Month: October 2025

In last week’s “Tasty Tuesdays” post, I mentioned that there would be TWO featured recipes in honor of “National Pear and Pineapple Month”. In that post, I presented a recipe which featured the first of these tasty fruits: PEARS. So… This means that today’s “Tasty Tuesdays” post will feature the other one: PINEAPPLE! Here goes…

Pineapple-Bulgur Wheat Salad

“This fresh and sweetly satisfying salad makes a friendly lunch all by itself. If you need to prepare it ahead, try to leave at least the avocado and the pineapple till the last moment; this one doesn’t keep.”

Ingredients

1 cup water

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup raw bulgur wheat

1 medium avocado

1 cup fresh pineapple chunks

1/2 cup chopped red bell pepperr

2 inside stalks celery, chopped, OR 1/2 cup cucumber, chopped

3-4 scallions, thinly sliced

chopped chives

1 Tablespoon oil

3 Tablespoons lemon juice OR 2 Tablespoons cider vinegar

Directions

Bring water to boil with salt. Add bulgur and return to a boil. Remove from heat, cover pot tightly, and set aside for 15 minutes or until water is absorbed. Cool to room temperature.

Peel and cube avocado and stir into pineapple chunks so that the juice from the pineapple will keep the avocado from discoloring. Combine with bell pepper, celery, scallions, oil and lemon juice or vinegar. Stir in bulgur wheat and serve.

Makes 6 generous servings.

So, there you have it: Pineapple-Bulgur Wheat Salas — a vegetarian recipe in honor of both “Vegetarian Month” AND “National Pear and Pineapple Month”!

I don’t know about you, but I don’t happen to have any “bulgur wheat” in my pantry. Consequently, I did a quick online search: “substitutions for bulgur wheat”, and I got quite a number of search results, including an article (from alsothecrumbsplease.com) entitled “10 Best Bulgur Substitutes for Making Tasty Dishes”. So… I’m going to try this dish using one of the following 10 substitutes for bulgur wheat:

1. Cracked wheat
2. Wheat berries
3. Farro
4. Whole wheat couscous
5. Barley
6. Quinoa
7. Buckwheat
8. Shelled hemp seeds
9. Millet
10. Amaranth

At this point, I think I’ll be trying either barley or quinoa since I happen to have both of them in the pantry. One important thing to note is that the last five options (6-10) are the “5 best gluten-free bulgur substitues”, according to the article’s author. So… If you have a sensitivity to gluten (which, thankfully, I don’t), please use one of the last five options. In any case, I hope you give this recipe a try — either as originally written OR using one of the ten substitutes for the the bulgur wheat.

As always, I’d love to hear what you think about this week’s featured recipe and/or about your favorite recipes that feature PINEAPPLE, so please take a moment to leave a comment below. In the meantime…

Take care.

As I mentioned in the first “Tasty Tuesdays” post of October last week, October is “Vegetarian Month”, so all of the recipes featured in this month’s “Tasty Tuesdays” posts will feature recipes from one of my long-time favorite vegetarian cookbooks: “Laurel’s Kitchen Recipes”. In addition to October being “Vegetarian Month”, this month is also “National Pear and Pineapple Month”, so the next couple of “Tasty Tuesdays” posts will feature… You guessed it… pears and pineapples, beginning with PEARS! So read on for a simple recipe which features this tasty fruit.

In the above-mentioned cookbook, there was a section called (intriguingly enough) “Innocent Sweets”, and here’s what Laurel Robertson (and her co-authors Carol Flinders and Brian Ruppenthal) had to say about PEARS:

“In winter, Bosc pears and Winter Nelis are often available at bargain prices. Even if they are rock-hard, bake them like yams, for the sweetest, most delicious, and easiest dessert imaginable. They don’t want stuffing like apples; you just stand them on their bottom in a pan (line it with brown paper if you want to save scrubbing later) and bake at about 350 degrees F for 45 minutes or so, until the syrupy juice had broken out and the pear is soft. We usually serve them as is, but you might want to make a gingery sauce or pass toasted nuts or feta cheese to nibble alongside.”

