Happy New Years! For anyone who does happen to read this blog, I hope you had a wonderful time on New Years Eve, I hope you indulged like crazy (what is the holiday season for anyway?) and I hope you're ready for some new yummy food ideas. =)

Some of you may have actually made New Years Resolutions to eat healthier. Well I hear that having a good breakfast is key (though I don't find myself too miserable when I skip it). Still, a nice weekend breakfast with Boyfriend is one of my favorite meals, and this one did not dissapoint. The sunny side up oatmeal is something I've seen on other blogs and also in a back issue of Health Magazine I read while waiting for ANOTHER dentist appointment. So simple: 1/3 cup oats microwaved with 2/3 cup water, seasoned with S+P + Italian Seasoning. Topped with a few chunks of roasted red pepper and topped with a single sunny side up egg (this one looks a little overeasy, but it's just a little overcooked).

This meal was super easy since Boyfriend was already making himself sunny side up eggs and I just asked him to make 4 instead of 3. I wound up just cutting one of the eggs out of his sunny side up omelet and plopping it on top of my bowl. This was SO GOOD. So savory and warm and gooey and it hit SO many nutritional points: fiber (check), veggies (check), protein (double check), volume (check!). The bowl was approximately 210 calories. If the egg was really nice and sunny-side-up it would have broken and spilled it's yolk, which was the original idea.

Next time, I might spring for a bit of cheese, or maybe some tomato basil instead of the peps.

But...not all breakfasts can be leisurely enough to make an egg AND a bowl of oatmeal. Not only that but that bowl requires a sit-down affair. But with these muffins you can get your hit of carbs (check), protein (double check!), fiber (check) and dairy (eehhh...) on the go. This is my second batch this month because they are just.so.handy!

Same ingredients this post from 2 weeks ago:  
Ingredients (makes 10 muffins) at 100 calories/muffin
3 eggs (240 cals)
2 servings All Egg Whites (50 cals)
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour, or any flour (260 cals)
2 small chicken sausages, buffalo flavor, chopped (140 cals)
3 servings turkey bacon, chopped (105 cals)
1/2 cup Fage 0% Plain Greek Yogurt (55 cals)
1/2 medium sized sweet onion, chopped
Handful (3 servings?) fire roasted red peppers, chopped
2tsp S+ 1tsp P
1/2 tsp baking powder
Topped with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese

So why go through all this again? The reasons are two-fold. First, please not my pink TJMaxx pan. Pink! Love it.
The second is to show you the ease of the cooking process. Pam up your non-stick pan, throw in the chopped onion, give it a few minutes and add the meat. This can sit for a while, but if you cover it it will cook faster. Place all of that into a bowl, give it 5 minutes to cool and start plopping in the rest. I don't usually both with all that Dry Ingredient, Wet Ingredient stuff because that seems more like One Bowl, Plus Another Bowl to me. Anyway, mix it all together, throw in some roasted red peppers from a jar (or perhaps some roasted tomatoes from a can?) and start loading your Pammed muffin tin (use plastic, it is THE BEST).

To cook: 375 degree oven for 20-25 minutes. Don't worry, they will not rise immediately. They will look like sad little egg pucks for a long time and you will almost give up but out of absolutely nowhere, they'll pop right out and say hello. 5 minutes after THAT, take them out, stick a toothpick in and make sure it comes out clean then sprinkle on a little parm cheese. These were sprinkled with bigger parm pieces so they didn't come out with the pretty spikes but just look a bit gooey.

This batch did not get devoured as quickly but went at a reasonable pace. Since there are only 2 of us, I froze these for future breakfasts. They froze and defrosted wonderfully. 45 seconds in a microwave and a perfectly delicious little 100 calorie protein bomb was all mine. =) Haha, yeah right, I didn't just eat 1 =)

Now, on to things that don't involve me experimenting in the kitchen. It was Boyfriend's big 3-0 birthday this past weekend and he was on call. Major bummer! That meant waking up at the pitiful hour of 5am and coming home at 9pm! I dutifully waited until he fell asleep and stayed up to make him blueberry pancakes, which I placed right on his desk in the morning along with a little cup of maple syrup and a little spoonful of butter (well I Can't Believe It's Not Butter). He was pleased. But not as pleased when I brought him lunch from his favorite burger joint and threw him a mini surprise party where I ordered in something from every one of his favorite take out restaurants (featured: potato-gorganzola pizza, pad thai, alaska sushi rolls, enchilladas, buffalo wings and waffle fries). His mother also brought him some of his favorite desserts: tiramisu and carrot cake. 
Here's what I was thinking: since dinner is generally homemade that's not much of a treat. But if I ordered in his favorite foods, THAT would be special. BUT, who is having a slice of pizza, a dish of pad thai, an enchillada, a sushi roll and a bunch of wings in addition to 2 slices of cake? So, I cut all the stuff into bite sized pieces (thankfully, the sushi and the wings came that way!) and served it tapas style so that everyone could try a bit of everything! =) Big hit. If you are thinking of throwing someone a party, this is a really great (and not too expensive, really) way to do it. I saved a lot on costs by picking all these things up from the take-out places instead of having them delivered and having to pay tip. Not too shabby. Plus, it certainly made cleanup very easy. 

