Chicken Lettuce Wraps

I have to record this recipe before I forget. Dinner tonight was amazing! It was so simple and easy to put together and would be perfect for mixing up ahead of time on days that we are all busy at work and school.

Chicken Lettuce Wraps

Ingredients:
1-2 chicken breasts diced small
1/2 onion diced
1 cup mushrooms diced
1/2 cup red peppers diced
dash of garlic garlic
3 TBS soy sauce
3 TBS brown sugar
1 TBS red wine vinegar
romaine lettuce

Directions:
Dice chicken and veggies - almost mince them. Saute together until chicken is cooked. Add garlic, soy sauce, brown sugar and vinegar toss to coat and let cook until the liquid is gone. Cool and serve on romaine lettuce leaves.

Kale and Sweet Potato Quesadillas

Our daughter is a mini - me of my husband not only in looks but in food taste. They love any type of mexican food and together they can go through a costco pack of tortillas in about two weeks (48 tortillas!!!).  Thus meaning I am always looking for ways to expand our mexican selection of foods in our house. We do a lot of tacos, nachos, fajitas, enchiladas, etc and everything is LOADED with veggies. I love making sweet potato and black bean quesadillas for example. My husband, being from New Mexico, can never get it spicy enough and our daughter loves the variety of what you can do with a tortilla! 

This week I wanted to expand on the sweet potato quesadilla so I added fresh organic kale. They turned out so good. I actually started out making a plain cheese and garlic quesadilla for our little but she wouldn't have anything to do with it. Instead she ate 1/2 of a loaded kale and sweet potato one. Love that my family craves veggies and loves fun quesadilla variations! 


Kale and Sweet Potato Quesadillas

Ingredients:
Tortillas (2 per quesadilla)
2 TBS coconut oil
Kale (1 bundle)
Sweet Potato (2 med sized)
Mushrooms (1 cup)
Onion (1 small)
Cheese (shredded)

Seasonings (celtic sea salt, garlic from TS, cumin)

Optional Toppings:
sour cream (green valley makes a great lactaid free one)
guac or diced avocado
salsa

Directions:
Dice sweet potatoes and onions finely and saute until soft in coconut oil. Mash roughly then add diced mushrooms and roughly chopped kale then add your seasonings. Cook until kale is tender. 

Lay tortilla in a hot skillet and add cheese and sweet potato and kale mixture, top with second tortilla. Lightly brown tortilla on both sides then slice into triangles. Serve with your toppings. 

Banana Carrot Muffins

We have been on a muffin kick lately. A couple weeks ago I posted a great recipe for Apple Carrot Muffins and it got me thinking about other ways to use a mix of fruit and veggies in muffins. I wanted something that I could serve our toddler for breakfast and also make a healthy snack. Both of these recipes make a ton of muffins in mini muffin form and freeze great! 

Whole Wheat Banana Carrot Muffins
makes 5 dozen mini muffins

Ingredients:

• 2 cups whole wheat flour
• 2 cups finely chopped/grated carrot
• ¼ cup quick cooking oats
• ¼ cup coconut
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1tsp cinnamon powder
• 2 ripe bananas mashed into a paste
• ½ cup olive oil
• 1/2 cup yogurt
• 1 cup brown sugar

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Mix all the dry ingredients in a bowl.

In a separate bowl combine all the wet ingredients and mix well.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix till combines. The mixtures will be quite hard. If it looks too dry add a little more yogurt. Don’t be tempted to make it too watery.

Scoop the batter into the greased mini muffin tray. And bake till done, approximately 10 minutes.

Mardi Gras - Jambalaya, King Cake, Crafts and more!

Happy Mardi Gras! 

I honestly never even knew what Mardi Gras was ... ok I still don't know much about it. However, my husband's family (mother's side) is from New Orleans and so there are a couple fun traditions that we wanted to make sure we shared with our children.

I had never attempted to make any kind of traditional New Orleans food - failure was a huge fear as my husband grandmother is an incredible cook.  After having her Jambalaya several years ago I just never could convince myself to give it a try in our kitchen. This year I dove right in! I just searched for a basic recipe that sounded like it had good flavor. It was a total hit! We all loved it and it made a tons so of course we had plenty of leftovers to freeze for another meal in a month or so.

We also celebrated by making Jester hats in the traditional Mardi Gras colors - purple, yellow and green. Pandora provided a great New Orleans Jazz station to jam to. Finally we enjoyed a store bought King Cake - it will take a while to find that baby but it is always fun to see who will be the lucky winner!

