Cooking at Home: Vegetable

Showing posts with label Vegetable. Show all posts

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Quick and Easy Ideas for Preparing Dinner

Image via WikipediaGot this from FindBestFood.net, and it seems to be quite practical tips.

Read on...
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Tasty Healthy Dinner Recipes- 5 Quick And Easy Ideas You Can Apply Today

Have you been searching for ways to quickly prepare tasty healthy dinner recipes? Then this is the perfect read for you. Dinner is the main mealtime of the day where the family comes together to enjoy a specially-prepared healthy home-cooked dish. However, time is always an issue, more so when you work the whole day, preparing a tasty family evening meal is already an ordeal, making it healthy too is even more difficult.

As such, on numerous toxic days, having a compilation of quick, tasty, nutritious recipes on hand is one great thing that can help prevent you from conveniently turning to to-go or ready-made foods which are usually bad for your health and your budget.

Healthy Cooking for Two (or Just You): Low-Fat Recipes with Half the Fuss and Double the Taste

I’m speaking about tasty, nutritious dinners that you can easily prepare within only 30 minutes. Yes, it’s achievable! Healthy dinner recipes don’t have to be bland or too long to make. Check out these proven techniques that have always worked for me.

Prepare Ahead Of Time

With lack of planning, you easily turn to reaching for the take-out food menu. Have a plan in place, at least 5 meals every week, and ensure that all ingredients are within reach. If possible, utilize Saturdays to cook several meals for the coming week. That way,you’ll have an entire week covered; all you’ve got to do is take it out the night before, put it inside the icebox and prepare it as soon as you get home. Even more important is that you will have a meal with flavor and texture you will surely enjoy.

Add Spice To Your Dinner Meals

More Healthy Homestyle Cooking: Family Favorites You'll Make Again And Again

Healthy dinner recipes for wholesome meals do not have to taste monotonous. Sprinkle your dinners with several spices and herbs. Adding more spices is a clever way to make the flavor come out without having to put loads of fat or calories. We may be overlooking some great spices just sitting in our pantry. Usually, the flavor can easily be altered by utilizing a new set of spices and herbs . Why not give it a try?!

Set a Standard Formula for Wholesome Meals

Healthy meals become easy if you have developed a system to follow. Always keep your healthy dinner recipes to a simple formula of protein along with carbohydrate in addition to vegetable and you will end up being equipped to create supper fairly quickly. This system can definitely include a vast range of options – roasted chicken, pasta with cheese and broccoli, grilled meat with peppers and onions with tortillas, sauteed meat with vegetables on rice. The choices are endless!

Cut Your Prep Time With Frozen Vegetables

Cooking Light The Essential Dinner Tonight Cookbook: Over 350 delicious, easy, and healthy meals

Everybody must have extra veggies and offering frozen vegetables is a convenient means to get more into your family’s eating routine. Always keep a broad variety of frozen veggies within reach. You can easily change the flavor with herbs and spices, margarine blended with lemon juice or Italian dressing. Simply put your vegetables in the microwave or on the stovetop with a veggie steamer for a short while and you instantly have your vegetables for your meal.

Fresh Fruits Are Equally Exciting, Too

Fruit is an excellent way of getting your fix without the need of binging on sweets. At meal times, throw in fresh fruit as a dessert, or a side dish, or maybe add some into the main course of your healthy dinner recipes. Fruit provides you with plenty of nutrients and it also fulfills your need for sugary treats.

Yet another great idea would be to juice a variety of vegetables then add in fresh fruit to help flavor. You won’t only get the added benefit of vegetables but also the great taste of fruit juice. It’s amazingly tasty!

The Food You Crave: Luscious Recipes for a Healthy Life

I’ll say this again – healthy cooking doesn’t necessarily equate to uninteresting taste and hours of cooking pre-work. With a little bit of ingenuity, organizing and some recipes, you can easily create healthy dinner recipes which are not only good for you and your family but also taste delicious. Put these ideas into practice and you will be on your way to becoming an expert in healthy cooking in a very short time.

Looking for actual scrumptious wholesome recipes? Check out my site to instantly get FREE tasty healthy dinner recipes.

And if you’re serious about starting or keeping healthy eating practices for you and your family as well as staying in shape more permanently, take a look at my review on The Diet Solution Program’s collection of over 50 done-for-you healthy recipes and meal plans. A MUST READ before you purchase! Click Here: HealthyDinnerRecipesReview.com. Excited to seeing you there.

