Tag Archives: eating on a budget

Quinoa Muffins

25 Jan
These muffins are hearty, healthy and taste great!

These muffins are hearty, healthy and taste great!

I’ve mentioned previously that I really love getting ideas from Pinterest. I first had quinoa at the White House when I had lunch there for the first Kids’ State Dinner. After that I was hooked on quinoa and I searched for lots of different ways of cooking it.

Today’s recipe was originally a Pinterest recipe for Martha Stewart Quinoa Muffins.

We had to healthify it a little bit. I’ve put the link to the original recipe above, and I’ll make notes to tell you how we changed the recipe to suit our needs.

Everyone in our house likes these muffins. I’ve made them twice now, once following the original recipe back in the fall, and once a few weeks ago with our modifications. If you haven’t cooked with quinoa, I encourage you to try it. I like having another ingredient option for my cooking and baking. The last time I used it, I cooked up a big batch and used some for the muffins, some for a side dish with dinner another night, and some I ate like oatmeal in the mornings for my breakfast. It’s quite the versatile ingredient.

QUINOA MUFFINS
INGREDIENTS

  • 1 cup quinoa, rinsed
  • 1/4 cup vegetable oil, such as safflower, plus more for pan (We used 1/4 cup plain, nonfat yogurt.)
  • 2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pan (We used 1 cup wheat flour, 1 cup white flour.)
  • 3/4 cup packed dark-brown sugar
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 cup raisins (We used craisins for half the batch and chocolate chips for the other half the batch.)
  • 3/4 cup whole milk (We used skim milk.)
  • 1 large egg (We used egg substitute.)
  • 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Splitting the batch in half allowed for using both craisins and chocolate chips as filling options.

Splitting the batch in half allowed for using both craisins and chocolate chips as filling options.

DIRECTIONS

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium saucepan, bring quinoa and 1 cup water to a boil. Reduce to a simmer; cover, and cook until water has been absorbed and quinoa is tender, 11 to 13 minutes.
  2. Meanwhile, brush a standard 12-cup muffin pan with oil; (we used fat free nonstick spray) dust with flour, tapping out excess. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, raisins, and 2 cups cooked quinoa; reserve any leftover quinoa for another use.
  3. In a small bowl, whisk together oil, milk, egg, and vanilla. Add milk mixture to flour mixture, and stir just until combined; divide batter among prepared muffin cups.
  4. Bake until toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool muffins in pan, 5 minutes; transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

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What’s For Dinner Wednesday: Sweet and Sour Turkey Kielbasa

23 Jan
We've been on quite the kielbasa kick lately!

We’ve been on quite the kielbasa kick lately!

Our family has always loved kielbasa. I can remember being in high school and buying “hot lunch” on the days that kielbasa was on the lunch menu.

Lately we’ve been buying it to use every once in a while for our meals, just to break things up, as long as it’s a lowfat turkey kielbasa, not the regular kind. All of our kids like it and it’s affordable. We find ours at Aldi’s.

Recently Don found a recipe for a lowfat sweet and sour sauce for chicken, on food.com, and he used it to make the kielbasa. It was delicious. We served it with a lowfat couscous and a side of broccoli. Everyone loved it, we’d make it again, and I’d make it for chicken too!

Today I share that recipe with you for my What’s for Dinner Wednesday post. It might make a healthier option for a Superbowl Sunday game dish in a couple of weeks, if you’d like to give it a try.

INGREDIENTS

1/4 cup chicken stock
2 stalks celery, diagonally sliced
1 onion, thinly sliced lengthwise
1 small red bell pepper, cut in strips
1 small green bell pepper, cut in strips
1/3 cup pineapple juice or 1/3 cup orange juice
2 tablespoons packed brown sugar (can use more)
2 tablespoons white vinegar
3 tablespoons soy sauce (or to taste)
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 cup mangoes or 1 cup pineapple chunk
1 pinch salt and pepper

I love how pretty this dish looks. Don threw in the cherries as a treat for the kids, but I loved what it did for the colors in the dish too!

I love how pretty this dish looks. Don threw in the cherries as a treat for the kids, but I loved what it did for the colors in the dish too!

