Gnocchi With Shrimp, Asparagus & Pesto

There's something to be said for quick and easy but FRESH meals. This meal was so easy to make and I guarantee anyone could make it.  If you can boil water, this is the recipe for you :)  I pretty much followed the recipe exact, it was just too good to mess around with.

I acquired a magic bullet through marriage (thanks honey!) and I am ashamed to say that I don't use it to it's fullest.  Its fantastic for making Pesto, so why we are not having fresh pesto is a mystery. Something that I MUST change though!  ;)

On to the recipe:

Gnocchi With Shrimp, Asparagus & Pesto

Source: Cooking Light JULY 2007 (via myrecipes.com)

YIELD: 4 servings (serving size: 2 cups)

Ingredients

2 quarts plus 1 tablespoon water, divided

1 (16-ounce) package vacuum-packed gnocchi

4 cups (1-inch) slices asparagus (about 1 pound)

1 pound peeled and deveined large shrimp, coarsely chopped (I forgot this step, so shrip was whole and worked fine)

1 cup basil leaves

2 tablespoons pine nuts, toasted

2 tablespoons preshredded Parmesan cheese

2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

2 teaspoons bottled minced garlic

4 teaspoons extravirgin olive oil

1/4 teaspoon salt

Directions

Bring 2 quarts water to a boil in a Dutch oven, or large pot. Add gnocchi to boiling water and cook 4 minutes or until done (gnocchi will rise to surface). Remove gnocchi with a slotted spoon; place in a large bowl. Add asparagus and shrimp to water, cook 5 minutes or until shrimp are done. Drain. Add shrimp mixture to gnocchi.

Combine remaining 1 tablespoon water, basil, and next 4 ingredients (through garlic) in a food processor (or a handy dandy magic bullet); process until smooth, scraping sides. Drizzle oil through food chute with food processor on (or just stop and unscrew bottom from bullet - it doesn't seem to hurt the process); continue until well blended. Add salt and basil mixture to shrimp mixture; toss to coat. Serve immediately.

Before

After

This was so yummy and fresh and light!  The daughter loved it, which REALLY surprised us.  She ate it even though the entire dish was green AND it had asparagus.  Its a mother's dream come true :)

Nutritional Information

    * Amount per serving

    * Calories: 355

    * Calories from fat: 24%

    * Fat: 9.3g

    * Saturated fat: 1.6g

    * Monounsaturated fat: 4.5g

    * Polyunsaturated fat: 2.5g

    * Protein: 26.5g

    * Carbohydrate: 42.7g

    * Fiber: 3g

    * Cholesterol: 170mg

    * Iron: 5.7mg

    * Sodium: 894mg

    * Calcium: 108mg

Red Beans and Rice

Back in the day I spent a few years in New Orleans, and of course, one of the things that the Big Easy is known for is delicious food! Too bad I spent those years in teenage la-la land. I couldn't have cared less about food or cooking in those days. Oh well, live and learn :)

So now in my older years I am making an attempt at Red Bean and Rice for the first time. And I have to say, it turned out pretty darn tasty!

Serves: 6-8 easily

Ingredients
1 lb uncooked red kidney beans
1 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 green bell pepper, chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped (I may have had more than 3, but we are garlic fans here)
7 cups water
Sausage of your choice (I used Sprouts Spicy Andouille 12 oz- pic below) sliced
1 cup uncooked Brown Rice (more if you like more rice)
Cajun Seasoning
Salt
Pepper




Directions.
Soak beans in water overnight. Once beans have soaked, drain, rinse and set aside.

Place olive oil in large pan/Dutch oven over med-high heat. Add the onion and bell pepper, salt and pepper and cook for about 6-8 minutes. Add garlic and cook for another 2-3 minutes. Add beans and water. Increase heat to high and bring to a boil. Decrease the heat to a simmer, cover and cook for 1 1/2 hours, stirring every 30 minutes.  Uncover, increase the heat slightly to maintain a steady simmer, add sausage and Cajun seasoning, and continue to cook for another 30 to 40 minutes or until the beans are tender and the sauce is thickened to your liking.

