A Girl's Gotta Eat!

Last week I tried a new recipe from my Cooking Light cookbook that I was extremely excited about and had very high hopes for: Chicken with Rosemary Sauce. I had everything on hand except the chicken, so I picked that up Thursday and decided to try it out for Friday's feast. The recipe was easy, healthy, and didn't call for too make ingredients, a seemingly perfect combo. But when all was said and done, and it was time to sit down and eat, it left me … unsatisfied. The flavors worked well enough, and the chicken was moist and all, but it just didn't live up to the expectations I had set for myself. So then I faced a dilemma: throw away perfectly fine leftovers, which is wasteful and ridiculous, or eat them, wishing all the while that I was eating something else. After a couple days of putting off the inevitable, it struck me. I could use the original recipe, jazz it up with my own flair, and have a delicious meal (hopefully) that was satisfying and avoided w...

Here’s another quickie that I’m sure you’ll be glad to have on hand. Mike and I still have a fair amount of Alaskan fish in our freezer from Mike’s trip there last year. As we need to be finishing it, we’ve been looking for a variety of recipes to keep dinner interesting as well as tasty. The recipe we most recently used is definitely going to be one of my go-to recipes in the future. It uses ingredients I (almost) always have on hand, it was tasty, and we think relatively healthy. The only thing we didn’t have this time was onion, so I sprinkled the fish fillet with onion powder before spreading the mayonnaise mixture over it. We usually have shallots on hand, which I think would add a little bit of color to an otherwise very monochromatic dish. Speaking of it being monochromatic, while this is some of the tastiest, moistest fish I’ve made in a while, it’s not overly pretty. If you’re making it for guests, think about garnishing it with a sprig of parsley, and/or using red on...

Yum indeed...Weight Watchers friendly cupcakes. I make a friend/co-worker a birthday treat every year, and this year we went with Hungry Girl's Boston Cream Cupcakes . The recipe was easy to follow and doubled well (I didn't want to use only half a box of cake mix), and quite tasty to boot. I do think I could have stuffed more filling into each delicious treat, but I didn't realize that until they were already being enjoyed at the office. For my first attempt at a filled cupcake, though, I was pretty pleased. Everyone else seemed pretty pleased as well, especially the birthday girl (she was really the only one who mattered anyway!) (As a side note, Hungry Girl also has several recipes utilizing won ton wrappers that I want to try.) Boston Cream Cupcakes Ingredients: Half of an 18.25-oz. box (about 1 3/4 cups) moist-style yellow cake mix 1/2 cup fat-free liquid egg substitute (like Egg Beaters Original ) 3 tbsp. chocolate frosting, room temperature 2 tbsp. l...

I read a recipe a while back for Summer Squash Pasta Soup (it's another from Seasoned to Taste by the JL Chattanooga.) I thought it sounded delicious, but I don't like making soup during the hot months, and good summer squash is sometimes hard to come by in the colder months. I have a solution. In our past couple CSA boxes from Delvin Farms , we've been getting more pattypan squash than we could stuff and eat. Technically the recipe calls for yellow crookneck squash, but I decided this would be an acceptable substitute and put some tasty looking squash to good use. Also, Mom and Dad haven't been able to eat all their pattypan, so I decided to make a double batch and invite them over for supper. Mike decreed the result as his new favorite soup, and the rest of us thought pretty highly of it as well. I didn't have fresh thyme on hand, but thought dried worked fine. If you don't have or prefer not to cook with wine, I'm sure you could use additional brot...

Well...it almost is, anyway. With a long-missed crispness back in the air today and a baseball game on TV tonight, I was in the mood to break out the soup pot again. Mike thought it sounded good, too, and we both agreed that we should try something we've never made. So, I pulled out some past issues of Food Network Magazine and EveryDay with Rachael Ray and got busy browsing. Rachael Ray won this time with her Curried Chicken and Cider Soup . It seemed easy, healthful, and the perfect start to the season. Anyway...this was, indeed, quite tasty. I doubled the recipe, since I couldn't think for the life of me what we'd do with half a chicken and half a head of cauliflower. The original said this freezes well, so I decided to make extra and we could always freeze some for later. Mike loved coming home from class to the smell of this on the stove, and ate until he was stuffed. All-in-all, I'd say it was a success. I think I might also add a pinch of cloves next time. ...

