Sweet Potato Hash w/ Chorizo and Crumbled Feta

Looking for a delicious dish? Want healthy ingredients in there? Want it to be really easy? Made in only one pan? You've come to the right place...

Onion Potato Soup

I just couldn't go one more day without blogging. It's been since October.

OCTOBER.

Black Bean Cakes

Sweet Potato Oven Fries w/ Blue Cheese Fondue

This pile of naturally sweet, cheesy goodness is just one of the excellent memories from last week. I am very recently returned from an amazing week at the Montreat Youth Conference. I bet there are very few people who attended that will tell you that their week was, in fact, NOT amazing.

Chipotle Black Bean Hummus

I don't think there will be any of this left when Paul gets home tonight...

My mouth is on fire and yet I can't/won't stop. At least I will definitely get my 8 glasses of water today.

Whole Wheat Garlic Crackers

Is there anything better than biting into a crisp garlicky cracker with a giant air bubble when it's still hot from the oven? Okay, so there probably is but I still think it ranks up there in life's pleasures.

Kale-Tempeh-Lentil Bowl

Earlier this year I got knocked out by a virus, spent two full weeks laying down, and felt weak and shabby by the time I recovered. I hated the way I felt so I made the decision to run. I downloaded the RunKeeper app to my iPhone and started the free Couch to 5K program. I even signed up for an actual run that would be the cap to my training program and my semester.

Sweet and Sour Cucumbers

When I started running I was timid about how far I wanted to venture away from home. It got boring zig-zagging the same streets trying to stay inside the town limits. And when running gets boring the temptation to quit early becomes overwhelming.

Late last week I finally ventured outside the town limits and for the first time in my life I ran 3 miles without stopping. Coincidence? I don't think so. I ventured toward another town today and when the running app told me I was done, I wasn't ready to quit. What I was I afraid of? 

Easy Faux-Fried Chicken Tenders

Have you ever had one of those days? You think you're trotting along getting things done and then... your car won't start. It worked fine yesterday, you didn't leave your lights on, it clearly wants to turn on but it just won't.

Lemon Zucchini Pasta

I am finally at a point where I can really come back to my hobbies and side projects. There are times in my life, and I'm sure in yours, when I have to evaluate what I need to do, what's really vital, and make decisions accordingly. Even though I love doing this blog it's just a passion project, and when sh!t got real, it had to go on the back burner.

But now life is fairly calm again. I'm in a good place with school, I've got a good handle on work, and I have a backlog of recipes I want to make. Another thing I'm doing is running. I've talked before about how Paul is a runner and I am not, though I'm sure it would do me some good. I also made delicious breakfast cookies when I talked about that... After being sick in early March and laying on a couch for almost two weeks, I decided I needed to get moving. I started a couch to 5K program on the RunKeeper app on my phone. Paul suggested that instead of just trying to become a runner I should sign up for a race to work for. So I did!

Rosemary Parmesan Olive Oil Bread

I'm trying to get back in the swing of things. It has been a long time since I posted a recipe - about a month, which in the blog world is probably more like a year. 

Lentil-Walnut Burgers

In this installment of Adventures in Housesitting...

I keep getting locked in the bathroom.  Seriously.  It's kind of embarrassing but there it is.  Every night after I wash my face and brush my teeth I have to call to Paul to help free me from the outside.  One of these days...

Turkey Sausage and Spinach Pasta

I love Saturday mornings.

I get to enjoy the sunshine that is finally shining through our living room window.
Paul is making breakfast. There is a big pot of freshly brewed Costa Rican coffee in the corner making the room smell amazing. We're watching football. You know, real football.
(Did I mention Paul is English? I've willingly been converted.  Go Spurs!) After the football we're going to go for a hike in our favorite park where we got engaged. It's total marital harmony.

You know what doesn't make for marital harmony?  Figuring out what to eat that will make both of us happy. Paul is a meat and potatoes man. I want veggies in pretty much everything and eat meat sparingly. I know that after a week of black beans, white beans, split peas, and lentils for dinner I need to work harder to compromise.

One-Pan Pasta

Every once in a while I get the privilege of staying with a youth from my church when their parents need to be out of town.  (We also house-sit like it's our job, but that's another story...)

Last night I was with a young woman named Lily.  She plays basketball and volleyball, and we learned that we like a lot of the same TV shows and both dream of going to Paris.  Lily feels like a rare kid in the world of Middle School.  I never had to ask her to do anything.  She cleaned up after herself, did her homework, and even got herself to bed on time.  

I knew it would be a little bit weird for her to have me there but I wanted to at least start off our time together with a good meal.  I also wanted that meal to be simple because the point was not to impress her with fancy food but to have some quality time at the table.

Enter one-pan pasta.

Eggless "Egg Salad"

Back when I worked in retail everyone was reading the book "Skinny Bitch" and afraid of eating anything, myself included and maybe especially.  It was the most miserable 5 pounds I ever lost.

Many good things came from that era, friends topping the list, and I still eat a lot of the foods I learned to prepare while living in fear of death by ingesting what I previously thought of as "nutrients."

