Fun low-cal lunch. 10/13/22

Posted on October 14, 2022 by Beebamom
Chicken zoodle soup

My daughter had some extra zucchini from her plot at the community garden. After she finished making a delicious zucchini cake (which I should have taken a picture of before we ate it), I used the rest to make chicken zoodle soup. I have a little hand zoodler and I made thick noodles out of the zucchini. Then I also zoodled a carrot, and shredded a little cabbage. I cooked the carrots and cabbage first in some chicken stock and at the end put in some rotisserie chicken and the zucchini zoodles. It was really good and the zucchini zoodles did a good job mimicking noodles!

I can see doing this same sort of soup with vegetable stock and extra firm tofu for a vegan lunch. I am going to try it again and add more vegetables for an even heartier soup.

Posted in American, Lunch, Poultry, soup, Vegetables | Tagged | Leave a comment

Creamy polenta with black beans, avocado, and radish. 10/12/22

Posted on October 13, 2022 by Beebamom
Creamy polenta with black beans, avocado, and radishes

When John makes polenta he starts with 1/2 cup polenta and just under 3 cups of salted water, two bay leaves, and two cloves of garlic. He cooks it, stirring, for 15 minutes. After discarding the bay leaves he stirs in two teaspoons of butter. This makes a fairly loose polenta which is what we like. You might like to make yours tighter or add some cheese.

In the meantime I drained and rinsed a can of black beans. I added the beans to some onion, garlic, and spicy chiles that I had sautéed with cumin and chipotle powder. Adding some vegetable stock makes the beans saucy. They just need heating through and near the end of cooking I added some cilantro.

We split the polenta and beans between our two low bowls and garnished with avocado, radishes, and cilantro. This was our first time making this. The original recipe is on the NYTimes Cooking site under the name, Cheese Grits with Saucy Black Beans, Avocado, and Radish. Of course we lowered the fat and adjusted the portion size. It turned quite tasty but next time we will add more crunch.

Posted in American, Easy, Grains, Kitchen tips, Legumes, Methods, Vegetables, Vegetarian, Weeknight dinners | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Roasted tilapia, sheet pan veg, and mustard sauce. 10/11/22

Posted on October 12, 2022 by Beebamom

Roasted tilapia with sheet pan cabbage, carrots, and green beans with mustard sauce

The trickiest thing about making this dinner was to get everything finished cooking at the same time. I pre-heated my oven to 425F convect. I knew the carrots and cabbage would take about 30 minutes and the green beans about 15 minutes. But we also had to worry about the fish which John normally cooks for 15 minutes at 400F. As it turned out, he put the tilapia in the oven with 15 minutes to go and the fish cooked in only 10 minutes so we covered it to keep it warm while the veg finished up its last 5 minutes.

I served the fish and vegetables with a mustard sauce made up of equal parts (in this case 1 tablespoon each) of Dijon mustard, whole grain mustard, light mayonnaise, and water stirred together. Really easy, delicious, and goes well with both the fish and the vegetables.

I love the look of the cabbage! It looks like a piece of lemon meringue pie!

Posted in American, Easy, Fish, Kitchen tips, Methods, pescatarian, Sheet pan, Vegetables, Weeknight dinners | Tagged | Leave a comment

Shrimp bowl and a word of caution about frozen shellfish. 10/10/22

Posted on October 12, 2022 by Beebamom
Shrimp over riced cauliflower with edamame, cabbage, cucumber, avocado, cilantro, scallions, jalapeño and dusted with ebi furikake

This is our typical Monday dinner, some kind of protein with accompaniments over either rice or riced cauliflower with a sprinkling of jalapeños, scallions, cilantro, and furikake. The standard accompaniments are cucumbers, avocado, edamame and cabbage.

Our daughter has been wanting our shrimp bowl to have more pieces of shrimp so tonight we used the medium-sized, tailless, raw frozen shrimp from the Great Value brand at Walmart. After dinner she remarked that the shrimp had kind of a weird flavor and I agreed. Upon checking the package ingredients we found that the shrimp had been processed with sodium tripolyphosphate, a preservative often used with scallops and shrimp which effects their texture and flavor. We always check frozen scallops for this additive but did not realize they put it in shrimp too. Always make sure that there is only one ingredient in your bag of frozen seafood, scallops or shrimp. That’s it. The end.

