Cool Nights, Warm Soup

The weather around here the last few weeks has not indicated anything about Summer being on it’s way.  Sure, we have had a few sporadic days of lovely sun but they are always followed by like a week of grey skies and chilly air.  What is up with that?

Due to this Autumn-like weather, the cat and I have been spending mass quantities of evening couch time rewatching almost all six seasons of Gilmore Girls on DVD.  Yes, we know how to live life over here!  Nothing says comfort like a cozy blanket, a purring kitty, and four back-to-back episodes of Lorelai and Rory hijinks.

Well, and soup.

After three days of grilled cheese sandwiches to accompany my comfort TV I got a craving for vegetables.  Shocker I know.  But a salad wasn’t going to fit the comfort food profile.  I needed something warm and savoury to satisfy my craving.

I spent about 10 minutes channelling my inner Gilmore Girl, trying to decide if I should head on over to my favourite Vietnamese place for Chicken Noodle Pho to go.  But my pocket book brought me back to reality.  How hard could it be to whip up something comforting, Pho inspired, and reasonably priced? 

Asian Inspired Chicken and Vegetable Noodle Soup

Yields 4 servings

Ingredients:

• 4 cups low-sodium chicken stock (or 1 900ml container)
• 2 cups water
• 1 boneless, skinless chicken breast, sliced into bite-sized strips
• 1 clove garlic, grated
• 1 tbsp fresh ginger, grated
• pinch of red chili flakes
• 1/2 cup carrots, matchsticks
• 1/2 cup red pepper, strips
• 2 green onions, chopped
• 2 cups Asian greens (I used baby bok choy), roughly chopped
• lime juice to taste
• handful fresh basil, chopped (or cilantro)
• 2 cups prepared vermicelli rice noodles

Directions:

1. In a large stock pot, bring 2 cups chicken stock and 1 cup water to a simmer over medium heat.  Add chicken, garlic, ginger and chili flakes.  Return to simmer and cook until chicken is poached through…approximately 5-7 minutes.
2. Add remaining chicken stock, water, carrots, red pepper, and any thicker parts of Asian greens.  Simmer 2 minutes or until veggies soften slightly. 
3. Add softer Asian greens and green onion.  Continue simmering just until wilted.  Remove pot from heat, add squeeze of lime and stir in basil.
4. To serve: add serving of prepared vermicelli noodles to bowl; ladle soup over noodles.

According to MyFitnessPal a serving of this soup without the noodles is only a measly 150 calories!  So don’t feel bad about adding the noodles, even if they are a little calorie dense (approx. 175 calories per 1/4 cup).  The noodles are the comforting part! :)

This soup ended up being one of my favourite things I have created in ages!  It turned out exactly as I had hoped, saved me a few bucks, and provided the veggies and comfort food I was craving.

I’m sure Lorelai would be disappointed in me for using my stove, but this is a disappointment I can live with.

Now, when the heck is Parenthood coming back on?

And how do we feel about Rory appearing on Mad Men?

Healthy Homemade Recipe Roundup

Back in the fall I spent a little time deciding what I wanted this blog to become if I kept it going. 

• I didn’t want to to be a daily ‘chore’ anymore
• I didn’t want it to be a boring tell-all of everything I do every day
• I didn’t want it to be restaurant reviews that only mean something to local friends and readers.

So what did I want it to be then?

First and foremost I wanted it to be something fun and motivating for ME!  And along with that hopefully it would be fun and motivating for YOU!

To make that happen I decided that I would still talk about working out, fun with friends, personal anecdotes and other randomness, but my main focus would be on food and recipes.  Sometimes healthy, sometimes not.  But always simple, fresh, economical and hopefully super tasty!

While I have posted a couple of over-the-top decadent desserts over the past few months (Maple Bacon Sticky Buns anyone?) I am pretty pleased with the collection of healthy options I’ve presented too.  Here’s a list of those recipes from the first quarter of 2012…

Fast n’ Fresh Simple Slaw

Wild Nettle-kopita Hand Pies

Shrimp and Pesto Quiche

Quinoa with Roasted Beets, Goat Cheese & Honey Vinaigrette

Creamy Spinach, Caramelized Onion and Yogurt Dip with Roasted Garlic

Make your own Taco Seasoning

Creamy Coconut Cauliflower Soup

Crispy Corn Flake Chicken Strips

Clementine Guacamole

Roasted Butternut Squash Chowder

Kale and Almond Pesto

Roasted Garlic White Bean Dip

Butternut Tart with Chorizo and Goat Cheese

Egg White Frittata with Smoked Salmon and Capers

Ooooh, just collecting these up has set me on a path for next week’s shopping list.  It’s so easy to forget to make old favourites again when there are so many new things to try.  But next week I see those deeeelish chicken fingers in my belly.  :)

Coconut Cauliflower Soup

Every single time I buy cauliflower I land up with at least half of a head just hanging out in my produce drawer waiting to die.  It used to be that a live-alone gal could buy some pre-cut cauliflower at the market but apparently those days are gone and whenever I need it I have to buy a whole one. 

