Parmesan and Lemon Chickpeas and the Vacation Recovery

Whenever you go away for a little while, it's always odd to come back and get into the swing of things again. Your fridge is usually empty, there is a mountain of laundry to do, mail to sort, emails to go through, tan lines and tubbiness to ponder, and then eventually you have to go back to work.

I always give myself very little transition time between traveling and going back to work. I don't know if I'm a masochist, but I tend to head back to work at break neck speed. This time I gave myself a whole 13 hours. Practically a record!

My body is arguing with me, though. I got used to eating and drinking a lot more than I was, and I find my body is wanting more food than my normal routine gives it. I'm ignoring it and trying to get it back on to my regular schedule. I'm also craving foods I didn't eat while I was on vacations... fresh raw vegetables, my favorite salad, simple foods without a stack of ingredients, sauces, and fancy names.

When I come home from being away somewhere, I usually make Parmesan and Lemon Chickpeas. The ingredients don't really go bad so I tend to have them still in the fridge or the pantry. It's a simple, one bowl and spoon meal that makes two servings. I can throw it together and sit on my bed spooning with one hand and going through emails with the other. Simple. Uncomplicated. Filling.

It's my way of kickstarting myself after the vacation stall, getting me back to regular life and remembering that consistency will come too. Eventually all the clothes will be back in the closet, the mail will be handled, the tan lines will fade, and everything will return to it's normal place. I'll just have lots of great new memories.

Parmesan and Lemon Chickpeas

If you are using grated parmesan that comes out of a tub, use the 1/8 cup measure. If you are grating your own with a microplane grater it will be very fluffy, in which case you want a fluffy 1/4 cup.

1 Can Chickpeas, drained
1/8-1/4 Cup Grated Parmesan
1 Tablespoon Good Olive Oil
2 Teaspoons Lemon Juice
Salt and Pepper

This dish is simple. Gather your ingredients. Put them in a bowl. Stir them up with a spoon and eat. Be sparing with the salt and generous with the pepper. Add more lemon juice if you like.

Eat with a spoon out of the bowl while putting your life back together.

Makes 2 servings

Pepper and Corn Summer Salad

I didn't mention it, but a few days ago this little baby blog of mine turned a year old. I think it's getting close to the realm of toddler now. I've been really lucky over the last little while because it seems I'm getting more and more visitors. Hi visitors! Thanks for coming by! Salted Spoon seems to be climbing up the Google charts a little, because lots of people seem to get here by searching for different foods and recipes.

I always find it interesting taking a peek at how people find this blog. It's always fun to see the search phrases that have been put in to get here. I think the most interesting one this week was "where to get cramble up sausage for pizza", which I hope led them to my Sausage and Pepper Breakfast Tortilla Pizza.

But it's interesting, too, to see what other people are really seeking. I get a lot of visitors looking for "cabbage as a snack". I really really like keeping cabbage on hand. I frequently make it as a midnight snack, and I think that my recipe for Charred Cabbage is what is being found.

So I challenged myself to dig through the fridge and pantry and come up with a new cabbage recipe. What I came up with was a fresh, simple and summery pepper and corn salad that uses cabbage as a wrapper. The end result was really yummy and, honestly, I'm pretty happy that I get to put this into my repertoire now.

So, for all you cabbage snack lovers out there, this one is for you.

Pepper and Corn Summer Salad

1 Cup Corn
1/2 Yellow Pepper, diced
1/2 Red Pepper, diced
2 Tablespoons Rice Wine Vinegar
1 Tablespoon Olive Oil
1 Tablespoon Green Herb (Parsley, Basil, Dill), minced
Pepper
4 Cabbage Leaves

In a large bowl, mix the peppers, corn, vinegar, oil and herbs together. I tend to have parsley available most often, but I think basil is your best choice here. Mix together and then grind over a generous amount of pepper. Mix again and taste, then adjust the seasonings.

Take four clean cabbage leaves and where the stem is thick at the bottom, cut it out in a little triangle. Divide the peppers and corn mixture between the cabbage leaves, then roll up into little wraps.

Eat over a plate to catch the drips, muttering to yourself about the deliciousness of summer while you make a delightful mess.

Serves 2.

