Wednesday 20 August 2008

Chicken with Aubergine Sauce (Bekki)

Here’s a recipe I liked so much I had it twice in two days last week.

Fried chicken with pepper eggplant saute

Chicken breasts, boneless & skinless
Whole grain breadcrumbs
Parmesan cheese, grated
Fresh oregano leaves chopped
Olive oil
Milk
Salt and pepper (to taste)
Red pepper
Aubergine

(There aren’t any quantities in the original recipe either, but it’s so simple, I’m sure you can make it up!)

Mix breadcrumbs, parmesan, salt and pepper and oregano leaves. (I used dried)
Heat non stick skillet/frying pan with a little olive oil.
Coat the chicken in a little milk and dip in the breadcrumb mixture.
Fry until golden and cooked through.
While it’s cooking, peel and chop aubergine into 1 cm dice. Chop red pepper.
Cook the pepper and aubergine together in some olive oil, adding salt, pepper and oregano to taste. Since I was only cooking for one, my chicken and veg fitted in the same frying pan.
Once the veg are tender, put all but a few in a blender, or into a bowl and use a hand held blender. Whizz until smooth. I added a little creme fraiche.
Serve the chicken with the sauce over it and those bits of veg you saved on the top.
The blog it comes from, Five: Four is full of yummy stuff. Four chefs take five ingredients and come up with a recipe, all of which are South Beach friendly. It looks like they haven’t posted anything on it since last October, but what’s there looks good and there are links to the cooks’ own blogs which have lots more recipes.

1 Comment »

  1. Sounds interesting. When we next have an aubergine I might have to make everyone try this. I’m sure there’s a couple of Daddy’s (gluten-free) rolls kicking around in the freezer that are too old to do much but make breadcrumbs with.

Sunday 17 August 2008

Coconut Custard Pie

(Originally posted by Brandi)

I made this pie last week and have really enjoyed it. Here is a link to the recipe:
(Debs, can you do that thing that you do to make it light up?)

(All fixed, D)

My modifications are as follows:
I did not use a crust. Just sprayed the pie pan and baked the filling.
I used 2 T Splenda and 2 T fructose in place of the sugar.
I used unsweetened coconut
I served it with feresh whipped cream and shaved chocolate on top. It’s also good by itself or with ice cream ;-)

I am used to enjoying “less sweet” things, but you may want to add more sweetener. For me, it was perfect.

Enjoy!

Baingan Bharta (eggplant curry)

(Originally posted by Tami)

Not really BUT I did tell Debs that I was leaving OWOA about 2 weeks ago. I haven’t been around or weighed in a few weeks. I started school and am still struggling to juggle my time and thought it best to leave the group. I’ve also been dealing with a great bit of home sickness. Yes, I know that I was born and raised here in Western WA and only lived in TN just over 2 years but it’s home. The south is deep in my blood and always has been. My grandad was born and raised in Arkansas. Still loves it to this day but never moved away from WA after he retired from the airforce because my Grandmother detested the south. Not me. His blood, his love runs deep in these veins. Any hoots! My longing to get back there isn’t helped by the cool grey days we’ve had here. Summer seemed to skip us over…until yesterday. Now it’s like 70 but still breezy. I don’t know if that can be considered summer.

I just make something yummy and before sending the recipe to Debs to ask that she share it with y’all I thought I’d see if I still had posting priveledges. Guess what?! I guess I do. So, without further ado I would like to share something that I found at Allrecipes. I had one lowly eggplant sitting in my fridge and since Jeff hates the thing I thought I’d use it for lunch.

Baingan Bharta (eggplant curry)

1 large eggplant

2 tablespoons veggie oil (I used olive oil)

1 teaspoon cumin seeds (I used ground cumin)

1 medium onion, thinly sliced

1 tablespoon ginger garlic paste (I just minced 4 gloves of garlic and sprinkled in some ground garlic)

1 tablespoon curry powder

1 tomato, diced (didn’t have any because of the recall so I used sundried tomatoes in oil…I was skeptical but it worked well)

1/2 cup plain yogurt

1 fresh jalapeno, finely chopped

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 bunch cilantro, finely chopped

Preheat oven to 450F. Place eggplant on a medium baking sheet. Bake 20-30 mintues until tender. Remove from heat, cool, peel, and chop. (I placed the hot eggplant immediately into a brown lunch sack and put it in the fridge. I was hungry and didn’t want to wait forever for the skin to seperate from the meat) Heat oil in a medium saucepan (skillet) over medium heat. Mix in cumin seeds and onion. Cook and stir until onion is tender. Mix ginger garlic paste, curry powder, and tomato into the saucepan, and cook about 1 minute. Stir in yogurt. Mix in eggplant and jalapeno pepper and season with salt. Cover and cook 10 minutes over high heatRemove cover, reduce heat to low and continue cooking about 5 minutes. Garnish with cilantro to serve.

It supossedly feeds for…um…I ate half of it…not in one sitting mind you. I put 1/4 of it in a bowl, sat and ate it then got back up, put more in my bowl, sat back down and ate that bit. So see, I ate 1/2 the recipe in 2 sittings.

Cookout Suggestions?

(Originally posted by Brandi)

We are having a Lifegroup cookout tomorrow night and need to bring something. We are the last to sign up and can bring whatever we want. It will be hamburgers (we will bring our buns) and somebody else is already bringing baked beans (sugary, I’m sure) so I don’t think I should bring beans. Any suggestions for a South Beach friendly side dish to bring? Feel free to make suggestions even if you don’t post a recipe. I’m just drawing a blank and I want my Bird-man to have a yummy meal!

