Makai's Favorite: Giblet Gravy

This is Makai’s favorite part of Thanksgiving. Note: Makai is a dog. We make no claims about the taste or healthiness of this dish for human consumption.

This recipe is from The Good Food Cookbook for Dogs.

1 tbsp vegetable oil*

½ pound turkey or chicken giblets

2 tbsp all-purpose flour

1 cup chicken broth

1. In a small skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Add giblets. Cook, stirring frequently for 5 minutes, or until giblets are cooked through.

2. Remove giblets from pan using a slotted spoon. Cut into small pieces.

3. Return the oil in the skillet to medium heat and add flour. Stir to form a flour and oil paste.

4. Slowly add chicken broth, stirring constantly. Make sure you scrape up the brown bits from the bottom of the pan.

5. Return giblets to the pan and stir. Cook 1-2 minutes, until gravy comes to a boil and thickens a little bit.

6. Serve a few spoonfuls over your dog’s regular food.

7. Refrigerate leftovers in a sealed container.

*The recipe calls for 2 tbsp vegetable oil, but this produces a lot of splatter. We suggest starting with 1 tbsp and adding more as needed.

Tofu with Peppers, Carrots and Brown Rice

Tofu with peppers and brown rice is one of our speedy go-to dishes. About a year ago, we went to it too much and experienced major tofu-with-peppers burnout. We avoided the dish for months until this fall, when our normally lettuce-heavy CSA finally pulled through with some beautiful peppers—and carrots. How could we resist?

1 package extra-firm tofu, drained, patted dry and cubed

2 (or more) red, yellow, orange, green or purple bell peppers, cut into chunks

3 (or more) carrots, peeled and sliced

2 tbsp canola oil

3 tbsp reduced-sodium soy sauce

3 tbsp rice vinegar

1 tsp toasted sesame oil

Grated fresh ginger (somewhere between 1 and 2 tsp)

Garlic powder, to taste

1 cup brown rice

1. Cook brown rice.

2. Combine soy sauce, rice vinegar, sesame oil, ginger and garlic powder in a medium bowl or pie plate. Add tofu and marinate for 5-10 minutes.

3. In a large skillet or wok (we use an electric wok), heat 1 tbsp canola oil over medium heat. Add peppers and carrots. Cook, stirring until tender crisp. Remove peppers and carrots from wok.

4. Heat 1 tbsp canola oil over medium heat. Add tofu and marinade. Cook, stirring to keep the marinade from burning, for 7 to 10 minutes until edges start to brown.

5. Return peppers and carrots to the wok. Add brown rice. Mix everything together, stirring well so the marinade flavors the rice and vegetables.

Grilled Pineapple and Chorizo

This is more of an idea than a recipe. If your lives are anything like ours, you occasionally suffer from a shortage of time and lack of inspiration in the kitchen. Here’s some (super speedy) inspiration.

1 fresh pineapple, peeled and sliced into rounds

2 chorizo sausages (We used chicken chorizo. It was on sale at Whole Foods.)

1. Grill the sausages on a well-oiled grill over medium heat for 15 to 20 minutes. Check to make sure that that they are cooked completely through before removing from the grill. (If the sausages say they are precooked, then you can just toss 'em on a hot grill until they are nice and browned.)

2. Re-spray the grill and cook the pineapple slices over medium-high heat, a few minutes to a side, until grill marks appear. (Warning: the high sugar content of pineapple increases the risk of burning, so keep an eye on it.)

3. Slice the pineapple into bite-size pieces.

4. Slice chorizo and toss with grilled pineapple.

Peanut Bars

These are kinda like granola bars, but better. There’s just one problem: they don’t hold their bar shape very well. I considered rolling them into balls, but after posting Angels’ Balls and Balls of Awesomeness, I was worried you might think I had a “thing” for balls.

¾ cup dry roasted unsalted peanuts

2 cups dried cranberries

1 ¾ cups old fashioned oats

2 cups Rice Krispies (or equivalent)

½ cup natural unsalted peanut butter

just under ½ cup packed brown sugar

½ cup plus 1 tbsp honey

1 tsp vanilla extract

1. Coat a 9 x 13 pan with cooking spray.

2. In the biggest bowl you can find (trust me), combine the peanuts, dried cranberries, oats and Rice Krispies. Stir to make sure everything is mixed together.

3. In a large microwaveable bowl, combine the peanut butter, brown sugar and honey. Zap on high for a minute and a half (it’ll be hot and bubbly).

4. Stir peanut butter mixture until it’s fully combined. Stir in vanilla.

5. Pour the peanut butter mixture over the dry ingredients. Mix well, making sure everything gets coated, especially the oats—they often try to escape.

