Stay the Course

I am frustrated this week, but trying to stay positive as well. I just wish I had a book of recipes that are tried and true, because I am sick of the duds! I got up early this morning and got the teriyaki pork in the slow cooker and came home to a blackened, burnt mess. I *thought* there wasn’t enough liquid in it this morning, but decided “Hey, this recipe came from an official WW cookbook, I’m sure they test these out and that the recipe won’t steer me wrong.” Mmmm no. There was a not enough liquid and I’m kicking myself for not throwing in a cup of water. So Chick-fil-a to the rescue!

Last night I made a Cooking Light recipe with much better results, although I am not in love with the pizza crust recipe. I prefer the one I used before. The CL one was just far too sticky. I liked the flavor combination of mushrooms, red onion, and gorgonzola. I got a little too generous with the gorgonzola though, and it ended up overpowering the other flavors. In this case I should have followed the recipe more closely! I can never win Ah well, practice makes perfect, and Chick-fil-a is right next door when we have a kitchen disaster on our hands.

Shiitake Mushroom and Gorgonzola Cheese Pizza (from Cooking Light)

Ingredients:

1/2 recipe Pizza Dough
Cooking spray
1 tablespoon cornmeal
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 1/2 cups thinly sliced button mushrooms
1 1/3 cups thinly sliced shiitake mushrooms
1 cup vertically sliced red onion
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
3 tablespoons low-fat sour cream
1/2 cup (3 ounces) crumbled Gorgonzola or other blue cheese

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 450°.

Roll the dough into a 12-inch circle on a lightly floured surface. Place the dough on a 12-inch pizza pan or a baking sheet coated with cooking spray and sprinkled with cornmeal. Crimp the edges of the dough with your fingers to form a rim.

Heat the oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add mushrooms and onion; sauté for 5 minutes. Cover, reduce heat to medium-low, and cook for 3 minutes or until the onion is very tender. Stir in the salt and pepper.

Spread the sour cream over pizza crust, leaving a 1-inch border. Top with mushroom mixture; sprinkle with cheese. Bake at 450° for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Cut into 8 wedges.

Serves 4, each serving is 2 slices

WW points per serving = 6

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Menu Plan Monday Mar.10, 2008

Monday: Mexican Lasagna (don’t know points value) and Broccoli-Cheddar and Potato Soup 5 WW pts
(not served together, the soup is for my lunches this week and the Mexican lasagna is for Tyler’s)

Tuesday: new recipe! Shiitake Mushroom and Gorgonzola Cheese Pizza 6 WW pts

Wednesday: new recipe! Slow Cooker Teriyaki Pork 4 WW pts

Thursday: Feta-Stuffed Chicken 4 WW pts

Friday: hmm, no clue. I hate cooking on Fridays, we’ll probably just wing it.

See what’s on the menus of other food bloggers by going to the weekly roundup post at orgjunkie.com

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Pesto Pasta

I really love pesto and can’t wait for summer when I can grow a few basil plants on our deck so I have it free for the taking! This pasta was so simple to make, unfortunately it didn’t reheat very well for lunch the next day, not really sure why, but it lost the strength of it’s flavor. So make it in small batches and eat it fresh I bought fresh pasta at the store and it was good, but not so much better than the dried stuff that I was blown away. It did shave about 10 minutes off the cooking time though, which is always nice when you’re in a hurry! We’ll definitely be making this again, and I’ll hopefully make a double batch of pesto so I have more for later!

Fresh Fettuccine with Homemade Pesto

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups lightly packed fresh basil leaves
2 T pine nuts, toasted
2 T low sodium chicken broth or vegetable broth
2 T extra virgin olive oil
1 garlic clove, sliced
1/4 t salt
1 (9-ounce) package fresh fettuccine (I found it in the produce section at HyVee, but I’ve also seen it in the dairy section at other stores)
3 T shredded Parmesan cheese
Freshly ground pepper, to taste

Preparation:

1. To prepare the pesto, puree the basil, pine nuts, broth, oil, garlic, and salt in a blender or food processor until a smooth paste is formed.

2. Meanwhile, cook the fettuccine according to package directions, drain, and transfer to a bowl and keep warm. Add the pesto and the parmesan, toss to coat. Serve with the pepper.

