Sweet and Sour Roasted Pineapple and Peppers

This recipe is from The Supermarket Vegan by Donna Klein. It's a simple dish with onions, peppers and pineapple that have been roasted in the oven for about 45 minutes. I served it with sautéed chard and brown rice.

Pineapples one of my favorite fruits! They are high in manganese, vitamins C, B1 and B6, copper and dietary fiber. Pineapples contain a compound called bromelain that is known for aiding digestion. Other compounds in pineapples are known for their antioxidant protection and immune support.

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Take Out Sushi

Sometimes you just don't feel like cooking, and this was one of those nights. Everyone needs a break from the kitchen now and then, right? So we ordered sushi from Sushi Hana in Montclair. We got vegetable tempura rolls that come with really delicious peanut sauce and avocado rolls, both made with brown rice. Sushi's always a great dinner choice for warm spring evenings!


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What's in the Fridge? Stir-Fry

This is another fridge clean-out stir-fry. It consists of shiitake mushrooms, red onions, sugar snap peas, hot peppers and cabbage cooked in peanut oil with some rice vinegar and a little bit of Bragg's Amino Acids. I cooked brown rice to go with it. It was delicious!

Brown rice is rice the way nature intended. When the outer layers of a grain of rice are removed, white rice is produced. Brown rice is much more nutritious than white because several vitamins and minerals are also removed in the process, such as vitamins B1, B3 and iron. Brown rice is also a good source of magnesium, calcium, folate, zinc, manganese, phosphorus, selenium and dietary fiber.


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Simple Stir-fry

I've been making some pretty elaborate dinners lately, but not every allergen free meal has to be so complicated. It's pretty easy to make dishes that are vegan and are free of soy, wheat, corn and the other foods I'm sensitive too. To prove that point, I made a simple stir-fry. It was easy to make, but it was still delicious and packed with nutrition.

The stir-fry consisted of onions, sugar sugar snap peas, red and orange mini peppers, mushrooms, baby bok choy and peanuts. I used peanut oil, rice vinegar and wheat-free tamari sauce to season the veggies, and then I added some spicy Thai chili sauce for a little kick. (Yes, tamari does contain soy. I'll admit - I use it occasionally as a condiment.) I served the veggies over Trader-Joes Brown Rice Medley, and I topped the whole thing off with sesame seeds.

Sesame seeds may be the oldest condiment known to man dating back to as early as 1600 BC. They are high in calcium, magnesium, iron, copper, phosphorus, vitamin B1, zinc and dietary fiber. Sesame seeds also contain lignans the sesamin and sesamolin which have been shown lower cholesterol and prevent high blood pressure. Sesamin has also been found to protect the liver from oxidative damage. So be sure sprinkle sesame seeds liberally on your veggies and rice dishes!



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Collard Greens with Rice and Black Eyed Peas

This is a recipe from my friend Donna that I altered slightly. I chopped up half of an onion and sautéed it for a a few minutes and then added chopped collard greens. Then I added Trader Joe's Brown Rice Medley, vegetable broth and a can of diced tomatoes and let it all simmer together. Once the rice was almost cooked, I added a can of black eyed peas. This meal is nice and warming and is the perfect comfort food for a cold winter's evening!


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