Sausage and Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

Today, I modified an awesome recipe for stuffed peppers. While the recipe called for couscous, chickpeas, and feta cheese, I substituted quinoa and sausage. It was delicious, incredibly healthy, and totally in line with our paleo experiment.

Sausage and Quinoa Stuffed Peppers

two red bell peppers
two yellow bell peppers
package of Mediterranean spiced quinoa
pound of ground hot Italian sausage

1. Cut the tops off the bell peppers and remove any and all seeds and white meat along the insides.
2. Place the peppers in a large pot of water and bring to a boil. Boil for 7 minutes or until tender. When done, drain and set the peppers aside.
3. Meanwhile, cook the quinoa according to the package directions (basically bring to a boil for about 15 minutes, then cover, cool, and fluff).
4. Also, meanwhile, brown the ground sausage in a skillet.
5. When everything is done cooking mix the quinoa and sausage together.
6. Fill peppers with sausage and quinoa mix.
7. Enjoy!

I really enjoyed the healthy mix of tastes, but my husband added sriacha sauce to give it a little more kick. If you like, you can add hot pepper flakes to the quinoa and sausage mix to give your meal a little more heat or add hot sauce as needed while eating.

Chicken Stir Fry

After talking to a good friend of ours who has recently embarked on a paleo diet journey, my husband suggested that he and I attempt something similar. I've been pretty bad about my diet lately, defaulting to premade meals or going out to eat or slacking off and eating ramen or cereal or frozen foods. And yet, after going to the doctor for my insurance check-in, I found out I've lost over 20 pounds anyway!

So I'm motivated to try again with some new recipes. Also, I think the stricter ideas behind the paleo diet will help me restrict caloric intake without having to track every single calorie every time. Now, note, the husband and I will not be doing the full paleo. We're hesitant to give up carbs completely now that we're climbing regularly, and I hit the gym about three times a week for cardio. Also, I love cheese. So the thought of completely forsaking cheese is a little blasphemous.

Still, our modified paleo will be more strict than previous incarnations of my diets. We'll be limiting grain and starch as well as dairy intakes to once a day. So if I throw cheese into an omelette for breakfast, there's no more dairy for the day.

With that in mind, I'm embracing a whole bunch of gluten free recipes. Tonight I made a wonderful chicken stir fry that didn't even need rice or noodles. Of course, the husband may eat his leftovers over some ramen for lunch tomorrow, but that's his gluten for the day.

So here it is. Let me know if you like it!

Chicken Stir Fry


1 lb chicken
sesame and ginger marinade (premade, but we had it in the pantry, so I had to use it!)
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 tsp minced garlic
2 tsp grated ginger (I used the powdered ginger, and it worked fine. I imagine fresh would rock though.)
2 large carrots
half pound snap peas
two cups mushrooms
1 cup chicken broth
t tbsp cornstarch

1. Chop up the chicken into bite size pieces, removing any extra skin or tendons.
2. Cover in the marinade and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes. The longer you marinate, the stronger the taste, but really I only needed about 30 minutes to have amazing juicy chicken.
3. Chop up veggies. Carrots should be cut up into sections about the length of your smallest finger and then cut lengthwise from there until fairly thin. Snap peas are good just in half, and mushrooms generally sliced.
4. Mix together the soy sauce, garlic and ginger in the bottom of the wok. Heat up to medium heat. My wok heats ridiculously fast, so I just put it up to about 250 and the soy sauce immediately started bubbling.
5. Heat that up for about two minutes.
6. Add chicken and cook thoroughly, mixing in the sauce fully. This takes about five minutes.
7. Add the carrots and mix well.
8. When they start getting a little soft, add the snap peas.
9. When they start getting soft, add the mushrooms.
10. Finally, when the mushrooms start to change their color slightly, add 1/2 cup the chicken broth. Allow this to come to a nice bubbling broth and let some of the broth cook off.
11. Meanwhile mix the remaining broth and cornstarch. Add as the last and let it cook off a bit more of the liquid.
12. Enjoy alone or if you want to put on noodles or rice, feel free. The sauce is pretty amazing and would be great with something to absorb it, but that defeated the gluten-free part of it for us.

