Thai Vegetable and Tofu Curry

If you look closely at the picture you will notice the white stuff under the curry and you might think its rice. Well.....wait for it........ its actually cauliflower (shocking!) okay maybe Im being a bit over zealous, but today I wanted to make dinner low carb and I wanted to make thai curry.  But you can't have curry with out something to soak up the sauce and you can't eat rice without getting the carbs.  So to help with a complicated problem what would any sane person do?  Look it up on Google of course! It told me that cauliflower chopped up in a food processor will be the perfect substitute for rice.  Well I'm hear to let you know that it worked out pretty well.

Thai Vegetable and Tofu Curry
Adapted from Eating well


Ingredients

• 2 teaspoons canola oil
• 1 medium red bell pepper, cut into 1- to 2-inch-long julienne strips
• 1 medium onion, halved and sliced
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
• 1-2 teaspoons green curry paste, to taste (the original calls for red, but all i could find was green)
• 12oz Extra firm tofu drained (use about half the package) 
• 1 Cup vegetable broth
• 1 Cup Coconut milk
• 1 Tablespoon fish sauce
• 1 teaspoon light brown sugar
• 2 Cups broccoli
• 3/4 Cup Cabbage
• 2 Cups baby spinach
• 1 Tablespoon lime juice
• lime wedges

For the "RICE"

1 Head of Cauliflower

Directions 

Heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add bell pepper and onion; cook, stirring often, until beginning to soften, about 4 minutes.

Add garlic, ginger and curry paste; stir to mix. Add tofu and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 2 minutes. 

Stir in broth, coconut milk, fish sauce and brown sugar; bring to a simmer. 

Add broccoli and cabbage, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, stirring occasionally, until   broccoli is tender, about 10 minutes.

Stir in spinach and lime juice; cook just until spinach has wilted. Serve immediately, with lime wedges.

To make the Cauliflower rice 

take one head of cauliflower, wash and cut it up to fit into a food processor, chop/grind until it looks like couscous 

using another pan on medium high heat, add some cooking spray and cook the "rice" for about 3-4 minutes until warm and serve with your thai vegetables. 

Stuffed Zucchini Canoes (vegetarian)

Today old man winter did not want to place nice.  Lately the snow was beginning to recede exposing the dirty brown patches that we would normally call grass, and you could feel that spring was in the air.  sigh* I fell asleep last night dreaming of riding my bike through our little town of  Misawa listening to the birdies chirp and all the cliche things you can associate with spring.  Then the alarm went off at 5am, only to look outside and realize that 6 inches of snow had fallen, while I was dreaming of spring.
Old man winter just slapped Misawa Japan in the face! Once I dug my car out of the snow and trudged off to work, about 5 hours later we were actually released because of the constant blizzard like conditions.  It has to be serious weather for the commander to release us from work, so (sad face ) my dreams of spring will have to put on hold for a few more weeks.
   In the meantime I had bought these massive zucchinis at our commissary and got the idea to make stuffed veggie zucchini canoes.  I took all the ingredients that I thought would make a tasty filling and came up with these delicious zucchini canoes.  By the way shout out to my neighbor for rummaging through her cupboard for a can of tomato sauce. Mondays our commissary is closed and there was no way I was going to find out if the roads were plowed or not off base.

Stuffed Zucchini Canoes (Vegetarian)
Oishii Treat Original

Time: 45 min.

Yields 2 servings


Ingredients

1 X-Large Zucchini (if your store doesn't have giant ones like mine did, use 2 medium zucchinis)
1 Tablespoon Olive oil
1/2 Cup Red Peppers diced
1/2 Cup Red Onions diced
1 Garlic Clove finely diced
1/3 Cup of your favorite marinara/ spaghetti sauce
1/2 Cup Morning star beef crumbles
1 Tablespoon Parmesan cheese
1 Cup Spinach
1/2 to 3/4 grated cheese of your choice (I used a cheddar and mozzarella mixture)

Directions

Preheat Oven to 350 Degrees
Slice your zucchini lengthwise and scoop out the insides.  Be careful to leave a little of the flesh around the zucchinis. Keep the scooped out flesh, dice it up and set aside.  Spray the inside of your zucchini with some Olive oil. (I used Pam olive oil spray).  Place Zucchini rind side up on a cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes. (Once done remove from oven and turn zucchini over to get ready for the filling)
On medium high heat add 1 Tablespoon of Olive Oil to a saute pan and saute the finely diced garlic for about 1-2 minutes, add your peppers and onions and saute for another 4-5 minutes or until your peppers and onions are soft.  Add your diced zucchini flesh, beef crumbles, marinara sauce and Parmesan cheese. cook for another 4-5 minutes.  Lastly add you spinach and mix until wilted. Remove from heat and scoop filling into your canoes.

sprinkle with the grated cheese and place back in the oven for another 15 minutes. and enjoy :)

Pumpkin Roll w/ Cinnamon Cream Cheese Filling

Mmmm can you say pumpkin roll! who says that pumpkin dessert is only good in the fall...nope not this girl.  I will happily keep making pumpkin dessert all through the year.  Its also the one treat that my Nana likes to bribe me with. Yes I did say she bribes me with pumpkin roll...why does she have to bribe me with dessert you say? she believes that by bribing me with her delicious, moist, lip smacking pumpkin roll that I will make sure to visit her house first every time I'm home on leave from the military and guess what, it always works.  Since I don't get to come home as often as I like, I keep having withdrawals for my favorite dessert.  So for Christmas my wonderful Nana gave me a recipe book with all her amazing cookies and desserts that she makes for the holidays including my oh so favorite pumpkin roll. and when I start feeling nostalgic for home I like to whip it up in the kitchen.

