Rustic Fruit Tart

It's no secret that I am a huge fan,  admirer, addict of the food network. They always make everything seem so easy especially with 30 minute meals, and $10 dinners, and Semi-homemade things....well I looked in my fridge and saw some berries that were close to being expired and I had a pre-made pie dough that I bought last week for another recipe that did not get posted. It wasn't very pretty and although my family told me it was delicious I need to perfect it before sharing it. So this was very easy to throw together, taking a lesson from Anne Burrell and her love of all things "Rustic" aka: I personally am just to lazy to always make things perfectly pretty, and have no counter space for rolling dough out.  

I used this as a clean out my fruit and other things kind of recipe. I used two different jams with the fruit use what you have on hand. 

One of my favorite breakfasts is sweetened ricotta cheese, I had some in the fridge so I added it to the base of pie crust. 

1 Pie crust is needed. Either homemade or pre-made. Set out on counter top to come to room temp about 20 minutes before you need to use it. If homemade roll out to the size you want. I used a boxed one and did not roll it out any thinner/bigger then what it was. 

Preheat oven to 375

Sweetened Ricotta Ingredients:

1 Cup Ricotta Cheese

1 tbsp cinnamon

1tsp Vanilla extract

1. Mix ingredients and set aside.

Fruit Filling Ingredients:

1 Pint Strawberries, diced

1 Pint Blueberries

1 tbsp Cinnamon Pear Jam

1/4 cup Strawberry Jam

1/4 cup water

1 tbsp Sugar

2 tbsp corn starch

2. Everything goes into a pot boil for 3-4 minutes then simmer until thick. Turn burner off and set aside to cool.

3. Grease baking sheet and lay out pie crust.

4. Spread the Ricotta filling on the bottom about 1 inch away from the sides

5. Spread fruit filling on top of the ricotta.

6. I used an egg wash (one egg+ water mixed) brushed on the 1 inch boarder to help hold it together. 

7. Fold sides up and over filling, I pinched the dough together to hold form and brushed the top with more egg wash.

8. Bake 375 for 30-40 minutes. Let cool 10 Minutes before cutting to serve. 

In the oven.

After baking.

(Sorry lighting for this picture is so bad...)

I served as is because like I said it was a spur of the moment fridge clean out dish. But this would be great served with vanilla ice cream, or with some cinnamon whipped cream, or vanilla bean whipped cream. 

It was really yummy...so much so that I didn't get to take a picture of it cut before it was all eaten. I did have some extra fruit filling left over. I put it in a jar and have used it on toast for breakfast....will be yummy warmed and put over ice cream or waffles/pancakes too....mmmm

Enjoy ^.^ 

Laura <3

Protein Bars 2.0

1/2 cup Milk

3 Tbsp Ground Organic Flax

1 Cup Rice Cereal

1/2 Cup Oats

1/2 Cup Granola Cereal

1/4 Cup Sunflower Seeds

1/4 Cup Crasina

1/4 Cup Coconut, unsweetened

1/2 Tsp Salt

2/3 Cup Almond Butter

2 Scoops Protein Powder (Flavor of your choice)

1 Tbsp Honey or Agave which ever you prefer

1. In a small bowl, combine the milk and flax seed. Allow the mixture to sit and thicken while you mix everything else, except Almond Butter and Honey.

2. In a larger bowl mix the rest of the ingredients.

3. Pour in the thickened Milk/flax and stir.

4. Add in the Almond Butter and mix until a dough is formed. Use your hands it is much easier than trying to use a spoonula. 

5. Taste the mixture, if you want it sweeter you can then add the honey or agave which ever you choose to use. 

6. I used a small loaf pan but depending on the thickness you want depends on the size pan you use. Don't forget to prep the dish with wax paper making it easier to get the bars out. 

7. Place dish in freezer for about 20 min to set up.

8. Cut bars, mine were cut into 7, wrap individually and store in the refrigerator or freezer.  

These don't make a ton so they are great to make on a weekly basis for breakfasts for the week. Grab and go on the way to work. These were good but were not as good as Protein Bars 1.0 

Enjoy ^.^

Laura <3

Summer Pasta Salad with a Creamy Poppy Seed Dressing

Tonight for dinner I wanted something easy. I had some left over Zucchini and some Yellow Squash from our neighborly Vegetable Fairy. This was super easy had all the ingredients on hand, and I just baked up some Chicken Breasts as the protein in the toaster oven with salt pepper and random spices. 

Ingredients:

1 lb Pasta, any shape that you have on hand

2 Large Tomatoes, largely diced

1 Medium Zucchini, sliced in rounds then quartered

1 Yellow Squash, sliced in rounds then quartered

1 cup Carrot, shredded

1/4 cup Parsley, minced

1/2 cup Greek Yogurt

1/2 cup Poppy Seed Dressing

Salt

Pepper

Garlic Powder

Onion Powder

For the Creamy Dressing:

Combine the Greek Yogurt, the Poppy Seed Dressing, Parsley, and spices in a bowl and set aside. 

