Comfort Food

Snacks are always in order at our house. This week zucchini pizza poppers fit the bill (besides giving me a chance to use some of my newly purchased coconut flour). These are moist and cheesy with a pizza taste but not a pizza carb count. I couldn't find sugar free marinara and I didn't take the time to make my own, so I just used a little regular purchased pasta sauce. In addition, I left out the pepperoni, but added some onion and mushrooms. Though the recipe uses a cake pop maker to create pretty, perfectly round tasty bites, I put mine in a mini muffin pan and they turned out just fine. Here's the link: http://247lowcarbdiner.blogspot.com/2013/07/zucchini-pizza-poppers.html

Today's comforting dinner featured dressed up mac and cheese, which is one of my favorite dishes any time, any where. This version has Dreamfield's pasta and a cream-based cheese sauce. I am consistently happy with low carb sauces since I started using xanthan gum to thicken them. I sprinkled 1/4 teaspoon of xanthan gum over two tablespoons of melted butter, stirred a few seconds and added 1 cup heavy cream mixed with 1 cup water. After the butter was incorporated, I sprinkled another 1/4 teaspoon over the top and stirred until the sauce was thick. Then I added 8 ounces of shredded pizza cheese. Finally, I mixed the sauce with the cooked pasta, sautéed veggies (left over from this morning's quiche) and finely diced ham; poured it into a casserole dish, and baked it for 30 minutes at 350 degrees. It tasted like homemade heaven to me!

Of course, comfort food frequently entails sweet treats. At my son's behest I made some vanilla sugar cookies for the guys. These are full carb and full sugar. Though I did lick the beater, I did not eat a single cookie (yet)!






On the other hand, I also made some low sugar peanut butter cookies. The recipe uses rice flour, but I used almond flour instead. In addition, the recipe calls for 1/3 cup of sugar, so I substituted about 1/6 cup of stevia. In the end, the cookies were not very sweet, so a little might be better. However, I used some leftover sugar free frosting to make mini sandwich cookies which are really good. The texture on these cookies is a little perplexing, though. At first bite they seem dry, but once chewed a little, they stick to the roof of your mouth just like a spoonful of peanut butter. In the end, they turned out alright, but I probably won't make them again because there seem to be so many other cookie recipe choices. Here's the link if you want to have a look: http://www.mygfgirlfriend.com/2013/07/easy-low-sugar-peanut-butter-cookies-gluten-free/

 Another sweet treat we tried this week is iced chai latte, which turned out sweet and creamy. I started with three 12 ounce cups of strongly brewed chai tea. (I let them steep about 30 minutes and thoroughly squeezed the tea bag to get the most out of each one.) Next, I mixed in 1/4 cup of sugar free vanilla syrup and 1 1/3 cup cream + water. (The recipe called for milk, but I used about 3/4 cup heavy cream mixed with water to make 1 1/3 cups of liquid.) I assume almond milk would also work, especially since the syrup provides a good deal of sweetener. Finally, sprinkle in some cinnamon and refrigerate the whole concoction. (We tried it over ice, but that seemed to dilute it too much.) I think the mixture tastes like a chai latte I recently had at a little Thai restaurant downtown.







Since it's Sunday, comfort food must include something for breakfast throughout the week. While I enjoyed the little popovers with a ham crust last week, today I went with tried and true - sautéed veggies (onions, mushrooms, zucchini, tomatoes) and Parmesan cheese quiche. It puffed up so prettily, I almost had to cut into it for lunch.

 

