Sauteed Vegetables with Lemon Vinaigrette Dressing

Posted on April 26, 2014 by Simply Healthy Cooking with Pam
This recipe was created on Easter Sunday. I did not want to eat the traditional foods that are normally served on Easter because Ham and the sides tends to have a lot of carbs, fat and sodium in it and there are consequences for me when I eat foods with too much of these things. This is an excellent dish as a meal or a side. This was one of the recipes that are vegan/vegetarian friendly. I used my favorite vegetables and beans for this sautéed stir fry dish. Enjoy!

Mixed Sautéed Vegetables with Lemon Vinaigrette Dressing
Created on 04/20/14

Easter04.14vegetables
Ingredients
1 pound fresh asparagus cut into bite size pieces
2 medium zucchini sliced medallion style
4 medium carrots, peeled and sliced diagonally
1 bag of organic non-gmo frozen corn
1 pint of cherry tomatoes cleaned and halved
1 cup of chopped green onions (approximately a bunch)
10 ounces of crimini mushrooms wiped clean and sliced thick
1 can of organic garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
1 cup of vegetable stock
Salt/pepper to taste

Lemon Vinaigrette (In a small jar with tight fitting lid – add the following ingredients)
1 full lemon squeezed
1 tablespoon of honey
Salt / pepper to taste
1 tablespoon of Stone ground Dijon Mustard
3 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar

Put all the ingredients in the jar, shake well and set aside.

Heat about 3 tablespoons of vegetable stock in a wok over high heat. This process will go very fast. Remember to season each batch of vegetables with salt and pepper suited to your taste. Sautee the carrots for about 5 to 7 minutes; you want the texture to be medium soft and remove and transfer to the serving platter. Then add about 2 tablespoons of vegetable stock and the mushrooms and cook for an additional 3 to 5 minutes, remove and transfer to the platter. Add more stock as needed and continue to cook the zucchini, asparagus, and green onions for additional 3 to 5 minutes and add to the vegetables previously added to the platter. Add the corn, tomatoes and garbanzo beans until fully heated through and transfer to the serving platter.

CLICK HERE TO PRINT THE RECIPE

 

Filed under: Dressings, Gluten Free, Simply Healthy Recipes, Vegan Recipes, Vegeterian Recipes | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Vegan Potato and Corn Chowder

Posted on January 9, 2013 by Simply Healthy Cooking with Pam
It’s a new year. Simply Healthy Cooking with Pam has been going strong since December 30, 2009. I cannot believe that I passed the 4 year mark. Lots of changes and learned so much about food. I have been slowly changing my food diet to reflect more vegetarian / vegan recipes. I am experimenting with different kinds of soups this month. I have a cookbook I use frequently called “The Big Book of Vegetarian” by Kathy Farrell-Kingsley. This book has lots of good recipes that are very filling and hearty. I highly recommend it. This soup is really creamy without any dairy use at all. Everything in this soup is vegetable. This soup is amazing when all ingredients are summer fresh straight from the garden or farmer’s market. I tweaked the original recipe to the ingredients I had on hand. Enjoy.

Vegan Potato and Corn Chowder, created on January 6, 2013

Click on image to see a larger photo

Click on image to see a larger photo


2 large Yukon Gold Potatoes (peeled and diced)
2 large organic carrots (peeled and diced)
2 large stalks of organic celery (diced)
1 medium Vidalia onion (chopped)
4 green onions (minced green and white parts) (Original recipe calls for 1 leek (white part only)
2 cups of organic corn, or 4 medium corn on the cob – kernels cut from the cob
5 cups of organic vegetable broth
2 teaspoons of dried basil or 2 tablespoons of fresh chopped basil
1 teaspoon of fresh dill or 1 teaspoon of fresh thyme
2 tablespoons of sunflower oil or vegetable broth
Salt and Pepper to taste

In a large soup pot, warm the oil or vegetable broth and add the carrots, celery, onion, green onions and cook until softened, about 10 minutes. Stir often.

Add the corn, potatoes, broth, and basil. Bring the soup to a simmer over medium-high heat. Reduce the heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until the potatoes are cooked and the vegetable broth has reduced to just barely covering the cooked vegetables. Add the chopped fresh dill.

Ladle the soup to a blender or food processor in batches, be careful when process because the soup is very hot and can spurt up from top of blender or food processor. Process the soup until desired consistency but has some chunks of vegetables. Return to the soup pot and season with salt and pepper.