And finally, because it's not all about breakfast, a recap of a fabulous dinner party hosted by our newly-married friends, the rocket scientist and the nurse. We brought over grilled veggies with  bean dip and crudite (left) which we enjoyed with a round of wheat and dark beers (Boyfriend and I split two bottles, each getting to taste both kinds). We moved on to the main course of a PERFECTLY cooked/breaded/herbed rack of lamb (shown is my plate of 2 pieces, omitted is the extra piece I took later) and some garlicy potatoes. The highlight of the meal (sorry rocket scientist) was this amazing chocolate caramel lava boozy cake made by the nurse. Not shown is the 1/4 of a piece I stole from Boyfriend's SECOND portion! The dip was unbelievable. Such an amazing dinner.

In exercise news: the gym really cleared out big time for the holidays = good. So I decided to put in a LOT of extra time there and managed to stave off the holiday bulge. Or rather, I gained it, but then worked my butt off to lose it! I will also be starting a new hot yoga studio soon. I've gone to this one before, there are a lot of inversions, of which I am not a fan.

In the meanwhile, I hope everyone is having a great start to their new year and getting all healthy and resolutionized =)

xoxo
Jules

Well, I hope everyone had a happy holiday, whether it be Chanukah or Christmas or if you just enjoyed a ton of free food, family fun and lets face it, alcoholic excess. In NYC, people are known to enjoy all of these things in the two weeks preceding Christmas and also, in the week preceding New Years Eve. While at home, I've tried to keep it healthy, but my past few weeks have been peppered with 1) Holiday parties at my job 2) Boyfriend's holiday party 3) Chanukah parties 4) family get-togethers 5) Jewish Christmas (yes, all New York City Jews go out for Chinese and see movies) 6) Christmas celebrations and finally, 7) much needed date nights. 

Now, the holiday parties at my job were difficult enough not to indulge in (I failed, not too miserably) but Boyfriend's holiday party was at this place --->

It was impossible to avoid indulgence.

Too much dessert at numbers 1 and 2, complete intoxication at the fancy-pants party.

#3-Chanukah featured latkes. These are essentially big hash browns but we Jews enjoy eating them with gobs of sour cream. Luckily, I generally don't like sour cream, so I stuck with mustard. Still though, they are deep fried potato cakes. Had about 3.5 of these on the first night of Chanukah.

The family get togethers involved Turkish food and sushi and I think I was actually not too bad there, though I'm sure the preceding dental work had a lot to do with that.

Here's a typical Chanukah meal at our apartment (2nd night, see picture). Candles are lit, food is eaten, usually with TV. This was a simple tuna salad: arugula salad + 1 can tuna + 1 tbsp Fage Plain 0% Greek Yogurt + some mixed peppers/onions (from frozen veggie packet) + spaghetti squash + S+P.

We had a lot of arugula leftover and I happened to have some crumbed FF Feta on hand, so I threw that down with a tbsp of dressing for a "side salad" near my main salad =)

This was delicious and so filling =) And the candles were all romantic and stuff.

If you are wondering, yes, that is a beer stein (HofBrau) and I use it for drinking water around the house.

Now, lets talk cooking.

This was awweeessommmeee and SO easy!

It's a knockoff of Rachael Ray's Apricot Chicken. I dumbed it down for those simpy don't have all sorts of herbs and things on hand and reduced certain things that would add to the fat/calorie count (like taking the 1 full cup of apricot preserves down to 1/2 cup).

Here's the original recipe.

MY Ingredients (serves 4-6)
3 chicken breasts, butterflied (~750 cals?)
1/2 onion, chopped
1.5 cups chicken stock
~20 dried apricots, quartered (~300 cals?)
1/2 cup apricot jam/preserves (~230 cals?)
2 tbsp vinegar (any white vingar would do)
S+P + 2 bay leaves
**I'm not sure how much the chicken breasts weighed, but they probably came in between 200 and 250 cals each***

Lets call this 1500 cals total

 

Directions
1. Drop the chopped onions onto a Pammed non-stick pan. Sautee minimally until just translucent
2. Place the chicken breasts, cut side down on the pan. Sear just a bit (2 minutes) and flip. Let them sit for 2 minutes, then pop in the chicken stock, apricot quarters and bay leaf.

3. Once the chicken stock comes to a boil, add the apricot preserves and vinegar
4. Continue to reduce until you've reached stew-thickness or sauce thickness.

*Make sure to remove the bay leaves! They are a choking hazard!*

I went with stew and served it over a base of wild rice. I can't stress this enough, this recipe was AMAZING and hearty and so satisfying because it was both savory and sweet. I couldn't resist adding just a tiny bit of red pepper flakes for a bit of kick, but not everyone is a fan of that.

It wasn't really "low cal" and with the rice, even my little bowl over there (I had a tiny bit of seconds on the chicken) was at least 450 cals. This is fine for one meal, but I had dessert too. Whoops, I guess that explains why my jeans were tight that week!
See, THIS is why it's a good idea to write out recipes before trying them. I honestly thought this was super calorie friendly. While it's very healthy (and if I could find sugar-free apricot jam I would use it!) it's not that diet friendly.

