Quick Weeknight Meals: Cooking with Trader Joe's & Gardein: Mandarin Chickenless Chicken

 

My go-to recipe for busy weeknights, Mandarin Chicken-less Stir Fry

I use any vegetables I have on hand, sometimes I even pre-chop vegetables ahead of time so that when I don't have the time to prep a complicated meal, I have already done the hardest work. I saute the ingredients in the following order: onions, then by order of hardness; i.e. carrots, celery, peppers. Once the veggies are cooked, I remove and set aside. Next I saute the chickenless chicken morsels per the directions on the bag, and at the last minute combine the sauces, veggies, and morsels and heat through while stirring. I use Trader Joe's Satay sauce as a short cut adding in the sauce that comes with the Chickenless Mandarin Chicken for a sweet and savory dish that tastes like comfort food but is packed with good for you veggies! While I am sauteing, I prepare brown rice noodles or I use frozen brown rice from Trader Joe's. The results: a quick dinner that seems like it took me hours to prepare, and never any leftovers ;)

Lunch on Beach Drive: Spring Break Stop in St. Petersburg

Our last full day in Florida, we dropped off my sister Meg, her wife Jackie, and their daughter Ellie to Tampa airport and took a detour on our way back to Sarasota, making a stop in St. Petersburg. We visited the new version of the Dali Museum in downtown St. Pete's and afterwards strolled down Beach Drive to find a place to eat lunch. Cassis American Brasserie's menu jumped out at me, so we took a table on the sidewalk to people watch. The city is filled with beautiful sculptures and we had a front row seat to one of the prettiest. Dave ordered a wedge salad, chicken soup, and the special cajun ribeye sandwich. I ordered onion rings and a spinach, strawberry, and beet salad. Seriously the best onion rings ev-er! I had the Beach Drive Lemonade with muddled strawberries and lemon, raspberry vodka, and simple syrup, perfectly refreshing! Can't wait to come back next spring...

Good Morning English Muffins & a Soft Boiled Egg

Take Two Finally an excuse to use the egg cups I inherited from my late Grandma Peggy! Last night while making lunch for my hubby, I started craving the soft boiled eggs my Mom used to make when we were children. Granted, Mom used a coffee mug and muddled the egg with salt and pepper, making it more of a mayo-less egg salad. Soft boiling eggs perfectly seems to be a task not easily mastered by cutting my hard boiling time in half...Oh well, it was delicious nonetheless. I placed enough water to cover the egg in a pot and brought to a boil. Once boiling I removed from heat and let sit for 6 minutes. Now, my yolk was not as soft as I typically like it so next time I will cut down my time in one minute increments until I get it right.  While I waited for my soft boiled egg I smeared a toasted whole wheat English muffin with raw almond butter, strawberry preserves, and an organic banana. Unfortunately, Allie thought the English muffin looked irresistible, so she gulped it down while my back was turned. (See guilty face below) I am trying to cut back on my caffeine, so green tea and chamomile with a touch of honey was the finishing touch on my breakfast. I have been playing around with the myfitnesspal website and iphone app and below I have included the nutritional information for this meal.

The guilty but satisified puppy...

Breakfast Calories Carbs Fat Protein Sodium Sugar Publix - English Muffin - Original, 1 muffin 100 24 2 4 210 1 Trader Joe's - Almond Butter Raw Crunchy Unsalted, 2 tbsp 190 6 17 8 0 2 Egg - Egg, Hard-Boiled, 60 g 70 1 5 6 65 0 Bananas - Raw, 1 medium (7" to 7-7/8" long) 105 27 0 1 1 14 Green Tea - Lipton, 1 tea bag 0 0 0 0 0 0 Bigelow - Cozy Chamomile Herb Tea, 1 Bag 0 0 0 0 0 0 Honey, 0.5 tbsp 32 9 0 0 0 9 Trader Joe's - Fresh Strawberry Preserves, 1 g 3 1 0 0 0 1 Totals 500 68 24 19 276 27