What to do with all these sun-chokes?

This is what a sun-choke looks like before being peeled. 

Welcome to my life Sun-chokes! I had never seen or tasted these things in my life.  However, I got probably about 2 lbs of them in my Bountiful Basket.  I asked "What are these?" and these little kids told me "Artichokes."  "Artichokes huh?"  with a slight bit of disbelief in my voice, for I knew from my life experience, with was far more than these kiddies, that these were not artichokes.  So I went up to this old lady and said "What are these?"  and she said "Artichokes."  So now I am really confused.  When I left they gave me paper explaining what these tuberous looking things were.  They are Jerusalem "artichokes" or  "sun-chokes". Why they call them Jerusalem artichokes I have no idea because they are from America and aren't artichokes at all. They are the roots of sunflowers!  They are a root so they are sort of like a potato thing, slightly sweeter, not as sweet and jicama, but not as bitter as a potato.  You will probably just have to try them one day.  They apparently can be eaten raw, but I thought they tasted much much better after they were cooked.  I was really excited to try them since I had no idea what to expect.  At least in this dish they were EXCELLENT!!! I wouldn't mind having this over and over again.  However - I won't claim this is low in fat, but you can decide by your standards if you consider it healthy or not....   

So I peeled all the sunchokes, and then I sliced them in the food processor really thin.  I then put some oil in a pan and added some garlic and onions.  I let the garlic and onions soften and the sunchokes also start to soften.  

I realized the sunchokes were going to need some more help, so after sauteing some mushrooms in for awhile I added some vegetable broth to help them steam and get softer.  

This is the ONLY broth I can find that is void of MSG in the whole store.  Even the chicken broth by the same company says "natural flavoring" - Which generally means MSG.  I guess that stuff is natural?  So I get this because I know what each thing is on the label - Just organic vegetable and herbs.  Nothing vague, and nothing I don't know what it looks like. Stupid MSG intolerance, makes things all complicated and expensive. 

I then added about 1/2 cup of heavy cream.  

I covered the mix and allowed everything to soak in and let the sunchokes steam.  I finally realized that they will still be a little more firm that potatoes, but you can still poke them with a fork when they are done. They have a crunchy aspect like a water-chestnut.  That would be the best way to explain their firmness when done - a water-chestnut.  If you can see I added about 4 oz.  of neufatel cheese.  - Hence why you may have to decide if you really consider this healthy.  I was going to use mascarpone cheese - but I guess they don't sell that anymore here.  I guess not enough people bought it.  

Melt all the cheese down and it will make a thick sauce.   

I then mixed in a handful of fresh parsley and about 2 cups of spinach, cut into strips. 

And there we have it!! I sprinkled it with some Asiago cheese as well. The sunchokes were so so yummy! 

Spaghetti and Meatballs!

This is my husband's favorite!! One of mine too so we try and make it healthy! 

Add two slices of bread, oatmeal, and flax seeds.  

So we have our bread crumbs. 

I used some spinach and some orange bell peppers. I like the vegetables in meatloaf when you bake them instead of  pan frying them because it helps them stay moist where they tend to get dry in the oven and adds great flavor.  

So here it just shows 1/2 pound of turkey sausage, but I ended up using 1 pound.  I used three egg whites. 

Then I spiced it up and mixed up everything. 

Then add your bread crumbs a bit at a time until it is the right dryness.  Which is about what the meat is before you added the egg and vegetables and so it sticks together and can be handled easily. 

Spray a oven pan with oil. 

Roll into the size of meatballs that you want. 

I got this new tomato sauce and i am NEVER going back!!! It was wonderful.  No sugar, just sweet tomatoes!  I don't care if I have to pay more for it - soooo great!!

So when the it's all done you just plate it with some whole grain spaghetti and cheese of coarse!!!

I made this cute little one - Wish I had a little kid to feed it to!

Chili made by a bean hater.