Moving right along: Jewish Christmas Eve! Well, yes, having Chinese food and seeing a movie is NYC Jew tradition but my friends are a bit more snooty and decided that only something exotic would do. Burmese food! It was very flavorful. There was a shrimp tagine that was spectacular, the mango salad (top left) was delicious and refreshing, their cocunut rice (top middle) was so sweet and tasty and there was a lo-mein style dish that was very nice. The thing in the middle is called "thousand layer bread" and my friend have dubbed it thousand calorie bread. It tastes kind of like a compressed, deep fried croissant. I had a tiny piece of this and didn't want to reach for seconds. The wine flowed by the carafe and we rounded out the night with Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. I was all sleepy thanks to the wine and finally lost the battle towards the end of the movie. I woke up just as it was ending and didn't get what had happened =(

Christmas dinner was hosted by my big sister from college. She is a super vegan and hosted a vegan Christmas dinner. There were 6 in attendendance and boy was it a diverse crowd. We had a the host: lawyer/vegan, her boyfriend: Belgian, vegan, her coworker: a lawyer/musician (an army clarinetist), his boyfriend (Jewish psychologist), myself and my Boyfriend. So actually the Belgian and the army clarinetist were the only ones celebrating Christmas. The rest of us were just supporters. The dinner was fantastic. I mean really, amazingly delicious lentil soup that I could have sworn was chicken soup, a "chicken" pot pie made with Gardein chicken (which was SO SO SO tasty, but I couldn't pass it off as chicken) and a chocolate cake that was to die for. Now the lentil soup was great, but I feel like I don't see myself making a pot since Boyfriend is not a huge soup eater. The pot pies, however, were fantastic. They had just a cover of phyllo dough lightly brushed with EVOO instead of a full on crust (top and bottom) so they were super light. Loved it! The cake also was very rich and delicious but made with so many ingredients I don't see it happening in my kitchen. Watch out for those pot pies though =) 

And finally, because all of the celebrating and all of the socializing left me feeling like I needed some personal time with Boyfriend, we had a date night. We had recently tried to go to this tapas place, Pipa, but couldn't get a seat (no reservations on a Saturday night in Union Sq, go figure) and this time we did have reservations. Pipa is essentially an extremely overpriced tapas place with a really great atmosphere. Lots of chandeliers, live Spanish jazzy music playing, great heavy wooden tables and candles....muy romantico. But, as overpriced as it was, we found the food to be totally worth it. We ordered a calamari dish (upper left), a mushroom croquette dish (middle), a flatbread, crab-stuffed peppers and a side of roast potatoes. The calamari and mushroom croquettes were completely unique and so flavorful. The stuffed peppers made quite an impression on Boyfriend and I was very impressed with the lightly fried calamari (very light, no encrusting of batter!). The spread underneath the croquettes was to die for. But all of that was entirely eclipsed with the dessert (tres leches, top left) was served. It was a banana whipped cream with a banana ice cream on top of a tiny bit of rum-soaked mocha cake. There were three little chocolate covered espresso beans embedded in the whipped cream too. So decadent, couldn't be more "worth it". So this whole meal came out to about $100. We were both stuffed, we both had one beverage each and we got to snuggle up on a cushioned bench and listen to Spanish guitar music (one of our fave genres). It really made the weekend =)

So, to sum up: A week (or more) of almost daily alcohol consumption, complete decadence, treats all the time...lots of working out. Unfortunatley, I did not manage to control myself most of the time and I do not forsee a lightening up of the alcohol/calorie consumption until after New Years Eve (but after THAT will be a dinner with both sets of parents and a 3-day long wedding festival in Long Island). So...it looks like I'll be packing a one-piece for the ski vacation =(

Even TONIGHT my friends have already requested that I join them for a beer and I can't very well pass that up.
Sigh.

Next time, a breakfast post.
Dr. Jules

Those up there? Omelet Muffins! I've made and raved about them before but for whatever reason haven't made a batch in ages. These were unbelievable. The previous batches were a salsa muffin (tasty but not exactly easy on the eyes) and a salmon/cream cheese muffin (easier on the eyes, harder on the budget). The ones you see here are both inexpensive to make, super cute and probably the most filling ones I've made thus far.

Ingredients (makes 10 muffins)
3 eggs (240 cals)
2 servings All Egg Whites (50 cals)
1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour, or any flour (260 cals)
2 small chicken sausages, buffalo flavor, chopped (140 cals)
3 servings turkey bacon, chopped (105 cals)
1/2 cup Fage 0% Plain Greek Yogurt (55 cals)
1/2 medium sized sweet onion, chopped
Handful (3 servings?) fire roasted red peppers, chopped
2tsp S+ 1tsp P
1/2 tsp baking powder
Topped with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese

Directions: sautee the onion (in Pam, not oil). When the onions are translucent throw in the chopped meats and cook just a little. I used fully cooked sausages and bacon, so I just warm them up.
After cooking the onions and warming the meats, combine the remaining ingredients together (feel free to play around with the spices) and bake in a muffin tin at 375 degrees for about 20-25 minutes or until the muffins have risen nice and high. Once they rise, sprinkle some grated parmesan cheese on top and cook for another 5-6 minutes until the cheese is melted. 

These come out at ~100 or maybe 105 calories apiece. They're a bit small (about the size of a vine-ripened tomato) but they are FULL of protein and fiber. Super filling. Plus, you can have 2 and a yogurt for 300 calories. =) Actually these went so fast I had to make another batch which I'll post soon. 

