Salmon Fried Rice

Ingredients:
1 trader Joe's salmon patty (thawed)
1/2 tbsp butter
1/4 cup white wine
1 tsp lemon juice
1/4 tsp pepper
1/2 cup cold cooked brown basmati rice
1/3 cup frozen peas
1/4 cup shredded carrots
1-2 green onions
Spray Butter
Spray Bragg's Amino Acid (or soy sauce)

Place butter, wine, and salmon in frying pan. Once the salmon starts to cook, cut salmon in pan into bite-sized pieces. Add green onions, pepper, and lemon juice. Cook until all liquid is gone and salmon starts to brown slightly. While salmon is cooking, microwave peas, carrots, rice, spray butter, and bragg's for 3 minutes. Stir microwave mixture into the frying pan. Cook an additional 3 minutes.

I use the term fried rice loosely here, because I know you are technically supposed to have eggs in fried rice, but since I don't like eggs, I left them out. If you want to use eggs, scramble the eggs first and then set them aside. Add the eggs with the microwave mixture. I didn't have carrots or green onions when I made this recipe and it was still delicious.

A few tips about this meal - Frozen brown rice is my favorite, but Trader Joe's is always out of it. So I started making my own. I freeze the rice in individual portions. It really helps when I'm exhausted at the end of the day and don't want to cook.

Without eggs this meal has about 440 calories.

Healthy Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 box spice cake mix
1 can of Libby's pumpkin (small 15 oz can)
1/2 cup chocolate chips (semi-sweet are healthier)
nutmeg (optional)

Mix cake mix, pumpkin, and chocolate chips in bowl until blended. Spoon** dough onto greased cookie sheet. Sprinkle nutmeg on top of cookies. Bake at 350 degrees for 8 - 12 min depending on size of cookies.

Makes 27 cookies. Each cookie has 98 calories with chocolate chips or 80 calories without.

**Mackenzi, I used a "big spoon" - you know- the one's we don't like to use to eat cold cereal.

Kidney Beans and Rice

I got this recipe from Laura Padro (the next door neighbor I used to babysit for) when I was 11. It's one of my favorite meals. It works really well for vegetarians as a full meal. Whenever I eat it I'm filled up, but you can also use it as a side dish with Chicken or Beef.

Cooked Brown Rice
1 large can kidney beans (drained)
1 tbsp olive oil
1 15 oz can tomato sauce
1 large pepper finely chopped (green, red, yellow, or orange)
1/2 onion finely chopped
1 garlic clove minced
1 tbsp fresh cilantro finely chopped
1/2 tsp cumin
Salt and Pepper to taste (1/4 tsp of each to start with - that's for you Mackenzi)


Prepare Brown Rice. Saute onions, peppers, and garlic in oil until onions start looking transparent. Add tomato sauce, cilantro, cumin, salt, and pepper. Bring to slight boil. Add kidney beans. Heat thoroughly (about 5 min on medium). Serve over brown rice.

Tips:

Brown Rice - I love Trader Joe's Frozen Brown Rice, but they are usually out of it when I go pick it up, so I make my own. I double the rice I usually make in the rice cooker and then measure out 1/2 cup servings of rice in baggies and freeze them.

Peppers - Yellow and orange peppers are sweeter than red and green ones. I prefer them in this recipe. When I feel like it needs more spice, I add tapatio hot sauce

Frozen - This one works really well for frozen dinners/lunches. I measure out 1 cup of the kidney beans and put it in a Ziploc container and keep the frozen rice on hand for a quick lunch/dinner.

Frozen Yogurt

Top 5 frozen Yogurt places.

1. BeachBerries (only in Huntington Beach, CA)
2. Red Mango
3. Yogurtland
5. Pinkberry
4. Great American Yogurt
5. Golden Spoon

Frozen Yogurt is one of my favorite treats. I have recently tried these yogurts and have based my results on flavor, ambiance, and presentation.

BeachBerries (or beach berries) won perfect scores on all accounts. The flavor is my favorite because it is creamy, sweet, and smooth. The store is located on PCH and Main Street in Huntington Beach. So, after a hot summer day at the beach, it's the perfect place to go get something refreshing. They offer the yogurt parfait style so when you get three toppings, they layer it with the yogurt. It's delicious and pretty.

Red Mango was really good. I can't really judge the ambiance of a red mango store because my boss actually picked it up for me, but they're yogurt tastes very similar to BeachBerries'. Their containers are your run-of-the-mill cups with lids.

I liked the different flavors that Yogurtland & Great American Yogurt offered and that I could get as much or as little as I wanted (you pay by weight rather than cup size). Their Plain yogurt was a little too tart for me and not creamy enough. Sometimes it felt a little grainy.

Pinkberry has a good flavor if you prefer a more tart yogurt. It is still smooth, but not very creamy either.

At Golden Spoon, I got their vanilla flavored frozen yogurt and it was too sweet.

I'll keep adding more, as I try different places and flavors.

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups regular all-purpose flour, unsifted
1/2 cup cocoa
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3/4 cup soft butter
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 teaspoons grated orange peel
2 cups coarsely shredded zucchini
1/2 cup milk
1 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (optional)

Glaze:
2 cups powdered sugar
3 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350°F.

1 Combine the flour, cocoa, baking powder, soda, salt, and cinnamon; set aside.

2 With a mixer, beat together the butter and the sugar until they are smoothly blended. Add the eggs to the butter and sugar mixture one at a time, beating well after each addition. With a spoon, stir in the vanilla, orange peel, and zucchini.

3 Alternately stir the dry ingredients and the milk into the zucchini mixture, including the nuts with the last addition.

4 Pour the batter into a greased and flour-dusted 10-inch tube pan or bundt pan. Bake in the oven for about 50 minutes (test at 45 minutes!) or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan 15 minutes; turn out on wire rack to cool thoroughly.

5 Drizzle glaze over cake.

Glaze: Mix together 2 cups powdered sugar, 3 Tablespoons milk, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Beat until smooth.

Cut in thin slices to serve. Makes 10-12 servings.

Lindsay's Cake Cookies

1 box cake mix*
1 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
1/2 cup oil

Mix cake mix and baking powder in bowl. Mix in eggs and oil. Beat until smooth. Drop 1 spoonful onto cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 8 to 10 minutes.

* I really like using spice cake for the mix and then before putting the cookies in the oven, I sprinkle a little nutmeg on top.

Chicken Marinade

3/4 cup Newman's Own Balsamic Vinaigrette
3 leaves chopped fresh mint
3 leaves chopped fresh basil
1 tsp. chopped fresh chives
1/2 tsp chopped fresh oregano
1/4 cup water
6 chicken breasts

Put chicken in a gallon ziplock. Add remaining ingredients and coat chicken. Marinate for 1 hour to 24 hours.

Notes: I have just discovered the wonders of fresh herbs (from a garden, not the store). So none of the herbs here are required, the Newman's own is good enough by itself.