Roasted Green Beans with Peppers & Onion

Roasted Green Beans with Peppers & Onion (from Kraft Recipes, Servings: 6, Total Time: 50 minutes)

Ingredients

·         1 lb. whole green beans, trimmed

·         1 each red and yellow pepper, cut into thin strips

·         1 large onion, cut into thin strips

·         ½ cup  Light Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing

·         ½ cup Shredded Low-Moisture Part-Skim Mozzarella Cheese

Directions

1.)    Heat oven to 400°F.

2.)    Toss vegetables with dressing in large roasting pan.

3.)    Bale 30 min. or until vegetables are tender, stirring after 15 min.

4.)    Sprinkle with cheese; bake 2 to 3 min. or until melted.

I made this for Thanksgiving at my mother’s. I used a sweet balsamic dressing from Kraft and it imparted an excellent flavor onto the vegetables.  A sweet/sour taste since it was a vinaigrette.  My family really enjoyed this as well.  I used frozen green beans, thawed, and tossed them with the rest of the veggies.  I think that this dish could honestly do without the cheese (when using the sweet balsamic) – I don’t feel that it really added anything. Maybe with regular balsamic it would.  The veggies stayed crisp and worked well with a side dish of mashed potatoes.  A great side dish to Thanksgiving dinner (and my Tofurky).  Enjoy!

Roasted Spring Vegetable Risotto

Roasted Spring Vegetable Risotto (from AllRecipes, Servings: 8, Total Time: 1 hour)

Ingredients

·         1 lb. asparagus, cut into 2-inch lengths

·         2 cups whole baby carrots cut in lengthwise quarters

·         6 green onions, cut into 1-inch pieces

·         3 medium assorted peppers (yellow, red, green), cut into 1-inch strips

·         2 medium zucchini or yellow squash, cut into diagonal slices (I used zucchini)

·         1 cup halved fresh medium mushrooms

·         2 tsp. chopped fresh rosemary leaves

·         3 ½ cups vegetable broth

·         1 Tbsp. olive oil

·         1 1/3 cups uncooked Arborio rice

·         ½ cup shredded Italian Five Cheese

Directions

1.       Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Spray 17x11-inch roasting pan with cooking spray.

2.       Mix asparagus, carrots, onions, peppers, squash, mushrooms, rosemary and ¼ cup broth in prepared pan.

3.       Roast 20 minutes or until done, stirring once. Prepare risotto while the vegetables are roasting.

4.       Heat oil in saucepot. Add rice. Cook and stir for 2 minutes.

5.       Add ½ cup broth and cook until broth is absorbed. Add remaining broth, ½ cup at a time, stirring until all broth is absorbed before adding more. (Total cooking time: 25 minutes)

6.       Add vegetables and cheese. Heat through. Serve immediately.

First off, I love this dish! Yum, yum, yum! My husband enjoyed it too.  With that said, I think that the recipe needs to be tweaked slightly.  If you use the size of veggies recommended, you need to roast for more than 20 minutes – maybe even up to 30 minutes.  The next time that I make it, I will probably chop all of the veggies smaller, more of a rough chop.  That is just the size that I would prepare in this risotto dish.  There are a lot of veggies, and I actually only put in about half because I knew that my husband would want more of the rice part.  I used the remainder as a “base” for my risotto!  More veggies for me!

Now, for the taste – even though there is only ½ cup of cheese, this was creamy and I could see the stringy cheese each time I brought a forkful to my mouth.  The rice was cooked through with only a slight crunch to it. The veggies were really crunchy (see above recommendation), a little too much for my husband, but I liked them that way.  Overall assessment – I cannot wait to make this again!