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KitchenKatalog: Blog 343
Thursday, December 23, 2010, 06:51 PM
I made the usual Bailey's Irish Cream Which Chocolate Cheesecake for a holiday party. Since it was not for me to eat, I made no attempt to lighten it at all.
There are a few notes from this. First of all, I had apparently incorrectly been using the whisk all of these years. Reading the recipe again, I realized the beater blade is really what I wanted. This was particularly nice because I now have one of those blades that scrape the bowl. It was much easier to do.
The other note is that every place I went either was out or didn't carry white chocolate in bars so I had to use the chips. This was fine for in the cake because it is just ground but for the topping, I also just had to use ground instead of grated chocolate. I do not think it has as nice of an airy, white look, but it is fine.
See the recipe page (linked above) for the Points plus as well.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 825, 2010-12-23_185122
Thursday, December 23, 2010, 11:34 AM
The fajitas were just onions, peppers, mushrooms and kidney beans with fajita seasoning. I would like to make my own seasoning sometime but this worked well enough. We added the red kidney beans right at the end so they didn't get too smashed. The beans were there to be a source of protein and some substance. We made the onions rings inspired by the Hungry Girl Recipe I copied below. We really just winged it but it was helpful to have the recipe. They were pretty easy with two people so you that I did not get my hand full of egg. Finally, we made sautéd spinach because it was getting old and we wanted to use it.
Fiber One Onion Rings (from Hungry Girl)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 823, 2010-12-23_113425
Wednesday, December 22, 2010, 10:56 AM
This was Emily's idea and it worked pretty well. We made the same pasta recipe as last time but we cut it in 1/3. Also for some reason, it did not need any more water. I used 1/3 cup egg whites for the 1/3 of 4 eggs and it seemed to be enough liquid. Odd that this time was fine but it worked.
The filling was somewhat haphazard. Emily and I read a bunch of recipes and just set out to do it. We mixed mostly pumpkin with skim ricotta and then added some nutmeg, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice and splenda. The filling was good but it tasted a bit like pumpkin pie. I think next time, I will look for a more savory pumpkin filling. I think it came out to what we were aiming for but I want to try it differently.
Overall, it was pretty successful and not really too hard. Last time Meredith and I made pasta, we halved the recipe and had more than enough noodles. Since we were stuffing them, we made less pasta. I felt like it made a lot less but it was enough.
When assembling, we folded it over making it a bit more like a dumpling with pasta but it was easier to assemble because the pasta sheets were not all uniform.
Points plus are not too bad. Last time, I calculated 18 for 1/2 recipe so 2/3*18=12 or 6 each. The filling was rather low with just skim ricotta. Really not bad! And, unlike most stuffed pasta meals, we got a lot!
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 805, 2010-12-22_105619
Tuesday, December 21, 2010, 11:15 AM
We made these for Meredith's work party so there was no attempt to lower the calories. We tried one and they were very good. The main recipe is below but we made some changes.
The biggest change was we used creme-de-menthe in the butter cream instead of peppermint. The cookies came out very dense but they have a really nice chocolate flavor. We had to refrigerated everything in the middle of putting it together because everything was getting too soft.
I am not going to try to do the points. It isn't worth it.
Candy Cane Cookies (from Kitchen daily)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 807, 2010-12-21_111557
Monday, December 20, 2010, 10:55 AM
We made pizza dough with the usual recipe but I flipped the whole wheat and regular flour. I 1/3rd the recipe to make two medium sized pizzas a person (3 people with my sister visiting). I was really not thrilled with the dough. It wasn't overly flavorful and didn't crisp nicely. I think I need to do more pizza dough research. Also, I need better pizza cooking instruments.
We used tomato sauce that was half home made and half from a can. Toppings included spinach, Skim ricotta, mushrooms, onions, peppers, broccoli, jalapeno peppers, Canadian bacon, etc. We used fat free and lite cheeses. I do not remember any specific ones but I think Meredith's second one was a Tex-Mex pizza. It also had chipotles in adobo and salsa.
I do not think I did a Points plus calculation on the dough so it is after the break.
Whole Recipe (points plus)
White sugar...1
2 cups whole wheat...2.67*8=21.36
1 1/2 cups bread flour...2.75*6=16.5
1 tbsp Olive Oil...3.60
--------------------------------
Whole Recipe...42.46
We 1/3rd it so it had 14 total. We made 6 pizzas so figure 2.5 each
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 803, 2010-12-20_105501
Friday, December 17, 2010, 12:40 PM
I made these on a whim. I used 2 pieces of turkey bacon and some ham mixed with egg whites. After cooking that all together (turkey bacon cooked first), I layed it on a small Trader Joes low carb tortilla. I layed it in a line, added some lite cheese, and rolled it up. I used a toothpick to hold it together and pammed them. I cooked them for about 15 minutes in the toasted but on bake at 350.
They were very good! And I think low in points but I am not sure about the tortilla. Still, the filling was mostly protein so that stays low.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 795, 2010-12-17_124045
Friday, December 17, 2010, 12:37 PM
We made the usual Moussaka from the recipe on my page. It needed more seasoning than the recipe called for but I updated it with that note.
It was really good but I do not think it was as good as previous times. I am redoing the points here as best I can.
Points plus:
1.25lb Lean Beef...20
2 cups milk...4.3
1/4 cup whole wheat flour...2.67
1.5 tbsp Olivio (smart Balance)...1.93
around 1 lb potatoes...9
------------------------------
whole thing has 38 points plus. It made over four servings or four large servings. Either way, it is not bad for a lot of food.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 791, 2010-12-17_123729
Friday, December 17, 2010, 12:31 PM
We tried to make ice cream bread off of the recipe below. It was really not very good. I thought it tasted a lot like really bad scones. And it was a good amount of points for only six pieces.
I do not know the exact points but it was about 8 for the flour and 6 for the ice cream. So about 2.5 per piece. Not worth it!
Ice Cream Bread ( FromA Taste of Home)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 788, 2010-12-17_123158