So it's been a while

It has been a while huh? 7 months! wow.

A lot has happened in the past 6 months and I have tried and made a bunch of really yummy healthy recipes. I apparently post on facebook way more than I post here. I've had several of my friends tell me I should write a book about my adventures and misadventures in cooking. I am not sure that I am that ambitious! lol

Recently my husband was diagnosed with coronary artery disease. He is a really young guy, so this type of thing is mostly genetic. But that also means that from now on we have to eat with both his dietary needs and my dietary needs in mind.

So now that we are watching our cholesterol, we have cut out a lot of the animal products that add in unnecessary cholesterol and fats. This has also cut out most red meat. Not entirely, we still eat it on occasion, but just not as regularly as we did before.

Even more recently my husband attended a cardiac nutritional education session and came home with a list of items he "isn't supposed to eat anymore". He has been really bummed about all of the food he can no longer eat. So my goal, has been to find ways to make food that he likes and enjoys but does not contain the harmful fats and cholesterol in them that they normally do.

This past weekend I made a wonderful Blueberry Banana bread. The original recipe makes this into muffins, but I did not have any muffin papers so I made a bread instead.

I made several modifications to the recipe to make this an even healthier version.

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup loosely packed brown sugar
• 1/4 cup quick cooking oats
• 1/2 cup nopalina
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 pint blueberries
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
• 1 banana, mashed
• 1 cup skim milk with a splash of vinegar
• 1 egg
• 2 tablespoons apple sauce
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Spray 2 8x4 bread pans with cooking spray
2. In a large bowl, stir together the all-purpose flour, whole wheat flour, sugar, brown sugar, quick-cooking oats, nopalina, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  In a separate bowl, mix together the mashed banana, buttermilk, egg, oil and vanilla. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry, and mix just until blended. Gently stir in the blueberries and walnuts. Pour mixture evenly into the two bread pans.
3. Bake for 20 to 30 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the tops are golden brown and toothpick comes out clean.

This makes a lovely and yummy bread that comes out to:

Nutrition Facts
16 Servings
Amount Per Serving
Calories		165.0
Total Fat		16.6 g
	Saturated Fat	0.9 g
	Polyunsaturated Fat	2.9 g
	Monounsaturated Fat	1.0 g
Cholesterol		17.1 mg
Sodium		167.8 mg
Potassium		208.4 mg
Total Carbohydrate		28.0 g
	Dietary Fiber	4.0 g
	Sugars	16.5 g
Protein		4.7 g

Vitamin A	2.3 %
Vitamin B-12	1.5 %
Vitamin B-6	5.0 %
Vitamin C	6.9 %
Vitamin D	2.0 %
Vitamin E	2.1 %
Calcium	5.4 %
Copper	5.7 %
Folate	5.4 %
Iron	4.4 %
Magnesium	3.9 %
Manganese	14.8 %
Niacin	3.4 %
Pantothenic Acid	1.9 %
Phosphorus	5.6 %
Riboflavin	5.8 %
Selenium	5.9 %
Thiamin	6.2 %
Zinc	2.1 %

Caldo de Res

This weekend I sat down and planned a menu for this week. What we should eat. Things that are healthier for all of us. My husband has food alergies that trigger migranes so there are some limitations I have to work with.

Sunday I made Caldo de Res which is a Mexican beef soup. I found this on Allrecipes.com and it came very highly rated. I thought I would give it a try and OH MY GOSH! WOW was it Amazing! It was so flavorful and delicious. Truely delicious. It was healthy and very yummy too!

The original recipe can be found here

Ingredients

2 pounds beef shank, with bone - NOTE: Next time I will use stew meat and a soup bone. The beef shank I found was too fatty for my taste.
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
1 onion, chopped
1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes
3 cups beef broth - NOTE: I used low sodium low fat
4 cups water
2 medium carrot, coarsely chopped
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1 potato, quartered (optional)
2 ears corn, husked and cut into thirds
1 medium head cabbage, cored and cut into wedges - NOTE: I used about half of the cabbage

1 cup chopped fresh cilantro
2 limes, cut into wedges - NOTE: I used 1/2 lime per serving
4 radishes, quartered - NOTE: I used 1 radish per serving

Directions


1.Cut the meat from the beef bones into about 1/2 inch pieces, leaving some on the bones.

2.Heat a heavy soup pot over medium-high heat until very hot. Add the oil, tilting the pan to coat the bottom. Add the meat and bones, and season with salt and pepper. Cook and stir until thoroughly browned.

