Teriyaki Steak Bento

My Asian inspired lunch was so good. Even though I didn't stand in line to use the microwave to heat it up, it was still tasty. I had some Teriyaki Steak strips for my protein. That marinade recipe is in the e-book. That's the one I ran a correction for a few months ago. The ginger in the recipe should say fresh ginger. If you want to use powdered, just use 1 teaspoon.

Since stir fry veggies are not too lunchbox friendly, I added some finger food vegetables. For a dip, a cup of leftover Pineapple Glaze from the Mega Meatballs recipe. Aren't leftovers great for packing lunches? The veggies are so good dipped in this sweet and sour sauce. Today, I brought steamed cauliflower and snap peas. Love those things.

For color, I had a small serving of cranberry sauce. So, this didn't fit the Asian theme so well, but it is very pretty. It is amazing how far one recipe of cranberry sauce will go!

Tonight, I will be planning my major grocery shopping trip for Thanksgiving. We are doing two turkeys, one baked and one smoked. I am having trouble finding a bird which is not injected with a solution. I am planning to do my own brining, and just need a plain bird. Why DO they have to inject this perfectly good bird, anyway? Seems wrong to pay more for a turkey that has had less done to it! But then when did much of anything in the food industry make sense? Guess since we are paying by the pound, solution is cheaper than white meat.

Good luck on your holiday shopping!

Italian Spinach Worthy of Olive Garden

I'm not best friends with spinach. Popeye fan that I was as a child, I never could never grow to like it. That changed when I found out about lightly sauteing fresh spinach leaves. This, I like. I also love warm spinach salads, but that is a topic for another day.

Tonight I made another dump meal of Mediterranean Chicken. While that went in the oven, I went to play RockBand with the kiddo of mine. Oops, I forgot about the side dish. I wanted something really quick, so I decided to saute the spinach I had left over from this week's salad. This turned out to be a cross between a sauteed veggie and a scramble. The flavors are simple and real. Nice for a side dish. Very pretty too.

Italian Spinach

3 Tablespoons olive oil
4 cups fresh spinach leaves, prewashed
8-10 grape tomatoes
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 egg
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese

Heat olive oil in skillet. Cut tomatoes in half while it is heating. Add the garlic to the oil and stir. Add tomatoes and spinach. Saute until leaves are wilted slightly. Break the egg into the skillet. Stir well until egg sets. Add Parmesan cheese. Salt and pepper to taste. Serves 2-3.

This is a nice side. The garlic comes through and contrasts nicely with the vinegar of the Italian dressing that marinates the chicken. John just told me this dinner was Olive Garden quality. He may have just been buttering me up to make amends for hurting my feelings a bit earlier today, but he is usually pretty honest about his food ratings. Maybe I'll try making this again soon and see if he still likes it as much!

Cozy Cranberry Hot Drink

The chill is in the air, and there is no better place to be than by the fire with a soft afghan and a cup of this Cozy Cranberry Hot Drink. This goes together almost instantly and is very flavorful. If you miss apple cider, give this a try.

Back in my college days, my sweet mama would send me care packages. I remember always requesting her Russian Tea mix. It was a dry mix, made mostly with Tang and sweetened tea mix. Gee, could I have gotten any more sugar? I loved it because I had a little hot pot that I could use in my room. No microwaves in dorm rooms then. The tea was a nice change from sodas. This tastes very similar, but has no sugar at all.

It will require a trip to Aldi, and perhaps an order from Netrition. Both good investments if you plan a long winter. The main ingredient is the Fit n Active Cranberry Drink from Aldi. I like that as a replacement for juice in the mornings too. No aspartame, which is good. The next main ingredient, I buy from Netrition. Pineapple DaVinci syrup. I use that often...when I manage to keep a bottle...it is one of my favorites.

Cozy Cranberry Hot Drink

1/2 cup Fit n Active Cranberry drink
1/2 cup water
1/8 cup Pineapple DaVinci syrup
a short squirt of lemon juice-about 1/4 teaspoon
a sprinkle of pumpkin pie spice

Mix everything together and heat in a cup in the microwave or on stovetop. Serves one in a mug.

