My personal journey to create delicious "calories in" using lower calorie/lower sodium versions of wonderful recipes
Thursday, May 19, 2011
Never Buy Store Made Again
In a small bowl, mix together 1/2 cup of Helmann's light mayonnaise (140 calories), 2 packets Splenda, 3 TB lemon juice. At this point you can get creative -- add a tsp of Dijon Mustard or a tsp of White Horse Radish for a little zing -- and whisk all the ingredients together.
Pour the mayonnaise mixture over the cole slaw, mix well and enjoy.
This recipe makes about 10 servings with 50 calories per serving vs the 230 calories in the store bought version!
Sunday, May 8, 2011
A True 30 Minute Meal
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Simply Brisket
When you buy the brisket get pieces that are not much bigger than 2 1/2 pounds each. I have found that using 5 or 6 pound briskets produces tough results. For this Passover I have purchased 2 2 3/4 pound briskets. Use a shallow roasting pan that is only large enough to hold the meat. Line the roasting pan with aluminum foil. Wash and pat the meat dry and put into the pan. In a small bowl, for each brisket, mix together 1 entire package of onion soup mix 1 tablespoon mustard powder, 1 teaspoon garlic powder and 2 tablespoons of olive oil (gotta keep this as healthy as possible) so that it forms a thick paste. Spread the paste over the first brisket, prepare a second batch the same way and spread it over the second brisket. Tightly cover the briskets with a second piece of aluminum foil. If you have prepared this a day or two before the Seder put the pan into the refrigerator overnight. For this year I am hosting the second night. I will prepare the meat mixture on Sunday night, refrigerate and cook the brisket on Monday. I'm not sure if the onion soup mixture acts as a marinade, but I have found that the brisket is tastier when I do it this way. When you are ready to cook the brisket, place it in a 325 degree oven for 2 1/2 to three hours. Let the brisket cool before slicing. Skim the excess fat off the sauce and serve. Enjoy!
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Miriam's Fluffy Matzo Balls
To cook the matzo balls, fill a two or three-quart pot with 1 1/2 quarts of slightly salted water (if desired) and bring to a brisk boil. Reduce flame and into the slightly boiling water, drop balls approximately 1 inch in diameter formed from the mixture. Cover pot and cook 30 to 40 minutes.
You, my readers, will have to tell me what you think after you make your own matzo balls.
In case you are wondering about the calorie count, this recipe makes about eight matzo balls with approximately 150 calories per serving of 2 matzo balls.
Manischewitz Matzo Balls Recipe by Western Foods
Ingredients:
- 2 tablespoons melted fat or oil - use olive oil instead
- 2 large eggs, slightly beaten
- 1/2 cup Manischewitz® Matzo Meal
- 2 tablespoons soup stock or water - substitute 3 tablespoons of plain seltzer
- 1 teaspoon salt, if desired
Saturday, April 9, 2011
How Low Can You Go - Limbo Low Limbo High
As you look over the ingredients, you will notice that I am chopping the vegetables. Chopping softer vegetables like these is an easy job if you own an onion chopper like the one below. It not only chops onions, it does a great job on garlic, cucumbers, radishes and baby carrots. Just don't use it on tomatoes or lettuce.
Ingredients for about 3 large servings:
Salad
2- 3 green leaf lettuce leaves chopped
1/2 cup baby carrots chopped
3 green onions, thinly sliced
3 radishes chopped
1 kirby cucumber chopped
2 handfuls grape tomatoes
1/2 cup canned chick peas
Sprinkling of fat free feta cheese
For the Dressing mix together the following
1 1/2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 1/2 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp cumin
1/8 tsp lite salt
1/8 tsp fresh ground black pepper
pinch cayenne pepper
Assemble the salad ingredients in a large bowl and pour the dressing over.
Calories per serving about 125 based on the following calorie count:
1/2 cup chick peas 100
1 1/2 tbsp oil 150 calories
4oz grape tomatoes 30
4 oz baby carrots 40
1 oz fat free feta cheese 60
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Eat Your Greens
I started with 2 six-ounce Haddock fillets. I soaked the fish in an egg white bath. Meanwhile, I poured 1/3 cup of cornmeal (I prefer yellow) into a plastic bag with a few shakes of Lemon Pepper seasoning and dredged the fish fillets in the cornmeal. I heated up my skillet and sprayed it with Pam cooking spray. I added the 2 fillets to the hot pan and then drizzled 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil into the pan and let it run under the fillets to give them a bit of a crunch. I turned once and then added the second 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil to the pan following the same procedure. This way I sauteed the fish without using alot of oil. I turned the oven on to 350 degrees and while the fillets were cooking lined a small aluminum baking dish with foil and sprayed it. I transferred the fillets to the baking dish and placed them in the oven while I prepared the sauce.
