"Pizza?"

This was something I ate often when I was little and it's a kid friendly, healthy version of pizza. It's full of flavor, super quick and ready in the amount of time it takes to melt cheese in your oven. With very few ingredients you can have fun with the kids and teach them how to love good food.

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 7-10 minutes

Ingredients:

1 slice of bread (I used shepherd style sourdough)

sliced tomatoes

2 slices of Swiss cheese

sprinkle of cheddar or any fine grated cheese

Mustard

sliced (thin) onions

Basil

Pepper

Directions:

Spread mustard on your bread and layer first your Swiss cheese, tomatoes, onion, cheddar(fine grated), and pepper. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees, and on a foil lined cookie sheet place your "pizza" in for 7- 10 minutes, or until the cheese melts. Add the basil at the end for a bright, and fresh flavor!

**The best part about this great snack even more than it being a healthy alternative is that you can make it for less than $2.00.....wow!

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Mini Meatloaf Muffins

I used a simple meatloaf recipe and packed it into mini muffin cups. I spiced the meat up with sauteed onions, garlic, mushrooms and fresh parsley so I could add less salt, and also used a GLUTEN-FREE "bread" crumb to bind it. Then I piped a dollop of mashed potatoes on top of each mini muffin and added a sprinkle of parsley. Tyler poured a little BBQ sauce on each one of his, and we paired it with a little avocado, tomato and cucumber salad.

Prep. time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 35 minutes

Servings: 4-6

Ingredients:
1 lb. of ground turkey
2 eggs
2/3 cup of gluten free panko or GF bread crumb
2 Tbs. olive oil
1 8 oz. pkg. of mushrooms chopped
1/3 cup onions chopped
1 Tbs. garlic minced
2 Tbs. chopped fresh parsley
1 tsp. dried parsley
3 cups of mashed potatoes
cooking spray
salt
lemon pepper

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Peel, dice and boil your potatoes. Saute onions, garlic, and mushrooms, in olive oil. Set that aside to let it cool down and grab a large mixing bowl. Combine the meat, eggs, about a 1/2 tsp(approx.) of lemon pepper, and when the onion mushroom mixture is cooled add that the parsley and bread crumbs. Mix by hand lighting incorporating all the ingredients, but be careful not to over mix or the meat will become tough when it's cooked.

Spray your muffin tin and roll approx. a Tbs. worth of the meat mixture and plop one into each mini muffin spot. You can lightly pressed down to create the "muffin shape." Once your oven is done preheating place the muffin tin in, uncovered, and set the timer for 20 minutes.

Drain your potatoes and whip them until they're creamy. Add a little salt and pepper. I used a sandwich bag to pipe the potatoes onto the finished mini muffins. Fill a sandwich bag to the tip of one side and cut the tip off, about the size of a dime. Set the potatoes to the side until the meat loaf muffins are finished.

When the muffins are done they should slide out pretty easy, arrange them on a tray or large plate, take your mashed potatoes and slowly in a circular motion pipe them into a little mound on top. I garnished each one with a sprinkle of dried parsley, but you could also spoon a glaze of BBQ sauce like my boyfriend did!

These are a fun little idea to mix up dinner night, for a party, or BBQ.

Jazz it up in less than 10 minutes, from prep to plate!

Today the Boo and I had a great visit from a girlfriend I've known since middle school. She and her adorable little boy Adam came and played for a couple hours and we had a little snacky lunch. I threw together a pasta salad real quick, made some yogurt dip for vegetables and Greek potatoes(lime and dill) I had so much fun last night with The Hunebee, attempting videos, that I decided to throw something together real quick so I could get my practice on!

In less than 10 minutes I prepped up some add-ins for the already completed Pasta Salad. Inside the salad, already, was olive oil, Queso fresco, fresh thyme, fresh basil, and about a 1/3 cup Greek yogurt. I added fresh spinach, scallions (tops and bottoms), and Lime all ORGANIC and garden fresh from Momma Gina that Christine brought last night. From my fridge and pantry there is garlic and sweet peppers that I sauteed all together till slightly wilted and immediately tossed with the original Pasta.

