This is a favorite and easy recipe to make during this awesome season of Fall. (I love Fall! I couldn’t imagine being anywhere that doesn’t get to enjoy the colorful leaves and crisp cool days…)

Anyway, in addition to random days making this, I made this dish last year for my family’s Thanksgiving dinner and for a Fall Harvest potluck we just went to over the weekend.

Ingredients include:
(Make sure you try to use all organic!)
• 1 (2-pound) butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1 medium onion, thinly sliced
• 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1 1/2 cups couscous
• 1 1/3 cups vegetable broth
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1/3 cup dried cranberries (I used Eden Organic Dried Cranberries.)
• 1/2 cup pecans, toasted (I didn’t use in case people would be allergic to nuts.)
• 1/4 cup finely chopped flat leaf parsley (I used dried organic parsley.)

Preheat oven to 425°F. Combine butternut squash, onion, olive oil, nutmeg, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Spread on a rimmed baking sheet. Roast until squash and onion brown slightly, stirring occasionally, about 25 minutes. Allow to cool.

Combine squash and onion mixture, veggie broth, butter and cranberries in a large saucepan and bring to a simmer. Add couscous and cover. Take from heat and let stand for 10 minutes. Stir in pecans and parsley and season to taste with salt and pepper. Fluff with a fork and serve.

There will be plenty for a family gathering or expect to have leftovers if it’s just a couple people eating.

This evening, I made this really delicious dish that I found, again, using the The Whole Life Nutrition Cookbook. I have yet to go wrong with this cookbook. This book was recommended by my sister (the one studying in Seattle at Bastyr University), where the authors also attended this school. Definitely worth getting this cookbook, if you don’t buy any other cookbook.

Anyway, this dish has a great flavor and texture with the raw kale, red bell pepper, green onions and cooked wild rice all combined at the end. I typically don’t do seconds with meals, and I totally did with this one. Nice and light and very nutritious!

Wild Rice and Kale Salad ingredients include:
• 1-1/2 cups wild rice
• 3-3/4 cups water
• pinch of sea salt
• 5 curly green kale leaves, washed and chopped
• 1 red bell pepper, diced small
• 1 bunch of green onions, cut into thin rounds
• 1/2 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice (or I just squeezed a half of lemon)
• 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• sea salt and ground pepper to taste

First place the rice, water and sea salt into a pot. Cover and bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer for 55 minutes, remove from heat and let stand at least 30 minutes to cool. (Or I just started the next step after the rice was done simmering and that’s how long I let my rice cool.)

Prepare your veggies, and place the chopped kale, diced red bell pepper, sliced green onions, lemon juice, and olive oil into a large bowl and gently toss. It says to add rice and sea salt & pepper and toss again, but I preferred to keep the rice and veggies separate (as pictured). I still combined as I was eating and it tasted amazing, but just wanted the ingredients to be separate on the plate. But totally combine before serving if you so choose.

You can store the extra rice salad in a glass container in the fridge for up to 5 days. (good to know, right?)

Enjoy! I definitely did!

Wednesday, September 9, for dinner, I prepared a breakfast-for-dinner meal and it turned out quite delicious. It was a little different tasting than what we are used to, but definitely a good different taste. Typically I prefer my potatoes roasted and I think the ingredients that I prepared totally could have been roasted, but I followed the cookbook, The Whole Life Nutrition Cookbook where you pretty much sauté everything.

Zucchini and Potato Hash ingredients included:
• 2 TBS extra virgin olive oil
• 1 small onion, cut into half moons
• 2 or 3 medium (or 5 small) red or yellow potatoes, sliced into thin rounds
• 1 large zucchini, sliced also into thin rounds
• 1/2 bunch green kale, chopped small (although, if I were to make again, I’d chop it larger than I did)
• 1 to 2 tsp of dried thyme
• 1 garlic clove minced
• sea salt to taste
(says it serves 4, but it could be more or less depending on how much you eat, obviously)

Scrambled Eggs ingredients:
• 3 organic, cage-free eggs (or as many as you want)
• I used Italian seasoning, salt and pepper to season my eggs, but definitely use the seasonings that you prefer

First, I prepared all the vegetables to be used. For the potatoes and zucchini, I used my mandolin slicer (DEFINITELY using the hand guard at all times…), but if you don’t have one, thinly slice the vegetables using your veggie knife. Once I had all the veggies ready to go, in a large stainless steel skillet (11-inch works well), I heated the olive oil over medium heat.

