No bones about it, this Split Pea & Potato Soup is deliciously wonderful without the classic ham bone, making it a comfort food green light for the health conscious eater. It's a vegan's dream, with only vegetable ingredients, so full of character and flavor, and yet free of pork and preservatives that come with ham or other processed meats.

Typical split pea soup is a thick and salty ham filled bowl of bloating sodium, nitrates and other additives that leach out of that processed meat as it simmers on the stove. Here, I offer my recipe for a much lighter soup by adding a little more water ( yes, water, because you don't really need a box of chicken broth to make good soup!) 

Anyone out there looking for complicated tedious recipes? Anyone? I didn't think so!!! With fast food, drive through window service, and convenience foods flying off the shelf, what was my butternut loving brain thinking when I posted the recipe for that gorgeous Spinach Butternut Risotto Cake a year ago? 

It's a thing to behold, a savory and colorfully stratified "cake" 

It's been a couple of years of fully energized mornings, primed with the goodness of greenery and nutrient dense add ins, free from the weight of sugary carb' and fat loaded breakfasts. What was I thinking? That heady sugar high delivered in an array of forms from a combination of grains and sweeteners, served up with an occasional plate of breakfast meats and eggs, made me wonder what all those commercials featuring bright heel kickin' mornings were about. I really do love "breakfast foods", but have found that they really do not love me back! 

For the most part, my conclusions have come after actually experiencing the freedom of snappy spirited mornings in contrast with the typical bulk of a standard American breakfast that fails to deliver what our bodies are really craving. It was a