Sprout & Pea

When my mom and I hand made quinoa ravi­oli a few weeks ago, I wanted to top it with some­thing light to let the home­made fla­vors and tex­tures shine. So, we decided to make a lit­tle sage, shal­lot and but­ter sauce. Unfor­tu­nately, not used to the elec­tric stove that my mom has at home, I wound up burn­ing the shal­lots a bit, but I still enjoyed the slightly crisp, deli­cious taste. The fla­vors screamed win­ter and I wanted to try mak­ing this sauce again when I returned home to 32 degree Brook­lyn. Read more:

Recently, Bob­bye, a Sprout & Pea reader asked me if I made my own quinoa pasta. Well, Bob­bye, I never had but you inspired me to give it a go! I brought up the idea while I was home over Thanks­giv­ing and my mom was equally excited about it so together we attempted to make some quinoa ravi­oli. It turns out all you need to make this pro­tein packed pasta is some quinoa flour, arrow­root pow­der and eggs. We were skep­ti­cal about how easy the recipe sounded but if it turned out well, it would be an excit­ing solu­tion to not being able to pur­chase quinoa ravi­oli or tortellini at the store. Read more:

This dish is inspired by both my mom’s deli­cious spaghetti squash and a dish i had at a local restau­rant a few years ago. Grow­ing up, one of my favorite side dishes with din­ner was my mom’s sim­ple spaghetti squash with honey and but­ter. It was like candy with my din­ner, only it wasn’t overly sweet and I was get­ting my daily veg­gies in. It wasn’t until I saw a spe­cial for spaghetti squash on the menu at Lodge one night that I thought of the deli­cious stringy veg­etable as a main course. With dou­ble inspi­ra­tion in hand, I decided to make my own twist on this, com­bin­ing my mom’s recipe for spaghetti squash with a few of the top­pings from my din­ner at Lodge– with a few tweaks. Read more:

Hands down, my absolute favorite side dish is my mom’s mashed pota­toes. She makes them with sour cream which gives them a nice creamy tang and when it comes to food, I tend to devour any­thing with a lit­tle tang. Over the years, I’ve adapted this recipe into a slightly health­ier ver­sion by sub­sti­tut­ing Greek yogurt and it tastes just as deca­dent. Con­tin­u­ing on the healthy route, tonight I decided to make my adapted recipe with cau­li­flower instead of pota­toes.
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