Healthy Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

A long time ago, back in Atlanta, I made a boy I liked Stuffed Peppers. I had no idea when he and I started dating that I'd end up falling for him completely, and that in a few short months we would be living together. I had absolutely no clue that three years later, we would be deeply into the best relationship of my life. 

Please excuse the sappy. I'll stop now. 

Back when I was vegetarian, stuffed peppers was a huge go to for me. I used to stuff them with mushroom risotto. For the last six months, I've been watching what I eat and following a rigorous exercise plan. I'm not going to lie, it's been really really frickin hard. Writing a food blog and loving food as much as I do has made the whole thing so much more challenging. 

Last fall, I could barely run a quarter of a mile. I wouldn't be able to put a treadmill over 5.5mph. Going up a flight of stairs made my heart pound. 

Since then, I've cut my portion sizes, eaten healthier, and I exercise in some form or fashion several times a week. It started with walking to the grocery store that was half a mile away, then the one that was 1.3 miles, then the one that was 1.8, then the pet store that was 2.3. Soon I was running instead of walking. 

I've lost 20lb. I can now run comfortably at a 7.2, and I can run a 5k without stopping. I'm fitting into clothes I haven't worn since college, and I think there might be a few abs under my shirt. I'm happier and I have so much more energy than I used to. 

All this is huge for me. I just wanted to share. Oh, and instead of stuffing my peppers with mushroom risotto, I put Quinoa in them now. You should try that too. It's yummy.

Healthy Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

1/2 Cup Uncooked Quinoa

1 Cup Vegetable Stock

1/2 Cup Carrots

1/2 Cup Peas

2 Tablespoons Marsala Wine

2 Green Bell Peppers

In a small saucepan, cook the quinoa in the vegetable stock for 15-20 minutes until it is just cooked. Peel and dice the carrots and cut the tops off the bell peppers, slicing about half an inch down so the top comes off cleanly. Pull out all the seeds. 

Preheat the oven to 375F. In a bowl, mix together the quinoa, carrots, peas (it's fine if they are still frozen) and two tablespoons of marsala wine if you have it. You can also use a standard red, or omit it entirely, but it's best with the marsala. Stuff the green peppers with the filling, replace the top of the pepper, and wrap the whole thing in aluminium foil. 

Yes, I spelled that with the extra I. I'm English and proud.

Set the peppers on a baking pan and bake in the oven for about 35 minutes. The peppers will have cooked and all the flavors will have muddled together in a delightful manner. 

If you want to make this a touch less healthy, top it with creamy mushroom gravy (click here for the recipe).

Makes two servings.

Other recipes you might like:

Zucchini Pancakes

Welcome Made Just Right Members!

A while ago I mentioned that I had entered my Raw Zucchini Pasta with Peanut Sauce recipe in a competition for Made Just Right, and today I was lucky enough to be featured on their site! So welcome, Made Just Right-ers!

Thanks for stopping by my blog! You can sign up for my RSS feed using the button to the right, and if you scroll down you can also sign up for email subscription. Here are a few more Vegan recipes you might like!

Slow Roasted Tomatoes

Vegan Pumpkin Bread

Vegan Lentil and Wild Rice Salad with Tahini Dressing

Slackers Ratatouille 

Raw Zucchini Pasta with Peanut Sauce

Recently, I saw I had an opportunity to submit recipes for the Made Just Right recipe contest. The contest was sponsored by Earth Balance and you had to create an original recipe using one of their products. It seemed fitting to go ahead and play with an idea I'd had for a raw vegan dish. 

I recently received a spiralizer for my birthday, and I loved the idea of using zucchini to make a kind of interesting pasta. This dish is all about texture. I really like it, and it's ridiculously healthy which is good because I am still dieting (which is probably part of the reason why I haven't had so many recipe out of late). 

Raw Zucchini Pasta with Peanut Sauce

• 4 Zucchini
• 4 Carrots
• 1 Jalapeno
• 1/2 cup of Crunchy Peanut Butter
• 2 tbsp. of Soy Sauce
• 1 tbsp. of Rice Wine Vinegar
• 1 tbsp. of Lime Juice
• 1/4 cup  of Water

In a small mixing bowl, mix together the Peanut Butter, Soy Sauce, Rice Wine Vinegar, Lime Juice and Water. Mix together until smooth and set aside.

