More Adventures in Cooking

Just wanted to share a few more culinary accomplishments for me...

Broccoli and cheese quiche!! This consisted of half full eggs and half egg whites, but it was good. The bad news - I used too much broccoli, and after about 3 days, it started smelling like it went bad. So I couldn't finish it. At least what I tasted was good! But lesson learned...use less broccoli!!

So this isn't a feat of culinary accomplishments, but it was AMAZING and I was stuffed until about 2 pm!! These are breakfast burritos...3 eggs whites and 2 turkey bacon slices (split between the 2 burritos), high fiber tortillas, fat free Cheddar cheese, and I poured about 2 tbsp of Salsa Verde over each before rolling them up! And I also tried the Fruit2Day drinks I've been hearing about - the juice is great, but they put pieces of fruit in them, and I really can't stand that. It really bothers me to have to chew my drinks. So I won't be getting them again. But...that doesn't mean you shouldn't! Like I said, the juice was good.

Adventures in Cooking

September has been a month of cooking/experiments! Check out some of my creations below!!

A nice acorn squash with salt, pepper, and roasted pumpkin seeds. YUMMM!!!

Then, Justin wanted a Weight Watchers meal (you probably heard me gasp around the world)...so I made a healthy pizza - from scratch. Whole wheat crust, fresh tomatoes, fresh cilantro, mozzerella and pizza sauce. Also YUM!!!
And I had purchased some butternut squash at a Farmer's Market recently, and I wanted some soup so I improvised. See the amazing recipe below!!

Butternut Squash Recipe:

1 large (or 2 small/medium) butternut squash
1 cup Fat Free Milk
1 cup Fat Free Cream cheese
Garam Masala spice
Curry spice

Peel and cut all the squash. Boil over the stove for 20 minutes, or until squash is soft enough to smush with a fork. Drain the pot, and mush all the potatoes to as smooth or lumpy as you'd like.

Put all the mashed squash back in your pot and put the stove top at about medium heat. Add the milk and cream cheese, and stir until all the cream cheese has melted and you reach desired consistency. Add the spices to your taste preferences. (I just did a dash or two until I got it right where I liked it).

This recipe will make a very thick soup, almost like a paste. But I looove really thick soup. You can slowly add more milk to make it thinner until it gets to your preference. And I just picked those spices because I love Indian food!

And I made sure I picked fat free cream cheese and milk because I'm on Weight Watchers. But it reallllly tastes yummy!!

Chicken with Pine Nuts and Orzo

I have GOT to share this AMAZING recipe I made last night!! Well, 2 technically. The Chicken Recipe is Weight Watchers, and the orzo recipe I got off a box of orzo - but it was spectacular!!! I will definitely make it over and over again. In order to help you duplicate this extremely tasty dish, I have copied it exactly as it is from the recipes I used.

Orzo with Spinach, Pine Nuts & Parmesean Cheese
1 cup of Orzo
1/4 cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 pinch dried red pepper flakes (optional)
10 oz. fresh baby spinach leaves
2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil leaves
1/4 pine nuts, toasted
1/4 cup shredded parmesean cheese, plus extra for serving (as much as you'd like!)
Salt
Pepper

1. Cook orzo as package directs.
2. Heat olive oil in large skillet over medium heat. Add garlic and pepper flakes and cook, stirring, for 1 minute.
3. Add spinach and stir to mix in garlic. Reduce heat to low, cover and cook for 5 minutes until spinach is wilted. (*This was the point I added the pine nuts so they could get toasted**)
4. Once spinach has wilted, stir in balsamic vinegar. Add drained orzo to skillet with basil, any additional pine nuts and parmesean cheese. Toss well and season with salt and pepper to taste. Serve with additional cheese, as desired.
*Makes 3 entree or 5 side dish servings.
**No nutritional facts listed, therefore, no WW Points :-(

WHILE PASTA IS COOKING, START ON CHICKEN!


