Red Bell Pepper Bisque

I love a good soup and this one is both healthy and not much work. The key is to make sure the vegetables are nice and cooked down. Then when the slow cooker goes to work it wont have to be cooked quite as long and will have a deeper flavor.

4 red bell peppers chopped

2 leeks, white part only, chopped

1 onion chopped

1 3/4 cup chicken or vegetable broth

1 1/2 cups 2% Milk

Salt and Pepper

1. Coat skillet with cooking spray and set over medium high heat. Add bell peppers, leeks and onion. Cook 10 minutes or until vegetables are tender.

2. Place vegetables in slow cooker. Stir in broth and season with salt and pepper. Cover and cook on high 2-4 hours.

3. Puree soup on batches in a food processor or blender. Return soup to cooker. Stir in milk and cook 15 to 20 more minutes, or until heated through.

Faux Beef Pot Pie

Earlier in the week I used my food processor to chop up a whole host of root and winter vegetables. Really almost anything can go in this dish and so far I've used different ingredients each time. The first time I made this I used left over pork tenderloin with vegetable stock and forgot to add the peas I had planned on using. This time Im going with, fennel, celery, carrots, turnip, diced onions and I have left over steak and home made beef stock. This dish could easily omit the meat if you choose. After you have all your vegetables chopped you can preheat your oven to 375F.

If you have leftover rice, bulgur or quinoa now is the time to take it out of the fridge. I had cooked quinoa the other day in vegetable stock for extra flavor. I added some olive oil and a half cup of shredded cheese to about two cups of cooked quinoa. I choose to go with mozzarella as I think it will compliment the flavor of the beef in the dish better but any cheese would do. Set aside the toping mixture for now.

If you are starting with raw meat, salt and pepper it and brown on all sides in a frying pan. Once cooked most of the way remove the meat to a side plate and drain off all but a tablespoon of fat or add enough olive oil (a must if skipping the meat) to make a tablespoon. Next add the hard root vegetables to the same frying pan. I like to sauté just long enough to take the hardness out of the vegetables, without getting anywhere near mushy, as once this dish is assembled it will be cooked another 30 min anyway. Next I add in about 3 tablespoons of flour (I used whole wheat) and cook for about 30 seconds. Add in peas, or less hardy vegetables like corn if using, and 2 cups of broth along with dried thyme and sage or rosemary and stir, cooking for another 2 minutes or until partially reduced. My broth is home made and therefore entirely devoid of salt so at this stage I like to add a good bit of sea salt to help bring out the flavor of the stock and the vegetables. After reduced a bit  add the meat back in to the frying pan.

Next I add in 3 tablespoons of plain fat free yogurt to the pan, stirring in well. You can use low fat Greek style which has a nice thickness and tangy taste or you can go with regular plain fat free as I have here. I sometimes find I need to add more yogurt if I use regular plain and more stock if I use the Greek style. Cook for a few minutes until the dish has thickened and then remove from heat. The liquid should look a bit like the kind of gravy you expect to find in pot pie but a bit thinner.

Transfer the contents of the frying pan to a casserole dish. Top with quinoa/cheese mixture evenly and bake at 375F for about 30 minutes or until top has browned. Once done let it cool for about 5 minutes and then dig in!

Minestrone with Quinoa

Traditional minestrone soup has vegetables in a tomato based soup with pasta and kidney beans. The recipe I found called for something like two cups of chopped plum tomatoes, and water, as the base. In the past, I have found that leaving the tomato peels in can make the dish a bit bitter. I like using diced or stewed tomatoes but the third ingredient on the can seems to always be high fructose corn syrup! I managed to find a can of organic diced tomatoes that only actually contains tomatoes - imagine that! I used that and water instead of trying to dice a ton of plum tomatoes in my variation below.


To a soup pot add some olive oil, minced garlic, chopped fresh thyme, chopped fennel, a little bit of crushed fennel seeds, diced red onion, chopped celery, a little bit of chopped leek and two bay leaves. Stir frequently over medium heat for about 8 minutes or until the vegetables are tender.

Add a can of organic diced tomatoes, juice and all, along with a can of your favorite beans, rinsed. I went with a can of tri-blend of black, pinto and kidney beans. Add about 2 cups of water to get actual soup consistency:

Next add about 1/3 cup quinoa and mix in well. I use quinoa as a rice substitute as it has pretty great texture and tons of fiber by comparison. I don't particularly like the pasta usually found in minestrone, so when I found a recipe that used quinoa instead I jumped on it. Quinoa doesn't look like much, but it does absorb as much water as rice would, so don't go over board!

