Turkey Muffins and Mashed Cauliflower

These are both items I've never made.  I make meatloaf and I often change up the recipe trying different things, but I've never made them in a muffin tin.  Its a great idea because its automatic portion control, they cook up faster, and I don't have to fight with D over the edge pieces.  I love cauliflower, I think I'd consider it my favorite vegetable, but I've never had it mashed to be like mashed potatoes.  You're not going to fool anyone into thinking they are potatoes but its still a close substitute.




Turkey Muffins (adapted from Skinny Taste)
1/2 onion grated
1 lb ground turkey
1/4 c. oatmeal  (this is less than the original amount, I didn't want them to dry out)
1 egg
1/4 c. ketchup + 2  TBS
2 tsp. Worcestershire
1 tsp marjoram
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp garlic powder

1.  Grate onion, mix with turkey, oatmeal, egg, 1/4 c ketchup and spices
2.  Spray muffin tin with non-stick spray and fill muffins with meat mixture.  (I made 5)
3.  Mix 2 TBS ketchup with Worcestershire and spread on top of muffins.
4.  Bake 30 minutes or until internal temperature is 165 deg.

Mashed Cauliflower

Head of cauliflower
1/4 cup milk or cream (more or less depending on the texture you'd like)
1 TBS Butter (optional)
Grated Parmesan Cheese (optional)

1.  Steam cauliflower.
2.  Mash cauliflower with milk, butter, and grated Parmesan cheese.


Check out other recipes at A Southern Fairy Tale.

Chicken Tikka Masala

When in college I became addicted to Indian food.  During my last semester it became a Sunday tradition of one of my friends and I to go get Indian at the vegetarian Indian restaurant by my house.  We'd go and usually just get the special of the day.  This has caused me to not actually know the name of very many Indian dishes.  It being a vegetarian Indian restaurant I never actually had Chicken Tikka Masala.  So to actually have a memory of that dish we have to go back even farther in my college years.  My first experience with Indian food came while in London with my brother.  Since I had moved to KY I never went for Indian until last year.  I convinced D to go for a lunch buffet from a restaurant that I heard a lot of good things about.  Guess what?  D loves it too!  Our favorite dish on the buffet is always the Chicken Tikka Masala, so we decided to attempt this dish at home.  

We decided to go with a recipe from the last Food Network Star, Aarti.  The original recipe is located here.  Below are my changes:

Marinade:

1 cup Greek Yogurt (I actually didn't have enough yogurt so I used how much I had and used cream to fill the cup the rest of way)

1 TBS ginger (we have a tube of already grated Ginger)

3 tsp minced garlic (or 3 cloves)

1 lb boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into bite-size pieces

1.  Mix the marinade and add chicken.  Marinade at least a few hours.

Sauce

3 TBS butter

2 tsp olive oil

6 tsp minced garlic

1 TBS grated ginger

2 TBS tomato paste

2 tsp Paprika

1 tsp Garam Masala

1 can diced tomatoes

2 cups water

1/2 c. heavy cream

1.  Heat a pan on medium and add butter and oil.  Once butter is melted add garlic and ginger.  Saute until beginning to brown.

2.  Add tomato paste, cook until it begins to change color.  Add paprika and garma masala and allow to cook about 1 minute until fragrant.

3.  Add the tomatoes and water.  Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer and cover.  Cook for 20 minutes.  Remove the heat and allow to cool for 5 minutes.

4.  While sauce is cooking, remove chicken from marinade and either grill or place under broiler for about 7 minutes per side.  Allow the chicken to char on the outside.  Don't worry too much if it is not cooked through it will cook through in sauce later.

5.  Place cooled sauce in blender and puree sauce.

6.  Add sauce back into pan and bring to boil.  Add chicken, cover, and reduce to simmer.  Cook for 10 minutes.

7.  Stir in cream and remove from heat.

8.  Serve with rice or naan.

Meatballs

Another savory dish!  Can you believe it?  I made up this recipe as I went pulling ideas from different recipes I've made before and it worked!  They were really good meatballs and I was able to keep the calories pretty low.  Enjoy!


