Cilantro Turkey Rice Soup

For those of you that don't know this, never EVER throw a turkey carcass away after a turkey dinner until you've made broth from it! The first time I heard this I thought, blech how can you get anything tasty from a carcass. But I trusted the reviews and really, I don't know why I doubted it since it's common sense that your broth flavor comes from the bones and not the meat. All you do put the turkey skin and all, minus any leftover meat into a large pot, cover generously with water and let this simmer for 3 hours. Strain and it's ready to be used.

Now on to my soup, I had the broth that I made last night and I knew that I didn't want it to go to waste but I wasn't in the mood for your typical chicken noodle soup, I was actually in the mood for the refreshing taste of cilantro, I love the taste of cilantro. But after looking all over the web I couldn't really find a recipe that was perking my interest. So I winged it and came up with great results, will be making this soup again, and again... you get the picture.

I will say that this made a large soup, we're a family of five and we'll get two meals out of this soup.

Cilantro Turkey Rice Soup

4-6 litres of turkey broth (or chicken)
1 bay leaf
5-6 whole peppercorns
1/2 tsp garlic powder
2 tbsp chicken bouillon (I use yellow kind from a Mexican import store)
salt to taste
about 1 cup fresh chopped cilantro
3 medium carrots, sliced
1 medium onion, chopped
1 large zucchini, sliced
2 celery stalks, chopped
1 large jalapeno, whole

2 cups cooked rice
2 cups leftover turkey, chopped

Bring the broth to a simmer and add your herbs and seasonings. While this simmers cut your vegetables and add to your broth. Cook until tender. Add the rice and turkey. Serve soup with fresh lime juice and baked tortilla chips. We also used saltine crackers. Either way it's a good summery kind of soup, just what I wanted today.

Enjoy!
Tina

Oatmeal Pancakes (Clean Eating)

At the beginning of the year I bought myself a couple of clean eating books, with every intention of trying to cut out the bad foods most of North America has in their cupboards. While I know we are not the worst eaters out there, I know we can improve. I found this recipe online that's chalk full of clean eating recipes (kind of ironic that I would search online when I spent the money for the actual cookbooks, lol) and it is so filling, seriously! I had two pancakes with one cup of strawberries and I could barely finish the last few bites. Next time I'll have one pancake with maybe a little more fruit. Either way, it's filling and good for you.

Oatmeal Pancakes

1 1/2 cups dry oatmeal (I used instant)
1 1/4 cups milk
1 lg egg
1 Tbsp oil
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla

Mix the milk and rolled oats together and let this soak for 5 minutes. Add the oil and egg, and vanilla and mix well. Stir in the dry ingredients. I found that when I made this as stated, the dough was a little too stiff for pancake batter. So I added more milk until I had a normal pancake batter, all together I used about 1 3/4 - 2 cups of milk. Cook on a pancake griddle and serve with fruit. If you want to keep in line with the Clean Eating plan you would eat this with pure maple syrup or you could use regular pancake syrup.

This makes 9 pancakes at 136 calories each. So my breakfast of 2 pancakes, 1 cup of strawberries and maple syrup was just over 400 calories! And if left me feeling full right up until lunch.

Enjoy!
Tina

Baked Tortilla Chips & Fresh Salsa

I saw these chips online the other day and just had to make them today, and it only took the evening for all of us to gobble them up! The chips are lightly brushed with oil and than baked, so you're saving a lot on calories vs the fried ones. But the best part is that they are actually crispy, taste like they were fried! I love it when that happens, lol.

The salsa is one of our favourites to go with tortilla chips and it's so easy to make. My sister in law is a native to Belize and she makes the best ceviche, which is basically what this is but ceviche is made with shrimp or cooked chicken added. I don't always have the chicken on hand and I don't care for shrimp so it just seems easier to make it without.

Tortilla Chips

12 corn tortillas, preferably white
salt
oil

Brush both sides sparingly with the oil with a pastry brush, sprinkle with the salt. Stack all the tortillas in one pile and cut into six triangles. Spread on a baking sheet and bake at 350F for about 10-15 minutes, flipping chips once. Remove once they are golden brown.

Salsa

3 Roma tomatoes, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 large jalapeno, chopped
1/2 English cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped
1 lime
2-3 tbsp chopped fresh cilantro
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp salt
2-3 tbsp water

Mix all the ingredients except the lime and the water, squeeze the lime juice over the salsa. Add just a little bit of water to dilute the lime juice a little. You can adjust the salt and garlic powder to your personal preference. This is best if allowed to sit in the fridge for at least an hour.

Enjoy!
Tina

Cream of Broccoli Soup

We love cream of broccoli soup, but I've always been a little apprehensive with making it. I've tasted too many cream soups that tasted a little like cardboard, but this one was really good. In fact my husband said it tasted like the soup from one of our favourite restaurants!

I'm going to post the original recipe and then I'll let you know about some of the changes I made.

Cream of Broccoli Soup

2 Tbsp butter
1 onion, chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
3 cups chicken broth
8 cups broccoli florets
1 tsp chicken bouillon
dash of nutmeg
salt and pepper to taste

3 tbsp butter
3 tbsp flour
2 cups milk

Melt the butter in a large saucepan, add onions and celery and saute until tender. Add broccoli, broth, bouillon, nutmeg and salt and pepper. Simmer for 15-20 minutes or until broccoli is tender. Take your potato masher and gently mash the broccoli, I like a chunky soup so I barely mashed them at all. Meanwhile melt the 3 tbsp of butter in a smaller saucepan and stir in the flour. Now slowly add the milk, stirring in between. It should be smooth before you add more milk or else you'll get a lumpy soup. Stir this into the soup until thickened.

