Veggies the Cool Way

I am not one of those moms that routinely tries to sneak veggies into my kids. Most of the time, it's obvious, like salad or grilled vegetable of some sort.  I don't have time to mix spinach puree into my brownies!

BUT if you find a recipe that can get veggies into your family and they want to eat a lot of them, that is always a good thing!

I have been seeing these all over the place lately, they are zucchini and sweet potato "chips". Basically you slice them SUPER thin (I used a mandolin), the width of a quarter. Then spray oil on them, sprinkle with the spices of your choice (I used salt and paprika).  You then cook on 225 degrees for about an hour, then turn the pan around and cook another 30+ minutes until you see and feel them getting crispy.  Keep checking towards the end, because they will start to burn.  And they do crisp up a bit more after you take them out.  They were AWESOME.  Got the idea HERE.

Next, I needed a meatless meal the next night, but still wanted it to be hearty enough to stand alone.  This was butternut squash baked ziti, and I am not gonna lie to you, I am not sure what all I put in it.  That probably does not help those of you who like a recipe.  I got the general concept from doing a recipe search for butternut squash lasagna.

Basically, I roasted a butternut squash that I had cut into cubes on 425F, along with a whole sliced onion.  I pureed all that together with salt, cinnamon, and a little chicken stock.  Then the cheese pasta layer was ricotta, spinach, mozzarella, a little Tony's and I pureed that and mixed with noodles.  Then layer this on top of one another, and complete with cheese and spinach leaves.  It was YUM-O! 

These last two things have nothing to do with veggies, and everything to do with carbs.  BUT, if you eat your veggies, then you get double the carbs.  Right?

This is the Pioneer Woman's Blackberry Cobbler.  This looks NOTHING likes hers.  Oh wow.  Who cares.  I mean, it has an entire stick of butter in this small pan.  It rocked.  And there is fruit in it.  And that is close to a veggie.  

I am not really sure why I have not made homemade sandwich bread in awhile.  I did.  It was quite possibly the softest, yummiest, flavorfulest any other "est" words that you can think of that describe bread, since I cannot seem to think of more.  I kept trying to come up with an excuse to incorporate it into every meal today.  Recipe is HERE.