brussel sprouts – Fervent Foodie

Spinach Caprese Quesadilla

August 4, 2010 5 Comments

While at work yesterday, my mind kept drifting to dinner–but nothing was sounding good to me. Since I have an abundance of tomatoes and basil (thank you backyard garden for your fruitfulness 🙂 ) I decided to do something caprese inspired.

Caprese is one of my all-time favorite Italian dishes, and it typically consists of tomato, fresh mozzarella, fresh basil, balsamic vinegar, and olive oil.

Before diving into to the caprese, I got to work on some brussel sprouts. I halved 10 brussel sprouts, trimmed down any rough ends of the stem, and then made a small slit down the core of each sprout half. I read that making this little slit on the rougher part of the sprout helps to ensure even cooking. I put the sprouts on a cookie sheet that was liberally sprayed with cooking spray, then seasoned them with S&P, and gave them a good toss before throwing them into a 415 degree oven for 17 minutes.

Brussel sprouts!

Now onto the caprese! First, I sliced up 1 roma tomato and 1 Sargento light mozzarella string cheese and put them into a bowl:

Then, I drizzled the tomato and mozzarella with 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar and a 1/2 tsp olive oil and sprinkled with some salt and pepper. Next I added 3 sliced up fresh basil leaves and tossed everything to coat.

Meanwhile, I topped a Mama Lupe’s Low Carb tortilla with some fresh spinach and topped with the tomato mozzarella mixture:

I topped this off with a second Mama Lupe’s low carb tortilla, then I popped this baby onto the George foreman grill for about 5 minutes (until the tortilla was crisp and the cheese was melty):

None of these pictures do the quesadilla justice! If you like caprese, you will love this:

I’m hoping I get some tips on taking pictures of food indoors at the Healthy Living Summit! I can never seem to get indoor pictures quite right!

By the way, if you love caprese too check out the recipe I tried for hot caprese! I also added a “rating” scale to my recipe page

Stats on dinner: 325 calories, 43g carbs, 12g fat, 20g protein, 14g fiber

A few hours after dinner, it was time for my night time snack. I was craving a green monster smoothie, so I put the following into the blender:

1/4 cup Stonyfield Farms Fat Free Yogurt
1/2 cup Almond Breeze unsweetened vanilla almond milk
2 cups spinach
1/2 cup fresh frozen strawberries
1/2 cup fresh frozen blueberries
1 packet Truvia
1 ice cube

Green Monster:

This guy was so much GREENER in person than in these photos… my camera was being stubborn last night!

Stats on the green monster: 119 calories, 24g carbs, 2g fat, 8g protein, 6g fiber

Question: what’s your favorite “healthified” Italian dish?

Recipes

Chili Yam Fries

August 2, 2010 7 Comments

I had an appointment to get my hair cut this evening FINALLY. Is it just me, or is there a thin line between being happy with your hair and your hair looking like the coat of a baby wildebeest? Same thing goes for cutting my nails–one day they are a fine, respectable length, and the next day they’re so long I feel like a neanderthal 😯

Hmmm.. hair and fingernails… not exactly the best segue to dinner, are they? (PS – no clue that’s how you spell “segue” til I googled it)

After the hair appointment I headed to the grocery store. A couple times a year, our local grocery store has a huge meat sale, and I kid you not, it is literally the talk of the town. And I don’t mean just for the week of the sale, it’s a highlight throughout the year. You can be at a cookout several months later, and the BBQ’er will proudly announce “got these here ribs at the meat sale (insert head nods here). Buy one, get one free. Can’t beat it. Just can’t beat it.”

Case in point, check out the text I got from my friend Tim this evening:

At the grocery store, I picked up a random assortment of veggies and all the meat I could carry 🙂

It was already 7:30 by the time I got home, and I have a ton of work to get done tonight so dinner was a hodgepodge, albeit a tasty hodgepodge.

I picked up something new at the grocery store:

Chili Garlic Sauce (found in the Asian food aisle). I also picked up a yam. I recalled seeing a recipe somewhere for chili yam fries so I figured I’d give that a shot tonight.

I scrubbed up the yam and chopped it into big bite size pieces, then tossed with:

1 tbsp chili garlic sauce
1 tsp reduced sodium soy sauce
S&P

Into the bowl:

I sprayed down a cookie sheet, tossed the yams on topped, and cooked in a 415 degree oven for 25 minutes, stirring once. The chili garlic sauce smelled SPICY. I had a momentary flashback to my brief encounter with chipotles in adobo…. My face hurts just thinking about that!

Meanwhile, I sprayed down another cookie sheet and threw 6 halved brussels sprouts on it. Then seasoned with S&P. These also roasted at 415 degrees, but only for 17 minutes.

