Guess who I met!

Yep - that's right, I met the one and only Chef Michael Symon! He was doing a book signing at Williams-Sonoma in Natick MA - he's just as awesome in real life as on TV.

I'm such a stalker!

Steak, Spaghetti Squash Fritters and Roasted Potatoes - oh my!

I was really looking forward to dinner tonight - all day I plotted and planned knowing the one thing I was making was the Spaghetti Squash Fritters, Michael Symon's recipe naturally. From there, I decided on adding roasted fingerling potatoes and grilled flank steak. I bought the potatoes and squash at the local Farmer's Market and the steak at Whole Foods so everything was fresh and all natural.

The fritters I've made and blogged before but I'm doing it again because they are so yummy AND this time, they came out much better!

Chef Symon's recipe can be found on the Chew's website (http://beta.abc.go.com/shows/the-chew/recipes/Michael-Symon-Spaghetti-Squash-Fritters) which I tried to follow thinking I had all the ingredients...I didn't so I mixed it up just a bit. I started by roasting the squash on a 400 oven for about 45 minutes. In the past, I have cut the squash in half, giant pain in the butt, scooped the seeds and then roasted. This time, on the advice of a co-worker, I put the squash on a pan and roasted it as is - no cutting, no seeding. Once it cooled, I cut it in half (a LOT easier), scooped out the seeds and shredded the squash. It's very important to get all the moister out of the squash so I scooped that meat into a dish towel and gave it to the hubs to wring it out. Then added 4 ounces (or about that) of blue cheese, some garlic, chives (since I didn't have green onions), the zest of an orange and salt and pepper. Also added three tablespoons (maybe a bit more) of flour and one egg. Mixed it well and fried in canola oil then sprinkled with sea salt and more orange zest. In hind site, I could have skipped the chives because I couldn't taste it over the orange and blue cheese.

I bought red, white and purple fingerling potatoes at the Farmer's Market last week and wasn't too sure how I wanted to prep them. Ultimately, we decided roast them in olive oil, garlic, onions and salt and pepper. Mixed it so that the oil covered the potatoes and roasted in a 375 degree oven for 30-45 minutes; truth be told, I didn't really watch the clock, we don't mind the potatoes being over cooked. One thing about purple potatoes...they look funny but taste the same as a red or white potato. Plus, kids think they're fun!

I am still working on adding beef, good quality beef, into my diet. This is not easy for me by any means and I know the Hubs and L are very tired of chicken! I splurged on a flank steak at Whole Foods and attempted to grill it - still working on mastering the grill, too. I put some olive oil on it, salt, pepper, onion and garlic on both sides. Then I put it on a medium heat grill, roughly 6-7 minutes per side and got a nice medium steak for dinner.

The hubs and I were REALLY happy. This was the first meal I've worked on in quite a while.

All that was missing was a glass of wine for me and an Amstel Light for the hubs!

I hope you'll give the fritters a try, they are a good amount of work but worth it!

Enjoy - be well!

Baked stuffed chicken

As promised, here is the first of three videos - baked stuffed chicken. Ok - so I go the recipe from a Hunger Games cookbook and it's suppose to be stuffed groosling...whatever that is supposed to be. Actually, it's turkey.

Hope you enjoy!

Thank you to my cousin Leeann McKeon from Keon Films for making the video.

Oh boy - so many changes!

I owe you an apology for being off the blog for a while, we have been busy!

We moved, C turned one, L turned 11, the hubs turned.... And naturally, it was summer! Never the less, I'm back and will be posting my three videos shortly. I am looking to make more and see how things will progress. I can hope you will continue to follow me and tell your friends!

Thanks for your patience!
M~

upcoming posts - need your help!

Thank you to all of you who read my posts and my apologies for not posting in quite a while. I am working on some videos to post in the next few weeks...well the videos will be made and posted after over a period of time.

I am most definitely making my whoopie pies but want to know what you'd like to see me make. I have a recipe I've created based on a Giada recipe but this is all me. I think I'll make that one as a side dish, it's a potato and couscous salad.

Please either message me or post here what you'd like to see for an appetizer, salad and main dish. From there, I'll see what I can do!

Thank you and thanks again for reading!!!

Be well!

