The challenge has been pretty fun so far.
Here are some pictures and (loose) recipes of what I've made!
Teryaki beef lettuce wraps:
Maybe not the most fancy or photogenic dinner, but easy and delicious none the less. This is the dinner I made right after I got my delivery, so I just cooked with whatever I had on hand. Honestly, I find that a bottle of Soy Vay Veri-Veri Teryaki sauce always makes an easy meal and goes a long way. I also love Trader Joe's Soy Yaki.
All I did was:
- Brown some ground beef, drain it and set it aside (add salt and pepper to taste).
- Next, heat about a tablespoon of olive oil to the pan and then add chopped zucchini and mushrooms to the pan. Cook for about 2 minutes and then add some ginger (I just used powdered...like a pinch), red pepper flakes, and splash in some teryaki sauce.
- Stir that around and then throw the beef back in. Heat on medium or so till its hot!
- Then stick some in a lettuce leaf. YUM.
Zucchini Linguine (with chick peas?):
OK, so apparently, this is a recipe that can be found on more than one website. I thought it sounded weird, but then I made a BUNCH of it and I've been happily eating it for days!
All I did was:
- Cook some whole wheat linguine (according to the box). Wanna know something important about cooking pasta? Save some of the starchy water that you drain out of it. For this recipe, if you cook a whole box, save about a half cup of the water. When you're done draining it, stir the water back in (it makes the toppings stick better and also is often used in Italian cooking as an ingredient for the sauce. I read it in a book.)
- Open a can of chick peas and rinse them, set aside.
- Cut three squash or zucchinis into half-moons. Slice up three cloves of garlic. Heat about a tb of olive oil in a pan. Add the zucchs and cook until they're a lil soft. Then add garlic, chickpeas, and sprinkle some red pepper flakes and salt to taste. Cook for an additional minute.
- Add it all together and throw some parmesan cheese on top. YUM.
Green beans and shitake mushrooms:
I am ashamed to say that I had yet to, as an adult, bought fresh green beans and cooked them for dinner. I was pleasantly surprised at how delicious these were- fresh green bean kick all other forms of green beans asses. And these were especially pretty.
All I did was:
- Clean a pound of green beans (cut off the ends), rinse, and blanche. Blanching is when you boil a veggie just to the point of making it not hard, and then quickly transfer it to cold ice water. This way you're not eating it raw, but you're not cooking it to death.
- De-stem some shrooms and then slice 'em up. Also, slice about 1 clove of garlic.
- Heat up a tb of olive oil and throw in the shrooms. After a minute, add a tb of sesame oil, 3 tbs of rice vineger, 3tb of soy sauce, red pepper flakes, and garlic. Add the green beans to the pan and heat through.
- Have you noticed how often I use garlic and red pepper flakes? yeah well..
Some other things I tried were radish dip (radishes blended with cream cheese... meh), and harvard beets. Harvard beets called for cornstarch (which I didn't have) so I simply peeled and boiled the beets and then mixed em up with white vinegar and sugar. Not bad....not great. I think maybe I will use less sugar next time.
Also- the one thing I have decided I will make EVERY time I get a new box of food, is TACOS. This week, they were pretty standard, since I was sent ground beef and lettuce. I plan to be a little more creative with future ingredients. But I will tell you, I hardly ever use store bought taco seasoning and I think my spice mix is delicious (mix cumin, chili powder, salt, cinnamon, pepper, and onion powder) and I use it just like the store bought kind! Way cheaper and more authentic/ delicious-- and much less sodium.
Now I'm hungry!
