Kitchen Yumminess

I cannot tell you how amazing it is to get cooking again... what with Matt having been absent for two weeks before we moved (cooking for one equals no fun), trying to not acquire more food before the move, eating out for 8 days on the road, and waiting for the kitchen dishes to be put to use and doing a grocery run. But yay for cooking!

Back to business. I left you guys during Giada's cookbook week. I think I shared the salmon and meatloaf recipes I shared? Yes, I believe so. I have made two more of her recipes:

Stuffed Baby Peppers:

I turned these into an entree by using three bell peppers (one was rotten inside so I couldn't use it) instead of the baby peppers. It turned out fabulously! I had never had stuffed peppers, so I thought I would finally try it. And you don't even miss the meat! I think I served it by itself. So good!

White Bean and Chicken Chili

This is a great variation of regular chili. I also believe it's healthier, full of protein from the chicken and white beans, and it uses no milk or butter, so it's not heavy. If you use low sodium stock, you can even control the sodium content. The white beans add the desired creaminess so you think it's full of butter and milk, but it's not. This recipe also uses Swiss chard, which I had never had before but wanted to try, so this was a great way to get introduced to the vegetable without it being served plain. Yummy yummy! And it comes together pretty quick, it's mostly just chopping nonsense.

I have two more Giada recipes planned, but I've either run out of the ingredients, or I couldn't find what I needed at WinCo. I'll probably just end up buying a different lettuce for the penne with treviso and goat cheese. Or maybe I could substitute chard, since I realized I like it. Hmmm...

Anyways, I continued this week with another Pinterest menu (because dude, I keep pinning recipes to that board! I'm rather addicted). Since relocating to California, I have realized that one of my favorite fruits, avocados, are available here all year long (YES!), so I found so yummy looking avocado recipes to try. I heart avocados :)

So far this week, I have made:

Avocado Pasta

This was SO DELICIOUS! Exactly like eating an avocado flavored fettuccine alfredo, but without out all the flour, milk, and butter! So I'm assuming it's healthy. I served it with lemon pepper chicken, chicken breasts just seasoned with salt and lemon pepper and baked in the oven. Next time I'll probably double the amount of avocado in the sauce, I like my pasta to have more sauce (what can I say, I'm American), but it was still so delicious. And easy: boil pasta, put all sauce ingredients in food processor and blend. If you don't have a food processor, no sweat, just mix it up in a bowl, avocado is easy to smash :)

Spicy Roasted Shrimp Sandwich with Chipotle Avocado Mayo

Again, super scrumptious. I would definitely make this recipe using rustic bread, don't use regular old wheat bread, it just won't work. I found the mayo to be a little spicy, but I used about 5 chipotles, so that might have been overkill. Matt, though, had absolutely no problem with it. To make it healthier, substitute all of the mayo for the Greek yogurt. You could probably also try it with sour cream, or cottage cheese. Actually, cottage cheese would be super yummy....

Man Pleasing Chicken

This dish is super easy to make, it's just dijon, maple syrup, and rice wine vinegar poured over chicken and baked! I added more syrup, since the mustardy taste was a little too strong, but that's easy to fix, just taste it as you go! I would recommend using thighs like the recipe does, I used chicken breasts and I thought it came out a little dry.

If you've noticed, my recipes lately have been more healthy than normal. It's SO much easier to healthier here in California. I'm not really sure why, since you can definitely buy all these ingredients in MS, but for some reason it's just easier. It also helps shopping at WinCo, which is WAY cheaper than most grocery stores, even the commissary. I'm also trying to get in better shape, and help control Matt's cholesterol, which he has been told is really high, but there's not much we can do about that since it's genetic. Anyways, if anyone has any other easy, really healthy recipes, please recommend them to me, especially if they involve avocado! I'm usually willing to try most anything! So is Matt.

Happy cooking!