Day 52: Chicken Noodle Soup

Day 52.

My friend, Andrea, asked me to blog some diet-friendly recipes. So here's my recipe for chicken noodle soup. I use white meat chicken and fresh veggies, so it's pretty friendly for the waistline. This can also be put together, start to finish, in about 15 minutes. From now on, I'll tag any diet-friendly recipes as Andrea. :) Hope you like this one!

Here's what you'll need.

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
2 large containers of chicken stock (I thought I only needed one, but I ended up needing two)
About 1/2 package egg noodles
Any fresh veggies you need to use up (I had carrots and broccoli)
I also had dried celery flakes and dried bell peppers
Garlic salt
Pepper
Parsley


Slice up the chicken and cook it thoroughly. Season with pepper and garlic salt.


Throw in your fresh veggies, and cook for just a minute.


Add the stock to the pot.


Add in the parsley, celery flakes and dried peppers. Season again with a little pepper and garlic salt. Bring to a boil.


Add the noodles and cook as package directs.


Once the noodles are cooked through, ladle into bowls.

Day 51: Banana-Berry Oatmeal Cookies

Day 51.

These are the cookies that I "invented" this week. I took a couple of different recipe and mashed them together and tweaked some other bits, then Ta-Da!

Here's what you'll need for these.

1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
3/4 cup shortening
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 cup mashed bananas (about 2 bananas)
1 3/4 cup quick cooking oats
1/2 cup blueberries

Preheat oven to 400*


Combine the flour, baking soda and cinnamon.


Add the shortening and both sugars to a mixing bowl.


Cream together.


Add the egg to the mixing bowl,


along with the bananas and oatmeal.


Mix well.


Add the blueberries


and fold in gently.


Use a cookie scoop to portion out dough.


Bake for about 10 minutes. Cool on a wire rack.

We all really enjoyed these cookies. They stayed super soft, even after they were stored overnight. MMmmm!

Day 50: Easy Fish Tacos

Day 50.

This one is super easy. I mean, insanely easy. Since it's Friday and Lent, we're meat free on Fridays. Usually we would just do cheese pizza or spaghetti or something boring, but decided we would try something new. So here it is!

Here's what you'll need.

Some breaded, frozen fish sticks
tortilla shells of your choice
Purple cabbage
Cumin
Chili Powder

Season the fish with the cumin and chili powder. Bake as package directs.


Shred the cabbage.

Once the fish sticks are cooked, make up your tacos!


We had this with the pico de gallo pilaf recipe from a couple of weeks ago and it was pretty tasty!

So there it is. My almost embarrassingly easy fish tacos. :)

Day 49: Crockpot Roast

Day 49.

Today was going to be busy, so I knew I had better pull out the crockpot! We hadn't had a regular ol roast in quite a while, so I figured we should do that.

Here's what you'll need.

1 2-3 pound beef roast
1 onion
Some carrots
Some potatoes
1 cup water
1 package onion soup mix

Put the roast in the crockpot.


Then dice and add the carrots,


the potatoes


and the onion


Like so!


Mix the soup mix and water.


Pour it over the top.


Cook on high for about 6 hours then turn to low until serving time. I put this on at 8am and turned it to low at 3. We ate at 5:30.


And it was awesome.

Question....for the locals

I have a question for you local readers...would you attend a weekly seminar in which you are taught to prepare a specific recipe? The final product would be available for tasting and you would be walked through the preparation and cooking step-by-step?

Just curious.

Leave a comment below and let me know what you think.
Thanks!

Day 48: Garlic Bread

Day 48.

Since today is Ash Wednesday, we can't eat meat since we are Catholic. Tonight's supper was simply spaghetti with meatless sauce. Pretty uninspiring. Except for the bread. ;) This is a great way to use up any extra buns you may have lying around.

Here's what you'll need.

Buns, either hamburger or hot dog
Butter
Garlic salt

Preheat your oven to 400*


Split the buns


Slather each half with some butter


Lay 'em out on a baking sheet


Sprinkle with the garlic salt


These looked a little blah, so I sprinkled on some parsley too.


Bake for about 10 minutes, or until lightly toasted


The finished product!

Day 47: Pancakes Two Ways & New Kitchen Stuff!!

Day 47.

Alright. Before we get to the recipe, I have new stuff to show off.


My new table and chairs. I bought our previous set used before we got married, going on 6 years ago. I love the new one!

And, thanks to Barbara, the amazing insurance lady, here's my new stove!! (And I'm not just saying she's awesome because she reads the blog)


The middle burner can be used two ways.

Like this.


Or like this. How cool is that??????

Ahem.

So, on to the meal.

We love pancakes. But. Millie likes chocolate chip, I like blueberry and Kurt likes chocolate chip or plain. What to do? Well. I'll show you.


Mix up some pancakes. I cheat and use the "Just Add Water" mix. Yeah. I'm lazy like that.


How cute is this guy?


Filled up!


Since Millie wanted chocolate chip, I just sprinkled a couple of mini chips onto the batter once it was poured. Some sprinkles too. 'Cause we're fancy.


For blueberry, I poured out the batter


then sprinkle on some blueberries! Mine were frozen, but they defrost enough.


More chocolate chip


Here's Millie's pancake man.


The best way to top chocolate chip pancakes? With whipped cream!!


Blueberry deliciousness!!