Recipe #63: Mushrooms and Brussel Sprouts Pasta

I have recently realized that when people say, "healthy" there are lot of people who immediately think, "organic". Well, I have at least noticed this perception of health more often than not around this area. And while I do sometimes agree with some definitions of the word, "organic", I can never justify the purchase because of the difference in price points. With vegetables and fruit I wash them as much as possible after I buy them and before I eat them. Yet, I guess if what I buy has been pumped with hormones and then sprayed constantly with pesticides from day one of being a seed until today when I buy the item it really doesn't matter how much of a bath I give them.

And then I have all of these questions about organic meats...what does this mean, exactly? Someone once told me that the term "organic" can mean that the animal was never treated with any kind of antibiotics and/or altered with biotechnology. Now in my opinion this concept is very natural and I can appreciate the principle. However, I have heard that if the animal becomes ill in any way the farmers will continue to milk the animal and even send the animal to the chophouse.

Of course, everyone has a friend of a friend of a friend of a girl they once knew and it happened to be this girl's doppelganger who gave them the supposed (rumored) information. Yada, yada, yada. Yeah, I know how this goes. It's like playing telephone and you simply can't trust everything you hear. We have to be individually responsible enough to explore that information ourselves no matter how easily believable any(every)thing sounds.

Well to be honest I decided to put all of this behind me tonight and not only buy non-organic items but I also did not add any kind of meat whatsoever to this dish. I'm going to save this challenge for another night when I have more energy. In fact, just thinking about all of these decisions after a long day just made me even more tired. But here's what I concluded: The definition of healthy is so ambiguous that even without all of the organic ingredients I can still successfully create a healthy and well balanced meal. I found the recipe from here: http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/fettuccine_brussels_sprouts_mushrooms.html and I was very pleased with the outcome!

Ingredients:

* 8 oz of Pasta
* 10 oz of Brussel Sprouts (I purchased frozen)
* 14 oz of White Mushrooms
* 1 tsp of Red Wine Vinegar
* 3 Cloves of Garlic
* 1/3 container of Light Parmesan Alfredo
* 4 Tbsp of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
* 2 Tbsp of Dried Chopped Basil
* 1 tsp of Black Pepper

Cooking Directions:

First bring a medium pot of water to a boil.

Then add the spaghetti noodles and cook until tender.

Pour the alfredo sauce onto the noodles and keep warm over medium low heat. Add the pepper and the basil.

Follow the directions on the brussel sprouts packaging to cook them properly.

On a cutting board remove the stems of the mushrooms and then slice them.

Then mince the garlic cloves.

Place a large frying pan over medium heat and drizzle the olive oil to even coat the pan.

Add the mushrooms and cook until tender.

Then add the minced garlic and cook for only about 1 minute in order to release the flavor and aroma.

Drizzle the red wine vinegar into the mushroom mixture.

Add the brussel sprouts and mix together all of the ingredients.

In a serving bowl add some of the noodles and then scoop some of the mushroom and brussel sprout mixture over the top.

Serve hot immediately.