Mexican Egg Bake Part Deux: Pictures!

Yesterday I was responsible for "occupying" Jason while Nacho proceeded to decorate their entire house in pictures of Jason's life from birth-present (he turns 30 tomorrow! eeeee!) So since my time started at about 9 am I decided to start with brunch and reprise my Mexican Egg Bake! And since I just barely started getting it together enough to take pictures when I cook, I figured I'd take some pictures and put them up so you can see just how delicious it really looks!

About to go in the oven

Finished!


Ready to be topped

With me and Steve's new very favorite salsa ever!


Today I think I may even recreate something similar for Father's Day since my dad loves eggs and veggies and it's easy to make for several people at once!

Sour Cream Cranberry Bars!

Ummmm YUM! I've never been much of a fruit person (weird, right?) so I was never tempted by desserts like this, but thanks to Paradise Bakery's crumbly bleu cheese salad, I have discovered the deliciousness that is dried cranberries. Also, in general, I am trying to open myself up to the tastes of more fruits due to my constant sugar cravings--if only I craved things like strawberries! GROSS! I know I'm in the minority here, but I HATE strawberries. Haha anyway, in addition to the cookies I made for the Tony Awards party (Did anyone else see the hot mess that was Frances McDorman?!) I also decided to try something new with these bars and they were a HUGE hit. And at only 126 calories a bar, you can enjoy them and a salted oatmeal chocolate chip cookie at the same time for dessert for under 250 calories! Yes please!

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1/2 cup canola oil
  
• 1/2 cup packed splenda brown sugar blend
  
• 2 cups quick-cooking oats
• 1-1/2 cups plus 2 tablespoons whole wheat pastry flour, divided
• 2 cups dried cranberries
• 1 cup (8 ounces) fat free sour cream
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup splenda
  
• 1 egg white, lightly beaten
• 1 tablespoon grated lemon peel
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a large bowl, cream butter, oil, and splenda brown sugar blend until light and fluffy. Combine oats and 1-1/2 cups flour; add to the creamed mixture until blended. Set aside 1-1/2 cups for topping.
Press remaining crumb mixture into an ungreased 13-in. x 9-in. baking pan. Bake at 350° for 10-12 minutes or until lightly browned.
Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine the cranberries, sour cream, sugar, splenda, egg, lemon peel, vanilla and remaining flour. Spread evenly over crust. Sprinkle with reserved crumb mixture.

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack. Refrigerate leftovers.

I got about 30 decent size bars out of it. The recipe claimed 36--not 36 of the size I like! But I did my calculations based on 30 bars :O)

Salted Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies!

So, truth be told, I really enjoy cooking, but I LOVE baking. I haven't been doing it as much lately, because to be honest, if you don't keep a LITTLE of the bad stuff in there, it just isn't worth it. Plus, having a whole batch of cookies at my house is just bad news haha. But, I was wracking my brain about what I wanted to bring to tonight's Tony Awards Party, and got so excited about the idea of baking for people that I not only made these babies, I doubled the batch and also made sour cream cranberry bars (recipe coming soon)!

I don't know if I've mentioned in here how obsessed I am with Tina Hauper's Carrots'N'Cake, but I am a little obsessed. So I searched her recipe page and then added my own twist to the recipe making it a little lower in calories and a little lower in the bad fats. The result comes in at a 92 calorie cookie that I thought was freaking delicious. The bad news? They are a little small, so if we're being honest you will probably eat two so in reality I should say it's more like 184 calories a serving. There are definitely things I want to play with to see if I can get it lower without compromising deliciousness, but for now I am pretty in love with these cookies!

• 2 cups rolled oats
• 1 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
• 1/2 cup splenda brown sugar blend
  
• 1/2 cup sugar-free maple syrup
• 3 egg whites
  
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 stick (1/4 cup) butter, softened
• 1/4 cup canola oil
  
• 3/4 cup mini dark chocolate chips
• Sea salt

Preheat oven to 325. Grease baking sheet (I also lay tin foil down first so that I don't have to clean the baking sheet when I'm done because I'm lazy like that :O) ). Mix all ingredients except chocolate chips and salt together in a big mixing bowl. Fold in chocolate chips. Use a table spoon to scoop dough into small balls on cookie sheet. Sprinkle with sea salt (I ground mine up first and then used my fingers to sprinkle so that I could be in control because no one wants a mouthful of salt when they bite into a cookie!). Bake for 12-14 minutes or until golden brown and tops are set.

PS: They don't really spread out so you can place them fairly close together and fit more on a sheet! :O)

PICTURES! I'm usually so focused on what I'm doing that it never occurs to me to take pictures, but my blog is empty looking and sad without them, so this time I made it a point!

Dough:


Cooling:

YUMMY!

I like lunch

Sometimes I just put something super easy together and it ends up being delicious, but I forget to tell anyone because it doesn't really seem like cooking haha. Today I had a super delicious, healthy and filling lunch that I will probably end up repeating for like a week haha.