During the last 30 minutes of the beans cooking, add rice to a seperate pot. Add just enought water that when you stick your finger into pot and the tip of your finger touches the rice, the water reaches your first knuckle of your middle finger (or first line). Set on med-high, cover and let boil. Once the water begins to boil, reduce to low-med and simmer until ready. I love the knuckle trick, I saw it on Cooking Channel's Spice Goddess and its worked everytime.

Once beans are cookied to your liking, serve over rice.  Enjoy :)

Nutrition Facts (Based on 8 servings)
(Approximate - from caloriecount.com)
Amount Per Serving
Calories - 396

Total Fat - 9.1g
Saturated Fat - 2.5g
Cholesterol - 51mg
Sodium - 455mg
Total Carbohydrates - 58.8g
Dietary Fiber - 10.0g
Sugars - 3.2g
Protein - 20.7g
Vitamin A 9% • Vitamin C 38%
Calcium 11% • Iron 35%

Lemon Pepper-Chipotle Fish Tacos

I have been craving Fish Tacos since I saw this blog, almost a month ago.  I went the lazy way and bought the slaw mix from Central Market (big tub of already cut cabbage/carrots for $1.77 =Win in my book!), but I'm ok with that :)  Friday nights are for quick dinners anyway!

The base of this recipe is the same, but I wanted a little more spice in mine.  My recipe calls for some Chipotle powder for a little kick!  Yum!  Next time I do this recipe (and I will, because it was super simple and very yummy) im going to make a Chipotle Cream sauce or something, maybe Chipotle mayo ;)  Although I did add some Queso Fresco & Chipolte laughing cow to this


Servings: 4 (or 2 very hungry people)
Ingredients:

• 4 tilapia fillets 
• 2 cups cole slaw mix
• 1 lemon (1/2 sliced, 1/2 for juice)
• 1 tbsp honey
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 lime 
• Chipotle powder
• lemon pepper
• salt, pepper
• cooking spray 
• 2 wedge laughing cow Queso Fresco/Chipotle laughing cow
• soft tortillas (I used low carb) 

1. Preheat oven to 350

2. Spray cooking spray along bottom of cooking pan. Season both sides of fish with lemon pepper and chipotle powder.  I used generous amounts of both, because tilapia if pretty bland IMO. Sprinkle a litttle dalt, then add sliced lemon over fish, Squeeze about 1/2 the lemon all over the fish.

3. Line pan with fish, bake for 20-25 minutes, until fish flakes easily.

4. While fish is baking, in a bowl whisk together olive oil, honey, lime juice, salt and pepper.  Add in coleslaw mix.  Toss well and let sit to marinate while fish cooks.

5. Warm tortillas in oven for 2-3 minutes. When ready to serve, break fish into chunks, spoon onto warm tortilla, add 1 wedge of laughing cow (in chunks), then add slaw.  Top with guacamole (optional, not included in nutritional info).

This was pretty tasty, as far as I can remember - I pretty much inhaled them so the 15 seonds my tastbuds actually came in contact with the food was pretty tasty!

Nutrition Facts (from caloriecount.com)
Serving Size: 1 Taco
Amount Per Serving
Calories - 270
Calories from Fat - 78
Total Fat - 8.7g
Saturated Fat - 2.3g
Trans Fat - 0.0g
Cholesterol - 63mg
Sodium - 983mg
Total Carbohydrates - 23.3g
Dietary Fiber - 9.0g
Sugars - 7.5g
Protein - 26.0g
Vitamin A 1%     •     Vitamin C 57%
Calcium 7%     •     Iron 6%

Orange-Cranberry-Banana-everything I can think of Muffins

I have discovered there are a million and one recipes for muffins on the internet. For a beginner like me, its a little overwhelming. So, what the logical thing to do? Add one more of course!