DIRECTIONS:
1
In a large skillet, bring chicken and stock to a simmer over med-high heat.
2
Add celery, onion and sweet peppers; cook, stirring often, for about 5 minutes, or until chicken is no longer pink inside, and veggies are almost tender-crisp.
3
Mix together the juice, brown sugar, vinegar and soy sauce until blended.
4
Stir into skillet; bring to a boil.
5
Cook, stirring for about 2 minutes, or until glossy and thickened.
6
Mix the cornstarch with a small amount of cold water and add to the simmering sauce to thicken.
7
Add mango or pineapple chunks (if using), salt and pepper; simmer for 2 minutes, or until heated through.

Read more at: http://www.food.com/recipe/extreme-low-fat-sweet-and-sour-skillet-chicken-78288?oc=linkback

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Liz’s Chocolate Chip Cookies

18 Jan

One of the things I love about recipes is the fact that they often remind me of people, places, of times in my life. Today’s recipe reminds me of all of those things.

When we eat our cookies, I'll be thinking of Liz!

When we eat our cookies, I’ll be thinking of Liz!

A while back we lived out of state for a few years and conveniently enough, we were in the neighboring state to where my brother and his roommates were living at the time. We were less than an hour away from them, which was fun.  Liz was one of the roommates, a friend of his from college, and a wonderful person. In fact, all of his roommates and friends were wonderful, but today’s recipe is from Liz, so today we focus on her.

Technology being what it is, we’ve been able to stay in touch with Liz and share the events of our lives with each other, which is so great. She is still living nearby, just a few hours from here, and now she has two children of her own.  She’s a fan of The Whole Bag of Chips, and recently she sent me today’s recipe. She knows how much I love cookies and she also knows that I love cookie batter. She specifically sent me this recipe because there were no eggs in the batter, so it makes it safe to taste.

I love that this recipe replaces some of the sugar with honey. It also lent itself well to being a low-fat recipe between the lack of eggs (great for people with egg allergies) and the fact that I could replace the butter with my new go-to, I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter. It may just be my new favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe for all of those reasons. This time around, I even replaced half of the white flour with wheat flour, just to healthify it even more. Every little bit helps!

Each Friday we spend a chunk of our afternoon with my Grandma Rose, the girls’ great-grandmother. I’ve begun bringing along a low-fat or non-fat snack for our dessert, to make things easier for her and for us. At 91 years old, she puts out quite a spread, and I’m glad I can help out a little bit. Today we’ll be bringing along a batch of Liz’s chocolate chip cookies for everyone to enjoy.

These make a great long-weekend baking project too, so give them a try this Martin Luther King Weekend!

LIZ’S CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES
INGREDIENTS

1 1/4 cups flour (I did 3/4  cup white flour and 1/2 cup wheat flour)

1 tsp. baking soda

1/8 tsp. salt

1/2 cup butter (I used I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter)

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup honey

1 cup chocolate chips

1 teaspoon vanilla
IMG_9153DIRECTIONS

Combine all ingredients and mix well.

I used my small Pampered Chef scoop to put them onto my ungreased trays.

Bake at 300 degrees for 18-20 minutes (18 was perfect for my oven.)

ENJOY!

Grandma Rose

We enjoy being able to spend some time with Great Grandma Rose! This photo was taken a year or so ago, at her house on her 90th birthday.

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What’s For Dinner Wednesday: Eggplant Rollatini

16 Jan
Five thumbs up! Definitely a keeper for our family!

Five thumbs up! Definitely a keeper for our family!

It’s funny how things happen.

A couple of months ago Don mentioned to me that he’d seen a cooking show that featured a dish we never have had before but that he thought we’d like: Eggplant Rollatini.
I had never heard of it but from the way he described it, it certainly sounded good.

And then literally within the next day or so I received my next issue of All You magazine. I love that magazine because of all the recipes and all of the coupons.

Wouldn’t you know it, one of the featured recipes was for Eggplant Rollatini?! Crazy, right?

I ripped it out and placed it on our kitchen cabinet, the catch-all place for me to stick recipes. Well, one of many catch-all places I stick recipes.

Jump ahead through December and all of our fat-free recipe research, past the holidays and I’d totally forgotten about Eggplant Rollatini.

Last week I took a closer look at the recipe and realized that it would fit in perfectly with our newly overhauled menu plan. Turns out, Eggplant Rollatini is super healthy and very easy to make nonfat.

This past weekend we tried it out. Now when I say “we” I really mean Don.  He cooked it.

