It’s Wednesday so you know what that means? Hump Day Treat! I have truly become Chef Jodi these past few months and have challenged myself to try all different kinds of recipes and vegetables that I normally wouldn’t have tried in the past at all. I have always been a big pasta girl and I love making spaghetti, lasagna and everything in between. I would use whole wheat pasta when I was in the mood, but sometimes I just didn’t feel like it or didn’t want to run to the store to get some. My new obsession and alternative to eating pasta has been chickpea pasta! You heard me correctly: chickpea pasta! It looks like pasta but it is made from chickpeas.I heard about Banza (chickpea pasta) months ago while shopping at Fairway when they were giving out free samples, but I wasn’t really interested in it at the time. This time when shopping the store, I saw that it was on sale: 3 boxes for $5! What a steal!!! Another healthy tip I have learned is instead of using extra virgin olive oil I use coconut oil. Not only is it a healthier substitute, but honestly you can hardly taste the difference. With certain things I still use extra virgin olive oil, but the majority of the time when I cook I use coconut oil. A staple dish I make now with my chickpea pasta is this one below.

Ingredients:

1 cup of Banza pasta

1 tomato (sliced into small cubes)

1 thin chicken breast

some garlic

¼ sliced Vidalia onion

¼ cup of sliced mushrooms

½ of sliced zucchini

Coconut oil

In a frying pan I put coconut oil and a spoon full of garlic that I buy in a glass jar from Fairway. I let that heat up a little in the pan and then I saute the cut onions. My favorite thing is grilled onions so I am sucker for putting it in the majority of my dishes. Then I add the mushrooms and the sliced zucchini and I saute it all together until it has little golden brown all over it. While I am cooking the vegetables in the pan, I am also boiling the water for the banza pasta which takes about 8 minutes to cook. Once all the veggies are done I add  the sliced chicken which depending on your personal preference you can cut into strips or into cubes. In a separate bow,l I put the cooked banza pasta with the sliced tomatoes and then once the chicken is done pour all of the ingredients in the pan into the bowl and mix it all up!!! Sometimes I will add a little bit more of coconut oil if it needs it to cover everything or you can also add from Trader Joe’s this Honey Thyme Balsamic Vinaigrette (1 tsp.) of it and just mix it all together!
Hope you all enjoy!

(image taken from google)