Pumpkin in June?

I've been pretty busy so lately I've been modifying our old recipes with healthier alternatives. For example, yesterday we made spaghetti but instead of using beef, we used ground turkey instead. In addition to the ground turkey we cooked with multi-grain noodles. Remember that in the past I've noted that the whole-wheat noodles are disgusting, but we cannot tell the different between multi-grain and "regular" noodles. 

Today I had a friend come over so I decided to make a healthy treat instead of a dinner, I am getting tired of trying dinners, wanted to change up the menu a bit. I made Pumpkin-Pie Coffeecake from the American Heart Association book on page 284. I was nervous to try this because it calls for pumpkin from the vegetable section of the grocery store, not canned pumpkin pie filling, wheat-bran cereal (I used Grape Nuts--which I hate!), flour, buttermilk (I learned that you can buy this in a canister (made of cardboard in the baking isle near the canned milks), suger, spices, egg whites, flour and some powered sugar (for the topping).

Well, let me tell you this...the "cake" is delicious!!!!! It has the consistency and texture of a very moist banana bread but with a pumpkin pie taste. I would make this treat in a heartbeat again. I think it would be great for breakfasts. Madison gobbled it up like it was going out of style...that is a very good sign. 

The recipe calls for it to be made in a 9 inch baking pan and to be cut into 12 pieces. At 12 pieces, each piece is 177 calories, 1 mg of cholesterol, and it says 6.5 grams fat ( I think that is because the recipe calls for pecans, but I did not use them...) This was an excellent recipe....try it out!

Sweet Wednesday

Last night was leftovers from Monday which were just as good if not better! 

Tonight I made a recipe from the Hungry Girl recipe, it was called "Sweet Coconut Crunch Shrimp" on page 379. Five shrimp (jumbo) equaled a serving which was 164 calories and only 4.5 grams of fat. For the main ingredient (breading) it had Fiber One bran cereal, coconut, bread crumbs, and some spices. Kevin gave this shrimp dish 4 stars. It was very easy to make. Prep time probably took about 20 minutes and then cook time was about 12 minutes. We did not even try to serve it to our little one. In general, she is not a big fan of shrimp. 

Along with the shrimp, we ate spinach and strawberry salad with a strawberry vinaigrette. The salad was not very high in calories either because the dressing was not creamy. The salad went well with the sweet coconut, it made a great summer dinner. What was even nicer is the fact that it is pretty cool outside so it was not a pain to have the oven on tonight. 

I think my next L-F and L-C dish will be pumpkin coffee cake from the American Heart Association Low-Fat, Low-Cholesterol book. If you haven't bought these cookbooks, I would recommend them. Try checking them out at your local library before purchasing them.

Until next time!

Mexican Monday...

Ok, so tonight's dish was called "Outside-In Turkey Tamale Pie" from the Hungry Girl book, page 312. It was another crockpot recipe and it was delicious!!!! Basically I took ground turkey and browned it. Then the recipe called for kidney beans, but I don't like them so used pinto beans but you could use black beans too. I don't know why kidney beans were recommended but maybe they are lower in fat or more healthy. This may be true but I am not totally going to stop living by eating things that I think are disgusting. 

Besides the kidney beans the recipe called for various amounts of corn, black olives, diced tomatoes with chilies, instead of using the specific measurements I just poured the entire can in. How much fat or calories are in sweet corn? Probably not that much. Besides, what was I supposed to do with 1/2 a cup (can) of corn? There were also some spices. Then the recipes says to add the turkey to the crockpot, pour in the veggies and spices and finally add some cornmeal with chicken broth.


When the meal is done, the cornmeal has expanded with the turkey and veggies and makes it thick like a casserole. The Hungry Girl recommends adding fat free sour cream and fat free shredded cheddar cheese I took it one step further and added a spoonful of salsa to my plate. 


I am not one to love Mexican dishes but this one left me wanting seconds...of course I did not have them...I'll save them for lunch tomorrow. 


The recipe is supposed to serve seven people (1 cup each) and be 230 calories (this # may vary a bit depending on the calories in the type of bean and whether or not you use salsa etc..)

Salmon Leftovers...

Today I had to think fast about what to serve for lunch. I am posting about lunch today because tonight we have dinner plans with family.

I was trying to think about how I could reuse salmon without stinking up the house. I decided to serve a tomato and spinach salad with salmon and Annie's organic Goddess dressing. 

The salad was GREAT!!! What was funny is the fact that I really could not taste the spices on the salmon last night, but today I could really taste the spices, especially the thyme. I did not choose a low fat dressing because the meal last night was very healthy and lunch was healthy today too. I used just a serving of dressing on my salad which is 2 tablespoons, which actually was enough to coat the salad without over-kill. 