His first impression was that the recipe was very labor-intensive, which is not really tops on my list for a keeper recipe. His words were something to the effect of,  “This better be good, it was a lot of work.”

It was DELICIOUS.  If you like Eggplant Parmesan and you like Lasagna, this was a combination of the two. It was wonderful and Don declared that it was well-worth all of the work that went into it. He said he’d definitely make it again. All five of us gave this a thumbs up.

Therefore, I thought I’d share the recipe from All You with you today. It makes a good Sunday afternoon meal (which is when we had it) when you have the time to make something more labor intensive, definitely not a 30 minutes to the table type of dinner for a week night though.

The recipe lists the prep time as 45 minutes, standing time 15 minutes and cooking time as 45 minutes, so you can see what he meant when he said it was a lot of work.

Well worth it though, I promise.

The finished product!

The finished product!

EGGPLANT ROLLATINI
INGREDIENTS

4 medium eggplants

salt and pepper

1/4 cup olive oil

one 10 ounce box frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry

3 cups part skim ricotta (ours is non-fat)

3 cloves garlic, minced

2 large eggs beaten (Don only used one, but they were extra large eggs)

1 1/2 cups shredded part skim mozzarella (we used non- fat)

3/4 cup grated Parmesan

one 24 ounce jar of marinara sauce (also fat free)
DIRECTIONS

1 Slice ends off eggplants (Don peeled ours also). Cut eggplants lengthwise into 1/4 inch thick slices, discarding the ends. You should get roughly 16 slices, total. Lay slices on a rimmed baking sheet and sprinkle both sides liberally with salt. Let stand for 15 minutes, then rinse salt off under cold running water and pat slices dry.

2 Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Brush both side of eggplant slices with olive oil and place in single layers on two baking sheets. Roast for 15 minutes until tender, turning eggplant slices over halfway through. Let cool on sheets on wire racks until cool enough to handle.

3 In large bowl, combine spinach, ricotta, garlic, eggs, 1/2 cup mozzarella and 1/2 cup Parmesan. Season with 1 tsp. salt and 1/2 tsp. pepper. Mist a 9×13 baking dish with cooking spray. Spread 1/2 cup of sauce over the bottom of dish. Divide ricotta mixture among eggplant slices, using about 1/3 cup for each, spreading it down the center. Roll up slices and place seam-side down in baking dish. Top with remaining sauce and sprinkle with remaining mozzarella and Parmesan.

4 Cover baking dish with foil and bake for 30 minutes. Remove foil and bake until browned and bubbling, about 15 minutes longer. Let cool for 10 minutes until serving.

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Whole Wheat Snickerdoodles

11 Jan
I love making and eating Snickerdoodles and I was glad we didn't need to give them up this Christmas!

I love making and eating Snickerdoodles and I was glad we didn’t need to give them up this Christmas!

You all I know how much I love a good cookie.

A few years back I discovered a recipe for Snickerdoodles and ever since, I have used them on my trays for Christmas.

This year, before Christmas even came, way back in October, I found a recipe on one of my favorite blogs, Budget Gourmet Mom, for Whole Wheat Snickerdoodles.

I knew even back then, that I’d be trying out this recipe for my cookie trays this year.

Little did I know then, that I’d be overhauling our entire cookie tray plan as well. Thankfully, these cookies were easy to adapt to the lowfat diet we needed to incorporate.

Here is the recipe from the Budget Gourmet Blog, along with any notes or changes I might’ve made along the way to fit our needs. Snickerdoodles are great any time of year, and they’re a great recipe for involving your kids in the kitchen, so give this new recipe a try!

At Christmas time I need as much help as I can get so it's all hands on deck for cookie baking!

At Christmas time I need as much help as I can get so it’s all hands on deck for cookie baking!

BUDGET GOURMET MOM
WHOLE WHEAT SNICKERDOODLES
INGREDIENTS

  • 1/2 cup butter, softened (I used I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter sticks for my baking this year.)
  • 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 375°.

In a medium bowl cream the butter and brown sugar.

Add the egg and vanilla and mix until combined.

In a separate bowl sift together the flour, baking soda, cream of tarter and salt.

Add to the creamed mixture and stir until it forms a dough. It helps to work it with a rubber spatula until it comes together.

In a small bowl mix the additional sugar and cinnamon.

Form tablespoon sized balls, roll in the cinnamon and sugar,  and place on a baking sheet 2″ apart.