Sleep...

Lately, there seem to be a lot of studies about how much sleep a person needs to be healthy, aid in weight loss or what ever. I don't seem to fall into any where near enough sleep to be rested, healthy or my weight loss. I work at 5 AM, my alarm goes off at 3:25 and I hit snooze a few times then I get up a little before 4. Here's the kicker, to make sure I get eight hours of sleep I would need to go to bed at....7:30. As if that could EVER happen!

Like most women, when I say I'm going to bed it will still take some time to get into bed - I have a lot to do first. I have to get my clothes ready for the next day (so not to wake up the Hubs or baby), then I get my food ready (if I haven't already), get the things together for my shower, get changed, then go to bed where I will spend several seconds - if not a full minute - putting on my Burt's chap stick. Let me side bar for just a second - Burt's holy Burt's! I'm so addicted to putting on chap stick at night that I cannot sleep until I have a good coating on - but it's not just putting on a good coating, I look like a crazy lady just lying in bed rubbing the golden yellow tube of minty bees wax chap stick on my mouth in slow motion for 20-30 - up to 60 seconds. You know how to you see the crazy lady smearing their lipstick all over their mouth, missing her lips and getting her face but she thinks she looks good - yeah, that's me with my Burt's!

Anyway... back to a 7:30 bed time.... L goes to bed at 8, the baby goes to be around 7:30. If I want to have a conversation with the Hubs, wait for it - WITH OUT INTERRUPTION - I have to wait until after 8. So, lets say I go at 8:30, well, that would be do-able, but then I'm too tired to get off the couch to go to bed. Besides, I might as well wait up to watch the weather, right? Ha! At this point, I'm also too engrossed in whatever we're watching on TV...

I guess I have no other choice but to live with too little sleep and live with the consequences of lack of sleep... I'd rather be tired then miss my family! Who cares if I look crazy - the hubs loves me anyway! ;-) LOL!

Be well!

Cinnamon rolls

Having gone through the weight loss process I did, I NEVER thought I could eat a cinnamon roll again. I say that like it was high on my prioiety list when in fact, it was FAR from. I have these moments of wanting to feel "normal" which means eating the way I did before I lost weight. Of course, that would be foolish to do because I'd just gain the weight back. All of that leads to this blog where I make the the foods I miss or want to try in a healthier way.

OK - my point...I made cinnamon rolls! YAY! This is something I put togehter from watching Daphne Oz, on the Chew, and Giada, on the food network. I sort of combined the two and then made it my own. All of this was originally inspired by my sis-in-law - she made homemade (dough from scratch) cinnamon rolls but I couldn't try them because of the sugar.

Daphne used puff pastry, so did I, Giada used a can of crescent roll dough. I guess I'll tell you what I did and you can check out their sites for their recipes. I softened one stick of butter in the microwave, added cinnamon - maybe a tbsp? - then a tsp of vanilla. Then I added some brown sugar. I kept one roll/sheet of the puff pastry folded in thirds and rolled it out so it was long and narrow. From there, I spread half the butter mixture and rolled the dough so I had around a 12" log and repeated with the second piece of pastry dough. I cut the dough into pieces roughly 1 1/2" - 2". Now here's the tricky part. I went all Giada and put brown sugar and chopped pecans into the bottom of a baking dish, put the rolls down and baked them at 375. The first mistake was using a baking dish, the second was the brown sugar. As I watched the rolls fall over and turn messy, I decided to follow the advice of someone who gave feedback on Daphne's recipe and moved them to muffin pans. Let them finish cooking and it was so much better!

Did I add that I FROSTED THEM!!!! Oh yes I did! Frosting was easy, slowly melt 1/2 a stick of butter on a really low heat, add 4 oz of cream cheese cinnamon, sugar and vanilla to make the frosting. Smear the frosting on the roll while the roll is still warm and oh, enjoy!

By the way, the heart shape is merely by chance.

Enjoy - Be well!

Cocoa tomato chicken

I made this for the boys (the Hubs and L) for Valentine's Day - tried to tie the whole cocoa/chocolate thing together. Yeah...so it didn't turn out quite like I thought. Plus, I totally chose the wrong side dish! HAHA - it was a REALLY bad choice for a side.