You can also add some red pepper flakes in with the soy sauce for a bit more heat.

Tuna Casserole

Today was an absolutely gorgeous day with no rain, 75 degree weather, so no comfort food needed here. I wanted something easy, light and delicious, especially since I was having dinner alone tonight.

Tuna casserole it is!

It's so easy to make this with WAAAY too many calories by adding too much cheese or mayo and milk. So skip all of that. I aimed for an easier method that would contain the calories by using a mixture that premeasures my calories. Cream of something soups!

Achieved a perfect creaminess, added veggies, and had enough room to have seconds. YUM!

Ingredients

12 oz noodles (I actually used a little less as I was combining the leftover noodles from other dishes. I had elbow macaroni and rotini/spiral pasta. Both enriched with nutrients.)

2 cans tuna fish (packed in water, not oil. Oil adds too many calories and makes the fish too fishy tasting.)

2 small cans of peas and carrots

1 can cream of mushroom soup

1 can cream of chicken soup (Actually if you want to skip this and do two cans of mushroom soup, you can cut some unnecessary calories without skimping on taste.)

salt and pepper

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350.

2. Boil the noodles according to the directions on the package.

3. Meanwhile, heat up the cans of condensed soup. Season a bit with salt and pepper. Be careful not to bring to a boil, but just simmer at a low heat while the noodles boil.

4. When the soups begin to bubble, add the peas and carrots and the tuna fish. Stir together.

5. After the noodles finish, drain, rinse, and return to the pot.

6. Add the soup and tuna fish mixture and stir completely.

7. Put the noodle mixture into a glass baking dish and put in the oven. (If you're not worried about calories and want the taste to be a bit richer, you can add cheese on top at this point.)

8. Bake for 30 minutes.

9. Serves 8. Enjoy!

Nutritional Information (8 servings)

Calories: 170

Total Fat: 4.4g

Saturated Fat: 1.2g

Cholesterol: 28mg

Sodium: 623mg

Total Carbs: 19.2g

Dietary Fiber: 2.0g

Sugars: 0.5g

Protein: 13.6g

Vitamin A: 39%

Vitamin C: 4%

Calcium: 2%

Iron: 8%

Healthy Chicken Parmesan

Well, I haven't cooked an original meal in quite a few days. There have been a lot of meals out, scrounging for food, unoriginal salads with added protein, and other excuses not to cook. Today though, was rainy and just begging for a good comfort meal.

I don't know about you, but Italian food just screams comfort food to me. Something about the warm richness, the interplay between cheese and red sauce, it just does something for me. So when I came across this really easy and healthy recipe, I decided to try it out. It's not quite as rich as many chicken parm recipes, but that's probably because it is really straightforward and is so low cal. Try it, because it's surprisingly delicious and filling.

Ingredients

1 pound chicken (about three breasts each cut in half)

1 can diced tomatoes

1 can tomato sauce

2/3 cup parmesan cheese, divided

1tsp flour

basil

oregano

rosemary

salt

pepper

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425.

2. In a shallow baking dish, place chicken breasts in a single layer. Sprinkle with salt and pepper followed by a mixture of 1/3 cup parmesan cheese and flour.

3. Bake for about 20 minutes or until they start just getting browned on the top.

4. While the chicken is cooking, mix the tomatoes and herbs in a saucepan. Heat to a boil and then simmer on low heat until slightly reduced. I mixed the herbs until I got a taste I liked. The recipe called for garlic, too, but the garlic I had went bad, so I skipped it.

5. Remove chicken from oven and pour the sauce over it. Sprinkle with the remaining cheese. Reduce the temperature to 360, and then bake for about 15 more minutes.

6. Serve with veggies of your choice. Also, help yourself to two servings if you're hungry. There's plenty of wiggle room with these!

