Acqa frisa, a cold Puglian soup, is a bowl of water in which are floating pieces of tomato, pepper, cucumber, and onion. Olive oil is added. You are then served a basket of stale bread and you let it soak in the water. Except for the olive oil, pretty diet-y.
Acqa frisa
One of the best ways to stay on a diet is to order something that you don’t want to eat.
Lightly fried shrimp with head, two small fish with bones and heads and squid
This was served after an antipasto of raw shrimp with heads, raw squid and assorted raw shellfish. Then there was rigatoni which were undercooked dressed in a light tomato sauce with the above assorted shell fish and squid except cooked this time. Can’t say that there was much about the dinner I wanted to eat other than the bread and wine.
I am trying to make choices that are either seafood or vegetable. This did not turn out as tasty as I had hoped but it was fairly light without too much oil. I think something was lost in translation. We are currently eating a small breakfast, followed by a large late lunch and then a light dinner. It is working well so far.
Orecchiette with turnip greens
Sometimes you make mistakes. Especially when the menu is in Italian. I only ate half of this and only because I was really hungry. All the cooking makes the pasta like mush. Apparently this is a dish you can only find in southern Italy and Sicily. I would avoid it.
Not a good choice
This was dinner at the Cefalicchio Country House in Canosa di Puglia, Italy.
Sea bream with zucchini crust
After eating so low fat for so long, it is hard not to think everything that has a top dressing of olive oil is too greasy. I’ll probably get over that. I am not sure it’s a good thing.
During our trip to Italy, I am going to post what I would consider good selections for dinner when eating out. We had this fish as our main course in Benevento, Italy. Because we were pretty exhausted after the long flight and drive, we ate in the hotel. We were really impressed with the quality of the food.
Grilled swordfish on cauliflower puree with spinach, fennel and carrots
This is my last home-cooked meal before we leave for Italy. Over the next few weeks, I’ll post pictures of what I ate while we were away. Going on vacation is often the death knell of a diet. But this summer we crossed the country and back in seven weeks and I lost over six pounds. I have more modest ambitions this time. I hope I don’t gain weight. I plan on enjoying myself and eating lots of great pasta, seafood and vegetables.
In the meantime, for my last home meal we made pan roasted chicken breasts with mashed rutabagas and tiny green beans. We also made up a packet of chicken gravy and put some mushrooms in it. First, fear not the pressure cooker! It makes cooking hard root vegetables a snap. The pressure cooking booklet says to cook rutabagas for three to five minutes with an immediate cool down. After the pressure regulator starts to rock, I cook them for seven minutes with an immediate cool down. I like to make sure they are easily mashable. After draining, I put them back on the stove over a medium flame and mash them while some of the excess water evaporates. I add a tablespoon of low fat butter substitute. And remember they taste like a starch but they count like a vegetable.
Fear not the pressure cooker
No need to french these little green beans
Pan roasted chicken, haricots verts and mashed rutabagas with chicken-mushroom gravy
The posts I’ve done this week were for the most part done in real time. The pictures are exactly my plate and what I am eating for dinner. Often people think it looks like a lot. Like, how can you eat all that and lose weight? I guess the answer would be that I don’t screw up the rest of the day, I don’t eat food that has a lot of fat in it, I tend not to eat anything other than protein that is low in calories, and I love vegetables. Anyway, in looking back over the week, I think fish tacos were my favorite meal of the week. Yum.
The fish is frozen ono that you get from Costco. It’s seasoned and quickly cooked in a pan that’s been sprayed with olive oil spray. The tortillas are corn. The condiments are fresh salsa from the grocery store, shredded cabbage, green onions, cilantro and crema made from nonfat yougurt, salt and cumin. The beans are canned. I enhanced them with some of the salsa and cumin. Pretty easy. Really good.
Null soup
I can whip up this soup in about 20 minutes. I start the broth simmering and then cut up the vegetables in order of how long it will take them to cook. The harder root vegetables I cut in small pieces and start first and finish with the parsley and green onions at the end of cooking. The potato-y looking small chunks are rutabaga pieces. Rutabagas count like they are vegetables but give the impression of being starchy. The carrots and cabbage give it a nice sweetness. There’s also celery and mushrooms. A teaspoon of soy sauce gives it a deeper flavor without tasting like you put soy sauce in it. I call this null soup because back in the day when I worked for Weight Watchers, it was a no-point filler-upper. We also consider it “eat-down” soup. When we are about to go on vacation, it’s a way of using up all the bits and pieces in the refrigerator.
This is just a bad picture of a very good GBOF (giant bowl of food.) John is an expert shrimp cooker and I am an excellent vegetable chopper-upper. What you end up with is a complex bowl of smoked paprika, hot and mild chili peppers, tomato, celery and shrimp. The zucchini is really just a filler so that you feel like you can eat a giant bowl of food. Really, isn’t that what it is all about, finding ways to make people feel like they have eaten a satisfying dinner without overdoing the calories and fat? If there are 30 calories of fat in this I’d be surprised. This is served with brown rice cooked ala America’s Test Kitchen’s baked brown rice. The rice is perfect every time but refuses to pose for a flattering picture. The next time we make shrimp creole I’ll try for a more complimentary picture. We probably prepare this once a week.
John’s recipe for shrimp creole
1 lb. shrimp, peeled, de-veined, tails removed, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 cup shrimp stock (made from shells and tails) or water if no stock
1 large onion, chopped
3 ribs celery, chopped
1 red bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1 pasilla pepper, seeded and chopped
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and chopped
4 cloves garlic, sliced thin
3-4 zucchini, sliced into half-round disks
2 15-oz. cans of diced tomatoes in juice
1 cup V8 juice
2 Tbs tomato paste
2 bay leaves
2 dried chili pepper pods
6 Tbs smoked paprika
1 tsp Old Bay seasoning
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
Salt
1/4 cup chopped parsley
2 green onions, chopped
In a large dutch oven, heat the olive oil.
Add onions. Season and sweat for a couple of minutes.
Add celery, peppers and garlic. Season and sweat for a few more minutes.
Add tomato paste to the bottom of the pot and cook it for a couple of minutes.
Add seasonings into the mixture and let them cook for a few minutes.
Add tomatoes with their liquid.
Add zucchini.
Add bay leaves and chili pods.
Add V8 and shrimp stock (should barely cover the mixture).
Stir to combine. Bring to boil, reduce heat, cover and simmer 20 minutes.
Note: no shrimp in the pot yet! Have them at room temp ready to go seasoned with salt and pepper.
After the 20 minutes of simmering, turn off heat, remove bay leaves and chili pods.
Let the mixture cool to 180 degrees F (probe thermometer works great).
Add shrimp, stir gently, re-cover, and let steep 10 minutes.
After 10 minutes, correct for seasoning and serve over brown rice. Sprinkle chopped parsley and green onions over top.
Here’s a link to the brown rice recipe. I omit the oil but do spray the dish with olive oil spray so the rice won’t stick.
Omnivore 