I was informed by my trainer Andre', none to subtly, that I HAVE to start eating my veggies. Here's the problem: I don't particularly like them. Don't get me wrong, I want to like them, but I just don't. Here's a list of veggies I find tolerable:
- Steamed spinach (raw is too bitter)
- Steamed broccoli (again, not raw)
- Steamed cauliflower
- Lettuce
- Cucumbers (this was a recent realization, as in the past week. I had to work my way up to it though)
- Onions, if mixed in something
- Red bell peppers if cooked down
- Corn
- Cooked green beans
- Potatoes
Yup, that's about it. Makes getting in a ton of veggies a little difficult. So that being said, I went online in a search for something I could eat that had a good amount of veggies. I came across a website that I will now be visiting on the regular: www.whatrunslori.com
On her site I found a recipe for Paleo Lasagna that looked delicious! I decided to try it and make a few changes to it. Here's the recipe I ended up making:
Paleo-ish Lasagna
- 1 bushel fresh spinach, de-stemmed and chopped
- 1 medium white onion, diced
- 1 lb extra lean ground beef or ground turkey
- 15 oz can diced tomatoes, low sodium
- 3 tbsp tomato paste
- 3 tbsp Italian seasoning
- 1 tsp salt
- ½ tsp pepper
- 2 cloves garlic, crushed
- 1 lb zucchini, sliced into strips lengthwise (about 2 zucchini’s)
- 2 C. plain Greek yogurt
- ⅓ C. shredded mozzarella cheese
- 2 wedges Laughing Cow Light Creamy Swiss
- 1 head broccoli, roughly chopped
- 1 egg
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Using a mandolin, slice zucchini into thin strips that will be used as the “noodles”. Lay them on a cookie sheet, sprinkle lightly with salt and bake for 10 minutes. Using a paper towel dry off the zucchini “sweat” and set aside.
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| We baked them on 2 cookie sheets but put them all on one to set aside In large skillet, heat 1 tbsp olive oil and add diced onions. Saute on medium-high heat until softened, around 3-5 minutes. Add ground beef, canned tomatoes, tomato paste, crushed garlic, Italian seasonings, salt, and pepper. Cook all ingredients until beef is cooked completely. Set aside.  In bowl, combine yogurt, mozzarella, Laughing Cow Light Creamy Swiss cheese, broccoli pieces and egg, mix well.  Grease bottom of 9x13 Pyrex dish with cooking spray, then smooth a thin layer of the sauce along the bottom, just enough to get a little all over the bottom. Place a layer of zucchini strips evenly atop the sauce, top with some of the broccoli-yogurt mixture, add enough spinach to cover everything and then top with sauce.  |
Top with another layer of the zucchini strips, broccoli-yogurt mix, spinach and sauce. Place final layer of zucchini strips, top with remaining sauce and about a handful of shredded mozzarella cheese.
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| Looks like I missed my calling as a food photographer, right?! Right? *crickets* Ok fine, maybe not... |
Bake 45-60 minutes or until golden brown on top.
On my plate, this is what this delicious concoction looked like:
Words cannot express how amazing this lasagna was! Not being a huge fan of zucchini, I was a little worried about the zucchini "noodles" turning me off from the dish, but I guess the sauce knocked down some of the zucchini taste. Word of warning, I don't think we dried out our zucchini enough so it was a little watery at the bottom of the pan, but I read (later, of course) that if you let it sit for about 10 minutes before cutting into it, it'll be less watery. Guess I'll have to try that out next time. It totally didn't affect the taste though. I'm not gonna lie, I can't wait to have leftovers tonight!
Cinnamon Applesauce
I love applesauce. I don't love all the extra sugar and stuff that gets thrown in there. I've been wanting to try and make my own for a while but just haven't gotten around to it. However, in my internet search for all things veggie, I came across a super easy recipe from www.paleoparents.com for cinnamon applesauce. I decided to give it a shot. The other day I bought some gluten-free, buckwheat flax pancake mix (yeah, I know. 2-year-ago-Katy would have laughed in your face if you had ever told her that I'd be buying that, like, EVER) and thought the applesauce would be good on top. So I got up early this morning to make it and have it done in time for breakfast.
- Apples, anywhere from 5-12. I used 5 for this batch. You can use any kind of apple, I used 3 Gala's and 2 Honeycrisp apples.
- Cinnamon
First, preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Then core and peel your apples, cutting them into wedges.
Place the wedges in a Pyrex dish and sprinkle with cinnamon. Mix them all around so all the apples have some cinnamon on them.
Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 1 hour.
Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 1 hour.
No, there isn't a smudge on my camera lens, that's steam that's still rising off the apples. And just in case you're a kitchen idiot like myself, when removing the foil off the pan, MOVE YOUR HAND! Lesson learned for next time. Steam burns suck.
Bexar ended up putting the apples on his pancakes whole while I mashed mine up, and they were really really good!
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| I know it's hard to see, my bad! |
In keeping with this whole lots-of-veggies thing, we made a new dish for lunch today:
Balsamic Cucumber and Chicken Tacos
This started as a recipe from www.whatrunslori.com again, and then was tweaked just a bit.
- 1 large English cucumber, thinly sliced into rounds
- 1/4 cup packed cilantro, roughly chopped
- 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
- 2 tbsp white or red onion, thinly diced
- 3 tbsp fresh lemon juice
- 1 tbsp fresh lime juice, or more lemon
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp freshly cracked pepper
Combine all ingredients in a bowl and let sit while you prepare the chicken.
We just boiled chicken with some salt and pepper until the chicken was fully cooked. You can save some time by throwing the cooked chicken in a Kitchenaid mixer with the paddle attachment. 2 minutes later and bam: shredded chicken.
You can use lettuce leaves to make this a lettuce wrap but we didn't have any so we used corn tortillas. Layer the cucumber mixture, top with chicken and any additional condiments you want-jalapenos, tomatoes, avocado, etc. This is what Bexar's tacos ended up looking like:
Mine obviously didn't have tomatoes but it was still crazy delicious!
So that's been our experiments so far, hopefully we'll keep finding new ones and if they're successful, I'll be sure to share them!
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