About the Author: Searching for actual scrumptious healthy and balanced recipes?

EatingWell Serves Two: 150 Healthy in a Hurry Suppers

Taken from FindBestFood.net; source article is below:
Tasty Healthy Dinner Recipes- 5 Quick And Easy Ideas You Can Apply Today

Monday, January 10, 2011

Nourished by nurture

Image via WikipediaI found this great article in that it not only teaches about the values of cooking, but getting the young to enjoy cooking, and eating - the right way.

I shouldn't take away the good of finding out by yourself what the author is saying here, so I'll stop here and you go ahead.

Do take note that there are recipes and many other valuable articles that you can find in the source website, so if you are keen, follow the link at the bottom after reading.

Read on...
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Nurturing by nourishing
Teaching children to cook can undo bad eating habits, introduce healthier foods

By Su-Mei Yu

The Cancer-Fighting Kitchen: Nourishing, Big-Flavor Recipes for Cancer Treatment and Recovery

My grandson, Thomas, is 7 years old. He does not eat green vegetables, except for edamame or cooked and salted soybeans. As a toddler, he devoured canned baby food of chicken and broccoli. However, since he has discovered pasta, feta and parmesan cheese and chocolate, he has banned green vegetables from his diet.

His older sister, Claire, who is 11, is no better. Known as the hard-to-please eater in the family, her diet is limited to processed meat such as salami and pepperoni, cheeses, bread and yogurt. Recently, because of campaigns at schools to get kids to eat more healthy foods, Claire has begun to eat raw carrots, broccoli and cauliflower. Maggie, the middle child, is the best eater among the three children. She will try anything at least once — except seafood.

My grandchildren are typical of many American children, raised in the land of plenty and affluence, where parents let them decide what to eat. To someone from an older generation, this practice seems to be a new phenomenon.

One Bite at a Time, revised paper: Nourishing Recipes for Cancer Survivors and Their Friends

When I was growing up, our family ate everything my mother cooked — with no questions asked. We were expected to finish everything on our plate. My mother never cooked separate dishes for children. Subsequently, we learned to appreciate endless varieties of foods with different tastes, flavors and textures.

More recent generations of parents appear to think that their kids know best. Or, perhaps, everyone in the family is so busy that at dinnertime all we want is to have our children eat something — anything. So, our children end up choosing and eating addictive foods that are laden with lots of fats, salt and sugar.

My grandchildren are good examples of the challenge facing us. How do we get our young ones to eat healthy foods? Most importantly, how do we convince them to eat vegetables?

Recipes for Life After Weight-Loss Surgery: Delicious Dishes for Nourishing the New You (Healthy Living Cookbooks)

I have eaten healthy foods all of my life. I am also a cook and a cookbook writer. I’ve been invited to write a regular column featuring children’s ideas and recipes for preparing seasonal vegetables, dishes that they will want to eat. In doing so, I hope that not only children such as my grandchildren will begin to eat more vegetables; I also hope to teach them to appreciate how vegetables are grown and how they mature. And in the process, we can develop an understanding of the relationship between the environment and healthy food. Most of all, I would like to get children in the kitchen with the adults in the family, to learn to cook. I believe cooking is a part of the cultural fabric that holds families together and promotes the well-being of our society.

Besides, cooking can be fun — really!

The first recipe here is a creation of my grandson, Thomas. He calls it Veggie Pasta. He not only chose the vegetables he wanted in his pasta, including corn and carrots; he also prepared them. He diced the carrots and helped mix corn into the whole-grain pasta that his mother helped him cook. While dicing carrots, he thought that his pasta needed more color, and so he came up with edamame. He pondered seriously whether he should put his favorite feta cheese in his creation, since other children might not like it. We had a serious discussion about this, and I convinced him that this was his recipe and he should make it the way he would like it.

Since Thomas knows nothing about cooking, his mother suggested that the pasta should be baked after being mixed with the vegetables and cheese. Thomas didn’t agree. He thought the feta cheese would become “bland,” or in other words, lose its sharp flavor. He was right.

Granddaughter Claire had been thinking about our little project. She had taken cooking classes last summer and loved them. Claire believes kids will eat something that not only tastes good but looks good, because pretty and artistically presented food is more appealing. She didn’t want any blah-looking food with everything all mishmashed together. Her mother bought prepackaged multiple-colored cauliflower and broccoli florets from Trader Joe’s.