Nutritional Info (Makes 6 Servings)

Calories: 116

Total Fat: 1.0 g

Cholesterol: 43 mg

Sodium: 83 mg

Total Carbohydrates: 5.5g

Dietary Fiber 2.2g

Sugars: 3.3g

Protein: 17.3g

Vitamin A: 9%

Vitamin C: 9%

Calcium: 1%

Iron: 3%

Chinese Breakfast and Salad Day

After the bottle of wine last night, I woke up a little bit hungover and craving Chinese. Luckily I had an option here in the house and didn't have to order in. Trader Joe's Chicken Gyoza potsickers are easy to make, curb my cravings, and are not an entirely unhealthy option. Granted, I could have made a much healthier decision, but I'd still be craving Chinese, and might cave and order something far less healthy.

So yes, I had potstickers for breakfast. I'm an adult. We can do that!

I went with the full serving size, in part so I didn't have to do any math. (Hangover, remember?) I washed the whole thing down with a sparkling water, so the carbonation could calm my stomach and I didn't incur any more calories.

Breakfast:

Trader Joe's Chicken Gyoza Potstickers (7)

Target Brand Sparkling Water

Nutritional Info on Breakfast:

Calories: 230

Carb: 36g

Protein: 13g

Fat: 3.5g

Saturated Fat: 0.5g

Cholesterol: 30mg

Sodium: 640 mg

Fiber: 2g

Sugars: 2g

Vitamin A: 0 IU

Vitamin C: 9 mg

Calcium: 20 mg

Iron: mg: 2.7 mg

Potassium: 0 mg

Not an awful way to start the day, but certainly not the best choice. Besides, by the time 2 o'clock came around, I was hungry again and dying for some vegetables. Specifically I was craving avocado again. (Ok, so it's technically a fruit. It's still green!) I decided to go out and eat at a place that had outdoor seating and would prepare my food for me.

Taco Mac just opened up the corner, and I remembered they make an amazing Shrimp and Avocado salad. So I grabbed some of my writing, drove up the street, found a nice table on the patio, and ordered a salad. It was so good! Exactly what I wanted. It has blue cheese, black beans, and tomatoes in addition to blackened shrimp and creamy avocado. I ordered honey mustard on the side and used only a tiny portion; the salad didn't need it!

Nutritional Info on Lunch:

Calories: 530

Carb: 40g

Protein: 25g

Fat: 33g

Saturated Fat: 6.5g

Cholesterol: 155mg

Sodium: 1310 mg (Whoops! Too high)

Fiber: 15g

Sugars: 14g

Vitamin A: 16000 IU (Wow. Good on Vitamin A today!)

Vitamin C: 36 mg

Calcium: 250 mg

Iron: 4.5 mg

Potassium: 0 mg

Then I didn't get hungry for dinner until around 8. I had originally planned to make Chicken Pot Pie, but after that salad, I really wasn't wanting anything so heavy. Husband wasn't hungry either and was craving a smoothie. What a great idea!

I whipped up a fruit smoothie with a cup of strawberries, half a cup of mixed berries, and a cup of 2% milk. I forgot to sweeten it, so it could have used some honey. But it was still good.

Smoothie Nutritional Info:

Calories: 173

Carb: 34g

Protein: 5.5g

Fat: 2.9g

Saturated Fat: 1.5g

Cholesterol: 9.8mg

Sodium: 54 mg

Fiber: 7.2g

Sugars: 21g

Vitamin A: 380 IU

Vitamin C: 106 mg

Calcium: 188 mg

Iron: 2mg

Potassium: 510mg

I was a little low on calories by the time I finished, so I made a quick Tuna salad with a touch of mustard and some shredded carrots atop a bed of spinach. Now, I'm ridiculously full and I hit my calorie goals and many of my nutritional goals as well. Yay, healthy day.

Nutritional Info on Dinner:

Calories: 233.9

Carb: 7.2g

Protein: 43.5g

Fat: 1.7g

Saturated Fat: 0.4g

Cholesterol: 50mg

Sodium: 251 mg (not the best)

Fiber: 2.7 g

Sugars: 3.1 g

Vitamin A: 13,597 IU (Damn)

Vitamin C: 12.2 mg

Calcium: 69.2 mg

Iron: 3.5 mg

Potassium: 763 mg

So I did an awesome job on calories, carbs, protein, Vitamins A & C, & even fiber. I feel pretty good about my choices today despite my potsticker breakfast. Even though I didn't spend much time cooking, I had a very healthy day.

