Polenta Stuffed Peppers

 What do you do when you have an abundance of anaheim chilies and fresh tomatoes?  How about polenta stuffed peppers, a side of black beans and as starters some fresh fig margaritas, flax seed chips and fresh guacamole.

For the guacamole, I used two avocados that my friend Laurie gave me right off her tree.  I added them to the food processor with some scallions, two small tomatoes, a piece of red pepper from the jar, some peperoncini, garlic, lime juice, fresh parsley, cumin, chili powder and S&P.  

  

 In the mean time, I slit the chilies lengthwise and removed the seeds.  I placed them slit side down on a cookie sheet.  I then cut three tomatoes in half and a red onion in quarters, drizzled them with olive oil and put them skin side down on another cookies sheet. I roasted all the veggies at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes or so.

While the veggies were roasting in the oven, we enjoyed the guacamole, some healthy chips (yeah right) with flax seeds and some margaritas.  I made them in the blender with tequilla, lime juice, triple sec, lots of ice and added some fresh figs which gave it a pretty pink color.  

The stuffed peppers are ready to go in the oven to bake.  To make them:  1.  Put the roasted tomatoes and onions in the food processor with about 1/4 tsp. cinnamon and S&P to taste.  2.  Put half of the mixture on the bottom of a 13x9" glass baking pan.  3.  Open a tube of polenta that you can buy at Trader Joe's.  Of course you can go to the trouble to make polenta from corn meal but this is so much easier.  I had thought you could only slice this polenta roll but no, just put it in a bowl and mash it with your hands or a spoon.  4.  To the polenta I added a 10 oz. bag of thawed frozen roasted corn 5.  To the polenta and corn, I added some goat cheese and feta cheese - about 1/3 cup or so.  I didn't add any salt since the feta is pretty salty on its own.  6.  I stuffed each pepper with the mixture and put each in the glass pan.  7.  Cover the stuffed peppers with the remaining tomato/onion mixture.  8.  Bake 350 degrees for about 25 minutes.  9.  Serve covered with chopped scallions.  

A delicious and nutritious meal.

Healthy and Wholesome

A healthy home-cooked meal, with recipes mainly from the Power Foods Cookbook, made for a delightful, delicious Tuesday evening with my friend Stephanie.  Steph is my dear friend and the one who turned me on to this cookbook which I think is the best around.  It features interesting and inspired recipes using wholesome, healthy ingredients.  We have both made and shared lots of recipes from this cookbook.  Here's a taste of tonight's meal.

Easy side dish of roasted cherry tomatoes.  A bit of olive oil, basil, S&P over the tomatoes and bake at 400 for 20 minutes.  Served this as an appetizer with goat cheese, hummus and whole grain pita crackers.

Fresh sliced fennel for the chicken breast recipe.

Chicken breasts with fennel, carrots, chopped dried apricots and sliced Greek olives served over Trader Joe's tricolor quinoa preceded by a salad of fresh shredded asparagus and radishes mixed with rocket, a bit of olive oil, vinegar and S&P.  

  My very talented and darling friend Stephanie

Finicky Tucker likes Stephanie.

Ahh...life is good.

A nutritious and delicious dinner

My BFFs and long time friends Erin and Amalia came over for dinner last night.  We get together for a 'girl's night in' at least once a month and have been doing so for years now.  Last night Amalia brought her two awesomely well behaved sons Elias and Joshua since her husband Robert had a last minute opportunity to go skiing at Mammoth.  We were going to order out (or is it order in?) but I told them  that I had lots of food in my frig and that I'd make dinner.  

So without going to any trouble at all, I made a nutritious and delicious dinner for us girls while Amalia heated up mini frozen pizzas for the boys. 

Dinner - Quinoa with fresh kale & cranberries, chicken, grilled tomatoes, beets, carrots & yams.

Grilled tomatoes are so delicious and so easy.  These are Trader Joe's mixed cherry tomatoes.  Just add a bit of olive oil and some coarse salt.  I added some fresh rosemary too.  Grill in a hot 400 degree oven for about 20 minutes.

Trader Joe's now carries these thinly sliced fresh chicken breasts which is such a better size than those "honkin" big ones.  I seasoned the chicken with salt and pepper and then dipped each one in a lightly beaten egg white and then in a bread crumb mixture that I made by:   combining in my Cuisinart about 1 cup bread crumbs with about 1/4 cup parmesan cheese and handful of the nuts that I made the other day.   I grilled these in a bit of olive oil on a high heat.  It just takes a few minutes on each side and then voila...!  You can tent them in foil until the rest of the dinner is ready.

