Week in Review: What I Ate This Week

I love food blogs. Surfing the internet for interesting recipes to make is one of my favorite things to do. I'm always clipping recipes to my Evernote file to use later (yes , I know I would do this with Pinterest) but I like Evernote better! I do have a problem with following recipes though, I very rarely follow them exactly, and I find measuring ingredients to be dull work, so most of the time I just eyeball things. This could be why some of my meals are complete flops, and other are stupendous! A friend from work asked what I was eating on my diet way of life, because she has problems knowing if a recipe would be worth making. Since I am always trying something new from one site or another I decided to start doing a "What I ate this Week" review with links the the recipes that I cooked.  Hope you enjoy!

	Carrot Spice Muffins from FatFree Vegan Kitchen These turned out really well. They are not a very sweet muffin, but this could have been because I opted to get rid of the sugar in the recipe and replaced it with more agave. Mine weren't vegan because I used and equal amount of plain greek yogurt in place of the soy yogurt. I also added some water at the end because my batter was super thick! I also added a 1/2 tsp of nutmeg and about 1/2 cup of chopped pecans just because. I have a problem with following recipes to the letter. But over all, they turned out great. I've been enjoying them for breakfast with some cream cheese or peanut butter, but they are good plain-jane too.
	Spinach Strawberry Salad I sub honey for the sugar and olive oil for the vegetable oil in the this recipe and add a tablespoon of flax seed to it just because. This is easily my favorite salad to make at home because its almost like eating dessert. I only make in when strawberries are on sale though because I end up using 1/2 of the quart for a single salad! I also add either pecans or walnuts (whatever I have on hand) for some extra protein power.
	Budget Bytes' Spinach Artichoke Lasagna I've always thought that vegetarian lasagna was a little bland in comparison to my Mommy's meat lasagna with sausage and hamburger, but no more. This is a really good recipe if you are looking for something a tad lighter. Not that lasagna is ever really "lite." However this is really flavorful and I make mine with whole wheat noodles so I don't feel too guilty eating it.

This Zucchini "Noodles" with Seasame-Peanut sauce from FatFree Vegan Kitchen was a delicious raw meal. There is no need to spend 30 dollars on a vegetable spiralizer, instead I got a Julienne Peeler from Bed Bath and Beyond for 10 dollars and it worked beautifully for this. Granted it isn't as fun and pretty as having continuous vegetable curls, but its easy to use, clean, and store. I cut all my vegetables the night before and just added the sauce the next afternoon. It was great cold, but next time I think I might sauté the veggies in a little oil for a few minutes, add some tofu and then cover it with the sauce for a stir fry. You can used many types of vegetables in this. I add Summer Squash and carrots to my zucchini. Also, a little agave to the sauce sweetens it up a tad. Allergic to peanuts? I wouldn't hesitate to use cashew butter!

Oh She Glows' 15 minute Creamy Avocado Pasta This dish is so quick and it's creamy from the avocado but is really light and doesn't leave you feeling bloated. I used whole wheat pasta and added a can of chickpeas for some extra protein. I used more basil that the recipe called for because who doesn't love basil? Mine was about to go bad and I needed to use it quick. I meant to add a handful of spinach in there too because I had a little left from my strawberry salad earlier in the week, but I completely forgot! I doubled the recipe for 4 servings so I could have left overs, but it will probably turn brown in the fridge. As long as that doesn't turn you off it should taste the same. Otherwise, its so quick its something that you could pull together in a pinch.