Carb-friendly dinner: chicken patty w/light Caesar salad

Recently, I’ve been trying to cut back here or there on my carbs. Due to my mother’s diabetes and my obesity (and therefore being in the danger zone), I figured it was a good move to make. So I’ve been browsing the diabetes-friendly recipes online and found this really interesting one: Chicken Caesar Burger at Taste of Home.

The idea intrigued me but I didn’t want the big white hamburger bun. I had bought some whole wheat English muffins, but I got to re-thinking that idea. I thought, Why do I need a bun?? So I considered deconstructing the recipe ever so slightly and presenting the patty next to a Caesar salad.

So, that’s what I did and boy, am I full! They were very filling and very satisfying. I was full after one patty and my salad. I only made a slight change to the patty recipe: I didn’t add the second bit of parmesan cheese to the top of  the patty and I didn’t have fresh garlic, so I used a teaspoon of garlic powder.

The recipe itself was extremely easy to follow. Everything for the burger goes into one bowl to be mixed, while the salad stuff is mixed in another. Grill these up on your indoor grill and within 6-8 minutes, they’re done (just make sure that the internal temp is at least 160F). I think the whole process took no more than 15 minutes to throw it together and cook. While the patties cook, make the salad. And the patties are very large, being 1/4 pound a piece.

The salad was about 2 cups of romaine lettuce, 3 slices of ready-made bacon (chopped and quickly cooked up in a non-stick pan), the parmesan I didn’t put on the burgers and some Renee’s fat free Caesar salad dressing.

Delicious! Even hubby agrees! I’d recommend this to anyone.

Homemade marinara sauce

For our New Year’s Eve night in, I realized that I had forgotten to pick up a jar of marinara sauce, so I set out to make my own. I had seen a recipe for marinara sauce a long time ago and remembered it for the most part. Sadly, I no longer remember where I saw it. So I had to wing it. Here’s what I did.

Christmas leftovers stew

We all end up with leftovers at Christmas (or whatever holiday you celebrate!), don’t we? I know I do. Not only did we have leftover chicken from our Christmas-Day-at-home this year, but also turkey that Mom sent home with us the night before.  We had an entire veggie tray that was just going to waste, too. So, I put  on my thinking cap, set my big stew pot on the stove and started to clean out the fridge. Here’s what I did…

PC hors d’oeuvres in review: mozz sticks & spanakopita

As we did last year, hubby and I stayed in for New Year’s Eve. We actually prefer it because we can stay in our comfy clothes, don’t have to fight with traffic or weather, and don’t have to worry about one of us staying sober to drive home. If we pass out on the couch, who cares?

Last year, I did a lot of food-prep myself, creating homemade pizza rolls and mozzarella sticks, along with a crockpot butter chicken dinner (which we saved for the next day because we were full on appetizers).

This year, I decided that pre-made hors d’oeuvres was the way to go for a lazy New Year’s Eve!

Comfort Food, Jazzed Up – Maple Bacon Meatloaf

There was a bunch of ground beef in my fridge that needed to be cooked up or tossed into the freezer. It’s been kind of cold as of late, so comfort food was kind of  priority number one a week ago or so. I found out a few years ago that hubby loves meatloaf. It was something he never got as a child — his mother just never made it. I don’t know if she didn’t like it or maybe his dad didn’t like it, but hubby had just never experienced it. It was practically a staple food  in our home, when I was growing up.

So the first time I made it was an experiment. When he took his first bite, I held my breath because I really feel that meatloaf is one of those “love or hate” dishes. He loved it. So ever since then, I’ve been trying to find new and exciting ways to jazz up this comfort dish. This time around, I originally wanted to do something with beef and teriyaki, but realized I had no teriyaki sauce (I usually have a jar of it around). I had no eggs (they had just expired), so I was thinking that I could get moisture and binding from something sticky. I started hunting around for something else sweet and stumbled across the bottle of maple syrup. Here’s what I did with it…

Quick & easy twice-baked potatoes

We had baked potatoes the other night with maple bacon meatloaf. Tonight, I wanted something very simple for dinner. I was craving something cheesy. I was craving something comforting. I got thinking about the double-baked potatoes my mom used to make and got inspired. Now, this recipe is nothing like what she used to make, but it worked for me.

Jack & Lois – a Hamiltonian hidden gem

301 James St. North
Hamilton, ON L8L1H3
(289) 389-5647
jackandlois.com
(Dine in or take out)

I recently had the pleasure of visiting this cute little hole-in-the-wall establishment on James Street North (at Barton), not once, but twice.  I was involved in the McMaster 24 Hour Film Festival and we had the gala at a nearby theatre during the artcrawl this month. The after-party ventured over to Jack & Lois’, as one of our judges was the owner, Eric. I had never heard of the place and really have to say that I enjoyed it so much that I took my mother and husband back there a mere two nights later. It was simply that good.