While edible, our dinner was not as good as it should have been, truly a pity.

Posted in Asian, Kitchen tips, Legumes, pescatarian, rice, Shellfish, Vegetables | Tagged | Leave a comment

Sunday Breakfast for Dinner. 10/9/22

Posted on October 10, 2022 by Beebamom
Breakfast for Dinner

This week’s Breakfast for Dinner was exactly that, two eggs soft scrambled, veggie breakfast patty, and toast. Sometimes I just need a simple prep dinner.

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Weekly Menu. October 10-16, 2022

Posted on October 9, 2022 by Beebamom
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Chicken Marsala, mashed potatoes, asparagus. 10/8/22

Posted on October 9, 2022 by Beebamom
Chicken Marsala with mushrooms, asparagus

I made mashed potatoes specifically to eat with the Marsala sauce. Unfortunately the Marsala sauce turned out way too sweet and booze-y but the mashed potatoes alone were quite delicious. Usually when we make this we use a shortcut and add the Marsala as part of the liquid in a packet of chicken gravy and then boil it to get rid of the alcohol. Then we add some rotisserie chicken and sautéed mushrooms. Somehow John’s measurements were off.

Growing up I was on mashed potato duty every night. My father really liked mashed potatoes. Due to my overload of them as a kid I rarely make them now. And of course I am very parsimonious with the butter and use low-fat milk to mash them with. Still, they tasted pretty yummy. Having the asparagus is a treat. Asparagus prices have been lower lately since it must be Spring in the Southern Hemisphere. Asparagus needs no embellishment.

I wish dinner had turned out better but you can’t win them all!

Posted in American, Easy, Methods, Poultry, Vegetables | Tagged | Leave a comment

Singapore shrimp, rice, snow peas. 10/6/22

Posted on October 7, 2022 by Beebamom
Singapore shrimp, snow peas, rice

This is the first time John and I have made this dinner. I have included the recipe below. We used 12 ounces of shrimp and cut the rest of the recipe in half. The full recipe must be for at least 4 people. It turned out very well! The sauce was sweet and spicy and I was able to do all the chopping in my mini-prep food processor. I see that this recipe often comes with noodles and is called Singapore noodles. I am pretty sure we will make this again.

P.S. We used lime zest instead of lemongrass

Posted in Asian, pescatarian, Recipes, rice, Shellfish, Vegetables | Tagged | 1 Comment

Vegan pasta with tomato-mushroom sauce, zucchini 10/5/22

Posted on October 6, 2022 by Beebamom
Fusilli with tomato-mushrooms sauce and zucchini, onions, and garlic

Two weeks ago I made extra spaghetti sauce and froze it. Tonight all I needed to do was thaw the container of sauce and sauté a few more mushrooms to add to it. I decided to keep the zucchini as a side dish which I made simply by cooking up some onions and garlic and then adding the zucchini half-rounds. The only thing I would do differently is buy more zucchini!

Posted in Easy, Italian, Pasta, Vegan, Vegetables, Vegetarian, Weeknight dinners | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Grilled flank steak with grilled potato and broccoli. 10/4/22

Posted on October 5, 2022 by Beebamom
Grilled flank steak, broccoli, grilled potato

Just a reminder that all the pictures on my site are exactly what I eat. I lost 60 lbs. eating these dinners and by having reasonable breakfasts, lunches, and snacks. By cooking at home John and I can control the amounts of fats and carbs plus insure our portion sizes. In fact I read an article today from the Mayo Clinic which reported that limiting dining out was a indicator of weight loss success.

Flank steak is an economical beef choice and is quit lean. It only takes about five minutes to cook on the grill. To go along with the steak I gave John a split potato that I had microwaved. A little char on the potato makes it even better. Tonight’s vegetable was sautéed broccoli. The vegetables are always the first thing I eat. So delicious!

Posted in American, Beef, Easy, Grilling, Healthy tips, Vegetables | Tagged | 1 Comment