Absence Followed by a Good Day

I apologize for disappearing for quite a few days. My life has encountered a few crises/tragedies/events which have prevented me from writing much of anything. I've only just been able to keep up with the writing that pays my bills, so my non-paying/joyful writing in my blogs and novels has taken a bit of a back seat for a bit.

I'm back now, though, and should be for some time.

So, I've received a request from one of my friends. I've managed to drop over 10 but less than 20 pounds in two months. This is a great record, and I'm proud of it. But just sharing my favorite recipes doesn't share much in the way of my mistakes, missteps, failures, and cheats... of which there are many. So, I'm going to start laying it bare. You're going to be able to call me out when I stop at Burger King for a Whopper because I'm lazy or cave and get a 700 calorie chicken quesadilla because I just want it!

So, gods help me, I'm going to attempt to be honest online in front of everyone...

Today's menu:

Lunch:

So, it's the weekend, and breakfast is rarely something I do anyway. At most, I have a glass of water and wait until I'm hungry around noon. Maybe it's not healthy, but I really don't like to eat when I'm not hungry. So I eat when I feel like it. And at 1:45, after waking up at 10:30, I was starving. So I made an epic sandwich.

Turkey Sandwich:

2 slice whole wheat bread

4 slices honey smoked turkey breast

1 slice provolone

1 cup spinach

1 tsp dijon mustard

1 tsp light mayoniase

I toasted the bread to give it better texture. there's nothing I hate more than a mealy, soft sandwich. If I can't get a hard roll of bakery bread, I'm toasting the crap out of my bread to come somewhere near the texture. Adding the spinach gave it a touch more of crunch to my sandwich. I probably could have skipped the cheese, but, um, yum. Screw a few calories. :)

I washed the monstrous thing down with some sparkling and calorie-free flavored water. Perfect.

Nutritional Info on Lunch:

Calories: 315

Carb: 29g

Protein: 22g

Fat: 12g

Saturated Fat: 4.9g

Cholesterol: 30mg

Sodium: 1103 mg (not the best)

Fiber: 4.5g

Sugars: 5.2g

Vitamin A: 3,015 IU

Vitamin C: 8.4 mg

Calcium: 240 mg

Iron: mg: 2.6mg

Potassium: 306mg

Dinner was an extravagant affair, to say the least. Many Sundays (and Saturdays, and Wednesdays), especially ones in which the weather cooperates so incredibly as it did today, my friends and I get together to cook a communal dinner. Oh, who am I kidding? We do it as often as we possibly can. Nothing beats getting together with your favorite people, sharing food and drinks, and generally enjoying a wonderful evening together. Any excuse to get together? We'll take it.

So tonight was one of our "Please let it be officially spring so we can grill out more" dinners. We chose steaks and veggies for dinner, and I was in charge of a healthy dessert. I got about a bite into my own steak before stealing my husband's far bloodier steak (my steak had better be bleeding and mooing to be worth it!), so I only got a small portion of a steak, which was actually perfect for me. Here's my results for the night:

Steak/Top Sirloin (mostly sure that's what we were eating, but cooked rare for me over the grill)

Grilled Thick Stalk Asparagus, marinated in a seasoned salt, olive oil mixture

Full cap mushrooms

Tomatoes

Fresh Basil

Asiago Cheese Loaf in olive oil and pepper (or whatever juices available)

While the nutritional facts differ depending on if you added balsamic vinegar to the tomatoes topped with fresh basil or ate your whole slice of Asiago loaf and dipped it in the olive oil or vinegar, and whether you ate the whole steak or a quarter of a slab like I did, these are the approximations:

Calories: 374 (Again, ate only a little steak. I credited it as half a steak, but I imagine it was a quarter of a serving.)

