October 2011

This summer I was flicking through my mom's copy of House and Home magazine and came across a recipe for Mediterranean Stuffed Zucchini. It looked and sounded delicious - and was vegetarian, of course - so I gave it a go. It was as delicious as it looked and sounded, so I had it again for dinner earlier this week. But as I was eating, I thought: "I'm only eating the stuffing". I know you can eat the skin of a zucchini, but only eating the skin of a zucchini does not appeal. Yeah yeah, you've got the stuffing, but it still feels like you're getting larger quantities of skin than you should have.

Well, we all call it oatmeal on this side of the world but I like alliteration! This oatmeal really is packed though...packed with vitamins. You get vitamin A from the pumpkin, vitamin B from the oats and wheat germ and vitamin D from the milk. And I get lots of *vitamin happy* from the chocolate chips :).

People often think that those of us with "special" diets can't enjoy treats. To them I say, behold the LARABAR. LARABARs give you no worries. If you're vegan, no worries. If you eat a raw diet, no worries. If you're avoiding sugar, no worries. If you can't eat gluten or soy, no worries! They're really that awesome. Most flavours are under five ingredients of REAL food. Not chemicals or supplements, but pure food.

Again, major annoyance at having to take dinner photos under harsh lighting thanks to dark fall nights...sorry for crappy pics! Anytime I start to make stuffed mushrooms, my mom will repeat the adage: "Life's too short to stuff a mushroom." Well, that's because stuffed mushroom recipes are usually time-consuming and laborious, but this one will take you no more than 10 minutes to prepare, so what's stopping you? I have always made stuffed mushrooms using individual button mushrooms filled with a herb-and-garlic cream cheese mixture and they are delicious! Then I made Kate's leek stuffed mushrooms, which were also wonderful and made with portobellos, so they're more filling as an actual meal and not just an appetizer. So I merged the two, added a few extra ingredients and came up with my best mushroom recipe yet!