Tonight's Dinner...Bean Wellington

Since giving up meat I have been trying to be creative for my family's sake. And to insure that I won't give up because I am bored with food. I am a total foodie!! I love cooking and trying new and interesting things. I haven't always been so open to food but I have recently learned to LOVE food. Although to look at my waistline you would have never known that I am a former food hater....lol.
So here is what we had tonight....oh and btw my 11 yr old is also a food hater...she is the pickiest human being on the face of the earth...BUT...she is learning to love food also. She ate three slices of this tonight. I was stunned. My 3 yr old, however, was not interested at all. She ate about 4 forkfuls of succotash and ran off. Oh well, I guess it's her age. Now...the recipe....


Bean Wellington

Ingredients
1 sheet of thawed puffed pastry or pie crust (homemade or store bought)

1/2 C dry lentils
1 tbsp steak sauce
1 tbsp Worcestershire(watch out for those anchovies) sauce
1 bay leaf
1 tsp thyme
2 cloves of pressed or minced garlic
2 tbsp tomato paste or puree
2-3 tsp "beef" bouillon
1-2 tsp "chicken" bouillon
salt & pepper to taste
water

2 boiled potatoes
3-4 tbsp rice, soy, almond, or dairy milk
1/2 C carrots
1/2-1 Onion
1/4 C - 1/2 C ground flavored crackers or flour or breadcrumbs

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

Cook lentils in water with steak sauce, worchestershire sauce, garlic, tomato puree, bouillon, garlic, thyme, bay leaf, salt and pepper . Start with 1 C of water stirring often, adding water 1/2 c at a time till lentils are soft and water is cooked away. This will probably take about 2 1/2 C water total and 30 +/- mins. When cooked to soft consistency set aside to cool, remove bay leaf.

In a food processor combine boiled potatoes (no skins) and milk. Process till smooth. Set aside in mixing bowl. Process carrots and onion till fine. Add to mixing bowl. Add ground crackers/flour/breadcrumbs. Mix together well.

Put lentils in the food processor and blend till coarse. Add to mixing bowl of other ingredients. Mix well.

Oil a piece of parchment paper or foil. Lay out mixture onto oiled paper/foil and form into loaf. Wrap tightly. Cook for 1 1/2 hrs. till firm.

When finished cooking allow to cool enough to handle it. While it cools roll out pastry or crust on floured surface. It should be large enough to fit loaf. Lay loaf in the center of the pastry and wrap sides in. Lay on cookie sheet seam side down. Brush top lightly with olive oil. Cook till golden brown about 20-25 mins.
Enjoy with gravy or ketchup.

Here are the pics of our dinner.

The Bean Wellington right out of the oven.

Here it is cut open

My 3 yr old's plate

My plate

Mother's Day fun

Mother's Day was tons of fun. We went to the Museum of Natural Sciences to see the dinosaurs. Which my 3 yr old dd finds very exciting. We had a wonderful time. Afterward we went to a veg restaurant called Mama's Vegetarian in Center City Philly. It was very good. It's nice to have a fast food type place that has yummy middle eastern food. They make their pitas fresh daily and they were THE best pita's I had ever tasted. Unfortunately, they don't have a kid friendly menu so my girls ate french fries for dinner...lol.
It was a great mother's day. And probably the 1st one i didn't spend with my mother. Because of my older daughter having a Sunday morning obligation we have postponed OUR mother's day outing till Thursday. We are going to New Hope/Peddler's Village. I love it there and if the weather is nice, it will be a fun day.

Happy Mother's Day!!!

To all of the lovely mothers out there who are the true blessings in this world, I'd like to send you very happy mother's day wishes.  I hope that your children bring you much nachas (blessings, pride).

Some people are FARKing jerks!!!

My daughter has been having issues with this one girl at school. The girl used to be her friend but for some reason they stopped being friends a few months ago. My daughter was just as happy to go on with life without this girl in it. But apparently this girl wasn't happy with that decision. So she has been causing some drama with her. So...we have basically been telling our daughter to go to the principal with any problems at school and if there are things that aren't such a big deal we have been telling daughter to brush it off. Well, this girl has been causing trouble and going home and telling her unbalanced mother lies about my daughter. She tells her mother that my daughter is doing the things to her, that she has actually been doing. So yesterday, this mother calls us and starts spouting off nonsense about how she is going to physically INJURE my daughter and cause her problems in school. A grown woman threatening a child to her father!!!! Can you believe it???? I am so upset about this. And my husband is livid. We did call the principal to have someone else intervene because this has gotten out of hand. The bigger problem is that this woman is sort of in charge of certain things AT the school and this will make for uncomfortable things in the future. I am just in disbelief that people can behave in such a horrible manner. I don't deal with these issues, my husband does because I turn into mama grizzly bear and get out of control. I need to protect my babies. But I was hoping she would show up at my home yesterday just so I could open up my own can of CRAZY!!!
~sigh~ What's wrong with people?? These are supposed to be religious people. They are acting like animals. Unbelievable!!!!

Vegetarian....

Well...I have been afraid to say it out loud because I don't want to jinx myself. But I haven't eaten meat since Monday April 19 2010. We do still have it in our home as my husband is completely against NOT eating meat. But he is great about only eating it for two meals per week. It has been Fab U Lous for his cholesterol too. I do still eat dairy and things that contain eggs but something IS better than nothing, right? So I have some great new recipes that I have come up with that I will be posting soon. I want to make them again so I can add pics. 

Anyway....do you think it's safe to call myself a...~gulp~...vegetarian??

Food/Product Review : Coffee!!!!

My husband had bought me the Keurig Special Edition Home Brewing System for Chanukah. I love it and have been using the individual Green Mountain coffee K-cups. I highly recommend this for anyone who only likes one or two cups of coffee in the morning and doesn't want the hassle of making a pot of coffee. And for my birthday he bought me the reusable filter. Which makes me very happy because I was feeling guilty throwing away all those little cups everyday. :( So, yesterday I went shopping at Whole Foods and bought some coffee beans. The brand is called The Coffee Scoop and it's a local (Bucks County, PA) specialty coffee company. They are PA Certified Organic and Fair Trade licensed. I bought the Breakfast Blend (Medium Roast). I must say this is THE best coffee I have ever had. If you live in PA get to a store and find this and if you don't like in PA get on their website and order. The price is reasonable too. I paid $10 for 12oz of whole bean goodness.

Here are some pics....

The Coffee Maker...

The Beans...

The cup of roasted, swirly goodness... (ignore the "floaties" I didn't stir it before the pic because I like the swirliness of it)

Food Review: Tofu Hot Dogs

I bought the LightLife Smart Dogs because I love the fake Bacon. But the hot dogs are sort of Icky! I made them on the grill thinking, all food taste better grilled...lol. I was wrong. I also bought Tofurkey Beer Brats for the Hubs and he only ate half of one, so they were pretty gross too. The outside of both were very rubbery and the inside of the hot dogs were pretty much deflated mush. They also had the typical soy aftertaste, which I can't appreciate.
Anyone have veg wienie suggestions? LOL