OK = so, this is a Paula Dean recipe - of course! Essentially, you cook chicken for a few minutes on both sides, remove it from the pan and build the sauce. The sauce has two cans of tomatoes (one sauce, one diced), onions (I used too much), two tbsp of cocoa powder and a little sugar - think I'm missing something here. You get the sauce cooking then add the chicken back it, letting is simmer for 15 minutes, turn the chicken and cook for another 15 minutes.

Yeah, um, Ms. Paula suggests rice as the side...I used mashed potatoes....I should have used rice :-/.

I really enjoyed the chicken but I had a lot of sauce left over - it was so much that I could have frozen it - I didn't. I don't think the boys liked it so much.

As I'm writing this is I realized that this would be great on steak. You could use a denser cut of beef, roll it in flour, brown in the frying pan with some olive oil. From there, build your sauce in the same pan to pick up the drippings. Once it's all set, throw it in the crock pot for a few hours to break down the beef making it more tender.

I would suggest giving this a try - it's worth it. If you're looking for a strong chocolate flavor, you won't get it - you're getting more of a mole sauce.

Enjoy - Be well!

Red soup

I have very wonderful friends and we get together every so often for good food, drinks and we play Pokeno which is sort of like bingo but way better! Anyway, the last Pokeno night my BFF's sister K made red soup. I loved it and asked how to make it; it's a very easy recipe. I decided to make it but my own version; one because I didn't have the ingredients and two because I wanted to control the salt. So, I'm stealing the name and the flavors but not the same way.

Here's my recipe for Red Soup (by the way, this is my first real recipe I've ever come up with):

saute 1/2 onion or shallot in tbsp olive oil
add 1 tbsp chopped garlic
add any left over veggies you may have (I stole this from K's recipe) I used carrots
saute until tender
add 6 cups of stock
1 small can of tomato sauce (again stolen from K)
2 cups of your favorite pasta cooked
add 1 cooked pound of your favorite beef or chicken
one to two boulion cubes to add flavor
salt and pepper to taste
allow to come to a boil and allow to simmer 15 minutes do the flavors have time to blend

The bread - so simple! It's a can of thin crust pizza dough that I cut into pieces, spread with melted butter and sprinkled with paresan cheese and a little garlic powder then baked on 350 for 15 minutes.


Like I said - I got the basic concept from K but I stole it and tweaked it so I could call it my own ;-)! That being said, this is just a concept - you can make this anyway you want. I hope you will!

Enjoy, Be well!

Cream Cheese Tarts take 2

I think one of my first posts, it was the video I made, was Paula Dean's cream cheese tarts - esentially, they are mini cheese cakes. As with most recipes, I follow the recipe the first go round with the obvious substitutions for sugar and such. The next time, I make it my way - generally, slightly different.

I was getting together with my NH (New Hampshire) girls and needed to bring a dessert so I decided to make the tarts again. They are so easy and tasty! I'm not going to go too far into the recipe, I'll just add that I used real butter (which I think it calls for) and I used the Sugar/Stevia blend - so tasty. YUM!

The tarts are topped with a fresh strawberry or blueberry sauce I made. The sauce is really easy, it's fruit, sugar and a corn starch/water mixture for thickening. Cook it on the stove to soften the fruit, from there, I let it cool so when I put it on the tarts, it won't melt them.

Somehow, I had a lot of the cream cheese mixture left over so I lines an 8 x 8 glass baking dish with Nilla Waffers pour the mix in, added waffers to the sides to make a side crust and then baked it for 20-25 minutes. Have to tell you, I liked that so much more than the tarts - flavor was better.

Enjoy - Be well!

Blueberry Almond Muffins

Who says you can't eat muffins while trying to loose weight or stay healthy? If you make them from scratch, they can be what ever you want. I am blessed that my mother has all her dad's recipes and has passed them on to me and the siblings. I want to keep those recipes close to home so I won't be sharing them, just yet.

