Waffles, pot pie, pesto risotto, and lentil tacos

After this week I have 50 recipes to go!

Here's what I made:

• Sinfully wholesome waffles

• Phyllo Pot pie

• Steamed chicky seitan (in the pie!)

• Pesto risotto with roasted zucchini

• Ancho lentil tacos

Sinfully wholesome waffles

• I would maybe make this again

• I made 1 substitution

• Freezes great!

I love waffles, but the 45 minute time commitment was putting me off, but it really is just the time that it takes to do the waffle in batches. I suppose you could cut the recipe down, but it is nice to have extras to freeze.

It says to rest the batter for a period of time, and I feel like you do need that to hydrate the oats that you’re adding. I found that my waffles had some dry patches where there were oats. So I wonder if in the future I would try to soak those a little bit just to get the cooking process started. I also don't have wheat germ, so I substituted that for more oats, which the recipe suggests. For my last few waffles I added blueberries and slivered almonds.

Phyllo Pot pie

• I would definitely make this again

• I made 0 substitutions

• Would probably freeze well

I absolutely love a pot pie so I was excited to try this phyllo-topped version. It turned out really well. I do think it’s a little heavy on the potato, so I would maybe just use one potato and add more seitan?

I also think seitan is maybe not agreeing with my body these days...(it's basically 100% gluten) so maybe I would just do this with chickpeas in the future.

Using the phyllo sheets for the topping is really fun, looks pretty, and it’s easy to do. The recipe calls for just 10 sheets, but they're so thin and finicky so I just cut a whole roll and made two 9-inch pies. It does reheat pretty well also.

Steamed chicky seitan

• I would maybe make this again

• I made 0 substitutions

• Freezes well

The seitan cutlets turned out pretty good, but not as good as the steamy bean-y sausages from the stew a few weeks ago. I would say you really do need to get the chickpeas super mashed, so in the future, I would probably use a food processor, rather than doing that by hand just to get a more consistent texture.

Pesto risotto with roasted zucchini

• I would maybe make this again

• I made 2 substitutions

• Freezes well

The pesto risotto was also really good, but there’s no protein in it really. I also ended up adding frozen peas because I like peas in my risotto and I had some from the pot pie recipe.

It took me a weirdly long time to make the pesto for this recipe also, I left out the cilantro. I thought I had walnuts, but I didn’t so I used cashews instead, and it calls for thyme, and I thought that it would blend the stems because they didn’t feel very woody, but it did not so I ended up straining it. I am glad I did because there were a lot of stem pieces in the sauce. I would make this again, but I like the other risotto recipe from this cookbook better.

Ancho lentil tacos

• I would probably not make this again

• I made 3 substitutions

• Freezes well

This taco recipe I’ve had my eye on for a while, but I really like the chipotle pinto bean taco with oyster mushrooms so I would just always make that instead.

I think this is a nice option and a way to eat lentils, which I don’t honestly do that often. But alas, like the seitan this week, my body just did not love eating a lot of lentils!

I did not have the ancho chili but I did have a Guajillo chili from a pozole I made a few months ago so I used that, and no surprise I left out the cumin, but also the coriander because I think the one I have is too floral.

I topped these with pico de gallo and guacamole and that was great. I think they would also be good with sour cream because they are a little spicy if she does have a recommendation for her nacho cheese sauce to top this with but I already made a ton of recipes this week so I didn’t attempt that as well.

Weekly reflection

The standout recipe this week was definitely the pot pie, and it's exciting that I'm down to 50 recipes to go! That means I'm almost half way through my challenge. I still have a few desserts left to make, so I'm hoping to bring more into church to share with folks. On the other hand, 50 still feels like a lot to do!