New box...yummy dinner!

Fish night! Good thing, 'cuz I is tired and fish is quick. Plus, I delegated the fish prep to my husband while I set about making a fruit salad with the kiwi, strawberries, oranges and a banana. Super simple! Fruit slathered in vanilla yogurt is always a sure hit.

I wanted a hot steamed vegetable component to our meal, also, so I put some broccoli heads and chunks of the purple carrot into the microwave steamer and set it to cook in the microwave for 5 minutes.

Lee was making the fish in those individual ramekin boats, topping the Bank Rockfish with butter, lemon juice, basil and parsley. The basil had survived from our little window plants we started a couple of months ago. Lemon pepper and garlic salt seasoned it just perfectly. The dishes baked for about one half hour until the fish was a flakey white. Lee also made his special tartar sauce with mayonnaise, dill pickle relish, lemon juice, Worchesterchire sauce and dried dill. Its always so tangy and good.

I kind of wanted to make rice, too, but we really didn't need it. We had our fill of fish and veges, so the salad was almost like dessert. Almost, cuz nothing beats those Girl Scout cookies!

The only drawback was that there were no leftovers. I will have to build some green salads for our lunch tomorrow. Maybe those garbanzo bean sprouts will make a nice addition to the salad. : )

Potato with Ragu Bolongese e Fagoli

Tonight was more recycled food, with another twist: a cup or so of last night's leftover meat became the base for a Bolongese-type sauce over baked Russet potatoes.

Because this is one of my later work nights and Lee beats me home by 15 minutes, I enlisted his help. He poked fork-holes in the potatoes that I had already scrubbed and popped them into the microwave for 5 minutes to partially cook them. But I love the flakiness of an oven-roasted potato, so I asked him to finish them in the oven. So he then coated the potatoes with olive oil and seasoned them with coarse salt. They went into the oven for another 40 minutes until fork-tender. 

When I got home, I heated up the leftover ground meat and added some tomato paste, diced tomatoes, and a can of garbanzo beans. For good measure I added the last bunch of spinach that I had sliced into strips, making sort of a chunky vegetable ragu al la bolongese e fagoli. I think. Anyway, I. Served the sauce over the baked potato and topped it with more cheese, and the guys loved it.

Stuffed Butternut Squash

My husband wants to eat more like a Caveman, so that translates into ditching grains. Okay! So tonight we had roasted butternut squash filled with ground meat and cheese. The cheese might not be exactly Paleo, but at least its not a grain. No rice to stretch this stuffing!

I started by roasting the squash at 350 Degrees for about 45 minutes. Meanwhile, I sauteed some chopped onion and ground beef until it was completely browned. I added some seasonings: salt, pepper, oregano and thyme. After I had taken the squash out of the oven and let it cool for a bit, I then scooped out most of the fleshy part and put it into a mixing bowl. I added the browned meat and about a cup of shredded cheese. That made the filling for the squash, which I packed into the four halves. I put them back into the oven for another 25 minutes until it was heated through.

I loved the sweetness of the squash with the meat and cheese flavors! Dinner was accompanied by a small green salad and a creamy tarragon dressing.

Oh Sweet Salad Makings!

"Fruit, Vegetable, Herb, and Juice List for 02/25/2013 - 03/01/2013

THIS WEEK'S TOTE INCLUDES: Celery,Broccoli,"Dino" Kale,Radishes,"Organic" Purple Carrots,Romaine Lettuce, Brussels Sprouts,"Organic" Garbonzo Bean Sprouts,Kiwi,Sweet "Oro Blanco" Grapefruit,Fuji Apples,Tangelos,Vine Ripened Strawberries"

Lots of good sweet salad makings! I think I could make a salad with any of these ingredients, beyond green salad. We could have broccoli salad, Waldorf salad, fruit salad, shaved brussel sprout salad, kale salad...endless possibilities! Garbanzo bean sprouts--so cool!

A note was included saying they ran low on apples, so some squash and shallots were substituted. That's nice! They were cute little orange squash.

Recycled food is pretty good

I am in to food recycling. That is, I cook something, then remake the leftovers into something else. That is how we got a frittata for breakfast this morning.

A couple of nights ago we had roasted potatoes and I had about one potato's worth of wedges left. So this morning I am looking in the frig and spy those babies and think "Frittata!" I already had some chopped sweet bell peppers, cuz when I cut one up in strips for roasting in another recipe, I could'nt bear to throw away the ends. So I cube them up and keep them in the frig for something else. If I don't use them in a day or so, I put them in a freezer bag so I almost always have some red or green peppers on hand. Brilliant, I know.

