Chicken & Scrambled Eggs

I suppose the downside of eating healthier or even when you stop eating something altogether and you go back to it once, your stomach likes to fight it. Maybe that's just me? /squints. For example: If I consume too much bread, dairy, or just grease in general (deep dried stuff), I get freakishly bloated and stomach pains starts to settle at night. Then the next morning I get a 100% guarantee trip to the restroom.

Every now and them I still allow myself to eat things like doughnuts or a piece of bread, but in moderation of one small bite or so or else I end up facing the wrath of my stomach. But you know you what I don't regret making this decision. At all. So what if I can't eat rice, noodles, pasta, or deep fried Oeros? I have my own arsenal of snacks and delicious recipes. #NoRagrets. It's all about finding that balance and coming to realization what you're giving up and if you're willing to give it up to become a better you.

Here was day #3 of my health journey:

Eggs has become my best friend... Get them brotein!

Happy Eating!
~Kitty

A New Year with Protein Burgers

It's a new year! Happy belated new year to you all and hope you all had a wonderful holiday! :) I'm hoping for great things in 2014, one of them being able to blog more and continue this fascinating adventure I've taken in 2013 in search of a better and healthier lifestyle. I'm quite proud to say that I've lost tremendous weight being relatively average in size through making smarter choices in picking what I eat. Now that the holidays are over it's back to better eating healthier again! I've been feeling the full force of holiday dinners and parties for the last 31 days and they are not pretty. But it's back on track from here. :)

There are certain things I've learned in the last five months in taking control of what I ate and I have to say that eating healthy is really tough in this society. The fact that we have so much fast food chains every few steps it's tempting not to go in and order a large hamburger with fries and a soda, plus it's convenient for most consumers. People! There are great alternatives to eating such high calorie foods by swapping some of the ingredients out for something else. For me, since I love burgers I have them protein styled. Making them at home is so simple and easy with just a few ingredients it makes for a great meal.

Protein Burger
Ingredients:
90% and above lean ground beef is most desirable
Worchester Sauce
Salt & Pepper
Onion Powder
Romain Lettuce
Tomatoes
Onions

Many places that offer protein burgers usually wraps the burgers in Iceberg Lettuces. In all honesty, that is a big no-no in my book. Iceberg lettuce while shape works great in a lot of situations lacks flavor and texture, nutritional value, and overall sustainability in your fridge. Compared to iceberg, romaine has five times more vitamin C and a hundred times more beta carotene. I take the large leaves of romaine, wash them and cut them in half and use those as my buns.

As for the meat we use ground beef, before shaping them we drizzle Worchester sauce, I don't use a spoon, we eyeball when we cook. About three to four seconds of drizzling of the sauce should work for a medium sized bowl of ground meat. After we put in the salt and pepper and onion powder. We use grinder salt and pepper from Costco and we use about four turns when making our protein burgers. Then we shape them into balls the size of an average fist as the patty shrinks when cooked. The tomatoes and onions can be cut however you like them to be. Once the patty is cooked, place them on the lettuce, dab on the vegetables and voila! A hearty hamburger! I normally also eat them with yam fries on the side from time to time. :)

Eat smarter. Healthier life. Happy eating!
~Kitty

New Paleo Things

I've been trying a few things the past few months to try and tone up and lose weight at the same time, but after two months of trying, I wasn't seeing the results that I had wanted. A good friend of mine actually suggested changing my diet, because a big part of losing weight is about what you put in your body. I considered it and the thought of change terrified me. I love my food, especially carbs. But nothing was going to change if I didn't take the first step and so my journey into the Paleo World began. In short, a paleo diet basically mean a caveman diet that consists of mostly just meat and vegetables, no carbs, grain, and dairy. Supposedly everything should be organic as well, but in this day and age living off a college budget, it's hard. I still try and buy organic when I can though.

