Leftovers Breakfast Idea: Tex-Mex Omelette

Okay, so this dish doesn’t look like much. Admittedly, it kind of fell apart in the pan on me. Probably a little too much filling. But hey, it was breakfast, I was half-asleep and I was very hungry. I didn`t care how it looked, so long as it tasted good.

And it really did.

The point of sharing this? That breakfast doesn’t have to take a lot to throw together. Just grab some leftovers from the night before, fry ’em up and throw in the egg to make an omelette out of it. For this one, I used some of the leftover fajita filling, a bit more seasoning (for the egg) and a bit of cheese. You could take it a step further and serve this with salsa and sour cream on the side, too, depending on how spicy the meat mixture is, your tastes, etc.

Frankly, I was too hungry to get that fancy.

And despite it looking like the dog’s dinner, it was very, very tasty and satisfying.

What do you put in your omelettes? I’m always looking for new ideas!

A different type of Club Sammy: Chicken Club Wrap with Turkey Bacon

I love club sandwiches.

I mean, what’s not to love? Chicken, bacon, cheese, lettuce, tomato, mayo… and lots of toasted bread. If you’re like me and you’re trying to cut back on your carbs, those three slice of toast might seem like a bit  much. As a result, I started omitting the middle slice, even in restaurants. Not only that, but although I enjoy toast, I found that club sandwiches have always been messy — not because of the fillings but because of the crumbs! LOL.

This is where flour tortillas and an indoor grill has really come in handy. I really like reinventing old favourites and I really enjoy trying to find ways to cut a few calories, carbs, fat, sodium and sugars where I can. So, I turned a classic club sandwich into a wrap. The changes I made include:

• the wraps were made of whole wheat or multigrain flour tortillas
• light mayo was used instead of full fat mayo
• the cheese was shredded to use less (I’m not a fan of light cheddar, so I try to cut back on the amount of regular cheddar I use)
• the bacon was low sodium turkey bacon

I made this on the weekend for my mom and she fell in love with the sandwich so much at lunch time that she said she was considering asking for another one for dinner! She had never had a grilled wrap before and so she commented that she really preferred the grilled version over a “raw” wrap. I agree with her, really. The grilling just changes the texture and taste ever so subtly. I might even whip a few of these up ahead of time, grill them off and throw them in the fridge, then just reheat them in the microwave at work this week. 🙂

Take a look at the spread on this wrap before I bundled it up:

Does that not look yummy? This is a great way of using up leftover chicken from the previous night’s dinner. What’s not to love about this wrap??

Warning: this is higher in sodium at just over 700mg of sodium. You can cut back on that sodium by finding a lower sodium tortilla, choosing a light cheese and even cutting the mayo out. But I enjoy mayo and as mentioned, I’m not a fan of light cheddar. I’ll run with it. All told, here are the nutritional values based on the sandwich pictured above:

Calories: 412
Carbs: 31g
Fat: 23g (you can cut back on this with the cheese and mayo alone, as these add up to 14g on their own)
Protein: 20g
Sodium: 786mg
Sugars: 2g

Considering this wrap is very filling (to me), these values are more than acceptable to me. I find I can eat one of these sandwiches and be satisfied until my next meal. Some people will make “club wraps”  (or sandwiches) with deli chicken meat — I don’t recommend if it you’re wanting to cut back on sodium. It’s tasty, but when possible, go for regular baked chicken to cut back on that sodium. An ounce of a plain, baked chicken breast has negligible sodium in it; 3 slices of deli chicken can have 600-800mg in them. You can also cut back on the sodium by only using one slice of turkey bacon — I used 1.5 slices this time. If you’re not worried about sodium, then make it how you like it! 🙂

If you have an indoor grill that grills both sides at the same time, at 360F, this sandwich should be done in about 3 minutes. If your grill only does one side at a time or you only have a grill pan for the stove, grill the wrap for 3 minutes  per side, placing another heavy pan on top to help flatten it. Don’t have a grill or a grill pan? Use a non-stick pan. But the grill really makes a pretty sandwich. Just look at those grill marks:

(And  no, I didn’t use any non-stick spray. It just grilled up nicely like that, as my grill is pretty non-stick.)

A little extra work goes a long way: Pesto-Stuffed Chicken Sandwiches

Every now and then, I crave a good sandwich. But since I’ve pretty much sworn off of most deli meats due to the high sodium levels, I’ve not had many sandwiches as of late. We had some chicken in the fridge a couple of weeks ago, so I looked in the cupboards to see what I could do. I could just make a sliced chicken sandwich, a grilled cheese with chicken on it or even a chicken salad sandwich, but I’m not a huge fan of that last one, either. But all of these had me thinking, “Ho, hum, boring.”

Even a Chicken Club sandwich wasn’t giving me much excitement.

The comfort burger: a Meatloaf Burger

Sometimes, you just want a burger. Last week, I was craving burgers so much that I almost caved and went to McDonald’s. *shudders* No. No. I’ve sworn off of that place, honest! I think in the last year, I’ve been there only once. Maybe twice. I’m trying to divorce myself from certain places that I know are just  bad news for me.

Just what the doctor ordered: potato-leek soup

So, I’ve been sick since New Years Day though I finally seem to be on the mend. The problem is that when I’m sick, we tend to eat horribly and rely on takeout a lot. This probably isn’t helpful to the recovery process as takeout isn’t exactly the most nutritious food out there

So I mustered up some strength and tore apart the fridge, taking my cutting board and veggies into the living room to chop and prepare while sitting down as much as I could. (Standing for long periods of time just won’t do when you are lightheaded.)

Luckily, there were lots of veggies to choose from including leeks, which is something new to this household. I’ve wanted to try them out for a while and just thought to pick them up with the last grocery run. And when you’re ill, what’s the first thing you generally want to eat other than toast or crackers? Soup!

Now, I haven’t had any stomach problems with this illness, so I didn’t need it to be broth-based, so here’s what I did…

COMPARISON: quesadillas/quesadilla-like sandwiches

Despite buying a lot  of frozen meals as of late to try, I have been making fresh food, too. I promise. I’ve been trying to reintroduce some sandwich options into my meal plan. I’ve been having some success in doing so by using the Weight Watchers and PC Blue Menu bread products. In this particular case, I had bought a package of the Weight Watchers whole wheat tortillas and decided I wanted a wrap of some sort.

COMPARISON: Smart Ones breakfast sandwich vs homemade

Recently, I’ve reviewed a couple of frozen meals, but I thought I’d switch it up a bit today and compare two products today instead of just giving you my random, meandering thoughts on what I thought of the frozen meal in question.

Today, I’m going to compare a frozen meal with the nearly identical product made from scratch, specifically made with ‘lighter’ ingredients. The frozen meal in question is Weight Watchers “Smart Ones” English Muffin Sandwich. I like these because they’re easy enough to throw in the freezer at work and to toss into the microwave on morning break (I’m one of those freaks who can’t eat immediately after getting up in the morning).