Carbs: 42g

Protein: 31g
Fat: 11.8g

Saturated Fat: 3.9g

Cholesterol: 61mg

Sodium: 1566mg

Fiber: 6.8g

Sugars: 7g

Vitamin A: 1590 IU

Vitamin C: 56 mg

Calcium: 43mg

Iron: 4.4mg

Potassium: 769mg

On top of all of that, I had dessert and at least 20 fl oz of wine! And I still did fairly okay with my stats.

My desserts were largely fruit based with a little bit of sweets. I gave everyone my favorite dessert of angel food cake with whipped cream and berries. Usually, my mother serves it with ice cream rather than whipped cream, but I chose to substitute a light whipped cream and no one complained! The fact that the berries were amazingly delicious probably helped.

Angel Food cake (divided into 12/ths)

Strawberries (at least 1 cup per person)

Blackberries (about 1/4 cup per person)

Raspberries (about 1/4 cup per person) --in my defense, these berries are off season so they're a bit more expensive than other fruits available right now

Cool Whipped Topping Lite (4Tbsp-1/4cup)

Calories: 192

Carbs: 41g

Protein: 3.6g
Fat: 3.1g

Saturated Fat: 2g

Cholesterol: 0mg

Sodium: 212mg

Fiber: 7.3g

Sugars: 12.6g

Vitamin A: 105 IU

Vitamin C: 105 mg

Calcium: 82 mg

Iron: 1.2 mg

Potassium: 363 mg

In addition to all of this (I know... I'm such a glutton on the weekends!), I had about a bottle of wine across a few bottles in the night. I'm estimating this at about a full bottle of red (One, because it has more calories, so it makes me harsher on myself. Two, because I had one more glass of red than I did of white, and it's too much work to calculate the many different types of wine. If I had to calculate all: riesling, half a glass of cab sav, and two and a half reds.)

Wine:

Calories: 451

Carbs: 13.9 g

Protein: 0.4 g
Fat: 0 g

Saturated Fat: 0 g

Cholesterol: 0 mg

Sodium: 21 mg

Fiber: 0 g

Sugars: 3.3 g

Vitamin A: 10.6IU

Vitamin C: 0 mg

Calcium: 43mg

Iron: 2.4mg

Potassium: 674mg

At the end of the day, I went a bit overboard with calories (1,333 instead of 1200). If I had cut out the wine, it probably would have been a picture perfect day. I'm a bit too high on the sodium, didn't hit my fiber or iron or potassium goals (though I never do!), and was slightly too high on the calorie count. Frankly, though, I feel it was a perfect nutritional day, despite those lapses. I had a good mix of veggies, protein, carbs, and nutrients. I could have done better on some, and I could have abstained from drinking and done MUCH better on my calorie count.

And yet, these sorts of evenings make everything worthwhile. Eating is not a matter of consuming nutrients or earning energy or making good choices. It's about the experience of being with my friends and really experiencing a wide range of tastes and experiences. Tonight was perfect, and though I went slightly over, no regrets.

More like this, please!

Lasagna Roll Ups

Here's another great recipe for leftovers. I like making dishes in big batches, so I don't have to cook every night if I don't want to, and so that the husband has some healthy lunches for work.

This one I got from Caloriecount.com, but have adapted to add meat for more protein, and expand for more servings.

Ingredients:

12 lasagna noodles

12 oz fat free ricotta cheese (The recipe called for 14, but I actually used closer to 12 oz, mostly because I used the ricotta in another dish a week or two ago.)

three cups spinach (I used fresh spinach and tore the leaves by hand.)

4 oz reduced fat mozzarella cheese

1/4 cup Parmesan cheese

1 medium egg

14 oz pasta sauce (The recipe called for a full bottle of pasta sauce, but I only ended up using about half that amount. You can add if you like, but I don't like too much sauce on mine.)

1 pound lean ground beef (You can of course skip this for an even healthier version. I'll include the nutrition information for both at the bottom.)

Directions:

1. Cook lasagna noodles according to the package directions. (Basically boil for about 10-12 minutes.)

2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

3. While water is boiling and oven is heating, in a large skillet, brown the ground beef, draining off any excess oil when done.

