Tag: vegan

Berry Chocolatey Peanut Butter Shake

Berry Chocolatey Peanut Butter Shake

This is one rich and chocolatey shake, and I am happy to say my kids absolutely love it! This is an all powerful, nutrient dense, plant based protein shake that is nothing but delicious. It tastes like dessert and has zero chalky protein powders added. […]

Mango Black Bean Salad

Mango Black Bean Salad

This mango black bean salad is a delicious and refreshing side to add to any Southwest or Mexican themed meal. The sweet and juicy mangoes paired with the lime and cilantro add a burst of flavor to the black beans and corn. I also add peppers, red […]

Brussels Sprout and Farro Salad

Brussels Sprout and Farro Salad

If you have been following along, I have been preparing, eating, and posting a lot of salads lately. I am loving our shift to a more plant based diet, but I just cannot do leafy salads everyday! I need salads with texture, crunch, flavors, protein, color, and variety. I think I have been doing fairly well creating and compiling a good collection of resources. Here is one of my absolutely best and favorite salads! Who has been OBSESSED with yummy, caramelized, roasted brussels sprouts?! Me! Me! Me! I die for it. If its on a menu, I order it. Always. 

roasted brussels sprouts

This hearty salad incorporates roasted brussels sprouts, crunchy and chewy farro, sweet apples and raisins, toasted pepitas, and zesty lemon juice with shallots. What a flavor bomb! 

brussels sprouts and farro salad

This salad is so easy to prepare, with the most tedious step being washing and preparing the brussels sprouts. Sometimes you can find them already trimmed and washed, which is convenient. I always prefer to trim and carefully wash brussels sprouts myself. Once they’re all prepared, lay them flat on a large, flat pan, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil, minced garlic, salt, and pepper. Roast at 400 degrees (F) and voila! Be sure to save these to roast and then add onto the salad right before serving, because they are so delicious crunchy. If you toss them in the salad and let it sit, they will get soft. 
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cut the brussels sprouts
After trimming and cleaning the brussels sprouts, cut in half.

roast the brussels sprouts
Lay the prepared brussels sprouts in a large pan and drizzle with olive oil, salt, and pepper.

For the farro, I have started cooking it the way renown chefs do at SoHo’s Charlie Bird Restaurant. Cooking the farro with 1 cup of apple cider and bay leaves, makes it perfectly scented and flavored to toss with the rest of my aromatic autumnal ingredients: apples, pepitas, and raisins. 

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Easy Bruschetta (tomato basil)

Easy Bruschetta (tomato basil)

Bruschetta has lately become one of my favorite appetizers and sides to share for dinner parties or casual gatherings. It is easy, healthy, delicious, and serves beautifully as an hors d’oeuvre (or an appetizer if you want to keep it ‘cas’). I make my bruschetta with […]

Green Blender Review

Green Blender Review

  I’ve always been into smoothies and juicing, but every once in a while I fall out of routine.  Then my Vitamix just SITS there. After all, it takes time to plan to purchase all the fresh produce you need for smoothies, and then it […]

Creamy lentil soup (shorbat ads)

Creamy lentil soup (shorbat ads)

Shorba means soup in Arabic. Ads means lentils, so shorbat ads translates literally into soup of lentils.

shorbat ads with lemon and pita

This popular soup is a Ramadan staple and will be found at Iftar (the daily meal of breaking the fast during Ramadan) tables quite frequently in the Arab world. It is a beautiful, creamy, yellow soup that is both hearty and healthy. It is naturally vegetarian and vegan, has virtually no fat, is gluten free, and is full of heart healthy fiber and vegetables. So almost every diet will love incorporating this dish.

Red or orange lentils

Shorbat Ads or yellow lentil soup
Garnish with cilantro and paprika; serve with pita chips and lemon.

yellow lentil soup

 

The velvety texture might surprise you because there is no fat, milk, or cream added. The orange lentils, along with the aromatic root vegetables of carrot, onion, and garlic are what scent and flavor this delicious soup. I’ve already discussed what a fantastic legume lentils are for your diet in my recipe for lentil  pilaf, and you can read more health benefits here. This creamy lentil soup is often found in many Middle Eastern restaurants nowadays, and while the flavors can vary, this is surely going to be the best recipe.

