Ingredients:
1 can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
4 cloves garlic, peeled
3 tbsp tahini
juice of 1/2 lemon
1/2 cup water
1 tsp olive oil
1/2 tsp sweet smoked paprika
2-3 slices roasted red peppers (I used a jar, but you can roast your own)
dash of salt

Do It:
Add all ingredients to a nutri bullet or food processor and blend until smooth.

Sometimes you just need meatballs. Every Italian American knows this to be true. Like moths to a flame, we can’t resist a good old fashioned meatball from Mom’s Sunday sauce. For vegetarians, vegans, and the gluten-freed this poses a teensy problem.

Fortunately, this recipe makes meatballs that are gluten free and meat-free, while still hearty and delicious! Full of veggies like red pepper and kale, and whole grains like quinoa and oat flour, these vegan meatballs are not only healthy, they are crazy good!

Vegans and carnivores alike will love these. And the best part is that the variations are endless! In this recipe I use curry to give it a more exotic flare. You can dice and add your favorite spicy peppers, or whatever veggies fit your mood. Customize the ingredients to make it your own. Get creative – cooking should be fun!

As a side note to vegans…

Oh man, I can’t get enough of the combination of fennel and radicchio (see Radicchio-Endive-Fennel Salad for health benefits of each vegetable)

My basic ingredients

But if you noticed, I am roasting them this time, hopefully bringing out a nice, caramelized flavour. So I cut them like this:

And put the fennel on the roasting pan first, because it takes way longer to caramelize than radicchio does. Sprinkle some olive oil on top to prevent burning, and throw in a 375 F oven or toaster-oven for 20-30 minutes. Then, add radicchio and roast for another 15-20 minutes.

Meanwhile, I was reducing balsamic vinegar in a pan, with broth and the juice of this orange

And I had a delicious sauce to pour over the roasted vegetables once they were all done. Oh, and I threw in some Panko (bread crumbs) just to give it some weight, but you can use…

Thousands of years ago — way before the advent of pot roast or filet mignon — our cavemen ancestors roamed the countryside in search of something to kill and then eat. Apparently men risked life and limb tracking down a woolly mammoth while the women stayed home so they could scavenge up some berries. Now fast-forward to modern times. While men now find their meat neatly wrapped in cellophane on supermarket shelves — and that tumor on their prostate will likely kill them before a saber toothed tiger does — we still hang on to the stereotype that eating meat is a manly thing. That NOT eating meat will somehow make you less of a man.

Yep, That seems to be the one thing we decided to hold onto for the past 12,000 years. Since we’ve decided to no longer live in caves, I think it might also be time to finally reconsider the…