4. In a medium mixing bowl, combine the ricotta, mozzarella, Parmesan, spinach, egg, and cooked ground beef.

5. When noodles are done cooking, rinse them with cold water and spread out on a clean towel. You don't want them to stick to each other, and it's much easier to work with cooled noodles.

6. In a glass baking dish or two, pour about 1/2 cup of pasta sauce on the bottom of each, and spread it out so it covers the dish.

7. Spread the cheese and beef mixture on each cooked pasta noodle, like so.

8. Roll the cheesy noodles up into rolls.

9. Set in to the dish, seam side down (This will prevent them from unrolling while they cook.) and top with the rest of the pasta sauce (or with however much you want).

10. Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 35 minutes. The cheese will be nice and gooey and melted by then.

11. Enjoy!

Again, these make great lunches and are delicious single serve lasagna treats.

Nutrition Facts: with/without beef

makes 12 servings

Calories: 255/150

Total Fat: 11.6/4.7g

Saturated Fat: 5.1/2.5g

Cholesterol: 64/30mg

Sodium: 237/201mg

Total Carbs: 17.7/17.7g

Dietary Fiber: 1.1/1.1g

Sugars: 1.9/1.9g

Protein: 19.3/9.3g

Vitamin A: 21%

Vitamin C: 4/5%

Calcium: 18/17%

Iron: 13/7%

Filipino Rice Noodle Dish or Chicken Mei Fun

So haven't done much cooking in the past few days. The weekend took us to visit family, and most other days have been eating out or eating leftovers. But I did manage to make one of my favorite healthy meals this week.

I got this one from Suck It, Martha, and have adapted it according to the only size of rice noodles I have been able to find. Now, if you want to try this one, you need a HUGE wok to cook it in. Seriously, this thing makes like 12 servings, and they are pretty healthy-sized servings.

It also requires some serious veggies. I'm talking an entire head of cabbage, 4-5 carrots, 4-5 stalks of celery, and then some. But it's totally worth it. And the husband and I eat leftovers for lunch for a full week.

Ingredients:

4-5 carrots

4 stalks of celery

1 medium - large onion

4 cloves of garlic

1 head cabbage

1 pound mushrooms

1 pound of snap peas

1-1.5 pounds chicken, thighs work best

12 ounces rice noodles

2 tbsp vegetable oil

6 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp hoisin sauce

Directions:

1. Bring the chicken to a boil in about four cups of water.

2. Reduce the heat to a rolling boil and simmer 12-15 minutes or until cooked through.

3. When cooked, cool and shred and set aside. DON'T THROW OUT THE WATER! You need it later.

4. Meanwhile, using a food processor, shred the cabbage, carrots, and celery. Set them aside in a big bowl.

5. Separately shred the onions and keep them in another bowl.

6. Chop the mushrooms and garlic and add to the big bowl of veggies. (I know! It's a LOT of vegetables!)

7. Heat the oil in the wok and add the onions. Cook them until clear.

8. Throw in the rest of the chicken and the veggies (don't forget the snap peas). Carefully stir them as they cook.

9. Cook them long enough to soften up the snap peas, which doesn't take too long, less than 5 minutes, generally.

10. Add the chicken stock, soy sauce, and hoisin sauce, and bring them to a boil. Keep stirring.

11. Break the rice noodles up and add to the broth and veggies. By the time all of the water is absorbed the noodles should be fully cooked. However, some pieces may be a little brittle, so be sure to mix it all up completely.

12. Enjoy!

And wait until you see these nutrition facts! Since the dish is almost completely made of vegetables, and since rice noodles are so much healthier than any other pasta, the whole dish is amazingly good for you. And same disclaimer: these stats may not be perfectly accurate as they are just entered into a recipe analyzer, but they're enough to help you make good choices and estimate your intake. :)

Nutrition Facts:

makes 12 servings

Calories: 208

Total Fat: 1.4g

Saturated Fat: 0.4g

Cholesterol: 29mg

Sodium: 281mg

Total Carbs: 35.0g

Dietary Fiber: 3.9g

Sugars: 5.0g

Protein: 14.1g

Vitamin A: 56%

Vitamin C: 62%

Calcium: 6%

Iron: 11%

Parmesan Tilapia

First thing's first: I fit into my skinny jeans! After one month of being on this diet, I've managed to drop one size. Basically, I estimate that to be about 10 pounds. So yay! Eating healthy and watching everything I eat is really helping.