I live next to several super markets. There is the really upscale gourmet one, located very unfortunatley directly below my apartment. It's too expensive to shop there under most circumstances. Further away (but on the way home from the gym) is a more reasonable supermarket that is more comprehensive but still a bit pricey. Keep in mind though, I'm speaking in city terms. It's still about 1/10 the size of an average Shop-Rite and doesn't have anything on Wegmans or Stop+Shop. Finally, there's the affordable, sort of hispanic supermarket across the street which is a kind of "shop at your own risk" type of place. I wouldn't really purchase raw meats there and I'm not hugely surprised if the veggies I get from there don't last very long. Still, this picture was taken at the affordable market and it's a gorgeous vegetable display, complete with a brussel sprout branch. Did you know they grow like this? I certainly didn't! I figured they were kind of like berries, but this is really beautiful!

So, for those of you who have followed this blog, you'll know that my posting can be a bit erratic. The good (?) news is that my posting frequency is about to increase. I am currently located in one of my hospital's sattelite locations in the Bronx. It's a much slower service so while the only shuttle I can take out of here is at 5:30 pm, I can easily be done with any and all work by about 2-3pm. This means a lot of downtime, and actually this was the location in which I created the blog to begin with. I actually have a small backlog of meals to present so the posts will be fast and furious. Watch out!

Why this picture? Well, it seems that the holidays and all other indulgences have put me up a few pounds and I am now sitting at my goal weight and tend to fluctuate up (usually not down) so it is not where I'd like to be. I am tryind desperately to cut down on snacking, and certainly on portion sizes. This little cup is my triumph. Here is a tiny little coffee cup with a tiny little spoon holding a little under 1/2 cup of mocha chip frozen yogurt. This stuff is amazing, by the way. Creamy and delicious as regular ice cream but a little less guilt-free. It's more sinful than Tasti-D-Lite but also tastier.

Finally, a compliment to any dinner and super easy to make: tomato mozarella pieces.

This was actually from a while ago and I totally forgot to post it. I had mozarella, basil and tomatoes left over from the vegetable casserole I had made for thanksgiving. These went with the stuffed chickens and made a really nice side/appetizer for those.

So simple: slice up some tomatoes, toss on some shredded mozarella and chopped basil and bake in the toaster oven for 5 minutes until the mozarella melts. Make sure to top with S+P

This was actually part skim mozarella. Another great way to serve it is to buy fresh mozarella, slice that and put it on top of tomato slices with or without a basil leaf. No baking required. The freshness is amazing.

The best thing about these: you can make a LOT of these if you're having company. They go fast, but if you have the ingredients on hand, making them is fast too =)

I think that's enough for today's post. I have plenty more coming up, including a much better post on making the omelet muffins. The second batch is already being eaten today =)

I've been having a pretty great kitchen run lately. Here's the second hit of last week.

I had defrosted a few chicken tenders over the weekend and they kind of sat around in the fridge and I had no ideas of what to do with them. Then I ran into an appealing-looking container of feta cheese, grabbed some spinach, and spinach+feta stuffed chicken breasts were born.

First thing was first. The tenders were pretty small so I butterflied them (i.e. cut a pocket into the middle of each tender) and flattened them out. How? Well I covered them in plastic wrap and beat them to death with a heavy pan. That was satisfying! And loud! Good thing our neighbors have a noisy yappy dog and can't very well complain. This is especially wonderful when I set off the smoke alarm (not infrequently!) because our stove doesn't have a ventilator system.

Then I mixed up the stuffing: 2 servings fat free feta cheese (2 oz), a big handful of spinach and 1 tbsp truffle-flavored oil. I also added a splash of lemon juice and a sprinkle of S+P.

Mixing it all together is really important, keep going until the feta turns green from the spinach. I think adding pine nuts would be a great addition too.

I suspect that a mixture of mozarella and basil will be equally delicious. Especially with some tomato.

Finally, I threw the tenders into a Pammed non-stick pan and kept them on the same side each for about 3 minutes. I used tongs to flip them so the stuffing didn't fall out. It did fall out a little, but it turned out ok.

Up top are two flipped tenders, on the bottom is a tender that has only cooked on one side.

These three were Boyfriend's dinner. I had just gotten yet another dental procedure so this was going to be too chewy for me that night.

Boyfriend ate these three (minus 2 painful bites for me) with full enjoyment. He also went on to eat all the rest of the 4 tenders and so I actually never wound up tasting one. But based on the situation (and my bites), I will have to assume they were delicious.

My dinner that night was a bowl of yogurt with jam =( =(
I ate heartily before the dental appointment though.

Tonight I have finished my latest rotation where I got to spend more time with patients, though of course they were uniformly pretty sick. Still, the next month will have me heading over to the Bronx, which is actually where I started this blog back in April.

Tonight holds ahead a hang-out with my coworkers where I will hopefully keep my drinking to a minimum. Sadly, the holiday and wedding season have left their impression on my waistline and the scale doesn't lie, so I know I'm not crazy. I really have to take it easy!

Hope everyone is having a happy holiday season!
Julie

Both Boyfriend and Boyfriend's Brother (Bro here) have birthdays coinciding with major holidays. Bro's bday had just happened and I figured that the easiest way for the bros to hang was to have him over our place.

Bro is actually even more healthy-food conscious than I am and to that end, I went all out. Nothing with butter, oil, sour cream etc.

I started with Pinto Bean Dip. The garnish was celery and some acorn squash.

The bean dip was gone in a flash and the acorn squash was a little underdone (I need to learn patience) but was mostly gobbled up too! That  bean dip is so the best entertaining tool. It's beautiful, vegetarian, adaptable...you name it.