Chicken with Pine Nut Gremolata
4 6-ounce skinless, boneless chicken breasts
Salt (*I used kosher salt, but I LOVE salty food!)
Pepper
2 teaspoons olive oil, divided
1 cup loosely packed fresh flat-leafed parsley, finely chopped
2 tablespoons pine nuts
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 teaspoon grated lemon grind
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1. Place chicken breast halves between 2 sheets of heavy duty plastic wrap; pound to 1/2 inch thickness using a meat mallet or a small heavy skillet. Sprinkle chicken with salt and pepper, seasoning to taste.
2. Heat 1 teaspoon oil in large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add chicken to pan, and cook 5 minutes on each side, or until cooked through. (**The recipe doesn't call for this but for the last 5-10 minutes the chicken was cooking, I threw in a handfull of pine nuts to roast them - TOTALLY made the recipe!!!)
3. While chicken cooks, combine parsley, pine nuts, remaining teaspoon oil, garlic, 1/2 teaspoon lemon rind, 1 tablespoon lemon juice, and salt and pepper to taste. Toss gently to combine. Server gremolata (this mixture) over chicken.
Yield - 4 servings. (Serving size - 1 chicken breast, 1 1/2 tablespoons gremolata)
Weight Watchers points - 5

As Rachael Ray would say - YUMM-O!!!!!

Cooking Adventures

Since I started on Weight Watchers, I've really gotten in to cooking. I find that it really calms me and puts me in my old little world and it's just amazing to me to see things come together and make fantastic tasting items!! I turn everything out except what I'm cooking.

So I've taken some pictures of 2 recent dishes (on my cell phone, so I apologize for the poor quality) that I was excited about and that turned out well!


Dish #1 - Cheese Quiche from scratch:

This was the quiche going into the oven. It was supposed to be a spinach and cheese quiche, but the spinach wasn't defrosted by the time I made what you see below, and I didn't want to leave a bowl with raw eggs and milk in the fridge overnight.

And I can I just say that the finished project (below) looks YUMMY?!!??!??!?! I didn't have the spinach ready, but I felt like adding something extra, and so I just threw in the rest of the onions I had in the fridge. This was breakfast for me for about a week. O....M....G....

And then here's a great side shot of a slice of the best quiche ever (sorry mom!).

Then...
Dish #2 - Turkey Burger:

I attemped 2 first with this dish: I had never tasted ground turkey, let alone a turkey burger, AND I had never made my own turkey burger from scratch! Here's what it looked like in the bowl when I mixed it with onions and seasoning - the MOST disgusting consistency and feeling in between my fingers I have ever experienced. It was like the feeling you get when you chew your gum too long, and it goes from being "elastic" feeling to dissolved in 2 seconds. Ew.

So, it looks great, but here are the two patties I made (Justin wanted one). Still kind of yucky...

But, in the end - doesn't this look good? It was really tasty too - with a slice of cheese and some spinach leaves, on a whole wheat flattened sandwich bread. So all in all, I think I would make it again, because it was SOOO good, but I'm really not looking forward to touching the ground turkey again. EW - just had another nightmare flashback.

Accountability

I will admit...I haven't been very good. I haven't taken the stairs one day this week. I'm just in a rush in the mornings and the stairs take too long. Then at the end of the day, I can't wait to just get home and relax. But...I still have that goal to work out 3 times by next week, so I know I can do that. In fact, after I finish dinner, I'm going to do some Pilates.

What's for dinner you ask? Salmon with homemade "marinade" with cilantro. And a side of cous cous with some yummy veggies. Smells goooood...

And coming soon - a new blog layout and header! And yes, I will make my own header!

Home-cookin!

The past few weeks have been really interesting with a lot of home cooking going on! I've been doing really well with cooking Weight Watchers meals and sticking to the idea of smaller portions. The funny thing is - I haven't had my first meeting yet, so I don't know how many points a day I'm supposed to have, but I still feel good about the meals I'm making and eating. I feel like I can do this!!

So here's a peak into the meals I've been having...very yummy!

Chicken and shrimp stir fry...

Justin is cutting up garlic in this photo for another stir fry recipe that we tried...

This is the first "official" WW meal I made, a chicken wrap...so good I made it twice!

Found a great chicken casserole recipe. We ended up having it for lunch the next 2 days!

I don't really like how I look in this one, but I'm on the way to looking better and feeling better about myself! I'm making a side dish of broccoli to a WW meal my mom made and I reheated.

Justin wanted stir fry again, so since it wasn't a WW recepie, I made sure to give myself a small bowl and small portion, and shockingly enough for me - I was full! This is great!