A Little Help from Mom

Now that school's in full swing, I have to plan meals a little further in advance than during the summer. Previously, this meant flipping through cookbooks for anything that looked interesting or putting a couple of ingredients into my favorite search engine hoping to find some good recipes. Of course, the time it takes to sift through all those can be problematic. Enter Pinterest and my mom. Thankfully, once Mom's finished her cooking, cleaning, and gardening for the day, she takes a break to play with her online bulletin boards before moving on to reading or crafting. (Makes me tired thinking about it.) This is especially good news for me because when I'm looking for something to make (in the way of foods or crafts), all I have to do is click on her name. Though she has 51 boards and 19,000 pins, they are well organized and offer a plethora of tempting photos and tasty ingredients. This week I took a look at her low carb dinners and snacks to come up with a menu of goodies that includes Sausage Squash Casserole ( http://www.sugarfreelowcarbrecipes.com/?p=110 ), Parmesan Meatloaf ( http://mommyimhungry.blogspot.com/2012/02/parmesan-meatloaf-gluten-free.html ) , Cheese Steak Stuffed Peppers ( http://afewshortcuts.com/2013/01/cheese-steak-stuffed-peppers/ ), Smoked Gouda Soufflé ( http://www.ibreatheimhungry.com/2011/08/smoked-gouda-souffles-w-sauteed.html ), and Chocolate Brownie Mug Cake ( http://www.ibreatheimhungry.com/2013/05/chocolate-brownie-mug-cake-low-carb-gluten-free.html ) along with the goodies below. I guess this just goes to show that a body's never too old for a little help. Thanks Mom!

 I began the day (after talking to my Mom, of course) by making this wonderful Smothered Chicken. While the chicken breasts bake, creamed spinach (complete with cream cheese and Parmesan cheese) and sautéed mushrooms get going on the cook top. Halfway through baking, all the goodies go on top of the chicken along with slices of mozzarella which melt and brown during the remaining cooking time. This little treat was the best chicken dish I've eaten in quite awhile. And, best of all, there are plenty of leftovers for this week's lunches. (I used a 2.5 pound bag of frozen chicken breasts and cooked them without defrosting.) Here's the link: http://baconbuttercheesegarlic.blogspot.com/2013/02/a-special-meal-for-my-valentine.html

Once lunch was over (which the guys snarfed down pretty quickly), I set my sites on making breakfast for the week. While this recipe did not come from Pinterest, it did come from a friend's posting on Facebook. Lazy Eggs, which consists of making muffin sized quiches with a ham crust, are pretty ingenious and super easy. Spray a muffin pan with Pam, put a piece of ham into each cup. (I used two very thinly sliced pieces of baked ham lunch meat.) Add a little cheese (in this case, mozzarella left over from the smothered chicken), and an egg. (The recipe calls for breaking an egg into each cup, but I like mine scrambled. So I broke the eggs into a bowl and whisked in some olive and tomato bruschetta topping from the fridge before pouring them into the cups.) Twenty minutes at 350 degrees yielded 12 tasty breakfasts for the week. There are many variations of this on the web and on Pinterest, many of which use a slice of bacon instead of the ham - maybe next week!

With breakfast taken care of, I decided we needed something to snack on during T.V. time. (After all, one mustn't watch Downtown Abbey without a martini and munchies.) Enter Sausage Roll Bites which I made with some leftover grilled hot dogs in the freezer. These are excellent - a little crusty on the outside and tender on the inside - making them a kind of upscale pig-in-a-blanket. I'm sure they'd be even better with a nice sausage, but I like to use up those leftovers. These would make easy appetizers or even a quick start to the day using pieces of breakfast sausage links instead of dinner sausage. Just about any little meat morsel would be good as a center to this breading. In addition, since the recipe calls for coconut oil, it's a good way to get your daily dose. While I was perusing the site this recipe came from , I also found Zucchini Pizza Poppers, so take a look around while you're there.
Here's the link for the sausage bites: http://247lowcarbdiner.blogspot.com/2013/05/yummy-breakfast.html

Finally, we needed something sweet which usually means cookies at our house. While these are not extremely low carb, they are better than many treats, and they're really easy. My go-to treat is cookies made from a cake mix. (It's just too easy.) So, today I used a sugar free cake mix and sugar free icing, both of which seem to be readily available at the grocery (and Walmart and Target). Since everything was vanilla, I stirred some sugar free raspberry Jello into the icing, which gave it a delicate color and a fairly intense flavor. Since they are sugar free but not carb free, I only ate one sandwich cookie, and I couldn't tell the difference between these and the full sugar variety I've made in the past. (I've decided I'd really rather eat less of something really good than more of something that is only so-so.) My son, who is a sandwich cookie fiend, couldn't tell the difference either. I don't think these will last very long!

All in all, I had a full day of cooking with the guys hanging out in the kitchen to keep me company. Who could ask for more? Enjoy!