Next up: Throw-Together-Pasta! This is one of my favorite meals to make when I'm serving multiples (or when I want to have leftovers!) I defrosted some uncooked tail-on shrimp we have in our freezer with a few tbsp of herby marinade on top for a few hours. When I got home and the shrimp were nice and room temperature so I threw them on a pan and cooked them until they were just a HAIR underdone and transferred them into a clean bowl. At the same time, the pasta was cooking along in a big pot (Spinach Pasta this time).

Meanwhile, Boyfriend sliced up 1.5 zucchinis, 1 tomato and a few handfuls of basil. I sauteed the zucchini in the shrimp pan, then tossed in the tomatoes and basil. I satueed all THAT for just 1 minute before throwing in about 1/2 of a jar of tomato sauce (this was "spicy roasted red pepper" sauce) along with the almost cooked shrimp. This can pretty much simmer for a while to reduce (20 minutes?). When the pasta is done, drain that and toss it with the tomato/shrimp/zucchini mess and you have a beautiful dish of food. Of course, topped with a little Parmesan. Mmmm. Below is my bowl. The boys got seconds but I stuck with this guy and took exactly one serving of leftovers to work the next day. This dish works sooooo well as leftovers because it tastes great cold.

Just look at those beautiful green spinach noodles! =) This was so incredibly filling and I spent all morning the next day looking forward to lunch (even though there was only one shrimp left).

Pssst.....the secret to the amazing zucchini....Liquid Smoke. I sauteed it with Liquid Smoke + S+P and it was perfect. Liquid smoke, sold in most supermarkets is kind of like soy sauce, but it just makes things taste smoked. Amazing. What will they come up with next?

Finally, the squash gratin recipe I've been wanting to post (because it's SO GOOD!)...
This holiday season is a triple whammy for me and my waistline. In addition to Thanksgiving, Chanukah, Christmas (Chinese food!) and New Years, I also did a lot of eating at a bachelorette party, a bridal shower, 2 weddings (one still coming up). Not to mention it's also Boyfriend's birthday. These are all delicious but they do not jibe well with the upcoming romantic ski vacation Boyfriend and I will be taking in 1.5 months! Eek! So.... I will be focusing on some healthy stuff now.

I decided to contribute one super-healthy dish for Thanksgiving this year and this was it. It was a squash gratin, composed of parts of several different recipes. It was definitely well-received and as my mom said "how can you go wrong when all your ingredients are fresh and delicious?"

Kids, this is NOT a low-effort recipe like some of the others I tend to concentrate on. It's especially hard when all you have to work with is a little grill pan. That smokes. And sets off fire alarms. This is especially bad when you do most of your cooking after 10pm and live in a large apartment building full of early-waking medical professionals!

Ingredients (serves 6-8)
2 medium zucchinis
2 medium yellow squashes
2 big tomatoes (or 3 vine-ripened ones)
1/2 sweet yellow onion
3/4 cup low fat shredded mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
2 big handfuls of basil (chopped)

Preparation:
1. Slice the tomatoes into thin rings (1/4" or less)
2. Chop half the onion into thin rings (you can use more if you like onions) and sautee in a Pammed non-stick pan until brownish
3. Chop the zucchini and squash into about 1/4" rounds and grill on a grill pan (if you don't have a grill pan, just get them medium-cooked in a pan (or bake). Make sure to season all veggies liberally with S+P. Consider a spray of olive oil.
4. Chop the basil and combine with the cheese in a small bowl

_Take a casserole dish (square, round, oval, whatever you have on hand).

Layers 1+2

Yellow squash then onions

Make sure when you place down the yellow squash that the pieces overlap a little bit with one another in order to create a reasonably strong base.

Throw down the onions after the yellow squash pieces.

Layer 3+4+5
Sprinkle on a thinnish layer of the cheese/basil mix to start the layers sticking.

Next put down a layer of zucchini similarly constructed as the yellow squash

Finally, lay the tomato slices over the zucchini. These don't have to overlap as much.

Sprinkle a layer of cheese over the tomatoes.

At this point, each vegetable has been layered but if your casserole dish is small or you happen to have large vegetables you may have some slices leftover. Go ahead and make some more layers, you don't have to worry about order, just make sure you manage to sprinkle some cheese between every 2-3 layers.

For the final layer, alternate rows of all 3 vegetable types for a beautiful multicolored appearance. Sprinkle the top with a nice layer of parmesan cheese (or if you have any more cheese-mix left over, do that)

Pop it in the oven at 375 degrees for an hour prior to service. Make sure you can see some of the liquid bubbling underneath and hopefully the cheese will be just a touch brown on top. This thing is a huge crowd pleaser and has comparatively little cheese and SO MANY VEGETABLES. How can you go wrong? It's kind of like a healthy lasagna.

Sorry I just can't resist, this is just so pretty and tasty, I had to put up another pic. Finally, how do I know that it was good? Because out of this whole thing, I only got to have 1 serving before it was all gobbled up. I was NOT given the leftovers of this to take home with me after thanksgiving. I took it as a complement =)

Already have another delicious new recipe on it's way =)
Until then,
Ciao!
Dr. Jules

I think I'm still in a kitchen rut =( Below is a jar of skinny vanilla soy milk with some raw oats, cocoa powder and frozen berries. I mix it around with the spoon until the berries thaw and wind up having a nice cool snack. In the winter. Why?

