Fancy Brunch Treat

In honor of mother's day I was making some fancy brunch for my boyfriend's mother. These little treats are super easy to make, and I think will impress those around you (which, I mean, isn't that what we're all about anyway?). Recipe comes from Taste of Home, health cooking.

So... all you have to do is take 10 wonton wrappers (you find these in the produce section at the grocery) and you mush them into cupcake tins (pre-sprayed with non-stick stuff). The recipe says "mini cupcake tin". I don't have a mini one, so I just used the normal one, and it seems to work out just fine. After you push them into the tin, spray the wonton wrappers and bake for 10-12 minutes at 350 degrees.

Meanwhile, make the egg filling. Really all you need to do is make some scrabbled eggs. Recipe calls for 2 eggs, so I used the egg beater equivalent. It also called for salt and garlic powder and a little bit of hot sauce. I added some oregano and chopped up green onion. You can make the eggs however you like though...maybe with some sauteed peppers or tomatoes? Cook the eggs in a skillet.

Then, you just spoon the cooked scrambled eggs into the 10 wonton cups. You can decorate with a little bit of chopped tomato, green onion, or bell pepper on top! The recipe says that for 2 it is 110 calories, 4 fat, and 1 fiber. But, they use real eggs in theirs, so this has to be less. As it stands, that's 2 points for 2 (or, for you math geniuses out there... that's 1 point a per egg cup).

****REMEMBER***** On Wednesday night I (Lexy) am flying across the country in order to be with Annie for some more blogging craziness. We already have some cupcake stores scouted out and plan on cooking up some fun food! Also, its her birthday, so people should tell her happy birthday!

Quick, Easy, and Super Yummy Dinner!

The other day I couldn't decide what to make for dinner. I spent many an hour scouring the internet (internets?) for something yummy to eat. Then low and behold on allrecipes.com i found a recipe for a yummy spicy/sweet sauce to put on chicken. Now, we all know that Annie is not a friend of the meat, but there are boys in her and my life that are not satisfied unless there is a chunk of dead something on their plate. BUT the cool thing about this recipe is that I think it's really good and easy to make it meat-free, OR perhaps with some soy curls?!?! So, here is what I did (or rather what Kevin and I did...he helped).

SAUCE
mix together:
1 Tablespoon brown sugar (I use splenda brown sugar)
2 Tablespoons honey
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 teaspoons chopped garlic (about 3ish garlic cloves)
2 Tablespoons hot sauce (taco sauce...)

1) Cut some chicken up into stir fry size pieces
2) Grill chicken on your panini/george forman grill until cooked
3) Put chicken in skillet with sauce and stir around for awhile (about 5 minutes or so on medium heeat)
4) Cook a bag of frozen veggies (I just use a stir fry mix that you microwave for 5 minutes and cooks in the bag)
5) Take chicken out of skillet and put in bowls with some rice (rice is cooking while you are cooking the chicken)
6) Throw bag of veggies in the skillet with the left over sauce and stir around to coat
7) Put veggies in bowl with rice and chicken (if you're eating meat....)

AND THATS IT!! Super easy! This whole meal seriously takes maybe 20 minutes from start to finish. I usually cook about a cup of rice for 2 people. I make my bowl with just a little bit of rice and a ton of veggies. Kevin's has lots of rice, no veggies, and lots of chicken.

I also think that you could take soy curls and rehydrate according to directions and then put them in the skillet and cook just like it were chicken. I have big plans to try that at some point.

broccoli casserole!

let's just start out by saying that this photo does no justice.  this blurry (bright!) picture in no way demonstrates the cheesy, ricey, broccoli goodness that this recipe creates.  

the recipe is originally from shadesofjaime.com (great website!) and i only made a few minor changes.

you will need:

-1 cup 2% sharp cheddar cheese

-1 cup cooked long grain rice (1/2 cup uncooked)

