Another Great Recipe, Stats and This Week's Menu

I don't think I posted my plan for last week, but I have it for this week, along with a successful recipe and some great stats!

First off, lets start with the really really good news.    I was at the doctor at the beginning of the week and the results of my bloodwork were amazing!  In October, my total cholesterol number was 148, but my HDL was only 20 and my LDL was 128.    Last week, my total cholesterol number was 145, but my HDL was 46 and my LDL was 99!!!!  The doctor was amazed and said that he's never seen such a change so quickly.   He took me off of one of my medications and looked up information on chromium supplements for me.   I'm now taking 200 mcg of chromium picolonate daily - half in the morning and half in the evening. 

Also, I'm down 21 pounds from January!   Yay me!   The scale had not moved in a while, but this week really started moving.   I'm feeling stronger physically and able to do more, but still not those darn burpees.   I shall conquer burpees soon!    Today we were jumping rope and there was a significant difference in what I was able to do as compared to the last time we jumped rope.    I've also started lifting weights and doing zone cardio workouts.    I am really pumped and excited about the progress I'm making and how I am feeling!

So as I'm planning meals, I'm finding that I'm gravitating to easy but nutritious meals.    I tried this salad last night and it was great. 

Cilantro Lime Chickpea Salad from here.

This is a great summer salad - very fresh and light, but has good protein in it.

Yield: 1-2 servings.
Ingredients:

• One 15-oz can chickpeas (2 cups cooked), drained and rinsed
• 2 cups spinach
• 1/4 cup sweet onion, chopped finely
• Juice from 1.5 limes
• 3/4 cup fresh Cilantro
• 1/2 tsp sugar (or to taste)
• 2 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1 garlic clove
• 1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 tsp ground cumin
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt + ground pepper

Directions:
1. In a food processor, add the spinach and pulse a few times until chopped very small. Add the processed spinach, drained chickpeas, and chopped onion into a large bowl.
2. In the food processor (no need to rinse the bowl!), add the lime juice, cilantro, mustard, sugar, garlic, cumin, and oil. Process until smooth, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.
3. Pour the dressing on top of the spinach chickpea mixture and stir well. Add salt and pepper to taste. Let stand for about 10 minutes to let the flavors develop. Serve over a bed of grains, like brown rice. Serves 1-2.


I made this pretty much as is - didn't add or subtract any ingredients.   I used the juice of one lime and used straight yellow mustard as I didn't have any dijon and didn't want to run to the store!  My food processor is also broken so I used a little manual chopper thing that I have and it seemed to work fine.    We really enjoyed it!

I want to try it again with basil.   I think that would be really good too, and I know that there are some people who don't really like cilantro.



And finally, here's the menu plan for the week, including last night:

Saturday:

Panini Sandwiches – turkey breast, provolone and avocado
Cilantro lime chickpea salad

 

Sunday:

Grilled Chicken
Fumi Salad

Monday - Healthy Chicken Gyros from here.

Tuesday – district Choir concert - Leftovers

Wednesday – kickboxing – Panini sandwiches

Thursday – Workout at gym - Grilled Sausages – Chicken Basil sausage with pesto sauce on whole wheat noodles

Friday – leftovers – workout with personal trainer

Saturday – Mediterranean Chopped salad from here. Note that it's not the first salad listed, but the one at the bottom of the list. 

Here a great week!

It's a Winner!

Sometimes I find a recipe that is a real hit and will be repeated.     Today I found one of those very successes!    In my meal planning, I found this recipe.    It looked good, but I knew that with my kids I would have to add some sort of meat to it.    I have a bunch of chicken sausage in the freezer and knew it would go well in this recipe.

Now, here's the issue - one of my kids DOES NOT like zucchini.   Before eating, he asked me if he had to eat all of his squash.   I told him that I would like it if he did.  He ate it all up and said it was "really good."  

So, here's the recipe and here's what I did differently

Stuffed Zucchini
Ingredients:
1 tbsp sour cream
1/4 to 1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp curry powder
1/2 tomato
1 tsp thyme
2 zucchinis
1 onion
cheese
pepper


*I did not use curry powder or thyme - instead I used fresh basil and oregano.   You could put whatever spices you want in it.   I used about 1 pound of chicken Italian Sausage
 
Directions:
Preheat your oven to 400 (200C).
Give the zucchini a good scrub.
Slice them in half length-ways. You can trim the ends if you like.
Spoon out the guts (leave about 1/2 an inch in) until you end up with boat like shells.
Now give the zucchini pulp a good chop, also chop a small onion and 1/2 a tomato while you’re at it.