Well… That wasn’t much of a recipe, was it? However, it sounds like an excellent way to enjoy “rock-hard” pears! I don’t know about you, but I can’t even count the number of “rock-hard” pears that I’ve brought home and hoped that they would ripen quickly. Had I read — and remembered — Laurel’s “recipe for Baked Pears back then, I could have been enjoying this “innocent sweets” treat much sooner!

However, my first thought for serving them wasn’t what Laurel et al suggested — serving ’em “as is” or with “toasted nuts or feta cheese” (a cheese I still need to try, actually). Instead, I thought about serving them with a scoop of vanilla ice cream — though I guess that really isn’t a vegetarian option since “ice cream” isn’t even mentioned in Laurel’s cookbook! So… I guess I’ll toast some almonds and/or give feta cheese a try. I’ll certainly let y’all know what I decide to have as an accompaniment to my Baked Pears.

As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts about Baked Pears, this week’s featured recipe, so please take a moment to leave a comment below. Oh, and if you have any favorite recipes that feature pears, I’d love it if you would share them with me, too! In the meantime…

Take care!

As I’m sure y’all know, I enjoy featuring recipes that can be used to celebrate both “national days” (National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day, for example) and “national months” (July’s National Hot Dog Month). Well… This month is no different. According to my trusted source, October happens to be, among other things:

• National Chili Month;
• Spinach Lovers Month; and
• Pear and Pineapple Month.

In addition, October is also “Vegetarian Month”! So… I thought I would explore vegetarian cooking in this month’s “Tasty Tuesdays” recipes. Through the years, I’ve known a few people who consider themselves to be be vegetarians, and because of this, I’ve purchased (or was given) a couple of books about vegetarian cooking, including one titled, “Laurel’s Kitchen” which gives readers an overview of vegetarian cooking, and another one titled “Laurel’s Kitchen Recipes”. It is this last book that will be the inspiration — and source — for all of this month’s featured “Tasty Tuesdays” recipes.

By the way, I hope you didn’t just freak out when I mentioned that all of this month’s featured recipes will be vegetarian. To be honest, I probably would’ve had I not read “Laurel’s Kitchen Recipes” myself. I say this because my very first experience with vegetarian cooking was way back during my early college days when a deaf friend of mine introduced me to TOFU, a typical ingredient in vegetarian cooking. Back then, I was REALLY turned off by the taste of tofu, and to this day, I absolutely REFUSE to eat TOFU — even though I’ve heard that it can be quite tasty if prepared properly. So… You will NOT find any recipes that list TOFU as an ingredient NOR will you find any recipes that include plant-based protein — like “fake bacon”. In addition, you can rest assured that this month’s featured recipes won’t have any “exotic” ingredients that you may not be able to find in your local grocery store.

With that confession out of the way, the first recipe that I’ll be featuring for “Vegetarian Month” will be one that can also be used to celebrate “National Chili Month”, and it is…

Chili con Elote

Basic and classic. The corn adds a lot, but when it isn’t in season we make the dish without and it’s just great.

The chili powder here is just enough for flavor without fierceness. If chili without tears isn’t chili to you, use more, or add cayenne.

Ingredients

1 onion, chopped

1 clove garlic

2 Tablespoons oil

1 green pepper, diced

1 teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon cumin powder

1 cup chopped tomato, or 2 Tablespoons tomato paste

1 cup fresh corn

4 cups cooked kidney, black, or pinto beans

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon oregano

Directions

Saute onion and garlic clove in oil until onion is soft. Crush garlic clove. Add green pepper and spices. Saute another 2 or 3 minutes. Add tomatoes and corn if you have it. Mash 2 cups of the beans and add to pot along with whole beans and salt and oregano. Simmer 30 minutes.

Serves 6

So, there you have it: “Chili con Elote”, the first featured recipe of “Vegetarian Month” as well as “National Chili Month”. And did you notice that there was NO TOFU in it? Just wholesome foods like onions, garlic, green peppers, tomatoes, corn, beans, and spices. Nothing “exotic”! This is one of the things I look for in recipes for vegetarian cooking! If a recipe has TOFU or anything else that wouldn’t be in my pantry, then I’ll usually pass on that recipe.

This month, it is my hope that you’ll give vegetarian cooking a try. (“Meatless Mondays”, anyone?) If you do join me in celebrating “Vegetarian Month”, I’d love to hear about your experience. Looking forward to reading your comments!