BLT-Licious Salad

Ok...so maybe BLT doesn't flow as beautifully as Teresa Guidice has joined Fabulous and Delicious, but whatever, I went for it. (that's what it's all about right? taking big risks!) 


I'm starting to learn the factors of age and marriage work viciously with each other in a non-stop campaign to meet up with their bff  "weight gain". I swear anything I eat now feels like it would just be much easier to affix it to my stomach with duct tape. Being the lucky gal I am however, my husband agrees to participate in living a healthier lifestyle. We've been working out - but as most health experts (not me) will tell you weight is 90% diet. (grr.... WHY OH WHY were Chicken Alfredo and Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream ever invented then!)


Missing out on my favorite foods is simply not an option, so we've started taking our favorite foods and reducing the fatty items. Tonight we made one of my favorite "mom" recipes. We made it healthier and serve it with a lot less guilt now! 


BLT Chicken Salad 


Original Recipe (items i substituted are in parenthesis) 


The Dressing:
1/2 Cup Mayonaise (I used lowfat mayo made with Olive Oil)
4 tbls. bbq sauce (we used 2 tbls.)
2 tbls. onion 
1tbls. lemon juice
1/4 tsp. pepper


Salad:
Lettuce (we used mixed greens because it's healthier - but any will work just fine!)
2 tomatoes diced
1 1/2 lb. Chicken (we cut up one chicken breast and divided it between the two of us)
10 strips of Bacon Crumbled (we used 2 strips of Turkey Bacon each)
2 hard boiled eggs sliced (take out the yolks and save even more fat!)
(we also added mushrooms)

First have your assistant and your bulldog grill the chicken
(if you do not have a bulldog - don't fret -
you can do it on your own!) 

Dice the tomatoes, mushrooms, bacon,
peal and slice the hard boiled egg

Mix the dressing in a small bowl

Toss the dressing with the salad and Enjoy! (guilt free!)

Hope you like it!


I hope low-fat keeps tasting this good! It's fun to try and make our favorite foods healthier so we can keep enjoying them. Hmm...what to make next??

What goes up...must come down?

I began the week yesterday with a few rough happenings. The week after our honeymoon I was on SUCH a high, and everything seemed to be falling into place - I remember thinking this all seems too perfect, and I wonder what will be the thing to break this wonderful time. Is it bad that we naturally seem to assume something will inevitably "go wrong"? I think it goes along with that whole "What goes up - must come down theory" although I think that saying has something to do with gravity as well. Have we just had enough things always fall wayside that we have just become accustomed to planning for it? 


Apparently I have at least, I figured something would get a little out of line - and I was right. That happened yesterday and has been growing for a week or so. Luckily now though when I do have bad days I have an amazing husband and bulldog to come home to! 


Last night, after that day - I needed some cooking therapy. I've been searching for a Sweet and Sour Chicken recipe for a while. I finally picked one of the many I found yesterday and decided I could modify as I wanted. 


I'm not even going to be shy - this recipe was AMAZING!!! It literally tasted like the stuff you get at a Chinese restaurant - MINUS the deep fat fried chicken! yea!!!


Here's the recipe: (what i did anyhow!)


Sweet and Sour Chicken 


Ingredients:
3/4 cup white sugar 
(could use a sugar alternative to lighten it up!)
1/3 cup white vinegar
2/3 cup water
1/3 cup soy sauce (i used reduced sodium version)
1 tbs ketchup
2 tbs cornstarch


Place all ingredients in a medium saucepan, bring to a boil and stir continuously until the mixture has thickened. 

Chicken:


I marinated the chicken for about 20 minutes in soy sauce. Then I cut the chicken into the size squares I wanted to serve, and coated them in flour. I put this into a frying pan with some Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Leave them until you can see they are cooked about half way through (flipping them too much will dry them out). Once the chicken was finished I put in mushrooms (you could add any vegetables you wanted - i might even add some cashews next time) and let them simmer. 

Finally - pour most of the sauce over the chicken/mushrooms, stir - making sure all chicken is covered, and let simmer for at least 5 minutes. 

I actually poured all of the sauce ingredients in the saucepan and did not turn the heat on, then I got the chicken cooking and once I flipped the chicken I turned the sauce on. You have to constantly stir it to make sure it doesn't burn. 


Make some rice (we used the uncle ben's brown rice to health it up a bit) and we also added some cheater egg rolls (which were delicious!) And ta daaaaa! You have dinner...This whole process took me about 20 minutes!

p.s. this meal was cooked partially thanks to our "challenge" - I've had some people asking how it's going. So far so good - but I'm saving the final details for the end! 

Please feel free to comment if you plan to / do try this! 

It's great to hear feedback!

a moment to breathe...

Sometimes there is nothing better in life than when I have nothing to do. I used to go CRAZY when I had one free minute of unscheduled time. After all things wedding planning the last few months I was excited for a break.


I realized in all of my uncomplicated, unscheduled bliss of a honeymoon - how much I was looking forward to being home and being married to and spending some quality time with my wonderful new husband. This past weekend gave me that exact time I'd been looking for - and I turned out to be right. The less things scheduled - the BETTER right now!


Luckily we did have one VERY fun event scheduled though. Our friend Andy turned 40 and our other friends Jenny and Keith were sweet enough to throw him a party! In my efforts to be a wonderful wife I wanted to be a fabulous party guest and show up with some delicious contributions.


Derek and I LOVE to cook together - we registered at Williams Sonoma and received lots of amazing new kitchen gadgets from the wedding. I picked out a couple of new tools to try and decided on Chocolate Covered Strawberries and Boursin Stuffed Mushrooms.


I of course did not want to make just regular chocolate covered strawberries - so I did some googling seriously what did people do before google?! and found a wonderful idea to infuse the dipped strawberries with riesling. Ah HA! This would be an excellent opportunity to try out my new "injector". Also, I came up with the idea to do some strawberries with sprinkles, and some with almonds too. (not my idea - it was stolen from one of the 5200 wedding brochures I've looked through the past nine months.)  but hey - some of the best idea's are stolen right?!


So here are my finished strawberries...our new "injector" works wonders - and I tried a double broiler for the first time word to the wise - melting chocolate in a double broiler in comparison to in the microwave for dipping is NIGHT AND DAY difference. I will never go back to the microwave! 

Next up - with the strawberries set it was onto the mushrooms. 

My FAVORITE type of recipe are the kind that make you look fancy but in reality is was super easy. I'm pretty into looking fancy and proper, but I don't always feel like I have a lot of time. So the recipe I found for Boursin Stuffed Mushrooms was just the ticket! 

Here's the recipe: 

Ingredients:

40 medium sized mushrooms

1 cup Boursin cheese

melted butter

Directions:

Wash mushrooms and remove stems. 

Fill mushrooms with Boursin cheese. 

Brush the mushroom caps with melted butter. 


Bake on a cookie sheet at 350 for 30 minutes. I put parsley on them as well when they were baked about half way through. They made the house smell AMAZING! I think they were a total hit with our friends! Hey - anything that makes you feel and look fancy but didn't take all the time that fancy usually requires - is AWESOME in my book! 

Anybody else have any secret "looks fancy but wasn't" tricks??