Cleaning Out the Pantry

It's finally fall and time for some warm, comforting recipes. I have been craving pasta like nobody's business lately. And today I was on the last little bit of my groceries and was trying to use up what I have in the pantry. While digging around in the depths of my pantry, one of my bags of beans ripped and spilled alllllll over the kitchen. There will be black beans hiding in the crevices of the kitchen for days. It was great to clean up. Anyway, I decided to make two giant pots of food so I don't have to cook the rest of the week. I had some tomatoes and some pumpkin and some coconut milk so I made pumpkin chili and tomato cream sauce.

My pumpkin chili is perfect for fall. It has all kinds of fall flavors and it's a really pretty orangeish red color. Plus it's really healthy and full of vitamins! The pumpkin adds really earthy flavor and the beans add lots of protein and heartiness. Aaaand you can make it in the crockpot! So here's my first recipe :)

Three Bean Pumpkin Chili
32 oz. tomatoes (Try to use tomatoes from a jar or a box, or fresh!, rather than from a can so you can avoide BPA in your food)
14 oz. canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling!!)
1 small white onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 cup corn
1 cup each kidney beans, black beans, and pinto beans
1 tbsp oil
1 tsp each cayenne pepper, dried oregano, and chili powder
1/2 tsp each black pepper and salt

Heat the oil in a large pan over medium heat. Sautee the onions and garlic in the oil until it's translucent. Transfer the onions and garlic to the crockpot and add the rest of the ingredients. Turn the crockpot on high and cook for three hours. So yummy! I had some over a tofu hot dog and it was bomb. You can feel free to add some ground beef or turkey or some shredded chicken if you're into that.

Recipe number two was to satisfy my pasta craving. I used the rest of the tomatoes and made a marinara sauce but decided that wasn't good enough. This is a healthier, vegan version of a tomato cream sauce. It was fast and easy to make and was so good! Here's recipe number two!

Vegan Tomato Cream Sauce
32 oz. tomatoes
1 can full fat coconut milk
1 onion
3 cloves garlic
1 tsp olive oil
1 tsp each basil, oregano, black pepper, and parsley
1/2 tsp salt

Sautee the onions and garlic in the oil over medium heat in a large pan until translucent. Add the remaining ingredients to the pan and simmer over medium low heat for about an hour until the sauce has reduced a little bit. Serve over some whole wheat pasta.

Steamy and delicious!