Press slightly with the bottom of a cup (we used our fingers) and bake 8-10 minutes.

Rolled cookies are particularly great for kids who want to help out.

Rolled cookies are particularly great for kids who want to help out.

Not just rolling, but tasting is another favorite job for my little helpers.

After rolling and placing on the trays, pat them down slightly.

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What’s for Dinner Wednesday: Oven Fried Chicken

9 Jan
This new chicken recipe got five thumbs up!

This new chicken recipe got five thumbs up!

As we’ve gone along in our search for delicious low-fat meals, we have been pretty happy with many of the ones we’ve found. Today’s is again from the South Beach Diet Cookbook, a cookbook that I’ve tabbed over and over again, since checking it out of the library last month.

This is listed as a Phase II meal, but we’re just eating from all over the book. We also tried a Phase I side dish, mashed cauliflower. I liked it, but it did not get the overwhelming thumbs ups that the chicken got. I liked the cauliflower so much that I made it again this week but I did not get any additional thumbs this time. I might be making it just for me.

Even Alex, who has chicken on her Do Not Like list, loved this chicken and asked when I would make it again. Most likely that’s because I let her have her favorite dipping sauces to go with it: ketchup and honey. It’s her own version of bbq sauce. Either way I was thrilled that she liked it, and even had two pieces.

Here is the recipe, I hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

OVEN FRIED CHICKEN WITH ALMONDS
INGREDIENTS

1 cup whole wheat bread crumbs

1/4 cup (one ounce) grated Parmesan cheese

1/4 cup finely chopped almonds (You could probably leave this out if you don’t have them but I liked it in. I used a Pampered Chef food chopper to chop my slivered almonds from Aldis.)

2 tablespoons chopped parsley

1 clove garlic, crushed

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon dried thyme

Pinch of ground black pepper

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts, pounded to 1/2″ (I used chicken tenderloins.)

Sprig Italian parsley, for garnish

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

In medium bowl, combine the bread crumbs, cheese, almonds, parsley, garlic, salt, thyme, and pepper. Mix thoroughly.

Place the oil in a shallow dish. Dip the chicken first in the oil then dredge in the crumb mixture.

Place the chicken in a shallow baking pan.

Bake for 25 minutes or until a thermometer inserted in the center of a piece registers 170 degrees F and the juices run clear.  (Do not turn the chicken during cooking.) Garnish with parsley.

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A new dessert recipe for you, and it’s healthy, to boot!

4 Jan
These yummy mini cheesecakes used fat free fillo dough, fat free, sugar free pudding and fat free whipped cream on top!

These yummy mini cheesecakes used fat free fillo dough, fat free, sugar free pudding and fat free whipped cream on top!

Oftentimes when you have an allergy or a dietary issue, eating out or eating some place that is not the comfort of your own home is tough. We’ve always had those issues, but never knew exactly what was causing them.

Now that our family knows that staying away from fats is the key to avoiding a severe stomachache for one of our family members, we worked very hard during the holidays to provide options for eating as close to fat free whenever we could, including when we went to someone else’s house. We also worked hard not to have completely separate choices for our family, but rather to make things everyone could enjoy.

This New Year’s Eve in preparing to go to our friends’ house for the festivities, Caroline and I came up with a great dessert recipe that was extremely healthy, meeting our fat free requirements, and delicious. It was an instant hit that night and I’d definitely make these again.

I had seen the little fillo dough tart shells on different websites, always filled with something cute, and one day they were on sale, 3 boxes for $5 at the store, so I grabbed them and put them in my freezer, knowing I could somehow make use of them.

Earlier this fall, on one of my favorite blogs, Budget  Gourmet Mom, I’d seen a recipe for a low fat pumpkin cheesecake parfait that I’d never gotten the chance to make, but the recipe had alerted me to the fact that Jello makes a fat free, sugar free cheesecake pudding mix. At the time I didn’t need to know that, but now, that information has come in pretty handy.

I picked up a few of these for my pantry, and they've come in handy this past month!

I picked up a few of these for my pantry, and they’ve come in handy this past month!

On one of my trips to the store, I was intent on finding various fat free dessert and snack options and I saw the pudding there, so I grabbed a few boxes to have on hand.

The side of the box has traditional pudding directions and then directions for making a cheesecake with the pudding, using a graham cracker crust.