Life has been crazy, and I am way behind in offering you my promised recipe per week. This one's short and easy, but delicious all the same. Plus, you can whip them up Sunday afternoon and have breakfast for the rest of the week! As weekday breakfast for me usually consists of something I can eat easily at my desk, these are perfect: Crustless Quiche Muffins . For the base, mix the following together in a bowl. 3 eggs, lightly beaten 1½ cups milk ½ cup baking mix Pour the base into 12 greased muffin cups. Now for the filling... The original recipe calls for 12 ounces of sausage and about 1½ cups Cheddar cheese. Most recently, I  sautéed some veggies from our farm box that I had finely chopped (bell peppers and zucchini, mostly) in about 1 tablespoon butter. I added two chopped turkey sausage patties (mine were precooked, but I still wanted everything to cook together for a bit.) I sprinkled this evenly among the filled muffin cups. Then I topped half with crumbled...

Mike and I returned home from vacation a little over a week ago to a very full farm box. We were very excited to find some tiny yellow squash in there and decided we would purchase a zucchini from the store to stretch the squash a bit further. I had already picked up some chicken tenderloins, so the plan was to grill those and have veggies as a side dish. However, when I got to store, the zucchini were also looking a bit smallish. I started thinking: why not combine the zucchini, our squash and maybe a few other veggies, then toss it with pasta for a Pasta Primavera dinner? I've certainly read enough recipes for it that I felt confidant in winging it this time. Here's what we started with....  1 small zucchini, 2 small squash, 1 green bell pepper, 3/4 pound chicken tenderloins. You'll also need 16 to 32 ounces of pasta sauce and 1 pound of pasta.   Chop all the veggies. We started by sauteing the bell pepper since it typically takes a bit longer. Drizzle about 2 to 3...

We used the recipe for Swiss chard that Delvin Farms sent us. It wasn’t my favorite (I’m not a big “greens” person), but I would still  make it again. Mike thoroughly enjoyed it though, and I did finish my bowl. We used the stalks and the leaves, adding the stalks first and letting them cook for a bit before adding the leaves. I also topped mine with a sprinkle of Parmesan cheese, having read several other recipes that did so. Swiss Chard Made Easy from Delvin Farms 1 bunch of Swiss chard 1 teaspoon butter 1 small clove garlic, sliced 2 tablespoons olive oil 2 tablespoons water Pinch of dried crushed red pepper Salt to taste Roughly chop leaves into inch wide strips. Heat a saucepan over medium heat. Add the olive oil, a few small slices of garlic and the crushed red peppers.   Sauté for about a minute and add the chopped chard leaves and water.  Turn thoroughly and cover.  Check for doneness after about 5 minutes.  Add salt to t...

We just picked up our first CSA box, and I must say that I was not disappointed. In our first stash, we received Swiss chard, Russian red kale, garlic, green onions, strawberries, red lettuce, and green lettuce. We were also supposed to have broccoli, but I accidentally picked up the one box without it. I believe we got extra red lettuce instead, so it’s all good. The garlic and strawberries had Mike and I most excited, but I was definitely intrigued by the kale and chard. If I’ve read 1 recipe for kale chips in the past couple months, I’ve read a dozen, and chard seems to be gaining popularity as well. And I had promised Mike that I would try everything in the box at least once. First, we made the kale chips. These were so easy and tasty that I cannot WAIT to get more in the coming weeks. I knew that they were baked until crispy, but I figured they wouldn’t really crisp up the way that say, potato chips, do. I was pleasantly surprised. I would also imagine that they retain many of th...

A few days ago, I posted a recipe for a super-simple, super-scrumptious Butternut Squash Soup. Unaware of how many squash to buy for that particular dish, I bought 2 and ended up needing only 1. And so, here is Butternut Squash Soup, take 2. I know, I could make myriad other recipes with my squash, but it’s cold and rainy, and who doesn’t love soup on a cold and rainy day? This time I went for a more “gourmet” soup, Creamy Butternut Squash and Ginger-Apple Soup from ** Starfish Café: Changing Lives One Recipe at a Time . The basics are the same: Sauté some onion in butter. Add squash and broth, and purée everything when tender. The “gourmet” part of this comes in the addition of apples, cinnamon, nutmeg, saffron, and yogurt. Yummy indeed. Now, before you rush out to buy the ingredients and notice that saffron is crazy expensive, let me tell you something—saffron is crazy expensive. Don’t feel like you have to add it. Many recipes I read encourage using turmeric in place of saffron (...

This one is short and sweet. I picked up some butternut squash while at the night market this past Friday (if you haven't been, you should definitely check it out). I read recipes using fresh butternut squash all the time, but had never attempted anything using it myself. Mike and I love the Campbell's V-8 Butternut Squash soup (the soups that come in the green boxes), so I decided to try my hand at making my own. We started simple... Every month in our Food Network Magazine, there is a booklet with 50 themed recipes, such as "50 Things to Do with a Jar of Pasta Sauce," "50 Egg Dishes," "50 Game Day Dips," and the one I used tonight, "50 Easy Soups." I love many things about the magazine itself, but this particular feature is probably my favorite. The soup was indeed easy, and quite delicious. The hardest part is cutting up the squash. We Googled butternut squash cutting tips and came across a very helpful fellow blogger with tips and...