3.Add 1 onion, and cook until onion is also lightly browned. Stir in the tomatoes and broth. The liquid should cover the bones by 1/2 inch. If not, add enough water to compensate. Reduce heat to low, and simmer for 1 hour with the lid on loosely. If meat is not tender, continue cooking for another 10 minutes or so.

4.Pour in the water, and return to a simmer. Add the carrot and 1/4 cup cilantro, and cook for 10 minutes, then stir in the potato and corn. Simmer until vegetables are tender. Push the cabbage wedges into the soup, and cook for about 10 more minutes.

5.Ladle soup into large bowls, including meat vegetables and bones. Squeeze lime juice over all, and serve with radishes.
 
This took about 2 hours to make, but it was well worth it. I cannot rave enough about this soup!

How to eat well with out planning

This week has been full of unplanned meals. I try to eat well even when I do not plan means out, but sometimes this can be difficult. We eat healthy even with out being WLS friendly, but even with that sometimes food just does not agree with me.

Last night we had stove top lasagna. This is something that I can eat and tollerate but not all WLS patients can. Pasta and breads do not bother me, and I can eat them, just in small portions.

Stove Top Lasagna
1lb ground meat (beef, turkey, pork) I used turkey
2 cups whole wheat egg noodles
1 Tbs minced garlic
1.5 Jars Spaghetti sauce
1/2 cup low fat cottage cheese
1/2 cup ricotta
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste
Italian seasonings to taste
Italian blend shredded cheese

In a large skillet or dutch oven cook the ground meat til there is no more pink and drain.

Return to heat and add in garlic, spaghetti sauce and uncooked pasta. Heat til boiling and then simmer for 10-13 minutes until the noodles are at your desired tenderness.

In a side bowl, mix together cottage cheese and ricotta until well blended. Add in salt, pepper and italian seasonings to taste, mix well.

Once noodles are finished, remove pan from heat and spoon in the cheese mixture and mix well. Top with shredded cheese blend.

I also made olive garden bread sticks to go with this. My husband loves them and I can have a few bites myself. It was a very delicious dinner that was wonderful in moderation.

Pistachio Protein Shake

I do not really like protein shakes very much. The taste is bleh, the consistancy is icky and the frequency that I probably should drink them is much too often. So when I hear of something new, or think of something new to make them taste better, I am all over it!

Tonight for my after dinner snack I decided to try a Pistachio Protein Shake. It was very yummy, so yummy that it didn't last long enough for a picture! Maybe next time.

Pistachio Protein Shake

1 cup fat free skim milk
1 scoup EAS Premium Vanilla Protein Powder
1 Tbs Jell-O Sugar-Free Instant Pudding Pistachio

Put all of the ingredients in the blender for about 20 seconds and there you go! A perfect desert. :)

Mini Egg Popups

So I've seen various recipes for egg popups in a mini muffin tin all over the place. These looked great and I had finally gotten my mini muffin pan and decided to try it. Baker's Secret Basics Nonstick 24-Cup Muffin Pan.

The end result was very yummy and something the husband and I really enjoyed. Our 2 year old son, not so much but that was mostly due to me making him a chocolate chip mickey mouse pancake lol.

Mini Egg Popups:

5 Eggs

1/4 cup fat free skim milk

1 tsp Kosher salt

7 twists of pepper from a mill

1/4 tsp garlic powder

1 Tbs bacon bits

1/4 cup italian blend cheeses

Preheat the oven to 350.

Mix the eggs and milk in a bowl. Once that is mixed very well add in the salt, pepper, garlic powder and mix again. Lastly add in the bacon bits and cheese.

Grease the pan and fill the muffin cups 1/2 way full. Use all of the mixture. Next add some extra bacon bits, and cheese to the tops of the egg mixture.

Bake in the oven for 30 minutes. Let them cool for about 5 minutes before taking them out of the pan.

These come out light and airy, very flavorful and are the perfect size. There were enough left overs that I can bring these to work for breakfast. My husband mentioned that they may not last that long because he wanted to munch on them all day.

I would say that these would be even better with some type of sauce other than the normal ketchup or hot sauce but I am not sure what type to try right now. Any suggestions?

Spaghetti Burgers

Last night we couldn't decide what to have for dinner. We knew we wanted something with a lot of meat but what? Finally, hungry and impatient, I went into the kitchen to concoct dinner. I came out with spaghetti burgers. This could also be called, left over burgers, because that is what is really was.