-1 cup fresh mushrooms, sliced

-around one smallish onion, chopped

-1/4 cup ff milk

-4 tsp reduced fat butter/margarine (i used 2ish instead, it was fine)

-1/4 tsp salt

-i added a can of chopped up water chestnuts to give this some extra crunch

-4 cups FRESH broccoli tops (not frozen!), chopped into tiny pieces (next time i make this, i will do a better job of chopping them TINY-- it will taste better this way.)

okay, so, heat your oven to 350, and put everything but the broccoli in a medium pot over medium heat until the cheese melts, then go ahead and add in the broccoli until it is heated and mixed in.  this whole process should take around 6-8 minutes.

spray a pan that it will fit in and cook this yumminess at 350 for around 30ish  minutes.

around one cup is about 3 pts.

i doubled the recipe and separated it into little throw-away tupperwares, which i froze into home-made lean cuisines!  they thaw out well in the microwave and are a great lunch treat!

yummy snack!

toasted chick peas (tastes like corn nuts, mmmm):

-drain two cans of chick peas, rinse

-spray pan and spread chick peas out

-spray chick peas with olive oil

-sprinkle with spices of your liking (i used garlic, cumin, and chili powder)

-bake at 350 for 50 minutes, shaking around every ten minutes.

-let cool

PIZZA!!!

Annie and I have been blogging for some time now (or maybe its just been a week...) but I think its time to start combining some of our blogs. So.. if we take 1part diet coke bread recipe and 1 part trader joe feta and combine them (along with some other stuff) we get DIET COKE BREAD PIZZA!! Pizza is amazing, I think we can all agree on that. But sadly, it can be really high in calories and fat and all that stuff. So by using the diet coke bread as the pizza dough, you save a lot of calories! And, its super yummy. So... here is what you do...

1) Make diet coke bread up until the point of letting it rise in the oven. Once you take it out of the oven you want to spread some flour on it (so as to keep it from being super sticky) and spread it out on a baking sheet. Spray the sheet first!! You want to spread out the dough so it touches all the corners of the sheet. (see picture)
2) Put in oven at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes. (There is nothing on the pizza yet)
3) While the dough is precooking you want to chop up all your favorite toppings. I'm a fan of basil, tomato, mozzarella, and feta. Annie makes a super good one with olive oil and pine nuts and some other yummy things I cant remember (but maybe she can comment on this post and let us know? :D)
4) After the 10 minutes take the dough out and put on some pizza sauce. I use regular tomato sauce and I like to add a little bit of Splenda (a trick Annie taught me, shes so smart), Italian seasoning, garlic powder, and a little bit of chili powder (I like a little kick with my food), after sauce put on your toppings. For my recipe its 1 cup part skim mozzarella, a bunch of chopped up tomatoes, and chopped up basil, and then about 1/3-1/2 cup feta (yay trader joes!).
5) Plop it back in the oven (still at 350) for another 10 minutes. And there you have it!! Awesome pizza that if you cut into 6 BIG pieces its about 6-7 points a piece. Not too shabby :) And no one can tell it comes from diet coke :D

If others have great topping ideas, leave some messages so we can try them out too!

say cheese!!!

Ok, so the word "cheese" may be a little misleading. So far Annie and I have posted fairly safe recipes. This one, however, is groundbreaking. YES groundbreaking. Well... maybe not quite that dramatic. But, it is really good, if you're willing to be a little adventureous and give it a try. I learned about this recipe during my Veggie Cooking class i took this past fall. They call it cheese, but you cant go into the recipe thinking of it that way. Instead just think of it as something yummy that you can put on crackers/chips. And its super good for you (compared to real cheese) and its vegan for all those veggie people out there :) So, heres what you do:

1) Mix 1 1/2 cups water with 5 tablespoons of agar flakes (they are usually in a blue package, i found mine at New Seasons--its a whole foods type store). Put that on the stove and bring to a boil. Once its boiling, simmer until the agar is all dissolved (the liquid should become almost clear). Keep stirring during this whole process.

