Artichokes, Olives, Capers - OH MY!

I have been on this artichoke-kick lately. I love them! I can't get enough of them. And I can't wait till my friend Beth decides to make fresh artichokes with all the dipping sauces just like she did for NYE this past year (are you reading this Beth?)

Any-who. Yesterday evening's dinner consisted of, you guessed it, artichokes. This particular meal has a light taste and is great paired with a salad and garlic bread (our staple "Italian sides" in the Luckey-Meyer home). Another great thing about this vegetarian meal - it is so close to NO PREP it almost hurts. The only items you need the cutting board for are the artichokes and parsley. But don't get me wrong - this is just the way I prepared it - you can buy already quartered artichokes! And I have been known to use dried herbs before! So if you really wanted this to be absolutely NO PREP - then by all means - get on it!

To start out, I bring vegetable broth, butter and flour to a boil and lower the heat, letting it simmer till the mixture has thickened up.

While the base of my sauce is thickening, I start to quarter 2 cans of drained and rinsed artichoke hearts. YUM! Not only are artichokes delicious - I think they are the most attractive produce of the bunch! (I really do have a thing for artichokes - LOL!)

Once the sauce has thickened and my artichokes are quartered, I add the artichokes, about a half-a-cup of lemon juice, garlic, and a little bit of parmesan cheese to the sauce.

Yep - the fettuccine looks good as it boils in my big pot!

I continue to let the sauce cook for about 10 minutes. When I am ready to mix in the pasta, I add some parsley and capers right before the end!

Once the pasta is drained, I pour it back into the large pot and I then add the artichoke sauce. I mix the pasta and sauce together, adding a bit of salt and pepper to taste.

I plate up the pasta, garnish it with some black olives, and DINNER IS SERVED! The briney (is that even a word?) flavors of the capers and olives give the subtle artichoke flavor a nice little "oomph". A prefect pair for anytime!

I told you I would be back with a complete meal! Tonight I am making a stir fry! Let's see if I remember to get out the camera!

Stuff This Not That

Welcome to my NEW kitchen! Okay, well, it's not new-new, but it's new to me!!! Though it's not that much bigger than my old one, I feel like I have so much more room to spread out and really get cooking! You'll also see Ronnie in there - my trusty helper!

Today's meal is consisting of a stuffed shell that I have been making for awhile now. Being a vegetarian, the hardest part about cooking is all the prep-work that can go into it. I like this particular meal because it utilizes frozen vegetables! The only thing I have to prep is some fresh zucchini and opening cans!!!

To start the meal, I boil some lightly salted water and add around 18 shells.

After heating some olive oil in a skillet I add about a cup of frozen pepper and onion mix, along with some minced garlic. See??? No prep! Straight from the freezer to the skillet! LOVE IT!


This is my only major prepping-step! I cut up a medium zucchini. Not too bad at all!


I then add the chopped zucchini to the pepper-onion and garlic mix and let it cook for about 5 minutes. Then I add a small can of sliced black olives! Mm-mmm... Olives! I think it's the olives that really make this meal special.


My trusty helper Ronnie is seen here mixing low-fat ricotta, parmesan and part-skim mozzarella cheese. This recipe originally calls for an egg, but I was out - I honestly didn't even need it as it turned out fine in the end!


After the cheese mixture is together and the vegetables are done cooking, I add all the vegetables with the cheese and then mix in about a 1/4 cup of pasta sauce.

Once everything is good and mixed and the shells have been drained, I then proceed to stuff the shells and add them to a greased 9x13 dish. This really is the hardest step, only because it takes the longest and you have to be a little bit careful to not rip the shells.

Finally I dump a whole bunch of pasta sauce onto the shells. The more sauce the better in my household - especially since leftovers can get really dry if you were light on the sauce originally. I cover the dish with aluminum foil and bake it for about 35 minutes.

After the 35 minutes is up, I take it out of the oven, remove the foil and top with some extra mozzarella. Then it goes back into the oven for another 10 minutes or so.

This meal really does come together easily and it looks way harder than it really is! Two reasons to love it and make it often! Also - though I have never frozen them - they make GREAT leftovers for lunch the next day. ENJOY!

Hearty Black Bean Soup

After a long Halloween night Ronnie and I needed some good comfort food for dinner the next day. I made "Hearty Black Bean Soup". I got this recipe from The Pretty Darn Quick Vegetarian Cookbook by Donna Klien. This book is great when you do need something pretty darn quick. Let's face it, we all can't cook from scratch all the time. This whole cookbook provides vegetarian recipes that need absolutely NO PREP! Yeah, I know it sounds strange and even not possible to cook a vegetarian meal with no prep, but it really is! For instance, she calls for a lot of prewashed, precut fresh vegi's and fruits that most supermarkets carry now. Or you can opt for the frozen or canned variety. I wouldn't suggest eating like this everyday if your looking to live a healthier lifestyle, but it's great for when you are in a pinch! This black bean soup is so simple and quick to make. It calls for two can's of black beans, vegetable broth, a can of sliced, stewed tomatoes, and various herbs and spices. It is delicious for how simple it is. It's great for leftover's also. (As you see in this photo - I thought about taking a picture after we had finished our meal, so I decided to take a pic of the leftover's in the fancy plastic tub. My apologies for not making it pretty.)