Take the sausage out of the casings and brown it in a frying pan.   When cooked all the way through, add the tomatoes, onion and chopped up zucchini guts.    Cook until all ingredients are cooked down a bit.    Add oregano, freshly chopped basil and sour cream (I used Greek yogurt.)

Put hollowed out squash in a casserole dish sprayed with non-stick spray.   Fill the zucchini boats with the meat and veggie filling and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.   Cook for 20 - 30 minutes until cooked through and browned on top.      Call the children and eat. (I apologize for the quality of the photo, but it's all I have as the food is all gone!)

Spring Break

Ahhh - Spring break was last week.    Usually in Colorado, spring break means snow and cold weather.   This year however, it was a different story.    Monday was a terrible windy dusty and awful day - warm, but too nasty to be outside.   The rest of the week however, was heavenly.     We've been running around in summer clothes, I got a pedicure and was sporting my new Sketcher's sandals.   

Alas, all good things must come to an end, and so goes spring break and so goes this weather.    We are going from 75 degree weather today to snow tomorrow!   Yikes!    I'm not looking forward to that but we really do need the moisture.

I didn't do too much meal planning last week.    My parents were here for the kids play, "Our Town" which ran March 22, 23 and 24.    It was a great show and it was really fun to see both of my kids on stage!   

One thing I learned from not meal planning during the break is that I do need to plan meals when I'm not working.    It wasn't a difficult week, but I went to the store more often and spent more money than I have been spending on food.    So, once school is over, I'll still be focusing on planning meals.  

Tonight I tried a new recipe.    It sounded wonderful, smelled good, and looked delicious, but it definitely needed some work.    The recipe is called "No Butter Chicken"    It called for Garam Masala, which I couldn't find in the store, so I made some.   I think that perhaps it was stronger than it would have been if I had purchased it and that I used too much spice.     I doctored it up with some coconut milk, and we are having it for dinner tomorrow.    Problem solved!   I did take some great pictures though, and the chicken was quite good, the sauce was just too spicy. 

 Onions, ginger, garam masala, tumeric

 Added chicken breast

Greek Yogurt

 No Butter Chicken - cooking down

 Homemade Garam Masala. 

 

Here is the plan for the rest of the week:

Sunday: No  Butter Chicken from here. 

Monday:    Salvaged No Butter Chicken, Rice, Roasted Broccoli and Cauliflower

Tuesday:  Crock Pot Chiptole Burritos from here.
Make Stuffed Zucchini and use leftover Rice – 6 p.m. swim class

Wednesday:    Leftovers   (kickboxing class)  6:30 p.m.

Thursday:  Stuffed Zucchini and peppers from here.(add Italian Sausage)   Boxing class 6:30pm

Friday: Leftovers

Have a great week!

Meal Planning March 18 - 24

Sunday:

Beef Stew – Use leftover veggies and meat from this week – roast beef and  corned beef

Potato pancakes – use leftover potatoes and mashed potatoes

Monday:  Chicken Enchiladas with Salsa Verde from here.  

Tuesday:  Leftovers

Wednesday:  Parmesan Crusted Chicken from here.   I'm going to modify it based on comments I've read and instead of using mayonnaise, I'm going to use a dressing I made with light mayo, Greek yogurt, ranch dressing mix and homemade pesto.   

Thursday: Leftovers

Friday:  I'm going to make this because it can be done in the crock pot.   I'll use cream of mushroom soup and add garlic.  My parents will be here and the kids need to eat. 

For Saturday - I'll have a house full of people and we will all eat before going to see Our Town - so we will have a repeat of something I made a few weeks ago that was quite good!

Have a great week!

Benefits of Meal Planning and plan for March 11 - 18

I've been very dutifully planning meals for a little over a month and I'm definitely seeing a number of benefits to going through this exercise.    The benefits include:

• time - by planning ahead, I'm also able to do some food prep ahead of time.   I'm also not in that "hmmm, what should we have for dinner" place at 5 p.m. on a school night.
• cost - this is one huge area that I am seeing an impact.    I've changed some of my shopping habits, and it's definitely clear in my pocketbook.    I'm really trying hard to only go to the grocery store once a week.    By planning our meals, I'm making the purchases I need at that time, and am avoiding extra trips to the grocery store.    This week, I spent $130 on groceries.   The last two weeks, my purchases came in at $80 and $65!   That's a huge difference, and helps with the price of gas continuing to rise!
• Also, by planning specific nights for leftovers, I'm finding that we are eating all of what we cook instead of finding something in the refrigerator a week later and thinking, "oh wow, what was that?"

