From thugkitchen.com....

ROASTED CHICKPEA & BROCCOLI BURRITO

3 cups of cooked chickpeas  (2-15 ounce cans, drained)

1 large yellow onion

1 red bell pepper

1 large crown of broccoli

4 cloves of garlic

1 lime

Spice Blend:

3 tablespoons olive oil

1-2 tablespoons soy sauce, tamari, or Bragg’s Liquid Aminos (You can usually find this old school hippie shit near the vinegars or soy sauces in the healthy eating section of most big grocery stores and on the internet)
2 teaspoons chili powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander or more cumin if you don’t want to go to the store
black pepper or cayenne pepper to taste

Heat the oven to 425 degrees. Chop up the onion, bell pepper, and broccoli so that all the pieces about the size of a chickpea. Chop up the garlic real small but save that shit until later. Place all the chopped up veggies in a large bowl with the cooked chickpeas. Pour in the oil and soy sauce, stir, and then throw all the spices in there. Mix until all the vegetables and shit are covered.

Put all of that on a large rimmed baking sheet (like what you would put cookies on but with an edge) and bake for 20 minutes. Take it out of the oven, don’t fucking burn yourself, add the garlic, and bake for another 15 minutes. The broccoli will look a little burnt at this point but that is the plan so chill the fuck out and take it out of the oven. Squeeze the juice of half of the lime over the pan and stir the roasted chickpeas and veggies all around. Taste some and see if it needs more spices or anything. Now make a fucking burrito. I like mine with spinach, avocado, cilantro, and some fire roasted salsa but you do your thing.
makes 6-8 burritos

just one more cookie recipe.....

From Gourmet magazine, these were easy to make, tasty, and my favorite new Christmas cookie of 2012:

Pistachio cranberry icebox cookies
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, softened
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon finely grated fresh orange zest
1/2 cup shelled pistachios (2 1/4 oz; not dyed red)
1/3 cup dried cranberries (1 1/4 oz)
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1/4 cup decorative sugar (preferably coarse)
SPECIAL EQUIPMENT: parchment paper
MAKE DOUGH:
Stir together flour, cinnamon, and salt in a bowl.
Beat together butter, granulated sugar, and zest in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low and add flour mixture in 3 batches, mixing until dough just comes together in clumps, then mix in pistachios and cranberries. Gather and press dough together, then divide into 2 equal pieces. Using a sheet of plastic wrap or wax paper as an aid, form each piece of dough into a log about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Square off long sides of each log to form a bar, then chill, wrapped in plastic wrap, until very firm, at least 2 hours.
SLICE AND BAKE COOKIES:
Put oven racks in upper and lower thirds of oven and preheat oven to 350°F. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper.
Brush egg over all 4 long sides of bars (but not ends). Sprinkle decorative sugar on a separate sheet of parchment or wax paper and press bars into sugar, coating well.
Cut each bar crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick slices, rotating bar after cutting each slice to help keep square shape. (If dough gets too soft to slice, freeze bars briefly until firm.) Arrange cookies about 1/2 inch apart on lined baking sheets.
Bake cookies, switching position of sheets halfway through baking, until edges are pale golden, 15 to 18 minutes total. Transfer cookies from parchment to racks using a slotted spatula and cool completely.
COOKS’ NOTES:
Dough bars can be chilled up to 3 days or frozen, wrapped in plastic wrap and then foil, 1 month (thaw frozen dough in refrigerator just until dough can be sliced).
Cookies keep in an airtight container at room temperature 5 days.

Chocolate chocolate chocolate

Three cookie/candy (not sure which) recipes, all unhealthy, all simple, all non-Christmasy, all unapologetically chocolate

Eskimo Cookies

Once upon a time, approximately at age 11 or 12, my mom kept me home from school becuase I was sick - really can't remember what my specific complaint was. However, I wasn't too sick, and she left to run errands. I immediately went downstairs, made a batch of eskimo cookies, cleaned up the dirty dishes and consumed the entire batch, thereby eliminating all evidence of my criminal activity (sweets were closely monitored in our house). I was really sick by the time she came home. Moral of the story is that these cookies are so delicious that children will turn to subterfuge and dishonesty for them. So that's a win. Also, they are extremely easy to make and fun, like play-doh. And these days, I put some latex gloves on and mix the stuff with my hands.

1 and  1/2 sticks of butter
3 TBSP cocoa
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup sugar

mix together well. Add:
2 1/2 cups oatmeal.
Do some more mixug until you can roll into little balls, sized 1 inch or smaller in circumference. Roll each one around in powdered sugar until covered. Refrigerate.

Boiler cookies, aka "No-bake"

This is a pretty popular recipe, but a little tricky. Don't cook enough, the cookies are soupy; cook too much, and they are crumbly.

2 cups sugar
4 TBSPs cocoa
1 stick butter
1/2 cup milk
1 cup peanut butter
1 tablespoon vanilla
2.5 cups oatmeal

 In a heavy saucepan bring sugar, cocoa, butter and milk to a boil. Let boil for 1 minute (at least - I boil for at least 2) then remove from heat and add peanut butter, vanilla and oatmeal. Drop mixture by the spoonful onto parchment or wax paper, then let cool til hardened.