This is kind of my standby poultry/protein hit. I take a pre-seasoned, uncooked turkey sausage (Hot Italian Turkey Sausage) and remove the casing. Actually I squeeze out the filling which is kind of more satisfying =)

Then I mush it all up in a bowl with 1-2 tbsp of black bean and corn salsa per sausage. This bowl is actually 4 turkey sausages with 4tbsp salsa. 

Usually I'm doing this while some frozen veggies are sauteeing up in a non-stick pan.

In the same pan (no oil needed, maybe a spray of Pam) I now brown/sautee/cook the turkey meat. 

I used this 4-sausage mixture multiple times actually, but the first night I made lettuce wraps: leaves of romaine with bit's of cheese then put together with the turky and veggies.

Same deal with tuna salad: 1 can tuna, 1-2 tbsp Fage 0% Total Plain Yogurt, some S+P and a forkful or two of spaghetti squash for bulk.

Lettuce seems to be my prefered vector for mushy food.

Sadly, my root canals still being incomplete, it's still solid enough to give me a headache =(

Another breakfast of champions: a small cup of cereal with vanilla soy milk, a Light N' Fit Yogurt and the Fiber One 90 calorie Brownie.

There may have been a snack or three in there too =)

Then, a spaghetti squash fest. A nice big bowl in front of the TV on my lap. My summer dresses are still getting mileage as house dresses!

The turkey sausage made an appearance with a spaghetti squash bed for lunch that day.

 

Finally, a spaghetti squash and shrimp lunch. The shrimp were lightly marinated in an herby marinade, the spaghetti squash is dressed with I Can't Believe It's Not Butter and chili sauce.

I know I promised a squash gratin but the pictures are trapped on Boyfriend's phone, so it's still to be resolved.

I also promised to discuss the weekend status post Thanksgiving.

On Friday I went to my 10 year high school reunion. I was sooooo excited for this thing for weeks and a lot of my newer friends were kind of surprised. They had no intention of going to their reunions. I had to explain that most people were fiercely loyal to my high school since we were all nerds in our junior highs and found acceptance there and learned neccessary social skills. I was not wrong. The bar was a regular zoo, packed to the brim. Everyone was there, everyone looked great and had great stories to tell of what they had done/where they had been. I was uniformly impressed, but I guess I had certainly not come hoping that people had gotten fat or had bad jobs. I am so proud of my fellow high school alums. The party was supposed to last until 10, but we left the bar after midnight and went to the party house we always used in high school. Can you say nostalgia? I got home at 2am, scarfed a TON of food and went to bed. Can you say....hangover?

That Saturday was the bachelorette party for Nurse Z who is getting married this weekend. There was a lot of fun that I am not planning on describing in a blog dedicated to food, however, our dinner at ilili restaurant was amazing. Delicious, flavorful food. Expensive food, but well worth it for her celebration. A note on her upcoming wedding: it's a RUSSIAN wedding, so I will have to expect lots of drinking and way too much eating, think crepe stations. My dress is awfully tight, I suspect that I will mostly be taking bites off of Boyfriend's plate in order to temper the alcohol.

Finally, new thoughts on Bikram Yoga. I still think it's boring, I still have no idea why I sweat that much for such easy poses, but I am finally making it through full classes without needing breaks in between. So I've been alternating 6-8 mile runs (holiday-related increase in intensity both of exercise time and calorie quantity) with Bikram Yoga. I've also heard that the guy who invented Bikram (Mr. Bikram, seriously) is suing another NYC studio for using his moves without paying him royalties! I had no idea yogis would go all litigious and zealously guard their ideas.

Since my last post, many days ago, so many completely food-unrelated things have occurred that I almost don't know if I can accurately account for all of them! I guess I'll start with a piece of good news. Last Friday I received an offer for the fellowship position I went to interview for. It was unexpected because usually there's some waiting time between the interview and word of acceptance but they made me the offer on the spot so now I know what I'll be doing for the next 2.5 years of my life! =)

Immediately after, I began my weekend on call. My calls are usually pretty tame, but this time, despite my desire to celebrate my new job offer, I got chained to the hospital until 9pm, only to return at 11pm and I only got home at 1 in the morning. The next day I tried Bikram Yoga for the first time. It's 1.5 hours instead of my normal 1 hour hot yoga class and it is much more than 50% more miserable. I hated almost every one of those 90 minutes but the next day when I saw what my body looked like, I made a resolve to return. That day I got paged in a few more times and went to a darling little french restaurant with my parents to celebrate the job offer. The food was mediocre, though I had my first beef bourguignon which tasted remarkably like any other beef stew I've had. Later that night we saw a movie about extreme skiing which was pretty good, though long and got me excited about the upcoming ski season. That ended at midnight and I got called in again at 2am and wound up sleeping at the hospital, only to go home at 7am and be paged back again at 9am. Came back in around 6pm and finally Boyfriend and I had a delicious feast of sushi. I didn't take pictures because I was euphoric/exhausted. I did take the time that weekend to buy myself an extravagant pair of boots as a gift to myself. Later this turned out to be a less-than-stellar decision.

Why? Because the final billing came in for my root canals and it is going to be unaffordably expensive even though I have dental insurance. Floss people! Don't be like me! So that was bad news. Then my phone got stolen, AT THE DENTIST'S OFFICE, which was more bad news. It had some pictures of food-related stuff on it that I hadn't uploaded into my computer yet. So I finally got a new phone (more hemorrhaging of money).  This weekend was phenomenal, more on that later. Lets talk briefly about food.