Cut the Zucchini and Carrots into ribbons. If you have a spiralizer, you can use this, but if not the easiest thing to do is to take a vegetable peeler and use it to peel down the whole vegetable. You'll be able to make thin ribbons, which will look almost like pasta

Deseed and mince the jalapeno pepper. Mix half into the dressing and taste. If you are happy with the heat level, stop there, if not just keep adding more.

In a serving bowl, mix together the dressing with the zucchini and carrots. The zucchini will have released a little water, which will thin the sauce out enough to coat everything nicely.

Grab a fork and dig in!

Serves 4

Lentil and Rice Salad and Letting the Dust Settle

The dust has finally started to settle after a really busy two weeks. My family is all back in England, my Stunt Guy is back in Georgia. My apartment is starting to get back into a more habitable state after looking for a few days like all hope was lost and it should be condemned.

I'm back to eating Single Girl's Lunch Salads daily, and the best part is that I'm finally managing to get back into the kitchen.

I'm starting to think that I might have a slight cooking magazine problem. See, I'm lucky. I often find really good deals on cooking magazine subscriptions, so I tend to get a lot of them in the mail. My problem is that I don't read them at the rate that they arrive. I read maybe one for every five that come in. This wouldn't be too big a problem, except that I keep finding stacks of unread ones all over my apartment.

Here is most of my unread pile.



I've started to get pretty good at marking recipes, then clipping them for later, though I don't think that the shoebox I am storing those clippings in is necessarily the best organizational tool. It is also getting a bit full.

But, the good thing is that I now have lots and lots of inspiration when I need it. I just dip into the shoebox, leaf through some clippings, get an idea and I'm good to go.

I also mark things in recipe books. I always have a little package of sticky tabs with me when I'm reading a cookbook. You can tell how much I like a book by how many tabs are sticking out of it.

I came home from running errands today and had what I thought was a pretty clear vision of something I wanted to make, but I thought maybe I should thumb through a book just in case. I pulled a random book from the shelf and started thumbing through the pre-marked tabs. I used to be vegetarian, and the one I grabbed happened to be a vegetarian cookbook. Inspiration, as usual, came before I'd gotten to the 10th tab. I found a lentil and rice salad. I liked the idea of that, but I decided to just use those two ingredients as my base and then make the rest up from what I had in the pantry and fridge. Luckily, it turned out pretty awesome, and I'm delighted to share the fruits of my labors with you.

I really do believe sometimes that the best food is borne out of raiding what you already have in the house. Sometimes it allows you to think up combinations that you normally wouldn't consider. This is a prime example.

Vegan Lentil and Rice Salad with Lime and Tahini Dressing
Inspired by Vegetarian and Vegetable Cooking by Christine Ingram

When you're thinking about rice for this salad, I would really recommend trying to include a mix that has wild rice in it. I have a rice medley that I pick up from Fresh and Easy and it's brown, white and wild rice mixed together. That extra chewy earthiness that wild rice has goes really well here. But, if you don't have it, use whatever you feel like.

Salad
2 Small Carrots, peeled and grated
1 Cup Cabbage, finely shredded
1/2 Cup Uncooked Rice
1/2 Cup Uncooked Green Lentils

Dressing
1 Teaspoon Tahini
2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
2 Tablespoons Fresh Parsley, minced
1 Tablespoon White Wine Vinegar
Juice of 1 Lime
Salt and Pepper to taste.... be generous with the Pepper!


Soak your lentils for thirty minutes in unsalted water, then boil them for 15-20 minutes until they are just tender. You want them cooked, but not mushy. Cook the rice, drain and set aside.
Grate your carrots and shred your cabbage. Then, mix your dressing together. Make sure to stir the every loving heck out of the tahini before you add it in. Taste the dressing and adjust the seasoning as you like. I added a smidge more vinegar than listed here, but I crave acid in everything. If you wanted, you could also substitute rice wine vinegar. Mix everything together in a large bowl. Serve with a little extra parsley on top.

You can eat this by itself pretty easily. It would go really well also as an accompaniment to fish, probably salmon or tilapia marinated in lemon juice.

Makes 4-6 Servings.

Want something sweet? Try these Chocolate Coconut Macaroons