I thought about calling this: Amazingly Simple and Delicious, Garlic Infused, Basil Tainted, Healthy, Fresh, Whip This Together And Feel Good About What You’re Eating over Zucchini Noodles Topped with Goat Cheese. Sauce.
That didn’t exactly fit on the line.
( Kind of like YOU, right? I know . . . ME too! )
Roasted cauliflower chickpea perfection……this hefty, so much clout you can serve it up and call it a meal – salad’s salad has got it all. Believe me when I tell you;
Seems kind of redundant to include the word raw in the name of a salad. I mean, isn’t the definition of a salad, you know….lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, dressing, what-have-you…a culinary state of perpetual raw-ness?
Ha! Sure, Bunny. You know as well as I do that any sort of salad is a good one (the notable exception being anything congealed together by Jello, yuk) but really, what defines a salad? Is it just any old conglomeration of random ingredients that aren’t called soup or dessert or a casserole; like this (Spicy Steak Salad with quinoa and black beans), or this (Roasted Broccoli and white bean salad)? Does it count as salad if it’s mostly cooked?
Have you ever had one of those happy accidents in the kitchen where you found yourself refrigerator diving for dinner fixins and ended up throwing together whatever you could find simply because you were:
a/ hungry
b/ too tired/cranky/not feelin it, to actually go out to a restaurant or hit up the grocery store, which leads to:
c/ desperation
…and it ended up being so undoubtedly delightful that you actually went out of your way to make it again? Kinda cool when that happens, I gotta tell you. It is a rare phenomena around here to be sure…
What’s a matter, baby pie? Not feeling too great today? Got yourself a wittle cold? Maybe a touch of the flu?
Feeling blue? Maybe a little green? (seeing red?) Maybe you’re just run down…
MAYBE you’ve been having too much fun lately. 😜 (I say we vote for that)
Whatever the reason, let’s not waste another inhalation of oxygen complaining about it. In under ten minutes, you can be sitting in front of a steaming, fragrant, body and soul replenishing bowl of THIS……
This is sooooo good! I know I always seem to say that and I really DO mean it each and every time…………
but I gotta tell you…….. this stuff. Oh man.
Take a favorite cooler-weather culinary pleasure (in this case, a satisfyingly steamy bowl of something yummy), take out the copious amounts of carbs (think potatoes, pasta, bread, beans), add in a plentiful pack of superabundant sustenance (like, ya know, just some major vitamin, mineral, antioxidant action), and you will end up with this amazing bowl of body and soul satisfaction.
It’s getting to be THE MOST WONDERFUL TiiiME of the Year! 🎶 (Sing it with me!)
Back to school time? Well, yeah, sure, if you have kids that would run a close second to this, but no, not exactly what I was thinking.
Christmas, then? Um….what? No, not yet, silly.
Pumpkin spice latte season? Ooooooo, that does sound good and you are definitely getting closer but NO! No! Wrong on all counts because any green chile fan the world over knows that the end of summer/start of fall signals one thing and one thing only and that could be nothing other than…
Hatch Green Chile Harvest Time!!!!!!!!! Yaaaaaaay! (the crowd roars!)
This is a super easy, super delectable, healthy and beautiful raw sauce that will pull a Sybil* on you with its myriad of personalities.
But only in the best way, of course.
Use it as a marinade. Use it as a salad dressing. Mix it into some Greek yogurt or sour cream for a quick dip to serve with crudities. Use it instead of cocktail sauce. Stir a tablespoon or two into a bowl of soup to give it a herbaceous hit of yum. Drizzle it as is over any grilled protein or vegetable as a vibrantly verdant finishing sauce.
Crispy-fied (not fried) roasted broccolini tossed with a garlicky, nutty rich, almond “pesto”, crowned with a perfectly runny over-medium egg. Go ahead and cut into it and that oozy, silky yolk is the foolproof foil for the sharpness of the pesto and the delicate green charred crunch of the broccolini. A perfect portion of creamy baked sweet potato serves as the delicious foundation, quietly but assuredly holding everybody together.
This sure works as dinner for ME…..but it didn’t start out that way.