CLICK HERE TO PRINT THE RECIPE

Filed under: Simply Healthy Recipes, Soup and Stew Recipes, Vegan Recipes, Vegeterian Recipes | Tagged: , , , | 1 Comment »

Stuffed Zucchini Boats

Posted on August 11, 2012 by Simply Healthy Cooking with Pam
I think that zucchini is my all time favorite vegetable. I am always trying out new things with zucchini. The market had a huge sale going on for the vegetable so I purchased quite a bit not realizing that I had too much. I had different veggies in the refrigerator so I decided to make a vegetable stuffing and made stuffed zucchini boats. Loved the concept. Loaded with flavor, little bit of prep work but worth it. Enjoy!

Stuffed Zucchini Boats
Created on 8/1/12

Click on photo to see larger image
10 oz of baby Bella mushrooms, wiped clean and chopped fine
1 medium onion, chopped fine
2 medium carrots, chopped fine
1 large bag of baby spinach
6 zucchini, halved and the centers scooped out and chopped fine
1 4 oz of Fontina cheese shredded (Optional)
1/4 cup of mushroom broth
Salt / Pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cut the zucchini in half and scoop out the centers with a spoon. Lay the halves on a cookie tray. Clean and chop fine all the vegetables except for the spinach. Just roughly chop the spinach because the cooking the spinach will wilt it quite a bit.

In a large pan, heat up the mushroom broth over medium high heat and add the mushrooms, onions, carrots and cook for a good 5 minutes until the mushrooms and onions develop a deep brown color. Add the zucchini meat that was scooped out from the centers, coarsely chopped and then add the spinach and saute for a few minutes until the spinach wilts and the zucchini is incorporated in the stuffing.

Stuff the halved zucchini with the cooked vegetables. Sprinkle with shredded Fontina cheese and bake for about 30 minutes until the boats are semi soft and if you used cheese the cheese has melted and browned on top.

CLICK HERE TO PRINT THE RECIPE

Filed under: Simply Healthy Recipes, Vegan Recipes, Vegeterian Recipes | Tagged: , , , , | 2 Comments »

Sweet Potato Mushroom Casserole

Posted on March 11, 2012 by Simply Healthy Cooking with Pam
As always, I am trying to cut down on eating a lot of potatoes. I came up with this recipe on one of my searches for good healthy food. I found a recipe on the blog of “Joy the Baker” and I tweaked quite a bit of it as I wanted to be really careful with the fat content of this recipe and add more vegetables. I was shocked at how wonderful this recipe turned out. The first thing that popped in my mind is how warm and hearty this recipe is and what a great side dish or main dish for a Potluck or Thanksgiving dinner. The original recipe used biscuits / dumplings; I chose Arrowhead Organic Herb Stuffing instead. The stuffing had whole grain bread and lower carbohydrates than the biscuits. I imagine you can really use anything for a topping. Enjoy!

Sweet Potato Mushroom Casserole
Created on March 11, 2012

3 medium sweet potatoes or yams (about the size of your fist) to equal roughly 2 cups, diced
6 tablespoons of olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
3 garlic cloves, minced
10 oz of Crimini mushrooms, cleaned and quartered
3 oz of button mushrooms, cleaned and quartered
2 medium sized organic carrots or 4 small sized carrots, peeled and diced
1 cup of organic fresh or frozen baby peas
1 cup of organic corn
3 to 4 teaspoons of fresh Thyme, roughly chopped to release the oils
3 teaspoons of Worcestershire sauce
1/8 cup of flour or corn starch
3 teaspoons of Balsamic vinegar (I did not really accurately measure I just used 3 generous dashes)
1 (10 oz) package of organic Arrowhead Savory Herb Stuffing (or use some type of your favorite topping)
4 cups of Mushroom broth (you could use vegetable broth – Mushroom Broth really puts out the flavor)
Salt/Pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a large pan, heat up the 2 tablespoons of olive oil over medium high heat. Add the mushrooms, season with salt and pepper and cook for about 8 to 10 minutes until the mushrooms begin to become soft and caramelized. Remove from the pan and set aside.

Add the rest of the olive oil to the pan and add the onions and cook for about 5 minutes until the onions begin to soften. Add the garlic and cook for about a minute. Add carrots and sweet potatoes and cook for about 8 to 10 minutes until the sweet potatoes and carrots are soft but firm. Be careful not to cook for a long time because the sweet potatoes will become mush. Add the cooked mushrooms back to the pan. Add the flour or corn starch and stir. Cook the flour for about a minute and then add the 2 cups of mushroom broth to the filling slowly, stir until thickened. Add the peas and carrots. Season filling with salt and pepper to taste. Stir in the Balsamic vinegar and Worcestershire sauce and Thyme.