I am understandably proud of myself, and really enjoying coming up with new recipes to try.

Now on to tonight's dinner:

Husband and I fended for ourselves tonight, which meant I could make fish! I love fish. It's so good for you, so easy to make, and so tasty.

I discovered this recipe a couple weeks ago on Caloriecount.com and made it for one of my first diet dinners. I've adapted it slightly, and I make only single portions of it. Regardless, I'm repeating this excellent recipe tonight and posting here so you can also enjoy this delicious Parmesan Crusted Tilapia.

Ingredients:

1 tilapia fillet (Buy frozen and defrost by leaving one or how ever many you want in the refrigerator for a day.)

1/8 cup bread crumbs (You can actually estimate downward on this and the cheese, as you won't use a full 1/8 cup. I just shook some crumbs and cheese out onto a plate as much as I thought would be needed to cover my tilapia.)

1/8 cup grated Parmesan cheese

pinch of Paprika

1 egg

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375F.

2. Rinse the defrosted tilapia fillet to get rid of excessive fishiness or any skin.

3. Beat egg in a small bowl.

4. Mix bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, and paprika on a plate.

5. Dip tilapia in the egg mixture and coat on both sides.

6. Roll the tilapia in the bread mixture, being sure to coat both sides with the bread crumbs and cheese.

7. Set tilapia in a greased glass dish and then back it for about 12 minutes. Be sure to watch your oven, because tilapia cooks quickly. Leave it too long and it dries out.

Enjoy!

I served mine on a bed of spinach with Sun Dried Tomato vinaigrette dressing. Soo good! I have to convince my husband to like fish one of these days.

Nutritional Facts: 1 tilapia fillet

Calories: 218

Total Fat: 6.5g

Saturated Fat: 3.1g

Cholesterol: 113mg

Sodium: 346mg

Total Carbs: 10.6g

Dietary Fiber: 0.8g

Sugars: 1.1g

Protein: 29.2g

Vitamin A: 8%

Vitamin C: 1%

Calcium: 19%

Iron: 12%

Ham and Cheese Quiche

Yesterday I ate at a friend's house and had some delicious tacos from our favorite sketchy taco place. They use corn tortillas and no cheese, so the food is actually a lot healthier than any other "Mexican" restaurant around us. Of course, the fact that it's actual Mexican food, may help with the health level. Most Tex-Mex or imitation Mexican restaurants slather their food in cheese and use flour tortillas, so they're usually not the best choice for those of us counting calories.

Tonight, though, I'm making one of my husband's favorites: ham and cheese quiche. And here I was just bashing the cheese! Ah well, low fat Swiss helps keep me from too bad a meal. :)

This recipe is adapted from my mother's quiche, which uses heavy cream instead of milk. Granted, heavy cream does taste delicious, but it's not kind to my waist line.

Ingredients

1 frozen pie shell, unbaked, 9-inch

6 ounces shredded Swiss Cheese (on sale at Kroger this week, and I snagged the low-fat)

6 ounces diced ham (98% fat free)

4 medium eggs or 3 large ones (I usually get the large, but the medium was on sale. Are you noticing a trend with my ingredients? I almost only buy things when they're on sale!)

1 cup 2% milk

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375.

2. Spread the ham and cheese on the bottom of the pie shell. Be sure to mix them up. You don't want a layer of ham and then a layer of cheese.

3. Whip together the eggs, milk, and pepper. If you want, throw in a dash of something else. Cayenne pepper is really good. I used paprika this time, because I enjoy the slight complexity it gives to eggs.

