Life in Quarantine continues.

This week I'm focusing on three good things.

#1 - I got a lovely email from Katie Drexler sharing this beautiful dish.




Katie said she had some purple Brussels sprouts and some kale so she threw them in a frying pan together with butter (lots of butter).

Doesn't that look fabulous?



#2 - Katie's obviously a much better food photographer than I am. I thought I had a lovely photo of this lentil dish, but then it blurred.




You'll have to take my word for it that it was delicious.

I've been continuing my coconut streak - more about that next week - so when I was making this lentil dish, I decided to add some coconut on top. It was perfect.

I cooked the heirloom lentils with garam masala, served it with rice, and sprinkled the coconut on top. 

Do you ever go on a binge with one ingredient?


#3 - For Mother's Day, my daughters sent me a lovely gift box from one of my favorite bakeries - Bread and Roses Bakery in Ogunquit, Maine. I have such lovely memories of stopping there with my husband for coffee and a treat before we walked along the beach. 




The one that is labeled cinnamon puff - well that is pure decadence. It's a plain muffin dipped in butter and rolled in cinnamon sugar. Oh my stars!




That's the one in the photo. I enjoyed it with a cup of coffee (they also sent the bakery's coffee) and a webcam view of the beach. 

This is an odd week for me. Yesterday was the one year anniversary of losing my husband and today is my baby's 30th birthday. In honor of my daughter's birthday, I thought I would share this post I did a few years back. It's rather timely because I've been eating a lot of lentils and hummus as spring rolls around. It's a great, easy lunch.

Every year for Thanksgiving, the vegan girl and I dig into the recipe books looking for something new to share while the others eat turkey and ham.  This year, for Christmas, we didn't want the standard nut loaf. Instead we decided on a recipe she found for lentil balls.

To be precise, we made Lentil mushroom walnut balls with cranberry pear sauce. They come from the Oh She She Glows Cookbook and you can find her recipe and a wonderful picture tight here.

For anyone unfamiliar with this cookbook, it is amazing. We call it the cookbook that never fails.  We have yet to make a recipe that isn't just out of this world fabulous. (Although if you love to see recipe  fails, she does show a pretty epic pie explosion on the page with the lentil balls!)

Since you have her recipe, I'll just give our photos.

Disclaimer: we used pecans instead of walnuts.

My favorite part was the leftovers. That's where I got creative.

The first night I spread plain hummus on pita bread, added the smashed lentil balls and added some roasted red cabbage. That was delicious, but I was so busy eating, I forgot to take photos!

As I'm typing this, I'm eating defrosted lentil balls on pita with lemon rosemary hummus, beets, and beet greens. YUM!  (And sshhhhh - so very healthy!)

Two mini pitas spread with this luscious hummus.

Frozen lentil balls

These beet greens were so gorgeous in the January market!

I chiffonaded the leaves and boiled briefly.

Or, if you want to do an uncomplicated version - I cook lentils, mix them with hummus, and put them in pita with roasted sweet potatoes and beets. Delicious and healthy.

I've been trying to eat more fresh foods, mostly plant-based, for a couple of reasons related to health and optimal weight. So last night I made a delicious recipe I'll share below.


I messaged a photo to one daughter and she said - Oh, that looks delicious.

I sent it to the other one and she said, "I can't say it photographs well." So I sent another photo and got back, "Still not my kind of meal. I had chicken."

I raised them both!

The one who ate chicken - she lived on blueberries and green peppers during one childhood stage. She's now the carnivore. She was bragging about the chili she made the other night that was beef, beans, and cheese. 3 proteins  - nothing extra - and she loved it.

The other one became a vegan in college. Her food is healthy and wholesome, but so low in calories that it can't put weight on a bird.

Did I mention I raised them both?

On to the recipe -

Last time I was in Whole Foods I noticed something new to me - black lentils. They're called the 'caviar of lentils' probably more for their color than anything else.  It certainly wasn't price - the whole bag was just $2.99.







