Instant Pot

I finally bought an Instant Pot, well, my husband bought me one. I have not used it for a lot, but I have made beans, rice, soup, spaghetti sauce, and curry in it. Yum! I have a regular pressure cooker. You know, the kind you put on top of your stove and avoid the kitchen while it is cooking in case it blows up. But this one cooks better and I don't have to worry about it exploding. I have not read a single article, to date, about that happening. 

Today I got a second liner in the mail. I love that the liners are made of stainless steel instead of Teflon, which always seems to end up somewhere in my food. Blech! I have never seen Teflon flakes in my food, but I see the pan getting scratched and the coating vanishing--I must be serving it. Anyway, here we go! 

One of my children got a new apartment several weeks ago. They want a rice cooker, but we have decided to get an Instant Pot instead. Very excited to hand it over!

Cucumber-Tomato Salad

Just cucumbers and tomatoes mixed with fresh lemon or lime juice, a bit of salt, and freshly ground black pepper. Mmmmm! This is one of my families favorites!

Moroccan Lentil Soup

I made this Moroccan Lentil Soup for dinner last night since it was really cold, for Texas, here. I got the recipe from Forks Over Knives. They have several really good looking soup recipes for the colder months. This one called for red lentils, but the (only) grocery store in town here does not sell them. So I substituted brown lentils. It was so good! We will be reheating it for dinner tonight along with a warmed loaf of ciabatta bread. Give it a try! You will be glad you did!

What is that lunch?

Last week was a busy one and I found myself taking this for lunch twice last week. You are looking at brown rice, dill pickles, red beets, white sweet potato slices, a crushed walnut, and nutritional yeast. It looks iffy, but tasted really good!

Baked Potatoes With Chili

I made baked potatoes with leftover chili for dinner this evening. I have also learned a quick way to make potatoes without baking them in the oven for 90 minutes. Put them into a pressure cooker for 20 minutes once the cooker has reached pressure; then put them into a 500-degree F oven for another 20 minutes. They have that fluffy texture you get when you bake them in the oven, but are much faster!

Quinoa Pot

This amazing quinoa dish was prepared by my oldest daughter for the families dinner tonight. It was wonderful! You cannot see the fresh lime juice or the cilantro, but it was amazing. Just quinoa, vegetable broth, black beans, frozen corn kernels, salt, and at the very end stir in lime juice and cilantro to taste. She added diced avocado to hers and said it was amazing!

Hash Browns

Nothing fancy here, just my lunch. I fixed hash browns, frozen from the store, with a sprinkle of ancho chili pepper and a side of salsa. Mmmm…

It was a bit annoying to have to read so many labels to find a hash brown without added oil, but I did it!