This recipe comes straight from my Egyptian grandmother’s kitchen (Teta), God rest her soul. While turmeric is used in many modern recipes today, it is actually not a part of this authentic recipe. I presume it is used to boost the yellow color, and it certainly does not hurt to add it. I use it because I love the nutritional benefits of fresh turmeric root, but beware it will dye your fingers and spoons yellow 😀 Chopped tomatoes are added to the recipe to boost the flavor and the secret ingredient I incorporate is chicken or vegetable stock. Water is perfectly fine, but I find the broth gives an extra depth of flavor. I don’t use any Maggie cubes or other MSG catch all seasoning with who-knows-what in it, so I definitely prefer the flavors added by the tomato, broth, turmeric, and root vegetables. 

Root vegetables: carrot, onion, garlic, tomato
The flavor companions clockwise: yellow onion, carrots, garlic, tomato.

root vegetables and tomato

The delicious base of this soup’s fantastic flavor starts by simply sautéing the vegetables in some olive oil over medium heat, just until fragrant. Pour in the broth or water, the lentils, and spices and you’re pretty much done. I used to shred the carrots and turmeric, but I realized this isn’t neccesary because I blend the entire soup into a velvety smooth texture at the end of the simmer anyway. So a rough chop of all the vegetables is perfectly okay!

shredded carrots 2014-06-30sugarandgarlic2014-9

Prepare the lentils by picking them over for dirt particles, and wash thoroughly then drain.

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sauteed vegetables
Lightly sauté in a teaspoon of olive oil until fragrant.
let it simmer...
Let it simmer…

 This soup quickly simmers until the lentils break down into a creamy consistency, which takes all but 20 minutes. The orange shelled lentils cook soft very quickly,  unlike the brown shelled lentils. So be sure to use the correct lentils.

Soup simmering.
Simmer on low, until thickened.
Puree the soup.
Puree with an immersion blender.

I then puree the entire mixture once it is cooked soft, into a thick and velvety consistency. The soup thickens significantly when sitting so be sure to stir in some extra water over low heat before serving if this happens. Like many grandmothers love to do, my Teta went the extra mile and added another step to make this soup REALLY lip smacking good. In another pot, she would brown some delicious tiny vermicelli noodles (sha3reya in Arabic) in butter, then pour the pureed soup over it and simmer until the noodles are cooked. This tastes really great and adds a nice texture.  However, I typically omit this step because I am trying to keep the soup healthy and paleo- and mostly because I don’t want to wash another pot! But I will usually do this for guests because it makes the soup extra special 😀

I serve with pita chips on the side, which is optional.

yellow lentil soup. Dip a pita chip. Dip a pita chip.

Fresh squeezed lemon juice is a must, if you ask me!

Lemon on soup.
Squeeze some lemon juice.

Lemon on soup.

Enjoy! Bil Hana wil Shifaa (Arabic for with health and healing)

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Garden Vegetable Linguine

Garden Vegetable Linguine

This delicious linguine pasta dish features spinach, pea shoots, onion, and garlic, with some hearty portabella mushrooms and sweet red bell peppers.  Pasta is such an essential go-to dish to create a flavorful and easy meal with a variety of vegetables and fresh ingredients. I […]

The Best Marinara Sauce (from scratch)

The Best Marinara Sauce (from scratch)

This is not only extremely easy and fast to make, but the best recipe yet. I love a good marinara sauce because it is so basic and essential in so many recipes: spaghetti, linguine, lasagne, casserole, grilled vegetables, shrimp stir-fry, stuffed zucchini and peppers,  eggplant […]