I honestly don't know that much about baking. My husband, who spent some years in the restaurant biz a few years back, does. Obviously he was going to play a roll in this recipe :) I know that everyone tells me that baking is exact, and the measurements must be correct or nothing good will come about, so that always makes me a bit nervous because I forgot lots of stuff a lot of the time.

My base recipe was adapted from Serious Eats: Orange Cranberry Muffins (so I could get the basics ratios!)

FYI: This makes 16 muffins - I didn't realize that until I was ready to pour. Oops :)

After adding a little of this, and a little of that, this is what we finally came up with:

Orange-Cranberry-Banana Muffins

2 cups flour

1 cup sugar, plus 1 tablespoon, divided

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 cup orange juice

8 oz can mandarin oranges (save the juice for a later step)

1/4 cup canola oil

1 large egg, lightly beaten (we used 1/4 cup egg beaters)

1 cup dried cranberries

1 ripe banana

Cooking spray

1. Preheat oven to 400°F.

2. Pour juice from mandarin oranges over the dried cranberries and let sit until ready to mix. (or you could do this overnight).

3. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together 2 cups flour, 1 cup sugar, baking powder, salt, and baking soda. Make an indentation in the middle.

4. In a large glass measuring cup, mix orange juice***, oil and egg. Pour mixture into flour indentation and stir until everything is just combined.

4. In a small bowl mash banana and mandarin oranges, stir in cranberries. Stir into batter.

5. Divide batter evenly among muffin tins. Sprinkle with reserved 1 tablespoon sugar. Bake 15 minutes. Remove from tins and cool on a wire rack.

***We actually thought that the little bit of juice left over from mandarin oranges would be enough, but it wasn't and we added about 3/4 cup water. I'm going to add 3/4 cup orange juice to this recipe, as the original had, that would probably work much better, haha!

These turned out really good. Our daughter, who doesn't really like fruity muffins, loved it! Not bad for my first time I think :) Thanks to the hubby I'm sure!

They definitely have my mind rolling about different items to toss into the batter :) I just happen to have some blackberries and ripe banana left...hmmm... ;)

Nutrition Facts(from caloriecount.com)

Serving Size: 1 muffin

Amount Per Serving

Calories

164

Total Fat

3.9g

Cholesterol

13mg

Sodium

192mg

Carbohydrates

30.5g

Sugars

16.8g

New Discoveries

Today was a beautiful day in the North Texas area and we just HAD to get out of the house. My hubby and I decided to take a trip to Central Market. One thing about this place, is that even though its an amazing place to explore, its WAY too easy to load your cart and leave $100+ poorer. So before going in, we decided we had a $40 limit, and pulled out that amount and no more!

Its amazing how a cash budget will put things into perspective for you. A person becomes much more picky on purchases. Although there were so many samples that were sooo yummy (Oyster Po-boys for goodness sakes!) we held strong!

One item item that peaked our interest, mainly because the loud POP the machine was making as it spit the fluffy bits of crispiness out, was something called Kim's Magic Pop.



Maybe we live in a cave, but we had never heard of these. So we took a sample, with some artichoke spinach hummus, and knew right away that these items were some of the chosen ones. And just by chance, they had a sell buy the POPs and get the hummus free :) Like that!



Amazingly, with these items and just a few more, we got out of Central Market only spending just under $14.00. Definitely a first for us!

On our way home, we decided to stop by one of our favorite places for fresh Samosas, a place called Royals Sweets. Samosas for $1.25/ea Yes indeed.

So for lunch we had a light and oh so yummy meal of Samosa, and hummus covered POP.


15 Cals per POP
70 Cals for 2 Tbsp Hummus

I don't know what the cals on the Samosa are, but considering the POP/Hummus is less that 100 I think we are ok :)