Friday, March 29, 2013

Skinny Chocolate Cheesecake Squares


The other day I found myself staring at my daughter's breakfast of cottage cheese, and a light bulb went off over my head: I bet I could make a healthy cheesecake with this!  That afternoon, I played around in the kitchen, and voila, a new tasty dessert in our household was born.  It's really easy to whip up (throw everything in the food processor, blend, pour into a dish, bake, then toss in the fridge), it's incredibly low in calories (91 calories a square!) but high in nutrients (thanks oats and cottage cheese!), and it tastes decadent.  You could also easily jazz it up if you need to, by mixing chocolate chips into the batter, or topping it with sliced almonds or whipped cream.  I like it all by itself though!

Thursday, March 28, 2013

Pinterest Hits & Misses, Part 4


It's that time again! If you are new here, the title is pretty self-explanatory.  I try out popular pins on Pinterest, and let you know if the pins worked and were "Hits" or flopped and were "Misses".  I have written a Pinterest Hits & Misses Part 1, Pinterest Hits & Misses Part 2, and Pintrest Hits & Misses Part 3.  

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Chicken Salad with Pecans & Apples


Happy first day of Spring! Okay, I know Spring technically started yesterday.  But today is my birthday, and until recently, the Spring Equinox was almost always on the 21st of March, so I still celebrate it then. In honor of the first day (ahem) of Spring, I decided to make the Spring-iest of foods, a Chicken Salad Sandwich.  I hadn't made the recipe in a long time, mainly because it was too high in calories for my diet.  However, I decided to play around with the recipe a bit, and lo and behold, I was able to create a delicious, healthy, low calorie, guilt-free chicken salad!  I served it on lettuce wraps, and I swear to you, I didn't miss the bread at all. I also pinky swear that my guilt-free chicken salad tastes just as good as the guilty kind. 

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Coconut Sugar Scrub



What You'll Need:
Extra Virgin Coconut Oil
White Sugar
Tupperware Container or Jar with a Lid
Optional: Lime Juice, Essential Oils

Thursday, March 14, 2013

Tofu for Dummies

In an effort to decrease my meat intake, I have been eating a lot of tofu lately.  Tofu can be a tricky food to love, especially if not prepared properly. While I'm still learning the best ways to cook and serve tofu, I think I have the actual preparation of tofu down pat now.  After speaking with some of my friends, I realized that a lot of people have no idea where to even begin with tofu.  So I have decided to devote a blog entry to all things tofu; aka: Tofu for Dummies.

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Skinny Peanut Butter Chocolate Brownies


If you've been following my blog, then you've probably noticed by that I have a major thing for brownies. And I do, I truly do. I could eat brownies all day, every day, and never get sick of them. So when I stumbled upon another healthy brownie recipe, a Skinny Peanut Butter Swirl Brownie from Sally's Baking Addiction, I was excited to give it a try.  This particular recipe uses yogurt and oats instead of butter, oil, and flour.  The result?  A fudgy, delicious, and healthy brownie!  I changed the recipe around to suit my own needs and tastes, and to lower the calories a little more (the original had 200 calories, mine has about 100).  Because there is no oil, butter, flour, etc. in these brownies, and since they are made with yogurt and oats, it's actually healthy enough to serve for breakfast if you are in the mood for it! It's also a great snack for toddlers and kids, though I recommend using full fat peanut butter and yogurt if you are making it for your children.  Another great thing about these brownies, like most of my recipes on my blog, these only take a few minutes to whip up.

Monday, March 4, 2013

Buffalo Chicken & Avocado Lettuce Wraps


Ever since I started making Slow Cooker Buffalo Chicken, I've been trying to come up with different ways to eat the huge amount of chicken the recipe yields.  So far my favorite way to serve the buffalo chicken is by making Buffalo Chicken & Avocado Lettuce Wraps.  It's quick to make, tastes phenomenal, and is very low carb. You don't have to do the slow cooker method to make the buffalo chicken part of this recipe if you don't want to. Feel free to cook and shred the chicken any way you please.  I do have some product recommendations though.  First of all, Frank's Red Hot Buffalo Sauce is the tastiest buffalo sauce I've tried at my local grocery store. I highly recommend it.  Secondly, if you are looking for a healthy, low calorie blue cheese dressing, I cannot say enough good things about Bolthouse Farm's Chunky Blue Cheese dressing.  It's made from yogurt, has only 35 calories per 2 tablespoons, and tastes eons better than any other low calorie dressing I have tried.  It's good stuff!