Celery soup

This celery soup was a perfect recipe to use leftover celery... and a good variation from asparagus soup.

• 1 teaspoon butter or oil
• 1 large onion
• 6-7 stalks of celery, cleaned and chopped
• About 3 medium potatoes, diced
• 4 cups water/stock
• 1 tsp celery seeds
• 1 tbsp curry powder
• Fresh herbs (I used parsley)
• Salt and pepper to taste

Sauté onion in butter/oil.  Add celery and potatoes and sauté for 5 minutes.  Add other ingredients and simmer covered until vegetables are soft, about 15 minutes.  Purée with a blender, food processor, or immersion blender.  Serve topped with cheese.

Pesto-Mozzarella Chicken

This recipe was easy, quick and good.  Below is the full recipe, but we cut our recipe in half to serve 2 people.  I used the pesto I made this summer that I have in the freezer.

4 boneless chicken breasts, fat trimmed and cut into long strips
1/2 cup basil pesto
2 oz grated mozzarella cheese

Preheat oven to 375.  Spray 9x13 baking dish with non-stick spray, then spread 1/4 cup pesto on the bottom of the dish.  Lay chicken over pesto and spread 1/4 cup more pesto on top of chicken.  Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil and bake for 25-30 minutes, or until chicken is barely cooked through.

Remove foil, sprinkle chicken with cheese and bake another 5 minutes.

Then, turn oven to broil and broil for 5 minutes until the cheese is browned.

Serve with rice, noodles, quinoa, or couscous to soak up the pesto sauce.