Then tonight, I made a chicken cous cous with veggies salad, and a side of broccoli. It turned out really well! And there was enough left over that I can have it as a small snack tomorrow if I'm hungry.

Whew. Those were some good meals! The healthy stuff can be expensive...so I may have to do a WW meal only once or twice a week and just be smart with the "regular" stuff. But I'm feelin' good!

Weekend Update

So I had a great weekend. I didn't really do anything, but I still feel like I had a productive weekend. Justin was going fishing early Saturday morning, so I had all day to myself with the 3 dogs. I mostly kept them entertained around the house, and they alternated chasing each other with taking a 2 hour nap. Easy enough. I stayed over at the house with the dogs since he would be getting up t 5:30 am. No thank you.

Turns out the water was about 15 degrees and they didn't bring their "cold gear", so they didn't go fishing, but Justin had every intention of going on Sunday, so I knew I'd have another day all to myself. I ended Saturday night watching tv in my parent's basement with the dogs and staying there again. When I say "with the dogs", I mean that I watched tv and they did this:

So cute!! So Sunday morning was a nice, quiet morning at the house spending some fun time with the dogs. I wanted to pick up the house since my parents were coming home tonight. And I also had a weird urge to make some cookies from scratch! I'm a regular Martha Stewart these days! Homemade Chicken Divan, stirfry twice last week, onion rings from scratch, and cookies...I'm on a roll!!

Of course the dogs were right there with me, but they weren't doing what you might expect - no begging for food, just sleeping.

I think Bailey and Baxter really "bonded" this week - Cody was at the vet during the week so he could be let out several times a day, so I only had Baxter at night. He stayed at the apartment each night, and somehow both of them ended up in bed with me when I woke up in the morning! They love cuddling...Best buds!!

Had to share this one of Cody - he was chewing on this toy, and fell asleep mid-chew!

And even though I hadn't really done anything strenuous today, I was still feeling too tired to cook, but didn't want to take the easy way out and get pizza. And I wanted something easy. So I made my first Weight Watchers meal!

It's a chicken wrap with some Asian sauce to give it taste, but not a lot of calories. And it was really good, and surprisingly filling. I had it around 6:30, and it's now 10:15, and I'm not hungry. That's unusual for me, since this late is when I normally start getting snack cravings. I think I can really do this!!

So the Weight Watchers meetings start on Thursday, and those meetings will help me hold my eating habits accountable. It's so easy when you do things like diet alone to reason or rationalize why you can have one more serving, one more bite, one more cookie. But when you have to write it down or share it honestly with someone, it makes it a tiny bit easier to put the fork down! I'm actually sitting next to a big box of the cookies I made, and part of my mind is saying "Oh those were so good, I should just have one or two for that really good taste". But the other part of my mind, the one that's now developing a friendship with my stomach/hunger is saying "but you're not hungry. Why have a cookie?"

And I actually feel very good about not having a cookie. Makes me proud of myself. It may sound small, but it's a big step for me. And I haven't even started the program yet!! I'm feeling good about this....check back for updates!

Chicken Divan Recipe

I made another AMAZING chicken dinner a few nights ago, but it's not from a written recipe. Which was a huge feat for me!

I was thinking all day at work about what to make for dinner when all I thought I had was chicken breasts. I got home and realized we had a ton of rice so I thought I'd make an easy chicken and rice dish. Then, the more I thought about it, I remembered I had some shredded cheese and broccoli in the fridge and then - BAM! - what if I made a casserole?

It immeadiately sounded yummy sound I started to Google recipes. I had a brief moment of panic when I remembered that you need Cream of Chicken soup to "hold" the casserole "together" and so I opened my cabinet while I held my breath - and there was a can! I was smarter than I thought and had bought the can a while back "just in case", and finally it came in handy!!

But then I had a thought - my mom probably has a really awesome, easy recipe for this. Well duh - I was right! She told it to me over the phone, so I mostly had to do it from memory, and since I know I will want to make it again, I figured I might as well write it down so I don't have to keep calling my mom and at the same time share it with you!

It's easy and has few ingredients - Enjoy!