The first few days were harder than most as I tried adjusting what I ate and cooking took twice as long as now my boyfriend had to cook two different meals rather than one. Yet once the ball started rolling it did get easier. Yes, I said it, it does get easier. I could feel my body getting accustomed to the greens and protein and whenever we had those terribly nice cheat days, greasy food (even simple things like bread) just made me bloated and nauseous. It made me think that I never wanted to eat them again. Working out were the worse right after cheat days which then I've concluded, it's much better off not having them. The occasional (in small moderation) I think would be much better than stuffing your face on cheat days.

As I move along this new path that I'm taking with my health and diet, I thought I'd share a few dishes that I've been trying and that maybe you guys out there might want to try it out yourself. :)

Day One consisted of a Grilled Chicken with Mixed Fruits. We just added a simple shake of black pepper to each side and slapped it onto the grill. I picked out an apple and a few nectarines, chopped it up and used that as a side.  It's amazing how filling it is! ^__^

Happy Eating!
♥, Kitty

Winter Dinner!

It's getting rather chilly out these past few days in Socal- I had a rather strong hankering for a bowl of soup that wasn't too heavy on flavor. Something light enough to warm the body and Di was craving pasta. After a few minutes of discussion and going out to get groceries, we decided to make Seaweed Egg Drop Soup and Creamy Chicken Marsala Pasta for dinner!

First up, I made the Seaweed Egg Drop Soup since it was so cold and really needed something warm. I boiled a pot of water added a speck of chicken bouillon, tossed in dried seaweed (not available in just any supermarket- I suggest going to a Chinese market) let it simmer until it softens then crack in the eggs. I like to use two, one to break the yolk, one so I can boil the yolk as a whole. Let it simmer again on low heat until serving time. Prep time: 2 minutes, Cook time: 5 minutes.

The main dish was the Creamy Chicken Marsala Pasta of course, Di boiled the pasta to al dente before mixing the chopped mushrooms, garlic, onion, and chicken with melted butter, 3/4 cups of Marsala Wine, chicken broth and heavy cream. We let the sauce boil in a pan until it was lightly thick then we mixed the two together then topped it off with Parmesan cheese and Voila! Dinner! Prep time: 10 minutes, Cook time: 15-20 minutes. Here's a link to a more detailed recipe: http://blogcritics.org/tastes/article/creamy-chicken-marsala-pasta/

Hope you guys enjoyed this dinner entree as much as I did as it did warm up my body from head to toes! :3 Until next time!

Ciao!
Kitty~

Sugary Goodness!

Wasn't feeling too well last night, so we decided to stay in for the night. :) After a light chicken noodle soup with rice for dinner we decided to bake some desserts. We scoured the web to look for something I would want to eat and we fell upon a recipe for Cinnamon Sugar Pull-Apart Bread. It looked delicious and we had all the simple ingredients at home already. So off to the kitchen to try it out!

We started out with all purpose flour and, sugar, yeast, whisked eggs, melted butter, milk, and vanilla extract. Later made the filling with nutmeg, cinnamon, and more sugar.

Whisked it all together, waited for the dough to rise before rolling it out and putting the cinnamon, nutmeg, and sugar mix. We then cut the dough into equal strips vertically and horizontally.

We then stacked it together and placed it in a PAMed glass loaf pan and let sit for another 10 minutes for it to rise.

We preheated the oven to 350 degrees, wrapped the two loaves to let it rise some more for another 10 minutes. We then set the timer for 35 minutes and placed them into the oven after.

35 Minutes Later...

Warm, delicious and yummy Cinnamon Sugar Pull-Apart Bread! :)

Here's the link to the recipe that we used: https://sites.google.com/site/foodsnotsprintablerecipes/cinnamon-and-sugar-pull-apart-bread. It only took us about two hours because of all the rising/waiting that needed to be done. But I had so much fun making this and I hope sharing this recipe gives you guys the same feeling. ^__^

Quick Bruncheon in the Sun!

