A (imagined) Perfect Day for Soup!

Even though we are suffering from freakishly warm October weather, I am so geared up for the holiday season that I had no problem imagining a cooler change. 

As usual, I was conscious of keeping the points+ as low as possible, so I made a point to use quinoa pasta and low sodium broth. You can totally use your own, homemade broth. I plan to do so just as soon as I've made some. But then you'll have to alter the nutritional information. And quite frankly, I'm stumped on how to calculate it for a broth recipe. So I used boxed. :]

I love making soup. It’s very homey and comforting to put a lot of things in a pot and then slurp them down later. I spent today making two and by far this was the easier and more delicious of the two. I foresee this being a staple for winter. With only 3 points+ per serving I can even have two servings before feeling guilty. MMMMMMMM, imagine how delectable this would be with some cornbread!!!!

Conscience Chicken Noodle Soup (optional soda on the side)
(adapted from Better Homes & Gardens)
Makes 15 servings| Serving size 1 cup| 3 points+

INGREDIENTS

• ·         1 whole Rotisserie Chicken
• ·         5 cups (approx.) Organic Low Sodium Chicken Broth
• ·         5 cups (approx.) water
• ·         3 TBSP chicken bouillon
• ·         1 bunch celery, diced
• ·         1 large carrot, shredded
• ·         1 medium onion, diced
• ·         1 box quinoa noodles

INSTRUCTIONS

1. 1.       Pull the meat off the rotisserie chicken, I like to save the bones, skin & cartilage to make my own broth one day, though I have yet to do this.
2. 2.       In a large pot or Dutch oven, combine all ingredients EXCEPT chicken and noodles.
3. 3.       Bring to a boil, and then reduce heat to low & simmer COVERED for 15 minutes.
4. 4.       Add chicken and noodles. Bring heat back to a boil, then reduce to a simmer UNCOVERED for an addition 10 minutes, or until your noodles are tender.
5. 5.       Allow to cool before packaging half up to freeze and half for the fridge. You may opt to portion out the fridge half into 7-8 1 cup servings.

This soup was soup-er easy to make once I prepped the vegetables chicken. That did take some time, but it can be done ahead of time if needed. This recipe makes a ton and its super delicious. Not overtly salty, but a strong base flavor profile.

Enjoy the hopefully-soon-to-be warm weather!

B

A little slice of sunshine.

Today I needed to bake something. It's been raining (literally) for 2 days straight. I have cabin fever! I wanted it to be something I could make relatively quickly without a ton of fuss, but as usual, it needed to be from scratch (I have my pride!) and relatively healthy. I found a whole wheat lemon cake recipe on Nigella Lawson’s website. It didn't call for icing (some cake!) but I was envisioning a Starbucks lemon pound cake icing on top so I whipped some up and loaded it heavy with lemon juice.

Whole Wheat (Iced) Lemon Cake
serves 16  at 5 WW Pts+ per serving.

Ingredients

·         2 cups whole wheat flour

·         1 ¼ cups dark brown sugar

·         1 stick butter

·         ¾ cup egg whites (or 4 eggs)

·         1 tablespoon cream cheese

·         Zest of 2 lemons

·          Juice of 2 lemons (separated)

·         1 teaspoon baking powder

·         1 teaspoon baking soda

·         1 cup confectioner’s sugar

Method

1.      Preheat oven to 375ºF

2.      Sift the flour, baking powder, and baking soda, into a bowl and throw out anything that doesn't sift through.

3.      Add the sugar into the bowl.

4.      Melt the butter in a microwave or pan and add to bowl.

5.      Add the eggs and combine the ingredients well.

6.      Stir in the lemon juice and lemon rind.

7.      Add the cream cheese, as much as you can get on a spoon and mix it in well.

8.      Put mixture in a prepared cake tin.(I used a bread tin)

9.      Bake in the oven until cooked,

10.  Let it cool & make the icing!

ICING:

11.  Sift confectioner’s sugar into a mixing bowl

12.  Juice the 2^nd lemon into the mixing bowl and beat till smooth and consistent.  

13.  Drizzle over cooled cake and let it firm.

Chili, in JULY?!

