Friday, July 20, 2018

Cooking Show: Vegan Recipes! Zucchini Noodles with Avocado/Pistachio Pesto, Pineapple-Lemon Mojitos, Strawberry & Spinach Salad with Poppyseed Dressing and Paleo Berry-Almond Crumble!

I need to confess that our recently-filmed cooking show was a bit out of my comfort zone!

My friend, Dot, cooked with me.  Dot is a vegan. The theme of each cooking show typically features a menu that mirrors the type of cuisine that my guest would like.  I went into overdrive, trying to come up with a vegan menu...a menu that Dot would approve of, with recipes that would be enjoyed by vegans as well as non-vegans!  

My (non-vegan) family willingly taste-tested all of my attempts and experimenting as I tried to come up with decent recipes.

Some of those attempts were just awful, but my family never complained.  All of the failures only helped to illuminate the recipes that were worth keeping!


Soooo good!  Zoodles coated with creamy avocado pesto, accented with sun-dried tomatoes...what's not to love?



 Strawberry/Spinach Salad with Poppy Seed Dressing

We featured this recipe on the cooking show a few years ago.  It's an oldie but goodie!

Click here to be taken to the printable recipe.


This recipe was inspired by a bottle of Pineapple-Lemon seltzer that I bought on a recent trip to the supermarket.

However, if you can not find pineapple-lemon seltzer, I promise you that you can substitute average, plain, basic seltzer and these mojitos will taste just fine!

How do I know this?  In the interest of quality control, I prepared two batches of mojitos for my family to taste-test (one batch with pineapple-lemon seltzer and one batch with plain seltzer), and the consensus was that both batches were fabulous!

          Berry-Almond Crumble

Please don't let my lack of photography skills scare you. 

This dessert is paleo as well as vegan, and it is FABULOUS.  After he took his first bite, my husband declared, "I could eat this whole thing by myself."

The sweetness of the warm berries combined with the crunchy almond topping is a winning combo!