Chickpeas and blue cheese salad. And many veggies

There may be many reasons why people do not want to eat healthy, and besides money, the time spent on preparing yourself the dishes can be a consideration equally important. When you are in a hurry, early in the morning, cooking or starting to chop vegetables is not the happiest scenario, isn't it?

Once in a while, I am doing my best to be a good healthy woman, and do my work properly. 

True is that very often I spend more time preparing than eating, but I do it with a clean conscience so it is not that bad after all. 

Very often my recipes are not very planned, as I am tempted to use one main ingredient and build the rest of the recipe based on this. A couple of days ago, I discovered that I did not experiment with chickpeas for a while, so I got ready for something completely new. Before, I had to soak the chickpeas for more than 10 years in salty water: 100 bio chickpeas, in more than double their quantity of water. In the morning, I boiled them for around 20 minutes at 250C.

The other ingredients are:

100 gr. white champignons, finelly chopped

half of cucumber, finelly chopped

150 gr. cherry tomatoes, finelly chopped

couple of parsley leaves

100 gr. blue cheese

2 teaspoons ginger-pear balsamico - this is really gourmet and I am looking forward to do more experiments with it. 

Healthy, ready go!

Here we are! It is so good and with so many ingredients that I did not eat anything else the whole day. Not even pasta. A big bowl for a hungry, busy day! 

Fast salad with pine seeds

I tried this salad recipe for the first time Friday morning, trying to combine in the most tasty way a lot of ingredients gathered on my cooking table.

What I did was to mix:

150 gr. pineseeds
cut finelly 6 scallions
cut in 4 each of the 16 cherry tomatoes
cut finelly a bunch of fresh rucola - or rocket, for the Englishmen around here
2 spoons olive oil
2 tablespoons of lemon juice

The salad is ready!

Fresh salad for the busy days

What could compare with a good and fresh salad in the morning.

But often, the morning is the worse time of the day to prepare something and often, if we are working a bit late in the evening, we can prepare in maximum 15 minutes a good salad with a lot of vitamins and refreshing 

tastes  that will wait for us in the fridge whatever early in the morning we will head to our office. 

The following salad is something you need for breakfast, lunch or dinner. I cannot have enough of it and I am happy to have it on my menu at least once the week.

I used the following ingredients:

- corn

- avocado

- tomatoes

- parmesan

- same salt

- olive oil

An amazing result will follow!

Bon appetit!

My new brand salad with almost everything

What upon an afternoon, I was so full of imagination, that I added in this salad almost everything available in my basket of vegetables: 

Greek cheese, creatively chopped

Rucola

Olives

Avocado

Tomatoes

Champignons

Salt

Avocado oil

Corn

Mixed together little by little - with the hands - all the components are easily learning to live together. For the moment, the salad is impatiently waiting in the refrigerator the swalling moment. 

Bon Appetit!

A fresh salad for a new beginning

This wonderfully green-looking salad was part of the never ending menu prepared for Rosh Hashanah.

The ingredients:
lettuce
avocado - half, finelly chopped
pomegranate seeds - 1/4
olive oil
1 table spoon of honey
Mixed them all together and serve them as often as possible. The final taste is delicious.

Another spring salad

The image of the following salad is the result of my wanderings in town. I only tasted and didn't tried it yet. Most probably, I would add or subtract some ingredients.
The ingredients used, hidden and visible are:
salad
cucumber
tomatoes
feta cheese
corn
peanuts
yogurt
For me, it was enough for a good lunch, before continuing my busy schedule.

Easy springy salad

Here it is not spring, but after a long winter I am ready for a temperature change (at least). In the honor of the sweet spring and summer time, I will suggest you the following fresh vegetables receipe:

For 4 hungry persons:"

4 big tomatoes, sliced
100 gr. baby corn
2 medium sized zucchini, chopped
100 gr. pine nuts
100 gr. olive oil

That's all! Enjoy the flavor, smell!
I add to the whole miraculous combination a good taste of humus!

Rice noodles with tofu

If you are in a hurry, as me - always -, but hungry and only 15 free minutes, I recommend the following dish:
1-2 pack of rice noodle
3 fresh tomatoes
3 cloves of garlic
100 gr. garden beans
100 gr. silk tofu
You can share with another person and you can be friends for ever.

Salad of Fresh Vegetables with Tofu

Easy to make, tasty and in just 13 minutes, for 3-4 persons:
250 gr. soft/silky tofu
3 tomatoes
100 gr. garden beans
100 gr. okra

You can add some oil, but without it's still tasty.
Bon appetit!

Friday salad with broccoli, carrots, nuts, mushrooms...and everything you want to

After one busy week, we need to rest and spend some quality time with our families. The food is ready, the Internet is off. It is an invitation to rest and positive thoughts. And for more inspiration, while tasting slowly my wonderful salad (for four)

2 big broccoli - boiled

300 gr. mushrooms, sliced and fried for 5 minutes

8 carrots, boiled and sliced

1 buch of fresh scallion

7 nuts

If you want, you could add some tomatoes too, parsley, dill, garlic (I'll never refuse such an opportunity), sesame seeds.

Befriend all of them, mix, put in the fridge and...that's all.

Preparation time - 25 minutes - including the boiling time for the vegetables.