Williamson Turkey Chili

One of my allllll timeee favorite meals any time of year is my family’s chili. My daddy taught me how to make it and I have added spices to improve the taste (since I use turkey instead).  My man doesn't like it so I only make it when he has his own meal taken care. I package up leftovers and keep a good stock in the freezer for a quick meal. Just thaw, add sour cream and cheddar cheese and enjoy! Yumm!

Ingredients:

·         1 lb. Ground Turkey (93/7)

·         2 cans Hot Chili Beans (Pinto in Chili Sauce)

·         2 cans Dark Red Kidney Beans

·         2 Cans Light Red Kidney Beans

·         1 Can Corn (not “sweet” or “creamed,” just plain old corn)

·         1 large can diced tomatoes(unflavored)

·         1 small can tomato paste

·         1 TBSP. Chili Powder

·         1 tsp. Paprika

·         1 tsp. Cinnamon

·          Sour cream & cheese to garnish!

Instructions:

1)      Brown the turkey in a Dutch oven or large sauce/soup pot. (I have stainless steel pans; I use olive oil for EVERYTHING that I cook.)

2)      Add in this order & stir well between each addition:

a)      Diced Tomatoes

b)      Corn

c)       Chili Beans

d)      Dark Red Kidney Beans

e)      Light Red Kidney Beans

f)       Tomato Paste

g)      Spices!!!! Add more if you like it even spicier!

3)      Let simmer uncovered for 30 minutes (serve at this stage!!)

4)      (For fabulous Leftovers!!) Turn off heat and let it rest as long as you want to thicken

5)      Spoon into containers about 3 cups each serving store in fridge for 2 weeks or freezer for 2 months.

Enjoy!!!

B.

Bangin' Baked Bang Bang Shrimp

A few weeks ago we were in New Jersey visiting family & went to dinner at Bonefish Grill for the first time. In all honesty, I was left less than thrilled with the menu but what I did decide to order was delicious. There just wasn’t that much from which to choose. Bittersweet. One thing that I ordered was their (in)famous Bang Bang Shrimp and impressed everyone in attendance by eating several pieces of shrimp! (A food I typically avoid because of the texture.) The taste was too good to pass up. Both Crunchy from being deep fried and smooth from the creamy sauce. Savory and spicy (pretty spicy… did I mention spicy?) I surprised myself! When we came home I decided I needed to make this for J, but in order to enjoy it with a clear conscience I looked up a bangin’ (pun totally intended!) baked recipe. Then I tweaked it a twerked it to make it even lower in points! Yay me! Here it is, enjoy!

Baked Bang Bang Shrimp: WW Style!
adapted from jocooks.com

Prep Time: 30 min (I had to thaw the shrimp first)
Cook Time: 15 min
Serves: 7 (6 shrimps per serving, or 2.25 oz) @ 6 Points+ !!!

Ingredients:

SHRIMP:

1 lb shrimp peeled, deveined & tail-less (save some $$!), I used Large instead of Jumbo because I wanted to stretch it farther
½ cup Quinoa Flour
½ TBSP Garlic Powder
1 tsp Smoked Paprika
¾ cup Plain Greek Yogurt
½ cup milk (I used 2%, cause that’s what we had)
½ TBSP Tobasco
**Salt & pepper to taste, I omitted this**
2-2 ½ cups Panko Breadcrumbs (I started with 1 and added as much as 1 ½ more while coating!)

SAUCE: **We decided to double this recipe for next time**

¼ cup Plain Greek Yogurt
¼ cup milk (again, we used 2%)
2 TBSP Sriracha
1 TBSP Honey

Instructions:

1.       Preheat oven to 400ºF and line a baking sheet with parchment paper or silpat.

2.       If you, like me forgot to thaw your shrimp, it’s easy! Dump it in a colander and run tepid water, tossing shrimp so that each pieces thaws evenly.

