Steamed Veggies

This is going to be more of a "how-to-make-dinner-with-the-fewest-amount-of-dishes-possible" post than a recipe.  The other night we made spaghetti, which we do quite often because we all enjoy it, including Rachel.  I decided to make fresh green beans and broccoli as our veggies.  I thought I liked green beans before, but I really like fresh ones.  They taste so much different than the canned ones.  Of course, I'll still use the canned stuff when they are out of season, but we are enjoying fresh ones for the time being!  And they take no more work than opening that old can.  Here's how I did it:

I got a very large pot as a wedding gift from my wonderful Uncle Mike and Aunt Deb.  It can with a steamer basket you can put in the top.  Now a steamer is basically just a colander that can withstand heat.  So, in interest of saving dishes, I dumped my snapped beans and broccoli florets into the steamer to rinse.  I prepared the spaghetti in the large pot.  With about 6 minutes left on the pasta, I placed the steamer basket right on top of the cooking pasta and covered with the lid.  I normally cook my pasta uncovered, but you need the steam to stay in for the veggies, naturally, and it does not bother the pasta one bit.  I gave all the veggies the same amount of time, but in the future I will hold the broccoli out another 1-2 minutes because I like it more crispy and less mushy.  And that's all there is to it!

Rachel wanted in on the veggie action!

Snapping the ends

My awesome pot on the right: pasta in the bottom, veggies on top