For the sauce I decided to be brave and bought about 3/4 pound of Swiss Chard. I cleaned it and cut it into 3/4-inch strips. Since I have started this blog, I have been treating myself to some new cooking utensils. So I pulled out my brand new Calphalon 21/2 quart saute pan (Bed Bath and Beyond had a $39.95 special - plus I used my 20% off coupon). I sprayed the pan with Pam spray and about 10 sprays of I Can't Believe It's Not Butter Spray for the buttery flavor. I added the garlic, thyme (dried of course) and Swiss Chard, let it cook until the garlic was translucent. Next I added the wine and covered the pan and let it simmer for a few minutes. After that I added 1/2 cup of bottled clam juice (available in Shop-Rite and other local supermarkets) and let the it cook for another 4-5 minutes. At this point I turned off the oven so that the fish would not over cook. Instead of 1/2 cup of heavy cream (100 calories and 40 mg of cholesterol per serving), I used 1/2 cup of Fat Free Half and Half (20 calories 0 mg of cholesterol per serving) to turn the sauce into a something that my cardiologist would approve of. I followed the remaining directions substituting I Can't Believe It's Not Butter for the remaining 1 1/2 tablespoon of butter. If you would rather use butter, then Land O' Lakes Light Whipped Butter has only 45 calories per tablespoon vs the 100 calories in every tablespoon of butter. Whatever you decide to do, this recipe is a definite keeper and changed my mind about "Eating my Greens".
Thursday, March 17, 2011
An Apple a Day
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/
Here is a very easy way to get your apple a day and use up all the fruit you have in your refrigerator that is past it's prime.
Into a large 6 quart pot add:
4 apples cored and cut into eighths (use any apple you prefer)
2 ripe pears cored and cut into eighths
1-2 cups of raisins
2 TB honey
8 cups of water (enough water to cover the fruit)
You can also add any other fruit that you choose such as red grapes or strawberries.
Cover, bring to a boil and simmer for 45 minutes to an hour. Once it has cooled transfer to storage containers and refrigerate.
Yields about 12 servings at 100 to 150 calories per serving (depending on how many raisins you add).
Saturday, March 5, 2011
There's Gold in ThemThar Hills
That is really good money, but considering that I sometimes have problems navigating the NY Times Web site I don't think I will be one of the the high rollers in blogs. Even though I am internet savvy, I must admit I do get tangled up in web searches.
For example, I clicked on the article because I wanted to see the reader comments. It took three tries before I found them. Now I ask you, is it me or is the NY Times web site poorly designed? Why are the comments on a separate web page, not right after the article? Also, if I want to include a web link in this blog, I can't just copy and paste it into my blog. I must first put the link into a Facebook private group I created and then copy and paste the link from Facebook to this blog. Convoluted right?
Anyway, not to digress, after I read the article, I decided to go to my blog (which I admit is not as flashy as other blogs especially not as glitzy as http://dooce.com/about) and register for Google Ads to see how much money I can make. Well since last week, I had 8 hits and made $0 dollars! Great start. So my dear readers, enjoy the article and if you can figure out how to make $ from blogs, please feel free to add your comments on my blog.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/27/magazine/27armst
http://community.nytimes.com/comments/parenting.bl
Saturday, February 26, 2011
The Best Meatballs Ever
Here is what I did to make the meatballs. In a bowl, I combined the fat free half and half, bread crumbs and egg white. I added about a TB of dried onion flakes, a TB of dried parsley and a TB of dried basil and 1TB of Parmesan cheese. I added the dried spices because the mixture of bread crumbs, egg white and fat free half and half looked watery, so I wanted to thicken it up before I worked in the ground beef. I also added the same spices as the original recipe as follows - 1 tsp dried oregano, dash crushed red pepper flakes, 1/4 tsp black pepper and 1/2 tsp lite salt. After I kneaded in the beef, I sprayed my skillet with Pam and added in the small meatballs and started to fry them. I added 1 TB of oil as needed. After the meatballs were browned, I put them on an aluminum foil lined roasting pan that I also sprayed with Pam and put them into a 350 degree oven to bake while I cooked two ounces of whole wheat spaghetti per person. I put about 1/2 jar of my favorite Mariana sauce in a small pot to heat. I had about 1/4 cup of left over wine in the frig so I added that to the sauce. When I added my pasta to the boiling water, I transferred the meatballs to the hot Marinara sauce. After the spaghetti was drained, I topped it with the meatball Mariana sauce.
Mangi! Enjoy the great taste without the additional calories or fat!
Serves 6 Serves 2
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Friday, February 11, 2011
A Special Valentine's Day treat
An update on why we can't find Oysters
http://www.nytimes.com/201
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Hot Soup for a Cold Winter's Day
Friday, January 28, 2011
Baked Apples with Caramel Sauce
Apples
24 dried apricot halves - chopped
4 teaspoons packed dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 small Granny Smith apples, cored
Caramel Sauce
1/2 cup evaporated fat-free milk
4 teaspoons packed dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon cornstarch
Pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Point value: 3 Calories: 180
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
In a small bowl, combine the apricots, brown sugar, and vanilla.
Pack into the apple cavities, then wrap each in foil.
Bake until soft, 40-45 minutes
2. Meanwhile to prepare the caramel sauce, in a small saucepan over medium heat, combine the 1/4 cup of the milk, brown sugar, cornstarch and salt stirring until smooth. Then stirring in the remaining milk, bring just to a boil, stirring constantly. Reduce the heat and cook 1 minute longer. Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla. Serve the apples, drizzled with the caramel sauce.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Grandma's Fried Chicken
Yummy ... and fattening.
