Roasted Enchiladas with Tomatillo Sauce

I wish I had taken a picture of this meal.  This is definitely, hands down, one of our FAVS!!  It was soooooo good!!  It took a little more time to make, although I took a walk why the vegetables were roasting, but it was so worth it! 

Roasted Enchiladas with Tomatillo Sauce

Tomatillo Sauce

1 1/2 lbs tomatillos, husks removed (in my local grocery store they were found by the tomatoes.  They are green and look like a tomatoe but they have a husk. They taste very different than tomatoes so I don't think substituting would work well, although they still would have been good with just salsa on the top, the tomatillo sauce is what made this recipe so delicious)
3 small jalapenos (I used the kind in a jar, but I'm sure fresh would be great.  I happen to like the tang of the jar.)
1 c. chopped cilantro
2/3 cup vegetable broth
4 green onions, chopped
1 tsp. sugar
1/4 tsp. salt

Enchiladas

1 small butternut squash, peeled, seeded and diced
2 medium sized red bell peppers, halved and cut into small wedges or slices
1 large red onion, cut into small wedges
1 1/2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp ground cumin (I used a lot more:)
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp. salt
3 cloves garlic, minced
12, 6-inch corn tortillas
1 1/2 cups shredded monterey jack cheese (I like cheese so I used a lot more of this too:)

1) To make sauce:  Cook tomatillos in pot of boiling water 3-4 minutes or until soft (like a ripe plum). Drain.
2) Puree jalapenos in food processor.  Add rest of sauce ingredients and process until smooth (I processed until it looked like chunky taco sauce). Set aside.
3) To make enchiladas:  Preheat oven to 400F. Coat roasting pan and 9x13 inch baking dish with nonstick spray.
4) Toss together squash, peppers, onion, oil, cumin, coriander, and salt in roasting pan.  Bake 50 minutes, stirring occasionally, or until browned.  Stir in garlic.  Reduce oven to 350.
5) Warm tortillas one by one in large skillet over medium heat.  Spoon 1/2 c vegetables down center of each.  Top with 1 tbsp of cheese (I probably did like 3).  Roll and set seam side down in baking dish.
6) Pour 2 cups sauce over enchiladas.  Bake 15 minutes.  Sprinkle with remaining cheese, bake 10 minutes.
7) Warm remaining sauce in skillet over low heat (I skipped this, I thought the sauce was great just the way it was).  To serve:  Place two enchiladas on each plate and drizzzle with warm tomatillo sauce.

I fed 7 people with one pan but if I would have made two pans they would have all got eaten, so next time I will be making two pans.  This is one of the few things that I have made where, hands down, EVERYONE raved about them!  My daughter generally doesn't care much for squash but she LOVED this recipe!  They've all asked me to make it again soon!

Green Smoothies

This is a recipe that many people have been asking me to post.  This is something we make just about every day in this house, usually as an afternoon snack.  I got this recipe (the basics) from a raw food workshop that I went to but I've changed it up a bit.  It is yummmy and there is not one person in this family that doesn't ask me to make them daily (including Rylee who doesn't eat anything that is green), so here is my version:

Green Smoothie

big handful of spinach
couple leaves of kale, de-stemmed (if you blend with stems it will be stringy)
one banana
one apple, peeled
one pear
two oranges, juiced (I just use a simple hand juicer)
1/2 of a lemon, juiced
1/2-1 inch cube of ginger, chopped up in a couple of pieces
2-4 Tbsp honey
1/2 c-1 c. water
12-15 ice cubes

Blend up in blender until smooth.  Enjoy!!

I'm always fascinated with how my body goes in these cycles of ebbs and flows. I'm pretty in tune with my body and constantly tweak my diet so I give my body what it needs.

I started this blog when I decided to give veganism a try for one month. That month turned into a six month relationship with veganism and for my son it lasted for two years. In that time I learned a lot about what foods make me feel good and what foods don't. My son learned to stick with his convictions towards the food industry- for him it was more about ethics and animal rights. He also learned that his body wasn't getting all that it needed with a vegan diet, especially as an athlete. He was having to take lots of supplements. I personally feel that if you have to fill your body with a bunch of synthetic supplements that you need to change your diet so your body gets what it needs from food. I also decided that there are certain things that I enjoy too much to give up, mainly wine and cheese. Those two things alone give me a lot of pleasure and I want them in my life:) So neither of us are vegan anymore.

The differences that Kev has experienced are amazing! Just adding eggs to his diet has made him stronger, less sick (something he has struggled with for three years), and is taking incredible amounts of time off of his swim races.

Tristan also informed me a few days ago that he is not vegetarian any more. He does not want to search meat out to eat but if someone cooks it for him, mainly when he is at a friend's house, he will eat it. I love that my kids are able to make those decisions for themselves and we honor and support those things the best we can. Being that his dad eats meat he won't have to look far if he really wants it.

Over the last couple of months I've been learning more about diet and nutrition; for me it is an ongoing quest, a sort of passion. My body is once again going through a cycle where it is craving something more. Over the last 15 years of being "vegetarian" about 7 of those years have been pescetarian, meaning I ate seafood during those years. It's been a year here and there, as I really just try and listen to what my body needs. I'm once again feeling like I need to add seafood to my diet (it's been four years since I last ate fish). One of the reasons, having nothing to do with how I feel, is that we are trying to move towards a more self-sustainable lifestyle, at least with the food part. Within a few years I would like to be able to only depend on the grocery store for grains and legumes and an occasional treat. Salmon is a readily available food source for us and extremely easy to get for pennies.

I may change the blog name, we'll see. I don't want to misrepresent. I will still mostly be posting vegan recipes, as vegan dinner meals are still more frequent than vegetarian meals but I want to concentrate on HEALTH! I want to start posting more tidbits on research and share more about general health and I want to post on my slow transformation to self-sustainability. I have always had a hard time with the vegan and raw food culture, mostly because they seem to be so black and white: if you don't eat this way you will die or get cancer! I think there needs to be balance in one's life; it's like Kevin from Alaska Center of Acupuncture said to me this week, "It's about what we eat six days out of the week that matter." You could say it's what you eat most of the time that matters.

So stay tuned! I really want to concentrate on this blog v. my regular one, simply because I have FB to update everyone on my life:)