A hearty main dish salad to celebrate Christmas Day in Egypt, that's January 7th according to the Julian calendar followed by Egyptian Coptic Christians. The whole-grain salad starts with the ancient grain called "kamut" [pronounced ka-mutt, rhymes with a mixed-breed dog, not a moot point], a chewy, nutty grain. From there? Gorgeous roasted carrots and some kale for color plus a basketful of Middle Eastern fruits, dates, apricots and pomegranate, all drizzled with pomegranate molasses. Not just vegan, " Vegan Done Real ". "We'll never eat all this," my head-talk worried. I'd just spent three hours in the kitchen concocting a massive whole-grain salad. The labor of my love sat on the counter before me on a white oval platter, a splendid pile of kamut, roasted carrots and kale plus more fruity jewels than a binge of Bejeweled . So beautiful! But my salad had formidable competition. I'd made it for the annual Christmas feast for some foodie ...

A Veggie Venture's Best Recipes from 2015, just one per month, all in one handy spot for easy reference, all "everyday vegetable recipes" to make again and again. I'm going out on a limb this year. For the first time ever, A Veggie Venture's "Best Recipes" of 2015 are not the most clicked, pinned, shared or even the most liked recipes. Forget popularity. I'm standing up usefulness! So this collection of recipes are the most every-day recipes, special in their very every-day-ness, recipes destined to be made and remade so often they'll fast lose recipe status and become "just a little something you whipped up." Truth is? I've personally made all but two of these recipes more than once, three many times, seven of the twelve many-many-many times. And I wasn't "recipe testing". I was just putting breakfast on the table. Or making lunch. Or a salad. In my kitchen? Those are the best recipes of all, the ones you pull...

Today's healthy breakfast recipe: Say hello to "Chakchoukah" – a savory Tunisian stew, perfect for nesting runny eggs. Low Carb. For Weight Watchers, just PointsPlus 3. Totally satisfying! So stop me now, wouldja please? My fingers may haltingly tap out the unfamiliar combination of letters for Chakchoukah but what my brain insists on spilling out is that 1970s ear worm of a song , Ooga-chaka Ooga-chaka. OogaChaka Eggs, how's that? It's got a ring, right? But that would ignore the North African roots of this dish, what I called Shakshuka (Eggs Nested in Summer Vegetables) when I first fell for baking eggs in tomato-y skillets. Call these eggs what you like but do, yes, make them one day this week because heaven knows, we need an antidote for the sugar, butter, cream and wine consumed in the last week. I so love it when Christmas falls on the weekend – Monday's return to healthy food is such a relief! But if I'm not really-really careful, though? It...

So festive, this entirely edible vegetable platter in the shape of a Christmas tree! Everyone remember Kayla's Thanksgiving Vegetable Platter ? Not to be outdone last year, Kayla's big sister Niki came home for Christmas break and designed a Christmas Vegetable Platter – Christmas Crudités, haha! Everyone oo'd and ah'd. Such creativity, these girls! Over the next few weeks, many of us will be both host and guest. A Christmas Vegetable Platter is a gift to all! This tree is so simple and uses only familiar, easy-to-find and inexpensive fresh vegetables. Go ahead, let your holiday imagination run wild!

Healthy roasted cauliflower with ribbons of festive red and green for the holidays – and all year-round too. Low Carb. Very friendly/adaptable for Gluten Free, Whole30 and Paleo. Not just vegan, " Vegan Done Real ". Say hello to the holiday season's most welcome side dish, a healthy vegetable dish for holiday potlucks, buffets and family dinners, a field of snowy cauliflower adorned with vegetable versions of boughs of evergreen and red berries. Because who else has noticed? People really do watch for healthy choices and gobble them up! The first time I made Christmas Cauliflower, I followed this lovely recipe from Kalyn's Kitchen for my annual cookie swap brunch last year, an antidote to butter-sugar-flour. So good! Will definitely make it that way again. Olives!! But once Christmas was over? This cauliflower stamped its white feet and insisted on being made again, unsatisfied with relegation to a few weeks in December. In summer, I paired the barely roasted ca...

An old-but-new quick appetizer, a homemade hummus that's perfect for a light holiday appetizer with a few veggies but also, of course, for year round. I use three special techniques that yield an extraordinary hummus – even without added oil. (Yes, you read that right, this hummus recipe has no oil!) Not just vegan, " Vegan Done Real ". Weight Watchers Friendly. Naturally Gluten Free. I've made plattersful of hummus over the years, always with canned chickpeas. But once I discovered an easy cooking technique that tenderizes the chickpea skins, creating an ultra-smooth, ultra-rich (but lower-calorie) hummus, it became a kitchen staple. The fridge rarely is without a batch of hummus! THREE SIMPLE BUT SPECIAL TECHNIQUES Jerusalem Chickpeas , dried chickpeas cooked especially for hummus. Long runs in the food processor, one or two ingredients at a time. Using water, not oil, to finish the hummus – and while we don't mind skipping all those calories, we do...

An addictive mix of roasted eggplant and chickpeas, a dip, a spread, a sauce, a scoop-it-by-the-spoonful-straight-from-the-fridge somethin'. It's the result of a happy accident, a last-minute leaving-on-vacation decision to throw separate batches of hummus and baba ganoush into the food processor together. Together. My notes from that day call it "Smoothest, Creamiest Most Amazing Hummus Ever" with three exclamation points. Three!!! And almost three years later? Ever since, I make it this way on purpose! Quick & easy. Low Carb. Weight Watchers friendly. Naturally Gluten Free. There's just one thing hard about today's extra-special recipe: what to call it. IS IT HUMMUS? Well, technically "no" since hummus means "chickpeas" – and even though it does call for chickpeas, it has no tahini and the texture is much much lighter and smoother than hummus, airy, almost. IS IT A DIP and a SPREAD? Yes! It's so easy to use as a dip with...