Chicken Divan

Ingredients:
2-3 Chicken breasts
1 cup shredded cheese (or more if you LOVE cheese!)
1 10.75 oz can Cream of Chicken soup
1 pkg frozen broccoli
4 tblsp butter or margarine
2 cups rice (or 1 package of 10 minute rice, or your favorite kind)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Follow package directions on broccoli to warm up it up (if it's frozen). If you choose fresh broccoli, use your discretion/taste to decide how much you want in your dish, and cook as normal in steamer.
3. As broccoli is warming, cut up chicken breasts into small, bite-size pieces. Saute these pieces in a sauce pan on your stove top on low to medium heat to cook.
4. Place all broccoli in a glass baking dish, size depending on how much broccoli/chicken you use. The pan needs to be just big enough for the broccoli to make a layer evenly covering your dish.
5. Once the chicken is cooked, layer it evenly on top of the broccoli.
6. Mix the can of soup, 1 cup of cheese and the butter/margarine (melted first). Spread mixture evenly over the broccoli and chicken.
7. Put pan in oven for 20 minutes.
8. While dish is in oven, cook rice as normal.

Serve Chicken Divan over rice - YUM!!

New Years Resolutions

I have a few things I would like to see myself do in this new year:

1. Save money!!!
2. Read 1 book a month.
3. Catch up on my scrapbooking.
4. Lose some stinkin' weight! I want to be back to my "I just moved to Colorado" weight, which means 30 lbs by the end of the year!
5. Try to eat healthier and branch out into trying new recipes!

And on a side note, I'm really enjoying logging in and seeing that I have comments!! So thank you, and keep them coming!

Catch-Up

Ok, so I didn't post last night like I said I would but I'm posting now! Here's a quick photo catch-up of what I've been up to the last week...not much, but some fun things!

Last Sunday, Justin and I decided to make our own guacamole! I was a little afraid, because making it from scratch made me worried that we wouldn't do it right and we'd get sick. Well, we must have done it right because we're both still here!!

Here's Justin cutting open the avacados...I didn't want to because you have to get semi-squishy ones for the perfect guac, and the squishiness grossed me out!

Then he had to gut them and mush them all together - like I said, gross!

While we were making it, it appeared that a snow storm was rolling in. This was as bad as it got - not one snowflake fell!

Don't worry - I did help! I cut up all the ingredients to put in. We had onions, cilantro, tomatoes, and lemon and lime juice.

Then when I wasn't in the kitchen, I was busy making this (just the cross-stitched part in the middle) for a co-worker to give as my final Secret Santa gift. Came out well!

I also stitched some more things for family Christmas gifts, but in case any of my family members still read this, I don't want to spoil the surprise before they get the gifts, so I'll post pictures of those later this week!

And as a parting shot, here's one of my favorites of Bailey - he dreams when he sleeps! Pay special attention to his mouth; I think he's barking in his dream, and it's the cutest thing!!!

Chicken Kiev Recipe

Nothing smells better than breaded chicken with garlic and Italian seasoning. Oh yea - top it off with white wine vinegar, mixed with butter and green onions. I'm talking about my mom's homemade Chicken Kiev recipe! With a little improvising on my part, of course.

I grew up with the recipe and always used to love walking in the house and smell the unforgettable smell, and know it was going to be a good night! When I moved to my first apartment in college, you bet I asked my mom for the full-fledged recipe!

Here's the recipe for you to take and enjoy...it's really easy!!! And very yummy.

Thanks Mrs. C!


Chicken Kiev
*Best served on rice

- Bread crumbs (plain or Italian seasoning)
- 1/2 cup margarine or butter
- Chicken breasts
- 1/4 cup dry White Wine/Vermouth
- 1/4 cup sliced green onions (2 bunches - cut up to 2 inches into green part)

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Melt 1/4 cup of the margarine/butter. Dip each chicken breast in butter. Cover it in bread crumbs. Place in shallow glass baking pan.
3. Bake near center of over for 30-45 minutes, depending on the thickness of the chicken breast, until fully cooked.
4. Melt remaining butter (1/4 cup) in bowl, and mix in onions and wine.
5. Pour sauce over chicken.
6. Return chicken to oven for 3-5 additional minutes to let the mixture seep into the chicken and to heat the sauce.

Enjoy! I didn't have any onions at home tonight, and didn't want to go out to the store, so I substitued onions with garlic. So we'll see what happens. I may have invented a new recipe!