*1 sun dried tomato extreme wellness tortilla
*1 wedge lite laughing cow garlic herb cheese
* 1 tbs light ranch dressing
*3ish oz grilled chicken breast
*sliced red pepper
*diced tomato
*spinach

When Steve and I are on top of things, we keep grilled chicken breast on hand so this yummy wrap took me about 5 min to put together. Just spread the laughing cow on the tortilla, chop up the other stuff and put it on top and roll it up and enjoy for a lovely 250 calories!

Also, has anyone else ever tried A&W diet cream soda? Delicious. Some night this week I will be making a cream soda float with some fat free vanilla bean fro yo!

And get ready and excited for tomorrow because I will be posting skinnified versions of the salted oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and sour cream cranberry bars that I am making for the Tony Awards party!

Nutella white chocolate chip oatmeal cookies!

Ummmm pretty much anything with Nutella makes me drool. Jacob said "this is my favorite cookie you've ever made!" I made 3 dozen and they were gone by the end of our memorial day BBQ. Heeerrreee we go...!

1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. splenda
1/3 c. splenda brown sugar blend
2 extra ripe bananas, mashed
1 c. Nutella
2 tsp. vanilla
2 egg whites
2 c. whole wheat flour (the pastry one would prob be better, but I only have regular)
1 c. quick oatmeal
2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 (11.5 oz.) pkg. white chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350°F. Beat sugar, bananas, Nutella, vanilla and egg whites in bowl. Mix in flour, oatmeal, baking soda and salt. Stir in white chocolate chips. Drop by tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheet.

Bake time depends on your taste, but I check them @ 9 min and as soon as they are just set at the top, I remove them so they stay gooey on the inside!

110 calories a cookie, but they are big enough that you just need one (or 5, but whatever haha). Recipe makes 36 cookies.

Skinny Memorial Day BBQ Sides!

I love a good bring your own meat bbq. It means I get to go pick out my own nice 6 oz piece of fish, be responsible for the highest calorie part of a bbq: the sides, and invite everyone I love over but not spend a gazillion dollars. Soooo I made these 2 delicious sides. They are not the lowest ever in calories and to be honest I have no idea what I serving size would be so I'm not going to tally up the calories, but they are much better than the alternatives and nutritious and delicious!

Sweet Potato Salad:
*3 l bs sweet potatoes cubed (you can peel them, but the skin has all sorts of vitamins, so if you don't have an aversion, I suggest keeping it)
*1.5 cups non fat plain greek yogurt
*1 tbs packed splenda brown sugar blend
*drizzle sugar free maple syrup
*1 cup walnuts chopped
*3/4 cup raisins
*cinnamon to taste

Boil sweet potatoes until tender but not mushy (approx 7-8 min). Combine yogurt with splenda brown sugar, syrup and cinnamon. Add potatoes and stir. Stir in walnuts and raisins. Refrigerate and enjoy!

Macaroni Salad:
*13 oz box whole wheat macaroni
*1.5 cups light miracle whip
*2 tbs dijon mustard
*1 bundle celery chopped
*chopped clausen dill pickles to taste
*6 hard boiled egg whites chopped
*3 hard boiled eggs chopped
*salt, pepper, spike and paprika to taste

Boil macaroni until al dente. Drain. Mix in all other ingredients. Refrigerate and enjoy! Sooo easy!

Lucky #2

So it's not a recipe, today I decided to post something different. I've been reading this blog which I found from an other blog I love. Whoo I feel fancy. That was my first time turning words into links! Haha, anyway, I was reading the first blog "Carrots n cake" and reading some of her work outs before I went to the gym this morning so I got motivated and decided to make up my own running interval work out and see how it went. Well, it kicked my ass and so today I decided I'd post a work out to change things up :O)

Now I usually get a little self conscious to talk about things that are hard for me work out wise because I feel like everyone else will think it's easy and I will feel lame, but whatever. I'm not a good runner or even an actual runner for that matter, but I like it and my body responds best to short amounts of time due to totally awfully constructed achilles tendins that are far too short, so today I did this:

*2 min walk (3.5)
*2 min jog (5.5)
*2 min walk (3.5)
*2 min jog (6.0)
*2 min walk (3.5)
*2 min run (6.5)
*2 min walk (3.5)
*2 min run (7.0)
*2 min walk (3.5)
*2 min run (7.5)
*3 min walk (3.5....I needed an extra minute and it made the first half an even 30 min)
*2 min run (8.0...OUCH!)
*5 min recovery walk (3.0)
Thennnn....
I repeated the whole thing in one minute spurts, then walked 2 min @ 3.5 and because all of the sudden I wanted to prove something to myself sprinted a minute @ 8.5 and looked like a total freak I'm sure haha.

So that took me to 45 min then I just walked @ 3.0 until I hit 4 mi which I decided was a good stopping point which took like an other 8 min. So those of you that are way more in shape than me could def bump up the interval times, add an incline or increase the speeds, but I was pretty surprised at how sweaty and tired I actually got. At 6.5 I was like "I GOT THIS" then at 7.5 I was like "Uhmmm...can I really actually get through 8.0?!" But I CAN and I did and even if you think you can't, I suspect that you can surprise yourself!

I've been in a total on and off work out rut, but today made me feel good! I think I'm getting my motivation back--I hope so anyway! :O)