So here is what I decided to do to create my delicious New Years Eve desserts:

I made one box of the Jello Cheesecake pudding mix using 1 3/4 cups of 1% milk. That is the amount of milk needed for a cheesecake, NOT for the regular pudding. I let that set a few minutes (it sets fast, in less then ten minutes) and then I used my Pampered Chef small scoop to scoop a little bit into the little fillo shells. One box of pudding filled 15 fillo tarts. I did not want to bring more than that so I used the leftover pudding, putting it into cups for future snacks in the days that followed. I was able to get two small cups of extra pudding in addition to the shells.

I left those in the fridge until we were ready to leave that night.

Getting the hang of shaving the chocolate and having it land on top was tricky but eventually we got it!

Getting the hang of shaving the chocolate and having it land on top was tricky but eventually we got it!

I took with me an Extra Dark Chocolate bar by Lindt that had very conveniently showed up in my stocking for Christmas, a grater like I’d use for cheese, and a can of Reddi Whip fat free whipped cream. We were also bringing a fruit tray (with a great dip which I’ll share the recipe for on another day) that had strawberries on the tray.

When it was time for dessert, people had the option to add whatever they wanted to their little tarts of cheesecake. Some added the berry and cream with the chocolate shavings (I was one of those people) and some did not.

Shaving the chocolate over the individual shells was tricky, as you had to figure out where the shavings were going to land. Initially they were landing everywhere til I got the hang of it. Had I shaved it all over the entire set of shells first, making them all exactly the same, that would have worked out perfectly, but I wanted to give everyone their options so I did them individually.

The great things about this recipe were:

It was inexpensive, fast and easy.

It was delicious.

It was versatile so people could take or leave whatever part of it they wanted to or leave it in tact.

It was healthy.

Even without the shells, you could do something similar with it in the future; a parfait or just a bowl of pudding with berries, with or without cream and chocolate.

And, it looked festive for the holidays.

This recipe gets huge thumbs up and I’d definitely make it again! I am especially proud because in general I am not an experimenter. I am a recipe follower to the T. So the fact that I sort of created a dessert is thrilling to me. The fact that everyone liked it…even more thrilling.

Give it a try for your next gathering and see what you think!

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End of Year Couponing Update for 2012

3 Jan
Hot off the press!

Hot off the press!

As many of you remember, I accepted a challenge from my college roommate, Karen, last January and tried my hand at couponing. I began at the end of January, right around the 28th of the month, or thereabouts.

My first couponing trip was to CVS and with that one trip, I was hooked on saving money!

This week marks the start of the new year, a whole new year of saving money. To celebrate, I am sharing with you some photos of a local magazine article in which I was one of the couponers featured. This magazine, Prime Time, is the January issue and it’s put out by the same company that puts out the two newspapers I work for, Beacon Communications. I was so excited when they asked if they could feature me for the story. Also featured is my friend Pam, who has been so helpful in teaching me her couponing strategies along the way.

Clip, clip, clip...

Clip, clip, clip…

I thought that with the feature story coming out today, it’d be a great day to share with you some of my couponing savings totals for the 2012 year.

Remember, all of the items I purchased were from places I already shopped, for things I already buy. I did not add any other stops to my already busy schedule and I did not start purchasing things I don’t need, like baby wipes for example, when I don’t have a baby, just to use the coupons.

Ready?

CVS: I saved $1604.36 at CVS this year. At CVS I utilized their own store coupons, stacked with manufacturer’s coupons, along with sales and their Extra Bucks Rewards to make the very most of every penny I spent there. I also made sure to enroll in their Beauty Club and just yesterday, their brand new prescription program, both of which earn you additional Extra Bucks for purchasing things you already were buying.

TARGET: I saved about $90 this year just by using my Target Red Card, which is not a credit card since we do not use credit cards, but rather a debit card. This does not count all of my savings from manufacturer’s coupons or Target store coupons, which I stack in order to make the most of my savings. With the Target Red Card you save an additional 5% off your total purchase after coupons. Caroline recently used our Red Card herself when purchasing an item that was over $200. She had saved up for months and used her Christmas money and a Target gift card for the rest, and saved herself quite a bit of money out of pocket by using the Red Card.

STOP AND SHOP: I only recently started popping into Stop and Shop  due to our new dietary needs, for things that my other grocery stores don’t have. Therefore, I only have one month’s worth of savings on my last receipt there, but I have saved $62 in that one month alone, according my last 2012 receipt.

