Diet Friendly Chunky Cabbage Soup

So either way you look at it, dieting sucks. However one great trick I have learned is that brothy soups help you keep diets in check because the liquid fills you up. Lucky for me, I also like the taste of cooked vegetables(but put a carrot stick in front of me and I'll take your finger instead). So here is a recipe I cook often in the winter. Also in this recipe, I had a leftover turkey carcase from a storebought roasted turkey breast that I picked the meat off of, and made my own stock. You do not have to do that, canned or boxed chicken broth will work just perfect.

Ingredients:

- 2 fat carrots
- 3 large celery stalks
- 1/2 giant sweet yellow onion
- 3-4 tbs Olive oil
- 5-8 cloves of garlic lightly chopped
- 1 head of napa cabbage
- 1tbs dried basil leaves
- 2tbs chicken boullion
- Pepper to taste

Broth- enough chicken stock to fill up half of a large soup pot or fill up your pot half way and boil your poultry bones on high while you chop all of your vegetables but the cabbage.

1. Put the olive oil in your pan and, on medium high heat, sweat down your Mirepoix(thats what you call your base mix of celery, onions, and carrots) and garlic until the onions are starting to become see through. Season with pepper but no salt, there is enough in your stock and in the boullion you will add later.

2. While those are sweating down, feel free to chop up your cabbage. I like it chunky, so I quarter the head of cabbage and then largely slice huge chunks.

3. When your onions are see through, add your broth, basil, and boullion. Bring all of this to a boil and then cover and turn the heat down to low. Let this simmer for a half hour.

4. After letting the carrots and celery get soft and flavor the broth, bring the heat back up to medium and stir in your cabbage. Let that cook for 10 minutes.

5. Serve while the stalks of the cabbage are still a little crunchy.

Creamy Turkey Kale Soup

Living at least 3 hours away from the nearest Olive Garden, I start to itch for some of its delicious menu items. Seeing as I cant make my bread sticks taste just like theirs, I settle for another favorite, the chicken and gnocchi creamy soup. My cravings building up, and my imagination becoming more vivid as craved, I did my best to figure out the ingredients. I think I did a pretty darn good job using my leftover turkey from the roast I picked up at the deli counter the other day.

Ingredients:
- 1 head of kale
- 1 pint of heavy whipping cream
- 8oz pack of gnocchi(little potato dumplings)
- 15oz can of cannellini beans
- 1 cup shredded turkey or chicken
- 3 14.5oz cans of chicken stock
- small hand full of garlic cloves
- 1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- pinch of chili flakes
- 1 tbs dried basil leaves
- s&p

1. Begin by bringing the chicken stock to a simmer with the turkey or chicken meat in it for flavor. While that's on the stove, start tearing up your kale. You should only put the leaf part in your soup, none of the bitter stem.

2. Add your kale and all of your seasonings and garlic. Cover and let cook down for 25 minutes.

3. Drop gently your gnocchi into the stock and begin stirring in the heavy whipping cream. Keep your heat on medium low to low to keep from burning the cream.

4. Stir in your can of beans(drained) and your Parmesan cheese. This will begin to thicken the broth a little bit.

5. Cover and wait about another 10 minutes. Basically when your gnocchi are floating, the soup is ready to eat.

Braised Chicken- An ode to Bobby Flay and his ability to make any dish "Southwest"

Hey look, its that guy! So southwest cooking according to Chef Bobby Flay, as far as I have figured out, is adding peppers and corn to your dish. Ladies and gents, I give you ground dried pepper seasoning and canned corn. And the Lord called it sufficient.

Anyways, so I was browsing the sale section at my grocery store, I noted that there were packages of skinless chicken thighs on sale and I had a half emptied bottle of red wine back at the house that had been open way too long and probably wouldnt taste as good to drink. What to do, what to do...

