Winner Announced and Sweet Potato and Kale Quesadillas

Thanks to all 136 of you who entered the Super Immunity Giveaway--a record number of entries for an HGK contest. My new friend, the random number generator, says that

#47 is the winner. Congratulations to Trish who answered "Flax and/or chia seeds. I can't start my day without one of them - in a smoothie or on top of my oatmeal." Please contact me at healthygirlskitchen@gmail.com with your full name and address.

Contests are really fun for me. I get to hear from a ton of readers who normally stay behind the scenes. Almost as much fun as making dinner with items commonly found in my pantry, freezer and fridge. No trip to the supermarket necessary! Here's what was going on at HGK for the past two nights:

HGK's Sweet Potato and Kale Quesadillas
serves 6

Printable Recipe

2 large sweet potatoes, peeled and large diced
vegetable broth for sauteing
1 large yellow onion, diced small
3 large garlic cloves, minced
1 cup frozen corn, optional: fire roasted corn
1/2 cup of your favorite salsa (the spice level you like)
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp cumin
2 tsp chili powder
1 15 oz. can black beans, drained and rinsed
4 packed cups (or more) chopped kale
hot sauce (or not)
salt (or not) or salt free seasoning
12 small whole wheat tortillas
optional: Daiya or other vegan cheddar cheese

Place diced sweet potato in a small pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer for about 15 minutes. Check if potatoes are tender. When cooked, drain sweet potatoes.

While potatoes are cooking, heat about 1/4 cup vegetable broth in a large pan over medium heat. When broth begins to bubble, add onions and cook, stirring frequently, for eight minutes or until onions are translucent. Lower heat and add more broth if onions begin to burn. Add garlic and stir.

Add corn and cook for another 5 minutes. Add salsa, cinnamon, cumin and chili powder. Stir. Add kale and stir. Cover pot and cook for 8 minutes, stirring frequently. Kale should be tender.

Add black beans and stir.

Drain potatoes and throw into the pot. Using a potato masher or the back of a large fork, mash potatoes. Stir with kale and bean mixture to incorporate everything. Taste and add salt if you must! Remove from heat.

Place a separate large saute pan over medium heat. Place one tortilla in pan. Dollop kale/bean/potato mixture onto the middle of the tortilla and mash down, covering all but the outer edge of the tortilla. Optional: Sprinkle with vegan cheddar cheese. Place a second tortilla on top and, with the back of a spatula, compress the quesadilla. After a few minutes, flip the quesadilla and crisp the second side. Remove from the pan and slice into 6 triangles (a pizza cutter works well for this step).

Crispy on the outside, soft on the inside. Just like a quesadilla should be, only without all that fat! Plus the added bonus of kale. How perfect is that?

Fastiest, Easiest, Tastiest Vegan Dinner Ever!

Oh my gosh! I have to shout out a HUGE thank you to my friend (and HGK contributor) Liz for inspiring me to make Isa Chandra Moskowitz's recipe for Buffalo Tempeh Wraps from her cookbook Appetite for Reduction.

For those of you not familiar with this author/cookbook, Ms. Moskowitz is a vegan cookbook author who admittedly gained weight testing and tasting all of her amazing vegan recipes. Lots of people think that because a food is "vegan" that it is healthy and even low in calories. But if you are here reading Healthy Girl's Kitchen, I'm guessing you have discovered that it's simply not true. Anyway, Ms. Moskowitz figured it out after authoring many successful vegan cookbooks, and gaining a lot of weight, and then decided to create a cookbook of low calorie, plant-strong, vegan recipes.

And. It. Rocks.

Like, a best ever cookbook.

So when my buddy Liz mentioned that she and her husband Chris were really loving the Buffalo Tempeh Wraps, I figured it wasn't going to be long before I gave them a try. It took me a day.

Do you like the taste of that hot sauce on spicy chicken wings? I've never been a wing eater, but I did once have that hot sauce in a shredded chicken dish and I have never forgotten how much I enjoyed the taste of the sauce. But to say that I've had no opportunity to enjoy that hot sauce on a plant-strong diet would be an understatement.

Until now.

Holy sh . . . cow!

Here's what you will need:

1. The recipe for Isa's Buffalo Tempeh. Liz told me to crumble up the tempeh after steaming it instead of cutting it into triangles like Isa's recipe recommended. The crumbles worked out beautifully. I just simmered the crumbles in the marinade for about 10 minutes.

2. The recipe for Isa's Cool Slaw. A winner all by itself. You will definitely want this recipe for any time you want to replicate a traditional coleslaw. It's amazing. I had to add more cashews to the dressing because when I blended it in my food processor it seemed thin. It was easy to fix by adding more cashews and blending again.

3. Big whole wheat wraps. I used whole wheat lavash.

The rest is history.

This guy loved it. Maybe you should give it a try.



Do you own a copy of Appetite for Reduction? What's your favorite recipe in the book?

I'm "Cookin' with Gas!" and a Recipe

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Sweet Potato, Black Bean and Kale Enchiladas with Green Tomatillo Salsa
"They're not good, they're GREAT!"
-Marv Solganik

?My kitchen renovation is finished (well, almost, but it's nothing that's stopping me from cooking like mad and having parties). Thank you to all of the wonderful HGK readers who stuck with me through my recipe dry spell. You won't be disappointed! I am on the warpath.
I love the sound of  gas igniting a burner. That's probably because I have been cooking with electric for the past 4 years. And most of the 7 years before that. So it's been mostly electric for over a decade. Why? Control. With electric, you have little control over the heat. With gas, you have a lot. Plus, a roasted marshmallow every now and then couldn't hurt anyone, could it?