Rather than taking my usual approach for near-dead veggies – tossing with olive oil and roasting – I decided to tackle my second favourite approach – create a healthy soup!

Cauliflower is easy to work with, low calorie, and it lends itself to pretty much any flavours.  Since I happen to have three cans of coconut milk in my cupboard it seemed only fitting these two ingredients should go together.  To round it out I added curry powder but I’m sure whatever your favourite handy herb is would work just as well.

Creamy Coconut Cauliflower Soup

Yields 4 servings

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 large carrot, chopped
• 2 stalks celery, chopped
• 1 small onion, diced
• 1 clove garlic, minced or grated
• 1 tbsp flour
• 1 tbsp curry powder (or more depending on your taste)
• 3 cups cauliflower, chopped
• 3 cups low-sodium chicken or vegetable stock
• 1 can (400ml) low calorie coconut milk
• salt & pepper
• optional garnish: kale chips, fresh parsley, chopped green onion

Directions:

1. In a large pot heat olive oil over medium heat.  Add carrots, celery and onions.  Stir and let cook until starting to sweat.  Add garlic, stir and let cook another minute or so.
2. Add flour, stir and let cook one minute.  Add curry powder, stir and cook another minute.  Add cauliflower and stir again.
3. Add about 1/2 cup of the chicken stock.  Just enough to bubble up and help scrape the browned bits from the bottom of the pot.  Then add remaining chicken stock, cover and let cook until cauliflower begins to soften.
4. Stir in coconut milk and continue to cook until cauliflower reaches desired level of doneness (I like mine al dente).  Season with salt and pepper to taste.
5. Optional:  For a thicker soup blend half of the pot.  Easiest is to use an immersion/stick blender to puree right in the pot, but you can also scoop into a regular blender to puree and add it back.
6. Serve garnished with something green.  I opted for fresh made kale chips I had on hand which worked brilliantly, but a sprinkle of fresh herbs would do well too.

MyFitnessPal calculates this delicious, easy soup to be only 150 calories per serving (depending on the nutritional stats of your coconut milk).  It’s missing a protein component so pair it with some cheese, lean meat, or hummus for a lovely lunch.

While tweeting about making this soup my friend Shirls commented that she hates cauliflower. I was appalled. Who hates cauliflower?  Do you?

Snowpocalypse Chowder

Well, our snow appears to have stopped falling from the sky but is showing no intention of leaving the ground any time soon.  I ventured out to the gym yesterday and was shocked that so many of the roads are still so bad.  Driveable but gross!  Slushy business.

Nice time for my darling boyfriend to head off for sunny South America, no?  I knew that whole business of trotting off to Greece without him would come back to haunt me.  Next time I need to be smart enough to book my warm and lovely vacation during Victoria’s annual snowpocalypse.

Alas, someone’s gotta stay home and pay her mortgage so instead of snorkelling with tropical fishies I’ll stay here and eat copious amounts of soul warming chowder.  Take THAT silly sunny vacation.

Roasted Butternut Squash Chowder

yields 6 servings

adapted from Food for my Family (thanks Pinterest!)

Ingredients:

• 6 slices bacon, chopped
• 2 carrots, diced
• 2 celery stalks, diced
• 1 small onion, diced
• 2 garlic cloves, minced 
• 2 baking potatoes, peeled and diced into bite-size cubes
• 2 tbsp fresh sage, chiffonade
• 1 tsp paprika
• pinch cayenne
• salt and pepper
• 1 carton (900 ml) chicken broth
• 1 cup water
• 3 cups roasted butternut squash, pureed
• 1/2 cup heavy/whipping cream
• 1 tsp cornstarch mixed with 2 tsp cold water

Tip: Add water 1-2 tbsp at a time to help the process of pureeing the squash.

Directions:

1. In a large pot, cook bacon over medium heat until browned and becoming crisp.  Using a slotted spoon, remove bacon from pot to rest on paper towel. 
2. In the same pot add carrots, celery and onions.  Stir to coat and sauté until al dente.  While vegetables are rendering down stir in garlic.
3. Add potatoes, sage, paprika, cayenne and a sprinkle of salt and pepper.  Stir to combine and continue cooking for 3-4 minutes.
4. Stir in chicken broth and water, cover and bring to a boil.  Once boiling remove the lid, reduce the heat, and simmer until potatoes are fork tender…approximately 10 minutes.
5. Stir in pureed butternut squash and whipping cream.  Taste for seasoning and adjust if desired.  Add corn starch mixture, stirring continuously while returning chowder to a light boil.  Reduce heat once bubbling begins.  When desired thickness is reached remove pot from heat, stir in reserved bacon, and let stand 5 minutes before serving.