You may be wondering why I'm telling you about it then, well, it's more the concept that I'm sharing. In these muffins, my grandfather used "lard" or "fat", I use butter - the real thing. (I have switched to real butter versus margarine, figure if I'm going to bother using fat it might as well be less processed than it has to be.) The I increased the amount of fruit because I like to have a lot of blueberries! The nuts were added simply because I had them. The biggest change I made though was the sugar. I have been cooking with a Splenda/sugar blend however, I ran out and the grocery store didn't have any either. In stead, the hubs found a Domino sugar/Stevia blend. I promise this is sooooo much better than the Splenda blend. It tastes far more like real sugar - could even say better than real sugar. It works the same as Splenda - 1 cup of sugar = 1/2 cup of the blend.

Again, take your favorite recipe and adjust accordingly.

Enjoy - Be well!

Calzone...take two...

Yeah, I've made my chicken with cream cheese and feta calzone in the past but I made it different today and I liked it so much that I felt it was necessary to share with you again.

Normally, I boil then chop the chicken but tonight I felt like trying it differently. Plus every time I make it, I have so much left over we end up tossing it out. So in an effort to have the same dish, limited waste and to try it just a bit different - and easier, I cut the chicken up, then sauteed it in the frying pan with garlic and onion (easy way, I used dried chopped both) then added some salt and pepper. From there, I thought hmmm.... I need to get this cold cream cheese mixed well with the chicken so I chunked up the cream cheese, added it to the pan, then poured in about 1/4 cup of skim milk. From there, I turned the heat off and added the feta - I'd say 1/2-1 cup...what ever fell out of the container, really.

I have a pizza stone I never use, I thought I'd give it a try so I heated the oven to 400 degrees while I cooked the filling. Then I unrolled a thin crust pizza dough over the pizza stone - imagine, rectangle block in a round hole (square peg/round hole), poured the mix into the middle then wrapped the dough around it. To top it off, I melted some butter, brushed it on the crust and then sprinkled it with Parmesean cheese. 15 minutes later - dinner was ready! I like to finish it off with pasta sauce though I don't really know if it's needed...that's up to personal preference. Give it a try and let me know what you think!

Enjoy - Be well!

Not your momma's mac'n cheese

It's no secret I LOVE watching the Chew, in fact, I think it would be a really fun job to have! I'm not a super fan of Carla Hall but I think that's only because I don't really know much about her, however, the more I watch, the more I think she's a bit silly and I could see her being a good time. Not so sure she cares what other people think...I like that!

I have NEVER made good macaroni and cheese from scratch until one night when we had the Hammock's over for dinner - thankfully, it came out good! I made Carla's mac'n cheese which worked out so well. This was the first time I was successful at making a roux - now you can't stop my rouxs!

The recipe calls for 1 cup of cheddar cheese - I used NY extra sharp, and 1 cup of pepper jack. So you make the roux, add some milk, your cheeses and then when it's almost done, you add 4 oz of cream cheese. WHAT?! That's right, you heard me...cream cheese. It made the dish so creamy and delish! Naturally, this was poured over your favorite pasta - I'm passed using elbows, I like a fun shape - any fun shape. What I forgot to mention is that the roux is made using bacon fat - how did I get the bacon fat, you ask. I started the whole meal by cooking, I think, six strips of bacon in sauce pan (a large dutch oven), remove the bacon but keep the fat, add some butter and flour for the roux. Once you're ready to serve, add the bacon as a garnish.

I love this dish. I should add that since I'm all about protein, I added some sauted chicken to the mac'n cheese so it hits all out needs!

This is really worth trying - check for the recipe on thechew.com under Carla's recipes. Let me know if you need any help, I have it saved!

Enjoy - Be well!

Chicken noodle soup

As they say, chicken noodle soup is good for the soul - especially when it's cold or you're just overall feeling the winter blues. I got my recipe from Light and Tasty forever ago - I make it my own way and sometimes I add a bit more or less than needed.

To start, saute a cup of carrots, cup of celary and a small diced onion in two table spoons of canola oil until the veggies are translucent. Then add in 1/4 cup of flour with Bell's poultry seasoning. Let it cook for about a minute. Add six cups of chicken stock and about four potatoes cut into bite size pieces. Put a lid on the pot and cook for roughly 20 minutes. Add two cups of cooked chicken and two cups of no-yolks. Cook for another 10 minutes and add a can of evaporated milk but don't let it come to a boil. Cook for another minute then you're done.

