DIY Pantry Staples - Vegetable Bouillon

I am unapologetically and currently obsessed with 101cookbooks.com. This healthy recipe blog by Heidi Swanson is aesthetically beautiful, super creative and absolutely delicious. This is the first recipe I've tried and has inspired me to launch into creating my own pantry staples. More to come! This recipe has pretty exact measurements so it was also an opportunity to use my new food scale while making a much lower sodium, flavorful alternative to stock.

1. Place 5 oz sliced and well-washed leeks, 7 oz chopped fennel bulb, 7 oz peeled and chopped carrot, and 3.5 oz chopped celery into a large food processor. Pulse about twenty times.

2. Add 3.5 oz peeled and chopped celeriac, 1 oz sun-dried tomatoes, 3.5 oz peeled and sliced shallots and 3 medium garlic cloves. Pulse again until all combined.

3. Add 9 oz of salt and pulse more. (The recipe calls for a lot of salt to preserve. I opted to nix the salt and instead froze in ice cube trays to preserve without all the sodium. You can introduce salt later when you use them.)

4.  Add 1.5 oz loosely chopped parsley and 2 oz loosely chopped cilantro. You may need to push the herbs to the bottom of the processor - mine tended to want to stay on top. Use 1 tsp per 1 cup of water.

Sunday Super - Red Beans & Rice with Soyrizo

I wanted something hearty but healthy and vegan to start off 2014 fresh. I probably should have went with brown rice but felt kind of lazy for the 45 versus 15 minutes of cook time.  This little number is full of veggies and filling without making me sleepy.  I also love soyrizo basically more than life itself. 

1. Cook 1 1/2 cups of rice. I'm usually pretty bad at cooking rice until i heard this great tip - cook rice like pasta in a big pot of boiling water. Simple but kind of genius! 

2. Dice 1 green pepper, jalapeño and red onion. Sauté in olive oil with soyrizo for about 5 minutes. Add 1 minced garlic clove, a heavy sprinkle of cumin and season with salt and pepper. 

3. Add 1/2 cup low-sodium chicken broth, 2 rinsed cans of kidney beans, 1 can of diced tomatoes with the juice, and 1 bay leaf. Bring to boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Serve with the rice and sprinkle scallions on top. 

Sunday Supper - Green Bean & Fingerling Potato Salad with Miso Dressing

This was technically made on a Wednesday. Emma was in town for my birthday and to ring in 2014 and we had been eating excessively. This was the first recipe I made from Tal Ronnen's The Conscious Cook and can't wait to try my next one! I definitely recommend this vegan cookbook and this great salad. It's loaded with greens and the miso makes the dressing unexpected. I also realized anything made in my Vitamix will come out tasting whipped like it's filled with cream even when it's not!

1. Boil a large pot of salted water and cook 8 oz of fingerling potatoes. Cool with cold water to stop the cooking. Slice into 1/4 inch think rounds.

2. Blanch 8 oz of green beans. Combine with potatoes and baby arugula. Season with salt and pepper. (I added red pepper flakes to mine - of course.)

3. Place 2 tbs yellow miso paste, 3 tbs rice vinegar, 1 tbs Dijon mustard, 1 garlic clove and 1 shallot into Vitamix or food processor and pulse into a thick paste. slowly add 1/2 cup safflower oil. Mix with your hands to evenly coat and not crush the leaves. Top with snipped chives.