4. Bake in the oven for 45-1hr or until the top starts browning like in the picture above.

5. Give it a minute or two to cool, and then slice into 6 even wedges. Serve with salad or other veggies if you don't claim salad is the food that food eats (*ahem* my husband).

There are so many ways you can play with this so simple recipe. My mother loves to add tomatoes or green peppers and onions. You can basically use any cheese you like or try doing bacon instead of ham. Just cook it first and put in the pie dish with the cheese, and pour the eggs on top. Yum!

Nutrition Facts:

This one's a bit high in saturated fat and cholesterol, so you better have eaten healthy the rest of the day!

(Disclaimer, based on caloriecount.about.com. May not be exactly accurate, but is a good general guideline.)

Per Serving (serves 6)

Calories: 324

Total Fat: 20.6g

Saturated Fat: 8.4g

Cholesterol: 140mg

Sodium: 616mg

Total Carbs: 16.1g

Dietary Fiber: 0.6g

Sugars: 4.5g

Protein: 18.0g

Vitamin A: 9%

Vitamin C: 2%

Calcium: 32%

Iron: 7%

Parmesan Chicken

I had already defrosted some chicken, and not wanting anything to complicated for dinner tonight I went through a handful of healthy recipes I had gathered to find the one with the shortest prep and cook time.

Bingo! Parmesan-Seared Chicken!

All you need is about fifteen minutes, a pound of chicken, Dijon mustard, grated parmesan, and some olive oil. Plus, with veggies on the side, the whole meal is only 455 calories.

I got the recipe from Caloriecount.com, which is also where I keep track of all of my calories.

Ingredients:

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breast--I went with the Perdue Chicken Breast tenderloins, because Kroger had a great sale on chicken last week.

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard-- I didn't bother measuring, and just used as much as I felt like.

1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese

2 teaspoons olive oil -- may have used a little more like a tablespoon to coat the bottom of the pan, but most of it gets thrown away

Directions

1. Coat the chicken strips with the Dijon mustard. -- I had a lot of fun with this step, using my fingers and getting all messy as I smoothed the mustard all over the chicken.

2. Meanwhile heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat.

3. Fill a plastic bag with the Parmesan cheese, throw in a few chicken tenders at a time and shake it up.

4. Using tongs, cook the chicken in the skillet, about 3-5 minutes per side depending on how hot your oil is.

5. Enjoy!

The husband and I really enjoyed these. Though the recipe says this makes 4 servings, I really didn't think 2 tenderloins was enough to fill either of us up. So I basically divided it in half, served with some mixed frozen veggies, and gobbled it up within about three minutes.

The chicken was really moist, and it wasn't too cheesy, since there's basically just a dusting of Parmesan on each one. I can highly recommend this one!

Nutritional Facts: 1/2 pound chicken

Calories: 375

Total Fat: 14.0g

Saturated Fat: 4.8g

Cholesterol: 133mg

Sodium: 600mg

Total Carbs: 1.4g

Dietary Fiber: 0.2g

Sugars: 0.4g

Protein: 63.3g

Vitamin A: 2%

Calcium: 28%

Iron: 11%

Why I'm Doing This

I'm a writer. That means I lead a very sedentary lifestyle. I wake up, get dressed, go to my desk, sit down, stare at the wall, hope for inspiration, and then write anyways. There's very little exercise except when I get up to make coffee, get more water, or cook dinner for me and my husband.

That's right, I'm also the person in the household who makes most of the meals. It's sort of a shame, really. I know little to nothing about cooking, while my husband knows how to make Indian and Chinese food from scratch.

On top of this, I recently discovered I have to lose a significant amount of weight to fit into a bridesmaid's dress for my sister's wedding in May. So that means, I have to seriously monitor what I eat, counting calories, doing meal prep, and more.

I started tracking my eating habits the last week of December, aiming to keep my caloric intake under 1200 a day. I've done really well by giving myself a day or two a week to slip up (up to 1500 calories instead), and so far I've lost almost ten pounds! Woot!

Now I'm going to share how I'm doing it with the recipes that have worked for me. Let me know what you think if you try any of them out. And if you have any suggestions, please please please share them!