try 5 new recipes

I’ve been thinking about trying to reduce or even eliminate wheat flour in my diet. I don’t have any medical problems prompting me to do this; I’ve just been reading a lot and talking with folks and think that going wheat-free might be a good thing for me, Mr. K and our health.

So with this thought in mind, today I tried my first wheat-free baking project: Carrot Flaxseed Muffins . These muffins used ground almond meal instead of flour. They’ve also got coconut oil, and coconut milk. Never baked with any of these ingredients before! They taste delicious, but are a bit crumbly. I think I’ll try this recipe again! They sort of stuck to the muffin pan more than I would like, and I think that’s because I tried using the coconut oil to grease the muffin tin. Next time I’ll try greasing with Crisco.

This was absolutely delicious! I’ve made this twice now, and it’s got to be one of my favorite desserts! It tastes just like one of those huge muffins you can get at a restaurant, but since this is made in a 9×9 pan, it’s a little easier to practice portion control. We had it warm with vanilla ice cream on top, heavenly!

My friend sent me some recipes which she recommended, and this was one of them! The recipe was for turkey patties and they a very yummy tomato-cucumber-Greek olive salsa to serve with the burgers. It was delicious!

Last night I tried a fantastic new recipe for Chicken Parmigiana. This is one of Mr. K and my favorite dishes, but I confess that until I tried this recipe, I usually bought it prepared at Whole Foods and then heated it up in the oven. Or we order it at a restaurant. It was super easy, I’m definitely going to be making this one often!

I got the recipe from Amy Sedaris’ fabulous book “I Like You” and it was quite easy. Although last night I was in a hurry, so I didn’t make the home-made sauce she includes in the recipe, I just used canned marinara sauce. This was the first recipe I made from Amy’s book, but the book looks packed with great recipes. Seriously, if I could have only one cookbook, this one might just be it!

Tried another new recipe tonight—salmon with couscous. Wow, this was great! Not to brag, but it was the best salmon I’ve had outside of a restaurant. And it was so easy. Rubbed the salmon filets with a mixture of brown sugar and curry poweder, baked for 15 minutes. Meanwhile, cook the couscous, and when it’s done, mix in some toasted almonds, chopped green onion, and raisins.

This is going to go in to the main rotation, it was that good!

I was a little late in making this for the Chinese New Year, but it was delicious! Stir fried beef sirloin, shrimp, carrots, broccoli, and onion in a sauce I amde myself of soy sauce, sherry, ginger, garlic and water. It was really easy and delicious!

Will definitely make this one again!

Oh my this was was really good! And it was easy too! I found the recipe on a little display stand at Safeway by the seafood. Literally, it took ten minutes to prepare the fish before grilling. And the mahi mahi came out nice and firm. Will definitely make this again!

I tried a new recipe for baked pork chops at allrecipes.com.

The marinade was quick and easy to make and the results were delicious! As I noted elsewhere in my ramblings, the pork chops are surprisingly low in calories, checking in at less than 300 calories for a 6 ounce pork chop.

I tried this recipe for mahi mahi which I found on Allrecipes.com. I doubled the amount of sauce ingredients for the marinade, since my hubby likes sauce on his fish. This was very good and easy, and according to Allrecipes.com, each serving checked in at less than 300 calories.

Definitely will be making this again!

This week I bought a new cookbook called “Eating for Life”. It is written by Bill Phillips, originator of the Body for Life program. Last night I made this casserole and it was really delicious. It ended up a lot like one of the Tuna Helper casseroles I’ve made from a box, but one of the things I liked about it is that I tried making it with whole wheat rotini. Yum! It made a huge difference in the way that the casserole tastes,

I bought this cookbook in an effort to learn some new and tasty healthy meals. So far, I am impressed with the book and the variety of recipes it offers. An awesome feature of the book is that each recipe is designed with using readily available ingredients. It even has pictures of the boxes you need to buy at the grocery store. grin

I am contemplating trying the Body for Life program. It seems nutritionally sound, so I thought I would start out by testing some of the recipes. I’ve reserved the actualy Body for Life book from the library. Something to think about this spring.