Sheppard's Pie with Sweet Potatoes

2 lbs of sweet potatoes

1 cup diced onions
1 cup diced carrots
1 cup diced celery
1 bell pepper of any color, or 1 package of mixed pepper strips - diced
1 pkg baby bella mushrooms
1 pkg of Sunshine veggie burgers (3 burgers)
2 tablespoons tamari sauce
2-3 cloves of garlic, minced

scrub the potatoes and poke with holes to release steam.  wrap in foil and bake for an hour at 400 degrees.  let cool.  They will easily slip out of their skins, discard the skins and mash the potatoes

water saute the veggies, with tamari.  Put veggie mixture into the bottom of a 2 qt casserole dish, spread the mashed sweet potatoes on top.  bake at 350 for 30 min, uncovered. 

This was a big hit with my little guy.  He was very excited to hear that there was "pie" for dinner, and he loved the mix of savory veggies with sweet potatoes.  He asks for this dish quite often now.

Garden Vegetable Soup

2  onions, diced
1 carrot, diced
1 stalk of celery, diced
12 ounces of sliced baby bella muchrooms, diced
2 small zucchini - diced
1 large can of diced tomatoes
4 cloves garlic
Italian herbs and salt to taste
4 tbls powdered vegetable broth mix

Water saute the onions till translucent.  Add in the rest of the veggies and cover with water.  Stir in the herbs and veggie broth mix.  Bring to a boil, then cover and turn down to a simmer for about 30 minutes.

This was enjoyed buy adults and the resident child. :)

Heirloom beans and Eggplant

Have I mentioned how much I am loving heirloom beans from Rancho Gordo?  They are so flavorful.  Last night I paired Vaquero beans with eggplant, and it was quite yummy in the words of my 4 yr old.

2 small/medium eggplant
1 pkg sliced baby bella mushrooms
2 cloves garlic - minced
1 pckg Trader Joe's fire roasted onions and peppers
1/2 jar of FF Trader Joe's tomato sauce
1/2 Cup Vaquero beans - soaked for at least 4 hours

1) Preheat oven to 400
2) chop off the ends of the eggplant and slice in half lengthwise.  Spray very lightly with olive oil spray and put face down on baking sheet, bake at 400 for 45 min
3) While eggplant is baking, cook the beans.  I like my pressure cooker, 12 minutes at high pressure with a natural release worked fine for these beans.
4) when eggplant is done, scoop out the flesh and chop.
5) In nonstick pan (large), water saute the sliced mushrooms, adding in the garlic after the mushrooms are soft.
6) add in the onions/peppers and continue to water saute.  Optionally add some basil (I used frozen).  Add in the eggplant beans and tomato sauce.  Lower heat, cover and simmer.

I served this over brown rice but it would go well over pasta too.

Creamy Creole Eggplant Casserole

One of my favorite cooking blogs is www.blog.fatfreevegan.com.  Susan cooks the same way that I do, using lots of veggies, no animal products and no added oils.  I've never come across a bad recipe from her site.

Tonight I tried this new one from her blog.

http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/2009/12/creamy-creole-eggplant-casserole.html  Unfortunately, I did not have any mushrooms in the house, so I had to make do without them.  Also, I had pre-chopped onions/celery/carrots from Trader Joe's, and while this recipe called for onions and celery, I thought the carrots wouldn't hurt anything.  I like tomatoes with my eggplant, so I also added a can of Muir Glen fire roasted diced tomatoes.  It was delicious!   Next time I will make sure to have mushrooms in the house (baby bellas would go great in this dish).  The non-eggplant fans in the house didn't even realize that they were eating eggplant tonight.

Heirloom beans and rice

I just discovered heirloom beans, and having tried a few varieties, will never go back to ordinary store dried beans or canned ones.  What a difference.  If you are trying to incorporate more beans into your diet, you owe it to your taste buds to check out http://ranchogordo.com.  These beans are guaranteed to be 2 years old or younger.  With soaking and a pressure cooker, these beans are almost instant food.


1 Cup (dry) brown rice
3/4 cup Rio Zape Beans - soaked for at least 4 hours (any variety of heirloom beans will do, this is what I used today)
2 onions, diced
4-6 carrots, peeled and thinly sliced
2 parsnips, peeled and thinly sliced
pinch of salt

I made short grain brown rice in my rice cooker.  (very easy, add rice & water, and press a few buttons, within 2 hours you have perfectly cooked rice that didn't need any attention).

Water saute 2 diced onions till translucent , then add a package of sliced baby bella mushrooms and some garlic.  sautee some more, then add carrots and parsnips.   Let it breathe for a minute or two, then add in the soaked beans, and enough water to cover everything.  Cover and lock the pressure cooker, and bring to high pressure.  Cook for 9 minutes at high pressure and use natural release.  When almost ready to serve, remove lid and bring to a boil.  Add a pinch of salt and the cooked rice.  Boil for about 5-10 minutes, or till beans/rice is the consistency you want.  Serve in bowls with spoons.

Eggplant Salsa over Baked Potatoes

This was from the other night, I'm behind in my posting.

If you don't alreadyown the Big and Healthy Cookbook from the Wellness Forum, you'll want to call them and get a copy. (614-841-7700).  It's full of lots of healthy vegan recipes.

I roasted 2 Italian eggplants (small), and separately sauted (in water), chopped onion, minced garlic,  mushrooms and Trader Joe's fire roasted onions and peppers.  (the local pepper crop was not good this season, too much rain.  Every pepper I bought had mold on the inside - yuck!  The TJ's frozen fire roasted peppers, on the other hand were great!).  I ran this mixture plus the eggplant thru the food processor, for a coarse chop.  I then put it all back in the saucepan and added a can of fire roasted crushed tomatoes and some nutritional yeast and let is simmer.  This was fabulous over baked potatoes.

For lunch the next day, it was equally yummy  served cold on toasted whole wheat pita with hummus.  In fact, there are enough leftovers for lunch for a few days.  Yum!!

Vegan Chili

I found this recipe http://vegweb.com/index.php?topic=16131.0, while searching for seitan chili recipe. I omitted the oil, and used a full can of red beans and one of pinto beans, instead of 1/2 of pinto and 1/2 can of black beans.  D is not a fan of black beans, and I don't like opening 2 cans that will leave me with leftovers, though I'm sure I could put them to good use later in the week.  Otherwise, we went with the recipe as written.  I served the chili over red rice, and it was very good.  As usual, I didn't cook with salt/pepper, and we found it didn't need any, though your mileage may vary.