Super Simple Pasta with Pumpkin Sauce (gf)

Last Wednesday I shared a recipe on Instagram and have never gotten so much feedback from a story. People love food, y'all! I thought I'd share the dish here - it's the perfect hearty, healthy, autumnal dish. 

I was inspired by this Paleo Hacks recipe, though I made a lot of changes to it because her sauce was trending sweet and I like mine spicyyyyyy.

Pasta with Pumpkin Sauce (gf)

Ingredients:

•  1 T extra virgin olive oil
•  I small white onion, chopped
•  1 cup pumpkin purée
• 1.5 to 2 cups unsweetened almond milk (adjust for consistency - should be sauce-like)
•  2 T tomato paste
•  1/2 t sea salt (adjust to preference)
• 1/2 t black pepper (adjust to preference)
• 1/2 t cayenne (adjust to preference)
• 1/4 t Pepperman (or any all purpose seasoning blend of your choosing)
• Pasta of your choice (we used this Edamame & Mung Bean Fettucine and it was delicious) 
• Fresh, chopped basil (optional)
• Fresh parm (optional)
• Spinach (optional)

To make:

• Heat olive oil over medium heat in saucepan and add chopped onion. Sauté until onions are soft.
• Add pumpkin purée, almond milk, tomato paste and all spices.
• Let cook on low heat.
• Begin boiling a large pot of water for pasta. Once boiling, add pasta, salt and pepper so noodles absorb the flavor. Boil until al dente (7 - 8 minutes for bean noodles) or until they are the texture you like.
• While pasta cooks, be sure to continue stirring the sauce. Turn to a simmer if it has begun boiling. If it has gotten too thick as it has cooked, add more almond milk. 
• Once the pasta is finished, drain in a colander. Remove the sauce from the heat.
• Serve the sauce over pasta. Add basil, parmesan, spinach or (if you're like us!) chicken meatballs (which we bought pre-cooked and simply heated up!). 
• Enjoy!

Moringa (or Matcha!) Mint Smoothie

First of all, let me answer the obvious question here: wtheck is Moringa!?

The best comparison I can make is that it's a lot like matcha, but has more powerful health benefits and is more bitter in taste. Also, it provides a natural energy boost, but doesn't have caffeine, which means you won't have that 3 p.m. crash from it. 

If you want to learn more, I think this article does the best job comparing Moringa and. Matcha: Battle of the Greens: Moringa vs. Matcha. And this article does a great job explaining why it's so, so, sooo good for you: 11 Surprising Facts About Moringa And How It Can Improve Your Health.

When Chris and I were in Kenya, we picked Moringa leaves and processed them all the way through to consumption. This meant drying the stalks, pulling the leaves off of them, grinding it to powder (a machine did this part), weighing, measuring and packaging it - and even creating the nutrition label. It was super cool and, obviously, not something we could do in the US for resale because, ya know, health codes. 

This is the Moringa leaf after we picked it from the stalk and dried it in the sun for a few days. After this, we ground it to powder!

We brought six containers of it back, which was really lucky, because I had no idea it's pretty pricey in the US. In Kenya, it's abundant and people eat it constantly. They'd never pay the premium we pay - cost of living adjustments aside! Their access to it is our like our access to refined sugar. 

So, now that you're a Moringa expert, I wanted to share an awesome smoothie recipe. We had an abundance of mint in our backyard (which we planted more than three years ago - mint is crazy!), so it was the inspo for this guy. 

Moringa Mint Smoothie

Ingredients:

2 t. Moringa Leaf Powder (any brand will work, as long as it's powder!) 
1 c. almond milk (Califia Farms is farrr and away my fav)
3 softened dates
1 handful of mint
1 t. vanilla
1 handful of ice
1 c. of spinach

To Make:

• Assemble all ingredients in a powerful blender. I love our Vitamix! 
• Pulverize until consistency is smooth and creamy
• If you like it thicker, add more ice. If you like it runnier, add more milk! Is that obvious? :) Idk smoothies can be tricky to get the consistency right!

I sipped it down in seconds and cannot wait to make it again. 

Roasted Beet Hummus

You can’t beat beet hummus, amiright? I recently experimented with a recipe for this hummus and thought I’d share it. It’s supersimple and nutrient dense.

If you don’t like beets, it’s probably not the recipe for you because it tastes quite beety. However, if you like them, it’s delicious! Not to mention beet-iful in its bright pink color.

OK I will stop with beet jokes and share the recipe.

Ingredients:

1 can garbanzo beans
Two large or three medium beets
Juice from 1 lemon, plus more as needed
1 T. tahini
Salt, pepper, cumin, cayenne to taste
1/4 cup of water or olive oil if you want a richer taste

To Make:

It’s important to note there are two ways to make this recipe. If you like a sweeter hummus, roast the beets before making. If you like an earthier taste and have a Vitamix or powerful, pulverizing blender, you can keep them raw. I preferred them raw.

1. Optional: roast beets to soften at 375 for ~45 minutes
2. Blend beets until creamy. If you opted not to roast the beets, this is going to take a minute. If your blender is not proving able, trying cutting the beets into pieces.
3. Once creamy, add lemon juice, Tahini, water (or oil) and garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
4. Add in spices. Taste as you go to add more as needed. 

Enjoy with chips, carrots or cucumbers! :) 

My Thoughts on "Healthy" & Buffalo Chicken White Chili Recipe

I struggled with calling this White Chicken Chili "healthy" because it's a word that kind of drives me bonkers. As my friend, Robyn, says, our culture has a very narrow definition of what healthy is. Healthy for you may not be healthy for me. And healthy today may not be healthy tomorrow.

Perhaps you're watching your cholesterol and need to follow certain guidelines to lower it. Those steps would be healthy for you. But, for me, as someone who has struggled with restrictive food habits, Intuitive Eating is a much healthier way to live. 

No two bodies are the same and it's a dangerous game we play when we start to believe we are the authority on what is and isn't healthy. I get fired up about it when I search Pinterest for recipes and see so many things tagged as healthy. From Paleo to Whole 30 to low fat to Vegan, you can find thousands of recipes claiming they have the healthiest version of something. How can they be so sure? 

This chili recipe is what I consider to be healthy. Is it Paleo? Nope, give me the beans! Is it Vegan? Nope, give me the chicken! But, it doesn't have anything artificial in it (see ya, sour cream & ranch dressing packets!), is chocked full of vegetables and is protein heavy. At our house, that's what we consider a delicious dinner. 

Buffalo Chicken White Chili

Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 6 hours (in slow cooker)
Yields: 8 servings

Note: I made this in my slow cooker, but you could easily do it more quickly over the stove. 

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 to 1.5 pounds chicken (if in slow cooker, put in whole and pull apart with fork at the end)
• 3 c. Organic Free Range Chicken Broth
• 1 c. chopped celery
• 1 c. chopped carrots
• 3 cans black beans (drained & rinsed)
• 3 cans white beans (drained & rinsed)
• 1 can fire-roasted tomatoes 
• 3 T. plain Greek yogurt (more yogurt yields a creamier result)
• 1/3 c. hot sauce 
• 1 t. cumin
• 2 t. chili powder 
• 1 t. cayenne
• Salt & pepper to taste

TO MAKE:

• Chop carrots & celery
• Drain & rinse beans
• Combine all ingredients in slow cooker 
• Return in 6 hours, fork chicken apart 
• Serve with your favorite chili toppings. I love avocado and cheddar cheese over mine. 

Happy eats! :)