Babybella Salad

Every 28 days or so, I randomly go on a cleaning/cooking/washing binge, and the results are often comical. Last week’s flurry of posts was a prime example, and there were still several dishes I made after those posts! My refrigerator is now organized by category and size of item, my clothes are now organized by style and frequency of usage, and the list goes on and on.

The first little dish I made was this big salad. I don’t know what it is about my chemistry that makes me think

*I*MUST*MAKE*A*GIANT*SALAD*RIGHT*NOW*

but ok, sure, salad is healthy. Why not?

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Ingredients:

Romaine lettuce, cut as you like it.

Shredded cheese

Sliced babybellas

Sliced scallions

Oregano, dried flakes

Basil, dried flakes

A dash of ground black pepper

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Directions:

1. In huge bowl, place lettuce and scallions.

2. In small bowl, place mushrooms, cheese, & spices. Stir.

3. Dump small bowl contents into large bowl. Toss.

4. Serve

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I had this mostly with balsamic vinagrette, but it was also good plain. I imagine it would be great with olive oil. It’s pretty easy to veganize this one, too, which I might try doing later. Enjoy!

Lazy Leftovers

I did not feel like cooking the other night. So, I made this with the leftovers. It was surprisingly good weirdness. Sometimes, it’s fun to fly without a net.

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What’s in it? 

Half of a small eggplant, grated

Some cooked babybella mushroom, garlic, & olive oil puree I’d made up and stored, with some sliced mushrooms thrown in. (I think those may have been buttons).

A handful or so of cheddar Daiya shreds.

Some nutritional yeast, some Mrs. Dash, some garlic…and probably some other spices that I am forgetting. I think the red piece was a bit of bell pepper.

Olive oil

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Enjoy!

Puréed Eggplant Parm

I LOVE eggplant parm. I think it was first vegetarian meal I was exposed to. When I go out to eat, there is a good chance that I will be having eggplant parm. (Many Italian-American dishes are safe for me, and I strongly favor Italian restaurants for that reason.)

I’ve only been making eggplant parm for the past couple of years, though. It always seemed too complicated for me: peeling, salting, breading- who has the time? I’ve been finding little tricks to make it easier, but I’ve accepted that certain elements are necessary if I want to replicate the taste I so love.

Some versions have been successful. Others, less so. I recently came up with this version when looking for an excuse to play with the processor. So far, I’ve made it only once. I apologize in advance for not remembering all of the specifics, but the fun of this, (at least for me), is the individual stamp of each preparation of the dish. I did not break this into two days for any particular reason. It was just that I had the eggplant on hand on a day I wasn’t craving it, and was trying to extend its usability by prepping & freezing it. Then, I got the processor, and just happened to be craving eggplant at the same time.

Puréed Eggplant Parm:

Tools:

Corningware: This a medium sized dish that yields a little over two servings.

Oven

Olive Oil Spray

Freezable storage container

Freezer

Fry pan

Food Processor

Cheese Grater

Freezer

Cutting Board

Large microwaveable bowl

Ingredients:

Eggplant

Olive Oil in a bottle

Italian Bread Crumbs

Garlic Powder

Oregano

Basil

Romano

Nutritional yeast

Smoked Gouda block

Mozzarella block

Day 1:

1. Cube the eggplant by using a knife and a cutting board. Shake a little garlic on top. If you want to do it right: peel the skin, shake sea salt on top & wait an hour or so.

2. Spray the pan with olive oil.

3. Fry the eggplant in bottled olive oil.

4? (I may have sprinkled some garlic powder in here)

5. When done, freeze eggplant in storage container.

Day 2:

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Put eggplant in large microwaveable bowl. Thaw in microwave.

3. Put eggplant in food processor. Make mush.

4. Spray corning with olive oil.

5. Line pan with thin layer of eggplant.

6? (Did I add basil, oregano, and garlic on that layer? Possibly…)

7. Add a thin layer of bread crumbs on top of it.

8. Grate some mozzarella. Add a layer of mozzarella.

9. Repeat this pattern: eggplant mush, bread crumbs, cheese, until you are on the last layer of cheese. Add some romano and nutritional yeast to the top layer, along with basil, oregano, garlic, and a pinch of shredded gouda.

10. Bake at 350 for about 20 minutes or so, keeping an eye on it.

 

Check to make sure it’s cooked all the way through, add leftover shredded cheese to the top, and enjoy!

Cheesy Bagels

I made these the other day for lunch. Boy, were they good! This is another fast & easy one.

Cheesy Bagels:

1. Set oven to Broil/HI.

2. Line a cake pan with foil. (Unless you *like* cleaning cheese goop. If so, party on!)

3. Spray pan with olive oil. (Best invention EVER.)

4. Slice your cheddar bagel in half horizontally. (Be careful. A good friend of mine once took part of his finger off with a bagel knife. True story.)

5. Process some Campari tomatoes until they turn into mush. (This always makes me think of that scene in Goonies. RIP Anne Ramsey.)

6. Process about 3 scallions but only enough to chop them. (Or just cut them with a knife. I was on a roll with the processor that day.)

7. Shred some cheese. I used provolone and american, I think, with a touch of smoked gouda.

8. First, place the tomato mush on your bagel, then the scallions, then the pile of cheese.

9. Add some romano from the shaker and some nutritional yeast to the top of the pile. I may have also used basil, oregano, and garlic. Yummy!

10. Place in oven/broiler and keep an eye on them. I loved the little brown overcooked patches, but if I’d been much later, these would have been full-on burnt.

Enjoy!

Chop! Chop!

Can you believe I’ve been a veggie for over a decade without owning a food processor? What was I thinking? My conscience tells me there is inherent laziness in owning such a thing. If you have a knife and a cutting board, you should be good to go, right? Well, yes and no. While chopping things by hand was good for the soul, it was not so great for my back. Maybe my posture is poor, or maybe, I’m just aging. Either way, it was time for a change. I enjoy prepping foods ahead of time, so that when hunger strikes, I have a quick and healthy option. This means that when I chop, I am generally chopping pounds of vegetables at a time. I buy fresh veg whenever possible, and for those of you cooking fresh, you know that prepping and freezing means having yummy foods at the ready. Conceding to using a machine for this will hopefully mean cutting prep time from over two hours to maybe an hour or less. A sound investment, in my opinion.

For my first food processor, I chose a simple pulse model with a two quart container in a vibrant magenta:

I was really just expecting it to do what my hand does, but faster. I discovered that even a pulse model can do much more than that. What a happy surprise! I also had purchased an inexpensive grater tower years ago, and promptly forgot about it. I recently unearthed it, and discovered the joys of freshly grated, rather than diced, cheese. Yum!

Needless to say, my most recent meals have been all about the chopping and grating. For some, this may seem pretty basic, but for me, this has been an opportunity to learn and explore the potential. Grate? Great!