4 cups peas
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 large onion, sliced
1/2 cup vegetable stock
1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped
salt and pepper

1. Heat the oil in a skillet over low heat and saute the onions until tender.
2. Stir in the peas, cover and cook for about 10 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, bring the stock to a boil in a pot over medium-high heat.
4. Add the remaining ingredients to the peas and pour the boiling stock over it.
5. Simmer uncovered until the stock has been absorbed and serve.

Makes 4 servings

2 cups dry rotini pasta
1 teaspoon lemon juice
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon pesto
1 tablespoon parmesan, grated
water
salt and pepper

1. Boil salted water, add pasta and cook until tender.
2. Meanwhile, heat olive oil and pesto in a skillet over medium heat and sauté the garlic.
3. Drain pasta, reserving 1 tablespoon of the water, and add to the skillet, along with lemon juice and reserved water.
4. Stir and top with parmesan cheese. Serve hot or cold.

Makes 4 servings

19 ounce canned lentils, drained and rinsed
4 Italian sausages
2 tablespoons olive oil
6 sage leaves
1 clove garlic
2 tablespoons vegetable stock

1. Cook the sausages with vegetable stock until browned, about 10 minutes, in a skillet over medium heat.
2. Meanwhile, heat the olive oil in another skillet over low heat with the sage and garlic. Cook until the garlic browns, then discard it.
3. Add the lentils and sausages to the flavored oil and simmer indefinitely for flavors to meld, at least 10 minutes.

Makes 4 servings

3 cups beets, cooked and sliced
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup flour
2 cups milk
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
salt and pepper

1. Melt butter over medium heat in a medium sauce pan.
2. Whisk in flour, then add milk and bring to a boil.
3. Continue whisking until thickened, then add a pinch of grated nutmeg.
4. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
5. Grease an ovenproof dish and arrange beet slices in it.
6. Season with salt and pepper and cover with prepared sauce.
7. Bake until beets are hot and bubbly, about 20 minutes.

Makes 4 servings

A friend made a comment that the theme for Last Night’s Dinner was very "round". We picked up some rainbow rotini pasta and I thought that a purposeful "round" theme would be fun. The pasta itself I just prepared simply with basil, lemon and garlic as a sort of Rotini Pasta Salad. Very simple, very easy to stuff your face with. The pasta was actually made with kamut instead of wheat or semolina, which was a first for me. I didn't notice a difference whatsoever. I don't know if kamut is somehow better than traditional pasta or not, but it's a great substitute, if it is!

The color of the dry pasta was green, brown and purple. Cooked, it was more orange, green and yellow, so my corresponding rainbow of colors seems a bit mismatched after the fact. I thought this whole meal was A+ excellent (and also very easy to prepare) but while I was hoovering forkfuls, Shannon was timidly asking, "If I eat the peas, do I have to eat the rest of it?" Since she's not a fan of peas, this was definitely a dividing dinner for us. She liked the pasta, but the flavor of the rest of the dishes didn't do anything for her. So this might be a hit or miss one for anyone trying these recipes out, too.

The peas (Green) were also prepared simply as Peas and Parsley. The flavor of the vegetable stock really penetrates the peas. I didn't really care for the parsley part of it, I think spinach or kale or something would've made this dish a lot better. Nevertheless, I love peas, so I had no problem packing them in.

I used the rest of the leftover bechamel sauce from Broccoli au Gratin to prepare Beets with Bechamel (Purple). The beets we bought were fantastic, so regardless of how they were prepared this would have been a beautiful dish. Maybe it's the pinch of nutmeg in the bechamel, but the subtle sweetness of the beets really came out in this and I thought the flavor was really packed into every bite. Cooking the beets whole probably had a lot to do with locking in all the flavor rather than slicing them to speed up the process, too. The bechamel adds richness to it and definitely looks pretty, but didn't really offer a whole lot to the dish itself (unless, of course, the nutmeg was a pay off).

The brown dish could've been anything, but I decided to make Lentils with Sausages. I think lentils are great. There's not really a whole lot to them, but they can be flavored so many different ways and they have a great firmness that holds them together but without really having any resistance when you chew. Paired with sage was a new thing for me and something I wouldn't have thought of before, but it was very good. The sausages could be omitted to make this a vegetarian meal and really have no real bearing on the flavor of this dish, they're simply there for substance.

All of these recipes are pretty straightforward adaptations of recipes from The Silver Spoon cookbook I received at Christmas. This is currently my favorite cookbook, not just because I can't afford another one, but because the recipes are great, simple and inexpensive.