Add onions and sauté for 3 minutes. Add potatoes and stir into the onions. Put a cover on the skillet and let cook for about 6 minutes. I noticed that my potatoes wanted to stick to the bottom of my skillet, so keep stirring them as much as you need to so that they don’t. They say to add any necessary water to prevent burning, which I did, and I think that helped a little.

(See below to get your eggs cooking.)

Then add the zucchini slices, kale, thyme, garlic and salt and gently mix. Put the cover back on and cook a few minutes more until the zucchini and kale are tender, stirring occasionally. Add salt as you like.

As for the eggs, you may want to start them going after you have the potatoes in the skillet. Heat up some butter or extra virgin olive oil in your stainless steel skillet. Crack open your eggs into your skillet (watch out for broken shells!), add your seasonings and mix. As they begin cooking, stir as needed to get them good and scrambled. I prefer my eggs really cooked, but you can keep them cooking as long as needed to get them to your liking.

I also toasted up some rosemary bread because I LOVE eggs and buttered toast. So after everything was done cooking, I dished out everything onto the plate and enjoyed! Again, very very yummy. Definitely worth cooking again. (Oh, and we had plenty of leftovers, enough for lunch the next day )

On Sunday, August 30, for dinner, my husband and I cooked up some broiled salmon with a side of mashed garlic potatoes and a Mediterranean Medley of Veggies. This was my first time EVER making mashed potatoes, and they turned out to be SO GOOD.

I shall start with the sides…

(Note: We used a lot of garlic in this meal, so I should tell you a little tidbit about garlic. After you slice, chop, mince or press your garlic, you should let it sit for 5 to 10 minutes before eating or cooking. Click here to see how to Bring Out the Health Benefits of Garlic.)

Mediterranean Medley
• 2 cups of Broccoli florets cut into quarters
• 2 cups chopped curly kale
• 1 medium carrot
(Mediterranean dressing which includes…)
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 3 TBS extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tsp fresh lemon juice
• sea salt and pepper to taste

Healthy steam your veggies! (This is a gentle way to prepare your veggies to enhance their flavor, bring out their color, make them tender and preserves most of its ingredients.) Bring steaming water to a boil in your steamer pot. Add Broccoli, kale and carrots, cover and steam for 5 minutes…adding the garlic to veggies for the last 2 minutes of steaming. Transfer to a bowl and toss with the remaining ingredients while veggies are still hot. They give you the amounts for the dressing, but I wing it….do what you want to what you like!

Garlic Mashed Potatoes
• 2 medium-sized potatoes
• 3 TBS extra virgin olive oil
• 3 cloves of pressed garlic
• 3 TBS soy or low-fat milk
• sea salt and pepper to taste

First you want to ‘Healthy Steam” your potatoes. (While most will want to boil their potatoes, you probably shouldn’t as that will make them become watery and lose some of their flavor. Healthy steaming will enhance their flavor and preserve most of the nutrients.) Cut potatoes into 1/2 inch cubes using peeled potatoes. (For non-mashed potatoes, you can leave the skin on though ) Once the steamer pot is ready, steam the potatoes for 10 minutes. (Potatoes are done when you can easily penetrate with a fork.) Mash together with the rest of the ingredients.

What made these interesting, is that we have been using vanilla soy milk with our cereal in the morning, and that’s all we had…so we had hints of vanilla flavoring in these potatoes. Pretty darn good!!! Especially for my first mashed potatoes!

And finally…

The  “Quick Broiled” Salmon
• 1 lb Salmon fillet, cut in half
• 2 tsp + 1 TBS fresh lemon juice
• Sea salt and pepper to taste
• 2 TBS extra virgin olive oil
• 1 medium clove garlic

Preheat the broiler on high and place an all stainless steel skillet (handle stainless steel too!) under the heat for about 10 minutes until it gets very hot. The pan should be 5 to 7 inches from the heat source. While pan is heating chop up your garlic and let it sit. Rub your salmon with the 2 tsp of fresh lemon juice, salt and pepper. (Note: you can leave the skin on, as after you broil it, the skin should peep right off.) Using a hot pad, pull pan from heat source and place Salmon on hot pan, skin side down. Return to broiler. Should take about 7 minutes, depending on thickness. Test with a fork for done-ness, as it will flake easily when it is cooked. Tis best with it’s still pink inside. Dress with the olive oil, 1 TBS lemon juice, garlic and salt/pepper to taste.