chicken spinach rice gratin

i go to class on wednesday evenings. the class is from 6:30 to 8:30pm and more wednesdays than not, dave walks in the door from work right as i'm running out of it. on tuesdays i plan ahead so that he doesn't have to fend for himself for dinner. leftovers are key - for both of us. i usually end up grabbing a bite at 9 when i get home.

i tried my second recipe from 101cookbooks yesterday, and again i was thrilled with the results.  the original recipe is vegetarian and is called just spinach rice gratin. it's a nice name, i think: spinach rice gratin. it makes it sound glamorous to my ears and better than what it could be called: spinach rice casserole.

there are several things about this dish that i love. for one, it's really very easy and i imagine difficult to mess up. two, it has a ton of spinach in it so it feels like you're eating naughty starches but you're getting leafy greens, too. and three, despite its name it doesn't actually have all that much cheese in it (while still tasting cheesy).

here's how to make it (my way):

ingredients:
2 chicken breasts
3/4 cup white rice
3/4 cup brown rice
2 cups finely chopped fresh spinach
1/2 cup shredded parmesan
1 small red onion, diced
1/3 cup sliced almonds or pine nuts (or a combination of both)
2 tablespoons olive oil

3 large eggs

1/2 teaspoon salt
a sprinkling of shredded mozzarella (optional - for the topping)

what to do:

preheat the oven to 400F or 200C. lightly grease a baking dish with olive oil.

combine the white and brown rice and rinse thoroughly. put into a medium pan and add 3 cups of water. bring to a boil, then simmer for approximately 15 minutes until water is absorbed. let sit, uncovered to bring the temperature down. stir occasionally to let out steam.

meanwhile, saute chicken breasts (or boil, use leftovers, whatever you have) until they're cooked through and chop into small pieces.

in a large bowl, combine the rice, spinach, and chicken. next, stir in the red onion, almonds/pine nuts and olive oil (leave a bit of the onion and pine nuts for garnish). stir in a bit more than half of the cheese you have (saving a bit for the top). in a separate small bowl, whisk together the eggs and salt. fold the egg mixture into the rice mixture, transfer everything into a baking dish and sprinkle with the remaining cheese.

bake for 30 minutes or until the casserole is set. enjoy!

grilled veggie gnocchi

i'm trying to be much better with leftovers. i don't often make enough at one meal to last another, but sometimes i have pieces of a meal left over that get stuck in the fridge. wasting less food is at the top of my kitchen priority list right now. for one, it's expensive to throw away all that yummiess and two, why would we throw away yumminess?!

after our meal the other night of grilled chicken and vegetables, we had a fair amount of veggies left over (by design, this time). i find that leftover grilled vegetables are fabulous. sometimes we put them over pasta, in quesadillas, on sandwiches, on a pizza, on their own - they're very versatile.

i decided to try something new this time.  dave's had this thing for gnocchi recently, so i decided to give it a whirl. i didn't even make my own - this was the easiest dinner ever. i boiled the gnocchi* per the instructions on the package, added just enough roasted vegetable tomato sauce (store-bought!) to coat, and piled veggies on top. we topped everything with some freshly grated parmesan cheese and let me tell you - DELISH!

*the gnocchi we get at one of our grocery stores is gluten-free. the gnocchi that is available at the other two supermarkets is most definitely NOT gluten-free to be sure to check your packaging!

hello, spring! let's grill!

in honor of the beautiful weather we've been having, we broke out the grill the other night for the first time this season. you could argue, of course, that you could use the grill year-round, but there's something about leaving the door to the backyard open as we wander in and out to check on things. i also love that since it's finally light out for more than 5 hours a day, we don't need to grill our food by artificial light.

one of our favorite things to grill up is a whole bunch of veggies that we then cut up and make a 'salad' out of. we usually add onions, peppers, zucchini, corn on the cob, and often asparagus and eggplant.  we had all but the last two this time.

we also grilled up some chicken breasts and we marinated everything in the same stuff: a combination of olive oil, honey, lemon juice, tabasco sauce, red pepper flakes, cayenne pepper and of course salt and pepper. YUM.

leftovers!

i had some leftover broccoli pesto and fire chili from the double broccoli quinoa i made and i wanted to use it up. i wanted to throw together something quick so i sauteed up a bunch of veggies (onions, peppers, zucchini, snow and sugar snap peas - anything would have worked), boiled some gluten-free pasta, and mixed everything together with some of the pesto. we topped it with fresh mozzarella cheese and fire oil. delish! i also think this would be really good with some grilled chicken on top!

