Fusilli with mushrooms, broccoli, and kale 10/18/22

Posted on October 19, 2022 by Beebamom

Fusilli with mushrooms, broccoli, and kale

Tonight we were supposed to have a tofu bowl for dinner. However apparently no one told the avocado it was supposed to be ripe by Tuesday and so it sits stubbornly in its clipped paper bag with only an apple as a companion. I picked an unripe avocado on purpose when I went to the store last Friday. I wanted to make sure it would stay unripe until Tuesday. As of right now it looks like we will not be eating a tofu bowl until at least Thursday.

So, what to do. I still wanted to go the vegan/vegetarian route and I want to save the pita and hummus meal for a hotter day. Pasta to the rescue. It takes no convincing anybody at our house to eat pasta. I had some broccoli that definitely needed eating and some new kale that would make a nice base. I cooked the mushrooms first, followed by the onions and garlic. When the pasta went into the boiling water I added the broccoli to the vegetables and kept them on low. The fusilli was done in about 7 minutes and I turned up the heat under the vegetables and the pasta joined them. I added about a cup of pasta water and cooked it all together for three minutes. A small glug of olive oil and a few basil leaves finished the dish.

Posted in Easy, Methods, Pasta, Vegan, Vegetables, Vegetarian, Weeknight dinners | Tagged | 1 Comment

Buffalo chicken wings and salad. 10/17/22

Posted on October 18, 2022 by Beebamom
Crispy Buffalo wings and salad

When I suggested we have chicken on Monday John voted for these chicken wings. This is the ultimate easy dinner and probably one of the more expensive ways to eat chicken wings without getting them at a restaurant or as take-out. We bought a frozen, prepared bag of wings and just heated them in the oven according to the package instructions.

Since I like the flats and John likes the drumettes we are the perfect couple for wing eating. Along with our easy wings I bought a Taylor Farms chopped salad that came with Buffalo ranch dressing. The celery and carrot sticks we made ourselves.

I think we need to find a good baked-in-the-oven Buffalo chicken wing recipe because these wings are not part of my healthy eating lifestyle!

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

Dininglite.blog – The Weekly Menu

Posted on October 16, 2022 by Beebamom
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Grilled burgers and bean salad. 10/15/22

Posted on October 16, 2022 by Beebamom
Grilled hamburger with onion and bean salad (aka Texas Caviar)

Even though I had to eat practically nothing all day to fit this hamburger into my diet regimen, it was worth it. Every once in a while I just crave eating like a normal (American) person. You know, a hamburger on an actual bun that has a top and a bottom. Normally I only eat open-faced sandwiches, bread on the bottom and a lettuce leaf on top so I can hold my “sandwich” in my hand. So the hamburger with its bun is a real luxury. John cooked them perfectly even though it was too dark outside for him to see what he was doing.

I made a bean salad which had black beans, black eyed peas, corn, tomatoes, onion, scallions, carrots, celery, red bell pepper, and a Serrano chile for a little zing. I dressed it with an almost fat-free Italian dressing comprised of Good Seasons mix, cider vinegar, water, and one teaspoon of olive oil. To emulsify the mixture and thicken it since it is mostly water, I use 1/4 teaspoon xanthan gum. The salad is seasoned with plenty of salt, cumin, and 5 shakes of Tabasco. We ate the entire bowlful!

Posted in American, Beef, Grilling, Healthy tips, Legumes, Methods, Salad, Vegetables | Tagged | Leave a comment

Lentil stew with turkey sausage and kale. 10/14/22

Posted on October 15, 2022 by Beebamom

Lentil stew with turkey sausage and kale

This dinner consists of lentils cooked with onions, garlic, carrots, and celery with sautéed turkey sausage added at the end and served over a bed of kale. Every time we make a pot of this we eat the whole thing. It is so tasty and good for us!

Posted in Easy, Legumes, Poultry, stew, Vegetables | Tagged | Leave a comment

Eleventh anniversary of my blog! And eggplant parmesan pasta. 10/13/22

Posted on October 14, 2022 by Beebamom

Wow, I have been recording my dinners almost every day for 11 years! I started out just putting in pictures of my dinner plate but have evolved to making comments and tips on how to make the dinners I eat and even include a few recipes. I enjoy looking back over the various dinners we have had and get ideas for future dishes. Also sometimes I think to myself, “Oh, that was so good! I wonder why I haven’t made it again!” Anyway, dininglite.blog will always be exactly what I eat. It helps me to stay accountable to eating in a healthy manner which so far has made my life better. I am glad you are here. Thanks for being part of my food journey.

Eggplant Parmesan Pasta

Eggplant parmesan pasta

I love eggplant parmesan but I do not love frying eggplant. So to make this healthier dish I cut the eggplant in cubes and sprayed them with olive oil spray and roasted the cubes in a 425F oven for 25 minutes. I also made tomato sauce with a large can of fire-roasted tomatoes, tomato paste, olive oil, onions, garlic, dried oregano and pepper flakes but you can just use your favorite jarred sauce if you want. To assemble the dish I placed some kale on the bottom of my bowl, followed by fusilli that I had finished in the sauce, then the eggplant cubes, some shredded mozzarella, more tomato sauce, and grated parmesan cheese on top.

It was soooo good! It tasted very much like the fried version but without all the oil. We are definitely having this again!!

Posted in Healthy tips, Italian, Methods, Pasta, Vegetables, Vegetarian, Weeknight dinners | Tagged , | 2 Comments

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