So I just woke a few hours ago (yes, noon...) and I was pretty hungry, went to the kitchen but was feeling groggy from sleep to make anything for myself. Di, being the awesome person that he is suggested that he'd make some Birds in a Nest for me to try as I've never tried it before and I was lurking on the web late last night looking at different versions of birds in the nest. Do they look ever so delicious... So he strolls to the stove and starts pulling bread and eggs out of the fridge. It's a rather simple recipe and I think it's a great dish for kids in the morning! And I felt this deserved a blog post~

Add a bit of black pepper I think would give it a nice kick! Maybe even draw a cute ketchup heart for your significant other, wouldn't that be cute? ;)

Another one of my favorites for brunch is Eggs with Hotdog Pasta, it's also a pretty simple dish to make. I usually buy regular hotdogs cut them into little pieces with a few chops of green onion and two eggs. Which pasta you use if really up to you, I like the shape of pasta shells, so that was the one I choose to use.

I use chicken broth sometimes for a lighter brunch dish. Boil the pasta, about 7 minutes in when their al dente, throw in the hot dog, green onion then the eggs to make a pasta soup. :) But when I'm feeling more a spaghetti type of pasta I would fry the hot dogs, put in tomato sauce under a medium fire then let it simmer for a bit before mixing the boiled pasta in it.

Ramen has always been a quick fix when one is hungry but too lazy to actually make anything. To make it more homey for myself, I literally just take an extra 5 minutes out of my time crack an egg on the fryer, add a dash of green onion for flavor and voila! A better tasting ramen!

Lastly, when I have more time on my hands, Di and I make something more fancy. Something like green onion (I love green onion on almost everything ;D) buttered corn, homemade lemon iced tea, and strawberry nutella bread.

All can be bought at your nearest supermarket! Have fun with these ideas next time and have a safe Labor Day weekend! Until next time!

Ciao~
Kitty!

The Greatness of Paninis...

I had my fair share of paninis from Panera Bread, Corner Bakery, Urth Caffe, to Slymar's Fix. I gotta say that my favorite one by far is are the ones stuffed to the brim with delicious goodness. The ones that use sourdough bread I find the most delicious. Panera Bread had always been my favorite place to grab a good panini, but over the recent years I have found that they were starting to put less in them than they usually did and that they've stopped using sourdough bread. :( They now use plain white toast. On the other downside, if you get the sandwich alone, it's still $7.85+. It's worth more if you get the half sandwich with the salad, soup, or bread with fruits or chips for $6.99 (As they call it their U-Pick 2!)

Chicken Chipotle with Strawberry Poppyseed Salad and a side of chips. ($7.99 Premium U-Pick 2)

Corner Bakery does almost the same thing as Panera, but their paninis differentiate themselves with the different use of cheese and they add arugula into their chicken pomodoro panini. It's $7.95 for their combo that comes with a pick of soup and chips with a slice of pickle.

Chicken Pomodoro Panini with Mother's Chicken Noodle Soup and Chips

Urth Caffe's Roasted Turkey Panini had thicker biscuit like bread, the meat was a little too dry and it resulted in it being too hard to bite. It was served with baby spring mix with a really good tangy vinaigrette-like sauce. Being Urth and its organic ingredients it is a little more costly to eat here. The panini here was $12.95 although not a bad place to check out for coffee! 

Urth's Roasted Turkey Panini

Lastly, a friend introduced me to new hole-in-the-wall joint near Arleta of the greater Los Angeles called Sylmar's Fix. Raving reviews online (http://www.yelp.com/biz/sylmars-fix-sylmar#query:panini%20sandwiches) and the portions of VERY generous. By far my favorite place to get a panini fix. They were large and delicious, they stuffed it with juicy mushrooms and large slices of chicken. Totally worth the $6.95! It's located behind a shopping center on Foothill Blvd in the city of Sylmar. Pure deliciousness!

Chicken Mushroom Panini

Well, I'm still on my journey to find other great paninis out there and these are the few places that has been on my list that I want to share! Until next time!

Ciao!
Kitty~