Makin' It Work ... One Day At A Time: Freezer-Friendly

Evening Chickpeas!

This is one of my all time favorite go-to lunch/freezer meals. I travel a lot for work and also I just like have prepared healthy meals ready in my house to save money and keep the waist trim so this recipe has become one of my stable freezer meals good for lunch or even dinner. I make it vegan because I like to eat vegan a few times a week but it can easily be transformed with some grilled chicken, sour cream, cheese, etc.

Roasted Veggie and Black Bean Rice Bowl

I must say I also make this recipe with NO ADDED SALT - it has soooooooo much flavor between the roasted vegetables with chili powder and the lime cilantro rice that I do not miss it at all. I have a low sodium salsa I put on top that usually adds a bit of salt but overall this is a very low sodium dish and you will not miss it at all.

I had a bag of dried beans so I just used that as opposed to canned black bean. Ignore all the soak for 6-8 hours. That is never really necessary.

I also made the lime cilantro rice which is my favorite recipe for any Mexican, Chinese, or any added flavor to rice.

This night I only had chili powder, garlic, and olive oil so that's what I used to dress onions,sweet potatoes, and jalapeno and it was just as good.

Chili Powder, Olive Oil, Garlic

Chunks of Sweet Potatoes and Onion to good bite size pieces

Then roast - my favorite way to make any vegetable delicious.

And finally - assemble

All the fixin's

Perfect little freezer meals - I add shredded lettuce and salsa for a little vegan burrito bowl.'

Enjoy!!

Good Mornin'

I've been getting more and more into making all natural food at home (especially when I had the time) and two weeks home and pretty much off work allowed me to dig into my Pinterest and pull out some great recipes I could create while I had the time as well as enjoy!

I'm very proud of myself for my little masterpiece last night of homemade pizza with homemade crust, marinara sauce, and healthy filling. This was all pieced together by a couple different recipes.

First was the crust - I put this together about a week ago and initially wanted to make it to freeze so we would have homemade pizza crust at the house instead of buying the sodium fat filled delivery or even processed frozen kind. I pulled this one out of my Pinterest and it was great and surprisingly very simple! Freezer-Friendly Pizza Dough.

Yeast, Sugar, and Warm Water dissolving

Using the Kitchaid to knead the dough

I followed the directions exactly and used 1/2 wheat and 1/2 white flour so 2 1/2 cups wheat and 2 1/2 cups white. It had a distinct wheat flavor which I loved and my boyfriend did not. He tends to think wheat is a little dry (as always) and just merely suggested that I used the second frozen dough to make two thin crust pizza so will be following up on that!

Marked each bag with what the food is, when it was made, and how to defrost/cook.

Second was the marina sauce. I had some leftover crushed tomatoes from a spaghetti night we had a couple days back so I was determined to make my own sauce for the pizza. It was great because I found a very simple one by Ina Garten I added some Italian Seasoning and Oregano before simmering to give it a more Italian flare. It was a great simple sauce for the recipe. Marinara Sauce.

Third and final was the delicious toppings. I found this recipe on Cooking Light which is always a favorite of mine. The do use processed food occasionally so I watch for that which is why I used my own dough marinara sauce even though the recipe calls for just a store bought dough and sauce. Spicy Sausage and Mushroom Pizza .

The store did not have spicy sausage so I went with the mild but then added some paprika and crushed red pepper flakes when I was cooking the sausage. Also - the package you see is 16 oz and the recipe only called for 4 oz. When I first put the 4 oz in the pan it look kind of minimal so I did end up adding another 4. I didn't need to... the 8 oz was a little too much and I ended up putting about 1/2 to 3/4 of the topping on and saved the rest to add into scrambled eggs in the morning. And finally I did add some salt and pepper. Cooking Light does a good job of keeping things low sodium but since everything was homemade and I was controlling the salt levels I need to added to bring out the flavors of the veggies.