Ingredients:
6 skinless chicken thighs
2 14.5oz cans of diced tomatoes(fire roasted if you got it)
1 15.25oz can of Whole Kernel Sweet Corn
2 small onions, sliced
1.5 cups red wine
5-6 garlic cloves minced
2 tbs ground pasilla pepper
S&P to taste
Olive oil(enough to drizzle in pan)



1. Brown your chick-chick! Salt and pepper your chicken on both sides before putting it into the pan. Drizzle some olive oil in your pan, enough to coat the bottom very lightly and bring up to medium high heat. Brown your chicken on both sides for about 3-5 minutes each. Have a plate off to the side to set your chicken on when your done. *note- if your are using a not-stick pan, your chicken may not stick. Its ok if you don't get as many crunchies stuck to the bottom, the flavors are all still there.



2. Toss in the onions! Salt and pepper your onions and let them start to cook down. When your onions start to get slimy looking, add your garlic and turn the heat down to medium if things start to burn and just let all the flavors caramelize. This could take a little bit,10-15 minutes if you really let it cook down, but be patient, its worth the flavor.



3. Lets make some steam... Deglaze your pan by pouring in your redwine and scraping up all the yummy bits attatched to the bottom. Bring that up to a simmer and add your can of tomatoes, juice and all. Add your ground pasilla pepper and let that stew for about 5 minutes.



4. Pop the crusty chicken back into your goulash and let it cook at medium low to low heat for 30-35 minutes. Covered or uncovered is your choice, I usually cover it mostly, letting the steam out to prevent tomato splatter from getting all over my kitchen.



5. Drain your can of corn and toss your kernels in, let your mix cook for another 10 minutes.



6. DEVOUR! Very tasty over rice.

Jordan's Favorite- Tomato Basil Soup with Mozzarella

My former roommate Jordan requested this recipe. This being her birthday and me not being anywhere near her now, here is my online present. Sorry you're not here to enjoy it. Make it yourself and do your own dishes, deserter. (love you!) This is a tomato, basil and, wait for it, red wine soup and when served hot you drop mozzarella cubes or balls so they melt and get all yummy in the broth.


Ingredients:
- 1 Cup Red Wine
- Handful of Basil
- 1 Small Onion
- 6-7 Garlic Cloves
- 2 TBS Chicken and Tomato Bouillon
- 2 Cans of Italian Seasoned Diced or Stewed Tomatoes
- 4 Cups of water
- 2 TBS Olive Oil
- S&P

1. Lets get those onions going. Quarter your onion and then thinly slice it up. Get your sauce pan(soup pot) hot. Coat the pan with olive oil and toss your onions in quickly so your oil doesn't burn. Salt and pepper your onions and put on medium high heat to let them start to caramelize down.


2. While the onions are getting golden, mince your garlic and add it it.


3. When everything is golden caramel brown and you see some crust on the bottom of the pan you are going to pour in your wine to deglaze it. Let the wine start to boil off so the alcohol can be removed.
4. While that's boiling mix your bouillon in 2 cups of water and pop it in the microwave for a minute. This will help the seasonings dissolve in the water before pouring it into the soup.
5. Add your tomatoes one can at a time. Between adding cans let the pot come back to a boil before adding the next ingredient.


6. Pour in the broth you mixed up and let things start to meld together and let those flavors get yummy.
7. Grab a hand full of basil, but not all of it, and chiffonade the leaves. Toss them in the pot. Save a few leaves to garnish your soup at the end.


8. If your Mozzarella needs to be sliced up now is the time to do it, assuming you bought one large ball and not a container of small bite sized balls. Make it into bite sized chunks.


9. Taste your soup and if you think its flavors have melded well, go ahead and serve it up. If not leave it for another 10 minutes or so.
10. Pour your soup into a bowl, drop your mozzarella on top, add a sprig of basil, impress your friends.

Stuffed Peppers

Make the filling and keep it in the fridge to cook one pepper at a time as you are hungry for one or cook up a bunch of peppers at once for your whole dorm suite. There's also the option of skipping the pepper stuffing altogether and just eating the stuffing. I had some with crackers. It made my tummy happy.