Italian Meatballs

1 1/2 lbs Ground Beef (or whatever type of meat)
1 egg
2 slices  Bread (I use a Healthy Life wheat... it is a low carb, high fiber bread)
1/3 c. Broth
1/2 onion grated
1/2 TBS Braggs (or Worcestershire)
1 tsp mustard (regular, spicy, brown)
1 tsp onion powder, garlic powder, oregano, basil (or whatever spices you'd like)
2-3 garlic cloves grated

1.  Soak bread with broth and whisked egg.  After a minute or so of soaking, mash up bread so it is no longer in pieces.  Mix in ground beef and all other ingredients.  Don't over mix the mixture.

2.  Roll into meatballs and place on a foil lined baking sheet.  Bake at 350 for about 15 minutes or until cooked based on the size you make the meatballs.

I was able to get 21 meatballs and each meatball was about 65 calories. These can be served with your favorite pasta sauce.  I took a small can of tomato sauce, a can of fire roasted tomatoes (both no salt added), fresh spinach, and some Italian spices to make a sauce.

Orange Marmalade Chicken

Finally, something other than a dessert!  When I'm not making dessert I'm trying to take meals and make them healthier.  I know I'm either one extreme or another.  I can't help it I have a sweet tooth and I need to make up for it somehow!  Trust me I'll be hitting the gym a little more this week because of that pie and cake! 

Usually by the time I get home from work and go to the gym its rather late cooking dinner, which isn't a problem because D has class at night anyway.  So during the week I'm looking for quick cooking no fuss meals.  We had some low sugar orange marmalade left over from some homemade BBQ sauce so I decided to finally put it to use on this recipe I found on Eating Well and then modified slightly... mostly just nixing the olive oil and shallots (which I would normally sub in onions but I was too lazy to chop!)  Below is my modified recipe and if you'd like the original follow the link by clicking on the name of the dish below.

Orange Marmalade Chicken (Modified from Eating Well)

Ingredients
• 1 cup reduced-sodium chicken broth
• 2 tablespoons red-wine vinegar
• 2 tablespoons orange marmalade (I increased to 3 and used the low sugar kind)
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• 1 pound chicken cut into pieces
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

1. Whisk broth, vinegar, marmalade, mustard and cornstarch in a medium bowl.
2. Sprinkle chicken with salt and pepper. Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat sprayed with cooking spray. Add the chicken and cook until golden. Transfer to a plate.

3. Whisk the broth mixture and add it to the pan. Bring to a simmer, scraping up any browned bits. Reduce heat to maintain a simmer; cook until the sauce is slightly reduced and thickened. Add the chicken; return to a simmer. Cook until the chicken is heated back through, about 1 minute. Remove from the heat and serve.

Note:

• The sauce thickens even more when sitting, by the time D got home to eat his the sauce was much thicker and coated the chicken much more than when I ate.
• This would be really good served with rice (but we avoid that carb) or tofu shiratki noodles since they are such a great noodle swap.

Daring Cooks Challenge #1: Soba Noodles and Tempura

Finally!!  The reason we started this blog...  OUR FIRST DARING COOKS CHALLENGE!!  I was so excited on the day of the announcement of the monthly challenge, I think I checked the website about 10 times before it was posted!  I was excited that this first challenge seemed like something that wouldn't be too difficult.  The most difficult part was going to get over my slight fear of a big pot of oil on the stove.  (Thanks Mom and Dad for the fire extinguisher for Christmas.  We didn't even need it!)  You'd think I wouldn't be scared of the oil since we deep fry our turkey, but that is outside and I make sure to stay inside!

