished.

Ingredients:
4 cups veggie broth
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 carrots, diced
2 celery stalks, chopped
1/2 onion, chopped
4 mushrooms, sliced
2 small yellow potatoes, diced (or root veggie of choice)
1/2 cup barley (optional)
2 bay leaves
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp thyme
1/2 cup cooking wine or sherry
1/4 cup saurkraut for each serving bowl

I cooked in a crockpot since I was at work but you can cook it on the stovetop also. Place half the broth at the bottom of the crockpot and add chopped veggies on top.

 

Add the remaining ingredients.

Cook on high for a couple hours or until done. Top with saurkraut. Enjoy!



Veggie Broth

This is more of a tip than a recipe but I wanted to share. I like to save my veggie scraps to make broth with. I keep a large bag in the freezer and add the ends and skins of onions, carrots, celery, etc. The only veggies you aren't supposed to add is calciferous veggies like broccoli, cabbage and Brussels sprouts. It makes a delicious healthy broth and reuses what would just be thrown away.

Instructions:
Keep a container in the freezer and add veggies to it as you collect them. It can be any size I just prefer to make a large batch at once.

Place the scraps in a large pot and cover with water.

Bring to a boil and then strain the veggies from the liquid. Enjoy!

Kale Pesto

I got three bunches of kale from the market this week so when I came across a recipe for kale pesto I thought it would be a perfect time to make it. The recipe called for a 1/2 cup of olive oil and I did 1/4 cup and 1/4 cup water but I might try all water next time. I did use organic cold pressed olive oil to keep it healthiest. I thought the recipe turned out great but when I had the leftovers I added extra lemon and it was even better. You can substitute walnuts for pine nuts to save cost.

 

Ingredients:

1 bunch of kale, stemmed

juice of 1 lemon

1/4 cup pine nuts

1/2 cup olive oil and water mixture

salt and pepper to taste

 

Place ingredients in a food processor and pulse until smooth. Serve on veggies, pasta or rice. Enjoy!

 

 



Creole Tempeh

I came across this recipe for creole shrimp. It was simple and I had all the ingredients so I decided to swap shrimp for tempeh and make this for dinner. It was really flavorful! I added beans which weren't in the original recipe just because I had some that were already cooked. Sorry about the blurry pics, the camera was picking up the steam and I was too hungry to wait for it to cool :)

Ingredients:

1 package of tempeh, cubed

3 tsp creole seasoning ( I made my own following a recipe online)

1 green bell pepper,diced

1/2 onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, chopped

3 tomatoes, diced

1 1/2 cups water

 

Add tempeh and 1 tsp of the seasoning to a pan with oil.

 

 



Stir fry for a minute and then remove from pan.

 



Add onion, bell pepper and garlic to the pan and stir fry for a couple minutes.

 

 



Add tomatoes and water. Turn heat to high and simmer until tomatoes are stewed (not sure if that's the right word to use but hopefully that makes sense).

 



Add tempeh back to dish (and beans if you want) with the remaining 2 tsp of seasoning. Reduce heat to medium and cook until tempeh is warm. Serve over rice. Enjoy!

Morrocan Stew

I bought a lot of squash when they came in season and I had just this one butternut squash left. I also had some chickpeas that I cooked this weekend so I thought I should make this stew. It turned out great. I put too much water so it turned out slightly more soup like but the broth was good so it worked out. The original recipe uses a 28 oz. can of tomatoes but I used water and fresh tomatoes. It would have been better with extra tomatoes.

Ingredients:
3 cloves garlic,minced
1/2 yellow onion,chopped
1 butternut squash,cubed
2 tomatoes,chopped
1 veggie bouillon cube
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 bunch kale,chopped

In a large saucepan heat garlic and onion on low.



Add squash,tomatoes,bouillon cube and enough water to cover everything by about an inch.

 

 

 





 

Simmer for 20 minutes or until squash in tender. Add seasonings and kale heat until kale wilts.

 

 



 

Enjoy!



Chickpea Lentil Burgers

 

 



This recipe came in a section of the newspaper that had a "meatless monday" recipe. It is supposed to have a variety of cheese in it but I left them out. The recipe also said it makes 4 burgers but it was like enough for about 10. I froze the extra patties for future quick meals. They turned out great and we had them with some homemade french fries. Yum!

 

Ingredients:

1 onion, diced (I did half yellow half red)

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 tsp ground cumin

1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

1 1/2 cups lentils

1 1/2 cups chickpeas

1 tbl tahini

2 cups breadcrumbs

salt/pepper to taste

 

 Heat onion and garlic in a medium size skillet.

 

 

 



Add seasonings and remove from heat. Place lentils and chickpeas in a food processor. Pulse until coarsely chopped. Add onion mixture and tahini to the food processor. Pulse until smooth.

 

 

 

Place mixture in a bowl with breadcrumbs and mix by hand. Form patties and cook them in a skillet, cast iron worked well. Serve on a bun or toasted bread with fixings. Enjoy!