-Fat Free Vanilla Greek Yogurt
-Low Fat Vanilla Almond Granola
-Strawberries
-Organic Honey
Mr. Gaunt and I walked to The Farmers Market and got BreadFarm Samish River Potato Bread, and walked back home (3.2 Miles). It was super windy, but felt great to get some exercise in. Then we drove down to Seattle to go wedding dress shopping for my friend Mallory, and lastly Ikea. Mr. Gaunt bought an entertainment center because our old one we had to leave with the house. All in all a lovely day.
I was craving cookies/baking something, and spent the morning searching for a healthy recipe. I found a yummy looking one in my Clean Eating magazine, but later realized it called for an entire cup of butter (two sticks) and that is just too much butter, even if it is clean. No thanks. I even searched Food Gawker but couldn’t really find anything that was low fat. Last resort I remembered that The Clean Eating Mamma had a recipe tab on her blog, and sure enough she had an Oatmeal Cookie Recipe. Best part is NO butter! Love it! I followed this recipe to a T except that I didn’t have baking soda (only powder) so I just left that out…ha! I also added chopped raw almonds, because almonds are delish and everything should have almonds in it. The batter tasted VERY sweet like honey and I was worried that it would be too sweet, but it must have baked out because these are very light on sweetness. More like an oatmeal breakfast cookie rather than a buttery cookie. I love em! Mr. Gaunt wasn’t so sure about the dark chocolate. I used a Green and Black Dark Chocolate bar (80% I think) from Whole Foods. I like Dark Chocolate, but I would guess small children wouldn’t be huge fans either.
My mom makes the most amazing Caesar Salad in the world. I’m serious, shes mildly famous for her Caesar Salad, well at least among us who have had hit. Growing up I bet we had Caesar salad at least 2 or 3 times a month, especially in the summer months when we would BBQ. The recipe she used of course entailed real mayonnaise and oil and other good secret stuff that I don’t really eat these days, not that I would pass up her Caesar Salad if she was here to make it, but I wouldn’t make my own. Besides just a regular big Caesar salad, we also often made Chicken Caesar Wraps (especially with Spinach or sun-dried tomato Tortillas…drool) that were so easy and yummy. I also don’t really eat Tortillas (did you know there are 300 calories and 9 grams of fat in a Chipotle Tortilla alone!) these days so the wraps are out, but I still wanted a Chicken Caesar Salad. So we made some!
First before I tell you what we used, here are some SCARY facts on Chicken Caesar Salads from restaurants:
Red Robin Chicken Caesar Salad Wrap
Chili's Chicken Caesar Salad
Olive Garden Chicken Caesar Salad
So yeah umm…you might as well eat a giant plate of Alfredo than these poor excuses for a salad!
The Caesar salad I made tonight was the following:
-Lettuce
-Home made Croutons (I cut up a Sandwich Thin and grilled it in I Cant Believe Its Not Butter until they are crispy)
-Chicken Breast (I used a Rotisserie Chicken from Costco
–Weight Watchers Caesar Salad Dressing (I added three big Tablespoons of Fat Free Mayo to make it creamy)
Thats it! It was really pretty good, Mr. Gaunt LOVED it which always makes me happy, and it’s not a diet buster! Hoorah!
I wanted to make a fun appetizer for New Years this year but I kind of forgot to look up a recipe until the last-minute, so I needed something fast and easy. I looked through a few cookbooks and magazines but found nothing. Finally I went back to my trusty FoodGawker and typed in Appetizer, and found this recipe. Im from Washington, so as far as Im concerned Smoked Salmon is a MUST at every party! Yum! In fact there were two Smoked Salmon dishes at the party we went to. This one looked super easy and quick (like 10 minutes to make) so it was a go. The recipe is for 8, but I tripled it and came out with like 35, so be careful.
INGREDIENTS:
8 round wonton wrappers
olive oil
4 ounces cream cheese softened (I did Fat Free)
1 tablespoon fat free sour cream
1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill, plus more for garnish
1/2 cup flaked smoked salmon
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
DIRECTIONS:
-Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
-Brush both sides of wonton wrappers lightly with olive oil. Place in a mini cupcake pan. Push down lightly to form cups. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until browned.
-Meanwhile, in a bowl combine remaining ingredients until mixed well.
-When wontons wrappers have browned, remove from oven and allow to cool for a couple of minutes. Transfer to a plate.
-Use a Ziplock bag to Pipe smoked salmon mixture into cups. Garnish with chopped fresh dill.
-Serve and enjoy! These were a big hit, when we left there were only two still there. And they are too bad for you either if you do fat free cheese.
Mr. Gaunt and I made pizza tonight. I skipped my weigh in because I don’t think I lost more than maybe a half pound. It’s fine, I maintained nicely all through Christmas, what more could I ask for? Anyways back to the Pizza, I posted earlier that I planned to make this squash pizza, but laughed out loud when I read they wanted me to cook the Butternut squash for an hour and also spend an hour caramelizing onions…ha! I wish I had that kind of time and motivation. So I adjusted things a bit to make them fit my time frame.
INGREDIENTS:
-Pre Made Whole Wheat Pizza Crust
-Minced Garlic
-Olive Oil
-1 small diced onion
-5-6 large Thyme Leaves
-1 Cup sliced Mushrooms
-2 Chicken Apple Sausages diced (optional, skip for Vegetarian)
-1/2 Cup 2% Mozzarella Cheese
-1/2 an Acorn Squash
-3-4 small red potatoes sliced
-2-3 Tablespoons Light Alfredo (or Olive Oil)
DIRECTIONS:
Preheat oven to 400
-Cut Acorn in half and scrape seeds and pulp out. Spray with Pam and sprinkle with garlic salt. Put in deep microwavable dish, add 2 or 3 tsp. water (just enough to make steam). Cover well with plastic wrap. Cook on high for 10 minutes.
-Saute Diced onions and Garlic in a large pan. Add Mushrooms. When mushrooms are soft add sausage. Saute it all until nice and brown and cooked. Turn burner off and sprinkle torn up Thyme Leaves on top, let sit.
– Slice Red Potatoes thin (best if you have a mandolin – Which I got for Christmas!)
-Spread Alfredo (or olive oil) onto Pizza Crust. Sprinkle lightly with cheese
-Dump The Onion Garlic Sausage mix evenly onto Pizza Crust
-Spread out raw Potato Slices evenly on top
-Scoop Out small clumps of the Acorn Squash and place evenly on top of the potatoes
-Sprinkle with Cheese.
Place in oven and cook for 15-20 minutes until cheese is golden. Let cool and serve. This is ABSOLUTELY the best pizza we have ever made! Everything was perfect! Oh and we Netflixed Mad Men and watched the first episode. The Feminist in me want to scream! Im going to give a few more episodes, people seem to love it.
In an attempt to get back into cooking I’ve decided to make a meal list for the week. My mom sent me a $50 gift card to Whole Foods for Christmas (THANKS MOM!) so tonight I went and got a bunch of groceries, staples for the week. I often go to the grocery store with no list and just buy things I like. Then I come home and search those items on Food Gawker to get cool recipe ideas. After selecting a recipe I figure out how to make it low fat, its kind of a fun challenge. So the recipes I have linked are NOT low fat, but when I make them they will be, and I will post the changes I made. So heres whats on the menu this week:
Vegetarian Sloppy Joe with Green Chilies
The Family Chapters 