1. Boil Pasta, set aside to cool

2. Dice Veggies

3. Shred Carrots

4. Combine Vegetables, Pasta, and Dressing. Chill until you are ready to serve. 

Dinner is served! Easy Breezy meal that took no effort at all! Super nice to have during a heat wave, wish I had whipped it up last week. It was a beautiful day today even got to sit outside tonight until the bugs started to bite!

A great way to serve this would be in mason jars for an on the go picnic idea!

Enjoy ^.^

Laura <3

Roasted Summer Vegetable Lasagna

I love eggplant. It is one of my favorite things to cook with glossy and deep purple skin is pretty to sit on the counter until you get around to cook with it! Grilled, charred, cubed, saute, roasted it's tender and smokey and a great meaty fill in for vegetarian dishes. This recipe could be made fully vegetarian just omit the ground beef I am 100% sure you won't miss it. 

Last week we took a trip to the farmers market store. I loaded up on veggies to use all week..then the heat wave hit. It was way to hot to turn on my oven and I really wanted to make a roasted eggplant lasagna. I made one last summer with veggies from out neighbors garden and fell in love with the meaty smoky dish. The heat wasn't so bad on Sunday so I broke out the oven! 

Our neighbor plants a huge garden every year and sometimes we get visits from the vegetable fairy. He drops off bags of veggies on our porch. This week he dropped off some cucumbers that I used in salads, some green onions which I used in this dish, and a yellow squash that I have not used yet. 

Did you know: 

Eggplant is Brain Food. Research on eggplant has focused on an anthocyanin phytonutrient found in eggplant skin called nasunin. Nasunin is a potent antioxidant and free radical scavenger that has been shown to protect cell membranes from damage. In animal studies, nasunin has been found to protect the lipids (fats) in brain cell membranes. Cell membranes are almost entirely composed of lipids and are responsible for protecting the cell from free radicals, letting nutrients in and wastes out, and receiving instructions from messenger molecules that tell the cell which activities it should perform.

Ingredients:

2 Large Eggplant, sliced lengthwise

1lb Ground beef (turkey, chicken, sausage any mix or opt out all together)

2 cups Tomato sauce

1/2 large bag frozen mixed vegetables

2 Zucchini, diced

12 Mushrooms, diced

8 Green onions, sliced thin

1 Yellow onion, diced

1 Green pepper, diced

1 Large container ricotta cheese

2 cups Mozzarella cheese, shredded

EVOO

Salt

Pepper

Garlic powder

Onion powder

Italian Seasoning

1. Slice Eggplant, salt, press for 30 minutes. Place on baking sheets season with pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, Italian seasoning drizzle with EVOO and roast  400° for 30 min. Let cool on sheets. 

2. In skillet brown meat season with salt, pepper, garlic, onion, and Italian seasoning
3. Dice veggies and mix with browned meat, once browned add in the 1 1/2 cups sauce.

4. Mix Ricotta cheese with pepper, onion powder, Italian seasoning, and garlic powder, set aside.

5. Once the eggplant is cooled use the remaining 1/2 cup sauce on the bottom of your baking dish and create a single layer of eggplant on the bottom. 

6. Top the eggplant layer with the mixed vegetable/beef.

7. Top this layer with the ricotta mixture.

8. Repeat steps 5-7 until all the ingredients are used. Top with 2 cups of Mozzarella cheese.

9. Bake at 350 for 1 hour. Let stand for 30 minutes before serving for it to set up.

As you may notice I did not add additional sauce in the layers, I did not want to to be to moist and squishy and not set up enough to cut without it falling apart. I served this with a green salad and some last minute garlic bread. The nice thing about dishes like this is that so many of the vegetables are able to me swapped out for what ever you have on hand. It's a summer garden empty your fridge kind of dish. 

It was yummy and we had left overs for dinner tonight. 

Enjoy ^.^

<3 Laura

Protein Bars 1.0

Boy has it been hot this week! I think we are in day 6 of the heat wave that is supposed to be ending this weekend. I HATE hot weather. It's icky, I can't ever seem to find enough motivation and frankly I miss my sweaters. I love the beautiful sunny days, but I am an autumn girl..funny since I was born in Feb. I hate the super cold too...but I would rather it be freezing cold than grossly hot. 

