Sequestration Meal #447

 

Here I have a veggie and rice casserole I made using leftover cashew nacho cheese sauce, leftover zucchini and tomatoes, and some smoky chickpeas with baby spinach (recipe roughly based on the New York Times version).

The veggie and rice casserole is similar to many I've made before; really I think it's mostly broccoli but I added mushrooms, onions, and carrots, so I didn't call it broccoli rice casserole. I thinned the nacho cheese sauce a bit with unsweetened soy milk and mixed the sauteed veggies and cooked rice with that, then topped the mixture in a casserole dish with the end of a package of Daiya cheddar shreds and some buttered (with Earth Balance) bread crumbs. I baked the casserole in my toaster oven, because it is July, and I'm not going to turn the oven on right now. I loved it, but that was predictable; I always love this kind of dish.

Someone commented on the chickpea recipe website saying you could use smoked paprika instead of cayenne, and I did that because the casserole was already a bit spicy from the nacho cheese. I also just used ground cumin rather than cumin seeds. It worked out just fine! I still don't necessarily gravitate toward chickpeas that haven't been mashed up somehow but I'm beginning to really enjoy them when they're seasoned well. This was really good; I'd definitely make them again. Though the casserole is really the "main" dish here, I'd happily make these chickpeas into a main dish sometime, rather than just a side. They'd be delicious with a side of cornbread in cooler weather.

This was a pretty great meal! Lately I think the cost of foods is forcing me into a whole new learning curve about how to get balanced meals in. Sure, tofu is cheap, but a can of beans is even cheaper. I'm exploring new things.

I'm not normally this anxious about money (even if I am at least a low level anxious about it a lot of the time) but for reasons I won't go into I had to write a report recently for work about how the rates of inflation are impacting our staff, and going through all the ways that necessities are becoming more pricey at a rate that is dramatically higher than even the alarming total average inflation rate did not do good things to my head.

I'm glad for a holiday, since I do need to recuperate from everything, although I will admit to having deeply ambivalent feelings about America, so I'm not exactly in a patriotic mood. But happy Independence Day to my fellow Americans who feel up to celebrating! And sympathy with those of you who don't! I'll see you tomorrow.