Now here's how I changed the recipe; I added more chicken broth, all together I used about 4 or 5 cups chicken broth. I also added about 1 cup of 18% table cream to give the soup a richer taste. With adding the extra liquid I then used 5 tbsp of butter and 5 tbsp of flour to thicken the bigger soup. I also used an extra celery stalk.

Enjoy!
Tina

Chicken Fajitas

Boy it's been a while since I last posted! I promise I was still cooking, only they were recipes that we had already posted and I didn't think anyone would want to see doubles, lol.

I have been wanting to try chicken fajitas for quite some time now and I needed a quick lunch today so I opted to try these. They are quick and easy to make which I love, and they're also a healthy dish, which I really love! And to make it even better, these were really good, I can definitely see myself making these on a regular basis. I know my husband will be asking for them often!

Chicken Fajitas

1 tbsp butter or olive oil (I used butter)
1 boneless chicken breast (cut into strips)
1/2 green pepper, sliced
1/2 red pepper, sliced
1/2 onion, sliced
1 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp cumin pwd
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp black pepper
1 tsp chicken bouillon

Put sliced chicken in a medium zip lock bag, add spices and shake together. Meanwhile, melt the butter in a medium pan and stir fry the onions until they start to turn translucent (I love my onions well done). Add chicken and continue frying until cooked. Now toss in the bell peppers and let this cook until peppers are done to your liking. If your pan gets dry I add a little bit of chicken soup broth instead of more butter to save on calories.

Warm a flour tortilla on the oven burner or BBQ and spoon the chicken down the middle. I had this with a tossed salad and Renee's Italian dressing. This was a super delicious meal for only about 400 calories!

*Note; The original recipe used all of the chicken for one fajita but I found it plenty to divide this into two fajitas. If you use all the chicken in one fajita your calories would increase by over 200.

Enjoy!
Tina

Sloppy Joes

I remember the first time I had sloppy joes as a kid. I was at a birthday party and this is what they served to all of us hungry kids. I was in love, lol. But as you get older you kind of put these simple recipes to the side and forget about them. And then you have a day where you can figure out what to make for supper and suddenly you remember how simple these are to make.

Sloppy Joes
1 lb extra lean ground beef
1/2 onion, chopped
1 small green or red bell pepper
3/4 cup water
1 cup ketchup
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp prepared mustard
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp salt

Fry the beef, onion and bell pepper until no pink remains. Add the remaining ingredients and simmer until they are the desired consistency. Serve with your favourite bread. I love serving these with toasted homemade hamburger buns, but I was out today so I use regular whole wheat bread.

Cinnamon Rolls

Well after smelling someone else baking cinnamon rolls and after reading about someone else baking cinnamon rolls on Facebook I decided that perhaps I should make them as well, lol. And my kids were eager to test taste them for me. A quick search on All Recipes resulted in these, with a few minor changes. The original recipe said to make the dough in your bread maker, but I did it the traditional way. I also added the caramel sauce which makes these more of an ooey gooey type cinnamon roll.

Cinnamon Rolls
1/4 cup warm water
1 Tbsp yeast
1/2 small pkg vanilla pudding mix
1 cup warm milk
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 egg, room temperature
1 Tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
4 cups bread flour (if using regular flour add 1 tsp bkg powder)

Filling
1/4 cup butter softened
1 cup brown sugar
4 tsp cinnamon
3/4 cup pecans, optional

Sprinkle the yeast in the warm water and let this sit for 5 minutes. Add remaining ingredients and knead while adding the flour. Cover and let rise in a warm place for 1 hour. (I put the bowl in the oven with the light on) Roll dough into roughly a 17x10" rectangle and spread dough with the butter. Mix the brown sugar and cinnamon together and sprinkle on top of the butter. Roll up jelly roll style and cut into 16 pieces, place in a 9x13 cake pan on top of the caramel sauce. Cover and let rise for 1 hour. Bake at 350F until done. Drizzle with icing of your choice.


Caramel Sauce
1/3 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 Tbsp milk or cream
Melt together in a small saucepan and pour into the 9x13 cake pan while dough is rising. Once rolls are finished baking I like to drop the rolls upside down on a clean tea towel so the sauce oozes in the rolls.

Enjoy!
Tina

Bienenstich

A local family restaurant that I regularly enjoy serves a great Bienenstich. It looks amazing and is surprisingly easy to make. In a restaurant this cake would be baked to be a tall two layer cake with a thick custard filling. The recipe that I use asks for mostly whipping cream and I have to say I prefer the taste, it's lighter and changes the taste. It also has only half the height, it doesn't look as elegant but it's easier to eat.

Bienenstich (Honeycomb Cake)
4 eggs
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 cup milk
2 tbsp butter
1 tsp vanilla

Beat eggs with sugar, add four and baking powder. Scald milk with butter and add quickly to eggs with vanilla. Grease and flour a 12x18 in cookie sheet, or two round cake pans for a higher (better looking) cake. Bake at 400F for 15 minutes. Prepare topping.

Topping
10 tbsp brown sugar
4 tbsp butter
6 tbsp whipping cream
3/4 cup coconut
3/4 cup sliced almonds

Melt butter and sugar in a saucepan, add coconut, cream and almonds. Spread on cake and broil to a golden brown. Freeze and prepare filling.

Filling:
2 cups whipping cream (I use nutriwhip)
1/2 cup sugar (don't use if using nutriwhip)
2 tbsp instant vanilla pudding mix

Whip cream and add sugar and pudding mix. Slice frozen cake in half horizontally. Spread bottom later with the cream and reassemble.

*Note: Freezing the cake makes cutting the cake a lot easier. You could even serve this frozen.

Have a great day!
Tina