I looked over some recipes, but then I had an idea -

I baked a sweet potato.

I cooked the lentils separately (boil for 20 minutes)

I roasted and shredded a beet.

Then I layered - the way all the finest restaurants do, right?









A squeeze of fresh orange over the top was the perfect moisture and unifying flavor. Oh, and I added some strips of Swiss Chard.

So tell me about your families. Do the family members share the same taste in foods?

What do you think of when you hear Shepherd's Pie?

I picture a cozy country cottage (probably in the English or Irish countryside) and a family gathered around the hearth eating a meat pie covered in a thick layer of mashed potatoes.

Hungry yet?

Cook's has a video. Here's hoping it plays. (You probably have to go to the page.)

https://www.cooksillustrated.com/videos/2363-shepherds-pie



I attended a Christmas party last week at a German restaurant and one of the items listed for the buffet was Shepherd's Pie. I was so excited.

Turns out German Shepherd's Pie is very different. The meat is bratwurst and beneath the potatoes was a layer of sauerkraut. Different, but delicious still.

The next day while I was waiting for my daughter's coffee drink to be ready, I picked up a magazine that had Shepherd's Pie on the cover - but it was a chicken one. The drink took awhile to be ready, so I got to read a lot. Apparently there was a lot more to changing the recipe than just switching to chicken. I wish I'd noted which magazine it was in.😟

Onward to Christmas Day.

My husband and eldest always have Thanksgiving Turkey and Christmas ham, but my vegan daughter always selects some new dish for us to try. This year we made a vegan Shepherd's pie.

The reason I'm sharing it today is because I think substituting black-eyed peas for the lentils would turn this into a rib-sticking New Year's Day meal.


(I can hear all you carnivores screaming NOoooooooo!)😱😱😱😱😱

We started with diced onions, carrots, parsnips and garlic.

Fresh thyme and sage.

Simmer everything for a while in the Dutch Oven.

The recipe called for a covering of whipped cauliflower, but my daughter had been eating so much cauliflower lately that we decided to substitute mashed turnips.

The turnips rest lightly on top.

After it's all baked.

It looks like mush here, but it's the perfect comfort food - and not an unhealthy ingredient in there!


To give proper credit, the Shepherd's Pie we made was a mish mash of these two online recipes.

Vegan Shepherd’s Pie with Mashed Cauliflower

and

Vegan Lentil Shepherd’s Pie with Parsnip and and Potato Mash

Do you have a favorite Shepherd's Pie recipe?

Any POLDARK watchers here in the cafe?

I confess a large part of this post was conceived just as an excuse to talk about Poldark.

The season finale was this past Sunday, and although there were times during this past season when Ross was anything but heroic, I stuck with it and in the end I *almost* forgave him.



If you're interested, I found a really interesting podcast interviewing Ross about the whole situation. As a fan of the show, I enjoyed it, but as a writer, it had me thinking about how I create history for my characters. Lovely to listen to him really analyze his character and his relationships.

Poldark Podcast 

So the food connection (bear with me) -

In one of the last Season 2 episodes, Dr. Dwight tells Caroline's uncle that he suffers from the "sugar disease" which I assume is diabetes.

Watching that episode on the Sunday after Thanksgiving having eaten so many wonderful pies (and heading into Christmas cookie season), I was reminded how badly I needed something healthy to eat.

So I decided to play with some healthy foods.

First I baked some gorgeous sweet potatoes.



Then I added some sprouted lentils and toasted sunflower seeds

I had the idea to add in some greens.  At first it looked like I had created an impossible mess, but they actually mashed down quite well.








I baked them for about fifteen minutes.

They made a great lunch. 

I tried adding some dried cranberries for a different flavor.

So let's talk - food or Poldark????

It's the last day of August! Can you believe it?  I don't know where the summer ran off to.

I love my teaching vocation, but I have to admit, it's really hard to go back this year after having such a productive summer of writing.

It's hot and I've been working in my classroom, so I'm relying on a lot of salads this week.  I've really become addicted to adding peaches to my salads since that experiment a few weeks ago.

