Recipe: Taco Pasta

Hola!  So last night I made this taco pasta from Plain Chicken - just with a few changes.  Basically, I was trying to make it healthier/less calories, and well whatever I figured I'd share what I did.  The mister gave it two thumbs up [which is rare from him on pasta/hamburger helper like dishes]!

A maybe healthier Taco Pasta, but maybe not ha!

1 lb ground turkey
8 oz pasta shells
1 green onion, chopped (or more depending on your tastes!)
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 green pepper, chopped
1 cup of salsa (use a bean one for more protein!)
1 packet low sodium taco seasoning (really, you could probably get buy on half a packet!)
3 oz of fat free cream cheese (or neufchatel cheese, both have less cals than regular!)
1/2 cup of light sour cream
Shredded cheese for topping (even better would be to skip this, but I still used it!)

1. Get your water boiling and cook pasta.  When you drain it, save 1/4 cup of the pasta water.
2. While pasta is going brown your turkey.
3. Once the turkey is nearly done add your onion. Cook meat through, add the garlic and saute.
4. Next, mix in the salsa and the taco seasoning.  Simmer for about 5 min.
5. Now mix in your cream cheese, sour cream, pasta and pasta water.  Keep stirring until the cream cheese is melted and the sauce is well blended.

Top with a bit of shredded cheese and some salsa if desired. Serve and enjoy! :)

Recipe: Strawberry Rhubarb Coffee Cake

Today I'm going to share a recipe with you, but it's not just any recipe - it's a family recipe!  I have been compiling recipes to make a Family Cookbook and I decided to make a couple of them and get some yummy photos for the book.  As far as I know this isn't some *secret* recipe (it appears pretty standard, but is fantastic), so I figure I'd share it with you.

Strawberry Rhubarb Coffee Cake

You Need:

For the filling...

3 cups of rhubarb (I used frozen, but def use fresh if you have it!)

16 oz. frozen strawberries, thawed

2 Tbsp. of lemon juice

1 cup of sugar

1/3 cup of corn starch

For the cake...

3 cups of flour

1 cup of sugar

1 tsp. of baking powder

1 tsp. of baking soda

1 cup of butter

1 cup of buttermilk

2 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

For crumb mix

3/4 cup of sugar

1/2 cup of flour

1/4 cup of butter

You Do:

1.  Preheat oven to 350F & grease a 9x13 pan.

2.  Cook the fruit in a pot, covered for 5 min.  Then add lemon juice.

3.  In a separate bowl mix sugar and cornstarch together.  Add to fruit mixture.

4.  Cook 3-5 minutes more until sauce is thick, let it cool.

5.  Start the cake batter, mix all the dry ingredients together then cut in the butter.

6.  Beat the milk, eggs and vanilla together.  Add to the dry mixture, stir to moisten.

7.  Spread 1/2 of batter into the pan and then spread cooled filling over batter.  Spoon the remaining batter in small mounds over the filling.

8.  Combine crumb mixture until fine and sprinkle on top.

9.  Bake at 350 for 40-45 minutes.

....and enjoy with a hot cup of coffee (or something else if you don't like coffee, ha)!

 

Recipe: Pasta Carbonara with Kale

Thought I'd share a recipe with you this Friday.  I got this one out of Williams-Sonoma Weeknight Fresh & Fast cookbook...and then just altered it to my liking!  I LOVE this cookbook...and the pictures are super pretty! :)

What You Need:

Multigrain Pasta, 6-8 oz

Kale, 1 bunch, chopped

2 large Eggs

Parmesan Cheese, 1/2 cup grated or shredded

Romano Cheese (or some other cheese, I used Mozzarella), 1/2 cup grated or shredded

Black Pepper

What You Do:

  1. Bring a pot of water to boil, add pasta and cook for 5 min.  Then add kale and cook for about 5 minutes longer (until the pasta is done).

2.  While the pasta is cooking, beat the eggs in a small bowl.  Mix in all your cheese and add pepper to taste (be generous with it!).

3.  Save 1/2 cup of the pasta water for later.  Drain pasta and kale then put it in a frying pan.

4.  Whisk 1/4 cup of the reserved pasta water into the egg cheese mixture.  Add the egg mixture to the pasta in the pan and put on low heat.  Stir continually until the sauce becomes creamy, then remove from heat.

Serve immediately, makes about 2 servings!