So, now how I make it... I do all the veggies and such with two bouillon cubes; I add the stock and potatoes - usually more than four. I will add more chicken and generally a box of pasts because I don't like have 1/2 a box of pasta in the cabinet and I could care for no yolks. So, adding more pasta means I need to add more stock otherwise it's too dry - almost pasty. In the past, instead of adding evaporated milk, I've been known to add sweetened condensed milk.

Truth be told, I make it however it comes out. This last time I made soup I didn't have celery, I didn't add any evaporated milk - in hindsight, I haven't used it in a long time - also, I made a bit of a roux to make it thicker. So really, this is one of those recipes that once you have the process down you can make it any way you'd like. I hope you'll try this one, your family will really enjoy it!

Enjoy, Be well!

Michael Symon vs Paula Dean Celebrity Death Match

Do you remember when M-tv used to show Celebrity Death Match? It was a clay-mation cartoon where two celebs would square off in a boxing ring and they would use some part of their personalities or what they are known for as part of the fight. I was wondering what it would look like to have my two favs go against each other - Michael Symon versus Paula Dean. He would come at her with brat wurst and she would squirt in the eye with melted butter...He'd come back at her with a cabbage mace (cabbage hanging off a stick like the mid evil weapon) and she'd pour cake batter all over him - or something.... In the end though, there wouldn't be a winner because they would both grab the bacon for the next attack, realizing each others love for salty pork, they stop the match and celebrate their common interest. I can picture the whole thing perfectly!

Since this is my little day dream, there can be no winner as I love them both! They are at the top of my list of people I want to meet and cook with so I can't have a winner....just yet! ;-)

Hee hee! Be well!

Skirt Steak - eh...

I'm not a big red meat fan - it's not my favorite to eat. I decided to try my own marinade and to try a skirt steak. I don't think skirt steak is the most tender cuts of beef though I understand that it's best grilled. I don't have a grill so I made my best effort with out a grill.

I made a marinade with balsamic vinegar, extra virgin olive oil, shallots, garlic, salt and pepper, and a bit of oregano. Then I let the steak sit in the marinade over night then I cooked it in a grill pan.

To make it a little tastier, I sprinkled the steak with fresh blue cheese. We had the steak with grilled potatoes and peas. If I enjoyed steak this would have been better but since I don't really enjoy it... I could take it or leave it. Now, having said all that, I would make the marinade again (I eyeballed the whole thing, not a set recipe) just with a better selection of beef.

Sugar free powdered sugar - is it possible?

Yikes! That's really all I have to say about that! Ok - so this came from a few different sources... It's one cup splenda and one teaspoon corn starch that is run through the blender or food processor. So very messy and I was a bit surprised with the results.

The powder sugar was very, very sweet. When you run it through the blender or the processor, you want to make sure you cover it with a towel because you will get sugar dust everywhere. It's best to make one batch at a time, keeping in mind one batch results to 1/2 cup of powder sugar. The sugar will last in an air tight container for two months.

So, I used the powdered sugar the same way I would substitue splenda for sugar (1/2 cup splenda to 1 cup sugar). I made chocolate coconut snowballs (chocolate cupcakes, remove the liner, frost the whole cupcake with a cream cheese frosting that has powder sugar, small amount of butter and vanilla, then roll in coconut) using the sugar in the frosting. It was very sweet but you couldn't tell it was not real powder sugar.

I don't have a picture -will try for another time.

Enjoy - Be well!

Red velvet cupcakes

As you know by now - I LOVE Paula Dean! She has these amazing looking red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting that, well, look to die for. I've never had a good red velvet cake/cupcake - I should say Ms. Dean makes red velvet cake I made it as cup cakes.

The actual recipe I used was on the Food network - Grandma's red velvet cake (I believe is the name). I switched out the sugar for the Splenda/sugar blend but I did use real butter - I figure it would be better to use real butter than margarine, I'd rather the real fat versus processed.

Once the cupcakes were cool - I made cream cheese frosting; this recipe came from Splenda.com. I used the splenda/sugar blend with cream cheese and butter. It was so good.

As for a splurge, this was a good way to go. The cake and frosting was so rich and delicious that it really felt like I was being so very bad!!!

Enjoy - Be well!