Ingredients:
~Filling
- 1 Box Spanish Style Rice-A-Roni
- 1 Can of Diced Tomatoes(for the Rice-A-Roni)
- 1 lb ground beef or turkey
- 1 small onion(diced)
- 2 Bell Peppers(diced)- I like one red and one green but colors are up to you.
- 5 Cloves of Garlic(minced)
- As much hot sauce of your choice as you can handle.(I used about 6 good dashes of Cholula)
- Seasonings to your taste.(I used garlic powder, paprika, onion powder, pepper but no salt since there is plenty in the Rice-A-Roni seasonings packet)

~Pepper Stuffing Business
- Large bell pepper that can stand on it's own.
- Yellow Processed American Cheese(I used Kraft singles but cubed up Velveeta is great too)

1. Get your Rice-A-Roni started. Follow the directions on the box.

2. In another pot get your ground up meat of choice browning and slice up your onion, peppers, and garlic. Toss the vegetables into the meat pan as soon as they are diced up. Add your hot sauce and seasonings.

3. Once your Rice-A-Roni is cooked(takes about 15 minutes) preheat your oven to 350*F.
4. In whichever pot is bigger, mix together your Rice-A-Roni and meat/veggie mix.
5. Decide how many peppers you are going to make and clean them out. Cut a hole in the top and pop out the center seeded mass of crap. With a spoon scrap out the spongy white-ish webbing and the rest of the seeds. To get the rest of the seeds out it may be easier to just rinse it out in your sink.

6. Set pepper(s) onto some tray or other baking safe platform to cook your peppers on. Lets make some lasagna. Start with a couple of pieces of cheese in the bottom and add a scoop of meaty rice goodness. Repeat. Add a couple more pieces of cheese, ricey meaty goodness and repeat. Again. Again. Oh yeah. Again. Full? Sweet.

7. Put your pepper(s)in the oven for an hour. Don't do what I did and pick at the extra filling until the peppers come out. I was too full to eat my peppers. Bad life decisions, don't make them.


8. At about 50 minutes check your peppers to see how brown they are on top, they may come out earlier if they look toasty good.

9. Plate it up! I decided to eat mine in a bowl cause its really juicy. I might suggest a piece of toast to sop up the goodness.

Universal Meat/Veggie Filler(and quiche recipe)

This meat and veggie filler can be added to pasta sauce, quiche, or just popped in a bowl and eaten as you fancy. Essentially you've got a balanced mix of protein and vitamins that can be mass produced and placed in Tupperware to just add at your leisure to whatever you feel like.

Ingredients:
-1lb ground Turkey
-1 package sliced mushrooms
-Couple big hand fulls of Spinach
-1 medium onion diced
-3 Cloves of Garlic minced
-Large handful of fresh Sage
-S&P

1. In a non-stick skillet brown your turkey or at least make sure it is just cooked all the way through. Put the turkey in a bowl or other container off to the side while leaving what little bit of fat is left naturally in the pan to cook your veggies.
2. On medium high heat toss in your mushroom slices and brown those off. To help draw the water out of them go ahead and S&P now. They will shrink down pretty small but if you start smelling burning they have probably gone too far or your heat is too high.
3. Toss in your onions and garlic, you want to get the onions to be reasonably translucent but they don't have to be caramelized. If you find things sticking a lot go ahead and add about a tablespoon of olive oil but not too much more than that if necessary.
4. Re-add your ground turkey and let those flavors all meld for a minute or two.
5. Set your spinach one handful at a time on top of the mess of food in the pan.

This will need to wilt down. If you have a lid, set it on top so the spinach can steam for a minute or two, if not just gently fold it into the mixture until all of your spinach is mixed in.

6. Take your sage leaves and just tear them up into small pieces and toss them in. The tearing action rather than chopping really brings out the flavor better in my opinion.
7. All done! Divi up into your Gladware or saved plastic margarine tubs and add into whatever you want. Want chunky pasta sauce? Just toss in some Ragu or add to rice a roni for a one pot meal.

Quiche Time!

Egg pie. Eat for breakfast or any meal really. This is a good way to get rid of those eggs that have been in the fridge and just past their sell by date.