Don’t nibble on the bacon while you are working on the soup!  You need it.  If you are a bacon monster, make extra.

Fill your belly full of this delicious creaminess before pulling on your fuzzy lined boots and your devil horn toque and your big red mittens and your puffiest Winter coat to take your hairless dog out for her business.

It wards off the cold.

Almost as good as a trip to Costa Rica.

Riiiiight.

It’s Soup Season

Part of the fun of taking some time off from day-to-day food photos is that I have been able to do some batch cooking and not bore you all to death with repeatedly showing that I ate the same dinner three nights in a row.  I didn’t realize how exhausting and pricey it is trying to find something new and exciting to showcase every day.

One of my favourite things to make any time of year, but especially when the weather turns chilly is soup!  It’s warm, filling, delicious, and generally hard to bugger up.  It makes perfect lunches, easy dinners, and keeps my freezer stocked with a few varieties at a time.

Every week or two I think of a recipe to try out, aiming for at least six servings so I can eat some, share some, and freeze some.

So far this season I have tackled:

• My Own Easy Healthy Broccoli Soup
• Doukhobor Borscht from French Fries to Flax Seeds
• Tom Yum Soup from Chatelaine
• Turkey and Black Bean Chili

… And just this week I cooked up a new recipe using the leftovers from the roast chicken dinner we had on Sunday night.

Creamy Chicken and Rice Soup with Kale

Ingredients:

• 4 cups chicken stock (I made my own from the chicken carcass)
• 1 cup water
• 1 can fat free evaporated milk
• 2 cups cooked chicken meat (I got about one cup from our leftover chicken and cooked up a couple of chicken thighs to get the rest)
• 1 cup cooked wild rice
• 2 carrots, peeled and chopped
• 2 celery ribs, chopped
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 cups kale, stem and coarse ribs removed, torn into bite size pieces
• 1 tbsp corn starch
• drizzle of olive oil
• 1 tsp fresh rosemary, minced
• salt & pepper to taste

Directions:

1. In a large pot, heat olive oil over med-high heat.  When heated add carrots, celery and onions.  Stir to coat and let cook a few minutes then add garlic and rosemary.  Continue stirring and cooking until garlic starts to brown.
2. Add chicken stock and water.  Bring to low boil and reduce to simmer until veggies become tender (al dente) … approximately 12 minutes.
3. Add chicken and rice, simmer until heated through.  Mix corn starch with 2 tbsp of water and combine well.  Add milk to soup, stir, then add corn starch mixture and return soup to a low boil, stirring regularly, until soup starts to thicken.
4. Reduce heat and add kale.  Cover and simmer until kale wilts.
5. Taste and add salt and pepper as desired.

I ran this recipe through My Fitness Pal and it clocks in at a lovely 222 calories per serving, based on six servings.  My belly is happy, my freezer is happy, and Michael will be happy since there is enough for him too.  :)

What are your favourite soup recipes to batch cook?  I will need a new one for next week.

Twitchy

Morning everyone!  Happy Friday!  Here we are almost at the weekend and I’m finally caught up on blog posts for the week.  Say hello to yesterday!

See that gorgeous smoothie presented to me before leaving Michael’s yesterday morning…it’s pretty exciting that his fridge always contains yummy almond milk!  Especially when he whips it up with bananas, egg, and blueberries.

I had to run off for a doctor’s appointment so I treated myself to Starbies on the way home. Half sweet vanilla iced coffee with milk and the only treat I seem to like there anymore…lemon poppy seed loaf.

When lunch rolled around I was happy to open up a can of Habitant Pea Soup.  I knew salad would be served with dinner and I’d been thinking about this soup since I bought it.

Yummy in my tummy.

As was my daily salted chocolate ration.  Take THAT chocolate!  You haven’t beat me yet!

Come late afternoon I grabbed another nectarine but decided to add a side of almonds.  My eye was twitching like crazy which can be a sign of not enough potassium (apparently) and since I don’t have bananas on hand I figured this was a good way to go.

Anyone ever get that twitchy eye?!  It happens to me all the time but the banana trick always works.  Probably an old wives tale but it works for me I swear!  (the almonds seemed to work too!)

There’s the dinner salad I promised.  I needed it to brighten up those beige leftovers!!  No big silver bowl, just a stack of lettuce, carrots, peppers, cukes, and blue cheese dressing.