Claire decided to make vegetable nachos with them. She baked the dish for about 4 minutes in a preheated oven, so that the florets were still raw and crunchy. They were delicious — and Claire actually ate them.

Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats

Maggie, in the middle, had a girlfriend over to do a school art project. She did not have the time to cook, but both the girls and the adults ate Thomas and Claire’s creations.

We congratulated them on being talented cooks, and on their winning recipes.

Taken from SignOnSanDiego.com; source article is below:
Nurturing by nourishing

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Salmon Chowder

Image via WikipediaThere's so many chowder soups out there, and there is usually one or two that you will be very fond of, a taste that you will prefer to the rest. If you like salmon chowder, here is one.

Happy eating!
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Recipe Finder: Salmon Chowder
By JULIE ROTHMAN - The Baltimore Sun

Don Neuman of Longview, Wash., was looking for a recipe he has lost for salmon chowder. He said that the recipe came from the label on a can of Veg-All back in the 1950s. As he remembers, the chowder was made with canned salmon and also called for a can of Veg-All and other ingredients he cannot recall. After some research, I learned that Veg-All is the brand name for canned mixed vegetables that has been around since the mid-1920s. The product is still being made today. Unfortunately, a search of the Veg-All website did not turn up a recipe for salmon chowder.

However, I was able to locate many simple salmon chowder recipes that sounded as if they might come close to what Mr. Neuman was looking for. I tested and modified a recipe I found on http://www.tastebook.com, submitted by Denise Pettiford-Bulluck. The major change I made to her recipe was to substitute a high-quality canned salmon for fresh cooked salmon. The resulting soup was hearty and flavorful and, hopefully, comes close to what Mr. Neuman was wanting to make again.

SALMON CHOWDER
Makes: 8 servings

1 (14.75-ounce) can salmon or 2 cups cooked cubed salmon
2 cups diced peeled potatoes
1 1/2 cups frozen mixed vegetables
1 large onion, chopped
1/2 teaspoon celery seed (optional)
2 cups water
1 cup tomato juice or 6 plum tomatoes, peeled, seeded and chopped
3 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
2 cups milk
Fresh chopped parsley or dill for garnish

Remove skin and bones from canned salmon.
In a Dutch oven or soup kettle, combine the potatoes, vegetables, onion, celery seed, water and tomato juice or plum tomatoes. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes, or until vegetables are tender. In a saucepan, melt butter. Stir in the flour, salt and pepper until smooth. Gradually add milk. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened. Add to vegetable mixture.
Stir in reserved salmon; heat through before serving. Garnish with fresh parsley or dill.

This recipe was taken from below source:
Salmon Chowder

Monday, November 8, 2010

6 Healthy Foods

Various fruits, vegetables, nuts, and grains; ...

Image via Wikipedia

When the weather outside is frightful staying inside is so delightful. Whether the change in season brings rain, wind, snow, or all the of the above, it’s a perfect time to cozy up inside your home and enjoy some of your favorite comfort foods. Resist the temptation to order take-out and choose the healthier and cost-effective route by making them yourself. With these 6 simple recipes you’re only a few steps and ingredients away from warming up your belly and charming your taste buds.

Breakfast: French Toast

Blend together milk (or non-dairy alternative), bananas, cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla to taste. Dip bread into the mix, coating both sides. Fry in well-oiled skillet until golden brown. Serve with maple syrup and fruit.

Snack/Appetizer: Miso Soup

Dissolve miso paste in hot water. Mix in chopped green onions, chopped garlic clove, some small cubes of tofu, and a few pieces of your choice of seaweed (such as wakame, nori, or dulse). Add in some leafy greens for some extra nutritional satisfaction.

Side dish: Roasted Vegetables

Choose your favorite veggie(s), such as squash, yams, beets, and broccoli. Slice up vegetable(s), coat with oil, season with salt and pepper to taste, and put in single layer on baking sheet. Bake at 400℉ for 20-30 minutes, checking towards the end to see if they’ve browned. If you want some extra flavor, experiment by adding your choice of spices, and/or toss in some nuts and dried fruit after cooking.

The World's Healthiest Foods, Essential Guide for the Healthiest Way of Eating

Entrée: Lentil Stew

Sauté 1 onion in a pot until soft and clear (about 5 minutes). Add 2 carrots (chopped) and 2 potatoes (cubed), and continue to cook for a 3-4 minutes. Add in 1 cup of lentils, 3 cups of veggie broth, and 1 cup each of other vegetables of choice (such as tomatoes, spinach, or kale). Simmer until lentils are soft (20-30 minutes). Season with salt and pepper.

