It doesn't look like there is a dinner thread going, and I need ideas from clever chick cooks! Now that it's getting cool, I am craving some fall food, and I can turn my oven on without overheating the house. Tonight's dinner is summery still - grilled sausage and zucchini skewers with sliced tomatoes. I think tomorrow I'll make the Mexican Eggplant with chicken. DD1 has really gotten into the SB way of life and wants to come over tomorrow and cook together. She requested the eggplant. I also saw a recipe for meatloaf made with turkey, white beans, and mushrooms that I want to try this week. I'll let you all know how that turns out. Meatloaf is one of the things I crave when it gets cool.

So, what are you having for dinner tonight?

sparkpeople.com has good recipes.

I've recently started using grated zucchini in my meatloaf/meatballs, and that has worked well. Here are the meals I'm looking forward too in the next couple of weeks. No oven necessary on any of them.

White chicken chili
Turkey Kielbasa soup with leeks, arugula, and sweet potato (phase 2)
Pepperocini roast (arm roast plus a jar of pepperocinis in the crockpot--having mine in a flatout with a wedge of laughing cow)
Spaghetti squash with puttanesca sauce (will have to read the label of my fave jarred brand. If it has sugar, I'll have to go on a recipe search)

All sorts of squashes on sale this week. Any ideas about what to do with them?

Go to epicurious dot com and search for roasted acorn squash with chile lime vinaigrette. It is awesome, even my kiddos will eat it.

We are eating weird easy vacation dinners. Tonight was turnip greens with garlic and rice vinegar (that's all I could find in the cupboard) and refried beans with salsa and ff Greek yogurt. Surprisingly good and a healthy at home dinner.

I have been perusing the Kath Eats Real Food blog. As soon as I go all Phase 2, I'm trying Sweet Potato Gnocchi (with Kale). I can't believe how good this sounds!! It is made with whole wheat flour, but in the comments section someone mentions how to make it with less flour. And I wouldn't use maple syrup on the kale.

But YUM.

The other things I plan to try soon:
Green Greens & Mac , which uses greens and butternut squash and whole wheat elbow macaroni
AND Butternut Squash & Mushroom "Risotto", which uses steel-cut oats instead of rice! I HAVE to try this one. Such an interesting idea.

OMG, I fall food so much.

If you're looking for Quick and easy (and I always Am)
Makes 4 ish meals
Preheat oven to 350
2 packs of the boil in bag brown rice
1-2 cans black beans drained and rinsed
24 oz jar Salsa
2-3pound pack of chicken (I just had 8 packs of boneless skinless thighs)
Spices
dried minced onion
Mrs Dash Grilled chicken
chili powder
cumin
season salt optional
Water or chicken broth
This is a total dump recipe
dump rice in bottom of pan
shake in all spices I do everything but the salt liberally
Top with black beans repeat the spices
Top with the chicken repeat spices
top with the salsa
Pour water or chicken broth into the salsa Jar Shake it up add enough till the rice is covered
(Alternatively you can add some salsa to the rice before the beans and just top the chicken pieces with salsa)

Toss in Oven
Bake 30 ish minutes for thawed chicken about an hour for frozen

This also works really well with Pasta sauce white beans and Italian spices

I made butternut squash fries to go with my veggie burgers the other night... cut into thin strips and baked at 425 about 10 minutes, flipped and 10 more minutes... I used the top of the squash for those and baked the bottom after scooping out the seeds to save for another nights dinner I imagine they would be fantastic with a bit of evoo and rosemary tossed with them before baking! Unfortunately I am leaving out the oil right now...

Its not very creative.... but my fav cold weather dinner has always been and always will be a nice spicy chilli, topped with a dollop of lf sour cream & served with a slice of ww bread..... yum!

tonight will be curried carrot soup, roasted delicata slices and veggie burgers

I was cooking sauce for the freezer and we had to have some. I sauteed broccoli rabe with EVOO, garlic & red pepper flakes, added some veggie chunks (chicken like) and some of the cooking tomatoes. We served it over zucchini spirals

Shmoo the other night I made Turkey sausage and peppers and spag squash

Allrecipes has a recipe for Slow Cooker Chicken Taco Soup that we love. I leave out the corn, and either make my taco seasoning from scratch (so it doesn't have a corn flour thickener in it) or leave it out entirely if I'm feeling really lazy. If you don't want to use beer in it, you can sub in chicken broth.

Chili is huge in our house. I load ours up with salsa, chopped up green or red peppers, and a ton of tomatoes as well as cans of kidney, black, and pinto beans. It's a great way to get all of those veggies in!

I've been experimenting a bit with hotdish recipes too. Another recipe site that I frequent has a homemade condensed cream-of-whatever soup recipe on it, and I made condensed cream of mushroom soup from it using King Arthur White Whole Wheat flour and skim milk with fresh mushrooms. I tossed it together with lean browned ground beef, onion, reduced fat shredded cheese, a little more milk, and frozen green beans. Topped with sweet potato fries, and made our 1st SB-friendly tater-tot hotdish!

I also have a recipe that I created for a whole wheat lasagna using fresh ball mozzarella that we make as a special treat on occasion.

I can link to all of these, but since I'm new here, I figured I would wait a bit before sending out a post filled full of links.

I would like to know if Emma ever cooked that Sweet potato gnocchi? It looks sooo good! I think I may have to make it today!

I am thinking a good ol batch of pinto beans is sounding good soon...

And its definitely chili season ;0)

Rikki, I was just thinking that a batch of beans sounded good. I have so many bags of dried beans too.

I'm making a fall vegetable curry tonight. I'm making the cashew basmati rice, but for the family. I'm going to put mine over spinach and let it wilt a bit.

http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/re...ipe_id=2012769