Be Nutritious

Orzo Greek Salad with Chickpeas

How I love salads, I cannot even explain. Perhaps I’ll try by telling you that even after eating out in many fancy restaurants, Sweet Tomatoes with its giant salad bar is still one of my favorites. Definitely in my top 5 favorite restaurants of all times. Salad bar is all I need to make me happy. Nothing more is required and nothing compares to a healthy and clean taste of fresh vegetables mixed with a tasty dressing.

This recipe is my take on a Greek salad but instead of preparing it with lettuce I used orzo pasta and chickpeas. That trick makes it more filling so you can have it as a main dish for lunch or you can take it with you to school or work for lunch break.

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Chicken Salad with Walnuts, Raisins and Apples.

My favorite dishes are simple dishes. I love cooking but I don’t like staying in front of the stove everyday for hours (besides who has time for that) so sometimes I just make quick lunch meals like chicken salad sandwich which I can take with me to school. As opposed to tuna salad you do not have to worry about ‘fishy’ smell surrounding you when you unpack your lunch, so it’ just perfect to take with you to school, work or any place where you’ll be eating around people. Nevertheless tuna can be prepared exactly the same way and it is as delicious as chicken so if you don’t care about ‘fishy’ smell go ahead and try one with tuna instead.

Ingredients (2 servings):

6 oz cooked chicken
1/4 cup light mayo (I like Smart Balance)
2 Tbsp honey mustard (or Dijon mustard + some honey)
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1/3 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 cup raisins
1/3 cup finely chopped red onion
1/4 cup apple cut into tiny cubes
Salt, pepper

Shred and chop chicken until it resembles chunky tuna.

Mix with the rest of the ingredients and season with salt and pepper.

Serve on a salad, with crackers, in sandwich or wrapped in tortilla.

Japchae – Korean Stir Fried Cellophane Noodles with Vegetables and Tofu

Japchae is a famous Korean dish made of stir fried glass noodles and veggies cut in matchsticks. I used to eat that quite often back in Poland in my high school years. Back then however I was pretty sure it was a Chinese dish because we used to get this in little Chinese stands that were plentiful in my hometown Lodz. I usually treated myself with stir fried glass noodles with veggies during lunch time when I played hooky with my friends. I am not proud of skipping school but hey….who has never done that? At least when you’re a kid you can still do it, once you’re adult you have to stick to your responsibilities and there’s no way you can skip work without consequences.
In my recipe I added some tofu to increase protein content of the food and I used wood ear mushroom but feel free to use any mushrooms you wish. Shitake or oyster mushroom works great in japchae. Also I used Bragg Liquid Aminos instead of soy sauce or tamari, but that’s because lately I’ve been experimenting a little bit with that stuff. Oh yeah, and unfortunately I do not own a wok but as you can see regular frying pan works just fine.

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Mirin Chicken

Do you know that delicious, sticky, sweet sauce that’s on top of the eel roll in a sushi restaurant? That’s Unagi (eel sauce) which is made of Mirin and soy sauce. Mirin is a Japanese, sweet cooking wine and although most frequently found as a dipping sauce for sushi, can also be used in many different recipes, like the chicken one I made. I’ve actually had Mirin hanging in my cupboard for a very long time and wasn’t sure what else except the eel sauce I can use it for. So I figured why not using it for a chicken marinade and sauce. When prepared that way it is very similar to another popular dish, chicken teriyaki, both sweet and salty with a beautiful glaze.

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Low Fat Tomato Bisque

I absolutely adore all kinds of creamy soups such as lobster or tomato bisque. As far as I am concerned I don’t mind eating bisque in a restaurant because usually it is a small portion but when I cook bisque at home, I want to make sure that it’s low fat. The reason for that is the fact that I know, I am not going to stop eating after a small, little portion and I’ll keep coming for more and more. At the end I will end up feeling guilty after consuming tons of calories coming from heavy cream.

One great substitution for heavy cream is half and half whether it is regular or fat-free variety. It doesn’t give as much smoothness as heavy cream but it is definitely smoother than just plain milk. Nevertheless my version of tomato bisque is healthy and on a lower side of fat

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Crab Melt

When I went back home to Miami last month I had a chance to eat fabulous crab and cheese sandwich in one of the food trucks that serve town. It was really great so I decided to make one after coming back to Georgia for the new school semester. What is pretty cool about all kinds of sandwiches is the fact that you can use any kind of bread or cheese you like, my favorite cheese is provolone but feel free to use any type you wish. The original one I ate in Miami was made with cheddar and multigrain bread. Also crab meat can be quite expensive sometimes so you can substitute it for imitation crab although don’t expect the same results because they taste differently.

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Homemade ‘Salad Bar’

Yesterday I acquired new, very useful kitchen gadget, Kitchenaid Ceramic 6″ Chef’s Knife – White. It’s very sharp and according to a producer, it should never require sharpening because it doesn’t get blunt like regular steel knifes. That’s fantastic because I can never properly sharpen my knives. Interesting thing is that it doesn’t even feel sharp but once you’ll start cutting, you’ll notice how sharp it is.

Obviously I wouldn’t be myself if I haven’t tried it out right away so once I came home I put it to work. I chopped tons of different veggies for my super filling, main dish salad. In general I do not like giving recipes for that type of salads because most of a time I just throw whatever I have in the fridge at the moment. It’s kind of like when you go to a salad bar and top your salad with anything that looks yummy so there is no recipe required. However my salad was so tasty and fresh that, I decided to share it.

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Huevos Rancheros aka Egg Tacos

Huevos Rancheros has been my favorite breakfast in the past few month. Ever since I prepared it once, it became my regular breakfast meal, which I eat even 3-4 times a week. I can honestly admit that I’m addicted to that stuff. Warm corn tacos, cilantro, Trader Joe’s salsa autentica (that’s the best salsa out there, better than restaurant one) are just fantastic when combined with runny egg yolk. Yummy, yummy, yummy, I could eat it all day long.

I like to call this dish egg tacos rather than huevos rancheros because I eat them like tacos. I fold the taco and take a bite. Just dont get discouraged when the runny egg yolk mixed with salsa will be falling all over your beard and hands back on a plate. Licking the plate afterward is the best part and if you’d rather not get messy, simply fry your egg little bit longer until the yolk is no longer runny.

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Vietnamese Sweet Potato Soup

We are very lucky to live just around the corner of a fantastic Vietnamese restaurant called Hy Vong in Coral Gables, FL. Here it was when I first tasted Vietnamese cuisine and I absolutely fell in love with the flavors. I always thought of Vietnamese cuisine to be pretty much the same as Thai but surprisingly it is quite different. Much milder first of all and although I am not a big fan of Thai cuisine I really like Vietnamese one. The soup I’m presenting is one of the many soups served in a restaurant and it is my attempt to copy the flavors In my version I used regular cooking cream and coconut oil but if you wish you can use regular cooking oil and a bit of coconut milk instead. The reason why I used coconut oil in place of coconut milk is that it adds just a hint of coconut flavor and even my boyfriend who is not very fond of coconut milk and won’t eat anything with it, absolutely doesn’t mind coconut oil.

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Pork Tenderloin with Mushroom Sauce

This recipe, although not exactly the same is eaten quite often in my home country, Poland. Basically every family has their own recipe for pork with mushroom sauce and my grandma always serves this dish during family gatherings. We eat a lot of pork and a lot of mushrooms in Poland, hence combining both together in one dish is pretty obvious. Pork tenderloin is a great cut of meat because it is low fat yet very tender and cooks quickly. I prefer it to other cuts of pork because of its diversity, it can be eaten in so many ways and can taste so different each time.

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