To spruce up Wednesday night’s leftovers I added sautéed mushroom and onions to the pork, and sliced and pan “fried” the already buttery herbed potatoes.

Holy deeeelish potatoes!

After strolling Miss Chibi around the block and staring a two episodes of the dumbest show I can’t stop watching Big Brother 13 I settled into another bowl of blueberries, granola and yogurt. 

I hope it’s a sunny weekend where you are. I’ve had a busy week and am looking forward to an adventure with Michael tomorrow!  Have a great weekend!

Slim Pickin’s

Mother Hubbarb’s Cupboards present you with random freezer finds, last leg produce, and mostly empty containers from the fridge.

Those 15 berries were literally the last of the fresh fruit around here.  Unless you count that lime that’s rolling around in my produce drawer.  Which I don’t.

Thankfully a frozen banana and Dreamsicle Amazing Grass kept the smoothie dream alive.  I am now even out of Almond Milk.  This week’s grocery trip is going to be ridonkulous.

Thank goodness for healthy cupboard foods. 

and last night’s leftovers.

At the end of the day I gave in and opted to eat out with Tiffaney.  We were out and about securing her plane tickets to Greece!!! and had planned to have a celebratory coffee but since we were both starving we stopped for soup at Green Leaf.

Vietnamese Chicken Noodle Soup!!  Easily the best thing I’ve eaten there.  I love a $10 meal that feeds me twice… you know I have leftovers.

Before crawling into bed I snacked on flattened banana.  Love.

Workout: 5 minutes Cybex, 20 minutes lower body strength exercises, 10 minutes ab exercises, C25K Day 5 on treadmill.  I be runnin’ and not dyin’!

Impromptu Soup

The little plastic thingy on my coffee maker broke again!  Nooooooooo.

I am thankful for two things:  1) that plastic thingy has broken before and I now keep Crazy Glue on hand at all times.  2) Becki gave me a Bodum for my housewarming.

Crisis averted.

After a weekend of mucho indulgence it was nice to eat yogurt, Kashi and extremely tasty strawberries for breakfast.

Lunch was what I’m calling Impromptoup.  Impromptu Soup!

As I often do on Sunday evenings, I was cleaning out the fridge and assessing what I had to work with this week for meal planning and such.

What I found:

• 2/3 of a carton of Chicken Broth
• 1/2 of a large cauliflower on it’s very last legs
• 1/2 of a butternut squash screaming to be used up

As I was organizing everything to go into the freezer for use at a later date I realized these three ingredients would be perfect for a quick and easy soup.  So I chopped up the cauliflower and peeled and diced the squash.

All I added:

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 clove of garlic, minced
• 1/4 of a red onion, diced
• 1/5 cups of water

Secret ingredient:

• 1 tsp of garam masala (curry powder would work too)

Directions:

1. In a large soup pot heat the olive oil over medium heat.  Add the onion, stir few a few seconds, then add the garlic and stir another 30 seconds.  Add the cauliflower and squash, stir around to lightly coat with oil.  Sprinkle with the garam masala, stir around to coat the veggies then let cook for about 3 minutes, stirring occasionally until spices are fragrant.
2. Add the chicken broth and top with water until veggies are submerged.  Raise to a boil, then simmer until veggies are tender.  Stir occasionally.
3. When cauliflower can be poked through with a fork, remove soup from heat.  At this point you can either let it cool enough to puree in a blender, or if you are like me you’ll have a good time pureeing it right in the pot with an immersion blender.  I like a few lumps, but feel free to puree til your heart’s content. :)
4. Taste and season with salt & pepper if desired.

Last night I ate a bowl with cheddar cheese sprinkles.  Today I ate it straight up with fresh parsley…

Veggies, crackers and Laughing Cow on the side.  Nom.

Dried cantaloupe…

Homemade vanilla soy misto…

Snackeroo:  unpictured bag of snack mix I totally plowed through for absolutely no reason. 

Quick din-din. 

Leafy greens dressed with olive oil & lemon juice, topped with leftover Lemony Quinoa Salad, topped with garlic shrimpies!

Mmmmmm….shrimp: pan cooked with butter, garlic, red pepper flakes and a pinch of salt.  I die. 

After dinner Chibi and I met the other Jamie for a Starbucks visit (grande non-fat vanilla Rooibos tea latte) and to receive a doggie giftie.

It’s about time this little girl got herself a more feminine outfit.  She wasn’t in a paparazzi mood so you can’t see the flower on her new top, but she’s pretty darn cute no? :)

Lordy, I’m going to have to change the header of my blog to “a food AND DOG lover’s blog…”!  What is going on around here?!