Eat Your Veggies - (and make 'em taste good too)!

One of my pet peeves is media and ads telling us that in order to eat vegetables or to get kids to eat vegetables, we need to disguise them - we need to make them not taste like, well, vegetables. Well, that's just stupid! Vegetables taste amazing!

I feel like I am qualified to say this. I spent the first 20 years of my life not eating vegetables - unless you count canned green beans and corn (which are vegetables...but come on - that's not much). I didn't even eat spaghetti sauce. My poor mother had to bribe my brother and I to try them, and I HATED VEGETABLES. So...if I can now say that vegetables are delicious and some of my favorite foods...well, that's saying something :)

I got a wild hair this afternoon and decided to do some cooking. I had been looking at one of my favorite cookbooks - Ellie Krieger's "The Foods You Crave", and got very excited to cook. Ellie is a Registered Dietitian (like me!), but with a flair for cooking. She's not one of those old-school RDs that I dislike so much that tell us all the things that we can't eat...and then throw flavorless brussel sprouts on our plate and expect us to be satisfied. No, Ellie teaches us how to make dishes that are beautiful, easy to make, healthy, and most importantly...delicious!! Here were some of my dishes I made tonight. As you can see, I made a pretty big mess (but it was well worth it).

Umm...this was SO MUCH prettier in person than on the camera...hmm...I thought I got a better picture. This is a vegan hybrid of Ellie's Fetticine Bolongese. The orignial recipe uses 1 lb of ground beef, but this one has vegan meatballs (which surprised me with how good they were actually. I've also made it with green lentils instead of beef, so do what makes you happy!! My version is this...

Heat olive oil in a skillet. Chop (I chop very finely, but you can make it as chunky as you want) 1 onion, 2 stalks celery, and 2 carrots. Add to the oil and cook until soft. Add a tsp of thyme, a clove of minced garlic, and the meat/vegan balls/lentils. Cook until warmed. Add 2 cans of diced tomatoes (I use one can diced and one can sauce). Cook for 10 minutes. Turn the heat down and add about 1/4-1/2 cup of evaporated milk (I use regular soy milk). Add to noodles and be amazed!!! SOOO GOOD. My dad and brother (nonvegetable eaters) have even eaten the ground beef version of this and liked it - even with all those veggies :)

This is radish, snap pea, and scallion salad - added a sweet vinegar dressing. I feel bad giving away all of Ellie's recipes, so buy the book. This one is worth it!!

This last one is Jewel Roasted Veggies. Aren't all the colors pretty?? I really think so. I'm not a huge brussel sprout fan, but roasted this way, they are SO GOOD. The purple stuff is beets. I'm new to the beet world, but so far, so good. This would make a pretty fall dish and great for Thanksgiving. Really, you could use any vegetables that are in season.

So anyway, these are just a few examples from tonight. Now I have some fun things to eat for a few days. The rest of this week, I plan to make a chile sweet potato soup, a spinach and chickpea salad, and roasted snap peas with miso sauce. These meals are so filling, so flavorful, and so good for me.

I hope you all get on the veggie bandwagon!! Anyone want to share their favorite veggie recipe??

Here is the link to Ellie's book. Seriously, if you buy one cookbook in your life - THIS IS IT!! I've never used a cookbook like I use this one!

http://www.amazon.com/Food-You-Crave-Luscious-Recipes/dp/1600850219/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1286331806&sr=8-3