AIP Moroccan-style Vegetables* (with reintroductions)

Whatever we had in the crisper, along with a few new purchases from today's grocery run...and YES there will be leftovers!

I've been making stir-fry vegetables but decided I was hungry for Moroccan-style again!  I had to make some adjustments to my original recipe to make it mostly AIP compliant, and used more and different vegetables since we just got back from our weekly grocery shopping and needed to get stuff out of the fridge, but YUM.

You can pretty much use whatever vegetables you have on hand, I did! These were in tonight's dish...

Cut up half an onion
2-3 radishes if you have them, sliced
2-3 large carrots
Several broccoli florets, cut bite size
Several cauliflower florets, ditto
1/2 zucchini cut in bite sizes
1 C. Cabbage, cut thin (not quite as thin as for slaw)
½ C. Mushrooms, if you have them.  (Or however many you want.)
2-3 cloves of garlic or a generous sprinkle of garlic powder
handful of raisins (that's the reintroduction, dried fruit is out, at first)

Saute' in olive oil till beginning to get tender, then add spices:

I used:

garlic powder

turmeric

cinnamon

ginger

powdered clove, just a bit for a kick

salt

cumin (whoops, another reintry--seeds) 

pepper  (ditto, one more)

(This is very much like my AIP curry powder, recipe here.)

Tonight we had the vegetables with Joseph's wonderful encrusted salmon filets...delicious!

Keep tasting till it has a nice complex taste with a bit of heat from the ginger and vegetables are tender, serve with a protein or whatever suits your fancy...and dig in!

* No nightshades for me on the autoimmune protocol, so no cayenne, oh well...the ginger gave it enough heat!

A Fabulous Sweet Potato...salad-ish something or other!

So what do you do when you suddenly find yourself with three of the biggest sweet potatoes you've ever seen in your life?!?

My cousin Keith is a wonderful gardener, and he gave us some of the last of last year's crop--the vines are busily out there making MORE, even as I type!  (And as you noticed from our last post, I've got my OWN garden again this year...with sweet potatoes, along with other goodies...)

Well, coincidentally, one of my favorite blogs, Mark's Daily Apple featured Purple Primal Potato Salad just the other day, and it's Independence Day today but I'm avoiding regular potatoes, so it got me thinking...why not try one out as a salad--ish? (And no, I didn't end up following Mark's recipe at all...I just went wild!)

Keith's aren't purple, but they ARE organically grown and huge--they're crowding my kitchen!

I'm feeling Middle Eastern these days, loving that tangy-spicy-savory flavor, so I made it up as I went along--measurements are strictly approximate, depending on the size of your sweet potato(s) and your appetite.  It tastes like something you might order at the Blue Nile or the, Marrakesh Cafe in Kansas City.

Feeling adventurous?

You'll need:

Sweet potatoes
1/2 onion (I used sweet yellow onion)
Mayonnaise
Sea Salt
Coarse black pepper
Garlic salt
Turkish seasoning or your own Moroccan mix
Cinnamon (yes, cinnamon)
Sesame seed oil (toasted)
Imagination

Boil 1 huge or 3 smaller sweet potatoes till fork tender

Cool, peel and cube (or cube first and THEN cool till fork tender!)

Chop onion as fine as you like and add to sweet potato

Stir in 2 dollops of mayo (you know what a dollop is, right?  Bigger than a tablespoon, not so big as a half cup...)

A few shakes of sesame seed oil...this is mostly for the delicous nutty flavor

Add a good teaspoon of  Turkish Seasoning (I like Penzey's, but I also make my own Moroccan mix)--you can add more or less as you like

A nice shot of cinnamon...maybe 1/2 t. to start?

A good shake of garlic salt, more or less

Raisins or dried cranberries (or both), a good handful...

Salt and pepper to taste

Now, mix all that up.  Add more Turkish Seasoning, cinnamon, garlic salt, whatever you like.

Refrigerate and then--dig in!

This gives you an idea how HUGE that thing was!  That's a big French chef's knife there, and a slice of normal-sized onion!

I was tempted to throw in a few raisins, but J. thought that might be a bit much.  I'm thinking some of his home made relish would be good, though...

I wasn't sure he'd like it, but he keeps going back for more tastes!