6. Transfer the mixture to the pan. Press down firmly. Allow to sit for at least an hour before cutting into bars.

Fall Week: Butternut Squash Pizza

This delicious dish is adapted from Two Peas and Their Pod. We’ve made it as a pizza and a calzone. The pizza is prettier and quite frankly, in a head-to-head taste test, the pizza would win, but the calzone was still delicious. To make butternut squash calzones, follow the pizza recipe below, but place the ingredients on one half of the dough and then fold it into a calzone. Poke a few holes in the top of the calzone and bake at 400° for 10 minutes, or until the crust is golden brown.

For more delectable butternut squash dishes, check out Butternut Squash Lasagna and Butternut Squash Potstickers.

Pizza dough of your choice (we use spelt dough)

Corn meal

Butternut squash, peeled, seeded and diced

Yellow onion, caramelized (a caramelized red onion would’ve been delicious too)

Olive oil

Garlic powder

Feta cheese

Mozzarella cheese

Dried rosemary

Golden raisins

Balsamic vinegar

1. Preheat oven to 400°.

2. In a large bowl, toss butternut squash with olive oil until squash is coated.

3. Spread squash on a baking sheet. Place on the top shelf of oven and roast 30-40 minutes, until squash is tender and starting to brown.

4. Prepare pizza dough. Sprinkle with corn meal for a little extra grip.

5. When squash is done, jack the oven temperature up to 475°.

6. Sprinkle pizza dough with garlic, top with squash, caramelized onions, golden raisins, mozzarella and feta. Sprinkle with dried rosemary.

7. Bake 12-15 minutes.

8. Drizzle with balsamic vinegar and mangia!

Fall Week: Fall (in a bowl)

Sometimes culinary experiments go horribly wrong (we don’t post the results of those disasters) and sometimes they go wonderfully right. Fall (in a bowl) is the result of a deliciously successful culinary experiment.

Quinoa

1 package extra-firm tofu, drained, patted dry and cubed

1 tbsp olive oil

2 Macintosh apples, chopped

Dried cranberries

Chopped walnuts

Apple cider

Maple syrup

Shredded sharp cheddar cheese

1. Cook quinoa according to package directions.

2. Toast walnuts in a dry skillet over medium heat, about 3 minutes or until fragrant.

3. Heat olive oil in a skillet on medium high and sauté the tofu, cooking until browned.

4. Throw everything (quinoa, tofu, apples, dried cranberries and toasted walnuts) in a bowl. Mix it up. Add a little apple cider. Add a little more. Add a little maple syrup. Stir.

5. Divide into servings. Top with cheese.

Fall Week: Stuffed Acorn Squash

We love fall. And we love fall food so we’re declaring this week “Fall Week” on Healthy-ish. To celebrate, we’ll be posting three recipes that just scream fall (to us, at least).

We’ll start with this fabulous dish, adapted from Eating Well.

2 large acorn squashes

1 package baby spinach

1 15 oz. can white beans (either Cannellini or Great Northern), rinsed

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 yellow onion, diced

1 tbsp tomato paste

EVOO

2 tbsp water

2 slices sandwich bread of your choosing (I used spelt bread)

1/3 – 1 cup shredded Parmesan cheese (equal to the amount of breadcrumbs)

1. Make breadcrumbs: Toast bread. Turn it into crumbs using a food processor. Spread crumbs on baking sheet and toast in a 350° oven for 3-4 minutes (until they start to brown). Set aside.

2. Stab squashes (so they don’t explode). Microwave for 6 minutes on high. Flip. Zap for 6 more minutes.

3. When squashes are cool enough to handle, cut in half and remove seeds. Drizzle insides with EVOO and microwave for 3 minutes on high, or until done. (Squash is done when it is fork tender and the inside is a dark yellow color.)

4. In a large skillet, heat 1 tbsp EVOO over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring, until the onion starts to brown, 2-3 minutes.

5. Add garlic. Cook, stirring for 1 minute.

6. Add tomato paste, water and spinach. Stir, then cover and cook 3-5 minutes, until spinach is wilted.

7. Add white beans. Cook, stirring, for 2 more minutes. Remove from heat.

8. Position rack in the center of oven and preheat broiler.

9. Combine breadcrumbs and shredded Parmesan in a small bowl. (My 2 slices of bread produced about a cup of breadcrumbs so I used close to a cup of Parmesan.) Add enough EVOO (at least 1 tbsp) to keep the mixture together.

10. Place squash in a baking dish. Fill each squash half with the spinach and white bean mixture and then sprinkle with the breadcrumb mixture.

11. Broil in center of oven 1-2 minutes, until breadcrumb mixture starts to brown.