Ok, this doesn't look all that appetizing in the pan but it really was delicious and oh so healthy.  First I made some quinoa - I buy that black and white version from Trader Joe's.  In the meantime, I soaked some dried cranberries in a mixture that came to mind of tamari, rice vinegar and agave.  The tamari was a little too salty so next time I'd use less or maybe add some orange juice.  I sauteed some fresh, chopped kale that my friend Antoinette dropped off the other day fresh from her garden (she has the greenest thumb of anyone I've ever met).  Then I added the quinoa and the sauce to the sauteed kale.  Antoinette brought me a fresh beet too so I roasted that along with a yam and some carrots at 400 degrees.  I put these veggies in at the same time as the cherry tomatoes but the beet took the most time at almost an hour.

Amalia enjoying dinner

Beth and Erin

After all that healthy stuff how about a delicious tiramisu cake that Erin picked up at Whole Foods.  Joshua and Elisa look pretty happy about it...heck, so do Erin and Amalia!!

Elias relaxing with Oliver and Juma

Erin and her Chewwy

Maj Jongg is Gaining Popularity

Knitting, playing mah jongg...OMG I have become my mother!  But, in retrospect, I guess my mom must have been one happenin' woman.  Mah jongg ( National Mah Jongg League rules) just happens to be one of my very favorite pastimes.  I play twice a week with two different groups and have been doing so for several years now; I've in fact taught most of the women in both of the groups how to play.  Many of the gals have gotten so good that they're already playing in tournaments.  Mah jongg is enjoying a resurgence in popularity and is a strategic, social, addictive and entertaining tile game.  Furthermore it engages several areas of the brain simultaneously and studies have shown that playing mah jongg reduces the risk of ever developing dementia.  For more info about how to play mah jongg, check out Sloperama.

The table is set up for four players.  On the left are two Susans, on the right is Lyn and I'm taking the shot.  All 152 tiles are initially placed face down on the table; each player then builds a wall 18 tiles wide by two tiles high.  Each player takes 13 tiles from the wall into her hand with an extra tile for the east player, then collects and discards tiles in order to build a hand on the annual card. 

 The goal of the game is to get a mah jongg by making one of the hands on the annual rule card.

A mah jongg for Susan using lots of jokers.

Dessert was from what else, my new Power Foods cook book.  This lemon cream was made with silken tofu so it was low in calories and fat but delicious.   It's garnished with fresh blucberries, blackberries and lemon peel.

Talk about Eating Healthy!

A few weeks ago my friend Stephanie turned me on to a new cookbook called "Power Foods".  I thought I was about done with cookbooks given that I have a zillion and pretty much just make up most of my 'recipes' these days but I found out otherwise.  This is one awesome cookbook packed with healthy, easy, delicious foods focusing on recipes using the 38 healthiest ingredients on the planet (why they couldn't come up with two more and make it an even 40 is beyond me!). It's the way I like to cook and eat (or at least aspire to most of the time) but this cookbook has given me some new inspiration. Tonight I had my cousin Rochelle over for dinner I made a bunch of recipes from the cookbook.  All were delicious and easy.  My maj girls are coming over tomorrow and will hopefully enjoy the nuts, the dips, the cookies and a few other goodies I still plan to make.  

Sweet potato and edamame hummus with lentil chips and blanched green beans with lemon zest

Watch that knife in your hand cousin Rochelle!

I'm taking the baked nuts and seeds out of the oven

This is one healthy nut mixture packed with almonds, walnuts, flaxseed, sunflower seeds, quinoa, honey and spices - yum, yum.

Ok - this wasn't  a recipe in the cookbook but we roasted some Brussel sprouts in the oven and added a touch of grated parmesan cheese

Roasted wild Alaskan salmon and parsnips with ginger along with the roasted Brussel sprouts

Double dark chocolate and ginger biscotti - rich but not overly sweet.

Ok if you've read this far, you deserve at least one recipe.  Here's the one for this delicious biscotti:

DOUBLE DARK CHOCOLATE AND GINGER BISCOTTI
1 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
 1/4 tsp salt
1 large egg plus 1 large egg yolk
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup (3 oz) coarsely chopped bittersweet chocolate (at least 70%)
1/4 cup finely chopped crystallized ginger
I also added some dried blueberries but the recipe didn't call for it.

1.  Preheat the over to 350.  Line a baking sheet with parchment.  In a medium bowl combine flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt.

2.  In an electric mixer, beat egg and egg yolk and sugar until light and fluffy, beat in the vanilla and oil.

3.  On low, beat in the flour mixture until combined.  Mix in walnuts, chocolate and ginger

4.  With moistened hands, shape the dough into tow longs.  Bake about 25 minutes.  Let cool.

5.  Reduce oven temp to 325.  With a serrated knife, cut the logs on the diagonal.  Bake about 20 minutes flipping halfway through.

ENJOY.