Hunger Games Date Night :)

I'm sure by now you've at least heard of The Hunger Games.  It's a great book and has now been made into a movie.  I enjoyed the movie, but I will say the book was definitely better.  That's usually how it goes. :)   Anyway, okay, remember before how I posted on a Pizzeria date night...well after that Brian did a Medieval date night {it was awesome!}, so it was back to me.  Since we were going to see The Hunger Games movie on Friday, I thought...why not make it our themed date night for the month!  Yes, yes, I am a huge nerd, but it was fun and the food turned out awesome! :)

 Obviously, decorations are an important part of our themed date nights. :P  A large part of the Hunger Games takes place in the forest, so I tried to recreate that...in a sort of abstract way.

The single white rose is symbolic for one of the characters, President Snow.

 The main character, Katniss Everdeen, sort of gets nick-named "The Girl On Fire"...hence my light decoration. :)

Next, the food!  Each item was chosen specifically and directly relates to the book.  I got these recipes from other bloggers and websites, so click the links for the recipes!

The Appetizers

Prim's Basil & Goat Cheese wraps that she left for Katniss before the Reaping.

Peeta's {burnt} Raisin & Nut bread that he gave to Katniss when they were younger and her family was starving. 

 Drink Special

The Cinna - This is not a drink but rather based on a character.  It has vodka, balsamic vinegar, sugar and strawberries.  Sounds weird, but I liked it!  Brian did not...lol.

 Main Course

Katniss' lunch with Cinna - Chicken in orange sauce, over rice.  Pea's and onions and biscuits {that are supposed to be flower shaped, but I wasn't that ambitious!}

Dessert

Last but not least, Peeta's Apple & Goat Cheese Tart.  I've never had a tart before, but this thing is delish!!  I'll definitely be making this again!

After all this crazy goodness we headed to the movie,which again I will say was good not great.  I had really high expectations, which was silly.  I just felt the movie was geared toward the teenie boppers, who by the way would not shut the heck up during the movie. Grr.  Anyway, I still think the movie is good enough to warrant a theater viewing!

Have a good Monday!

Recipe: Baked Breaded Peppers

So, a few weeks ago we went out to eat and had this breaded green peppers....and they were SO AMAZING! Now, I only just started eating peppers within the last 6 months or so, but I’ll try just about anything if it’s fried. Of course...fried = unhealthy. Plus, I don’t usually do any frying at home, it makes me nervous...all that oil, I’m afraid I’ll catch my house on fire! I decided that I should try to bread and bake them like I do with fish and chicken. They turned out really yummy, however the fried ones from the restaurant were crispy and these ones were softer. I searched the internet high and low for a recipe or anything to get tips on how to keep the cripsy, but no luck. Regardless, these are still fantastic and a great side for grill night!! :)

Bake Breaded Peppers

You Need:

Green peppers {2 large peppers made about 3 servings}

Butter, melted

Seasoned and/or Wheat Breadcrumbs

Cooking Spray

Foil

You Do:

1. Slice the peppers. You can slice them however you want, but I left the pepper whole and just sliced it...like a cross section. If you take out the seeds first, your pepper will collapse on you. So, the second pepper I sliced it first and then cleaned out the innards, which worked much better!

2. Melt some butter - I think I used 2-3 tablespoons. And mix up the breadcrumbs in a dish or bowl. I used regular seasoned and wheat bread crumbs. You could also probably use some panko...that might actually make a thicker crust if you wanted it.

3. Cover a baking sheet in foil and spray it down with cooking spray. Preheat oven to 350.

4. Take a pepper slice, dip it in the butter covering it completely. Then, coat it in the bread crumbs. Lay the slice on the covered baking sheet. Repeat this until all peppers are coated.

5. Cook the peppers. I think I cooked mine for 7-10 minutes on each side. Which probably accounts for their lack of crisp. I think I may put the oven hotter next time and just cook for 5 min, then flip and cook for another 5. Basically, just cook them until the breading is golden brown!

Enjoy! Be sure to let me know if you try this!! :) 

Also...still have an ad giveaway over at Eternal Optimist's blog!!  Ad will be 150x150 AND if you don't have a button I'll make one for you! :)

Recipe: Turkey Cucumber Rollups

I really need to be better about sharing my cooking and crafting adventures. Sometimes I just forget to take pictures, or I remember the pictures, but never get around to posting them! This is a super easy recipe that I found from Rachel Ray. <--so yea, this her genius, not mine. It’s so simple, but so yummy. AND HEALTHY.

