White Christmas Stew

The holidays have so many opportunities for fun get togethers with family and friends. I do a fancy dinner on Christmas Eve; we do a pretty spectacular buffet for Christmas day; but then there are those times which could use some special attention without calling for show stoppers. With grown kids and so many schedules, lots of us find that we have some "alternate" celebrations for the  holidays. My son's girlfriend, for example, cannot make our Christmas Eve dinner. Instead we are scheduling a casual evening earlier in the week to exhange gifts. This soup will be on the menu. No formal seating and place cards. Just a mug of soup, some appetizers and fun drinks.

Easy for the hostess, so I can enjoy the festivities. I will make the soup and keep it warm in the crockpot. My guests can serve themselves from a variety of holiday mugs. Yes, I have a lot of those. From crafting to gifting, we seem to collect them. I must admit I picked up that holly mug above at Goodwill. I just couldn't resist. It was so retro and adorable!

The soup is perfect for Christmas, with its creamy base and sparks of red and green.

White Christmas Stew

8 oz radishes
4 oz grape or cherry tomatoes
8 oz jar red bell pepper slices
2 cloves garlic
2 tsp olive oil
1 quart chicken broth
1 jar 4 cheese or roasted garlic alfredo sauce
1 lb precooked chicken sausages (I use spinach feta sausages from Sprouts)
8 oz cream cheese
10 oz frozen spinach leaves

Clean and trim ends from radishes. Cut into fourths or eighths if they are large. Boil in 4 cups of water for 15 minutes or until soft. Drain. While radishes are cooking, Toss tomatoes with olive oil and roast in the oven at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes. Let cool and cut into halves. In a soup pot or dutch oven, combine chicken broth, alfredo sauce, tomatoes and radishes. Chop the red bell pepper slices into small pieces. Slice sausages into coins and add to pot. Add Neufchatel to pot by the spoonful. Heat and stir until cheese is incorporated. Dice spinach leaves and add to pot. Simmer 10 minutes. Spoon into bowls to serve.

Serves 8:    312 calories 8 net g carb 

This is so good! The radishes have a very similar mouthfeel to potatoes, and no one is the wiser. For my sides, I am making some sausage balls (my oldest son's favorite) and some lavash crackers. Those are so easy to make. Just cut the lavash bread, give them a quick olive oil spray, and crisp them in the microwave. They are not gluten free, but they are very low carb, and appeal to everyone. We will have some Wassail too. Yes, I do have enough Christmas mugs for everyone to use two! I sure wish Santa could bring me a bigger kitchen!

Check out the recipe for Italian Sausage Balls and Wassail at this blog post. You will get some more holiday ideas too. It is near, but not too late to make some festive foods!

Get more ideas at Low Carbing Among Friends Facebook Page:            
   https://www.facebook.com/LowCarbingAmongFriends
 

Mediterranean Feasts and Yogurt Marinated Chicken Salad

So I just got back home from a week at a teacher training seminar at my alma mater. I am so ready to teach Oklahoma history again. I actually learned a lot. Sadly, I was especially reminded of how dorm cafeteria meals never seem to get better as the years pass. I am pretty darn certain that my family ate better this last week than I did, even if it did feel like I was on vacation.

Since last week I had been cooking up a storm for the the June Diner News, I had tons of dishes stockpiled in my freezer. With only hubby home, I made sure to send individual servings of several recipes home with my sweet mom and wonderful middle son. Now that I am back, I have reports that they were wonderful! Nothing spoiled while my kitchen was quiet without me. No, hubby does not share my cooking passion. Somehow he managed to leave some of my prepped food untouched. I don't see take out bags, so I guess he ate a huge amount of peanut butter and celery.

But my mom and Pearson raved about their food gifts. Now I just have to decide with to share with you. Mediterranean food is touted as among the healthiest in the world. We low carbers leave out the grains, but still benefit from the olive oil, fish, lean meats and veggies. Every dish here is a winner. You can find them all in the June issue of the Diner News. Get the 2017 issues for just $6.

Yogurt Marinated Chicken Salad

1 lb boneless chicken breast

Marinade:

1 cup Greek yogurt (add 1 tsp olive oil if using nonfat yogurt)

3 tbsp lemon juice

4 cloves garlic

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

1 tsp Archer Farms Mediterranean Seasoning

1 1/2 tsp chili flakes

1/2 tsp oregano

Salad:    2 heads Romaine Lettuce

12 cherry or grape tomatoes

1 cup zucchini slices

2 tbsp diced onion

6 Kalamata Olives

Slice chicken breast into large chunks, about 2 oz each. Combine all remaining ingredients. Place chicken into marinade for several hours.   To grill, place on oiled grates and grill until juices run clear. Serve over lettuce, tomatoes, zucchini, onion and olives. Top with Greek dressing. 

Serves 4:  210 calories  12 net g carb (will be lower as all the marinade is not consumed)

The marinade makes this chicken so delish! You can use any Greek Seasoning. I buy  mine at Target. I love the mint and dill flavors. Of course, this chicken doesn't have to be in a salad. It makes a superb entree with roasted veggies too.

