Minestrone Soup

We had soup for dinner last night... at the request of my sick husband. But this would also be a great recipe for those of you with snow on the ground! :) I served our soup with garlic cheese bread.... the frozen boxed kind! haha I actually have a secret love for that stuff because my mom never bought it when I was growing up but I would always have it at friends' houses and LOVE it. I mean, I know it comes out of a box (and it's not exactly healthy), Mom, but that stuff is good! haha

Anyway, here's the recipe! There is a lot of chopping to do but everything else is pretty simple... and healthy... to balance the bread from a box! :)

Minestrone Soup

Ingredients:

3 garlic cloves, chopped

1 carrot, chopped

1 onion, chopped

1 celery stalk, chopped

1/4 head of cabbage, chopped

1 can white beans (I used cannellini beans)

1 can diced tomatoes

4 cups chicken broth

1 parmesan rind

1 cup ditalini pasta

salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

Saute garlic, carrot, onion, celery and cabbage in a pot with a little olive oil. Add beans, tomatoes, chicken broth and parmesan rind and simmer for 20 minutes. Add pasta and simmer until tender. Add salt and pepper and serve.

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And Mom, if you're reading this, I know that you didn't buy boxed bread because you were always making something homemade that tasted WAY better and that you totally would have bought boxed bread if you had known that I liked it! haha

Anybody else have a secret guilty pleasure? :)

White Chili

If you follow me on Twitter then you know that Evan and I went to the Carrie Underwood concert on Tuesday night... and LOVED every second of it! But we stayed up way past our bedtime and we were both exhausted on Wednesday so I needed a SUPER easy recipe for Wednesday night's dinner... and the first recipe that came to my mind was White Chili. I mean, the hardest part is opening the cans... it's almost shocking how fast you can have dinner on the table with this recipe! Oh and it's also delicious and very comforting while being healthy all at the same time! Can we say, "Keeper"? :)

White Chili

Ingredients:

2 cans chicken broth

2 cans great northern beans

2 cans chopped green chiles

2 cans chopped cooked chicken

1 small onion, diced

1 t. garlic

1 1/2 t. cumin

1 can green chile enchilada sauce

Directions:

Pour all ingredients into soup pot and simmer until hot. Serve with shredded cheddar cheese and sour cream, if desired.

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Here are a few pictures... you'll have to forgive this meal for not being super photogenic... since that's it's one and only flaw! :)

If you couldn't already tell, this recipe is definitely one of my favorites! Give it a try on your next busy night! :)

Grilled Pepper-Jack Chicken and Succotash

I got my September issue of Food Network Magazine in the mail a few days ago and the meal on the cover looked so delicious that I just had to make it ASAP!!

So, for dinner last night, we had grilled pepper-jack chicken and succotash!! It's a keeper recipe for sure. It only took about 30 minutes to make and there were no leftovers! :)

Grilled Pepper-Jack Chicken and Succotash

Ingredients:

4 oz. pepper-jack cheese, shredded

2 cups baby arugula, roughly chopped

2 large skinless, boneless chicken breasts

1 T. olive oil plus more for brushing

1 1/2 to 2 T. cajun spice blend

vegetable oil, for the grill

1 cup frozen lima beans, thawed

1 medium yellow summer squash, diced

2 cups corn kernels

1 cup grape tomatoes, halved

juice of 1 lime

Directions:

Combine the cheese and arugula in a bowl. Cut a deep 2-inch-wide pocket in the thickest part of each chicken breast with a paring knife. Stuff with the arugula mixture. Brush with olive oil and season with cajun spice blend. Preheat grill to high and brush the grates with vegetable oil. Grill the chicken until blackened and a thermometer inserted into the thickest part registers 155 degrees, 8-10 minutes per side.

Meanwhile, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil in a skillet over high heat. Add the lima beans, squash and corn, season with salt and cook until the squash is just tender, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the tomatoes and cook 2 more minutes. Remove from heat and stir in lime juice.

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Now, on a slightly related note (since the recipe came from Food Network magazine), does anyone else watch The Next Food Network Star???

I am SO obsessed with this show and I look forward to it all year long!! I LOVED the finale on Sunday night but I am so sad that it's over now!! And can we talk about the winner?

I just LOVE little Aarti Paarti!! I can't wait to watch her show because I have never in my life cooked anything Indian and I really look forward to learning how to do it!!

What do you think? Do you watch the show? Were you pleased with the outcome? Will you watch Aarti's new show?

The Story of the Nutty Bird

Something about a hot summer day makes me want to eat a really light and healthy meal... maybe it's because I saw myself in a swimsuit this past weekend... haha I'm not sure but when I was thinking about what to "cook" for dinner last night, I just kept coming back to the Nutty Bird.

The Nutty Bird is a sandwich that I haven't eaten in FOREVER but I have many fond... and some not so fond.... memories of. When I was a little girl, my family used to have a favorite Saturday lunch spot called Daddy's Serious Sandwiches. The "Nutty Bird" was a sandwich on their menu that my dad and I used to always order. Some time when I was in middle school, the location of the restaurant where we ate closed. I missed the sandwich (because I've always loved my food! haha) so my dad started making it for my lunch at school.... and this is where the not so fond memories come in!