You Need:

Tortillas {I get the La Tortilla High Fiber kind}

Cream Cheese, low fat {or get the neufatel cheese like me!}

Cucumber

Sliced Turkey

You Do:

1. Chop up your cucumber. How small is up to you. I chopped up half a large cucumber and it made 5 tortillas.

2. Mix the chopped cucumber and cream cheese together. I used about 4 oz of the cheese, but the amounts on the recipe are obviously forgiving. Just use as much or as little cucumber and/or cheese to get the consistency and taste to your liking.

3. Spread cucumber cheese mixture onto a tortilla, use about a spoonful or 2.

4. Layer the turkey on top of it all and then roll it up!

Super easy and super yummy! My favorite kind of recipe.

P.s. These are super quick to make and easy for lunch! In fact, I made, took photos and ate these, all over my lunch break! :D

Recipe: Baked Potato Soup {freezer meal}

Baked Potato Soup 

{freezer meal!}

Image Source

{I accidentally deleted my photos...and ate the soup.}

What you need:

3-4 large baked potatoes

1.5 Tbs butter

2 cloves of garlic, minced

¼ cup of celery, diced

1.5 Tbs flour

1 cup low sodium chicken stock

2 cups skim milk

Dash of Pepper

Bacon Bits

Shredded Cheese

What you do:

1. Peel and chop up potatoes.

2. In a large saucepan heat butter over medium heat until melted. Add celery and garlic to the saucepan and saute for about 3 minutes. Lower the heat so you don’t brown your veggies!

3. Add flour to the pan and stir in and cook for 2 minutes. Make sure to scrape the pan and get any of the mixture that may have settled.

4. Whisk in the stock and add diced potatoes

5. Then slowly add the milk. Once milk is added do not boil! Stir occasionally.

6. Cook soup over medium/low heat for 20 minutes.

At this point you can either eat your soup or freeze it. Or do what I did, eat one bowl and freeze the rest. This recipe should make about 7-8 servings. I freeze mine in single serving containers, so the in the morning I put it in the fridge and it’s thawed out for lunch. So easy, and it’s only 259 calories!

Oh! When you do eat it...sprinkle on some bacon bits, cheese and pepper to taste! Sooo good!

xoxo, Kassie

Recipe: Lemon Garlic Tilapia

You Need:

Tilapia {or cod} fillets

Lemon Juice

Butter

Garlic, chopped {I used 2 cloves}

Dried Parsley

Pepper

You Do:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

2. Rinse fish off in cool water, pat dry and then place in baking dish. {I put a couple shakes of extra virgin olive oil in the dish first, but this is not necessary.}
3. Sprinkle lemon juice over fillets. Add more or less, depending on your desired taste.

4. Put some butter on the fish. I just used a butter knife and smeared a bit on top of each fillet.

5. Now sprinkle the fish with the garlic, parsley and pepper. Again, add to taste. The original recipe had a amounts, but this kind of cooking is easily “eyeballed”. :)

6. Bake in oven until fish flakes apart, about 30 minutes. {I only cooked 2 fillets and it was about 25 minutes.}

Enjoy!

Recipes Online!

Sorry, I don’t have a recipe for you today! Mainly because I was out of town and haven’t had time to cook. I have a couple old recipes I thought about posting, but to be completely honest I couldn’t find the photos!

So, instead I thought I’d share some of my favorite recipe sites with you. They are quite popular sites, so you’ve probably heard of some of them, but I’ll share why I like them so much.


FoodFit.com

I just recently found this one while I was looking for a good “healthy” recipe site. The two sites below offer healthy recipes, but they don’t focus on it, this one does. It has plenty of recipes and lots of good tips on eating healthy. I also like the refine options on the Search bar.


Kraftfoods.com

 
Can’t really go wrong with Kraft, can you? This website has TONS of great recipes. It’s user friendly and offers a “Recipe Box” to members {it’s free!} to save your favorite recipes in. They also have this cool feature that allows you to search for recipes by certain ingredients you have on hand. I’m not going to lie, the amazingly yummy photos help make this one of my favorite sites. I also really love how they have themed pages or menus for special events and holidays. Great for throwing a party!


