Asian Black Beans & Rice Filed under ( Asian, Beans, Frank, giveaway, Healthy, Vegan, vegetarian )

Thank you all for telling me about your favorite substitutes. Here are a few of your suggestions:

• Stephanie substitutes white vinegar for traditional household cleaners
• Erin adds turmeric to most dishes to replace or in addition to cayenne or paprika
• Anne Marie likes to replace breadcrumbs with oatmeal
• Winterjade uses banana instead of eggs in her pancakes

And the winner of the Substituting Ingredients book is…Megan D of the Oatmeal Diaries- wahooo! Congrats! Email me at Itzyskitchen at gmail dot com and I will get your book to you.

The rest of my week has been a lot more easy/peasy! I’ve been having to take Frank for his walks early in the morning (5 or 6 AM) due to the heat! Even at that time, its still almost 80 degrees and humid. I love it…Frank does not:

I did manage to get a nice run in on Wednesday. It was cloudy so the heat wasn’t too bad. I set out to do 50 minutes and ended going a bit over, but covered about 6.3 miles:

Wednesday night, I used inspiration from No Meat Athlete to make a new take on beans and rice. The dish doesn’t look gorgeous but tasted great! 

 

  I adjusted Erin’s recipe just a bit:

Ingredients:

• 1 cup cooked brown rice
• 1 15 oz can reduced sodium black beans (drained & rinsed)
• 1 small container pineapple tidbits (juice reserved)
• 1 small container water chestnuts
• 3 large carrots, cut into strips
• 2 tablespoons reduced sodium soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon Chinese 5 spice powder

Directions:

Mix 5 spice powder in with cooked rice and set aside.

Heat vegetable oil. Add carrots and red pepper and cook for a minute or two. Add beans and water chestnuts and cook until carrots are cooked through but still crunchy (as Erin noted :)). Remove from heat. Add soy sauce, 1/3 the reserved pineapple juice and pineapple. Place on top of rice.

I’m off to meet my friend Jill for some brunch and then its work time! Weekend plans??

Shrimp Wonton Soup–Take 1 Filed under ( Asian, Chinese, Healthy, shrimp, side dish )

 

HAPPY FRIDAY! This has been a semi-busy week and I am super excited for the weekend! What do you have on tap?  Tonight, we’re doing dinner with my parents. Saturday morning,  I am teaching Pump (Amelia and Lindsay are coming!) and then we’re hitting up somewhere for food. The rest of the weekend??

Last week, Josh mentioned that he really wanted Wonton soup, but that he wanted a healthier homemade version. Now, I’m not a greasy Chinese food fan, so I’ve never had wonton soup. I researched recipes on the web and came up with my own version (which was served with fried rice):

Ingredients:

• 8 large shrimp, cooked through (I boiled mine) and cooled
• 1- 8 oz can water chestnuts, diced (divided)
• ¼ teaspoon Chinese 5 spice powder
• 1 tablespoon low sodium soy sauce
• 14 wonton wrappers
• 1 cup shredded cabbage (divided)
• 32 oz low sodium chicken or vegetable broth

Directions:

Chop shrimp into small pieces. In a bowl, combine, shrimp, ¼ can water chesnuts, 5 spice powder, soy sauce and ¼ cup cabbage.

Spread wontons on a towel.

Spread filling evenly between the wonton wrappers.

Wet fingers and twist wrappers to form purses or envelops (envelops are easier), using the moisture to seal them shut.

Heat chicken or vegetable broth over medium heat until broth comes to a simmer. Add ¾ cup cabbage, remaining water chestnuts and purses/envelopes and cook for 10 minutes (until wrappers appear more translucent). Serve! If you’d like, top with chopped green onion.

Now, this soup was tasty….but it wasn’t a real Chinese food takeout tasting soup. Anyone have any good wonton soup recipes to share?? Let me know!

M: Slow Cooker Asian Pepper Steak Filed under ( Asian, Beef, Vegetables )

I did it! I officially completed all 10 of Rachael Ray’s top 10 recipes of 2010 =) This last recipe, Asian Pepper Steak, was saved until last because, well…I can’t exactly eat it! I’ve mentioned before I’m slightly allergic to beef, so while I could taste, I couldn’t completely partake in an entire plate of goodness. But I did whip up a pretty darn good taco salad for myself =)

But let me tell you, even though I couldn’t eat a lot of this, I did taste and this might seriously have been my favorite of all 10 of the dishes. It was definitely the hubs’ favorite.