Now check out some of the other recipes included this month! Be sure to order your subscription.

http://www.247lowcarbdiner.com/html/newsletter.html

Cauliflower Aleppo

Minotaur Steack Rolls with Eggplant Sauce

Caprese Salad in a Jar

Feta Slaw

Gyros Flavored Meatballs

Apollo's Sheet Pan Dinner

Sun Dried Tomato Crusted Fish

Poseidon's Tuna Wrap

Copycat Zoe's Greek Dressing

Zoodles By Zorba Greek Salad

Kabobs

Grilled Artichoke Salad

Zucchini Hummus

Cauliflower Hummus

With no new cookbook out in a while, my Diner Newsletter subscriptions are waning. Rather than purchase a year's subscription, I am changing the order now to the 2017 issues only. I may be phasing out the newsletter. It is a serious amount of work. If you are renewing, I will promise to include a new seasonal issue for the same price. Same new recipes, but seasonal rather than monthly. It will still be a great deal.

24/7 Low Carb Diner News:   http://www.247lowcarbdiner.com/html/newsletter.html

Get more great recipes at the Low Carbing Among Friends Facebook Page:               https://www.facebook.com/LowCarbingAmongFriends

Order our books at: 

http://amongfriends.us/24-7-LCD.php

Love the recipes I share on this blog? My ebook helps you plan and prep to stay healthy 24/7.   http://www.247lowcarbdiner.com

Pork in a Pita

Friday night and we have a crowd of teenagers coming over for movie night. Supper time had to be quick. I used some leftover pork roast from the freezer, added barbecue sauce and heated it up. Then just stuff a Joseph's Low Carb Pita and add the fixins. Joseph's lavash would do fine too.

John got lettuce, celery, pickles and a radish. (he didn't want that one, but I keep trying) Super easy. Super quick. Now on to the movie and the popcorn. Hope we don't go too crazy smelling that!

Sausage Roll-ups

Hot Breakfast. Or lunch. Or dinner. We ran out of eggs today because the snow kept me from getting my grocery run in this past weekend. That is when it is especially comforting to use the Diner system. Even if something happens like that snow, I know I have plenty of food in the freezer to tide us over. With no fresh eggs, I was still able to make a delicious breakfast.

If you have Minute Sausage in the freezer, this is a snap. You could make it up from fresh too. Just brown the sausage. Stir in a brick of cream cheese and a can of green chilies. Mine aren't in the can, but are also in the freezer. I buy a food service size can and freeze them in small batches. Huge savings there.

For the roll up, I just spread a little of the sausage and cream cheese mixture on a Lavash bread and rolled it up. I am not eating any bread products right now, so I just spooned some on a plate for me. The carby boys had theirs over toast. Yummy stuff and very filling too.

A Triple Play Roast Beef

When my college boys aren't around, a crock pot roast goes much farther. This one I was able to turn into a Triple Play meal. The first meal we had as a simple crock pot roast. Instead of potatoes, I peeled up a rutabaga. In went some onion and celery too. Those both add so much flavor.

So my two remaining boys were happy. This is truly a manly meal. For lunch the next day, however, I changed it up a bit. MMM. Smokey Beef Spread. This is actually a recipe I have used with leftover brisket, but roast will do. Since I still have my mom's Ninja machine, I used it to chop up the roast. I think I overdid it a bit and absolutely pulverized the poor thing. This spread really looks nothing like the brisket version. That I have always diced by hand and it remained chunky. I think I prefer the look of the chunkier spread, but the ease of the Ninja version. Maybe, you could use a food processor and try not to overmix. I seem to always get too much of a good thing.



The recipe for the spread is in the e-book. It is basically a mayo and cream cheese dressing mixed with chopped pickles and liquid smoke. Fantastic flavor. This time, since I was running a bit low on roast beef, I added two hard boiled eggs. Fortunately, I did not add those to the Ninja!


To serve the spread, I gave John one half a lavash bread and made it a roll up. The rest went on celery sticks.

The third meal will be a vegetable soup, using the broth from the roast, some leftover veggies baked with it, and some veggies added fresh. Just use what you have in the fridge; nearly anything goes. Mushrooms and celery are great choices.

Barbecue Chicken Wraps

The great thing about making up a giant batch of chicken is that the meals that come from it will be so easy. Such is the case tonight. Mmm. Part of the batch of flavorful Ultra Chicken becomes Ultra Barbecue Chicken Wraps in almost no time. All I have to do is cut the chicken breast into strips and toss it in the pan with some KC Masterpiece Classic no sugar Barbecue Sauce. Love that stuff.

John gets his wrap spiraled up in a Lavash bread. Since that is not quite enough to fill a hungry man, I also made him a lettuce cup with the BBQ chicken inside. What you want in your wraps is up to you. We like onion, cheese and lettuce. Sometimes we add pickles too.

Oh, if you don't own the e-book, the Triple Play Ultra Chicken is so named because it is marinated in Michelob Ultra before baking. No alcohol is left, the flavor is unique and worth a try. If you don't have that made up, these wraps work well with Freezer Favorites Chicken Cubes too. When it can be this easy, no excuses for take out, right?