3.       In a medium bowl, mix flour, garlic powder, smoked paprika, salt & pepper (if you want) until combined.

4.       To the bowl, add Greek yogurt, milk, tobasco and egg. Whisk until smooth.

5.       Dump the shrimp into the batter and toss to make sure each is coated completely.

6.       In another bowl, put your Panko breadcrumbs. (Keep the box on hand in case you need more! If you use more be sure to add it to the points.)

7.       In yet another bowl (I know, lots of dishes) mix all the SAUCE ingredients and refrigerate until you are ready to serve.

8.       Working in small batches, coat each shrimp in the Panko and place on the baking sheet. I used 2 tongs, one for moving wet shrimp to the Panko bowl and another moving dry shrimp to the baking sheet.

9.       Bake for 10 minutes, then flip the shrimp and bake for at least 5 minutes or more, until the shrimp are golden.

10.   If desired, move shrimp to serving dish and drizzle with sauce. (Or just pour it on and eat from the baking sheet! We won’t judge!)

11.   **We made some spaghetti and olive oil to go with this, adding 4 more points, and called it an entrée. Pretty awesome!

ENJOY!

Brooke.

Get excited!

Here's to getting you pumped and excited for future posts.


Look at how beautiful my baby is!

Pepper looks up, as I hang decor in our guest room.

Well... more to come!

Welcome!

Welcome to my personal blog. I have recently discovered a need to share my musings and misusings with the world. While this blog is named after my perfect puppy Pepper, I foresee many a blog post about other things that I adore. What may that be you ask? Let's take a look...

1. Pigs. I simply am obsessed with pigs. All shapes, sizes and colors. I find them irresistible and can usually be relied on to SQUEALLL in delight when I see one... in a magazine, a commercial, TV Show, movie or (god forbid) real life!!! I consider it my life-long dream to one day own a farm that can house (along with rescued animals of all genus) my porky porcine family.
2. Baking. I genuinely LOVE the art of patisserie. Or good old fashioned baking. To me, (i.e. uneducated) I consider the two different. Baking is comfort, patisserie is gourmet  I enjoy both to bake and eat these lovely confections, but more often then not, I bake WAY more than I need so I like to give them away (hoping for compliments because I am just THAT needy)
3. Cooking. I do love to cook. I do. really, believe me. I just NEVER HAVE THE TIME. That being said, I usually can rock a MEAN crock pot dish. I do make a point to cut out as many preservatives & unnaturalness from our food as possible. I frequently use made-from-scratch substitutes for things and prefer organic produce & meat when possible.
4. My love. My man. My gentle-blue-eyes-giant. I'll save you from the sap fest... but BASICALLY he is perfect. No big deal, just the luckiest stinkin' gal around this part of the world. I'll go ahead and name him J for our purposes.
5. RVA!! I just bought a house (more to come on that) just north of Richmond, VA. (Aptly names, Northside, whatup!) I love my town. I'm going to be sure to highlight its fabulocity and local fantasticalities as much as possible. Also just the state of Virginia in general. Pretty awesome (think I use that word enough?)
1. Side note, did you KNOW that awesomeness is from here? I'll make a note to devote an ENTIRE post to the cool cats that called RVA home and then you can THANK RVA for being spectacular. 
6. Home-ownership. Let's be real folks. It is a total love/hate & love-to-hate relationship. But it is a pretty gnarly (every sense of the word) adventure and as we make changes/improvements/revelations... I'll gladly share with you (and hopefully entertain at the least).
7. Music. I am a 2nd year (i.e. rookie) Music teacher. I will generally spare you from my educational exploits as I have a completely music devoted blog (merelymusicmadness), but when it comes to the career as whole, I have found that I may enjoy from time to time, sharing my excitements with the generic public (i.e. my friends and family, what what!)
8. (LAST-BUT-NEVER-LEAST) Pepper. My baby. Go ahead and get super pumped up for the adorableness of Pepper pictures & maybe a post or two about the care and keeping of a goofball (cared for a kept by goofballs).

There, did that whet your appetite  I'm sure that EVENTUALLY I will get engaged... until then I will refrain from posting about the "wedding" (hey, I never said I would stop pinning [or for that matter pining] for it!)

Let's all have a little fun now!

-BW-