double broccoli quinoa

i've been on the facebook bandwagon for quite some time now. i see its usefulness in reconnecting with old friends and staying in touch with people you might otherwise not. twitter, however, is something that i just really haven't understood. i don't understand why i should care about what someone else can say in 140 characters or less.

i've been reading up on what successful etsy shop owners do, however, and twitter is one of them. so, i signed up. i've been tweeting and i figured i better follow some other tweeters. i started following allrecipes. then the food network. then i figured i should follow the gluten-free girl, too. and then i started following a few other people who were featured often on any of those tweet feeds. and so it began. i've discovered some great new (to me) food bloggers.

one such blogger is from 101Cookbooks. i'm really loving this blog - everyone should definitely check it out. i made my first recipe from here last night and it was GREAT. it's a quinoa and broccoli dish with a broccoli pesto - hence the "double broccoli" part of the name. yum.

first up, the ingredients:

1 cup uncooked quinoa
2 cups chicken or vegetable broth
5 cups raw broccoli, cut into small florets
3 medium garlic cloves
2/3 cup sliced or slivered almonds, toasted
1/3 cup freshly grated Parmesan
2 big pinches of salt
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup heavy cream (this is really optional)

some optional toppings:
fresh chopped basil
fire oil*
chopped avocado
crumbed feta or goat cheese


next up, prepare the quinoa. rinse the quinoa in a mesh strainer. add it to a saucepan with your broth. bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer for about 15 minutes, covered. the quinoa should be fluffed. (it's a lot like making rice.) set aside the cooked quinoa covered to retain the heat.

up next, the broccoli. put a few inches of water into a large bot and bring it to a simmer. add the broccoli and cover. cook for just about two minutes. we want the broccoli to still have a bit of a crunch to it, but not taste raw. strain the cooked broccoli and run under cool water briefly to stop the cooking.

take a little less than half of the broccoli and put it into your food processor. add the garlic, about 1/2 cup of almonds (i added a bit of toasted pine nuts as well), the parmesan, lemon juice, a pinch of salt and a bit of fresh basil if you have it. drizzle in some of the olive oil and cream (if you're adding it) and pulse until your broccoli pesto is smooth.

combine the quinoa and remaining broccoli florets in a big serving dish. you'll end up adding about half of the pesto, but do this slowly. garnish with the rest of the sliced almonds, avocado, fire oil, cheese, or anything else you think would be yummy.  (we did almonds, avocado, fire oil, and crumbled feta.)

ENJOY!


*for the fire oil, heat up 1/2 cup of olive oil in a small pan until it's hot but not smoking. then remove from heat and add 1 1/2 teaspoons of red pepper flakes. stir, then set aside and let cool. you store this in the fridge, but it should be room temperature when you use it.

spicy vegetable stir-fry with coconut rice

we've been traveling a lot this year and it's been wonderful. the only real downside (besides being tired, of course) is that while we love eating out, i love healthy food IN, too.

last night i put together a veggie stir fry on coconut rice and it was tasty.

first, the rice:

1 cup uncooked rice, rinsed
1 cup light coconut milk
1 cup water
1 tsp sugar
1 pinch of salt

combine all of these as you would regular rice and simmer, covered. when almost all the liquid has been absorbed, take the pan off the heat and set aside (still covered) until you're ready to eat. the rice will absorb the rest of the liquid.

for the stir-fry:

i really just threw together two pre-packaged stir-fry packs that they sell at our local grocer. i started collecting all my own veggies, but it was MUCH cheaper to buy the pre-packaged stuff so that i got lots of ingredients.

certainly add whatever tickles your fancy. our stir-fry had: peppers, onions, bean sprouts, cabbage, carrots, edamame soya beans and broccoli. i also chopped up two hot peppers and threw them in (seeds and all).  feel free to leave this out if you'd rather have your stir-fry be kick-free.

i threw the onions, broccoli and peppers in a wok with a small drizzle of sesame oil for three or four minutes and then added the rest for another three or four minutes. in the last minute or so, i added sauce.

for the sauce, i combined just about equal parts low-sodium gluten-free soy sauce (yes, most soy sauce has WHEAT in it!) and thai sweet chili sauce. i added the sauce directly to the stir fry and didn't measure particularly well.


i really liked the way the coconut rice complimented the veggies on this one. someone tweeted about coconut rice yesterday and i wanted to try it. it's something i'll do again and again. hope you enjoy!