I have to say you may not consider this chili.  But this is a big step for me, I think this is first time I have actually put ANY beans in chili.  I am growing to like beans, but I still am a little weary.  Black beans are my favorite, so that's what I put in here. I used a lot of canned stuff because I was running out of food - so I guess it could have been a little bit more healthy, but you'll get the idea :D. 

I just chopped up everything, rinsed the beans and got everything all together.  So I had some bell peppers, onions, chicken, and canned tomatoes and corn. 

With oil soften garlic and onions. 

Add chicken and brown. 

Deglaze with tomatoes and add peppers. 

Add chicken and corn. 

I also added some tomato sauce, and some molasses. 

Add spices - I did Chili powder, Cayenne, Cumin, and some paprika.  Add olives.

Allow sauce to thicken to where you want. 

Add some cheese and sour cream if you want! 

Broccoli pesto for my pasta!

This goes together so quickly! I love pesto, but buying enough basil to make it can be a lot of money, also Basil in my area turns bad rather quickly so it's hard to even keep it long enough to turn it into pesto.  I saw a broccoli pesto online so I made up this recipe that is super cheap, fast, and really lower in fat that normal pesto.   

Sorry this is really low quality - but I steamed the broccoli while I boiled my pasta. 

Then I added some fresh thyme and parsley, flax seed, almonds, and parmesan. 

When the broccoli is bright green, which doesn't take long, take it off the heat. 

add it to your processor. 

Mix up. 

Add vegetable broth a little at a time until it is thinned enough.  After that if you want you can add some olive oil for flavor, but it's not required.  

Mix with pasta in a different bowl and then place on a plate.  Sprinkle with some cheese if you want. 

Whatever you have chowder.

Made this chowder out of a bunch of leftovers and random stuff I had that looked like it might be at the end of it's life soon.  It turned out really really good though.  I made some whole wheat cheese muffins to go with it but I will have to say the muffins were not all that great, so I did not include the recipe here. I do like the idea of a savory cheese muffin with the soup though, so if you found a recipe you could try your hand at it.  

So I didn't have any sun dried tomatoes, but I had a billion tomatoes.  So I cut them up really thin, sprinkled them with olive oil and some herbs and put them in a 400 degree oven.  I used these in the muffins but they would be good in the soup too! 

I wanted to bake my potatoes and squash since I didn't want to boil them - loss of flavor and nutrients - and I didn't want to cook in them in the soup as I feel that always sets me up for failure as they take way too long to cook and usually end up being underdone or by the time they are done there is hardly any soup left since it's all soaked up in the potatoes. 

This is some butternut squash I also baked. I just put everything in with the tomatoes in the oven at the same time. 

This is what the tomatoes looked like when they got all done.  You could put them in some muffins like I did but I think it would be better in the soup. 

So to start I chopped up three tilapia fillets.  Tilapia is good because it's really low in fat and it has a very mild flavor, so if you aren't crazy about fish, you might consider tilapia as an option to get your fish in without the super fishy taste.  It still tastes a bit like fish - but I bet if you seasoned it enough you might not notice.  

I just salt and peppered it. 

I cooked it in a big pot with some garlic, chicken broth (which I no longer use because I found out the company lied when they said it had no msg in it), about 1/3 pound of italian turkey sausage and some olive oil.  

I added the seasonings I like to this type of thing.  I used dill (because of the fish), paprika, thyme, and rosemary.  You can use whatever you want.  I deglazed the pan with more chicken broth. 

I then added a little over 1/4 cup whole wheat flour.  

Mixed it into this paste. .. and then my phone died.  

So then I added a whole can of chicken broth (I ended up using two cans for this soup) and waited for it to thicken.  After that I added some evaporated milk (it added a really nice sweet flavor to the whole thing).  When I had it to just about the thickness I wanted I added some frozen peas and corn, followed by the potatoes and butternut squash.  At the end I sprinkled in some fresh parsley.  I tasted it and salted and peppered it until it tasted the best I thought it could.  Then I ate it.