14 Comments »

  1. How about a cold veggie salad? My aunt used to cut up fresh broccoli and cauliflower and toss it with ranch…you could use the fat free ranch.

    Comment by Cristina — June 23, 2008 @ 8:03 am

  2. Is anyone likely to be taking salad? As in lettuce and stuff.. I know that sounds a bit boring, but you can stick all sorts of stuff in it and make it really interesting, and then you can fill up on salad if there’s no much else you can eat. Assuming of course, that you actually like salad!

    Comment by Debs — June 23, 2008 @ 8:03 am

  3. Kalyn’s Kitchen Spinach, Bacon, Feta Salad sounds good at the moment. And we love the Romaine & Yellow Beet Salad.

    Have fun at the cookout!

    Comment by Anita — June 23, 2008 @ 9:06 am

  4. This goes great with burgers

    http://kalynskitchen.blogspot.com/2006/08/black-bean-and-pepper-salad-with.html

    Comment by blestwithsons — June 23, 2008 @ 9:22 am

  5. I had a really tasty mayo-free coleslaw at a cookout once. I didn’t get the recipe, but it was petty spicy, and I believe they used some vinegar and olive oil for the saucy part. It wasn’t sweet at all, but was VERY yummy!

    Comment by Kate — June 23, 2008 @ 1:55 pm

  6. kalyns kitchen had a recipe up just a couple days ago with cucumber, yogurt, and dill. That would be fantastic to me!

    Comment by Stephine — June 23, 2008 @ 6:29 pm

  7. Pizza might be a good option.

    Comment by Bird — June 24, 2008 @ 4:46 am

  8. You not into salad, bird?!

    Comment by Debs — June 24, 2008 @ 5:36 am

  9. :-D

    Comment by Brandi — June 24, 2008 @ 6:09 am

  10. Thanks for all of your suggestions! Blest, I really wanted to make yours, but I would have to douple it and I am too much of a cheap-skate to buy those peppers for $1.50 each! ;-)

    I ended up making Chickpea salad II from allrecipes.com. (I used diced Roma tomatoes and added black olives and pepper.) So far it tasted great and it hasn’t even marinated yet!

    Comment by Brandi — June 24, 2008 @ 11:36 am

  11. I get my colored peppers at Sams Club. It’s usually $6 a bag for six red, orange, and yellow. And earlier this week they had bags of six red for less than $4!! YUM!

    Comment by blestwithsons — June 24, 2008 @ 5:55 pm

  12. I guess the real question, Brandi, was whether bird ate any of it? ;-)

    Comment by Debs — June 25, 2008 @ 4:40 am

  13. Two servings! ;-) Everyone else liked it too…it was all gone and I made a double recipe!

    Comment by Brandi — June 25, 2008 @ 9:01 am

  14. Excellent :grin:

    Comment by Debs — June 25, 2008 @ 9:27 am

Fresh Corn Salsa

(Originally posted by Christina)

Prep Time:
25 min
Total Time:
25 min
Makes:
3 cups or 24 servings, 2 Tbsp. each
1-1/2 lb. tomatoes, chopped
1 cup fresh corn kernels (Note: I used canned with no salt added)
1/4 cup finely chopped red onions (Note: I don’t care for onions, so I left these out)
1/4 cup chopped cilantro or fresh parsley
1 medium jalapeƱo pepper, chopped
1/4 cup KRAFT Zesty Italian Dressing (Note: I used the fat free version)
COMBINE all ingredients except dressing in large bowl.

ADD dressing; mix lightly.

This salsa was so good and easy to make. I’ve made it twice, the second time I added some lime juice to it.

I’ve used it over baked chicken and over baked tilapia…yummy!

Oh, you can find the recipe here.

Sweet BBQ Chicken Kabobs

(Originally posted by Christina)

1 lb. boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-1/2-inch pieces
2 cups 1-1/2-inch fresh pineapple chunks
1 each: red and green pepper, cut into 1-1/2-inch chunks
1/2 cup KRAFT Original Barbecue Sauce (NOTE: I used the KC Masterpiece Classic Blend BBQ Sauce that has only 10 calories per serving)
3 Tbsp. frozen orange juice concentrate, thawed
PREHEAT grill to medium-high heat. Using eight long wooden skewers (two, side-by-side, for each kabob), thread chicken alternately with pineapple and peppers onto skewers, to make four kabobs.

MIX barbecue sauce and juice concentrate; brush some of the sauce mixture onto kabobs.

GRILL 8 to 10 min. or until chicken is cooked through, turning and brushing occasionally with the remaining sauce mixture.

Prep Time:
15 min
Total Time:
25 min
Makes:
4 servings, one kabob each
I got this recipe from the Kraft Food & Family Magazine but it can be found here.

BBQ Sauce

(Originally posted by Bethany)

Okay, I’m gonna cheat! I haven’t tried this yet. Christy just sent me the recipe for this today! I am a huge fan of BBQ sauce, and well, well all know it’s just not the best thing as far a sugar goes. This one is fairly low on sugar. It’s in the Hungry Girl Cookbook, but she has it on her site!
I will be trying it out, so I’ll get back to you on the taste later.

HG’s Not-So-Secret BBQ Sauce

PER SERVING (half of recipe, about 3 tbsp.): 37 calories, 0g fat, 347mg sodium, 9g carbs, 0.5g fiber, 8g sugars, POINTS® value 1*

Ingredients:
1/4 cup canned tomato sauce
2 tbsp. ketchup
2 tsp. brown sugar (not packed)
2 tsp. cider vinegar
1/2 tsp. garlic powder

Directions:
Mix well. (That’s it!)

Happy BBQ-ing!