I have been spending every spare minute I have in my kitchen. I almost feel like I have to give it a nickname. It's definitely a "she." She is very feminine, really. Classic. Retro. Large. With an industrial element. So I need a name that reflects all of those qualities. Got any ideas?

I'm loving it that I can spread out and still have my kids and neighbors hanging out with me and having dinner. What an incredible luxury! I feel very blessed.

So what was the first thing that I whipped up in Bessie (if that's what we are going to call her . . . I'm not sure)? A recipe inspired by Gena Hamshaw at Choosing Raw, of course! As many of you know, it is rare that I create an original recipe. What I am really good at is tweaking recipes to fit within the Nutritarian framework, or at least be as Nutritarian as I can get them to be. I love the brilliance of adding Blackstrap Mollasses to vegan enchiladas in Gena's recipe. It's a great source of iron and as all of us Nutritarian's know, iron is something we should keep an eye on. And vegan enchiladas are hearty, crowd pleasing dishes. You really can't go wrong with that.

Sweet Potato, Black Bean and Kale Enchiladas with Green Tomatillo Salsa
Inspired by this recipe by Gena Hamshaw
Serves 8-16, depending on how much other food you are serving!

Printable Recipe

2 jars green tomatillo salsa (at least 20 oz. total)
5 large sweet potatoes (or 8 regular ones), peeled and cut into large cubes
1 large yellow onion
2 8 oz. packages sliced mushrooms
4 packed cups chopped kale (you could even use more)
2 cans black beans, or 4 cups freshly cooked
6 tbsp blackstrap molasses
2 tbsp tahini or almond butter (optional, but makes the filling nice and creamy)
1/2 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
4 tbsp lime juice
1 tsp salt (to taste)
2 tsp cumin
4 tsp chili powder
Black pepper to taste
8 large whole grain tortillas (with sides trimmed off) or 12 small corn tortillas
1 cup or so Daiya pepperjack or cheddar cheese (optional)

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.

Boil a large pot of salted water, and add the sweet potatoes. Cook till they�re fork tender, and drain. Transfer to a very large bowl.

Saute onion with a few tablespoons of vegetable broth. Add broth as needed during saute process. When they�re tender and light brown, add the mushrooms and kale and stir. Cook, stirring frequently, until kale is tender.

Mash sweet potatoes, but leave them a little chunky.  Add cilantro, black beans, molasses, tahini or almond butter (if using), lime juice, salt, cumin, chili powder, and black pepper, and stir.

Coat the bottom of a 9x13 casserole dish with tomatillo salsa.

Assemble your enchiladas by rolling about 1/8 of the filling into each of your large tortillas (adjust proportions if using small corn tortillas) and laying them side by side into the baking dish. Cover them with the rest of the the tomatillo salsa (they�s supposed to be smothered).

Bake for about 30 minutes. Remove from oven and sprinkle with cheese. Return to oven and bake until cheese has melted and enchiladas are hot (if you make the enchiladas ahead and refrigerate them before baking, you�ll need to bake them for at least 45-60 minutes before the cheese step).

So what do you think would be a good name for my kitchen?

OPR: White Bean and Mango Burritos

What is "OPR" you wonder? Well, it stands for "other people's recipes." I'm not much of a chef, if you haven't noticed, but what I am a master at is scouring the world for Plant Strong, Nutritarian recipes and then making and eating them. After I take some photographs that is!

Here's a new favorite that I discovered: White Bean and Mango Burritos from The Real Meal Today blog. They could not have been any easier or any more delicious! If you are craving Mexican food, give these a try. Go here to check out the original recipe, which would have been so spicy I'm not sure that I could have eaten them. I made a few modifications to the heat, to the proportions and also by adding lettuce. Spinach or any other green would work well too!

Here's my version:

White Bean and Mango Burritos

serves 4

2 15 ounce cans cannellini beans, rinsed and drained 

1 large ripe mango, peeled and diced (about 1 1/2 cups of diced mango)
1cup chopped cilantro
1/4 tsp Cayenne powder (less or more to personal preference!)
1 1/2 Tbsp nutritional yeast
1 1/2 Tbsp cumin
1 1/2 tsp garlic powder
6 medium whole wheat tortillas( as healthy as you can get them)
2 cups chopped lettuce

Combine all ingredients except the tortillas in a large bowl, mix by hand until incorporated. Using a handheld immersion blender, puree about 1/4 of the mixture right in the bowl with all of the ingredients. Remix everything. This will give the mixture a more solid feel and pieces of beans will not be falling out when you bite or cut it.

Soften the tortillas by putting over an open flame on you're stove, over a grill or in the microwave for a few seconds. This will make them easier to roll and move without cracking. Place 1/2 cup chopped lettuce and 1/2 cup of the bean mixture at the bottom of the tortilla, roll over forward 1 turn, fold sides in and then continue to roll to the end.

Optional: place on sheet tray and bake for 10-15 min at 325 degrees.

How do you get your Mexican Food fix?