I decided I wanted some more hummus for the week before thanksgiving, something tasty, versatile and healthy. I also decided to switch up the chickpeas, so I suppose what I really made was a bean dip.

Ingredients
1 can (15oz) pinto beans (drained, but pour about 2-3tbsp of the bean water into the blender)
2 servings (2 oz) fat free feta cheese
3 or even 4 servings of roasted red peppers (to taste)
1 lemon: zest and juice
S+P

Optional: 1 chipotle pepper, seeded

I also cooked up another batch of spaghetti squash, which I am quickly learning is an obsession!

This bowl has the spaghetti squash with a splash of I Can't Believe It's Not Butter spray and a 1/4 tsp of red chile sauce (you can sub in sriracha or any other hot sauce). Be careful though, a lot of traditional hot sauces are loaded with sodium. The chili sauces are practically calorie free and sodium light.

Another picture of the bowl. I promise the next post will be much more interesting since I have a new phone (read: camera) now!

Finally, I went home for a day before my interview with Yale University and my mom made this vegetable soup with a super melt-in-your-mouth meatball for me because she knows I'm having problems chewing.

As for this weekend, I'm going to keep the teasers going. Lets just say there was a lot of looking back and also looking towards the future. Instead, I'll talk exercise! I switched up my regular routine of ~3 monthly hot power vinyasa yoga sessions with a month of Bikram Yoga that I had a super-great coupon for. Groupon.com? Livingsocial.com? Best stuff ever!

Anyway, Bikram Yoga is 90 minutes long (as opposed to the 60minute power vinyasa) and while the activity is easier, it's also a lot hotter. Frankly, in the first 4 classes I hated every one of those 90 minutes but have since learned to only hate 80 out of 90 minutes (today was the 5th class). But...as much as I hate it, I love how happy it makes me with my body, and with multiple weddings and other events to go to in the upcoming months (not to mention a super-romantic ski vacation!) I'd better keep it up!

Anyway, I'll admit that this post kind of sucked but I promise to do better next time, and now with my fellowship sorted, a new phone in hand and a few cool dishes I've come up with in the past few days, I'm ready to unleash a better quality of blog post!

Ciao 

Well folks, before all this root canal business began, I signed up for a FoodBuzz Tastemaker Challenge (?) with a Heinz Classico Light Creamy Alfredo pasta sauce. The good people at Heinz sent me a free bottle of the sauce and wouldn't you know it, my teeth were so damaged I couldn't even "chew" pasta!

But, the deadline was looming (and has loomed past me already) so I had to improvise.

I realized soon after getting sooooo sick of paying for small bowls of creamy soups in restaurants that I had to branch out. Recently I decided to spring for a baked potato. Sure enough, I was able to get through it with minimal pain and rushed out to buy some for home.

So I got home, opened my fridge and came face-to-face with the Alfredo Sauce. At 60 cals for 1/4 cup, I thought it was a pretty good deal. I also thought it might go really well with baked potato.

It DID! I microwaved this baby for about 7 minutes (being careful to puncture it with a fork before heating). After slicing it open and pushing out the meaty insides, I put in about 1-2 tbsp of the Alfredo Sauce and mixed it up with some S+P. Not only did it taste great, but how pretty is this potato?!? It was cheesy, creamly and oh-so-satisfying! =) Great success Heinz!

Two days later, after singing the praises of the Heinz Light Creamy Alfredo sauce to Boyfriend, he finally made some us of it on a pasta dish. I even managed to get through some that day (see the little cup at 11 o'clock?)

He smothered the penne with the Alfredo sauce, tossed on some salt and topped it with a liberal helping of real parmesan cheese. My little cup had a liberal helping of the sauce with a sprinkle of reduced-fat parmesan.

Here's a closeup of Boyfriend's first serving of pasta. Not seen is the turkey kielbasa slices hanging out on the bottom of the pasta.

The second serving was sans-kielbasa.

The star of my dinner that night was half of this potato (the turkey kielbasa helped with the protein content!).

This is a Korean Sweet Potato.

It's not quite a yam, definitely much sweeter than a potato. It reminds me, if anything, of acorn squash. It was really nice and starchy but had some sweetness to it too.

It's made with some salt and some I Can't Believe It's Not Butter spread.

Also featured: orange water.

My now-bankrupted yoga studio had these pitchers of ice water out before classes that had orange slices floating in them. I was oh-so-pleasantly surprised that the orange taste was not-too-subtle and definitely welcome.

I marinated (?) this water with the orange slices for about 1 hour in the refrigerator and it definitely went pretty fast at dinner. Neither one of us drinks orange juice, but this was a hit.

Here's a shot of the whole dinner along with the branches of red berries that are our late-fall coffee table decor of the year =)

Finally, a note on the personal side. First of all, I began my fellowship interviews with Yale University Hospital. They have a great program...maybe even more than great because of the some of the unique opportunities in tumor genetics. But if I did wind up there, I might have to move to Stamford Connecticut. While I've been yearning for suburban life for a little over a year now, I'm not sure I'm truly ready to make that transition before I begin my career in full. Furthermore, moving to Stamford would still leave both Boyfriend and myself with a 1-hour commute each way. Tomorrow I begin the interviews with the New York programs, where I hope to be as impressed as I was with Yale.