Another thing I hate about the heat is that it is harder to bring snacks with me during the day. Banana's turn to smush and stink up the car, cheese get ucky too. A girl can only eat so many almonds. I love protein bars the problem is is that most of the ones on the market are covered in a "yogurt" substance or chocolate and again in the weather...not so appetizing. Or they are expensive...I love the Quest brand, especially vanilla almond crunch flavor but they do have some artificial ingredients in them, so I have been set out to make my own....I did some googling and found a bunch of recipes online and tried them out, changed ingredients, and came up with this...better yet it's a no bake! Welcome Protein Bar 1.0 experiment....

Recipe:

8 Scoops Whey Protein Isolate Chocolate Peanut Butter Flavoring ( I used this... )

3/4 Cup Raisins

1 Cup Natural Peanut Butter

3/4 Cup Crasins

1 1/4 Cup Whole Milk

6 Cups Oats

Instructions:

1. Prepare a 9/13 baking pan with wax paper

2. Place all ingredients into a large bowl

3. Mix...I used my hands was easiest.

4. Dump mixture into prepared baking pan press evenly

5. Place in refrigerator for 24 hours to set

6. Cut into desired amount of bars. 

I cut them into 26 bars, placed them into individual zip lock snack bags and put them back in the refrigerator. If no one but you eats them you may want to freeze some. 

Nutritional Stats:

Calories: 200

Carbs: 23

* Fiber: 3

* Sugar: 7

Fat: 7

Protein: 13

Sodium: 91

PROS:

* Easy to make

* No Bake

* Soft and Chewy (tastes like an unbaked oatmeal cookie)

* Minimal Ingredients (Most I had on hand)

* Can crumble to use on top of yogurt

CONS:

* Contains milk, need to keep in an insulated lunch bag on the go

* Need to be stored in the fridge not on the counter (I don't always have so much room in there)
* Super soft so they break apart easily making it hard to eat on the go

This was very successful but next round I will add some crunchy elements as it was to smushy mushy for me!

Enjoy ^.^
Laura <3

Mahi Mahi with Mango Salsa

At my lowest weight I was 173 then, Andrew came along. Being a WLS patient I was so afraid of obsessing over the weight I would gain through the pregnancy, then I read some WLS and Pregnant message boards. So many women were so against gaining weight I felt they were putting the baby in jeopardy of good health. So I decided I would gain what I would gain and I would deal with it after. I gained about 60 lbs, 30 of which I lost before I even left the hospital. The other 30 you ask...well it's crept up to about 37 lbs now and I am still working on evicting it.

Travis and I joined a local gym back in May we were super focused- food, exercise we were there almost every night the entire month. And I got frustrated I didn't lose a single thing! I refused to eat more than 1200 calories per day and I was working out-cardio only. Well it wasn't exactly what I was doing wrong as much as my birth control working against me. Since I have changed that and we have made our minds up to get back at the gym hardcore!

Recently I placed someone at a Shop Rite, this store has an in store nutritionist that shares recipes and new things on the market etc. I snagged a few recipes one was for a pineapple kiwi salsa. Well I did not have any Pineapple...I had Mango...and changed a few other things as well.

3/4 cup diced fresh Mango
3/4 cup peeled, diced Kiwi
2 tbsp. chopped fresh cilantro
3 tbsp fresh lime juice
1 tbsp lime zest


1. Mix all ingredients together and place in refrigerator to chill.
2. Place thawed Mahi Mahi fillets on baking sheet top with salt, pepper, lime zest.
3. Bake 15-20 min

Nutrition Info for Salsa per serving:
Serves 4
Calories: 34
Carbs: 9
Fat: 0
Protein: 1
Sodium: 2
Sugar: 7

After taking fish out of the oven I topped it with more lime juice, plated with 1/2 cup brown rice and sauteed mixed vegetables (Onion, Peppers, Peas, Carrots, Corn, Mushrooms + 2 tbsp EVOO)

Nutritional Stats for my entire dinner:

Mango Kiwi Salsa

4 oz Mahi Mahi

1 serving Brown Rice

Mixed Veg

Calories: 319

Carbs :45

Fat: 7

Protein: 24

Sodium: 113

Sugar: 8

Enjoy ^.^

Laura <3

Well Hello again...

It has been two years since I last posted. I have visited to look up my recipes many times but have not found the time to post. Life took a spin for the better, and now I am ready to start blogging again. I think it will be good for me to have some designated time for "me" even if it is just a few minutes a night. Let's see in the past two years I have gotten divorced, and am now in an incredibly happy relationship and we have a 1 year old little boy. He was born July 4, 2012 we just celebrated his birthday with a rather large Monster themed party. As you can imagine life has been a crazy roller coaster of doctor appointments, work, family gatherings and firsts. Travis and I have gotten back into a healthy routine including the gym, and cooking better. I look forward to sharing our adventures inside and outside of the kitchen!

<3 Andrew <3

Enjoy ^.^

Laura <3