Easy Red Pepper Hummus Recipe

Recently I got the Blendtec Mini Twister Jar and I love it!  I was thinking about getting the NutriBullet but since I already had the Blendtec, the Mini Twister jar made perfect sense.

I love hummus but when you buy the commercial stuff in the store it usually has garlic or onions in it.  Those two items make me sick.  These days it is getting harder and harder to find food without garlic and onion.

I adapted the recipe from what was displayed in the book that came with the Mini Twister Jar.  If you want to put garlic in it, feel free or to try other variations.  This is just the starting point.

Red Pepper Hummus

Ingredients:

• 1 TBSP olive oil (maybe some better oils to use)
• 1 TBSP Fresh Lemon Juice 
• 1 TBSP Tahini
• 7.5 oz Garbanzo Beans
• 1 to 2 TBSP liquid from Garbanzo Beans
• 1 Cup Red Pepper (I cut a red pepper in half)
• 1/4 tsp Salt
• 1/4 tsp Ground Cumin
• 1/8 tsp Cayenne Pepper
  

Directions:

• Add all ingredients into the Mini Twister Jar and place the lid on the jar.  
• While holding the lid on the twister jar, Select the Salsa/Dips/Batters button
• Turn the twister lid counter-clockwise during blending

I had never used Tahini paste before so I went on Amazon and found this product which seemed pretty inexpensive.  Two jars were around $10 if I remember correctly.  The paste tasted good and seemed to be just sesame seed paste with nothing else. It worked great for this hummus recipe.

I had one good-sized lemon and from that lemon, I got about 6 to 8 TBSP of fresh lemon juice just by squeezing it in a little handheld juicer.

Olive oil may not be the best, but use whatever you prefer and see how it tastes.  The cayenne pepper was very strong, but it gave it a good kick.  The original recipe called for roasting the red pepper, but I did not see any need to do this and red bell pepper is very healthy for you.  It is full of phytochemicals.

I love Blendtec and it works very well.  This little mini twister jar is ideal.  It is the right size and easy to clean out especially with the special spatula that came with it.

I don't think I would want to make more hummus than this recipe made because I want to keep it fresh.

Since it was so easy to make, it wouldn't take much for me to make some more at any time.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 1/4/16 by Don Shetterly

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Dairy Free Cream Of Chicken Soup

So today, I was making one of our favorite dishes and of course, the one ingredient I really need, I can't find.  Sure, I know the store sells Cream Of Chicken Soup, but everything we could find had onion and garlic in it (along with many other things I don't want).  Onion and garlic make me sick.  End of story.

I mean we looked all over in the area we live and every blasted food processor thinks that if it doesn't have onion and garlic in it, it ain't soup!   Ridiculous!   For someone that gets sick on onion and garlic, they are no friend of mine!

Anyway, I went searching and found a great recipe for this on MyWiseMom.com for a homemade, dairy free, cream of chicken soup.  I love that it is dairy free.  Now, you're talking my talk!

I made the soup tonight for the dish and it was so easy to make.  It tasted so good.  The only thing is, I poured a little too much spice in and well, that wasn't so good.  Next time, I'll cut back on them.

Easy Healthy Pancakes

Lately I've been playing with making something without all the bad stuff for breakfast.  I have been experimenting with making healthy pancakes from oatmeal that are super easy.  You might need a good quality blender for this, but we use our Blendtec High Speed Blender.  I'm not sure how this would work in a regular one.

To make these easy and healthy pancakes, I take 1.5 cups of oatmeal, 1.25 cups of water and put it in my blender.  Then, I add whatever fruit it is that I like.  I have used blueberries or a banana or strawberries.  I like all three and I'm sure other fruit would work.

Once I've combined them in the Blendtec blender, I select the button that says "batter" on it and I let it blend up through its routine.  Most of the time when I do this, it thickens fairly quickly so I often pour it back in a measuring cup.  It makes about 2 cups of batter and I can get about 10 pancakes out of it.

Easy Veggies Rice and Cheese Recipe

This is one of my favorite things to make!  It is simple and easy and nutritious.  The raw taste of the veggies just brings it alive.  Outside of cutting up some vegetables and steaming them and the rice, it is not a hard thing to make.  It takes very little time. So, here's what I do with my recipe and you of course can create it in whatever way works for you.

Sometimes I use a veggie chopper to chop the vegetables up, but tonight I just cut them up.  It all depends upon what you have and what you want to do. The veggie chopper really makes cutting vegetables up so easy.  There is no right way or wrong way to do this. 

Cook time for the veggies and rice was around 45 to 50 minutes, but of course that depends upon your steamer.

You can use whatever vegetables you wish to use.  Your favorite veggies are the ones that work the best.  Tonight, I used broccoli,  cauliflower, carrots, green pepper, red pepper, and snow peas.

Healthy Easy Banana Bread Recipe

I came across this on a google search and boy it is delicious.  Of course, I modified it a little bit because the original recipe had nutmeg in it and we did not care for that on the first attempt.  I also added pecan pieces to it and I make sure I put in at least the amount of bananas that the recipe calls for or just a little more.

In the original recipe, it stated a 50 to 55 minute baking time at 350 degrees.  Unfortunately, I found that I had to bake it for almost 60 minutes.  Of course that could be my oven.  So please experiment with what works best in your kitchen.

This is a very healthy recipe made without any oil or all the other bad stuff that people tend use in baking.  We used Mott's Apple Sauce (NO sugar added) and it did not have high fructose corn syrup.  We try to avoid high fructose corn syrup as much as we can. 

So here is the easy recipe.