Green Monsta

So I dunno if you picked this up from my last post involving mushrooms, but I am attempting to go vegetarian. Emphasis on the word attempt. I've been doing it for about 3 weeks now and I've only had 3 or 4 slip-ups! That is, if you even call them slip-ups - my vegetarian coach Brett told me that turkey is a vegetable and bacon is a fruit, so except for that Buffalo Chicken sandwich I had last weekend, I am in the clear!

Anywho. I was looking for some vegetarian recipes and I found this website called Oh She Glows. The author, Angela, is vegan, which is a little too hardcore for me, but I am still interested in trying some of her recipes. She has this smoothie drink called a Green Monster that piqued my interest. She had a recipe for a basic one on her site, but I kind of just used her recipe as a jumpoff point. She has a ton of different recipes that I want to try, but my first one was just kind of basic.

Ingredients
spinach
1 banana
frozen berries
coconut milk
ice

No amounts, except for the banana. Yea, so sue me. I just eyeballed it, and added more stuff as it blended. Let your hair down already geez.

Maybe this visual will help.

Or this one.

Basically throw it all in the blender and hit blend! Then drink.

My first attempt - not so green.

Second attempt. Greener!

 

Much better! And you can't taste the spinach. It is supposed to give you a ton of energy. I'll be putting up other recipes with different variations as I make them. To look for more recipes yourself, check out her Green Monster Movement.

Grilled Portobello Sandwich

Aight. This one is a little tricky. I have made it twice so far, and of course no pictures - but I do have one portobello mushroom left so maybe I will remember to take pictures on the 3rd try. *Update - I finally took pictures on the 4th mushroom. Go me!* This tastes awesome and it is really filling. It is a great dinner idea for someone who is trying to go temporarily vegetarian (me). Dennis even ate one. Amazing.

Ingredients

1 red bell pepper

salt and black pepper to taste

1/2 cup olive oil

2 portobello mushroom caps, cleaned

2 slices onion

2 Kaiser rolls, split

4 tsp mayonnaise

1 tsp roasted garlic

2 ounces mozzarella, thinly sliced

2 slices tomato

First step - roast the red pepper. Put it on the grill and turn it until the whole thing is blackened. Should be around 15 minutes.

While your red pepper is roasting, mix the olive oil with the salt & pepper. Brush the mixture on top of the mushroom and then on the underside, including the...gills. *shudder* Man those creep me out.

 Gills are less freaky when you have a super helper dog in the kitchen.

The first time we made these sandwiches, we used the grill but it was kind of difficult and annoying, so the 2nd time I used the broiler. I put the portobello and onion on my pizza stone in the oven and put the broiler on low and let them sit for a few minutes. I flipped the portobello, left the onion alone, and let them sit for another few minutes on low. Then I flipped the mushroom again and placed a piece of mozzarella cheese on top, then put the broiler on HIGH. YEAAA!!

Onion and mushroom chillin on the pizza stone.

Ok so at this point, your mushroom and onions should be doing well. Also at this point, your red pepper should be blackened. Put it in a bowl and cover it with a lid, then leave it be for a few minutes. Now go put your kaiser rolls (open-faced) in the oven under the broiler so they can get nice and toasty. One more thing - real quick like, go mix up that mayo and garlic to make a sort of, what do you call it... oh right, garlic mayonnaise.

 My garlic mayo. Mmm.

Do you see how tough it is to juggle all of these ingredients!? Yikes. Check on the roll and the mozzarella. Don't let the roll get burnt, but wait until the mozzarella is melty or else it will be cold and taste weird. Once you have found that happy medium, take everything out. Spread the garlic mayo on the roll, then pile the rest of your ingredients on. Don't forget the tomato! Nomnomnom.

Here is the original link from Allrecipes.com.

Leftover tip: I roasted a whole red pepper and put the leftovers in the fridge, so the 2nd time I made this sandwich I tossed the red pepper on the pizza stone at the same time as the mushroom and onion to heat it up. Works like a charm!

"Cilantro Lime" Pork

Notice the quotes? Well I got this recipe because I thought it sounded awesome. I became obsessed with making salsa last summer, mostly the mango/pineapple variety, and 2 ingredients that were in all of the recipes were lime and cilantro. So I saw this recipe and I was all like, whaaaaat? Well it turns out, the pork is still really tasty (can't go wrong with a crock pot), but I did not really get the cilantro-y limey flavor I was looking for. Boo!

Ingredients

1/2 cup olive oil

2 garlic cloves minced

2 tablespoons lime juice

1 tablespoon white vinegar

1 1/2 teaspoon adobo seasoning with cumin

2 tablespoons chopped fresh (or 2 teaspoons dried) cilantro

1 (4 pound) bone in pork shoulder

1 medium onion, sliced

2 cups beef broth

Mix the first 6 ingredients together with a whisk. That will be your marinade. Easy peezy.

 

marinade + pork = mmmm

Get your pork shoulder out and make shallow cuts all over it, then put it in a big Ziploc bag with the marinade and shake it all up so the marinade covers the pork entirely. Then put it in the fridge for at least 6 hours. I left mine overnight. It made the fridge smell yummy (even though the bag was supposed to be completely airtight, what the hell?). When your pork is done marinating, put it in a big pan and sear it on all sides until it is brown. This is going to make your kitchen smell fantastic.

Now lay the sliced onion along the bottom of the crockpot and put the pork inside with the fat side up. Pour the beef broth and the rest of the marinade in the crockpot. I got 2 small cans of beef broth and just used all of that, without really measuring. I also poured the beef broth into the Ziploc bag first to dry to get all of the marinade out. Cover the crockpot and cook on low for 8 hours.

There are some other instructions after this but basically, once the 8 hours was up Dennis and I started eating it. We made sandwiches with Sweet Baby Ray's barbecue sauce and this awesome pepper vinegar my dad made and gave us. Basically it is like... jalapenos soaked in vinegar (not sure what type of vinegar). I always fish some jalapenos out and put them on my sandwiches and OMG they are the bomb.

I can't remember how I found this recipe. It may have been on foodgawker's most favorited recipes of all-time where I found the last 2 recipes (Nummy Mozzerella Sticks & High Class Mac & Cheese). Not sure. Anyway, I think this recipe was sort of a bust because it didn't have the exact taste I was looking for, but the taste it did have was still really good, so I dunno what to think about this one. The meat was awesome, it made the house smell terrific (can I talk about how good this pork smells a little more?), and I did it all by myself with no help from Dennis, so in my book it is a success!

I have no pictures of the finished product because I have not been on top of my game lately. Sorry dudes.

Thank you to Des at Life's Ambrosia for this recipe. It looks like she's got a ton of other cool recipes on her site so check it out sometime!