A couple of other things that I have recently started doing:

• prepping all of the salad stuff and raw veggies ahead of time.    On Saturday or Sunday I am washing and cleaning all the veggies to use in salads and cooking for the week.    I read about doing this on a great blog I follow and the key is to make sure that the veggies are dry before putting them away.   I have a salad spinner, and once I wash the lettuce leaves (spinach and other veggies too), I put them in the spinner, spin them dry and then put them in a ziplock baggie layered with paper towels.  I have found that by doing this, my lettuce and leafy greens are lasting more than a week.   It's also much easier to do the same with other veggies and not have to wash and prep them.
• Making sure that lunches for the next day are made the night before.    This simple thing makes our mornings so much easier!   It's much much better to be able to go grab our lunches and not think about it in the morning.

So here is our plan for this week - including what we had for dinner last night.

Sunday March 11

Sausage and Pepper Medley
Mashed potatoes
Steamed Green beans

*this was a recipe I created to use the peppers and onions that I had in the refrigerator.

2 pounds Chicken Italian Sausage
2 Green peppers, sliced
1 Red pepper, sliced
1 red onion, sliced
2 roma tomatoes (I had two that were getting really soft and needed to be used)
1 Tbsp minced garlic
2 cubes of homemade pesto -  frozen in ice cube trays

Boil the sausage and then slice thinly.   Saute the peppers, onion and garlic in a large saucepan.   When fragrant but not soft, add the sausage and cook until the sausage begins to brown.    Add the tomatoes and pesto and cook until the pesto is evenly distributed and the sausage is browned to your taste.   We served this with homemade mashed potatoes and steamed green beans seasoned with thyme.  

My oldest thought that the green beans smelled like "summertime - like when you are digging in the dirt and it smells good."   He noted that they did not taste like dirt, though!


Monday
Pot roast in crock pot
Mashed potatoes - leftover from Sunday
Garden salad
Leftover green beans

Tuesday
Leftovers

Wednesday
Chicken with Tarragon and Leeks - recipe from Real Simple Magazine, April 2009
(I'm excited about this recipe because I love both tarragon and leeks)    If it's as good as I hope it is, I'll post the recipe.

Thursday
Leftovers

Friday:
Quesadillas  made with homemade re-fried beans

Saturday:  Will determine based on what is in the refrigerator.

Meal Planning March 4 - 11

I was busy again this weekend, despite having the day off from work on Friday!   We got a workout in every day this weekend (Saturday with our trainer, Moses, who worked us over with the circuit from hell)!    I also had to do some baking this weekend because I signed up to bring snacks for the theatre group on Monday.   The kids get to school  around 7 a.m. and are at rehearsal from about 2:45 - 5:30 p.m.     The director instituted a snack time this go around and I think it's been a good thing.   I made congo bars (see prior post) and brownies from here.   This particular brownie recipe is amazing and is my go-to recipe.   Easier and cheaper than a box of brownie mix and much better!



Tonight I made this!   

Oh my gosh, it was wonderful and the recipe can be found here!      Only Jacob and I were home, so there are leftovers, which may change my plans for later on this week.   Here's tonight's recipe as I did it and my plans for the rest of the week:

5 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 tsp lemon pepper
1 tsp dried dill weed
1 tsp salt
1 tsp garlic powder

Season the chicken breasts with the above mixture.   I put the seasonings all in a small bowl and sprinkled them over the chicken breasts.  

Heat a skillet and add olive oil and butter.   Once the pan is hot, add the chicken breasts and sear both sides.    I added a lid to the pan and let it cook a while on the stove and because I had to cook it in two batches, I put the first chicken breasts in the oven and cooked them with our asparagus that was roasting.  

 Sauce:

1/2 cup white wine
1 cup half and half (I used fat free half and half)
3 Tbsp capers, drained
2 Tbsp butter
2 Tbsp flour
additional half and half

Once finished, remove the chicken breasts from the pan and deglaze the pan with the wine.   Add the half and half and bring to a simmer, stirring frequently.   After about 2 minutes, add the capers.    The original recipe said it would be done at this point, but I found that I had to make a roux and thicken the sauce.    I used the butter and flour to make a roux and added it to the sauce.   I found it needed about 1/2 cup more of half and half.

We served this with roasted asparagus.   It was delicious!

For the rest of the week, here is our plan!

• Monday:  Spinach tortilla bake from here!   I've already cooked the chicken and chose this to use up ingredients that were in the refrigerator. And yes, that is from a quilting blog!
• Tuesday:    Leftovers - Gym Night
• Wednesday:   Sausage with Peppers and tortellini - pesto pasta - my recipe
• Thursday:   Leftovers -  Gym Night
• Friday:    Roast in Crockpot with potatoes and carrots
• For the weekend, this salad.