Dessert: Baked Apples

Core large apples and place in a baking dish with 1/2 cup of water on the bottom. Fill apples with: chopped walnuts, raisins, brown sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg (to taste). Bake at 350℉ until apples are tender (approximately 30 minutes).

Treat: Hot Chocolate

Heat milk (or non-dairy alternative) in a small pot on low heat and remove from heat before it boils. Whisk in cocoa powder, vanilla, and maple syrup to taste.

Wellness Super5Mix Dry Dog Food, Healthy Weight Recipe, 26-Pound Bag

This article was lifted from below source:

6 Healthy and Easy Comfort Food Recipes

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Thursday, April 29, 2010

Cover of Foods That Harm, Foods That Heal

The general perception for the eggplant is not a glamorous one. It is often one that carries with it not much content. This is due to the prevailing knowledge that eggplant doesn't present much vitamins and minerals, and its taste isn't something that you will crave.

There is little mentioned about the nutrients that can be derived from the eggplant, even in Reader's Digest's book, Foods That Harm, Foods That Heal, but one article in the Ezine directory gave a complete twist to that outlook, or should I say, perception, on eggplant.

That article tells about all the health implications or miracle - that can be derived from the eggplant. See it here: The Lowly by Extraordinary Eggplant.

As for the cooking side, read on...

Cooking Eggplant - Tips and Information

Eggplant: More Than 75 Delicious Recipes

If you're cooking eggplant for the first time, it may seem a bit tricky. Eggplant can be cooked in many ways and perhaps this is why people often take ages to decide how they're going to cook it.

Its beautiful purple skin is sure to add color to any dish and its sturdiness is ideal since it's perfect for grilling.

Very popular with vegetarians, eggplant is also a great accompaniment to meat dishes.

Eggplant is often mistaken for a type of vegetable but it is in actual fact a fruit.

This very versatile fruit can be cooked in various ways. For example, you can marinate it or roast it. Others prefer to use it in stews with meat and potatoes. Eggplant can be served either hot or cold.

You can also serve eggplant by itself as a side dish. A simple way to do this, is to slice the eggplant in wedges removing the top and bottom, brush some olive oil on it and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Bake it until lightly brown. Serve immediately.

If you don't like the taste that much, you can stuff the eggplant with your favorite filling and serve it with other veggies and potatoes. Using spices will also make a huge difference when cooking eggplant. Some spices that go well with eggplant are oregano, bay leaves, basil and parsley.

Simply Eggplant: Kosher Recipes from Around the World

The seeds of the eggplant are somewhat bitter so it's best to remove most of them if you're not too keen on this fruit, and especially if small kids are going to try it.

A word of caution. Eggplant absorbs a lot of oil! So if you're following a healthy diet be careful with the amount of oil that you use.

Eggplants can be very conveniently stored and you can steam and freeze them for up to six months!

So next time you see some lovely fresh eggplants, make sure to grab some because with a little thought and preparation, cooking eggplant can be quite easy.

Vintage Kitchen?Baked Eggplant Finest LAMINATED Print Grace Pullen 11x14

If you'd like to get your hands on a delicious eggplant recipe that is sure to become a family favorite, visit this Cooking Eggplant page.

Interested in trying other mouth watering recipes from the tiny Mediterranean island of Malta? Visit Addictive Maltese Recipes today!

Article Directory: EzineArticles

The Eggplant Cookbook: Classic and Contemporary Recipes for Today's Healthy Diet

Lifted from Ezine article directory; source article is below:
Cooking Eggplant - Tips and Information
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Monday, April 26, 2010

Planting Your Own Veggies

Image via Wikipedia

Back when I was a child, there was a small piece of land that we looked after. Our relatives didn't occupy that land until some time lately, and that gave us opportunities to at least plant some fruit-bearing trees, and some for foliage and ornaments.

I had my chance of discovering that I can plant. Yes, I'm a green thumb.

Unfortunately, the country that I and my family migrated in doesn't present me that opportunity. If ever there is anything that I can put on the soil, the soil has to be in a pot. We live high above the ground, suspended in mid-air by the layers of flats above and below us... (I did had a good success with my orchids and euphorbia in my previous flat - the sun was shining in our favor).

