Category: Vegeterian Main Dishes

Caprese Salad with Balsamic Vinaigrette

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caprese salad

Nothing is more beautiful than tomatoes, mozzarella and basil, drizzled with a tangy, sweet balsamic vinaigrette!  And takes almost no time at all.

4 tomatoes, sliced 1/2″ thick
1 ball of fresh Mozzarella, cut into 1/4″ slices
Handful of fresh basil leaves

Vinaigrette Recipe:

3 Tbsp Balsamic Vinegar (Costco’s is amazingly good)
2 Tbsp Olive oil
1/4 tsp garlic powder
2/3 tsp Dijon mustard
1/3 tsp honey
1 Tbsp chopped fresh parsley
1/8 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper

Mix vinaigrette up in a mason jar, and shake well.

Layer tomatoes with Mozzarella and basil leaves on a broad serving dish, and drizzle the vinaigrette over. So good.

Pepper, Mushrooms & Eggplant on Pasta

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We had roasted eggplant a couple of days ago, and had some leftover.  I also had peppers in the fridge and a bunch of mushrooms, so we threw together a lovely dish. A little parmesan would have been good, but we were out. It was delicious as is.

Maya wanted “hodge-podge” pasta tonight. (We keep a large mason jar with the tail ends of all different pastas. Even if they cook at slightly different times, they’re usually close enough to be fine, plus it’s fun to have all different shapes.)

1 Tbsp olive oil
1 red pepper, sliced thinly
1 green pepper, sliced thinly
2 Tbsp butter and 1 tsp of bacon drippings (optional)
2 cloves of garlic, crushed or 1/4 tsp garlic powder
8-10 large mushrooms, sliced fairly thinly
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
Roasted eggplant
Pasta

Start water boiling for pasta. When you start the mushrooms, you can start the pasta and it comes out about the same time.

Meantime, heat olive oil in a large saute pan. Add peppers to oil and stir fry for a couple of minutes. Turn the heat down a bit, and loosely cover the pan with a lid. (I used a lid that was smaller than the pan, but still covered the peppers.) After a couple of minutes, I uncovered them, and stirred again. Back on with the cover for another couple of minutes.

Stir again, and remove the peppers. Wipe out the pan in case anything was getting close to burning. Add butter to the pan, and the bacon drippings. Add garlic and cook for a couple of minutes until it starts to brown. Add the mushrooms and cook them the same way you did the peppers. Stir fry, then cover, stir again, cover and stir again.  For the final cook, you’ll want to leave them uncovered until most of the liquid dries up.

Add the peppers back into the pan, along with any juices. Using a spoon, scrape the flesh out of the roasted eggplants along the edge of the pan. Break up the eggplants into smaller chunks. Some parts will be stringy, but that’s okay. Toss with the peppers and mushrooms to warm and season with salt and pepper to taste. Yum!

I added another little pat of butter to my pasta since I love butter!

Roasted Eggplant with Tahini Sauce

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From the Wall Street Journal – though simplified. Eggplant and tahini are so good together! The original recipe called for fresh herbs on top, but we like it just like this.

6 small eggplants, halved, skin and stem intact
olive oil
kosher salt

Put eggplants on a baking pan, drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt. Roast at 425 for 20 minutes.

1/4 cup tahini paste
2 Tbsp lemon juice
sprinkle of garlic powder
1/2 to 1 tsp salt
1/4 cup water

Mix all together and drizzle over eggplant just before serving. Trader Joe’s also sells a Tahini sauce which you can substitute for the tahini paste and water. Just use 1/2 cup of the sauce instead.

You can use larger eggplants – just cut them in slices about 1″ thick.