Small tea cups may overflow, but my standard coffee style cup works great. I like to serve it in a clear mug so I can see the gorgeous color.

Hubby still has dinner waiting in the oven. He was not able to eat the burgers I sent for lunch until after 4 p.m. Glad that dinner was a freezer casserole, Sloppy Tom. That one will hold up well in a slightly warm oven until he is ready to eat. Now I am going to snuggle with a blanket fresh from the dryer and watch a movie with the boy. Hot drink, warm blanket, snuggly dogs. Who could want more on a chilly Fall evening? Well, it might be better if the dishes were done and the laundry put away, but I am still planning to bask in the glory of my hot drink. Better go before I drink it all here at the computer!

Cranberry Sauce for Pork

I just love recipes that make one dish, then almost magically transform into something else. On Saturday, I made a Cranberry Sauce using a blend of sweeteners to replace the sugar. That is pretty good; tasty with turkey, and very traditional. I had leftovers, and well, a girl can only eat so much cranberry sauce. The men at my house are not huge fans. I wondered what else I could do with it. This is that traditional sauce pictured below.



I ran across some recipes online for a cranberry sauce for pork. I still had some pork roast that needs to be used, so I borrowed ideas from several recipes and made my own version this morning. So glad I did, because the flavors are complex and addictive...if you like fruit and pork together. I always have.

Lisa's Cranberry Sauce for Pork

1 cup sugar free whole berry cranberry sauce (my recipe is in the November Newsletter)
1/2 half small onion
1 1/2 teaspoons Balsamic vinegar
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
1 Tablespoon butter

Chop onions finely. Add butter to a skillet and saute the onions until tender and just beginning to brown. Add vinegar and stir. Next add cranberry sauce and onion powder, blending well. Heat sauce to serving temperature. Spoon over pork roast or turkey slices.

Hubby has to work a basketball game tonight, so I rushed this morning to get all three meals done and packed up to send to the station with him. For breakfast, he got a sausage sandwich. Good thing I still had some coconut flour buns already prepared. For lunch he got a Taco Salad made with Mexican Minute Beef. For his dinner, which he will have to eat alone in front of the control panel, he has the pork roast with cranberry sauce, some green beans, and some Pumpkin cakes I was playing around with last night. Sounds like a good autumn meal. All that was put together in about 30 minutes. Whew! It really does save the day to plan ahead!

Pumpkin Cheesecake Pudding

I made these wonderful little dessert shots to take to that Thanksgiving dinner. They are deceivingly easy to make. They have the flavor of a cheesecake, the ease of a pudding, and the beauty of a dessert shot. For the crowd I was trying to accommodate, I made a double recipe and got 14 dessert shots. The photo above is another batch made in my shot glass tonight. I still had some pumpkin puree left over, and we really like this simple dessert. For the get together, I filled those tiny disposable cups intended for rinsing your mouth in the bathroom. Not as pretty, but they travel well and dispose easily. They still look fine if topped with a squirt of canned whipped cream.

Dessert shots are great because they allow you to limit your dessert consumption--or on Thanksgiving, eat more than one dessert! At our house we often hear the ladies say, "Just give me a tiny slice." Sound familiar? The guys just say, "I'll take one of everything." This pudding made into shots makes both groups happy. Want the recipe?

Pumpkin Cheesecake Pudding

8 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup sour cream
1/4 cup sugar free DaVinci Syrup, vanilla or Pumpkin Pie flavor
1/2 cup pumpkin
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (if using vanilla syrup)
Whipped Cream for topping

Blend everything together in a blender or use a stick blender. A hand mixer will do if the cream cheese is soft. Pour into dessert cups or shot glasses. To make a layered dessert, add whipped cream in between layers of pudding. Chill before serving. This recipe will serve 4 regular desserts or 7-8 dessert shots.

This is a variation on my Better Than Instant Toffee Cheesecake Pudding. Feel free to leave out the pumpkin and add any flavorings you like. Too easy to be so good.

