Day 25 of 30- Sweet Potato Shepherd's pie

Winters are so dreary sometimes.  Yesterday was a beautiful and sunny day.  Fiona's boyfriend came by and napped on the deck, curled up in a scruffy ball of cream colored fur.  today..... it was cold and wet and humid, the kind of cold that chills you to the bone, where even the hottest soups and the spiciest foods won't warm you up. I have no idea how the cats survive outside on gross days like today, or really cold days like earlier in the week.

Anyway, yesterday was so fantastic, and the thought of the warm sunny saturday afternoon's activities warmed me up.  A friend of mine from the program recently gave birth to a cute little baby girl.  My photography partner in crime and I went over to her apartment to take some cute photos of the 2 mo old baby, and it was tons of fun.  I have no idea how the couple do it, barely sleeping, trying to figure out what each of the baby's cries and sounds mean.  Complete mystery to me, but all cries, diaper changes, and fussing aside, baby K is cute as a button.  I look forward to taking some family photos out in the park when it gets warmer out :-)  picnic style!

cute little baby K :-)

It's been a while since I did a shoot, so this was a great breath of fresh air.  Babies are also a new photo subject, so that was a  new and exciting challenge. 

Today's recipe is a modified shepherd's pie, with a sweet potato crust.  It is so earthy, filling, warm, sweet and delicious.  The perfect combination of sweet, savory, and delicious.

Shepherd's pie with sweet potato

Ingredients

1/2 lb ground lamb (from the local farm!)
1/2 lb ground beef (we saw that ground grass fed beef was like, not THAT much  more expensive than whatever ground beef they sell at the grocer)
1 large leek
1 med onion
large handful mushrooms
1/2 green bell pepper
carrots
celery
1/2 c vegetable broth
1 can coconut milk
2 medium sized sweet potatos
salt
pepper
rosemary
parseley
thyme

1.  Chop the sweet potato into small sized chunks and roast in the oven until tender (set oven to 350 or 400 and turn down to 350 when baking the assembled dish)
2.  While the sweet potato is baking, chop the vegetables.
3.  Mix the ground lamb with the beef and season with salt and pepper, rosemary and thyme and some parseley
4.  Heat a big skillet/frying pan with some ghee and cook the meat until fully cooked.
5.  Toss in the vegetables and sautee with the meat until fully cooked.
6.  Add in the chicken broth and half the can of coconut milk and simmer with the vegetables until some of the liquids boil off.  Move the meat and vegetables to a glass baking dish until the mash is prepared
7.  When the sweet potatoes are fully cooked, process them in the food processor with a splash of broth and the remaining can of coconut milk.  Season with salt and pepper
8.  Scoop the sweet potato mash over the meat and vegetables in a nice layer and bake in the oven for about 10 minutes
9.  Set the oven to broil and broil on high for another 10 minutes

Serve:

A hot messy mash of veggies meat and potatos

I'm trying not to let days like today get me down.  I had an entire weekend devoid of yoga, and it's strange how down i feel.  I'm trying to find a happier place in my  mind and looking forward to hot summer nights when I look to the sky while biking home and see the sky like this:

Til next time, EAT WELL and BE WELL!

Day 21 of 30- Broccoli beef stirfry

Many exciting things happened today.  Namely-- an awesome pharmacogenomics workshop for a wonderful collaboration that the university has with the mayo clinic.  I really hope that something awesome comes of this for the medical students especially!  We have great ideas and we are probably the best equipped to be thrown into the clinical arena with research expertise!   I loved how enthusiastically the physicians and researchers visiting from Mayo wanted to collaborate.  It was such a breath of fresh air to see scientifically minded people actually willing to share their overly abundant mountain of knowledge and resources with those who have the ability to help.  So inspiring.  Times like these rekindle my love and joy for science and medicine together.  After the Individualizing Medicine conference back in October, I really felt inspired and excited.  That tapered off relatively quickly as various obligations took over my mind, but having them come and visit again was really a great way to jump start and refuel the love of learning.

After all this excitement, I felt like I had to try something new-- with my newly acquired coconut aminos!!!!  I had been trying so hard to try and do asian type dishes without the use of soy sauces or sesame oil.  Coconut aminos seem to be the next closest thing, and I found that the Co-op carries a nice and reasonably priced bottle of it!  yay!  WIN.  Today, we experimented with vegetables.  It was a fantastically tasty and quick dish to whip up, espeically with the superb pork roast of crispy carnitas to throw in with the veggies and to soak up the sauce.

Broccoli with meat (sorry for the gross sounding dish name)

Ingredients

1 medium crown of broccoli
1 small onion
large handful of mushrooms
2 cloves garlic
coconut aminos
pepper

1.  chop the vegetables into desired sized pieces.
2.  In a deep frying pan, add some water and heat to boiling and toss in the broccoli and garlic to quickly cook and steam.
3.  Throw in the mushrooms and onions and season with pepper and coconut aminos.  You don't need much of the aminos, two hefty splashes were enough flavor for me.
4.  Add crispy carnitas.

If you are going to cook a meat separately, say, beef!  You can slice the beef into thin strips and cook them up with some aminos and pepper and add them to the cooked veggies.  I might have to try this variation at some point.  The meat that the co-op carries has been so fantastic, it's a shame I haven't tried more cuts yet.

til next time, eat well and be well!!!!  especially be well in this cold.