I had two thawed out pub burgers, left over spaghetti squash, italian shreaded cheese blend, spaghetti sauce and minced garlic. Topped it with some home made garlic bread, spaghetti sauce and lettuce and you get a great burger that shocked my hubby with it's yumminess.

The Burger:
2 pub burgers broken apart into a bowl
1 cup of spaghetti squash
1 Tbs minced garlic
1/4 cup spaghetti sauce
1/4th cup italian blend shreaded cheese

Mix together with your hands and form 6 burgers. Cook in a frying pan.

The Toppings:
Home made bread. This allows me to cut the size slices I want. For me the slices are very thin, for my son and hubby they are normal sized slices.

The bread was toasted, sprayed with "i can't believe it's not butter" spray and sprinkled with garlic powder, then topped with a little bit of spaghetti sauce.

The burger was topped with some more italian blend cheese and it was allowed to melt on the burger in the pan. On the bread the burger was topped with lettuce to add a nice crunch.


These burgers were so tasty and my son ate them with out realizing he was getting some veggies as well. I was able to eat a whole burger in about an hour, however, only half of these burgers fit on the bread and I only had 2 thin slices of bread. I used lettuce as the bun topper.

Cinnamon Buns

I love to bake, and part of that is finding recipes that I would really like to try. I found a recipe for Brown Sugar Cinnamon Buns from one of my favorite baking websites. I looked the recipe over and decided to try to make this a bit WLS friendly by taking out all of the sugar. The results were yummy and something that all of my family enjoyed eating.

Karmie's Sugar Free Cinnamon Buns

Dough:

1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup Splenda brown sugar
2 teaspoon salt
3 eggs
2/3 cup milk
3/4 cup water
2 tablespoons instant yeast
1 teaspoon cinnamon
5 cups all purpose flour

Place the butter and the Splenda brown sugar in a bowl and beat with a mixer until fluffy.
In a sauce pan add the milk and water and heat until lukewarm, then add to the batter. Add in the cinnamon, salt and instant yeast and mix until all of the ingredients are well blended.

Add 3 cups of flour to the mixture, one cup at a time. Stir until well blended. At this point you can knead in the rest of the flour by hand or you can use a Kitchen Aid mixer. If kneading by hand put a half a cup of flour on a flat surface and pour the batter on top, knead in the rest of the flour until the dough no longer sticks to the surface or your hands. Knead the dough for 10 minutes.

Place the kneaded dough in a bowl greased with oil. Turn the dough in the bowl so that the dough is completely covered with oil. Cover bowl with plastic wrap, set in a warp moist place and allow it to rise for an hour.

Filling:

1/3 cup melted butter
3/4 cup Splenda brown sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 cup raisins (I used currants because I did not have raisins)

In a bowl mix together the Splenda brown sugar and cinnamon. Use your hands to mix it together well. Melt the butter in a bowl.

Once the dough has risen for an hour, pour the dough onto a flat surface. Flatten the dough and shape it into a 14x12 rectangle shape. Use a brush to spread the melted butter onto the dough. Next sprinkle the Splenda brown sugar/cinnamon mixture on top. Smooth it out with your hands so that it is spread evenly over the dough. Next sprinkle the raisins (or currants) on top.

Now roll the dough along the 14" side. Pinch the edge that overlaps the roll to the dough so that it is a solid roll. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper. Cut the cinnamon roll log into 1-1.5" pieces and place them on the parchment paper. I ended up with about 18 pieces though depending on how long the roll is and how thick or thin you cut them you may have more or less.

Once all of the pieces are on the parchment paper, cover the cookie sheets with plastic wrap and allow them to rest for 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 350 and bake for 30 minutes.

Topping:

1/2 cup cream cheese
1/3 cup soft butter
2 cups sugar free powdered sugar
1 cap vanilla extract
3-4 table spoons fat free skim milk

Place the cream cheese and butter into a mixing bowl and mix together on a low speed until fluffy. Then mix in the sugar free powdered sugar until the batter is smooth.

To make sugar free powdered sugar, you mix equal parts Splenda and Corn Starch and sift them together. I mixed 1 cup Splenda and 1 cup Corn Starch in a bowl, mixed them with a fork and then sifted the mixture into the mixing bowl.

At this point the topping was a crumbly mess, so I added in about 3-4 table spoons of fat free skim milk. This made the topping a nice smooth consistancy. I tasted the topping and decided it needed "something" so I added in a cap of vanilla extract.


Once the buns come out of the oven, transfer them to a wire wrack but keep them on the parchment paper. Immediately smear the topping on top of the buns.

Enjoy! :)