I have also saved with coupons at Walmart, Staples, AC Moore and Michael’s. I’ve saved online using Groupon, Living Social and other group buying deals, throughout the year. I accumulated over $200 in rebate money through the year, which I used to start off my Christmas shopping early this summer.

My kids and my husband have also picked up some great couponing skills. They all scan the CVS card when we enter the store, as many times as it will let us, and they can spot a good coupon right away. We recently went to CVS to get some Zyrtec. I had a $4 manufacturer’s coupon and when we walked in, a $5 store coupon off that very product came out of the machine. Elizabeth came running down the allergy aisle holding it up. She knew we would now save $9 off a product we used to pay full price for.

Of course, being my competitive self, my goal for the new couponing year is to beat the 2012 totals for the next year in order to save my family even more money!

Time to get clipping!

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What’s for Dinner Wednesday: Chicken and Veggie Chowder

2 Jan
This soup was hearty and delicious and everyone in our family gave it a thumbs up!

This soup was hearty and delicious and everyone in our family gave it a thumbs up!

Happy New Year!

If you read my New Year’s Eve post on Monday, then you’ll remember that I mentioned that some of my posts will be showing the new recipes we’ve been trying at our house during the month of December.

These recipes are helping us in our goal of eliminating as much of the “bad fats” from our diet and we’ve been using a variety of websites, blogs and cookbooks to guide us in finding some fun new meal options.

One thing our family loves is homemade soup. During the fall and winter months we have homemade soup all the time.

When I was looking through The South Beach Diet Cookbook last month, I saw this recipe for Chicken and Veggie Chowder and it seemed like we would all love it. We had everything for it at home already, so we gave it a go. If you were following the South Beach Diet itself, this recipe is recommended for Phase II. Since we are not, we could eat it any time we wanted to.

It was a cold day when we had it, and it was definitely a warm-your-belly kind of soup. Everyone loved it, which is one reason we love making soups. Very rarely does someone not like soup at our house.  This recipe was definitely a keeper, and of course, it was good for you.

CHICKEN AND VEGGIE CHOWDER (from the South Beach Diet Cookbook)
INGREDIENTS

3 cups chicken broth

2 carrots, chopped

2 ribs of celery, chopped

2 ounces mushrooms

1 onion, chopped

1 clove of garlic, minced

1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme leaves

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into 3/4″ strips

2 tablespoons trans-free margarine or butter (We’ve been trying out the Smart Balance Omega 3 sticks and the I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter sticks)

3 tablespoons whole wheat flour

1 cup 1% milk

3 spears asparagus cut up into 1″ pieces or 1 cup broccoli florets (we like both but we went with the broccoli.)

1 tablespoon chopped parsley

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

DIRECTIONS

In a large pot, combine the broth, carrots, celery, onion, mushrooms, garlic, thyme, and salt.

Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes or until the vegetables are tender.

Using a slotted spoon, remove half of the vegetable mixture to a food processor and process until pureed. Return to the saucepan.

Stir in the chicken, cover and simmer for 15 minutes or until the chicken is no longer pink.

Melt the margarine in a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir in the flour until smooth and cook for one minute.

Gradually add the milk and cook, stirring constantly for three minutes, or until thickened.

Stir into the chicken mixture. Add the asparagus or broccoli, parsley, and pepper and cook for 5 minutes, or until heated through.

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A new year, a new direction for The Whole Bag of Chips

31 Dec
Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

It’s New Year’s Eve!

It is the very last day of 2012!

You know what that means? It means that it’s New Year’s Resolution time for many. I know that last year I talked a little bit about the fact that because our entire family runs on a school year schedule, I’m kind of programmed to set my own personal goals and resolutions for the “year” in September, rather than January.

And that’s still true, but this new year is going to be a bit different, and you’ll be seeing it with some changes to The Whole Bag of Chips as well.

This blog is designed so that it often follows the twists and turns of our family’s life. As with any family, there are always lots of twists! We like to keep things exciting at our house.

Some of you may know that for years we have had a variety of stomach issues here. I know I’ve mentioned it in some of my posts. It’s one reason we don’t eat out often (besides the financial reason), it’s the reason I do my “sweets” after school rather than at night before bedtime, and it’s the reason why we work so hard to make our meals from scratch, and try to eat as healthy as we can.