The February 2011 Daring Cooks’ challenge was hosted by Lisa of Blueberry Girl. She challenged Daring Cooks to make Hiyashi Soba and Tempura. She has various sources for her challenge including japanesefood.about.com, pinkbites.com, and itsybitsyfoodies.com

Here are the recipes if you'd like to try them!

First, we cooked the noodles so that they could cool.  The noodles have to be rinsed with cold water after they are boiled.  The Soba noodles are served cold as a noodle salad.

Meanwhile, D mixed together the ingredients below to make a dipping sauce for the noodles and the tempura.

Then we cut up all the veggies so they could go back in the fridge to chill.  The sweet potatoes had to be blanched quickly to slightly cook them.

To keep the tempura batter cold we sat the bowl with the batter in a large bowl filled with ice water.

Mix the tempura batter together, it should be somewhat lumpy.

Once the oil was heated to about 340 deg.  The veggies came out and got tossed in some flour, tempura batter, and then into the oil.

We made snap peas, onions, sweet potatoes, and cauliflower.

Here is a finished plate with Soba noodles, dipping sauce, and tempura.

I even really liked the tempura left over.  Both of us agreed the tempura was good, but doubt we will spend the time to make it again.  It is definitely something we wouldn't have tried had we not been faced with the challenge.  Thank you Lisa at Blueberry Girl!!!

Turkey Taco Soup

Come join Soup-a-Palooza at TidyMom and Dine and Dish sponsored by Bush’s Beans, Hip Hostess, Pillsbury and Westminster Crackers

With all the cold weather and snow, it seems like every weekend all we think about is making a soup.  One that we can enjoy that night for dinner and then hopefully have for lunch a few days the next week.  I love taking a nice warm soup for lunch!  It is a great way to warm up since I'm always freezing at my desk.  We have had a ton of taco soups, but never made one on our own.  After looking up recipes and seeing they all called for taco seasoning mix and ranch seasoning mix, I knew we were on our own!  Seasoning mixes have way too much sodium!

Ingredients

1 lb ground turkey

1 container of salsa

1 box of broth

2 cans black beans (or dried beans that have been cooked already)

1 onion

1 green pepper

1/2 cup frozen corn

Garlic

2 TBS chili sauce

1 TBS Onion Powder or more after tasting soup

1 TBS Cumin or more after tasting soup

1 TBS Chili Powder or more after tasting soup

1/2 tsp Cayenne Pepper or more after tasting soup

Brown the turkey with the onion, garlic, and spices.

In a pot combine the broth, salsa, green pepper, corn, black beans, chili sauce, and browned meat.

Allow to simmer for at least 20 minutes.  Taste and add more spices by taste.  I really need to improve my photography and take photos in bowls other than my red dishes!  

Balsamic Chicken

Watch out balsamic vinegar I'm on a roll and the bottle is disappearing quick!  To go with the balsamic turnips I decided to keep the tastes very similar or..... I wasn't creative that night..  A quick and easy balsamic chicken!

Ingredients:
Chicken
1/2 cup Chicken Stock
2 - 4 TBS Balsamic Vinegar

Pound the chicken out.  Season with whatever seasoning you like, I used garlic powder, onion powder and a chicken seasoning we had.  Spray pan with non-stick spray and cook chicken on each side.

Remove chicken from pan, pour in chicken broth and balsamic vinegar.  Whisk to pick up the brown bits from cooking the chicken.

Place chicken back into pan and simmer with sauce until chicken is done.  If sauce is thickening too much add more stock and place cover on pan.

Remove from pan, pour sauce over top and serve!  (Red plates don't make food look very appetizing.. I promise it was good!!)

Eggplant Lasagna

We have been awful at keeping up with blogging, it is a lot more time consuming than we ever thought!  Plus the cord for the laptop is unusable, so having to go all the way to the office to use a computer really puts a damper on things.  We are determined to catch up and get back on track so expect a few posts!!