A simple salad

Before starting to write about elaborate dishes, on the basis of very elaborate and complicate recipes, I would like to share with you another speedy food combination. Of course, it is about a salad, and you can prepare it in no more than 10 minutes - up to your speed, maybe for a normal person 15 minutes.

What do you need:

Rucola leaves - washed and chopped

Cucumber - chopped

Fat-free yogurt - 100 g.

Sesame seeds

Help the ingredients befriend each other by mixing them and then dare to eat it! It is fresh, easy to digest and to combine with some cheesy food, in the morning, evening or for lunch. Also, a good contribution of vitamins if you are on diet.

Enjoy and you will never have enough!

Siam herbs - sweet garden beans

From the same category with the previous post, I have the great honor to introduce you in the world of Siam Herbs. My choice for today - and for the meal I am about to tell you the story soon - is garden beans. I will not assign then a special taste - or at least this was the case of the products I bought - but freshness. In a spicy combination, this is the element of equilibrium, the balance of simplicity, bringing the air of early spring.

I recommend them in salads (very fresh and natural, without any add of oil) - together with tomatoes and carrots, or in the spicy food following this post.

Enjoy it!

Moroccan carrot salad

From time to time, I simply fell in love with some recipes and/or ingredients. The taste effect is so strong that I can't live without. One of my long lasting relationship is with avocado: I use it all the time, as often as possible. Recently, I refreshed my reserves of avocado honey.

The latest entry is the Maroccan salad, I picked up the last week, from the same Cohen's book. Since, I did it again this Wednesday and again today. 

My adapted variant is:

4 - or more, up to the number of guests - carrots, finely gratted

1 bunch of fresh parsley

30 gr. sesame seeds

100 gr. canola oil

1 spoon of salt

1 spoon of sugar

1 spoon of lemon juice

The carrots, the oil, the salt, the sasame, the sugar and the lemon juice, are heated together for 10-15 minutes, carefully mixed. At the end, you add the parsley leaves and you can serve it!

For me, the gratted part of the story was the most demanding one, as I need, probably, more exercises at the gym!

Avocado-Pomegranate Salat

I am not following too many recipes, but for the sake of diversification and given my limited experience in the issues of cooking, I need to use some books.

I have already four big colourful ones in my library, a very modest presence, in comparison with the volume of my books.

But, I have Internet, so no worries about my bibliography and actually, I prefer the virtual option, as I can find useful video posts - maybe one day I will try to do it too.

The following recipe is adapted from Elizabeth Wolf Cohen's Jüdische Küche. 100 authentische Rezepte.

What do you need is:

1 pomegranate

2 oranges

2 avocados

10 fresh mint leaves

Cayenne pepper, on taste

1 spoon of honey

25 gr. of salt

Prepare the orange juice and mix together with salt, pepper, the salt and the honey.

Remove the seeds of the pomegranate, peel the avocado and slice it.

Pour the orange mixture and wait another 10 minutes.

The total amount of time is maximum 25 minutes.

I served together with some fish recipes, fighting hard the temptation to eat it as a separate meal. A lovely and unique taste, worthy to taste it!

Cucumber salad: oldies but goldies

This is a classical presence in our culinary life. Easy to make, tasty at every moment of the day.

For having it on your menu, you don't need more than 10 minutes of preparation (chopping the cucumber and the dill, spreading the sesame seeds and the yogurt) and another 10 minutes to wait while the ingredients (1 bunch of dill, 1-2 cucumbers up to the number of guests, 25 gr. of sesame seeds, 100 gr. yogurt) are melt. On taste, you could add some oil (or some vinaigre) too, but it is good also without. (my choice)

Fresh and tasty, easy to digest and, last but not least, a good looking green presence!

Enjoy it!

Refreshing mandarine salad

After so many drinks, you need to continue with something fresh. Like, for example, a salad. Not a salad with avocado, as we, in the house, we are having almost daily. This time, it is a mixture of:

2 bunch of fresh salad, washed and chopped

4-5 tangerines

sun flower oil

sesame seeds

salt

Blend them together for 2-3 minutes, put in the fridge for another half an hour - for allowing a dialogue and combination of ingredients and be ready to serve it with fish (in our case) or other meat-based meals or with some cheese and pasta. 

Easy and tasty!

Green and Red salad

In this house, we are crazy about salads. Without being 100% vegetarians, be in winter, spring or autumn, we are unable to refuse the offer of a colourful and healthy salad.

This time, we tried a Red-Green-White combination. As you probably know, the colours are having an important influence on increasing our appetite. 

The receipe:

4 big tomatoes

200 gr. mozarella

rucola, on taste

garlic, on taste

1 avocado

sesame seeds, on taste

olive oil, on taste

That's all!

My salad of the week

I am not a constant vegetarian, but most part of the time I prefer eating fresh vegetables and fruits. The following salad recipe is the full product of my imagination, the result was very tasty and filled my morning, lunch and evening. 

5 tomatoes, halved

2 packs of mozzarella cheese

100 gr. dried mint

250 ground salty peanuts - for grounding the coffee machine for bones helped me very much

100 gr. raisins

100 gr. sesame seeds

1 bunch of green onion, finely chopped - or 1 clove of garlic, finely chopped

100 ml. sesame oil/or usual sunflower or olive oil

You mix for 1-2 minutes the whole combination and it's ready to be served. The maximum time dedicated to this wonderful tasty work is maximum minutes. 

Bon Appetit!