That said, we still love our homemade desserts.

A lot.

However, in an interesting twist, it was recently suggested to us that eating a strict low fat/healthy fat/healthy carb diet might  be beneficial in helping us to fight the chronic belly aches here at our house. It was suggested that one of us may have something similar to an allergy to fats.

The first reaction I had was similar to the day I was told that one of my kids was allergic to dust.

She’s doomed.

But, in keeping with my overachiever, Type A personality, my next reaction was to take a deep breath and find out all that I could about cooking a low fat/healthy fat/healthy carb menu for my family.

Immediately.

We needed to see if this suggestion held any water.

And it did.

It was recommended that if we wanted to truly try this out and we were looking for recipes, that The South Beach Diet might be a good one to try for guidelines and new menu ideas. I checked one cookbook out of the library the very next day and read the entire thing cover to cover in about two days’ time, the first weekend of December.

December.

Christmas month.

Cookies, desserts, parties.

Not the easiest time to make such a switch, but I was going to give it 100%.

And so, here it is, December 31, almost a full month into our experiment, and although the chronic stomach pain has not completely disappeared, we have seen an improvement, enough that we want to keep up with this new way of eating. Our family is not on the diet, per se, not following the strict Phase I, II and III plan, but rather using the facts in the beginning of the book about fats and carbs and sugars, along with the recipes throughout the book, to overhaul our menu.

Therefore, in keeping with many people’s top New Year’s Resolutions: losing weight, and staying fit and healthy, The Whole Bag of Chips recipes will be featuring the recipes that we have been using in our meals as of late. We have switched our entire family over to this “diet” so that we are all eating the same thing and all eating as healthy as possible, together.

I tried to keep my healthy versions as close to my regular versions as possible.

I tried to keep my healthy versions as close to my regular versions as possible.

When it came time for Christmas Cookie baking, I made two sets: a regular set of our favorites for our trays and a healthy set of our same favorites, using modified ingredients, for our family. We did not want to give up the things we loved but yet we needed to try to keep to as low fat a diet as possible, even at Christmas.

So today, in preparation for your New Year’s Day breakfast, I will post for you a breakfast recipe that you can use tomorrow morning if you would like to start your 2013 eating healthier too.  The recipe is a modified version of our homemade pancake recipe along with a delicious hot peach compote recipe to go on top. Neither is far off from what we normally would make (in fact this pancake recipe hardly differs from our own), but they both are in keeping with the low fat/healthy fat/healthy carb guidelines. One is a South Beach cookbook recipe and one is from the Farm Girl Gourmet blog that I found online.

Happy 2013 and enjoy!

PANCAKES (from the South Beach Diet Cookbook)

My entire family loved this compote and it was so easy! I'd double the recipe next time.

My entire family loved this compote and it was so easy! I’d double the recipe next time.

INGREDIENTS

2 cups whole wheat or whole grain pastry flour (We have always had whole wheat flour at our house all the time and will often do half wheat, half white flour in our recipes.)

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1 egg

1 egg white (we just did two eggs instead of one egg and one egg white)

2 cups buttermilk (to make buttermilk use 1 T. white vinegar to 1 cup milk, so two and two here)

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

2 teaspoons canola oil (I used plain nonfat yogurt instead of oil, which is a tip we learned a few months back. We love how fluffy it makes our pancakes and waffles.)

DIRECTIONS

In a large bowl, whisk together the egg and egg white until very foamy. Whisk in the buttermilk, vanilla extract, and oil.

Stir into the flour mixture just until the batter is combined and pourable.

Heat a large, nonstick skillet coated with cooking spray over medium heat.

Pour 1/3 cup batter into the skillet to form a 4″ pancake. Cook for 2-3 minutes, or until the bottom is browned.

Turn and cook for 1-2 minutes or until golden brown.

I had everything I needed for this recipe at home already.

I had everything I needed for this recipe at home already.

FRESH PEACH COMPOTE (from the Farm Girl Gourmet blog)

INGREDIENTS

1 pound fresh peaches, skinned, pitted and sliced (or frozen)  *I used a bag of Aldi’s frozen peaches.
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup water
1 teaspoon cinnamon

DIRECTIONS

In a medium saucepan, add the peaches, brown sugar, water and cinnamon, bring to a boil.

Turn heat down to medium low and simmer for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally until mixture is thick and liquid is syrupy.

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