D was craving some lasagna.. odd because he says he doesn't really like lasagna.  However, we are right smack in the middle of The Revolution at our gym.  Therefore, NO pasta!  What do you do when you can't have pasta in your lasagna?  You look toward eggplant of course!  (We had many other ideas of what to use, Shiratki noodles layered, spaghetti squash, etc.. but settled on eggplant.)  It turned out great and neither of us missed the noodles.  I actually think we liked it better!  

Here is how we made it.  First, brown some ground turkey (or whatever kind of meat) with onions and garlic.  

Blended some fresh tomatoes with the pasta sauce to keep the nutrition stats better!  Yes, I know from our blogs title you'd think we didn't eat tomatoes.. and we really don't eat them often.. and when we do they have to be cooked or in D's case garden fresh.  Please don't top our salads or sandwiches with tomatoes!  EWW...

Mix sauce into browned meat mixture and simmer for about 20 minutes.  We also added fresh basil because they had some on sale at the store that day.

Next, cut eggplant into thin disks.  (I left this task to D.. I sometimes cannot be trusted with a knife!  Ask my nurse friend that had to come save me once.. THANKS SKY|!!)

Create lasagna layers, sauce, eggplant, cheese (we used fresh mozzarella), and to mine I added some fat-free cottage cheese and spinach.

Bake at 350 deg F for about 30 minutes covered and then 10 to 15 minutes uncovered.  ENJOY!!!

Crock pot Mexican Pork...

We love breaking out the crock pot in the winter.  It is great to come home and have the house smell like a yummy dinner and only be minutes a way from a nice warm dinner.  Pork tacos seem to be really popular lately, so we took a stab at our own Mexican pork.  The ingredients were thrown together in the crock pot and stored in the fridge overnight before we put it on.

In crock pot, put pork loin (ours was almost 2.5lbs), can of diced tomatoes (no salt added!), can of tomato paste (again no salt added!), 2 cups low sodium chicken broth, diced onion, diced garlic cloves (used about 5), juice of one lime, cumin, and chili powder (I'm sorry we didn't measure how much we put in).   Turn crock pot on high for 8 hours.  Shred up the meat if it hasn't already fallen apart with 2 forks.  Put the meat back in the sauce and cook for at least another 20 minutes or longer at this point I had another lime so we juiced it in the meat.  Serve as tacos or on spinach (how I had mine).

Chicken Cordon Bleu

Plain chicken gets boring after awhile... We had taken out chicken  for dinner but didn’t have any ideas of what to actually make with it.  I wanted something easy to put together and quick.  I had recently seen quite a few recipes for stuffed chicken breasts.  So, we went for a take on chicken cordon bleu (minus the sauce and breading).  It ended up just as we had hoped, quick, easy, and tasted very good! 

Here is how we did it:

First, pound out the chicken, we did this using our rolling pin with chicken sandwiched between plastic wrap.

Then, place chicken on foil covered baking sheet sprayed with cooking spray. Next layer a slice of ham (We lucked out D had recently smoked a ham in his new smoker so we had some really good ham!).

 

Next take cheese (whatever you have) and sprinkle (or spread) it on top. We used laughing cow cheese wedges (the garlic variety, awesome and only 35 calories). Don’t worry the laughing cow doesn’t melt and ooze out.

 
Finally, wrap up the chicken rolls and tooth-pick them so they don’t unroll while baking. Sprinkle a little bit of seasoning on your chicken rolls (we have a low sodium spice blend for chicken that I used) and put in a 350 deg oven until cooked through. Ours took about 35 minutes. It really is going to depends on how thin you pound your chicken and how thick your roll ends up.

Remove from oven, and let rest a little bit just so the cheese has a little time to set. (We really need some better kitchen lighting and I need to get better at taking more pictures!)

 

Mexican Stuffed Peppers or Mexican Skillet meal

Here we are January 2011… Another year starts.. The years sure are flying by these days. I moved to KY 6 years ago and met D. Insane!