Jambalaya

Ingredients:

• 1 (16-ounce) package spicy hickory-smoked sausage, cut into 1/2-inch slices
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 small green bell pepper, chopped
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 cups uncooked rice
• 1 (32-ounce) container chicken broth
• 1 (14 1/2-ounce) can stewed tomatoes, undrained and chopped
• 1 (8-ounce) can tomato sauce
• 2 teaspoons Cajun seasoning
• 1 teaspoon hot sauce
• 1 pound unpeeled medium-size fresh shrimp
• 3 tablespoons chopped green onions
• 
  
• Directions:
• Brown sausage in a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Drain, reserving 3 tablespoons drippings in pan. Add onion and bell pepper, and sauté 2 to 3 minutes or until tender. Add garlic, and sauté 1 more minute.
• Add rice and chicken broth. Bring to a boil; cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer 20 minutes. Stir in tomatoes and next 3 ingredients.
• Peel shrimp, and devein, if desired.
• Stir in shrimp and green onions; cook 2 to 3 minutes or just until shrimp turn pink.
• 
  
• Kitchen Notes:
• * I used "hot" smoked sausage from Hillshire Farms
• * Subbed green pepper for diced red pepper
• * Used 1.5 cups brown rice instead of white
• * Used Trader Joe's Mixed Seafood (calamari, shrimp, scallops - frozen) 
• * Omitted green onion
• * Makes a Large pot - enough to freeze for 2-4 meals later

Carrot Apple Muffins

A couple weeks ago we bought some Almond Poppyseed Muffins in the clearance bakery section at our local grocery store. I had no reason to buy them other than there were 15 mini muffins for $0.89. After bringing them home my toddler saw them on the counter and begged to have one. She ate 3 in the first sitting and the next morning wanted 2 more for breakfast with her banana. I had no idea when I bought them how much she would love them and my husband and I would consume zero! 

It got me thinking... why have I not pulled up some good muffin recipes and made big batches to freeze?  So I started looking for recipes, specially ones that included some veggies and whole wheat too. She loves squash so zucchini muffins are a must on the list but I wanted something different than those and banana ones. We already eat a lot of zucchini and banana breads. 

I found this recipe Whole Foods website and was a little skeptical but it turns out the whole family loves them! You can find the original recipe here... because as always I change it up a little bit! 

Carrot Apple Muffins

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/4 cup cane sugar
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon non-aluminum baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon celtic sea salt
• 3/4 cup grated carrots
• 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 1/4 cup almond milk
• 1/4 cup coconut oil
• 1 teaspoon real vanilla extract

Directions:

Mix all ingredients together and place in muffin tins or mini muffin tins (line with papers and or spray with nonstick spray). Bake at 350 until done (20 mins for reg muffins and 10 mins for minis). Let cool enjoy! 

Kitchen Notes:

* These are great to freeze - I just put in a ziplock bag and labeled so I can pull them out for a quick breakfast later. 

* Want them as a sweet treat for dessert? Add a cream cheese or vanilla frosting! YUM 

Porcupines

I often ask my husband what he wants on the grocery list and dinner menu. He often doesn't really have any suggestions... so when he does I run with it! About a month ago he asked for Porcupines - I didn't even know what he was talking about! I promptly went to a google search and found a couple recipes and read them to him. Once we found what he thought he recalled from childhood we were ready to go. 

This were actually very good! I will for sure be making these again as they are pretty easy and they even freeze great! 

Porcupines

Ingredients:
1 pound lean ground beef (could sub turkey)
1/2 cup uncooked rice
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp celery salt
1/8 tsp garlic powder (or sub TS Garlic Garlic!!) 
1/8 tsp ground black pepper
1 can tomato sauce (15 oz)
1 cup water

Directions:

1. In a large bowl, combine the ground beef, rice, 1/2 cup of water and onion. Blend in salt, celery salt, garlic powder and pepper. Mix well. Shape into 1 1/2 inch balls.
2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). In a large skillet over medium heat, brown the meatballs; drain fat.
3. In an 11x7 inch baking dish, combine the tomato sauce and 1 cup of water. Place the browned meatballs into the tomato sauce, turning to coat well.
4. Cover and bake in a preheated oven for 45 minutes. Uncover, and cook for an additional 15 minutes.

Cauliflower Mash

My toddler lately has been on a veggie strike. She use to eat every veggie in sight and then she came down with a bad stomach virus and decided that she would rather live on pancakes and fruit with the once in a while piece of chicken. 
We are a huge veggie eating family so I knew I needed to just keep trying with her and she would come back around. 
I don't have anything against hiding veggies but I do at some point want her to know and identify what she is eating so that she can make her own healthy choices. 
I have always been intrigued by subbing cauliflower for potatoes when making "mashed potatoes". I have known parents with great success with this so decided to give it a try. 
It turned out amazing! Even my husband who could take or leave cauliflower enjoyed the recipe. Our toddler ate 2 servings at dinner and another 2 servings at lunch the following day. That means this one is a winner for sure! 

Cauliflower Mash

Ingredients:
1 head cauliflower, cut into florets
1 TBS EVOO
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup grated parm cheese (can use dairy free alternative)
1 TBS cream cheese (we love Green Valley Lactose Free) 
1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/8 tsp ground black pepper

Directions:

1. Place a steamer insert into a saucepan and fill with water to just below the bottom of the steamer. Bring water to a boil. Add cauliflower, cover, and steam until tender, about 10 minutes.

1. Meanwhile, heat olive oil in a small skillet over medium heat; cook and stir garlic until softened, about 2 minutes. Remove from heat.

1. Transfer half the cauliflower to a food processor; cover and blend on high. Add remaining cauliflower florets, one at a time, until vegetables are creamy. Blend in garlic, Parmesan cheese, cream cheese, salt, and black pepper.