Tag: green

Ranch – version 2

Ranch – version 2

Whip out your blender, cut some veggies, and make yourself a nice fresh springtime snack to get you motivated to do whatever it is that you need to do. Snacking is good for the belly, the mouth, and the soul!!

Go Green!

Go Green!

GO GREEN… you hear it everywhere! Not only is going green good for the environment, it is good for your stomach and health too – and its not so bad for helping you celebrate St. Patrick’s Day either!

Spinach Pancakes

Spinach Pancakes

Now you wait just one minute before you stop reading (actually – you need to start reading in order to start, but don’t stop before you even start… if that even makes any sense). These are not pancakes like you would eat for breakfast… think instead pancakes like potato pancakes, or chick pea patties, or something like that! Yeah – that kind of pancake!

I am continuing my healthy green kick tonight with these Green Spinach Pancakes (which yes – once again are pretty gosh darn healthy for you!). After finding these on  another wonderful WordPress Blog (thanks Five & Spice – these are awesome, and the photos are a lot better – I plan on visiting the blog of this ‘down to earth’ nutritionist a lot more often!), I decided to make these for dinner. But keep in mind that these would make a great side dish or appetizer or part of a “tasting” dinner menu!

Spinach Pancakes: eat fresh

 

Spinach pancakes (with ‘yogurt’ sauce)

  • 1 1/2 cup plain Greek-style yogurt OR sour cream
  • 1 tablespoon lime juice
  • [1/2 teaspoon lime zest]
  • 1/4 cup chopped fresh mint leaves OR 1 teaspoon mint extract
  • 1 bag (10ish ounces) fresh spinach
  • 1 small finely chopped onion
  • 1 tablespoon butter
  • 2/3 cups all purpose flour
  • 2 medium eggs
  • 1/3 cup milk
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 teaspoon ground cumin
  • 1 teaspoon ground coriander
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  • olive oil for frying

Sauce: In a small bowl, combine the yogurt [sour cream], lime juice, lime zest, and mint leaves. Put in the refrigerator until you’re ready to serve the pancakes. Stir once again before serving… just to be safe

Wash the spinach, then put the spinach in a large sautee pan with a sprinkling of water, cover, and cook over medium heat (stirring a few times) until the spinach is wilted. This will only take a couple of minutes. Put cooked spinach into a colander and let it cool down so you can handle it. Once cool, use your hands and squeeze out as much of the liquid from the spinach as possible. Then chop the spinach up well and set aside. [a box of frozen spinach would probably work well here too)

Heat your tablespoon of butter in a sautee pan over medium-high until it is foaming. Stir in the chopped onion and cook until it has gotten nicely browned. Turn the heat down very low and allow to cook for about 3-5 more minutes, stirring occasionally, to get them a bit caramelized.

In a bowl: whisk together the flour, eggs, milk, 2 Tbs. olive oil, cumin, coriander, salt, and pepper. Stir in the spinach and onion until all combined. You will have a very thick ‘batter’

Pour enough olive oil into a large sautee pan to coat the bottom. Heat over medium-high heat until the oil is shimmering. Drop heaping spoonfuls of batter into the pan & try to make them circular and even thickness (with spoon OR pressing down on it with the spatula). Cook until the bottom sides have turned golden brown, then flip and cook another couple minutes (no more than 5 minutes total for each batch). Transfer the pancakes to a serving platter (if needed, keep warm in a 200F oven) and continue frying – using more olive oil as needed- until all the batter is used up. Serve the pancakes accompanied with the mint-yogurt sauce for generously smearing them with. These reheat well too! 🙂

 

… with all these green recipes: you should be all set for St. Patrick’s Day this year!

Cream of Spinach Soup

Cream of Spinach Soup

Yes – another GREEN recipe! Now that I am over being sick (and just have an occasional gross cough) Rich’s body decided he wanted to catch what I had. He is pushing through it (and not taking it easy like he tried to force me 

go GREEN smoothie

go GREEN smoothie

Installment #2 of GREEN recipes. I always read about detox smoothies and all sorts of other healthy-type-things, but am often too scared (or not enough dedication to “detox”) to try them. So when I found this Green Spinach Smoothie that included sweet flavors AND chocolate 

Spinach breakfast muffins

Spinach breakfast muffins

I keep finding some really cool GREEN recipes (look forward to reading about chocolate green shakes in the near future). I guess this is my way of thinking healthy (or not having snow days every other day even though I love the beauty of winter and snow) So these green beauties may look savory, but they are indeed a great breakfast muffin! These  also introduced me to the world of quinoa – so I will try to experiment and learn more about that now too… I’m going to try to experiment with one new thing each month 🙂

These muffins have a slightly sweet taste to them, but are dense and tasty enough to not be overly gross BUT not so “spinach-y” that you don’t want to enjoy them for breakfast. I’m telling you – the only way to truly enjoy these is to make them and try them yourself!


Spinach Quinoa Muffins (from Dandy Sugar)

Dry Ingredients:

  • 1 1/2 cups flour (50/50 mix of white & wheat works)
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • (1/2 tsp) fresh grated nutmeg
  • 1/4 tsp kosher salt
  • 1/4 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 cup cooked quinoa

Wet Ingredients:

  • 1 egg
  • 1/2 cup palm sugar (or 1/4 cup white & 1/4 cup brown)
  • 1 medium mashed banana (or even more!)
  • 2 cups of dry spinach leaves (should amount to about 1 cup processed)
  • 2 tbsp [canola] oil
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • zest of 1 lemon
  • chopped walnuts or almonds

Directions:

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees and prepare a 12 cup muffin tin OR for a breakfast at school – prepare a 24 cup muffin tin. Put 2 cups of dry baby spinach leaves into the food processor and pulse until the leaves resemble a puree. You should have about 1 cup of  chopped spinach total.

Combine dry ingredients into a bowl and whisk. In another bowl, whisk egg and sugar together until incorporated and light in texture. Add remaining wet ingredients and whisk. Pour dry ingredients into the wet mixture and stir just to combine – do not over-mix. Gently fold quinoa into the mixture.  Pour (mine was really thick… more like ‘dump’) batter into muffin tin to about 3/4 full each. Top each muffin with chopped nuts of your choice.

Bake for 15-19 minutes for the regular muffins (or about 12 – 15 minute for mini muffins) until centers set or a toothpick inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean. Enjoy while warm!

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Kermit the Frog always said “Its not easy being green” – but I think its easier than we all thought, so – GO GREEN… its good for your health, the environment, & all of our futures!