I also decided to begin my month of Bikram Yoga (after the disgraceful bankruptcy of my regular hot yoga studio) and went to my first 1.5 hour class yesterday. It was hot, it was difficult, but I just barely survived. I missed a few postures, but overall, I felt like it was a minor success. My skin was not thrilled and neither was I when I saw all the little red spots in the mirror =( =(

So, thus ends my foray into the truly mushy foods, as I am beginning to tolerate semi-solids now. I have eaten some poultry, salmon and risotto (most notably an amazing salmon/creamy rissoto they served me at Yale). This weekend I truly hope to finally have what I've missed the most: Sushi. =)

I will also be gearing up for thanksgiving. What's everyone's favorite thanksgiving foods?

First, I promised (and didn't deliver) photos of the salmon dinner from the last post. This was pretty fast, but really delicious. In fact, having paid for a salmon dish while out at a restaurant the night before, we both felt that this meal was far superior.

The asparagus (courtesy of Boyfriend) was grilled on a grill pan (a very very worthwhile purchase) after being sprayed with some olive oil (my olive oil mister is also one of my favorite kitchen gadgets!) and generously seasoned with S+P + some lemon juice.

The salmon was also sprayed in oil and sprinkled with S+P (both sides) and baked at 375 degrees for about 20-30 minutes. I actually cut up an onion and put the salmon on a bed of sliced onion rings and put a few on top too. Unfortunately, by the time the asparagus was ready to come out of the pan, the salmon was still completely raw in the middle, so I pulled it out of the oven and stuck it on the hot grill pan (re-Pammed) for about 8 minutes on each side. The oions, which went all around the salmon on the grill pan after baking, were amazing! They had salmon juices on them which just made them so flavorful!

The sauce was a hastily whipped up cilantro-yogurt sauce (click for recipe) that I had made and loved before.

I guess it's about time to discuss why I've not posted for so long. The meal pictured above actually happened 2 weeks ago (so I've been REALLY bad at posting!) and can be considered my "last supper" of sorts. My friend Nurse Z came over for a girls night that consisted of too much wine and stinky cheese (our respective Boyfriends don't appreciate stinky cheese so we figured we'd have it without them). We also rounded the meal out with some healthier options. Though it's safe to say the wine and cheese were the main staples.

My staple for healthy entertaining is, of course, chips and dip.

This is the baba ganoush (halved recipe) made just a little bit extra-special with the addition of 1/2 of a sweet yellow onion, sauteed in a non-stick pan until brown and transluscent. Blended with the eggplant it gives the dip a sweet, oniony taste that is just fantastic.

Also featured: Kale Chips, made with some nutritional yeast sprinkled on top most of the way through cooking. Yum!

Also, my third attempt at acorn squash went over quite nicely. Not surprisingly, the secret is to NOT UNDER-COOK IT!

This time I seasoned with a healthy dose of cinnamon, ginger and just a sprinkle of ground cumin, which made quite an impression on Nurse Z. Cumin is always amazing.

Finally, some chopped grilled zucchini sprayed with EVOO and seasoned with some S+P (maybe even a little too much). Grilled until super soft. Tasty and healthy. Took away the guilt of eating soooo much cheese and drinking soooo much wine. Well, at least until I saw the scale in the morning =)

So....why was this my last meal? Well, the day after I got a raging tooth-ache, scheduled an appointment with a dentist and found out that I had to have a root canal. Then I found out I had to have a second root canal because the damage had occurred between two teeth. Finally, the day after I began my root canals, I developed a toothache on the other side, necessitating a third (!!!!) root canal.

For the past three weeks my diet has consisted of homemade soups like this pumpkin one right here (not geat): In a saucepan heat and stir 3 servings canned pumpkin, 1 cup chicken stock (added more and more until desired consistency was achieved). As the mixture gets warm and begins to bubble I added about 3 tbsp greek yogurt and some cinnamon, ginger, cumin and salt. Finally a little white vinegar. It was only ok. I am just glad I was able to dip some bread into there.

I ate a LOT of cauliflower. You can see the cauliflower mash recipe from a recent post or head over to Recipage if you're catching up, hopefully the recipe will be posted by then.

I found that the best thing was to add in some sharp cheese (fat free is most calorie-friendly, full fat or part skim is tastier and gooyer) and use a veggie stock as the liquid. It also goes well with a dash of cumin.

I went shopping and bought myself this pretty blue ceramic bowl and matching tiny ceramic spoon at Crate and Barrel in anticipation of a looong period of eating things out of bowls. This bowl is small but it's gotten a lot of mileage for cottage cheese and yogurt. They've been mixed with raspberry preserves (pictured), pumpkin and various other sweet goodies. Most importantly, you don't have the chew yogurt or cottage cheese. =(

Finally, the very vast majority of my meals have consisted of Campbells Soup. I prefer the Healthy Choice, 98% fat free cans because they are low sodium and are calorie friendly. I skinny these up by A) spooning out 2 tbsp (and sometimes 3) of the soup mix out of the can and flavoring it up by adding veggie/chicken stock instead of water. I think it's silly that the soups come in servings of 2.5, as if you are making a Campbell's soup for a family meal. I go ahead and eat the whole can/pot but at least I know some of it is gone. I'm a big fan (or at least I was two weeks ago!) of the cream of chicken, mushroom and cream of celery soups.

I actually have a post in the works right now for a baked potato (other foods I can eat) and will discuss a recent trip to an upper east side wine bar that is so fantastic I just have to rave about it a bit.

Until then! Ciao!