I'm a huge fan of basil pesto, so this year when my garden had lots of basil I went into pesto-making overdrive.  Now I have an abundance of Basil Pesto with Lemon in my freezer, so I've been pondering new ways to use pesto.  Pesto ideas had been swirling around in my head for a few days when I had the thought of adding some pesto to turkey meatloaf to bump up the flavor.  Of course it's hard to come up with a recipe that someone hasn't thought of already, and when I searched for "turkey pesto meatloaf" I found that quite a few other people had the same idea.  The recipe here was adapted from Turkey Pesto Meatloaf at Culinate, although I did make quite a few changes for the version I ended up with.  My Turkey Pesto Meatloaf has a generous amount of pesto, and I used tomato sauce mixed with a little balsamic vinegar to top the meatloaf, a combination that went well with the pesto.  I loved this variation on meatloaf; hope other people will enjoy it too.

I probably don't need to remind you that Valentine's Day is just one week away.  Those who are celebrating by going out to dinner have hopefully made reservations, but if you're looking for something a bit special to cook at home I would highly recommend this delicious Pecan-Crusted Dijon Salmon.  Not only is it absolutely delicious, but this recipe is so easy that you won't have to spend much time in the kitchen.  (If salmon isn't your thing, there are a lot more ideas for Valentine's Day dinner at home with the Valentine's Day Recipes, including some low sugar chocolate treats.)

For my birthday in December my blogging and real-life friend Lydia sent me some black garbanzo beans, an ingredient I had never seen before I got them in the mail.  I was intrigued and immediately started looking on the internet and in cookbooks for ideas of how to cook this type of bean.  I settled on a recipe from The Indian Slow Cooker where the unsoaked beans were put in the CrockPot and cooked on high for 9 hours with water and a ground mixture of seasonings and Indian spices.  (Yes, that is supposed to say 9 hours on high.)  The final recipe I ended up was delicious but may not be all that authentic, because when I tasted the mixture after 9 hours it was a bit spicy for my tastebuds, so I added a can of tomatoes and some green onions and simmered it an hour more.  Cilantro and a little lemon juice is stirred in at the end.  I loved the chewy texture and the savory, almost nutty flavor of the black garbanzo beans.