family freezer meals #1 - chili

i had so much fun today making a big batch of chili! i wanted something for my friend's potluck tonight that i could also freeze batches of for when baby arrives and making good food for ourselves may not be the easiest!
chili was my first idea.

for this chili, i sauteed an onion and a couple big cloves of garlic in coconut oil. then, i added cubed turnip and some carrot, zucchini, broccoli, kale, 3 tomatoes, 4 stalks of celery, 1 baby bok choy, a few slices of red cabbage, and a can of mixed beans, about 1/2 cup of dried lentils and probably 1/2 a tablespoon of my punch-in-the-head powerful chili powder, a sprinkle of cinnamon and cumin and basil and some chopped fresh basil. let that simmer for awhile and OOOOH i am mighty pleased.

raw purple corn chips!

i have been vowing to use the purple corn kernels i've had in the fridge for raw chips for YEARS, i'm sure. i'm actually scared to do a search on this blog as i know it's been way too long.
well, finally i tried it! and i'm impressed.
i used this recipe from rawfullytempting.com and it was perfect.

first i needed to blend my flax seed into powder and process all the corn. i try to avoid corn in my usual day, though i am a sucker for anita's white popping corn! gah. anyways! i most definitely used organic (non-GMO!!!) yellow and purple corn for this recipe.


using my vita-mix for processing the corn and such was not ideal, but it just meant i had to take many breaks (as the motor was working overtime) and had to keep spatula-ing the sides to get everything mixing evenly. i really need to get a big food processor one of these days as my mini one is just not cutting it. it is, but not just not enough at once! ha.

the spreading part, as the recipe states, is not the easiest part. i didn't quite take my time and they are uneven. but now i know that i like the thicker parts better than the fragile thin chips!
but all sizes of chips taste awesome in the red pepper chickpea hummus paul made last night! 

thank you, rooted!

yesterday was not the best day and that's after a not so great wednesday. i can't even remember the last time i felt so frustrated and BLEH!
paul got home around the same time as me which is a crazy thing in itself and he suggested dinner and eek! the day suddenly perked up!
the especially crazy thing though was that i wasn't craving anything in particular and not particularly hungry.
so... the best place to go (and he hadn't been yet!) was rooted on the drive. i always feel so much better after being here and last night was no exception. the people here are amazing and the food is incredible!!! (ooh and i'm happy to report they are open every day 11-8!)
i quickly regained my appetite! YAY!

we shared a large kale casear (i felt like i could eat another of those! soooo good!!) and i had some of paul's chili and i ate most of the mexican wrap. messy but delicious! ooh and we had the lucuma/mesquite cheezecake for dessert! YES!

this is probably my most favourite place to eat in vancouver. and i can't help but think that even though i haven't mastered eliminating stress in the work part of my life, at least i don't seem to have food-caused stress in my life and i'm healthy overall. 

and eating at places like rooted make me feel super lucky and happy.

<3

if i could eat this in a restaurant, i'd be most pleased!

so this was lunch yesterday! another ani phyo delight, from p145 of ani's raw food essentials: tomato chili with taco nut meat (bean-free). i only had 1 tomato so i don't imagine i had quite the 3 cups asked for and i didn't use corn but... success! i used less chili powder than asked for since i had stuff from organic lives and wow, i still felt a punch in the head from the chili! it's powerful!

for the taco nut meat (p146), i used brazil nuts instead of walnuts and it was DELICIOUS.

i served the chili on top of some romaine and put half an avocado on each of our plates to calm the chili a bit.

 and yah, this couldn't be better if someone else made it! the PERFECT meal!!!

 and well, a couple hours later, i couldn't resist trying to make a cashew cream with lemon and vanilla to spoon over strawberries with cacao nibs!