Set the burner to high to get it all to boil and then reduce heat and let simmer for 15-20 minutes. Adjust seasonings with salt and pepper, remove the bay leaves and the soup is ready to be served!

How I love my food processor !

I found myself making burgers this weekend and craving a home made slaw that wasn't too heavy with creamy ingredients. After a quick search I found a recipe for an Edamame Slaw. 

Out came the food processor!

It made quick work of shredding cabbage, carrots, yellow bell pepper and celery. In another bowl I mixed honey with apple cider vinegar and lots of pepper. These went on my vegetables (along with some thawed shelled Edemame) and after a little time in the fridge I had what I was looking for:

While I had the machine out I made quick work of a few other vegetables I plan on using in a "Faux Pot Pie" - a variation on a recipe I found in Clean Eating Magazine. Turnip, leeks, carrots, fennel and celery all went into a plastic bag for later in the week. I would have done onion as well but I tend to buy chopped frozen onion now to save time on all my dishes. 

Half the fennel got saved for another dish; a variation on Minestrone which Ill get to next!

Pumpkin Corn Soup

I recently went to Washington D.C. and found that I just loved the Mitsitam Cafe at The National Museum of the American Indian. Regional Native American dishes, such as South America's tamales and fresh Yucca fries were grouped together at one serving area. It is amazing how much of Native American food we think of as merely 'American' food. Pork and beans is a classic example, pot pie (like the rabbit pot pie I had while there) is another. Mmmm, and fry bread must be the ancestor to every good bread product you have ever had !

To no ones surprise I picked up a two cookbooks in the museum's bookshop; one focused on the Southwest, and another that covered many other areas as well. Earlier in the week I decided to try to make the Pumpkin Corn Soup from the first book... here is my adapted recipe and the book information at the bottom. This wont be the last recipe I try from this book!

A quick break from the pumpkin madness...

Black Bean Brownies???

Dont knock it until you try it! I dont have a picture because they all got eaten!!

Wholesome Oat Muffins and the Arrival of Fall!

I love Fall and while it will still be hot in southern California for a while yet it always feels like Fall is here when I turn the calendar to October !

Im sure the month will kick off all kinds of soups but for now I thought Id talk about my Wholesome Oat Muffins which are perfect for breakfast during the week as they are tasty but also filing enough to keep you going until lunch. The recipe is pretty much out of the South Beach Diet cookbook with a few changes.  I find that I like the baking recipes that call for use of low fat buttermilk as they tend to be healthier even if you aren't on a diet and thankfully a diet cookbook doesn't have to be all bland boring foods! All that I change is add some flax seed meal for a bit more fiber, swap sliced almonds for walnuts and add tons more cinnamon. You really cant have too much cinnamon.

I  usually start the muffins by getting out three bowls, one small, one medium and one large. In the small bowl I put in the 3/4 cup oats with a cup of low fat buttermilk. I 've just been adding about two spoonfuls of flax seed meal and similar amount of sliced almonds. After that is all stirred up I let it sit while I do everything else so the oats can soak up the buttermilk. I also make sure to get my oven going to 425 F as that can take a while to heat up.

In the medium bowl I put 1 and 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (which thankfully is sold at Henry's by weight so I didnt have to spend a lot the first time I tried to make these), 1/2 teaspoon baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon baking soda, a pinch of salt and then 1 teaspoon cinnamon and stir it up until well mixed.

In the large bowl, I crack in an egg,  add 1/3 cup of Splenda's brown sugar substitute (even my Splenda hating roomie likes this half real sugar mix), 1/3 cup canola oil and a heaping teaspoon of vanilla extract. I usually use a whisk to really beat the egg and get the oil and sugar mixed in. Once that is done you can add the oats mixture and mix well. Lastly add the flour mixture but only mix until just combined. Over mixing will make the muffins a little dense.

You can make this into a loaf or as I like to into 12 muffins filling each cup about 2/3 of the way full. I use silicone muffin liners which help keep the heat even and make for easy clean up. If you dont use the silicone muffin liners then be sure to spray your pan with a non stick spray - preferably butter flavored! I pop that in at 425 F degrees for 12-14 minutes and let them cool for at least 5 minutes as they can get rather hot.

After two each morning I run out quickly!