D and I are back to our normally scheduled eating habits, but this time D is also tracking his food. This week we started the second unit of The Revolution at the gym (a morning boot camp like class). This is my 2nd time doing it and the first for D. 4:30am wake up calls are insane enough, but add to that 1 hr 15 min workout and it is incredibly insane!



After the run of incredibly NOT GOOD for you desserts that I’ve shared, here is an awesome dinner idea that is really good!! You can use any type of ground meat.. We had some lean ground turkey around. It also features the "grain" (really a seed) quinoa. I highly recommend it as a substitute for rice. It is really good and has protein!! Check our Wikipedia to learn more about Quinoa.



A picture of the ground turkey prior to browning. (D was making fun of this picture).

Add some onions and brown.

Once its brown, add these ingredients, diced tomatoes, water, quinoa (we had some red left and then had to use the white kind.) (NOTICE: NO salt added tomatoes spend the extra $$ and get these… The rest have insane amounts of sodium)

Bring pan to simmer. Allow to simmer for about 20-25 minutes.

This could be the end of making this meal. We’ve ate it like this before. But this time, we wanted more veggies. So we halved some green peppers.

Then stuffed them with 200 grams of the meat mixture (approx 225 calories for the meat). (Obsessively clean up counter after each pepper, ughh this part was a mess!)

Stick them in the oven at 350. I forgot to cover for the first 12 mins. SO COVER THEM! Leave them in there about 20 minutes, then top with cheese if you’d like. Mine is the one with cheese. (Fat free cheese to be exact) D didn’t want extra sodium.

Now, here is the link to the full recipe for the meat mixture. ENJOY!!!

Whole Wheat Pizza Crust... YUMMM

D and I were both craving pizza awhile ago, but we try to eat as healthy as possible and have been trying to not eat out... We were stuck trying to make the pizza at home.  Mind you neither of us have ever worked with yeast.  I had such little knowledge about yeast that I actually searched the grocery store for it (I really thought I remembered seeing it in the fridge section like by cheese??  Apparently, its in the baking aisle, why would I look there?).  I wish I had a picture of the first dough we tried!  It was awful, we used a recipe that had oat bran and wheat bran in addition to the whole wheat flour.. BIG FAILURE!!   Luckily when you buy yeast you have 3 packets!  So it was on to trial #2.... (had I known we were going to start a food blog there would have been more pictures).  This dough is perfect and the pictures below are actually from the 2nd time we made the pizza.  

The dough before we spread it out.  Notice extra flour everywhere!

Whole Wheat Pizza Crust from Wheat Foods Council

Ingredients:
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 package active dry yeast/instant yeast
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup hot tap water (120 - 125°F)
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tablespoon honey or granulated sugar

Preheat oven to 425°F

To prepare pizza dough, stir whole wheat flour; lightly spoon into a measuring cup and level flour.

In large mixing bowl, combine whole wheat flour, yeast and salt. Blend in water, oil and honey or sugar. Stir by hand vigorously until all ingredients are well mixed; about 3 minutes. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise to desired size.

Place dough in greased 15 x 10 x 1-inch jelly-roll pan or 12 to 14-inch pizza pan. Press dough to cover bottom of pan and up sides to form a rim.
Add pizza sauce of your choice and your favorite pizza toppings; bake in oven 15 to 20 minutes or until crust is golden brown and toppings are done.

Before we pre-baked the crust.

NOTES:

• The dough is very sticky we've had to up the flour both times.
• We used a cooking stone so no grease for us.
• When shaping the dough more flour is required.
• We cut the oil and honey in half.
• After the first pizza we also decided to bake the crust for about 5 minutes prior to topping..  The first pizza was a little soggy in the center.

After the pre-bake with all the toppings..

This pizza was topped with an olive oil and garlic sauce and fat free mozzarella, spinach and artichokes.