2) Put all of the following ingredients into the blender: 1 cup white beans (i used garbanzo.. you can use almost any type you want though), 2 tablespoons thaini paste, 2 tablespoons lemon juice, 1 tablespoon sesame oil, 1 teaspoon liquid smoke, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder, 1/4 teaspoon black pepper.

3) Once the agar/water mixture is good to go, slowly pour it into the blender through the little whole in the top. The blender should be going while you do this. Keep blending until its all mixed together and smooth.

4) Pour the mixture into a slightly greased glass bowl and put in the refridgerator for half an hour. Afterwards, you can put a lid on the container (we just didnt want condensation to build up). Leave in the fridge for 1-2 hours to firm up.

5) Slice like cheese and eat on top of crackers, rice cakes or any sort of fun things like that! The liquid smoke gives it a smoky flavor and the consistency is just like sliced cheese. It stays good for about 1-2 weeks in the refriderator. And its about 150 calories per 4 oz (whole recipe makes 16 ounces).

Go on, be adventureous and give it a try!!!

stuffed full o' goodness french toast

yummmm... french toast.  lexy found this recipe in a book, but we have tweaked it to make it even yummier.

1) spread 1 T of low fat peanut butter (i use better 'n peanut butter from trader joes and 1 T of jelly on two slices of light bread. put these together like a sandwich.

2) pour about 1/2 cup of eggbeaters in bowl, add a little cinnamon and a packet of splenda.

3) dunk the sandwich in the eggs, let it soak it up so the whole thing is wet and eggy.

4) spray a frying pan and put on medium heat.  cook the sandwich on the stove until both sides are browned and the egg is cooked through.

5) pour on some low calorie syrup... i use walden farms, which is zero calories.

6) enjoy!  this is around 3ish pts, depending on what pb and what syrup you use.  yum, yum, yum!

Second Installment of the Wonders of Diet Soda!

Annie's excellent discussion of the how to's of making wonderful magical guilt free cupcakes inspired me to share another super fabulous item that also uses diet soda! One would be amazed at all the things we can do with diet soda. Today we are going to focus on our friend the diet coke and make diet coke bread!...which may sound strange, but its amazing and a great way to impress people, which is something Annie and I are always trying to do :)

first, turn your oven on for around 150-200 degrees.

then, mix 3 cups of ordinary flour with 1 1/4 cups diet coke (which leaves you a little to sip on while you cook!) and one package of yeast. Mix this all together. its will be a little gooey at first, but should be able to get mixed to a dough consistency.

once you have a nice ball of bread dough, get a damp towel and place it over the bowl and put it in the oven, but turn the oven off at this point!!

Now you just wait (which, for me, is the hardest part) let the dough rise for about 30-45 minutes. Afterward, you might have to add a little bit of flour to make it not super sticky to your hands, and kneed it a few times before putting in a bread dish. Then plop it back in the oven for 20-30 minutes (Oven should be preheated to 350 for this part)!

Some fun additions to this bread is adding some salt and garlic powder. Or, i've tried it with mixing some honey in with it after it has risen. You want to make sure that its all mixed together though, or else you get hard baked honey spots, which is no good. try this fun recipe and you'll amaze people that its just a little diet coke with flour!

if there is one thing i love in life, it's a good cupcake.  quality cupcakes are hard to find, but what's even harder to find are good guilt free cupcakes.  lexy and i are here to tell you to look no further.  here's what you do:

*pick a box of cake mix, any ol' box will do.  i, personally enjoy vanilla, and lexy enjoys confetti cake.

*mix the cake mix with one can of diet soda-- take your pick...  lexy enjoys diet cherry coke with her confetti cake, and i am partial to diet root beer or pepsi max with my vanilla.

*mix thoroughly, try to get out all the lumps of powder, although it's not always possible.

*pour into cupcake holders and bake at 350 until a toothpick comes out clean.

what a magical treat!  

for those of you counting, this is around 2 ww points without frosting.  yummmmm........