Buddha Bowl for Food Fight Friday {I Made Chayote Too @puravidaville! 😉}

Happy Friday friends! Big surprise, it was a busy one! I wasn't intending on seeing my niece today, but when my sister told me she was asking if I was coming all morning I couldn't disappoint her. All my other plans go out the door to spend time with her. I'm sure it will be all too soon when I'll blink and she'll be old enough to have other priorities than spending Friday afternoon with her auntie, so I'm taking advantage of every moment that I have now. Many good memories made today as always!

As it is already 7pm here, I didn't intend on squeaking out a post today. However, when I saw @puravidaville's #fff post had some chayote tacos at the end, I knew I had to crank out my own chayote experience this week! Especially since I used some of my Buddha bowl leftovers for tacos, too. When fate intervenes, you go with it. (I promise I'll join #marketfriday soon @dswigle!)

Though I usually try to buy the bulk of my food from the local farmers market, every now and then as a treat I'll grab something a little bit different from the store that I don't find locally. One of the restaurants I went to around my birthday has a delicious chayote squash slaw that I have been wanting to try to make at home. When I happened upon some chayote at the store I just had to grab a few!

Kind of funny-looking, isn't it? My Brazilian gal pal had told me her mom makes a killer slaw, so I turned to her for some advice on how to work with it since I had never used chayote myself. I love having friends from all different cultures for so many reasons, but sharing food traditions is definitely a big perk! Her basic recipe was just to slice the squash and lightly boil it to soften it up a bit, then add it to onion, vinegar and some seasonings. I used slice sweet onion, apple cider vinegar, a pinch of white pepper, and some dill. Wow is that so frickin' good! So simple, but packed a major punch. Especially to brighten up the rest of my bowl. I made it the day before the rest of my meal to make sure it had plenty of time for the vinegar to incorporate in and to break down the onion a little bit to tame down the raw flavor.

The main part of the bowl was a bunch of roasted veggies like sweet potato, broccoli, onion and Brussels sprouts from the farmers market. I just sprinkled them with some seasoning and roasted them until soft. A batch of cooked canary beans bulked it out, and the bed of the bowl was Siberian kale from one of the organic farmers at the market. To top it all off I made guacummus! Yep, it's just what it sounds like. Essentially hummus but with avocado and lime blended in for a best-of-both-worlds mixture of the two greatest dips known to man.

I didn't have any fresh cilantro, so I used parsley in it for that herb flavor and also used ground coriander, smoked paprika and a pinch of cayenne. No shame in licking the food processor after that batch. Don't worry, I did remove the blades first. 😜

It was perfectly delicious and satisfying in a bowl, but made a pretty darn good taco filling, too! There's always ways to jazz up leftovers if you get tired of eating them the same way multiple days in a row.

Glad I could jump back in the @foodfightfriday ring again! It's only 7:28 now, so I managed to knock this one out in a hurry so I can check out some of the other contenders before shutting down for the evening. Have a fantastic weekend everyone!

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