What I really love about salad is you can eat a lot of it and fill up on the greens. Filling up on vegetables is a really great way to make sure you don't over eat on the less healthy foods. The USDA has just come out with a different type of visual to help people eat healthier. The traditional model was a pyramid and it suggested that everyone eat three to five servings of vegetable a day, but who really knows how much that truly is. The USDA's new model is a dinner plate, which shows a plate that says 1/2 of the plate should be vegetables and fruits. Having a visual that we all call relate to makes more sense. 

Here is the link: USDA plate visual

Now time to think about tomorrows dinner!

Saturday Night is Salmon Night

Tonight I made a recipe from the Low Fat, Low Cholesterol by the American Heart Association called "Mediterranean Grilled Salmon" on page 110. There are 132 calories per serving, and a serving is considered 4 ounces of salmon. The steps to make the salmon were to marinade the salmon for up to two hours and then grill it. 

The marinade was not like a typical liquid marinade, it reminded more of a relish that sat on the salmon. The recipe called for Sage but I did not have Sage so I had to use Thyme instead. I chose Thyme because it has a bit of a lemon scent and flavor. By using Thyme instead of Sage the title of the recipe was null and void, Mediterranean it was not. I ended up doubling the recipe and making more salmon than what was required.  Along with the salmon, I served brown rice, and I sauteed some zucchini in olive oil mixed with garlic powder, salt and pepper.


Madison really like the fish, which was surprising! She also loved the rice but would not touch the zucchini.

I thought that overall the recipe was OK. However, I really did not taste a lot of the spices, the fish was a bit bland. More flavorful than if I had not used a marinade, but still bland.

I think that I prefer a marinade that you soak your meat in instead of one that is thick and sits on the meat. Now to figure out what to do with the leftovers because I cannot stand the smell of fish being heated up in the microwave!

No Cook Friday

Before lunch today I figured that I might struggle a little with Madison considering that she did not like dinner last night, and today was going to be left overs.....yummy..NOT! So, I looked through the fridge to see what I could add to the concoction that I made last night and I found some low fat Colby Jack cheese. I heated up the casserole dish and sprinkled some cheese on it, and it was a hit for her. It ended up tasting like tuna noodle casserole which is not a hit with a lot of people and very weird considering that there were no similar ingredients in the the dish that tuna noodle casserole has except for noodles and cheese.

Tonight is a no cook night. We try to have Fridays as our get out and do something exciting for dinner night, while still trying to make healthy choices.

Tomorrow I am going to be making a Mediterranean grilled salmon with a flavorful fresh herb marinade. It is coming from the AHA book.

I'll keep you posted about the meal....Good night!

Dinner was not a Winner!

Ok, dinner was not a winner. The "Cheeseburger Mac Attack" on page 308 of the Hungry Girl cookbook did not taste anything like a cheeseburger or Mac n Cheese! Usually I am pretty good at picking out recipes. If it does not taste like it came from a restaurant I don't like it. I am willing to take the time to make more difficult recipes as long as the end result is great! This was a very easy recipe, but normally crock-pot recipes are. I screwed up the recipe because it called for frozen cauliflower with cheese. 

I bought broccoli and cheese instead. That was a major mistake because normally if you cook cauliflower and then whip it, it can have a subtle taste like mashed potatoes. I discovered this by accident when I was making my daughter's baby food. She did not like the cauliflower and I tried it to see what the problem was. I was so surprised that the taste was remarkable the same as mashed potatoes but a lot healthier.The broccoli over powered the rest of the food, plus it made the house smell bad too.

Other than the cauliflower  with cheese, the recipe called for ground turkey, macaroni noodles, ketchup, onion powder and light Laughing Cow Swiss cheese. When I was preparing the meal I thought that it was odd that there were no liquids in the recipe. After seven hours on low, the meal was done. It was very dry and my husband said that it looked like stuffing that you serve with a turkey. The noodles and turkey just all blended together and looked very bland. If it had not been for the broccoli the dish would have been a dull yellow color. 

I was disappointed with this recipe because I've made others in the past from this book and they have been really good. Regardless of the fact that I used broccoli instead of cauliflower the dish still would have been bland, dry, and dull in color. Again as I've stated in my blog previously, fresh ingredients is the key to low fat meals. I should have read the ingredients better before making this. It was definitely lacking in flavor, unfortunately I was left after the meal feeling hungry :(

Tomorrow I'll try another Hungry Girl recipe. If anyone has any low-fat and low-cholesterol recipes that they would like me to try, send them and I'll tell you what I think of it!

Recipe serves 8 for 179 calories per serving