Prepare the topping. Put the herb stuffing in a bowl and toss with the balance of the mushroom broth. Mix well with a fork, the stuffing should be crumbly.

In a 9 x 13 pan, layer the mushroom and sweet potato filling and top with the stuffing. Lightly sprinkle the remaining olive oil so that you will get some crunchy effect when you bake the casserole. Bake casserole for 30 minutes until the mushroom broth is bubbly and seeping of the top of the stuffing. The stuffing should be a deep brown.

Serve with a nice mixed green salad seasoned with fresh herbs and balsamic vinegar and olive oil dressing

CLICK HERE TO PRINT THE RECIPE

Filed under: Casserole Recipes, Simply Healthy Recipes, Vegeterian Recipes | Tagged: , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Everything but the Kitchen Sink Veggie Burger

Posted on February 17, 2012 by Simply Healthy Cooking with Pam
I am always trying to find decent vegetarian burger recipes for me to eat. My biggest frustration is keeping the patties together when I am cooking them. I found that the best way for me to cook veggie burgers is to put them on my stone and bake or broil them in the oven. This is less stress on the patty so there is no breakage. Veggie burgers usually come in all shapes and forms. I decided to make my own version and absolutely fell in love with it. What great flavor and so healthy for me. I just added things that I liked in a veggie burger and just kept adding till I achieved the flavors I wanted. Actually after adding all the ingredients, I couldn’t stop eating the veggie burger mixture. I think I hit it right on my taste buds! Adorn with your favorite things like pickles, lettuce, tomatoes, whole grain buns, caramelized onions, and mustard – whatever floats your boat. I think next time I might make Tahini dressing to go with this. Enjoy!

Pam’s Everything but the Kitchen Sink Veggie Burger
Created on 02/16/11

Click on picture to see a larger image

1 can of organic garbanzo beans drained and rinsed
1 package of Tempeh from Trader Joe’s
1 cup of fresh corn sliced of the cob or frozen organic corn
2 organic carrots peeled and minced
1 cup of raw sunflower seeds
8 oz of mushrooms, cleaned and minced – I used Baby Bella mushrooms
1 small onion minced
2 garlic cloves minced
2 Tablespoons fresh parsley minced
3 Tablespoons of Low-Sodium Soy Sauce
Salt / Pepper to taste
2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
¼ cup of egg substitute (if you have a better binder ingredient for the veggie burger please use that)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Prepare the vegetables; mince the mushrooms, onions, carrots, and garlic with a food chopper or with a knife. In a 10” sauté pan, heat up the olive oil over medium high heat. Add the vegetables, season with salt and pepper and sauté for a good 5 to 8 minutes until the carrots are sort of soft (not mushy). Remove from the heat.

In a food processor, pulsate the Tempeh and garbanzo beans until coarsely ground. Add the sautéed vegetables and pulsate a few times till mixture is blended. In the sauté pan, add the corn and sauté for about 3 minutes until the corn is cooked through, season with salt and pepper. In a glass bowl, empty the food processor bowl with the mixture into the glass bowl and mix in the corn. In the same sauté pan, toast the sunflower seeds until the color is a rich brown. Add the toasted sunflower seeds, minced parsley, egg substitute, and soy sauce combine well.

This makes about 8 to 9 patties. I formed the patties and placed them on the stoneware.

Click on image to see a larger picture

Very lightly sprinkle olive oil over the patties so they do not dry out. Bake at 400 degrees for about 30 minutes until lightly browned and heated thoroughly.

CLICK HERE TO PRINT THE RECIPE

Filed under: Simply Healthy Recipes, Vegan Recipes, Vegeterian Recipes | Tagged: , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Lentil Shepherd’s Pie

Posted on February 9, 2012 by Simply Healthy Cooking with Pam
I have been searching for some decent vegetarian or vegan Shepherd’s Pie recipes because the meat Shepherd’s Pie is extremely high in fat and is really not good for me. I have not found anything that seemed interesting or appealing to me so I decided to make my own after endless searches. Many of the recipes that I found seemed to be really high in carbohydrates which I felt came from the potatoes. I made mashed potatoes with cauliflower and 5 red skinned potatoes instead of the whole topping being mashed potatoes. Next time I think I will try the sweet mashed potatoes on top for the crust – I can picture the flavors or even try butternut/acorn squash mashed topping. I loved the lentils in my Shepherd’s Pie; it was loaded with this awesome hearty flavor – I was so thrilled that my recipe came out amazing! What is so great about this recipe is that you can omit or add the vegetable ingredients to suit your taste. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Lentil Shepherd’s Pie
Created on 02/09/12