(P.S. If you're looking for my mom's  cool Pinterest boards, here's a link: http://pinterest.com/gra6/ )

 

Cooking Day

Now that our last hoorah of vacation is over and we're back at school, time is at a premium. While I'd love to say that I'm June Cleaver incarnate and whip up a fabulous breakfast, lunch, and dinner daily, that would be an outright lie. Instead, I try to spend my Sundays cooking several items we can eat throughout the week. (Staying on track with the weight loss means no more frozen pizzas tossed in the oven because I have papers to grade!)

Breakfast is a must when living on a bell schedule that barely gives a body time to have a sip of coffee, let alone eat a snack. Last year I made sausage, egg, and cheese biscuits in advance to be popped into the microwave each morning. Since I haven't tried baking low carb biscuits yet, it seemed best to stick to something I've enjoyed all summer - frittata (or quiche minus the crust). So, after cooking up a package of bacon for the fridge, I took advantage of that yummy grease and sautéed chopped veggies (green onions, bell pepper, tomato, a few mushrooms) to add to my base of six eggs and a cup of heavy cream. (The cream makes this rich and fluffy!) Some Parmesan cheese and plenty of pepper round out the add-ins. After 40 minutes in the oven, this beauty is ready to go into the fridge supplying four days worth of breakfast. (Of course, you could crumble some bacon in, too, but I really like mine on the side. Ham, though, is a different story!)

Next, something to snack on during the week seemed to be in order. A couple weeks ago I thumbed through some recipes looking for foods to adapt to my new lifestyle. One of the recipes that caught my eye was for classic cheese straws. These are made with butter, flour, grated cheddar cheese, salt, and cayenne pepper, so the only change I made was to substitute almond flour for the regular flour. Mine spread a little more than I anticipated, but they are delicious - tender on the top and slightly crispy on the bottom with a rich, buttery-cheesy flavor. Next time, I'll be making a double-batch of these. (Recipe: In a food processor, combine one stick of softened butter, 8 ounces of grated cheddar cheese, 1 1/2 cups almond flour, one teaspoon salt, and cayenne pepper to taste. I used about 1/4 teaspoon, but next time I'll probably put in 1/2 teaspoon. Pipe the soft dough onto foil lined baking sheets and cook at 300 degrees for about 15 minutes.) I might refrigerate the dough to minimize the spreading. They're tasty as is, but didn't really hold their cheese straw shape.

Before deciding on what kind of lunch/dinner items to put in the fridge, I surveyed the remaining leftovers, which included two helpings of yesterday's beef stroganoff, a couple of teriyaki shrimp kabobs, and one foil baked chicken breast with veggies. Unfortunately, this cheesy pasta bake was all gone. (Boy, did it go fast!) Some of the best dinners seem to be things made up with what's in the fridge (primarily, some leftover cheese sauce that was a little too thick and lumpy). After putting it back on the burner, adding some white wine, a little lemon juice (the acid binds the cheese to the wine making it saucier) and a fair amount of stirring, I came up with a lovely, velvety cheese sauce which begged for pasta. So, I tossed some Dreamfields low carb penne into a pot and sautéed a variety of left over veggies from the fridge along with a pound of ground beef with a good dose of pepper and Italian seasonings. After everything was done simmering, I simply put it all together in a baking dish and gave it 30 minutes in the oven at 350 degrees. I think the cheese sauce - with its white wine and smooth texture - made this sort of average casserole into something extra special.

Finally, I ended the day with a double batch of fried chicken, which makes excellent leftovers. I always use boneless, skinless chicken breast cut into tenders because I like not having to deal with the bones and getting all white meat. In addition, since almond flour browns a little faster, smaller pieces help ensure the chicken is cooked through in less time. (The only complaint I have about the almond flour is that it tends to turn the oil dark and seems to absorb more of it.) Tonight's fare was nothing fancy, but definitely tasty. I just mixed an egg with some heavy cream to douse the tenders in before rolling them in seasoned almond flour. (I also seasoned the raw chicken with salt and pepper before dunking.) I fried the chicken four pieces at a time in a deep pot. Since I was only cooking a few tenders at a time, I kept it warm in the oven, which also gave the meat time to rest and the coating time to shed any excess grease.

While cooking several items each Sunday can be a chore, I like having plenty of leftovers in the fridge heading into the week. Not to mention, the house smells good and the guys tend to hang with me while I'm cooking - just in case I need someone to sample items as we go. Enjoy!