Recipes

Garbanzo Bean Salad

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We’re having a family cookout today, and I wanted to bring a healthy side dish.  After some googling, I decided to go with this recipe for Greek Garbanzo Bean Salad.

My salad consisted of:

  • 2 HUGE seedless cucumbers
  • 2 HUGE green peppers
  • 1/2 of a HUGE red onion
  • 2 cans of garbanzo beans (AKA chick peas), drained and rinsed
  • a HUGE container of cherry tomatoes, halved
  • 1 3.5 ounce container Athenos Reduced fat Feta Cheese

Isn’t it weird how sometimes you can go to the grocery store and all the veggies are puney, then sometimes they all look like they are on steroids?

The dressing consisted of:

  • 1 cup Ken’s Steakhouse lite Italian Dressing
  • 1 tsp black pepper
  • 3 cloves of garlic
  • 1 tsp garlic salt
  • juice of 1/2 a lemon

All togetha nah:

All up in there:

Hope the family likes it!

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Recipes

Tropical POB Smoothie

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I’m sure you all are very much aware of the fact that I’m attending the Healthy Living Summit next week!  Woot!

The attendees recently got an email inviting us to enter into a Stonyfield Farms Smoothie Contest.  The only requirements are that the recipe contact at least one cup of any Stonyfield Farms or Oikos yogurt and that there not be more than 5 ingredients in the recipe.  The more organic the better!

I have a smoothie nightcap several times a week, and my usual mix consists of strawberries, blueberries, and spinach.  Given that this is a competition, and I’m slightly competivie 😉 I wanted to make a smoothie that was different than the usual.

So, here’s what I got: 

  • 1 cup Stonyfield Organic Plain Yogurt
  • 2/3 cup chopped pineapple
  • 1 clementine orange (or half of a regular orange)
  • 1/2 cup chopped banana

I tossed all the ingredients into the blender and added a few ice cubes:

Blended everything up, poured into a glass, and then realized I had only used four ingredients (ice doesn’t count right?)… so I added a strawberry for garnish.

Check me out!

Disclosure: This entry is for the Healthy Living Summit Stonyfield Smoothie Contest.  Stonyfield is a sponsor of the Summit, but not this contest.

 

 

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Recipes

Turkey Meatball Sub

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The other day I made some jokes about how crazy people get about the meat sale in my hometown.  But this really is no laughing matter.  It’s a serious matter, well a matter of serious savings that is!  Check out this post from my friend Allison–make that posts.  One post was not enough for the meat sale 🙂

 

I was thinking about the meat sale last night when I pulled the frozen ground turkey out of the freezer to defrost.  I had bought it at the LAST meat sale (was that back in tax season??), and conveniently froze up individual servings of the ground turkey for future  use.  I’m so dang smart sometimes 😉

I decided to make a meatball sub for dinner.  I didn’t have a recipe in mind, I just sort of started adding things to a bowl.  Here’s what I ended up with:

  • 1/4 package of 99% lean ground turkey breast (about 5 ounces)
  • 1 egg white
  • 1/4 cup chopped white onion
  • S&P
  • 1 sprig fresh oregano (shout-out to the backyard garden 🙂 )
  • 1 sprig fresh rosemary
  • Sprinkling of marjoram
  • 1 clove garlic
  • 1 tbsp quick oats

Meatball mixins:

 

I mixed everything together, then used a small cookie dough scooper to scoop out 6 meatballs.  I placed the meatballs on a cookie sheet sprayed with cooking spray, and popped them into a 350 degree oven for 15 minutes.  Then I flipped the meatballs over and cooked for an additional 5 minutes.

Meat-a-ball-ay:

Next, I cranked the oven up to 415 degrees, and prepped some brussel sprouts for roasting.  I swear I must have bought the never-ending basket of brussel sprouts last weekend.  I feel like I’ve eaten them every night, yet haven’t made a dent in the basket!  Check out this post for how I roast brussel sprouts. 

While the brussel sprouts were cooking, I stacked up the turkey meatballs on a Joseph’s Low Carb pita, topped them with 1/4 cup Classico Fire Roasted Tomato & Garlic sauce, and sprinkled with S&P and Red Pepper Flakes. 

Then I wrapped it all up in some foil, and tossed into the ovenfor the last 5 minutes or so of the brussel sprouts cooking time.  Anytime I’m trying to make a healthified sub, I make sure to do this step.  It gives all the flavors a chance to marry and the pita gets nice and warm and soft.

Brussel sprouts make a comeback:

Altogether now:

Delish!  I love when I can make a healthier version of a food that’s typically on the do-not-eat list!

Stats on dinner:  369 calories, 36g carbs, 6g fat, 51g protein, 14g fiber

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Recipes

Spinach Caprese Quesadilla

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While at work yesterday, my mind kept drifting to dinner–but nothing was sounding good to me.  Since I have an abundance of tomatoes and basil (thank you backyard garden for your fruitfulness 🙂 ) I decided to do something caprese inspired. 

Caprese is one of my all-time favorite Italian dishes, and it typically consists of tomato, fresh mozzarella, fresh basil, balsamic vinegar, and olive oil.

