I like to save money. I like to know that there will be money when I decide to stop saving and want to give to someone in need or buy a  cute dress or a indulge in a cup of coffee that costs more than someone in another country has to spend on food for a week or visit a friend in another country. It’s just the way I am. As a money saving gal, one way I’m trying to explore saving is with the food we cook. Here’s where it gets tricky. I don’t like ground beef and that’s the primary source of protein in many of the recipes I find. It gives me the heebeegeebees for the most part-it just feels weird in my mouth and I don’t like knowing that I didn’t see everything that went into that little plastic package. I enjoy a good burger every now and again, but not any meat in the shape of a loaf or preceding the word helper.  Most of the good, less expensive foods we consumed growing up involved ground meat and the delicious vegetables and fruits that grew in the yard. My mom is a good mom. She is a great cook and was very creative with leftovers and allowed us as much cheese or milk as required to consume said leftovers so we weren’t scarred for life. Mostly she now has three grown children who enjoy cheese and milk. Also, I can’t really eat tofu. It tastes just delightful going down, but the rest of the process gets a little confused and it’s not pleasant for me. We’ve tried cooking with seitan-we now pronounce it satan. It was weird and smelled like cat food when I took it out of the can. I couldn’t get over the cat food smell so poor Jonathan had to eat the whole thing for the greater part of the week while I enjoyed delicious peanut butter and jelly.

We’ve had some great meals lately-sweet potato and black bean burritos, grilled veggies with polenta and some other black bean items. Does anybody have any other awesome (vegetarian/legume) recipes that they love?