Avocado Pasta

I owe Rosie at The Londoner for this idea.  Here's her post Avocado Spaghetti.  I just noticed that she spelled spaghetti wrong, but I suppose I'll forgive her because her food posts are amazing.  Or maybe leaving out the h is a British thing?

Look at that deliciousness!  I just had to make the photo extra-large for optimum viewing...

Unfortunately, I made this sometime last week and can no longer remember exactly what I put in it.  I knew I should have written it down...but I remember the gist of it. 

2 avocados

some fresh basil off my windowsill plant (best thing ever)

some minced garlic and alfredo sauce

and some olive oil

don't forget the pasta

Fruity Chicken Salad

oh-so-delicious

two chicken breasts, cooked and shredded

one golden delicious apple, chopped

big handful of cherries, pitted and chopped

3 large stalks celery, chopped

small spoonful of sour cream

large spoonful of mayonnaise

Rosemary-Chocolate Heaven

In cookies.  

Does it get any better?

I used my basic chocolate-chip cookie recipe, but added approx. 1 tbsp of dried rosemary.

Cookie Recipe

1 egg

1/2 stick of butter, melted*

1/4 c vegetable oil

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 c brown sugar

1/4 c white sugar

1/4 c wheat flour

1 c white flour

bake at 375 for 8 minutes

makes 24 cookies

*if you have a mixer you don't need to melt the butter...I melt it because I mix by hand

Yay Pictures!

contemplating the impending yumminess

the conclusion

best. cookies. ever.

Tomato Soup Scramble

Everybody's heard of Green Eggs...but how about...Orange Eggs?  

Aren't they pretty?

I wanted to spice up my scrambled eggs this morning because plain scrambled eggs are boring.  

And I had some leftover tomato soup in the fridge. 

I added about 6 or 7 spoonfuls of soup to 3 eggs.

I ate them on top of a sliced and toasted rosemary breadstick. 

The breadstick was also a leftover.  

Hooray for meals made from leftovers!

Purist Burger

Unusual for me.  I made a burger that was just. beef. I normally make my burgers exactly like I make my meatballs and meatloaf; with egg, breadcrumbs, herbs, and whatever else I feel like throwing in.  This time, I just took a hunk of beef out of the package, molded it into a burger-shape, and threw it in a skillet.  Of course, this was less because I wanted to be a purist, and more because it was faster and easier...I was hungry.  And I didn't want to make a whole pound of hamburgers, I just wanted one.

I served myself the hamburger on a bed of warm coleslaw, with some tomato and avocado.  Yes I played with my food and made it look pretty before I ate it. The plate is my canvas, food is my paint.  Or something like that. 

The coleslaw was about 1/2 of a small cabbage, and 1 medium carrot chopped up and cooked in a little bit of olive oil.  I tossed it with a bit of ranch dressing after removing it from the heat.  It was tasty.  

As for the lack of a hamburger bun...I'm on this kick where I'm trying to eat more protein and less carbs.  (or less carbs from bread and pasta, anyway) Carbs are necessary for energy...but not in the quantities that I normally consume.  I still eat a carb-loaded pancake for breakfast most days, and often a sandwich for lunch, but I'm finding that once I got used to the occasional bread/pasta-less meal, it's not so bad.  I can actually satisfy my hunger at dinner without eating pasta.  Who knew?  

Steamed Asparagus

Steamed Asparagus...and some other things of course.  Because asparagus doesn't make a meal. 

Thank you, Alton Brown.  I turned on the TV the other day while I was eating lunch so I could...watch somebody else making food... and this is what I found.  I'm still not an asparagus lover, but it's supposedly super good for you, and I just happened to pick some up the last time I went grocery shopping so...

So today, I decided to try his asparagus-steaming method.  I don't normally cook lunch, but I was short on options, and didn't really feel like a tuna-sandwich.  I ran a 5 mile race this morning (came in 1st place overall with a time of 33:08...felt good to beat all the guys...) and I wanted a nice big pasta lunch to refuel.  So I made some sort of tuna-mac, and decided to have asparagus on the side for a vegetable.  Because otherwise I would have had to make a salad...and I'm getting bored of salads.  And I'm pretty sure salads are NOT the food of champions...just because.

So for the asparagus...I soaked a couple of paper towels, chopped the ends off of about 20 asparagus stalks, and laid them on the towels.  I sprinkled them with salt, garlic powder, lime juice, and fresh basil.  Then I rolled it up, put the roll on a plate, stuck it in the microwave, and set it for 3 minutes.  They came out super bright green which is awesome...because it means I didn't cook out too many of the nutrients.

I still don't love asparagus...but these were definitely more on the edible side of the asparagus-scale.  They actually weren't too bad.  If only they didn't taste quite so much like...asparagus...

The tuna-mac was pretty simple, just pasta, tomato soup, tuna, and shredded cheese.  It would have been way better if I had baked it, but I was too hungry to wait that long.

And of course...what's a celebratory meal without a tasty beverage?  The cantaloupe I chopped up the other day was super juicy, so I saved the juice.  Today, I added some lemonade to that juice.  And some whiskey.  It was tasty and refreshing. And pretty.  

Stir-Fry the second: Peanut Butter Beef II

I just had to try the same thing again...with just a few modifications of course!  

I liked it better this time, much less watery, much more peanut-buttery!

Here's the first try in case you're interested.

And here's today's:

The Vegetables 

(cleaned and chopped into bite-sized pieces)

-3 small carrots

-1 1/2 c (approx) fresh green beans

-8-10 stalks fresh asparagus: cleaned

-4 fresh radishes

-1/4 c mushrooms

cook in a big skillet with some olive oil, minced garlic, and salt

The Meat

2 slices of thin-sliced beef, chopped into bite-sized strips

cook in a skillet with some bacon grease and chopped rosemary

when cooked, add 2 large spoonfuls of crunchy peanut butter (DO NOT drain the water that appears in the skillet during the cooking process!)

once the PB has been added, stir continuously until the PB is evenly distributed

The Pasta

whole wheat angel hair pasta, broken in half before boiling 

The Meal

layer in a bowl: pasta, vegetables, meat

Eat Up and Enjoy!