Meatless Monday - Gnocchi with Roasted Sweet Potato and Garlic Cream Sauce

I've been on a quest recently to get my kids (and my husband!) to eat more veggies. I mean we have some with dinner every night and I'm an expert at hiding them in sauces and stews, but there's always room for more.

So to that end I've been scouring the interwebs for inspiration and have found some fantastic vego, vegan and raw food blogs with some truly mouth-watering recipes. And even better they are recipes I'm sure I can get my boys to eat.

My plan is not only to increase the volume and variety of vegetables we eat but also to cut back on red meat. I'm not a huge meat lover anyway and neither is Charlie. So planning at least one meat free dinner per week is going to work well for us, and that means Meatless Mondays!


In honour of Veggie Mama's Meatless Mondays my first meat-free meal is her gnocchi with roasted sweet potatoes, mushrooms and garlic. Totally impossible to get a good photo of (as you can see above) but absolutely delicious.

Gnocchi with Roasted Sweet Potato and Garlic Cream Sauce
Recipe adapted from Veggie Mama
Serves 6

2 packs gnocchi
1 large sweet potato
2 tbs butter
1 onion, sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups sliced mushrooms
400ml pure cream
pinch salt
black pepper
plenty of grated parmesan

Cut your sweet potato into large diced, toss with a little oil and bake in a hot oven for approx 30 minutes or until cooked through and golden.

Saute the onion, garlic and mushrooms in butter, until mushrooms are soft and beginning to brown and all liquid has evaporated. Add the cream and bring to the boil. Reduce to a simmer and add salt and pepper to taste.

Cook the gnocchi in plenty of salted boiling water accoring to packet directions.

Add the cooked sweet potato into the sauce along with a handful of grated parmasan and stir gently to combine. Carefully fold the sauce through the gnocchi and serve with lots of extra parmasan on top.

The taste test ...

All of my boys loved this, as did I! You can't go wrong with mushrooms, cream and garlic. I made a double batch and this made plenty for dinner for the 4 of us plus lunch for hubby and I the next day. Definitely one to make again!

Yeast Waffles

We've decided to make Saturday morning breakfasts a bit special around here. Hubby is out the door by 7 on weekdays, often before the boys get up and then on Sundays we are in a rush to get the kids to their swimming lessons by 8am. Crazy. But on Saturdays we're all here together with nowhere we need to go. So from now on Saturday mornings for us will be a special yummy breakfast and a trip to the park. Yay!

First up today are these yeast waffles I stumbled across on Fake Ginger. Unlike Amanda I am a real ginger and absolutely love fresh ginger, but I heart her blog!

Anyway, hubby and I got a waffle maker as a wedding present but have never used it regularly. Partly because the recipes we have tried all seemed to oily, too heavy or just too annoying. That's why I liked the look of these yeasted waffles which can be prepped the night before.

Yeast Waffles
Recipe from Fake Ginger

375ml milk
90g butter
2 tbs maple syrup
1 ts vanilla extract
2 eggs
2 cups plain flour
1 1/2 ts instant yeast

Heat the milk and butter together until very hot and butter is melted. Remove from the heat and stir through the vanilla and salt. Cool the mixture to lukewarm then add the eggs, flour and yeast. Whisk well to combine and remove any lumps of flour. Cover and let sit at room temperature for 1 hour.

You can cook the waffles now or place in the fridge overnight.

Preheat your waffle iron. When ready pour in 1/2 to 2/3 cup of mixture (or whatever amount your instruction book says) into the centre of the waffle maker. Close the lid and cook for about 5 minutes or until golden brown and crisp. Serve immediately or keep warm in a low oven.

We got at least 10 waffles from this mix (we lost count).

We loved ours with sliced banana and maple syrup but the possibilities for toppings are endless.

The taste test ...

Really, really good! And the aroma of yeasty waffly goodness in the house first thing in the morning was fantastic. The boys scoffed theirs in record time, probably just thrilled to have something other than cereal or toast for a change. This recipe is a keeper!

TWD BWJ - Rugelach

This week we have Rugelach! Before making them for TWD a few years ago I had never heard of Rugelach and had no idea how to pronounce it let alone how they were supposed to look or taste. I felt a bit more prepared this time around and had fun with the recipe.

I made just a 1/3 batch (using only 1 stick of butter instead of 3!!!) and used prunes, dark chocolate and walnuts for the filling. Yum!

It seemed like the humidity would be a problem for this pastry so I made it in the food processor using cold butter and cream cheese then chilled it overnight before rolling. It worked like a charm and made some seriously good pastry!

Even with a 1/3 batch I still got 24 little cookies (pastries?). They were amazing straight out of the oven and still good the next day although they had lost their crispy edges.

There's still about a cup of prune levkar left and my boys are loving it spread on their toast or stirred through porridge for breakfast.

Thanks to Margaret and Jessica for a great pick! I'm happy to have conquered Rugelach and will definitely make them again with the apricot filling too. You will find the recipe on their blogs under today's date.

TWD BWJ - Chocolate Truffle Tartlets

Wow, our second recipe for Baking with Julia and it couldn't be more indulgent! This week we have Chocolate Truffle Tartlets which contain chocolate in almost every form.

First, a chocolate pastry made with cocoa. Next comes a decadent truffle filling made with melted dark chocolate, eggs and sugar. Then it's finished off with a smattering of milk and white chocolate pieces. Can anyone say yum?!

Surprisingly these tartlets aren't over the top in sweetness. A big scoop of creamy vanilla icecream was perfect on top. Still wouldn't want to eat too much though.

I made a full batch of pastry but only used about 2/3 of it to make my 4 tartlets (with a half batch of filling). I rolled the remainder of the pastry out and baked some little biscuits with it. Hubby was a big fan of the tartlets and my 2 littlest taste testers couldn't get enough of the pastry!

Our hosts this week are Steph, Spike, Jaime and Jessica. Thanks for a great pick! You can find the recipe on their blogs under today's date.

TWD Baking with Julia - White Loaves

This is the first week of the new Tuesdays with Dorie - Baking with Julia, how exciting! We will be baking fortnightly and should have one simple and one more complicated recipe to post each month. With over 300 bloggers baking along this is going to be fun!

So, first up we have White Loaves, chosen by Laurie and Jules.

I have been making bread a lot recently but cheating a bit because I use my breadmaker. I heart my breadmaker! While it makes great bread, of course, it also makes pizza dough and I can turn a basic dough mix into almost anything. Just last week I made cinnamon rolls (no pics sorry) and in the lead up to Easter there will definitely be some fresh hot cross buns too!

It has been a while though since I made a loaf of bread completely from scratch. I had forgotten how easy it is and Oscar loved seeing the dough rising and being punched down and turned into real bread.

This is a very simple recipe and it made 2 absolutely delicious loaves of bread. I stuck strictly to recipe and made 2 plain loaves perfect for sandwiches. We go through a LOT of sandwiches in this house. It froze well too and also made great toast.

All in all a great place to start the new TWD. I hope everyone else had success too! The list of bakers should be up soon on the TWD page.

You will find the recipe on pp81-82 of Baking with Julia by Dorie Greenspan, or Laurie and Jules will have it in their posts due today.