Serves 4 (one generous cup of pasta)

WW points per serving: 5

Source: Take-Out Tonight: 150+ Restaurant Favorites to Make At Home, Simon & Schuster, New York, 2002

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Butterscotch Bites

I saw this recipe on Cooking Light’s website the other day and decided to whip up a batch for my book club tonight. We read Eat, Pray, Love which got me craving some good Italian food and a yearlong trip around the world, but since I can’t really have either right now, these butterscotch bars will have to do I doubled the original recipe, figured I might as well if I was going to go ahead and make a mess in the kitchen! Oh, and I added chocolate chips, because I had a couple of almost empty bags of chips I needed to use up and who doesn’t love a bit of chocolate? These bars are VERY tasty, but it’s hard to eat just one

Butterscotch Bars (from Cooking Light)

Ingredients

1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup butter or stick margarine, softened
4 large egg whites
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
Cooking spray
1/2 cup butterscotch morsels
1/2 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350°.

Beat sugars and butter at medium speed of a mixer until well-blended. Add egg whites and vanilla; beat well. Lightly spoon the flour into dry measuring cups, and level with a knife. Combine flour, baking powder, and salt; stir well with a whisk. Add flour mixture to sugar mixture; beat at low speed just until blended. Add half of the butterscotch and chocolate chips, mix well with a spatula.

Spread batter evenly into an 13 x 9 baking pan coated with cooking spray; sprinkle evenly with the other half of the morsels and chips. Bake at 350° for 28 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan on a wire rack.

Servings & WW Points:

If you cut them into 32 little bars they are 3 WW points per bar

I cut them into 20 bars at 5 WW points per bar.

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Salmon with Dill

This was a great, fast, Monday night recipe. There’s nothing I hate more on a Monday night than a complicated dinner, so this recipe fit the bill. It was recommended to me awhile back by another Cooking Light fan. We enjoyed this recipe, but definitely make sure to serve it with some lemon wedges on the side, I think it would be a little bland without the fresh squeezed lemon juice. I served this with garlic and herb whole wheat couscous and asparagus sauteed in EVOO and salt and pepper. Quick sides making this dinner prepped, cooked, and on the table in less than 3o minutes!

Baked Salmon with Dill (from Cooking Light)

Ingredients

4 (6-ounce) salmon fillets (about 1 inch thick)
Cooking spray
1 1/2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh dill
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
4 lemon wedges

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350°.

Place fish on a baking sheet lightly coated with cooking spray; lightly coat fish with cooking spray. Sprinkle fish with dill, salt, and pepper. Bake at 350° for 10 minutes or until fish flakes easily when tested with a fork or until desired degree of doneness. Serve with lemon wedges.

Serves 4 (1 fillet per serving)

WW points per serving: 7

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Menu Plan Monday Mar. 3, 2008

Menu Plan Monday

Monday: new recipe! baked salmon with dill (7pts per serving) with roasted asparagus and couscous

Tuesday: chili (still need to decide which chili recipe to make!)

Wednesday: new recipe! fresh fettuccine with homemade pesto and salad (5pts per serving)

Thursday: black bean enchiladas (5pts per serving but you gotta cut WAY BACK on the cheese)

Friday: chick-fil-a!

See what’s on the menus of other food bloggers by going to the weekly roundup post here.

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Pizza Margherita

Finally got around to making our pizza today! I was surprised I was able to find fresh, ripe, and tasty roma tomatoes in February but the produce gods smiled upon me I am already getting the itch for fresh summer produce and Saturday mornings at the farmer’s market, I have big plans for the summer! HyVee’s produce will have to tide me over until then. We deviated some from the original Cooking Light recipe, using a Boboli whole wheat crust (which wasn’t as good as I hoped it’d be, shoulda gone for the regular one!) and part-skim mozzarella cheese. The ripe tomatoes and fresh basil were key to the flavor of this pizza, it *almost* didn’t even need the cheese! (this from a cheese addict, so you know it was good!) Maybe next time I’m feeling ambitious I’ll make the crust from scratch.

Quick Pizza Margherita (original recipe from Cooking Light)

Ingredients

1 Whole Wheat Boboli thin pizza crust
Cooking spray
1 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil, divided
1 garlic clove, halved
3 large plum tomatoes, thinly sliced
1 cup (4 ounces) shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup thinly sliced fresh basil
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon black pepper

Preparation

Preheat oven to 400°.

Brush crust with 1/2 teaspoon oil. Rub crust with cut sides of garlic.Arrange tomato slices on crust, leaving a 1/2-inch border; sprinkle evenly with cheese. Bake at 400° for 12 minutes or until cheese melts and crust is golden.

Combine 1/2 teaspoon oil and vinegar, stirring with a whisk.

Sprinkle pizza evenly with sliced basil, salt, and pepper. Drizzle the vinegar mixture evenly over the pizza. Cut pizza into 8 pieces.

Serves 4: 2 slices per servings.

WW points per serving: 5

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