Sausage and Sage

Do you have your low carb dishes planned out for Thanksgiving? I had a Thanksgiving Potluck to attend last night with a support group I am in. I chose to make the Sausage Stuffing from the 24/7 Low Carb Diner newsletter for November. I also made some cranberry sauce and some dessert shots of Pumpkin Cheesecake. I will feature those recipes later.

This is a really flavorful casserole for a stuffing/dressing substitute. There are no specialty ingredients to buy, and all the flavor of the holiday is in there! For this dish, I accidentally halved the amount of mushrooms, and it was still great. I love sage. My mom, who doesn't even like carby stuffing, had a large serving and ate it all. The rest of us, who appreciate a good traditional dressing, liked it too. It is not mushy, but still holds together well, even without any bread. Very tasty, especially with turkey. Don't leave out the nuts, they give this casserole a unique crunch. Add some pepper if you like, but careful with the salt; the Parmesan does that job!

Sausage Stuffing

2 pounds sage flavored sausage
1 pound mushrooms
3 ribs celery
1 chopped onion
1 pound cauliflower
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 teaspoon dried sage
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
4 eggs

Slice or chop vegetables in a food processor. Be sure the cauliflower is shredded finely. Brown sausage, celery and mushrooms in a skillet. Drain off grease. In a large bowl, combine meat mixture, cauliflower, nuts, spices, Parmesan cheese and stir well. In a small bowl, beat eggs. Add the eggs to the large bowl and mix well. Transfer the stuffing to a sprayed large casserole dish. Bake at 325 degrees for 40 minutes.


Those newsletters are loaded with great info for low carbers. When you have purchased the ebook, you get a year subscription to the newsletter too. This delicious recipe was included along with more side dish and dessert recipes, hints for planning, instructions on how to brine a turkey and more. It is not too late to get yours if you buy an ebook before December. There is definitely no reason to feel deprived on Thanksgiving, and no need to turn the holiday into a carb fest either. Most of our favorites can be made lower carb. The small splurge on your absolute favorite won't do so much damage if the rest of the meal is healthy.

NABS and Spirals from L & L

By the title of this blog entry, one would never know I was talking about food. Probably, lots of you know about NABS. (I did find out it was not the North American Bigfoot Society, good thing) Funny, but in my humble hills of Oklahoma, we never called those packages of cheese crackers filled with peanut butter by that name. Not that we didn't eat our share, mind you, we just never called them NABS. In fact, I don't think they have any special name at all. Maybe it is regional, the way so many of us have our pet names for our favorite (or not so favorite) caramel colored, caffeinated, carbonated beverages. 'Round here it is known as pop, but my college suite mate insisted my Dr. Pepper was a coke.

Back to the NABS. A great new friend and Diner, Lynn, shared her idea for making a low carb treat that tastes very much like the high carb counterpart. My hubby will be in Lynn's debt forever. He was always a peanut butter cracker fanatic. He really missed his office stash of crackers and his personal jar of PB. The one the boys were not allowed to get into while they were little. Now, he can have the flavor again. According to Lynn, just make cheese crisps by cutting the American cheese into fourths. Then microwave them until crisp. Spread all natural, no sugar added peanut butter on one and press them together in a little sandwich. The taste is great. The peanut butter rather dominates the flavors a bit, as is true with the carby snacks, but the crackers stay crisp. Lynn is inspired!


In addition to those, I made some Carnita Spirals for today's lunch using Joseph's Lavash bread. I cut one in fourths lengthwise making one long strip similar to a lasagna noodle. To that, I added Pork Carnitas, my sweet and smokey pork recipe from the ebook. Being very moist, the pork packs down nicely and stays put in the little spiral sandwiches. I also added one slice of cheese down the center of the Lavash strip, under the pork. Once the filling is in and patted down a bit, roll the bread in a tight spiral shape. This is great for lunches. Everything is moist and flavorful, not soggy or stale. If you have a great low carb idea to share, please do like Lynn and let me know, so we can all share.



My Bento Lunch for today featured these spirals, some cheese crisps, bell pepper strips and grape tomatoes, olives and a container of sour cream for dipping. It was just right. These bentos hold more food than it looks like. I am always the last to finish among the teachers in the lunch room. Not that we don't talk a bit too! Maybe that means that I just talk too much.