My daughter and I had a conversation about how we never would have thought that tomatoes and peaches would go well together, but they really do. I prefer the low acid yellow tomatoes, but my daughter claims the heirloom ones we've been getting at the farmer's market work just as well.

This week I made a lentil peach salad. So refreshing and so delicious. And SO simple.

I've mentioned my sprouted lentils before, but I'll repeat because I think they're so amazing.



They cook in 4 minutes! I made them a little in advance and chilled them in my brand new (keeps things cold) refrigerator.

I sliced the peaches and roasted them for about 5 - 10 minutes.

I used a wonderful medley of red and green lettuces.

Drizzled with some olive oil and red wine vinegar.

So refreshing and delicious on these still-oh-so-hot summer nights.

I think they'd make a great lunch as well.

One night I also sprinkled hemp seeds on top for some additional nutrition.

And here's the beautiful salad.

It's that time of year when I'm really starting to crave healthy foods. All winter long I indulged those carb cravings and the scale does not make me happy. But more than that, I don't like the lethargy that comes after a winter of slacking off the healthy eating.

So, little by little, I've been trying to work my way back into healthier meals and snacks. But as I mentioned last week, lack of time and energy steal the inspiration all too often.

This past week I was determined to make something I could use for dinners and lunch.
I made a wonderful bowl.

Are any of you familiar with the fabulous healthy food blog - Oh She Glows?

She has a recipe for something called the Power Protein Goddess Bowl.



Mine wasn't quite the same thing, but it was good and the perfect thing to help during the weeks of crazy NYS testing.

I started with a variety of roasted foods:
red cabbage
sweet potatoes
kale
beets
sunflower seeds


While those were roasting, I made a big pot of brown rice and another pot of my sprouted lentils. I mixed the lentils with the leftover hummus from last week and baked for about ten minutes.

When everything was ready, I just mixed an assortment of the ingredients and topped with toasted sunflower seeds. Gotta love that crunch!




It was good - and just what I wanted. Because of the rice and lentils, it was totally filling but in a non-bloating way. The roasted veggies just gave a nice crunch.


It tasted great chilled too.

I need to look into something similar with spring veggies for some variety.

Do you have any ideas. Does this kind of meal appeal to anyone?

I don't want to spoil the run of peanut butter treats this week - so here you go.

Jan mentioned breakfast bars in the comments of Jill's post yesterday. I thought of these.

I haven't made them yet, but I'm definitely going to.

No-Bake Chocolate-Coconut Protein Bars


I'll update this when I make them.


Okay, back to the regularly scheduled post.

One of the things I find most challenging about healthy eating is finding the energy to cook something after a long day of teaching and tutoring. There's no way I'm going to eat what I cook for my husband - I'd weigh a ton. (He does very physical work and needs the calories) But cooking a second, healthy meal... well let's just say that more often than not, it doesn't happen.

That's why I love finding something healthy and easy. Monday night was crazy - first day back at school after Easter break, teaching, tutoring, and then a long parent meeting. It was almost 7 by the time I got home. I was starved, but I wanted something healthy.

I had beets in the frig.

I bought a sweet potato.

I had mini-pitas (low-sodium ones).

I have sprouted lentils that I love and that only take 5 minutes to cook.

There was some baby kale for my smoothies and I had a fresh container of hummus.

Inspiration!

I sliced the sweet potato, drizzled the slices with extra virgin olive oil and put them in to roast while I walked the dog. When we returned, I sliced the beets and steamed them while I showered.


Invigorated by a shower and the amazing scent of roasted sweet potatoes, I cooked the lentils, then mixed in the hummus, layered the kale on the pitas, spooned the hummus/lentil mix on top and warmed it all together a bit.

The beets and sliced potatoes went on the side but I piled them up when I began to eat.















Delicious, healthy, and most of it cooked while I was doing other things.











Best part?  Leftovers tonight so I have time to eat before the meeting at church!