 

Chinese Noodle Bars

These used to be on that back of every La Choy Chow Mein Noodles can, but inexplicably disappeared about 20 years ago. Now whenever I make them people always want the recipe. Your loss, my gain, La Choy. 

12 oz bag of semisweet chocolate chips
6 oz. bag butterscotch chips
can of chow mein noodles (don't know the weight, maybe two or three cups by volume?)
can of cashew pieces, about 8 ounces? obviously, I never wrote this recipe down

This is much easier with the advent of microwave cooking. Put the chocolate and butterscotch chips in a bowl. Microwave 30 seconds. Remove and stir. Microwave again for 20 seconds. Remove and stir. Microwave 15 seconds, and so on, until it is totally melted. Just be careful becuase microwaved chocolate can burn easily.

Dump the noodles and cashews into the melted choclate. Stir until coated.
Place parchment paper on a jelly roll sheet. Pour out the mix and spread onto the sheet. Using a very sharp knife, cut the mix into bars before the chocolate cools.

Whole Wheat Pasta with Edamame, Arugula and Herbs

Cooking Light AUGUST 2010
Shamelessly stealing this from Cooking Light Magazine, because it is delicious and i can never find the recipe
Ingredients
8 ounces uncooked whole-wheat penne (tube-shaped pasta)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
2 cups frozen shelled edamame (green soybeans), thawed
2 cups loosely packed baby arugula
1 cup grape tomatoes, halved
1/4 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
3 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
2 ounces fresh Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, shaved

Preparation
1. Cook pasta according to package directions, omitting salt and fat. Drain.

2. Heat oil and butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add edamame to pan; cook 2 minutes or until edamame is thoroughly heated, stirring occasionally. Combine pasta and edamame in a large bowl. Stir in arugula and next 6 ingredients (through salt), tossing well. Sprinkle each serving with cheese.

Couscous Poppers

I love Buffalo Chicken Wings. I love the spicy flavor and the fried chicken. So I'm working on coming up with a vegetarian substitute that will defeat my craving for BW3. These are pretty tasty, if I do say so myself.


First, you need some ingredients:

Oh, good, we have those!! Next, start mixing them together:

1 cup of water

2 cubes of vegetable bouillon

Boil the water with the vegetable bouillon. Add

1 cup of couscous.

Once the couscous absorbs the water (happens in minutes), mix in

goat cheese

chopped parsley

1 TBSP chia seeds (totally optional but totally healthy)

Roll into balls approximately 1-inch around. Now the messy part.

Let the couscous soak a bit in some buttermilk, then roll them around in some Panko breadcrumbs. Meanwhile, heat some vegetable oil for deep-frying. Pop them into the oil until they are golden brown. Microwave some Frank's hot wing sauce with butter, and pour this over the fried poppers. Done! Pictured above with cabbage and tofu rounding out our dinner.

zucchini

we have 6 zucchini plants in the ground; i need to stock up on recipes.
http://chocolateandzucchini.com/archives/2011/05/zucchini_pasta_with_almonds_and_lemon_zest.php

Snow Day Soup: Bleu Cheese and Leek

Worked from home today to avoid the snow - or more specifically the traffic mess caused by the snow. Two years ago I spent four hours getting home from work in snow storm, meaning average speed was about 2.5 mph.  So I make sure I have my laptop at home when snow is forecast.

So I got to play in the kitchen a little today. For breakfast, made my favorite smoothie (frozen berries, banana, orange juice and yogurt thrown into the blender - delicious), and for lunch I made Bleu Cheese and Leek soup. Trader Joe's now offers a bag of sliced leeks in the frozen vegetable section. I've been using the frozen artichokes and frozen onions and frozen peppers for awhile - love to saute a few artichokes or peppers and throw into the middle of an omelet. But I hadn't seen the leeks before so I snagged them. The soup took about 15 minutes to make AND i got to use up leftovers.

2 tablespoons  Butter

1 cup chopped leeks

3 cups water - added 2 veggie bouillon cubes and minced garlic cloves

2 cups chopped cauliflower (we had leftover broccoli and cauliflower medley from dinner)

sprinkle of dried tarragon leaves

1 or 2  ounces Blue Cheese, crumbled

pepper to taste

Instructions:

Melt butter in pot over medium-low heat. Add leeks; cook until tender. Add cauliflower, tarragon, garlic and  stock; simmer until cauliflower is tender, 12-15 minutes.

Scoop the cooked veggies out with a slotted spoon and place in a blender. Add the crumbles of blue cheese to the blender and blend. Once it is pureed, pour it back in with the broth and stir it up.Simmer it a little more, then ladle bowls. Grind a little black pepper over the top if desired.


Eat with some buttered french bread and an apple.
While saute-ing the leeks, Jackie called to discuss christmas presents, I got lost in the moment and over-browned the butter and the leeks, causing the soup to turn into an unappetizing  mushroom color. But it was delicious. The bleu cheese added a little twang over the oniony taste of the leeks. Perfect for a cold winter day.