Being more specific

My sister asked me to be more specific regarding this months challenge.  How about this....use ingredient with a color in the title:  blueberries, blackberries, collard greens, red onions, yellow cornmeal, white peaches, etc, etc, etc. OR if something you make just has a nice color, please share!

Linguine with purple cabbage

Did you know there was a blogger app? Now I do!

Mark is a huge fan of red cabbage, so when I saw this recipe I thought there was a good chance he would like it. I love red onions do it was a win win.

I liked it and will make it again, although, when you cool the cabbage and the onions as directed, it gets a little and ended up a little sweet for me.  But still a nice healthy meal with a salad.

And Mark liked it!

Kale Pesto and Butternut Squash Mac & Cheese

I've borrowed heavily from Rachael Ray this week, but I usually modify her recipes to be vegetarian or to use what I have on hand. 

The first recipe was inspired by her recipe for a Caesar-style Kale Pesto.  After looking the recipe over again, I don't know that I really followed the recipe at all.  I blanched the kale in boiling water as directed and subbed it for the basil in my usual pesto recipe (minus the pine nuts, which I didn't have).  I tossed it with penne and tomatoes for dinner last week.  I froze the left-overs, which we used for pizza this week.  The kids loved it both times and it used up a bunch of the kale that is still going strong in our garden.  Be prepared for more green recipes in the coming weeks...

We'll file this next recipe under yellow.  It was adapted from Rachael's Pumpkin Cheddar Mac and Cheese recipe.  I omit most of the seasonings and sweetness that play up the pumpkin and just use this as a way of sneaking a veggie into mac and cheese.  I used 2 cups of pureed butternut squash that I froze from the last time I made this.  One large squash should easily get you 2 recipes worth of puree.  I omitted the cloves/allspice and honey, subbed skim milk and topped it with reserved cheddar and panko.  It's creamy with just a hint of sweetness from the squash.  This one gets requested every other week by our pickiest eater.

I like this recipe because the sauce doesn't "break" on me like a lot of other mac and cheese recipes I've tried, even though I use skim milk.  It's a good base recipe to play around with and customize since it seems to be pretty forgiving. 

Tempeh With Cherry Balsalmic Reduction Sauce

Apparently Blogger has a new interface, so forgive any layout issues! So, this was a fancy one. This one is from that Color Me Vegan book under the red section. I think it turned out kind of purple. It is a variation of your basic chicken, rice, and sauce. It was pretty good, not great, but I may make it again if I had all the ingredients on hand.

Better late than never: new challenge

I know I am behind. The reasons are two fold. One, sometimes it is just SO MUCH EFFORT to open the lap top, and boot up and log on....am I right? The other, I have an idea for a challenge, but it might be lame. I checked out this book from the library called "Color Me Vegan" It lists all recipes in order of color. I think there is a reason for this, but haven't read enough of the beginning of the book to know why, but we have done color challenges before, and thought it would be fun to try. Cook and share recipes that are Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple, White, or Brown/Black. We will have this challenge go through the end of May.