Although it was a little different taping myself it was fun to try and it's helping me figure out my way. We are thinking of going "Go-Pro" soon so I promise quality will only improve!

ENJOY!

Winner, Winner Chicken dinner!

I was about to take the easy way out tonight. I've been exhausted and I see no signs of stopping. Ugh, kinda intimidating when I really think about it, but none the less...ONWARD and UPWARD! Todays agenda was house cleaning overhaul but dinner still had to be made and that's the funny part of being a stay at home Mommy that they never tell you.

Maybe I should enlighten you with the fact that I love to procrastinate. Although in recent times I have found that knowing that and then challenging myself to work to the bone has become such a great joy. Positive energy attracts positive energy and from my diligence this evening I was met with two more opportunities in my personal cook endeavour. I "Tweeted" tonight that I'm seriously in need of a bigger kitchen now, but that has always been the case. Along with my procrastination, I'm a "more the merrier" kinda lady, and somewhere along the line those two together seem to contradict themselves in my own head, but I love it.

Back to the simple dinner that turned into work:) I decided that just doing it is better than skimping out AND the health of my two favorite people in the world is more important than me being lazy. The Hunebee's Mom sent home an organic goodie bag for me this Monday. A bundle of flowing green onions, an over-stuffed bag of minty mint, perfect limes and randomly growing cilantro from her ever bountiful, organic home garden. I had a huge bag of roma tomatoes that I got on sale, 3lb.s for $1, and I decided that I wanted to do a fresh tomato sauce. I was about to add olives and then I remembered having dinner with Momma-Gina last week and that was one of the things she told me to stop eating(tooo much salt). The sauce was for a couple chicken breasts thawing in my sink. I was mulling over what to make with it but rice, potatoes, or pasta just sounded like too much. I was really trying to go NO-carb, so I opted for a Panzanella like salad...ha.

Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 30 minutes
Servings: 4

Cost: $7 for the whole dinner

Ingredients for Chicken:

2 medium(on the large side) boneless, skinless chicken breasts, sliced in two(4 pieces)
2 Tbs. olive oil
salt and pepper

Sauce:

3 roma tomatoes, diced
1 large garlic clove, chopped
2 green onions, dice the bulb up to the dark green(set aside for salad and garnish)
1/8 cup carrot, minced
1/4 cup olive oil
Dash of dried basil, thyme, oregano and parsley
1/2 cup fresh chopped spinach
salt and pepper
1/3 tsp. white sugar

Directions:

In a small sauce pan, saute scallions, carrots and garlic in olive oil then salt and pepper. Add chopped tomatoes, herbs, salt pepper and sugar. Once the sauce has coked down a little add spinach, turn down the heat and let it simmer very low.

I like to rinse and dry my chicken before cooking it. In the oil, fry on both sides after seasoning. Tonight I added the juice from the chicken directly to the sauce, IT"S FLAVOR!

Ingredients:

1/2 cup pre-shredded carrot
1 roma tomato, diced
1 persian cucumber, partially peeled
1 cup of croutons (Garlic)
about a 1/3-1/4 cup of scallion leaves chopped

Dressing:

1/3 cup olive oil
1/8 cup red wine vinegar
1 tsp. yellow mustard
Salt
1 small serrano pepper, sliced thin, about 1 Tbs. (watch out!)

Toss the salad and dressing right before you are about to serve so it doesn't get soggy. Also be careful of  the serrano pepper, use less if you aren't familiar with its heat.

ENJOY! 

 

BEST Top 10 GLUTEN FREE recipes!

I will be working my little hands to the bone for the rest of this week compiling the BEST GF recipes EVER! Well 10 of them anyway...Like you know from reading past posts The HUNEBEE and KATvonVapure are GLUTEN FREE foodies! So there are many new and exciting dishes I have to come up with each week to keep them interested that don't consist of your typical quinoa, and GF Pasta. Leave your address when you stop by for an AMAZING easy, Gluten Free list you'll fall in love with over and over!