Pumpkin Roll w/ Cinnamon Cream Cheese Filling

By Oishii Treats (my great Aunt Wilmas recipe)

Prep Time: 15 Min.  Bake Time: 14 Min.  Total: 30 Min. 

Ingredients 

3 Large eggs

1 Cup sugar

2/3 Cup pumpkin puree

3/4 Cup flour

1 teaspoon Lemon juice

1 teaspoon Baking Powder

2 teaspoons Pumpkin pie spice

Directions

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees

Grease a jelly roll pan or a cookie sheet with sides and set aside. 

Mix all of your ingredients together in a medium bowl, you can either use a whisk or electric mixer.  

Pour mixture into your greased pan and place it in the oven for 14 minutes. 

Once done cool cake, and turn out on a tea towel sprinkled with powdered sugar. 

Filling

4 Tablespoons butter (or margarine)

1 teaspoon Vanilla 

1 Cup powdered sugar

1 8oz Package of cream cheese

1 teaspoon cinnamon 

Directions

Mix all ingredients in a electric mixer until fluffy. 

Spread cake with filling, place a piece of parchment paper or wax paper at the end of the towel the cake is on.  After spreading the filling, roll the cake until it goes onto the wax or parchment paper (make sure to have some powered sugar on the paper to prevent sticking). Place roll in the refrigerator or freezer.  

Roasted Red Pepper Hummus

 One of my favorite recipes to prepare is homemade hummus.  Its not only easy but it also makes an exactly dip for chips, vegetables and spreads for sandwiches. I love making a tomato, spinach and red onion sandwich with a healthy dose of hummus spread all over my bread.  I know a lot of friends and family were asking for the recipe and here it is.  Have fun making it, the best thing about hummus is you can add all types of spices and veggies to make it your own.

What you will need

Roasted Red Pepper Hummus
By Oishii Treats orignal recipe

Yields about 1 1/2 cups

Time: 15 Minutes       Chill time: 1 Hour

Ingredients

1 Can drained and rinsed Garbanzo beans (chickpeas)
3/4 teaspoons minced garlic
2 Tablespoons Lemon Juice
2 Tablespoons Water
2 Tablespoons Olive oil
2 Tablespoons Tahini paste (sesame seed paste) * you can usually find it in the asian food aisle
1/4 teaspoon pepper
pinch of sea salt
1/3 cup roasted red peppers

Directions

add all of your ingredients except the roasted red peppers into your food processor. Press the chop button and mix together.

 Once everything is combined add your roasted red peppers and grind/chop the ingredients until fully mixed. sprinkle a little paprika on top and chill for an hour and enjoy.

Double Chocolate Mint Cookies

I had no idea want recipe I wanted to do for my first post.  Should I do a recipe I had found on the web or T.V or should I do one of my favorite vegetarian recipes? hmmm decisions decisions.

Well after coming home from the hospital from getting a laryngoscopy done (by the way no bueno, my throat is killing me now after have a camera stuffed down my throat taking pics)  I came home to find Giada on T.V and she was making 3 different chocolate baked goodies yum! plus I didn't get to eat all day because of my procedure so chocolate and cookies looked great.  The ones she was making which caught my eye was the double chocolate mint cookies.  I checked my pantry and had everything I needed except the chocolate, yikes can't make double chocolate mint cookies without chocolate!  Well after coming across a bag full of different assortments of Hershey kisses left over from Christmas I thought hey why not I can use the mint heresy kiss with the regular chocolate Hershey kiss and tada.  The end product wasn't as pretty as hers but they were still just as soft and chewy as the ones she baked on T.V.  and as long as my husband liked them no worries then.

Double Chocolate Mint Cookies
Adapted from Giada at home

Yields 12 Cookies

Prep Time 20 Minutes  Bake time 12-15 Minutes

Half a bag of milk chocolate Hershey Kisses unwrapped (about 30 kisses)
2 Tablespoons unsalted butter
1 Cup Flour
2 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2/3 Cups sugar
2 large eggs at room temp
2 Tablespoons water
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Half a bag of Mint chocolate Hershey Kisses (about 25 kisses) (chopped up)

Directions

Move an oven rack to the middle of the oven and preheat to 325 degrees.
Using a medium size pot fill it half way with water and place it on the stove on medium high heat.  Use a large glass bowl and set on top of saucepan. Making sure that the bottom of the bowl does not touch the water in the saucepan.  Place your chocolate Hershey kisses in the bowl with the 2 tablespoons of butter and let it melt away while you prepare you wet and dry ingredients for the batter. (once the chocolate and butter are melted remove the bowl and allow it to cool down before being added to the rest of the mix)
in a small bowl combine your dry ingredients together.  Flour, baking powder, cocoa powder, whisk together and set aside.  In another medium sized bowl whisk together the eggs and sugar, add the water and vanilla extract. Mix until combined.  Stir in the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients a little at a time.  once combine fold in your melted chocolate until completely combined. Add your chopped mint Hershey kisses and mix into the batter.

Using a cookie sheet and a ice cream scoop, scoop 6 mounds of batter onto the cookie sheet.  place in the over for 12-15 minutes (depending on how fast your oven bakes mine always takes a little longer I needed about 15 min.) cookies will puff up and have little cracks on the top.