Click on image to see a larger picture

1 cup of lentils, cleaned and picked through for any debris, discard debris and then cook lentils for one hour or until soft but not really soft to lose its shape and become mush
3 large organic broccoli crowns cleaned and chopped
½ head of organic cauliflower
5 organic red skin potatoes, scrubbed and cubed, leave red skin on
5 organic carrots, peeled and cubed into 1 to 2” chunks
1 cup of organic frozen corn
1 cup of organic Muir Glenn tomato sauce
1 medium onion, chopped
1 (10 oz) package of white button mushrooms, wiped clean and cut into quarters
2 garlic cloves minced well
3 tablespoons of olive oil
½ cup to 1 cup of vegetable broth
½ cup of Tofutti cream cheese (measure based on taste and texture of the mashed topping)
2 tablespoons of Earth Balance butter (measure based on taste and texture of the mashed topping)
Salt/Pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

In a large stock pot lined with a steamer, put in the cleaned cauliflower, cubed potatoes and steam over medium high heat until tender – approximately about 10 to 15 minutes. Add the broccoli at the last 5 minutes of cooking, turn of the heat and remove the steamed vegetables to a large bowl. Separate the broccoli from the cauliflower and potatoes because the broccoli will go into the lentil filling.

While the vegetables are steaming, in a 10” sauté pan with 3 tablespoons of olive oil over medium high heat, add the chopped onions, mushrooms, and carrots and sauté until the carrots are soft and the mushrooms and onions have a deep brown color on them. Add the frozen corn and garlic and sauté until the corn is heated thoroughly and the garlic is soft.

Click on image to see a larger picture

Remove the sauté pan from the heat and add the cooked lentils. The lentils will absorb all the liquid from the vegetables. Add the broccoli to the sautéed lentil mixture and stir gently until everything is mixed well. Put the vegetables in a square 8 x 8 Pyrex or stone dish. Mix 1 cup of tomato sauce in the vegetables making sure everything is coated well.

Click on image to see a larger picture

In the bowl with the steamed cauliflower and potatoes mash the vegetables together. Season with salt and pepper and add vegetable broth to bind the vegetables together to make the mashed potato topping. I did not use all the vegetable broth and added some Earth Balance butter to give it some buttery flavor. Add the Tofutti cream cheese. Remember this is what I like in texture and flavor, please adjust the broth, butter and cream cheese as how you would like your mashed topping to be.

Spread the Cauliflower/Potato mash on top of the lentil mixture and spread to cover. Bake @ 350 degrees for 40 to 45 minutes until the tomato sauce is bubbling out of the top and the mashed topping is lightly browned.

CLICK HERE TO PRINT THE RECIPE

Filed under: Casserole Recipes, Simply Healthy Recipes, Vegan Recipes, Vegeterian Recipes | Tagged: , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

Carrot, Mushroom, Fennel Stir Fry

Posted on May 6, 2010 by Simply Healthy Cooking with Pam
I made this yesterday 05/06/10. I did not have a clue what to make for dinner and then I thought I have not done a stir-fry in a while. I had some vegetables in the refrigerator that I needed to use up soon because I have been so busy with school and the vegetables were looking pretty sad. I am very picky with Teriyaki sauces and will only use one kind. Veri Veri Teriyaki is a unique sauce that has so many flavors and often compliments the stir fry dishes. Check out their website when you have some time.

Carrot, Mushroom Fennel Stir-Fry
created 05/06/10


3 handfuls of baby carrots as much as your hand allows
4 green onions
1 package (10 oz) fresh button mushrooms
2 fresh corn on the cob
1 medium onion
3 tablespoons of olive oil
1 fennel bulb
4 garlic cloves, peeled and minced
2 to 3 tablespoons of Veri Veri Teriyaki sauce

Slice the baby carrots with the knife slanted – try to keep the slices as even as possible for a balanced cook time. Clean and slice the mushrooms. Slice the corn off the cobs. Cut the onion and fennel bulb in half and then in half moon shapes. Cut up the green onions and mince the garlic.

In a large stir fry pan in order heat up the olive oil on high heat, add the chopped onions, fennel and carrots. Cook continuously stirring vegetables for about 3 to 4 minutes. Add the mushrooms and continue to cook for another 3 to 4 minutes. Add the corn, green onion, garlic and cook for about 2 more minutes. Add the teriyaki sauce, stir the vegetables a couple more times and remove from the heat and serve immediately with brown rice or eat the stir fry vegetables by themselves. It is wonderful either way. Enjoy!

CLICK HERE TO PRINT THE RECIPE

Filed under: Simply Healthy Recipes, Vegeterian Recipes | Tagged: , , , | 8 Comments »