Saving calories on a simple dish like this can be challenging, because all the flavor comes from frying the chicken in three inches of oil. First of all, let's use skinless, boneless chicken breasts cut up into small pieces to resemble fast-food chicken nuggets. Use about six ounces of chicken breast per serving. By using the skinless breast, you save 100 calories per six ounce serving. After the chicken has been coated, spray the frying pan well with vegetable spray and add 1 tablespoon of canola oil for every two servings of chicken that is being fried. Fry the chicken on both sides until it is lightly browned, then add another tablespoon of canola oil and fry on both sides again until the chicken is a golden brown. Frying the chicken in the second tablespoon of canola oil gives the chicken extra crispness. This way the chicken tastes more like the fried chicken we all love but should not eat.
Transfer the chicken to a platter, sprinkle immediately with salt and pepper. If you have made the Cajun seasoning from the recipe below, coat the pieces with the Cajun seasoning or sprinkle the Cajun seasoning onto the chicken. Serve with broccoli coleslaw and baked sweet potato fries for a great meal without the guilt.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
SuperBowl Time
The original recipe which feeds 6 calls for 3/4 pound of chorizo, which has 1548 calories or 258 calories per serving and 2 pounds of ground chicken (almost 6 ounces per serving) which is about 285 calories per serving.
I really only wanted to feed two so I used one half pound ground turkey at 160 calories per serving and one spicy chicken sausage (about 90 calories per serving), and I saved almost 300 calories. I followed the rest of the recipe, which included one can of red beans, a bottle of beer and one half of a 28 ounce can of diced tomatoes. I also used Pam Spray with about a teaspoon of olive oil (saved another 50 calories per serving) for the browning. I used one tablespoon of chili powder and 3/4 tablespoon of ground cumin. Because I have to watch my sodium intake, I did not add any salt since the chicken sausage already has 480 mg of sodium. With these substitutions, you will have an awesome SuperBowl Chili that won't tip the scale the next day.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Lower Calorie/Lower Sodium Vichyssoise
Of course, I did not bother to read page 37 of Julia Child's book before I went shopping. Here she explains that 3 cups of potatoes/leeks is about 1 pound of potatoes/leeks. By the time I realized that I did not know how much I needed, I had already started cooking, so the calorie/sodium counts are based on the ingredients that I used. The wonderful thing about cooking soup is that you really can't mess it up. As long as you use a proportion of liquid to solid that you like, the soup will be fine. Although it is delicious hot, I think I did not use enough leeks, but you, my readers, must let me know what you think.
Basically you slice the vegetables, and simmer them in a large pot in the broth and salt for about an hour. Once the vegetables are tender, puree the vegetables in a food processor. Return to the pot and add the Fat Free Half and Half. If you are Kosher or Vegetarian, you can use Vegetable broth instead of Chicken broth. I ate it hot, but you can chill it and eat it cold. Next week we will be getting ready for the SuperBowl with our modified version of Rachael Ray's Chunky Chicken and Chorizo Chili. In the meantime, "Bon Appetit" as Julia would say.
Just as an update - I just had it cold and it is better cold than hot, but either way it is delicious.
Calorie count Vichyssoise | makes 4 quarts | |
Regular recipe | Calories | |
Potatoes | 3 Pounds | 1,048 |
Leeks | 1 Pound | 277 |
Chicken Broth | 2 Quarts | 120 |
Whipping Cream | 1 Cup | 789 |
2,234 | ||
Per Serving 8 large servings | 279 | |
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Friday, January 7, 2011
Low Calorie/Low Sodium Chicken Adobo
I wanted to write an entire blog on why I am interested in blogging about lower calorie/lower sodium versions of wonderful recipes. I was going to reference the popularity of the recent movie “Julia and Julie” along with the popularity of Television chefs like Emeril Lagasse, Rachael Ray, Bobby Flay etc.
However, when I saw this FaceBook Post about a Chicken Adobo recipe on the NYTimes web page ( http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/magazine/09Food-t-000.html?_r=3&src=ISMR_HP_LO_MST_FB ), I decided to jump in and try to make a lower calorie/lower sodium version that will taste good. So I will save the “why” blog for another day. Basically, the unskinned version of the recipe is half the calories and about 68% lower in sodium than the original.
Whichever version you decide to use my friends you must try this recipe. It is cooking right now and my house smells delicious!
Calorie Count for Chicken Adobo
Calories - 4 Servings | source CalorieKing.com | ||
1 Cutup Chicken |
| with skin | w/o skin |
2 Thighs |
| 396 | 164 |
2 Breasts |
| 388 | 248 |
2 Wings |
| 218 | 74 |
2 DrumSticks |
| 236 | 148 |
1 Cup Coconut Milk | 355 | 148 | |
per serving |
| 398 | 196 |
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Sodium |
| Kikkoman | House of Tsang |
1/4 Cup Soy Sauce | 7,255 | 2,350 | |
per serving |
| 1,814 | 587 |