Allrecipes.com

This is probably my all time favorite recipe site. The only negative...there may be TOO many recipes, if that’s possible. You have endless options, literally. I also really enjoy reading the reviews and the custom version of recipes to see what others did to tweak it. The “recipe box” on this site is far superior to Kraft’s {sorry Kraft!}. It’s much easier to sort things and it allows you to add “web links” to recipes or articles on other sites. They have a free and a paid membership. I’m on the free and it’s fantastic, although the paid has some cool features {like a menu planner} that might be worth checking out!

Recipe: Apple Chips!

Good afternoon!

From now on I will be posting a yummy recipe every Thursday!  I'm definitely not the greatest cook, but I get by. :)  Plus, cooking for yourself is cheaper and usually healthier than going out.

So, I'm what you would call a "grazer" - I like to snack throughout the day.  I obviously try to keep healthy snacks around, but sometimes it's just a pain and much easier to grab some potato chips or something chocolatey.   My friend sent me this recipe the other day and I think it would be awesome to make these in bulk and keep around in ziplocks for a nice little snack!  Enjoy!

Apple Chips

You need:
4 Apples [really you can use how ever many apples you want!]
1/2 cp. Brown Sugar
1 cp. Water
Cinnamon
Saucepan
Paper towels

1.  Preheat the oven to 250°

2.  First slice up the apples very thin.

3.  In a saucepan dissolve the brown sugar in the water over low heat.

4.  Dunk the apple slices in the brown sugar mixture for at least 30 seconds.  I left mine sitting while I cut up the next apple.

5.  Take the apple slices out and lay them on the paper towel to soak up any excess water.

6.  Arrange the apples on a covered sheet [I recommend spraying it, not just foil!].

7.  This is optional, but then I sprinkled cinnamon and some extra brown sugar on top of my apples.

8.  Put apples in oven and bake for 2-3 hours, or until crispy!  Enjoy!

peace, kassie

Sweet Fall...& some gooey brownies!

I know I promised the first “real” post last night and did not deliver.  I apparently lied...or did I? Maybe I’m just fashionably late.

In any case, fall is in full swing here (or at least through the weekend) and I’m loving it!  Since we are all new here you probably don’t know that I live in the midwest. Yep.  I generally enjoy it. I get bored easily, so all the crazy weather changes suits me well. However, if I could change one thing it would be to make fall about 6 weeks longer.  What’s not to love about fall?  Cool & crisp, football, hockey, comfort food, comfort clothes and pretty fall colors.  To say that I love fall is a severe understatement.

I should have taken some outfit pictures yesterday and today, because both days I was more than presentable and very much dressed in fall spirits.  However, I did not and do not have time today, so instead I will win you over with a fantastic brownie recipe.  We’ll be best friends after you make these, trust me.

Best Brownies EVER

You’ll Need:
13x9in pan
1 cup melted butter
1 cup of unsweetened cocoa
2 cups of sugar
2 eggs
½ cup apple sauce
1 tsp baking powder
4 tsp vanilla
1 cup flour
1-2 cups of additions - this can be whatever you want (m&ms, marshmallows, Reeses pieces,
     butterscotch, nuts, etc] or you don’t have to add anything!

Directions:

1.  Preheat oven to 350°F
2.  Grease the 13x9 pan
3.  In a large bowl combine melted butter and cocoa.  Mix until cocoa is dissolved.
4.  Add sugar and mix well.

5.  Add eggs and stir well.
6.  Next add the apple sauce and baking powder. *Note: This is instead of an additional 2 eggs.  You could just use 4 eggs instead if you want, but I’ve never made it that way.
7.  Add vanilla and flour.  Mix until you can no longer see the flour, but be careful to not over mix.
 

8. Fold in your Add Ins if you have any.  I know the recipe calls for 1-2 cups, but just add as much or as little as you want!
9.  Spread into pan and bake approximate 25-30 minutes.  Be careful not to over cook, put a toothpick in them to test, it should come out with gooey crumbs, but not runny.

 

I apologize for not getting any finished pictures, but let me tell you that once you taste these guys you will forgive me.  They are super moist and fudgy - the perfect brownie! 

I'll be gone for the weekend, so I probably won't see you until Sunday late or Monday.  The mister and I are headed to a college football game - my first ever, GO HAWKEYES!

Enjoy your weekend!

peace, kassie