Jambalaya it's what's for dinner!

On Sunday, before grocery shopping I sat down and came up with a meal plan...somewhere between that moment and Monday trying to figure out what I said I was going to make for dinner I lost the meal plan. On top of that I completely drew a blank, the only meal I could remember from the meal plan is this recipe because I marked it in "The Food You Crave" cookbook by Ellie Krieger as I was searching for "healthy" meals for the week. I had all the ingredients on hand except for two, a can of tomatoes and ham. Thus Monday night became Jambalaya night.  This recipe was super quick to make, I was finished in under an hour and I made some side veggies to go with the jambalaya.  

As I stated, I had all the ingredients on hand except for the cookbook recipe called for one 14.5 can of no salt added diced tomatoes, which I bought but forgot to add when cooking, therefore I omitted from my ingredient list, it was very tasty without but feel free to add if you like tomatoes.  Also I had to buy ham.  I went ahead and bought a small ham so that I could make this dish plus grind some up for ham salad, and I still have some left over!  Anyone have any ham ideas?  I am thinking of incorporating it into some sort of breakfast dish. Maybe a quiche. 

One other major change from cookbook version to mine, Ellie does not recommend using brown rice for this dish, she said it wasn't worth it that you should use a long grain white rice.  Which I understand would make it more authentic. But the husband and myself both agreed my version was excellent.  He didn't even realize it was whole grain brown rice until I told him.  I could tell the difference, maybe because I knew, but I still thought it made the dish very good.  I guess we will have to try it another time with white rice to compare.  But we were both surprised at how good this tasted.  I had to show my  husband the cookbook recipe because he couldn't believe this recipe came from a healthy living cookbook.

This recipe is another reason why I advocate always having chicken stock or other stocks on hand. It makes it so easy for to have go to recipes like this one.

Give this recipe a try or the original recipe from Ellie Krieger. Very tasty and easy which are two great things on a Monday evening!!

Link to Jambalaya Recipe