The Best of 2009

I don’t know about you, but after indulging so much over the holiday I’m more than ready to get back to eating healthy, nutritious foods. I’ve been cooking up a storm in the kitchen and have a few great new recipes to share with you. But first I thought it would be appropriate to reflect back on some of my favorite recipes from the past year. I’ve made more than a few great dishes since I got serious about blogging last winter and it seems like a shame to let them get lost in the archives.

So to help you start the New Year off on the right foot, here’s a roundup of some of the most crave-worthy recipes that have appeared on Healthy.Delicious. in 2009. This list certainly doesn’t represent all of my favorites (if I don’t absolutely love something that I make, I generally don’t post it) but they are some of the healthier recipes that I keep going back to and that you can realistically make during this time of the year. I had some fabulous recipes over the summer, but they just wouldn’t be the same without fresh, in-season produce.

Here’s to a great New Year full of healthy and delicious meals, good friends both new and old, and success in and out of the kitchen! If you had to pick one meal as your favorite of 2009, what would it be?

Vegan Dosas

Southwest Stuffed Acorn Squash

Egyptian Lentils with Yogurt-Marinated Chicken

Beef pho

Risotto with Crab and Lemon
Pumpkin polenta with chorizo

Spicy gumbo with andouille and bacon wrapped shrimp

Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Cranberries

San Francisco and the Foodbuzz Blogger Festival

WOW.

That’s all I can say. Thank you so much to Bertolli and Foodbuzz for this incredible experience! I had the best weekend – full of wonderful new friends, amazing opportunities, and delicious food. The entire weekend was surreal and I had a blast!!

The weekend was so jam-packed that I can’t even imagine trying to fit it all into one blog post. But since I really want to share the experience with you all, I’ll do my best. 🙂 This post is pretty heavy on the photos, but tons more can be found HERE.

porchetta sandwich

Cooking Basics: Browned Chicken Stock

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As the weather continues to cool down I find myself wanting soup more and more often. I think soup is just about as close as you can get to the perfect meal: warm, comforting, balanced and great for wither lunch or dinner (and in some cultures even for breakfast!). I usually make my soup with boxed stock, but nothing beats homemade soup made with homemade stock. This browned chicken stock is a great base for almost any soup – it’s richer than regular chicken stock, but the chicken flavor isn’t so overpowering that you can’t use it in a vegetable based soup too. I most recently used it in my Pho Ba, and it was wonderful. If you have a few hours one afternoon to let the ingredients simmer, you can easily make enough of this delicious stock to last you through a few pots of soup. Just divide it into smaller containers and freeze it – since you can cook it right from froze, you’ll be able to make a great homemade soup whenever you want. [….]

Daring Cooks: Quick and Easy Chicken Pho (Pho Ba)

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The October 2009 Daring Cooks’ challenge was brought to us by Jaden of the blog Steamy Kitchen. The recipes are from her new cookbook, The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook. I’ll be honest here – I wasn’t particularly excited about this challenge. I’ve made pho before, and I love it, but I didn’t want to do a second post on it. Plus, the main recipe presented to us was for chicken pho, and I don’t usually care for chicken soups. So I dragged my feet on completing this challenge and didn’t make it until last night. I’m glad I did though, because it was really good, and really EASY. Crazy easy. 90% of the ingredients are things that I generally have on hand (and the other 10% could be omitted or swapped) so this is a great recipe to keep in the back of your mind for when dinner hasn’t been planned. And the best part is that it makes very few dishes, so cleanup is a breeze![….]

Habanero Hot Sauce

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Last week I promised you a recipe for habanero hot sauce, but I ended up getting side-tracked by a few exciting (and top-secret) projects and didn’t have time to post it. But here you go! I made this sauce to go with the tamales that we had a few nights ago, but I’ve also used it in a few different ways since. It’s a great way to jazz up a frozen burrito, and its also pairs nicely with eggs. I’m planning to use it later this week in a squash hash as well. You might want to scale down the recipe a little – that’s a 12-ounce bottle you see up there – but this is a really nice condiment to keep around.

[….]

Mexican Omelette with Chorizo 11

Mexican Omelette with Chorizo

This simple chorizo omelette recipe comes together quickly but is jam-packed with flavor! This Mexican omelette is great for breakfast, but I also really love making them for dinner.

Healthy Pizza Stuffed Peppers. We love this recipe!

Pepperoni Pizza Stuffed Peppers

pizza stuffed peppers

Peppers make such nice little containers, don’t they?

I remember having a crab stuffed pepper at my grandparents house that I loved. I was probably 5 or 6 at the time. After that, I would always insist that I liked stuffed peppers, but whenever I had one I would be disappointed – they were always heavy and meaty and the pepper itself didn’t seem to make sense flavor-wise. But I finally found another stuffed pepper that I like. This pepper isn’t like those other ones: the bulk of the filling is orzo, which is mixed with pasta sauce, cheese, and your favorite pizza toppings. Its not nearly as dense as traditional stuffed pepper, and using fresh ingredients keeps the flavors light. [….]