Breakfast Burritos

This is a favorite of my guys. We don't have them too often because we don't eat low carb tortillas too often. I have had some Lavash bread that needed to be eaten, so I threw this together for hubby. This was Saturday morning, and I needed to run, so I got a picture, but had no time to blog. I bet you know how life gets! That's when Diner food saves the day--quick and simple. Real.

I just browned some sausage and added some eggs directly to the skillet when the sausage was cooked through. That mixture goes into a low carb tortilla or Lavash bread. One trick that I have learned, is not to stir too much after I add the egg. I try to keep large chunks. Those stay put better in the tortilla. The dogs would rather I stir a lot. They love to catch the chunks that tumble out onto the floor!

This is just as good without the bread, but then that is not much of a recipe, huh? I would add salsa, but hubby is not into that. Guess he is a sausage purist. He accidentally bought hot sausage, which usually would give him a problem, but this time was good. I added some raw sharp cheddar we got at the dairy. This stuff is SO good. It is especially good for cutting back on calories. The flavor is so strong, it doesn't take much cheese to get that awesome taste.

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.

Quick Lunch on the Go

If you ever need a brown bag for lunch, Deli Delights are an "E.Z. Fix" meal that travels well. Today, I packed some Cream Cheese Spirals and some Deli Roll-ups. For a little variety, I made some Spirals with Joseph's Lavash bread too.

Use whatever deli meats you have on hand. Today I used roasted chicken sliced wafer thin. I also threw in some pepperoni. It is a bit hard to tell by the photograph, but there are two different cheeses in there too. Just use what you like. Spread, roll and pack 'em to go!

Chili Cheese Nachos for 24/7 Low Carbers

Sometimes you miss nachos on a low carb diet. Not that they are every the healthiest choice, but who wants to go through life feeling deprived? With some strategic substitutions, we can have a pretty close version of tortilla chips. After all, the taste is in the toppings, which are naturally low carb. Joseph's Lavash bread can sub for carby chips.

To make a single serving of tortilla chips, cut one lavash sheet in half. Cut that into triangle wedges. Toast them in the oven until they are lightly browned and starting to crisp.

Arrange the chips on a microwavable plate. Top with cheese, chili and peppers or salsa. Today, I used a batch of 24 Hour Chili from the freezer and Monterey Jack cheese. That was quick. I also topped my nachos with my homemade Salsa Verde. A minute and a half in the microwave oven, and lunch is served. Couldn't or Wouldn't have made this yummy lunch if that chili hadn't already been made. That is how I work the system to make life easier.

Beefy Ranch Rolls

Beef. It is what's for dinner! This has been a hectic week for me--full of scheduled business and a few surprises too. Even though I didn't get all my prep day work done, with a few ingredients in my well stocked freezer, I don't need to panic. And no, I don't have an extra freezer, just the side by side in the kitchen. It can be done!

This delicious dinner was made on the fly after I celebrated being hired for a new teaching position next fall. My interview ran late, but since I had Minute Beef in the freezer, dinner was on time. Here is what we ate tonight:

Beefy Ranch Rolls

1 package Minute Beef
2-3 Joseph's Lavash Bread
1/2 cup cheese for each sheet of bread (I used mozzerella tonight)
Bacon Ranch Dressing

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place Lavash bread on cookie sheets. Thaw Minute Beef in the microwave oven. When warm, distribute the beef over the bread. Top with cheese. Drizzle bacon ranch dressing over all. Bake for 7-10 minutes or until cheese melts and Lavash begins to brown. Don't let it get too crispy on the edges. Remove from oven and cut each Lavash bread into 3 strips. Roll each strip into a spiral.

We ate this with Nana's Coleslaw with a Kick. Everyone here gave these rolls a big thumbs up.

Launch time

Things just never seem to go as planned. They cookbook was ready. The web page for ordering was...well...almost ready. Then life as usual intervened, and suddenly it is two months later. But now it seems as it is the real deal. Time to launch the cooking system and let my friends and fellow low carbers know about my venture.

The webpage is ready for orders. On it, you will find some sample recipes, some photos, and a brief explanation of how my kitchen system works. I also have the newsletter ready for anyone who buys the cookbook and joins up. That has extra recipes, favorite kitchen gadgets, seasonal ideas and more stuff that somehow interests me as a cook or low carber. I will also list the recipes I have chosen for entrees for the month.

Here's a sample from the October newsletter:

Joseph’s Cinnamon Crisps
Spread softened butter on a sheet of Lavash bread. Fold it together to make sure butter is evenly distributed even to the edge. Unfold the bread.
Mix 1/4 cup of granulated Splenda with 1 teaspoon of Cinnamon.
Sprinkle the sugar mixture over the buttered bread.
Cut the bread into 3 inch strips using a knife or pizza cutter.
Bake in the oven for 6-8 minutes at 350 degrees.

Get the cookbook and newsletter to get the pumpkin dip recipe that goes with these chips. Yummy.


I promise to be posting more regularly now. Be sure to let me know when you have stopped by.