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.

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.

My mommy's Tacos with a Twist

I grew up eating my mom’s tacos.  The first time I had tacos made using the spice packet I knew something was wrong.  I didn’t know what it was, but I knew they weren’t as good as my mom’s.  Since, I’ve grown up and moved out I occasionally used the spice packets, until last year when I actually read the back and realized how many calories and sodium is in that little packet of spices.  I’m back to using my mom’s recipe for tacos.  Its just as easy and way better anyway!


 I had to make it my own by adding some black beans to the mix to up the fiber.  The recipe below won’t show the beans, but I just added the equivalent to one can of black beans to the mix (I had some dried ones that we cooked and froze).  I typically use 90/10 ground beef for these but any ground meat will work.  I served these with a High fiber wrap and no fat cheese as an excellent dinner for right about 350 calories, it was about ¼ of the meat and bean mixture (calorie counts will vary depending on your meat and the amount of beans used).

My Mommy's Tacos

Brown 1 lb ground beef (or any ground meat) with chopped onion.  Drain fat.  Add 1- 8 oz can tomato sauce (I always use the no salt added kind) and a can of water.  Add 2 to 3 TBS chili powder, 1/2 tsp garlic powder, 1/2 tsp pepper, salt (optional), 2 to 3 TBS salsa (, I often leave this out...) and 1 TBS chili sauce (or more.. I never actually measure it).  Simmer for 10 to 15 minutes on low heat.

Thanks mom for making tacos without the packet!


See Eat at Home for other ideas on how to use Tomato Sauce.



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!  

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!!!

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!!!