The salty/sweet combination of the soy sauce, tomato sauce, and brown sugar was outstanding. And the sliced peppers added the perfect fresh crunch do the dish. I really can’t rave about this meal enough! Serve up with rice and it’s complete!

The biggest changes I made were I cut the recipe in half since it was mainly for the hubs, and instead of browning a slab of flank steak and slicing it, I just got the packaged stew sirloin meat to make the prep time a little shorter. I also only added the cilantro for the topping because that’s what I had on hand.

Pre-cooked:

Asian Pepper Steak

From Rachael Ray

• 3 lbs beef sirloin
  
• 3 TB cornstarch
  
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
  
• 2 TB ginger, grated
  
• 1 large onion, sliced
  
• 3 red bell peppers, sliced
  
• 3 yellow bell peppers, sliced
  
• 1 8-oz. can tomato sauce
  
• 4 TB brown sugar
  
• 3/4 cup soy sauce
  
• Pepper, to taste
  
• 2 cups rice

Topping (Optional):

• 2 cups bean sprouts
  
• 1 cup cilantro, coarsely chopped
  
• 2 limes

In a large skillet, sear the meat in some olive oil until brown on both sides. Remove the steak to a cutting board and slice the steak into 1-inch thick strips. (Again, I nixed this step and just added in stew sirloin meat to the crockpot)

Place the sliced steak into the crock-pot, then dust the meat with cornstarch and mix until there is no more visible cornstarch.

Add the remaining ingredients except for the topping ingredients to the crock-pot. Cook on high for 4 hours or low for 6 hours.

When you are ready to serve, get a medium bowl, mix the topper ingredients and place a portion of the mixture on top of each portion of Asian Pepper Steak. (Again, I only added the cilantro, but it really did add the perfect burst of freshness to the dish)

Serve on top of cooked rice.

Enjoy!

E: Baked Mini Shrimp Egg Rolls & Easy Fried Rice Filed under ( appetizer, Asian, Chinese, Family, Frank, Seafood )

First, I just wanted to share a couple quick pictures from the weekend. Dinner with my parents Saturday night was at the Blue Crab Raw Bar in Pawley’s Island.  My parents:

 

Me & Josh:

 

Frank is really (knock on wood) starting to feel better. We’ve been taking him on super mini walks and I’ve been feeding him brown rice and turkey. He thanks you all for your well wishes:

   

Ok, onto the recipes! I must say, I’m doing really well with my Friday night dinner successes! This one could not be easier. I prepped the majority of the meal ahead of time to make for a stress free night.

Easy Fried Rice:

Ingredients:

• 1 bag of Success 10 minute brown rice, cooked according to package directions
• 1 tablespoon canola oil
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 egg + 1 egg white
• 1/2 cup frozen peas, defrosted
• 1/2 cup frozen corn, defrosted
• Desired quantity soy sauce

Directions:

Add oil and garlic to a wok or frying pan. Cook over medium heat for 1-2 minutes. Add egg & egg white, scramble and cook through. Add cooked rice, peas and corn and cook for ~ 5 minutes. Remove from heat and toss in desired amount of soy sauce. Generously serves four as a side dish

Click here for the printable version of the recipe.

The result:

  

 

Baked Mini Shrimp Egg Rolls

I had some leftover wontons and wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with them. After doing a general search on the web, I found this recipe at Green Lite Bites. I made just a few adjustments:

Ingredients:

• 8 large shrimp, peeled and deveined
• 1 5-oz container water chestnuts, chopped
• 3 oz broccoli slaw
• 20 wonton wrappers
• water

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F

Boil water and cook shrimp for ~ 3-4 minutes until cooked through (no longer gray). Chop shrimp into bits.

Mix chopped shrimp, water chestnuts and broccoli slaw.

 

Place a small amount (~1 tablespoon) of the mixture in the center of each wonton and wrap up like an egg roll (the Green Lite Bites recipe shows how to do so and hers came out much prettier than mine :)). 

Lay on an aluminum covered cookie sheet, sprayed with non-stick cooking spray. Spray tops with a bit more spray. Bake for about 20 minutes, turning once.

I served ours with sweet and sour sauce.

Click here for the printable version of the recipe.

   

 

Onto Monday! Business as usual- teaching body pump, working & a little housework. How about you?