While all that was going on, I peaked in the fridge and found that I still had a grilled chicken breast from last week and some classico fire roasted tomato sauce that I had defrosted. So, one thing lead to another, and here’s what I ended up with for dinner:

Two thumbs up on the chili yam fries bits:

Roasted brussel sprouts rock my world:

More brussel sprouts for good measure:

Stats on the hodgepodge*: 325 calories, 40g carbs, 5g fat, 29g protein, 9g fiber

*hodgepodge consisted of 4 ounces chicken breast, 1/4 cup classico fire roasted tomato & garlic marinara, 1/2 of the chili yams, 6 roasted brussel sprouts

Recipes

Couscous Garbanzo Bean Salad

July 6, 2010 2 Comments

I found a recipe for Couscous Garbanzo Bean Salad in the July 2010 issue of Cooking Light, and while I was making last night’s Southwestern Tabbouleh, I realized many of the ingredients were the same in the two recipes. So, I was SUPER PRODUCTIVE and mixed up two servings of tonight’s dinner ahead of time. Boo. Ya. 🙂 I was also pretty amped to use some of the Rice Select Tri-Color couscous I picked up last week (and used in my Chicken Couscous Salad).

I put the following into a bowl, then covered with a lid to steam:

1/2 cup couscous
1/2 cup boiling water
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/16 tsp cinnamon

Meanwhile, I mixed up the dressing:

3 tablespoons lemon juice
1 clove minced garlic
Dash sugar

Then, combined the following into a bowl:

1 tbsp chopped mint
1/4 cup chopped green onion
1/16 paprika
1/2 can chickpeas/garbanzo beans/whathaveyou 😉
12 cherry tomatoes
1/4 cup reduced fat feta ounces feta
S&P & red pepper flakes
1/4 cup red onion

I combined the couscous and dressing with the other ingredients, then left in the fridge to overnight.

I was really craving roasted veggies, so I decided to only have 1/2 a serving of the couscous salad (a quarter of the recipe above) with a hodge podge of veggies that I tossed with 1 tsp olive oil and S&P and roasted in a 400 degree oven for 20 minutes.

I realized tonight that I’m really not a big fan of fresh mint 🙁

With every bite of couscous I thought to myself, man this would be really tasty if it weren’t for the mint… I ended up throwing some Frank’s Red Hot on there for good measure 🙂

The roasted veggies were so delicious:

If you’re a fan of mint, give this recipe a shot. Otherwise, sub in cilantro or basil or go for the Chicken Couscous Salad instead!

Stats on 1 serving of couscous garbanzo bean salad: 317 calories, 50g carbs, 4g fat, 14g protein, 5g fiber

Recipes

Grilled Brussel Sprouts

June 26, 2010 No Comments

Today, I decided to try out brussel sprouts on the grill. Using this recipe from food network as my guide, I microwaved 5 brussel sprouts for 3 minutes. Then topped with a tiny bit of olive oil, S&P, minced garlic, tiny bit of cayenne pepper, and some paprika.

I stuck the sprouts on a skewer and put them on the george foreman grill for 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, I assembled a turkey wrap sandwich consisting of 1 lite Flatout italian wrap, 3 ounces turkey breast, tomato, onion, banana pepper, a 1/2 tsp fat free italian dressing, and a few drops of Frank’s Red Hot.

After the sprouts had cooked for five minutes, I flipped them to the other side, threw the wrap on the grill, and cooked for another five minutes.

Lunch is served!

Stats on the wrap, sprouts, and grapes: 306 calories, 39g carbs, 7g fat, 27g protein, 14g fiber

What I ate

Leftovers makeover

June 13, 2010 2 Comments

I find most of my meal planning revolves around whatever leftovers I happen to have in the fridge. On a typical day I am cooking for one person, which leaves me with the option to eat the same things for several days on end or reincorporate the leftovers into new dishes.

For lunch today I wanted to use up some leftover chicken I had grilled up earlier in the week, and I had some leftover tomato sauce from the 10 cheese pizza I made Friday. So I decided to make a chicken parmesan inspired wrap, healthified of course. (AKA leftover chicken, leftover sauce , NO cheese, on a Joseph’s middle east bakery low carb pita–seasoned up with salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, and dried parsley)

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA — chicken parm wrap with roasted brussel sprouts

Aren’t Jarrod’s dishes lovely? 😉

After lunch we finished up the light tent. Now we just need to get some lights!

For my afternoon snack I had apples and some chocolate PB2.

Chocolate PB2 = fabulous! I need to work this into some shake recipes…

Tonight we visited our friends Tim and Jaci at their newly purchased, exquisitely decorated townhouse. Tim prepared a feast complimented with onions galore.

Roasted potatoes with onions and green peppers, seasoned grilled asparagus, and jerk marinated chicken:

P.S. can’t wait to get my hair cut tomorrow!

Happy Sunday!