Well, still there is an opportunity, but not like if it were really a piece of land.

Nevertheless, I found this article from Ezine directories, and it tells about growing your own vegetables, primarily, to be sure that you are growing a healthy piece of green to put on your plate later on, and secondly, to save!

Not to delay any longer, here it is:

Save Money and Eat Healthy - 5 Critical Steps to Growing Vegetables

Burpee : The Complete Vegetable & Herb Gardener : A Guide to Growing Your Garden Organically

Wow. Have you seen the prices of vegetables lately? Week-after-week, I cringe as I walk through the produce isle of my local grocery store. As wallets get thinner, it seems like prices are skyrocketing. And the worst part is the veggies aren't even that good.

So if you're ready to put your hands in the dirt and grow your own delicious and healthy vegetables...be prepared to save money and have some fun! Follow the next 5 steps and you'll be well on your way to a vegetable garden that your friends and family will be fawning over!

STEP 1: Location, Location, Location!

Yes, I know...that's a real estate term but the same holds true for your veggie garden. Plants love sun...the more the better. So when you scout for a location, pick the spot that gets full sun for the longest amount of time throughout the day. Now if you happen to have a shady yard then you might want to consider container gardening. This way you can garden almost anywhere that's sunny...even on the roof of a Manhattan skyscraper! So look around, make note of the amount of sun hitting certain areas of your yard and then move on to the next step.

STEP 2: Choose Your Method

Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades: The Complete Guide to Organic Gardening

Are you going to go with raised beds or are you going to plant right into the ground of your yard? Most people like the raised bed method because of a number of factors. First, it doesn't matter what kind of soil you have in your yard, you can use the best soil in your raised garden. The soil also warms up at a much faster rate so your plants will grow faster. The easiest way to do this is to make small frames with 2 x 6 wood planks...no more than 3 to 4 feet wide (if you're planting several next to each other, be sure to leave enough room in between the boxes for you to walk). And you can even go less than that, it just depends how much room you have. Then simply fill in the frame with high quality soil and you're done!

STEP 3: Prepare the Soil

Your plants will need nutrition to grow big and strong and organic gardeners will love this step! Mix a good amount of something called organic hummus to your soil (even if you're using potting soil). Now if you don't have a compost pile available to add the contents to your soil, go to your local garden center and grab some bags of processed manure and mix it in to your soil. You'll be amazed at the results!

The Vegetable Gardener's Bible (10th Anniversary Edition)

STEP 4: The Fun Part - Choose the Type and Amount of Veggies You Want to Grow

So what type of veggies do you want to grow? Tomatoes, asparagus, broccoli, carrots? It's totally up to you and it simply depends on what you like and the time of year. So have fun with this part. Now once you choose the types of veggies, you then have to decide how many to plant. Your first consideration will be how many people are in your family who'll be eating the crops. But there's an old farmer's saying - a row of each for each. That means plant one row of veggies for each member of the family. Of course the amount you can plant on each row depends on the row size. Play around with the numbers. And remember, you can always can or freeze the excess.

STEP 5: Planning the Layout

Here's where you have to take direction and shade into consideration. Plant your rows going North to South. This way you won't have one row shading the other and stunting the growth of those plants. Then all of your taller crops (beans, corn, peas, etc) should be planted on the north side so they won't shade your shorter plants. Medium size should be located in the middle (tomatoes, cabbage, broccoli, etc). And smaller varieties should be on the south end (carrots, lettuce, onions, etc). If you follow this layout, all of your veggies will get the sun exposure they need to grow well.

Grow Vegetables: Gardens - Yards - Balconies - Roof Terraces

So there you have it...the 5 critical steps to growing your own vegetables. Use this as your starting guide and then do more regional-specific research on what types of vegetables grow where you live and the best time to plant them.

You'll be amazed at the amazing flavor you'll get when you pick ripe and ready vegetables for your next meal. And you'll be even more satisfied when you realize the hundreds of dollars you save every year just by putting in a few, enjoyable hours in your garden.

Happy gardening!

Liberate Yourself from Store-Bought Vegetables Now!

See how easy it is to start growing the vegetable garden of your dreams.

Limited time FREE BONUS offer so click on Start Your Vegetable Garden now to claim your FREE bonuses.

Article Directory: EzineArticles

Taken from Ezine article directories under the same title.
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Cooking at Home

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Quick and Easy Ideas for Preparing Dinner