The BEST Ful Mudammas (stewed fava beans) from scratch

The BEST Ful Mudammas (stewed fava beans) from scratch

Ful mudammas (pronounced f-ool, rhyming with pool or tool, but why would I spell it like that, or foul?!)  is a vegetarian dish that is a staple food item in Egypt. It is the national dish of Egypt. You cannot go to Egypt without trying ful at least several times. It is eaten for breakfast, lunch, or dinner, but most often as breakfast.  Ful is the name of the broad bean used in Arabic and Mudammas in Arabic literally means “buried in the pot” as this dish is meant to simmer away for hours, allowing the vegetables and spices to build a deep medley of flavor. The flavorful stew of fava beans with spices, lemon, garlic, and olive oil thickens up into a delicious mixture that may be wrapped up into a pita sandwich, scooped up with little pieces of pita bread or chips, or even eaten straight out of the bowl with a spoon. This hearty dish consists of cooked fava beans and chickpeas, olive oil, lemon juice, tahini, garlic, spices, and a variety of fresh chopped toppings such as tomato, green onions, and parsley.2014-06-24sugarandgarlic2014-33Unlike most recipes for ful you will find, this does not originate from a can. In fact, many people are a little intimidated as to how to get the dried hard little beans to that infamous “mudammas” phase quoted so perfectly on the can. If you set aside one nice afternoon to do this, you can prepare enough ful and freeze it for later to last you a couple of months! You also get to control exactly what spices, flavors, and herbs are going in, and it’s preservative free 🙂 Two cheers for clean eating!

ful mudammas
Traditionally, ful is eaten scooped up with a piece of pita bread held between the fingers like a mini taco. We even have an Arabic term we use in Egypt for this common method of scooping up food called “taghmees”.

ful mudammas You can find the dried brown fava beans at any Arabic market, and most international markets. Make sure it is the small, brown bean, with a black mark on top. Do not get peeled, green, or the large fava beans because those are used in different dishes. I actually find my fava beans from the bulk bins at Whole Foods; they are organic and from a local farm. I cook about a pound at a time, which makes about 4-5 family sized (serving 4) portions or 10 single portions. So I estimate at least the equivalent of about 10 cans of ful. You want to wash and sort the beans. Because I love adding chick peas to my ful, I usually pressure cook a cup of chickpeas first, before the fava, for about 60 minutes. I set these aside while the ful is cooking. The kids LOVE eating the cooked chickpeas, plain with nothing added! What a perfectly healthy and fun snack for the kids! dried fava beans wash and sort the fava beansSimply cook the fava beans in a pressure cooker with water, onions, and garlic (no salt, it inhibits the cooking) for 45-60 minutes. There is no need to soak the beans overnight when you use a pressure cooker. Once the beans have cooked soft, I uncover the pressure top and continue to simmer the stew for another hour or so, this time with the addition of spices, olive, oil, lemon, onions, more garlic, and salt. We are getting those beans mudammas, or buried in flavor!

how to cook fava beans
When cooking the dry beans at first, do not add salt, as it inhibits the cooking.

ful mudammas cooked fava beans Once the beans are nicely tender and deliciously infused with the garlic, onion, cumin, and lemon,  you can prepare it for being served. First, I take the extra batches and portion them into glass storage containers to freeze for later. When I am ready to serve it, I give it a light mashing (some people completely puree it), add olive oil, fresh squeezed lemon juice, a drizzle of tahini, some cooked chick peas, chopped tomatoes, parsley, and scallions. The dish is served warm with pita bread. Ful mudammas in our family is often served for breakfast along side some small plates of hard boiled eggs, falafel, cheeses, olives, pastrami, pickled turnips, and refreshing slices of cucumber.

fresh chopped onions, parsley, and tomatoes
Fresh chopped onions, parsley, and tomatoes are typical toppings in Egypt.

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storing the cooked ful
I use glass pyrex because they can go easily and safely into the microwave or oven.

Fava beans are an excellent source of protein and fiber, and this healthy recipe is quite filling and has minimal fat. It is an excellent and favorite meal for suhoor, which is a meal Muslims eat in early dawn before the daytime fast begins. Once you taste a batch of freshly stewed homemade ful, you will never go back to cans! Once you go scratch, you’ll never go back 😉

ful with pita
Ful is always eaten with pita bread!

ful mudammas

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Baba Ghanouj (Eggplant Dip)

Baba Ghanouj (Eggplant Dip)

This dip is SO flavorful, zesty, and delicious! Roasted eggplant, fresh garlic, lemon juice and a dash of tahini sauce are what make up this delicious spread. Traditionally the eggplant is charred or grilled first to impart a smoky flavor, and some people use some […]