Heavy On The Veggie

I'm a meat and potatoes kind of girl. When I was little we lived on a farm. You do the math. I'll never be able to give up cheeseburgers or fried chicken. But I try to eat a variety of foods, too. And one thing that I do struggle with is making vegetable at home. And the fact that I can get the most awful tummy aches after eating vegetables and fruit doesn't help. What gives with that, anyway? Plate of fries? No problem. Sleeve o' cookies? Easy. Broccoli? I'm miserable for at least 5 hours.

So when Claire of Heavy On The Veggie reached out to me, I took it as a sign. She's a nurse practitioner with a focus on nutrition and exercise. And we have a few friends in common. Wasn't long until we had a cooking party on the books...

This is Claire's pretty kitchen. And that's her on the right. And that's Teal, in well, teal. She's an artist. More on her later, this post is about food! Not art.

So the focus for dinner was eating vegetables simply. IE, something I might actually try to cook myself at home. We roasted broccoli (I know, at home I'll switch it to cauliflower or something), grilled some okra, and made veggie pizzas. Even better, we had fun doing it.

Hey look, my friend Lulie was there. Again, this post is not about art, damn it...

But it is about wine.

I know okra seems like such a southern thing, but I swear it's tasty. And I had never had it grilled - divine. Claire just tossed it with EVOO, seasoned salt, and a little red pepper.

For the pizzas we used tomato sauce or pesto (I did half and half) on Naan bread and then loaded up the veggies. Roasted peppers, onions, mushrooms, whatever you want. We make pizza at home a lot and I regularly use roasted red peppers. So good. The broccoli was just tossed with EVOO, salt and pepper and then roasted in the oven at 400 for about 20 minutes. Claire squeezed a lemon over it before serving.

Good, healthy food with good people just makes you feel good. I've made it a priority to eat more veggies during my day. Thanks for the gentle push and guidance, Claire. Your blog is such an inspiration! I'm feeling Heavy On The Veggie.

PS: I'm pinning lots of veggie recipes here. Don't judge the other yummy recipes mixed in there. It's all about balance, right? ;)