As I may have mentioned in a previous post, I’ve become hooked on farm-fresh eggs and milk from Nashville Famers’ Market (for those of you in the area, my faves are JD Country Milk and Schrock Farms). A few nights ago I was on the hunt for an easy dinner that at least resembled something healthful, so decided to go for a frittata. I had just received an oven-safe skillet for Christmas and figured this would be a good way to break it in. Many of the recipes I found made a bigger frittata that what I felt like was necessary for just Mike and me, and none of them used the exact ingredients I was hungry for, so I decided to wing it. I must say, the result was quite tasty and heated up well the next day for lunch at work. The following is my “recipe” for our Mediterranean Frittata . Cook about 4 slices bacon in a large oven-safe skillet until crisp. Remove to a paper towel lined plate to drain, reserving the 2 to 3 tablespoons of the drippings in the skillet. Crumble the bacon once it co...

In our latest issue of Food Network Magazine, Mike and I found (among many other recipes) a recipe for Grapefruit and Mint Salad that we had to try. It looked really easy, and we had just seen beautiful, ripe, Ruby Red grapefruit at Kroger. Realizing that a grapefruit salad would not be nearly enough for a full meal, we decided to keep it healthy and make some sort of fish/seafood. I had originally planned to try a new grouper recipe, but once I was back shopping at Kroger, I came across two dilemmas. 1) It is difficult to find grouper in landlocked Tennessee (only frozen was available); and 2) There was Coho salmon on sale that looked divine. I made a game-time decision and went for the salmon, buying one fillet for dinner tonight and one for salmon bisque in a couple days. I wanted to try a “new” kind of salmon, so went for Asian-Spiced Salmon, which I found in Fiesta Seafood Kitchen: A Taste of Pensacola , a book filled with nothing but seafood recipes. It seemed easy, but full ...

Mike’s been in the mood for salmon of some kind, and as luck would have it, I recently ran across a new way to prepare salmon that I was eager to try. It initially appealed to me for several reasons, mainly because · it has feta cheese, so it must be delicious; · it was a low-calorie meal that seemed like it would still be filling; and · it seemed easy to make. I am happy to report that all my expectations were exceeded. I was a little concerned with cutting the salmon in half to stuff, as we have tried cutting our own salmon portions before and mostly succeeded in mangling them, but the fantastic meat counter girl at Kroger offered to not only cut my 2 bigger fillets into 4 portions, but also to slice them for stuffing. She actually cut little pockets in each, which isn’t exactly what the recipe calls for (see my pic below), but it was a nice start and did help when Mike finished cutting them at home. The only things I did different from the recipe was to use shallots instead of red...

I've been wanting to try this one for a while, and when I had bananas turning brown as Mike and I were packing for a weekend camping trip, I decided it was time to put said fruit to good use. Into the freezer the ailing bananas went, and out came the recipe for Anne's Breakfast Banana Bars . The recipe was easy to stir together and smelled divine while baking. I'm holding off trying them until breakfast tomorrow, but I really don't see how they could be bad, and it seemed a slightly more nutritious option than making Oatmeal Raisin Cookies (which still sound tasty, but I'm trying to exert a little self control here, and they wouldn't help with the banana situation anyway). I used blueberry Craisins for the dried cranberries and almonds instead of walnuts or pecans. Also, I lined my baking pan with foil, then coated with nonstick spray so the bars would be really easy to remove from the pan. UPDATE: Very tasty indeed. If you cut the entire pan into 12 equal p...

On tonight's menu...Monday Night Football and Moroccan Carrot Soup!  That peeler is one of the cheapest and best kitchen gadgets I own! Nothing says Fall has arrived like football and soup, and since the temps around here finally dropped below the 80s, it was time to break out the soup pot. I first tried this carrot soup at my aunt's house several months ago, and I couldn't wait to make it again so Mike could try it, too. It's really easy to make, and I believe relatively healthful. I'm not sure where the original recipe came from, so consider this one, "From the Kitchen of Aunt Sheryl." I used Greek yogurt, and doubled the recipe so we could have leftovers for lunches. The recipe as listed says it will serve 4. Drizzling in the honey... Moroccan Carrot Soup 2 Tbl butter 1 cup chopped white onion 1 lb large carrots, peeled and chopped into ½-inch pieces 2½ cups low-salt chicken broth 1 Tbl honey 1 tsp fresh lemon juice ⅛ tsp ground allspice...