Mediterranean Lettuce Wraps

A Med Month recipe and a giveaway! As I mentioned in yesterday’s eggplant dip post, I am celebrating National Mediterranean Diet Month with Oldways. If you haven’t heard of Oldways, I would suggest checking out their site. They are all about changing lives through real food, and their various programs offer something for everyone.

When planning my grocery shopping this week, I had the Mediterranean Diet Pyramid in mind and decided to whip up a dinner of fresh Mediterranean-style lettuce wraps for our Meatless Monday dinner.

I started with a couple of simple ingredients, a large bag of red lentils, soaked in several cups of water for a couple hours, mixed with a box of Near East Taboule wheat salad mix. Once I added the Taboule (Tabouli? The box says Taboule, but it looks strange to me!), I added a little more water, stirred in the seasoning packet that came in the Taboule box, and refrigerated the lentil mixture until we were ready to eat.

That’s right, we ate the lentils raw. There is something about red lentils, just soaked in enough water, that I love. They have a sweet pea flavor and a nice little crunch.

Preparing the rest of the meal was simple. I mixed up the eggplant dip and left that at room temperature, then chopped and grilled a rainbow of bell peppers. I hope you don’t get tired of seeing my grill pan; I love the way food cooked on it tastes!

Everything is more fun eaten in a lettuce wrap, so large romaine leaves were the base of this meal. Once the peppers were grilled and chopped, I added scoops of the lentil and bulgur mixture to the lettuce, and then we topped them as we wanted.

To my lettuce wraps, I added a spoonful each of the eggplant dip and Fage Greek Yogurt, then I rolled them up and enjoyed a nice crunch!

Our dinner incorporated elements from many parts of the Mediterranean Diet Pyramid, including two vegetables, a grain, a legume, and yogurt. It certainly felt like a well rounded, healthy meal while also being filling, inexpensive, and flavorful.

To celebrate Oldways and Mediterranean Month, Oldways is giving me a copy of their book The Oldways Table to give to one lucky Travel, Wine, and Dine reader.

Enter to win!

1) Follow @oldwayspt on Twitter and tweet “I want to win The Oldways Table from @traveleatlovemm & @oldwayspt” with a link back to this post.

2) Leave a comment with your favorite ingredient/s from the Mediterranean  Diet Pyramid

3) Check back on Monday morning for the announcement of the winner. I will post the winner here, and if I don’t hear from him/her in 48 hours, I will choose another winner.

Good luck!