Ingredients:
- 3 cups of your meat/veggie filler
- 1/4 cup of milk
- 6 eggs
- Non-stick Cooking Spray
- Handful of shredded cheese(optional)
- Store bought pie crust thawed but still cooler than room temp(you will need a pie pan, you can get a disposable foil one in the baking isle of the supermarket)


1. Preheat oven to 350*F and warm up your filler in the microwave or on the stove.

2. Spritz your pan and then line the pie pan with uncooked crust.

3. Spoon in your filler and make sure its evenly spread in the pan but don't pack it down. If your going to add cheese, sprinkling it on top of the filling.

4. Crack your eggs with milk in a bowl and whip them up with a fork like you would getting scrambled eggs ready. Pour this on top of the filler.

5. Gently place your quiche pie into the oven and back for about 45 minutes.
6. Take out of the oven(make sure your eggs all look cooked) and let cool a couple of minutes. If you put cheese in your quiche it will get a little crispy on top but careful not to let it burn.

7. Slice up and enjoy!

Dinner for 2: Jasmine Green Tea Poached Chicken and Sides

Valentines Day is coming up and on a budget and with no kitchen skills it may be hard to come up with something classy to cook for that special someone. Lets try something that just plain sounds fancy but if you have a little bit of time to work on it, its hard to go wrong. On the menu we have Jasmine Green Tea poached chicken, fresh cooked green beans, and jasmine green tea rice. The kicker is that the broth you make for the chicken will get used in everything else for flavor. Check the game play at the end to get an overview of the time it will take.

Ingredients:
Broth-
- 4 tea bags or 1/3 cup of loose leaf Jasmine Green Tea
- About a 3 inch chunk of Ginger, skinned and sliced
- 1 tbs Soy Sauce
- 1 Elephant Clove or 5 regular Cloves of Garlic
- 8 cups of Water

Everything else-
-2 Chicken breasts
-1 handful per person of fresh green beans(not from a can)
-1 cup of rice(not instant)
-Lil Bit-o-Olive Oil


1. If your using frozen chicken breasts start to defrost them. If not lets work on the green beans. Rinse your beans and pinch off both ends of the green beans. Compost the ends but otherwise leave them mostly intact. Looks prettier to keep them whole.

2. Broth time, get 10 cups of water in a big pot and start getting that to a boil while you get the ginger, garlic, and tea ready.
-Carefully skin and slice your ginger. Keep a couple of big slices to put into your rice but otherwise toss the rest in the water pot.


-Slice your garlic, 1/3 of it will stay sliced to put into the rice. Take 1/3 of it and put it in the water and the last 3rd will get used in the green beans so put it aside somewhere.

-Get your tea ready, when the water starts to boil, put the tea bags/infuser into the water and turn heat waaaay down to a simmer.

-Add your soy sauce and let the tea steep for at least 10 minutes. Take out the tea bags when done steeping.

3. Rice time. In another pot just for the rice add one cup of rice and 2 cups of broth and bring that up to a boil.Toss in the last of your ginger and the garlic slices you had set aside earlier.
4. Boiling? Good turn the heat down so the water is just at a simmer. Pop a lid on and forget about the rice for 15 minutes.
5. Pull another half cup of broth and set aside. Get your big pot of broth to a boil and put your chicken in. Cover and let poach in the broth. Depending on the thickness of the chicken your going to want to leave the chicken in the broth for 7-9 minutes on the boil.

If you have pink in your chicken it is not safe to eat. Place it back in the broth for another minute or 2.

6. In a saute pan add a drizzle of olive oil and get that hot. Toss in your green beans and left over garlic. Make sure they don't burn. When the beans start getting bright green toss in your broth you set aside for a quick steam finish. Set on low while you finish your chicken.

7.Take out of the broth and slice all pretty(on a bias).

8. Plate it up! Rice on the plate, green beans, and sliced chicken breast.


PRE-Game:
-Thaw chicken
-Prep vegetables
-Make broth

Kick Off!- Boil broth for rice and chicken.
15 minutes to go- let rice sit
10 minutes left- get chicken in
7 minutes left- heat up saute pan for green beans
5 minutes left- toss green beans
3 minutes left- slice chicken
1 minute left- turn off all heat

Game Over-
-Plate up dinner
-Light candles
-Woo your significant other