Black Eyed Peas

On one of the days in my rotation, the best source of some kind of protein is black eyed peas. I spent a couple of months wondering, "What the heck do you do with black eyed peas?"

I got some ideas from my Mark Bittman cookbook, and then I just started throwing stuff together.

Black Eyed Peas

1/2 onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

2-3 tbs olive oil

1 can black eyed peas

1 tbs paprika

1 tsp salt

2 handfuls of spinach

How I do it:

In a saute pan, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the onions and garlic and cook until they are translucent. Add the paprika and stir it in. Drain and rinse the black eyed peas and add them to the pan. Cook until they are heated. Then add the handfuls of spinach and cover the pan. Cook only for 2-3 minutes until the spinach is wilted.

This can be eaten alone, over a grain like rice, or over a chopped salad.

Tuna Salad Dinner

So what did I decide to put that delicious salsa on?

Salad of course.

This is the chopped salad that I posted a couple of days ago. I dressed it with olive oil and lemon juice, then topped it with salsa, and half a can of tuna fish, and just a sprinkling of salt.

Good dinner.

Salsa

My favorite condiment in the world is salsa. I would happily put salsa on everything.

And so I decided on Friday night to make salsa. This picture is of my first version. I just made it with the stuff I had in the fridge. Then when I was grocery shopping I realized a couple of the things that would give it a little more color and pizazz. Because really, you might as well eat with pizazz.

Salsa

tomatoes -- half a box of cherry tomatoes or 2-3 roma tomatoes. Try to get some with some flavor.

1/4 red onion

1/4 green pepper

1 clove garlic

1/3 cucumber

the juice from 1/2 lime

small bunch of parsley or cilantro

salt

1 tbs olive oil

How I did it:

I chopped everything up in a small dice, as small as I could manage. I put it all in a bowl, squeeze the lime juice over it, added the salt and olive oil and then stirred it.

I let it sit in the fridge for a little while and it tasted even better.

Chopped Salad

Isn't that beautiful and bright green?

I started feeling like I needed to eat more raw vegetables. I know it probably sounds completely ridiculous to say that I need to eat more vegetables, because that's practically all I eat. But it is almost, sort of, trying hard to become spring -- although here in the middle, we keep suffering setbacks to spring that always come in the form of snow -- and I have been feeling like the winter food I have been eating wasn't cutting it anymore.

So I started an experiment.

I read an article in the newspaper about how wonderful chopped salads are. Rather than large chunks of lettuce and other goodies, everything is chopped up really fine. According to the author this is absolutely the best.

So I went and bought all the types of greens I can eat -- romaine lettuce, iceberg lettuce, spinach, and kale. I got out my biggest bowl, and chopped everything up really small. I tossed the bowl in the bottom drawer of my fridge, and hoped that would keep everything inside pretty fresh.

It did. I ate this salad all week long.

Sometimes I dressed the salad with olive oil and lemon juice. A lot of the time I just poured/placed whatever I was having for lunch -- the heavy winter food -- on top. It was great with the black eyed peas, the lentils, and even the navy bean and rice soup.

It was an easy change for spring.

Microwaved Mug Muffins

Millet Mug Muffin

Buckwheat Mug Muffin

I came across the blog Edible Perspective a few weeks ago. I was surprised to find what Ashley calls "Buckwheat Bakes." I discovered that with just a few tweaks, I could eat these!

They are basically muffins, and so you can imagine how excited I was. It has been so long since I have made or eaten muffins.

And the other appealing feature is this makes one single serving that can be cooked in the microwave. And they taste good.

Mug Muffins

1 flax egg = 2 1/2 tbs boiling water + 1 tbs ground flax

1/2 banana, mashed

2 tbs water

1/4 buckwheat flour or millet flour

1 tbs carob powder

1 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp chia seeds

handful of raisins (optional)

Here's how I do it:

Put the 2 1/2 tbs water in a large mug and heat in the microwave for 30 seconds. Add the 1 tbs flax and let it gel for a minute.

Meanwhile, mash up the banana. (I do this on a plate -- yes, one more dish)

Then add everything to the mug and stir really well.

Cover the mug with a paper towel and microwave it for 1 min 45 sec or 2 full minutes.

Then I just eat it straight out of the mug with a spoon.