So breakfast was fast since the potatoes were already cooked. All I had to do was chop a couple of slices of an onion and saute them with the bell pepper for a few minutes in a bit of olive oil, then stir in the potatoes and heat it all up. I cracked 5 eggs into a bowl, whisked in some milk and salt, and poured it over the vegies. I let that cook with the lid on the saute pan for about 5 minutes, sprinkled on some cheese, and then divided into 4 portions for serving.

That was my recycled omlette!

Roasted broccoli is great with NY Steak

Roasted broccoli was just one easy component of this wonderful dinner. It started off with baking some sweet potatoes that had been rubbed with olive oil and sprinkled with sea salt. They needed about an hour at 350 degrees. The broccoli when in during the last 20 minutes. They, too, had a bath in olive oil and were simply seasoned with salt. Shrimp in butter with Italian seasoning rounded out the oven preparations, as I also sauteed some mushrroms in butter with onion and red bell peppers. New York steaks were seasoned with coarse salt and a steak seasoning blend, then grilled for about 8 mintes per side.  The finished steaks topped a bed of mixed greens

Abondigas Soup and Fruit Salad night

Today we went out to lunch at Olive Garden for Grandpa's birthday, so we ate way too much already. However, you know how it is...the sun sets and you wonder what's for dinner?

I decided to make a light meatball soup that called for zucchini and cilantro. I had planned to make this soup a few weeks ago, but ended up making the meatballs and freezing them for a quick dinner midweek. It's Sunday, but I am feeling lazy, so -- perfecto!

We are expecting a new SLO Veg shipment this week, so I am taking inventory in the fridge to see what I need to use up. I still had a basket of those juicy, sweet strawberries... not sure how that happened, but there they were, staring at me from the vegie bin. Okay, strawberries, a blood orange, an apple and a banana will make a perfect fruit salad to accompany the soup. I set about peeling the orange and dicing it into large chunks. Then I cubed the apple, peel and all, into bite-sized pieces. I cut the tops off the strawberries and quartered them, then sliced the banana and gave it a stir. It would be fine just like that, but I wanted to also use up some vanilla yogurt that had been in the frig for a week, so I stirred in a couple of tablespoons full. It made a perfect, sweet but light sauce for the fruit. I think the boys liked it. Taylor called the fruit salad a Gift from God!

http://www.food.com/recipe/best-albondigas-soup-107281

Fruit Salad
1 Blood orange
1 Fuji apple
1 banana
1 basket strawberries
2 Tbs vanilla yogurt

Dice fruit into bite sized chunks. Stir in yogurt and stir. Eat

Abondigas Soup
6 C chicken broth (water + 2 Tbs chicken broth powder)
1/4 C onion, diced
1/4 C celery, diced
1/4 carrot, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
olive oil
1 zucchini, diced
1/4 C cilantro, chopped
Spicy Mexican Meatballs

I started with the broth made with water and chicken broth powder I had bought at the Health Food store (hopefully it doesn't have all the MSG and additives other products have). I heated it in a stock pot while I prepared the vegetables. I diced the onion, celery and onion and added them to a saute pan with a tablespoon of olive oil, cooking until the onions were clear. I added the minced garlic and cooked for another minute, then added the vegies to the chicken broth. I defrosted the meatballs for one minute, then added them to the soup pot. I let it cook for about 10 minutes, added the cilantro and zucchini and cooked for another 5 minutes. The soup was served with warm flour tortillas and the fruit salad on the side. 

Oh yeah, how did I make the spicy meatballs? Here are the ingredients:

Spicy Mexican Meatballs

1/2 lb lean ground beef
1/2 lb chorizo sausage, casing removed (not the fully cooked kind)
1 egg, beaten
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 carrot, minced
1/2 cup cooked rice
1/2 cup cilantro leaf, chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon ground cumin

I mixed all the ingredients and made smallish meatballs, about 1-1/2 inches in diameter. Normally you cook the meatballs right in the broth, but I baked them in a 350 degree oven for about 20 minutes and cooled them on a wire rack. Then I froze them in a ziplock freezer bag until, well, today! I might add that I didn't add any other seasonings to the soup other than the chicken broth powder and the meatballs, and it turned out great with the just flavoring from the meatballs and vegetables.