Before diving into to the caprese, I got to work on some brussel sprouts.  I halved 10 brussel sprouts, trimmed down any rough ends of the stem, and then made a small slit down the core of each sprout half.  I read that making this little slit on the rougher part of the sprout helps to ensure even cooking.  I put the sprouts on a cookie sheet that was liberally sprayed with cooking spray, then seasoned them with S&P, and gave them a good toss before throwing them into a 415 degree oven for 17 minutes.

Brussel sprouts!

Now onto the caprese!  First, I sliced up 1 roma tomato and 1 Sargento light mozzarella string cheese and put them into a bowl:

Then, I drizzled the tomato and mozzarella with 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar and a 1/2 tsp olive oil and sprinkled with some salt and pepper.  Next I added 3 sliced up fresh basil leaves and tossed everything to coat.

Meanwhile, I topped a Mama Lupe’s Low Carb tortilla with some fresh spinach and topped with the tomato mozzarella mixture:

I topped this off with a second Mama Lupe’s low carb tortilla, then I popped this baby onto the George foreman grill for about 5 minutes (until the tortilla was crisp and the cheese was melty):

None of these pictures do the quesadilla justice!  If you like caprese, you will love this:

I’m hoping I get some tips on taking pictures of food indoors at the Healthy Living Summit!  I can never seem to get indoor pictures quite right!

By the way, if you love caprese too check out the recipe I tried for hot caprese! I also added a “rating” scale to my recipe page :mrgreen:

Stats on dinner:  325 calories, 43g carbs, 12g fat, 20g protein, 14g fiber

 

A few hours after dinner, it was time for my night time snack.  I was craving a green monster smoothie, so I put the following into the blender:

  • 1/4 cup Stonyfield Farms Fat Free Yogurt
  • 1/2 cup Almond Breeze unsweetened vanilla almond milk
  • 2 cups spinach
  • 1/2 cup fresh frozen strawberries
  • 1/2 cup fresh frozen blueberries
  • 1 packet Truvia
  • 1 ice cube

Green Monster:

This guy was so much GREENER in person than in these photos… my camera was being stubborn last night!

Stats on the green monster:  119 calories, 24g carbs, 2g fat, 8g protein, 6g fiber

 

Question:  what’s your favorite “healthified” Italian dish?

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Recipes

Chili Yam Fries

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I had an appointment to get my hair cut this evening FINALLY.  Is it just me, or is there a thin line between being happy with your hair and your hair looking like the coat of a baby wildebeest?  Same thing goes for cutting my nails–one day they are a fine, respectable length, and the next day they’re so long I feel like a neanderthal 😯

Hmmm.. hair and fingernails… not exactly the best segue to dinner, are they?  (PS – no clue that’s how you spell “segue” til I googled it)

After the hair appointment I headed to the grocery store.  A couple times a year, our local grocery store has a huge meat sale, and I kid you not, it is literally the talk of the town.  And I don’t mean just for the week of the sale, it’s a highlight throughout the year.  You can be at a cookout several months later, and the BBQ’er will proudly announce “got these here ribs at the meat sale (insert head nods here).  Buy one, get one free.  Can’t beat it.  Just can’t beat it.”

Case in point, check out the text I got from my friend Tim this evening:

 

At the grocery store, I picked up a random assortment of veggies and all the meat I could carry 🙂

It was already 7:30 by the time I got home, and I have a ton of work to get done tonight so dinner was a hodgepodge, albeit a tasty hodgepodge.

I picked up something new at the grocery store:

 Chili Garlic Sauce (found in the Asian food aisle).  I also picked up a yam.  I recalled seeing a recipe somewhere for chili yam fries so I figured I’d give that a shot tonight.

I scrubbed up the yam and chopped it into big bite size pieces, then tossed with:

  • 1 tbsp chili garlic sauce
  • 1 tsp reduced sodium soy sauce
  • S&P

Into the bowl:

I sprayed down a cookie sheet, tossed the yams on topped, and cooked in a 415 degree oven for 25 minutes, stirring once.  The chili garlic sauce smelled SPICY.  I had a momentary flashback to my brief encounter with chipotles in adobo….  My face hurts just thinking about that!

Meanwhile, I sprayed down another cookie sheet and threw 6 halved brussels sprouts on it.  Then seasoned with S&P.  These also roasted at 415 degrees, but only for 17 minutes.

While all that was going on, I peaked in the fridge and found that I still had a grilled chicken breast from last week and some classico fire roasted tomato sauce that I had defrosted.  So, one thing lead to another, and here’s what I ended up with for dinner:

Two thumbs up on the chili yam fries bits:

 Roasted brussel sprouts rock my world:

More brussel sprouts for good measure:

Stats on the hodgepodge*:  325 calories, 40g carbs, 5g fat, 29g protein, 9g fiber

*hodgepodge consisted of 4 ounces chicken breast, 1/4 cup classico fire roasted tomato & garlic marinara, 1/2 of the chili yams, 6 roasted brussel sprouts

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