{"id":456,"date":"2010-02-01T22:20:12","date_gmt":"2010-02-02T05:20:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/baconwrappedlife.com\/?p=456"},"modified":"2010-02-07T15:26:14","modified_gmt":"2010-02-07T22:26:14","slug":"meat-free-mal-matt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pink.jemts.com\/?p=456","title":{"rendered":"Meat-Free Mal & Matt?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Matt and I are experimenting.  Our lunches are pretty much the same thing throughout the week\u00e2\u20ac\u201dhe takes a sandwich or a wrap with deli meat along with a snack of some sort, I take leftovers from the weekend.  On the weekends we like to indulge in lots of meat\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6for example, this past weekend we managed to eat two meats that come from a pig, one that comes from a cow, and one that comes from a bird.  It was delicious, but also very overwhelming.  It will make for wonderful leftover lunches throughout the week, and I had a wonderful time cooking up some new recipes and some old favorites.  However, meat can be expensive\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6especially if you are trying to purchase meat of any decent quality\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6and I find that the more meat we put in a dish, the less veggies we end up consuming during the meal.  <\/p>\n

With our CSA box coming every other week and random cravings for vegetables lately, we came to the conclusion that we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d try to take our Monday-Friday dinners meat-free.  We made it through week one and are just starting week two.  The first week was pretty easy, since we had a crockpot full of sweet potato soup leftover to start us off on Monday, and we went out for Thai on Tuesday (Thai is one of the easiest cuisines to go meat free with).  Thursday, our planned risotto was a bust when I was off my feet with a lingering back pain and really just wanted a big plate of stir fried veggies\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6Buddhist Tofu from the Chinese place across the street it was (so delicious and simple!).  <\/p>\n

However, I imagine it will get a little more challenging in the coming weeks.  To prepare for this, we started a list of things that we love that can easily be meat free. We have a long list already\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6and most of the things so far didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even come off of that list! One stipulation: we aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t going to make meaty things with meat-like products\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6.the point of this experiment is for us to eat more veggies, not to eat more fake meat.<\/p>\n

This is a dish we actually made a couple weeks ago, but I just realized that it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not one that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s on our list\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6adding it now!  I first made this before Christmas for a couple friends and it might be the new favorite Italian dish in my repertoire.   Special thanks to our Kentucky friends Bob & Shannon, who sent us two jars of homemade marinara sauce.  AMAZING.  We still have one left because I want to save it as long as possible.  We shot through the first one with this dish and then a mini-meatball sub and salad dinner a couple nights later.  <\/p>\n

Zucchini Parm for Two<\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n