One food I really wanted while doing the "Skinny Bitch" thing was a sandwich (sounds like a joke but it's true), but I was still too scared to eat one.  Out of my desperation came this recipe.

You can put this sandwich salad in a wrap, on freshly baked bread, eat it with a fork, scoop it with chips, the world is your oyster!  It takes less than 10 minutes to make and will yield enough to give you two large sandwiches.

It's been a while since I've read "Skinny Bitch" so I can't tell you if this dish is something the authors would approve of, but I can tell you that it's delicious and husband-approved.

Costa Rican Gallo Pinto

Oh, our honeymoon...

Magical White Bean Soup Revisited

I mentioned this soup back in mid-November, but it's so good I think it deserves it's own page.

It's PHENOMENAL.

With just vegetables, a touch of oil, and white beans, it's flavorful, satisfying, vegan and gluten free, and did I mention that it's seriously yummy?

It's kicked up a few notches when you stir in a spoonful of home made vinaigrette and give it a sprinkle of parmesan cheese.  You don't need to do much to it.  When we had friends over for dinner back in November, we had bowls of parmesan, prosciutto, and chopped rosemary as well as a little pitcher of vinaigrette on the table for everyone to top as they pleased.  It went over splendidly.

I found this recipe in the book Bread & Wine  
by Shauna Niequist.  I cannot recommend this book enough.  Not only is it a fabulous read, full of stories about life and love, family and friendship, almost every chapter has a killer recipe at the end.  Every single thing I've made from this book has been the best thing I've ever made.  

If you're looking for a hearty, delicious, feel-good meal, try this soup.  You will NOT be sorry.

Smoked Salmon & Cucumber Wraps

I don't know about you, but I overdid it yesterday.  Yep.

I made a lot of delicious food but I didn't take any pictures of it because I was excited to be with my family after a stressful week before Christmas.

My normally dependable schedule for preparing my church's Christmas Pageant was thrown out the window when I discovered that all of our angel costumes were missing.  I called my mom to come out and help me look because moms always seem to have super powers when it comes to finding stuff.  Nope.  They were totally gone.

I didn't panic because I knew I had bins of white sheets and fabric, an old pattern for the costumes we already had, and a pretty decent knowledge of sewing.  As with so many things involving kids and scheduling, it was not smooth sailing.  Even with a costume for each angel at rehearsal, we didn't have enough when it was show time, but luckily a light beige tunic made a great substitute.  The pageant went off with out any major glitches and the kids were adorable.  In the end, a good time was has by all.  Success!

When it came time to finally kick back with my family, I relaxed and enjoyed everything Christmas had to offer, including Santa's cookies, fresh blueberry muffins, and (for some reason) the cheese ball puffs that were set around the room in big bowls just begging to be thrown in the air and caught in your mouth.

Today, with my pants feeling a little tight and my energy a tad lower than usual, I am ready to get back on track.  I genuinely like eating healthy foods that taste good and make me feel good.

Lunch today was really simple.  Pulled from one of my favorite cookbooks, it's a simple sandwich idea that you can whip up in minutes.  It's light, flavorful, filling, and you feel good about eating it.

Tonight, I'm going to make a big ol' pot of Magical White Bean Soup.  Without any fixin's it's a delicious gluten-free and vegan soup that fills you up without letting you down.

Guilt-Free Shrimp "Fried Rice"

I really enjoy a blog called The Londoner.  It's sort of a guilty pleasure.  It is one of the top lifestyle blogs in the UK and it features a young woman named Rosie who flits about town in super short dresses eating lots of things you might not believe she really consumes.  She presents a good balance of city glamour and country charm, as well as a good crop of super yummy recipes with tantalizing photos.  (Hello, Slutty Brownies...)

Girls today get a lot of terrible messages from social media about food.  Supermodels on Instagram seem to live only on homemade vegetable juice and the occasional bite of raw fish and we praise them for setting such healthy examples.  I greatly prefer the message of a beautiful woman who balances indulgences with smart, vegetable heavy meals while telling her readers to drink tons of water and get out and move.

The Londoner posted this recipe a few months back and I've fallen completely in love with it.  It's a regular in our house and just doesn't seem to get old.  I used to swear up and down that I hated cauliflower, but since falling in love with it in this recipe I've been eating it in quite a few dishes.  For now, I will swear that I hate beets.  Maybe then Rosie will change my mind about those too.

Rosemary & Walnut Oven-Fried Chicken

It's always a weird experience to make something a few times and then go back to the recipe and find you've been doing it wrong, or have been missing a big step each time.  I'm having that experience right now, except that every time I have made this recipe it's been delicious!

This is a super busy time of year and like a lot of people, I like having recipes on hand that are totally delicious, crowd pleasing, easy, and I don't feel the slightest bit guilty about.  This one is awesome.  

Yes, this is another recipe from Cooking Light Magazine.  More specifically, it's by a woman named Laraine Perri, who when googled turns up all kinds of delicious results from some pretty major publications.  I plan to really explore some of her recipes later because if this one dish can be so good when I leave out steps, I'm excited to see what else of hers I can cook incorrectly yet deliciously.