The ingredients on this sandwich are pumpernickel bread, smoked turkey breast, cream cheese, cucumbers, sunflower seeds and bean sprouts... very uncool for a middle school girl... with braces... to eat bean sprouts. Haha My friends (one of which is still one of my best friends... and hopefully she will read this post! haha) were RELENTLESS in making fun of me! They thought I was so weird for eating that sandwich and they used to wave their fingers in front of their mouths while I was eating it to represent the bean sprouts that got stuck in my braces... Awesome, I know. Needless to say, I asked my dad to go back to putting plain turkey sandwiches in my lunch and I haven't eaten a Nutty Bird since! Until last night... when I introduced my silly sandwich to my husband... he loved my sandwich and he did NOT wave his fingers in front of his face while I was eating... such a relief! haha

We also had a delicious summery salad to go with our Nutty Bird sandwiches. I had some fresh tomatoes from my grandparents' garden that I wanted to use so I looked up this Paula Deen recipe on the Food Network website:

Corn, Avocado and Tomato Salad

Ingredients:

2 cups of cooked corn, fresh or frozen

1-2 avocados, cut into 1/2 inch cubes

1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved (I chopped up some regular tomatoes)

1/2 cup finely diced red onion

Dressing:

2 T. olive oil

1/2 t. grated lime zest

1 T. fresh lime juice

1/4 cup chopped cilantro

1/4 t. salt

1/4 t. pepper

Directions:

Combine the first four ingredients in a glass bowl. Combine the dressing ingredients in a separate bowl, pour over the salad and gently toss to mix.

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Have a great Thursday!

Tips For Healthier Cooking

I don't believe in diets. I have tried every single diet that you can think of and I always get the same two results:

1. a constant bad mood

2. gaining back every single pound I lost once the diet is over

So what's my solution? I try to live a healthy lifestyle and I don't deny myself the foods that I love. The easiest way that I have found to do this is by simply substituting a few ingredients in every recipe that I cook in order to lower the calories in each meal. For example, I always buy skim milk, low fat sour cream, low fat cream cheese, 2% shredded cheddar cheese, turkey bacon, reduced fat syrup, reduced fat sausage, whole grain bread, etc. I find that when I use reduced fat ingredients to cook with, I don't notice a difference in flavor but I do notice a difference in my waistline. However, I am not super strict about these rules... if I try a lower fat version of something and I don't like it, I don't buy it again. I rarely buy fat free ingredients because I feel like they don't taste the same. I use full fat ingredients when I am cooking for company and when I am baking. I simply cut where I can and over time, it makes a difference.

Here are a few of my favorite substitutes:

Laura's Lean Beef:

I use Laura's every single time I use ground beef in my cooking. They have 4% fat and 8% fat available and I usually choose the 8% fat, especially if I am making hamburgers, because the tiny bit of extra fat helps the meat to hold together.

I Can't Believe It's Not Butter- Spray:

I use spray butter for EVERYTHING. It's a delicacy at our house. Basically, any time you would throw a pat of butter on something (veggies, bread, pasta, etc.), I use spray butter instead. And let's be honest, I usually don't use the spray top. I usually take the top off and pour a little butter on my food!! haha I may turn 0 calories into 20 calories or so... but that's still basically nothing, right? :)

Splenda:

Our biggest use for Splenda is to sweeten our coffee and tea but we also use it for several other things. I don't typically cook with Splenda, although I have before. Basically, if we ever feel the need to sprinkle sugar on something, we use Splenda.

Frozen Yogurt:

I don't really like low fat ice cream but I love frozen yogurt and it is naturally low fat! Every single time we buy "ice cream", we get frozen yogurt!

Speaking of frozen yogurt, I found a recipe today that uses frozen yogurt and it just so happens that it is a recipe for one of my favorite things!! Every night... usually right after dinner... I hear the song, "It's a Small World After All" and when I look out my window, this is what I see:

and immediately, this is what I crave:

So I found a version of this delightful treat that will keep me from being the only adult chasing the ice cream truck and will also keep me from eating the extra calories in the ice cream truck's version of this treat:

Strawberry-Shortcake Parfait Pops

Ingredients:

Cooking spray

1 1/2 cups Special K Red Berries cereal

1/2 cup unsweetened shredded coconut

3/4 cup vanilla frozen yogurt, slightly softened

3/4 cup strawberry sorbet, slightly softened

Directions:

Spray the insides of six 3-ounce paper cups with cooking spray. Pulse the cereal and coconut in a food processor until coarsely ground. Put about 1 T. cereal mixture in the bottom of each cup and top with 1 T. frozen yogurt. Add 2 T. sorbet and press into the cup, then pack in another T. frozen yogurt and sprinkle with more cereal mixture. Insert a wooden stick into the center of each pop and freeze until hard, at least 4 hours. Before serving, snip the paper cup and peel it off.

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What are some of your favorite low fat substitutes?