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This is one of our favourite vegetarian (and easily vegan) dinners based on this recipe - and one Gwen gobbles up faster than I can! I love that these burritos (or nachos) are filled with vegetables and legumes … often the one meal out of many offers in which Gwen will consume the veggies. This recipe is a little on the spicy side, so you may want to take out some filling for burritos for the little kids before adding all the spices - the last time I made these, they were too hot for Gwen, but I don’t generally measure the spices …

Sweet Potato and Bean Burritos

Ingredients:

• 6 sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed
• one can (or one cup) of any beans, drained and pureed - we use pinto beans most often
• 3 tbsp milk
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tbsp each cumin, turmeric, and chili powder
• 1 package tortillas
• salsa
• grated cheddar cheese
• sour cream or unsweetened yogurt

Directions:

1. Boil sweet potatoes until fork tender, drain
2. Add milk, garlic to sweet potatoes and mash
3. Combine pureed beans, spices, and sweet potatoes, stirring well
4. Add big globs of filling to wraps and place seam down on a cookie sheet
5. Smother burritos with salsa and grated cheese
6. Broil burritos until cheese is melted

Serve with big dollops of sour cream or yogurt. Can also be made as nachos - just place the filling, salsa, and cheese on tortilla chips and broil until melted.

Well, it’s been a few weeks since I decided to drastically cut down how much meat my family consumes. It’s going very well! I’ve been making a lot of the same dishes, except I’ll substitute a can of chick peas or some beans for the meat. Brad and I haven’t noticed that we’re more hungry (thank goodness! I was quite worried about that!), so I think the change is sustainable. Gwen won’t eat meat anyways, so it’s no biggie for her.

The second new dish I made last week I made for our weekly potluck - Lentil Loaf. I baked it for just under an hour and it was perfect. Instead of French style green beans, I chopped up 2/3 cup of green wax beans, covered them with water in a glass dish, and microwaved them for 2 minutes. This was a yummy, yummy dish! I served it with gravy. Who doesn’t like gravy?

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups dried lentils
• 2 cups water
• 1 bay leaf
• 2 cups grated cheddar cheese
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 2/3 cup French style green beans
• 1 cup plain breadcrumbs
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten
• salt & freshly ground black pepper
• butter, for coating
• breadcrumbs, for coating

Directions

1. Grease a loaf pan with butter and generously coat with breadcrumbs.

2. Put the lentils, water and bay leaf into a medium saucepan, cover tightly and simmer until water is absorbed and the lentils are tender.

3. Remove from heat and discard the bay leaf.

4. Preheat oven to 375°F.

5. Add the cheese, onion, green beans, breadcrumbs, lemon juice and egg to the lentils; mix well.

6. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

7. Spoon mixture into loaf pan and smooth the top.

8. Bake, uncovered for 1-1 1/2 hours until firm and nicely browned on top.

Last week, I tried two new recipes for vegetarian dinners.

First, I made chickpea curry.

It was yummy! I can’t remember where I got it, but here’s the recipe.

Ingredients:

• 1 can chick peas
• 2 onions
• 1/2 green pepper
• 3 stalks celery
• 2 carrots
• 1 tbsp chili powder
• ginger
• 3 garlic cloves
• 1/2 tsp mustard powder or 1 tsp mustard
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 2 tomatoes
• salt to taste

Instructions:

• Peel and cut onion. Cut ginger into small pieces. Cut green pepper, celery, and carrots into small pieces. Saute over medium heat in a frying pan with olive oil with cumin.
• Add tomato, cook 5 minutes.
• Add chickpeas, 2 tbsp water, cinnamon, and turmeric. Stir and cook for 5 minutes.
• Serve over rice or potatoes.

It was very good! I actually used half the cumin and turmeric because I was afraid of them, but it definitely needs the full amounts to have the right taste! I also totally forgot the chili powder, so it wasn’t nearly spicy enough!

Crystle lent me the book Diet For a Small Planet by Frances Moore Lappe. What an eye-opening book for sure! It discusses how many of our food resources are wasted in feed for our animals - especially beef.

After reading it, I’ve decided to challenge myself to make meat dishes only twice per week for the summer. This is a HUGE switch for us, as we currently eat a vegetarian meal maybe once or twice per week.

Really though, when it takes 2500 gallons of water to make just one pound of beef, and 7 pounds of grain (Lappe), does it make sense to comsume beef many times per week? Chicken is slightly less of an energy consumer, but still, compared to grain and vegetable sources of protein, it just doesn’t make sense (from the perspective of the planet anyways) to rely on animal sources of protein when plant sources are much more readily available and abundant.

Wish me luck on my new adventure!