Mellow Sunday night/Weekend Update

Wow...I don't think I could possibly recall all that I did this weekend. There were funny moments, and average moments. And I think the only way I could really track my weekend would be to do a bulleted list (I am, afterall, a bulleted list person) and include visuals. Pictures of course. It is my blog, after all!

Friday night:

- Originally we planned on going out but in order to save money, we stayed in. We stopped by the grocery store with out any real plan of what we wanted, and on a whim, I stopped by the stand that has those little recipe cards. I have my own recipes at home, but I never remember to look through them before I go anywhere. We saw one that really caught our eye, bought all the ingredients, and it was AMAZING!! It was the McCormick recipe for homemade Tortilla Chicken Chili, which is basically chicken and whatever chili ingredients you like (corn, beans, tomatoes, etc) and then their chili mix. Top it with crumbled tortilla and there you have it!

Saturday:

- Saturday morning always means sleeping in. Period.

- After getting up to let Bailey out so he didn't pee all over the apartment, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. I ended up downloading and watching Angels and Demons, since I liked the Da Vinci Code so much. I must say, I was very disappointed. I must first admit that I should have read the books, since I'm a self-proclaimed book nerd. But I just couldn't wait and wanted to see the movie first. I really liked the puzzle-solving and the deep story lines that ran throughout in the Da Vinci code, and I don't feel that it was quite up to that level in Angels in Demons. It's like the second movie went downhill in intricate plots. And *SPOILER ALERT*...

...I was really disappointed to be following the "mystery" of the Illuminati to the very end to learn that a priest killed the Pope and made it all up. Just took away from it all for me. I won't be buying that movie anytime soon.

- Around 2 pm or so, Justin asked me to go with him to visit his grandfather in the hospital. No sooner did we get to the hospital and get up to the room, then we walked in, and apparently they took his grandfather for a bath/shower, and it would be about 1 1/2 to 2 hours before he would be done. So we went out for lunch to a place called Panino's, and it was fun to go on a little date. They do a type of sandwich that is best described as a burrito, but the bread they use is actually pizza dough! SOOO YUMMY!!!

- After lunch, it was time for his mom's hockey game (she plays on a team that had a hockey tournament) so we weren't able to make it back to the hospital before their bedtime hours.

Sunday:

- Again, when one has the option to sleep in, one should. Fortunately for me, I woke up to the weather being VERY cold, so it made it very easy to turn back over and cuddle with the big puppy, who had ended up in the bed mysteriously the night before.

- Time was spent on the couch watching Monsters, Inc. I can't believe I still don't own this movie (or Toy Story, or a Bug's Life). I just really started "craving" it (can you crave a movie?) on Saturday, so I sat down and watched it with Bailey cuddled up next to me.

*On a side note, Bailey is really lazy. But that's ok, because then we get to cuddle a lot.*

- Later on, Justin and I ventured out to Whole Foods to get their supposedly thick cut Turkey bacon. We arrived there after about a 40 minute drive, only to find that they only had 1 kind that wasn't even thick cut, and was about $2 more expensive than a normal store. So we left.

- Right at the moment, I'm enjoying a homemade Chinese food dish (relax - I'm not that good - it was made from a box kit) that's really spicy, and I'm watching a marathon of "Man vs. Food" on the Travel Channel. What a great show!

In the meantime, it's been snowing for the last 7 hours or so, and it started accumulating about 5 hours ago. So needless to say, I'm in heaven!

I plan, as soon as I'm done with dinner, to read another chapter in my quest to read 2 books at once!

Whew - so that's my weekend, and that's where I'm at! Thanks for reading!

Happy Valentines Day!

Well, you knew this post was coming! I just couldn't wait until tomorrow to post it!

Justin and I decided that instead of going out to a public restaurant where it would be noisy and crowded that we would make our own lobster dinner for Valentine's Day! We went all out and got candles, a pretty tablecloth, tulips (my favorite!), wine - the works!

It was also my first Valentine's Day with Bailey (his first ever actually) and he had a LOT of questions about what we were doing! Here are just a few of the pictures from the evening!

All the supplies!

My tulips!!

Bailey giving "kisses"!

Justin with "Winston and Edgar" before their death sentence...


Bailey wanted to know what those pretty red things were...

Justin giving the "Kiss of Death"


Whatcha cookin' there?

The final product before...

And after!!

Happy Valentine's Day!