A Green Treat (Avocado Fries)

I'm not sure if I ever mentioned my love of the idea of avocado fries (have you seen them all over Pinterest?) to J or not, but either way, he found the recipe on his own and decided to surprise me with a Saturday treat. A lovely, lovely treat.

With inspiration from here, he went to work.

What To Do

- We used four avocados, but two would suffice for two people. Cut them lengthwise and carefully remove the pit and the avocado from its skin without disrupting it too much. This means you need avocados that are just hard enough to stay intact, but soft enough to scoop out easily!

- Preheat oven to 350

- We didn't have any panko in the house, so we used a mortar and pestle to crush up soda crackers with a ton of spices. Mix in whatever you want and have fun with it! We used: himalayan sea salt, chili powder, onion salt, garlic powder, celery seed, freshly cracked black pepper, Italian blend.

- Slice your avocados to resemble fries or wedges.

- Dip each piece in egg and coat in the cracker/spice mixture.

- Place tinfoil on a baking pan and a baking rack on top of that (to make it easier to turn the soft avocados over without breaking them).

- Place the fries on the rack and bake for 20 minutes, turning them over at the halfway point.

That's it! Dip it in homemade curried mayo or agave sweetened ketchup and call it a day!

Boy am I thankful for avocados....but who isn't, really.

Peanut Sauce Rice Noodles

I posted this little gem in April 2011 with the title "It's so good, we made it twice!" We have a tendency to always try new recipes in our house and forget to venture back to our Go-to's.

In a state of "we didn't take anything out for dinner and I don't feel like slaving away in the kitchen today, whatever will we make?", I remembered this recipe. Part of the reason it came to mind is because I've been chatting with my friend Becca who has been sincerely missing her daily PB intake while she travels around Asia - which made ME think I needed to eat some PB!

Instead of simply linking out (although it's linked above), I thought I'd re-write the recipe out so it's at the top of things on here. I also changed a few things based on what I had in my kitchen. If you like peanut butter and you like Thai food, get on this!

How to make this recipe in the easiest way possible?

1. Cook your vermicelli rice noodles (the fat kind) - takes about 6 min in boiling water.

2. Meanwhile, chop up some broccoli, kale and shrimp (buy pre-cooked and you're gold!). Throw it all in a pan and saute! Throw shrimp in last if it's cooked.

3. While the above two things are cooking, throw the following ingredients in a little sauce pan on low - no need to cook it, but the temperature makes it easier to mix together:

- 1/3 cup of broth
- 1/3 cup of 100% PB
- 1 tbsp of minced ginger (you can buy it minced!)
- 1 tbsp of coconut oil
- 2 tsp of olive oil
- 1 tbsp of lime juice
- 1 tbsp of fish sauce (using soy would be fine, too)

4. Once everything is done, mix it all together in the pan and throw in lots of cilantro if you have any! You're done.

What we added to our dishes:
- More cilantro
- Ground peanuts
- More lime juice
- Sriricha

The reaction? Oh yeah - people would DEFINITELY spend $15 for this dish at any Thai restaurant in town. 

A Quick Butternut Squash Mac n' "Cheese"

I found my love for Pinterest - once again - this week and had spent some evening ogling over fake cheese recipes. I, of course, got it in my head that I had to have mac n' cheese. Once you see two photos of it on Pinterest, it's really all you begin to see. Like how many variations can they really have on there?

Off to Planet Organic I went to get the lazy-girl's dairy/gluten/soy-free version of KD - aka "Mac n' Chreeze". To my dismay, the store no longer sells it, or any other dairy and soy free alternative. Lucky for me, I had vaguely remembered one of the recipes I saw this week and grabbed a small can of pureed butternut squash.

If you recall, I did the whole roasted squash + Daiya cheese thing before and loved it, but this time I needed a quick fix and wanted to try something new. (Note: If you have the time, I still highly recommend roasting the squash - nothing beats that warm taste).

Here's the cheese sauce recipe on Pure2Raw. Boy am I glad I found this one! I was only making a small serving, so I cut the recipe in half and made a few alterations for ease.

Here's what I did (it makes about 2 servings):

In a blender (used my bullet), add:
1/2 can (14oz) of pureed butternut squash
1/4 cup of nutritional yeast
2 tbsp of tahini
1 tsp of garlic powder
1 dash of apple cider vinegar
1/4 tsp of tumeric
1/4 tsp of salt

Plop however much you want on top of brown rice pasta and heat that puppy up!