Today called for a family favorite for dinner.  It was a tough one, Gidget had to go to the emergency room and we found out she has pancreatitis.   Poor little thing is staying overnight at the hospital.  And, let me tell ya, that’s like staying at the Four Seasons… in the penthouse suite.  For that price I can only hope that she is getting champagne pumped into her with her fluids.  If you don’t have a pet, the things we do for our pets makes us sound like crazy people.  But, when you have one, you are absolutely aware of your pet on-set insanity and you don’t apologize for it one bit. My non-pet-owning bank account thinks I’m crazy.  And I agree.

After all this drama, for dinner tonight I wanted something comforting.  One of this house’s favorite dishes, esp. Adam’s, is this chicken pocket of goodness. I asked Adam what we should name it as I began to write this post, and his first suggestion was all we needed, “Chicken Delisiousness”. Yep, nailed it. This dish is super easy to make, it’s the perfect comfort dish and it’s still not going to blow your calorie budget.

This one is not necessarily the best photo, unless you see the dish for all it is.  Hopefully these photos help tell the story.  And the story is deeeeelisssh.

This medium chicken breast is stuffed with bacon, light cream cheese, green onions, parsley, salt and pepper and wrapped in a light flaky dough.  Unfortunately, we don’t live in food heaven, so we can’t have bacon everyday.  When a recipe, like this, calls for 1-2 pieces of bacon, I’ve found that you can buy just two slices from the meat counter.  Rather than buying a whole pack, you can get just what you need, save some cash [I'll take anything I can get with The Gidge at the Four Seasons (re:VCA Hospital)], and not be tempted to eat bacon every morning. Oh.. but that would be great, wouldn’t it?

Recipe for this family fave below. But first, story time..

*After you finish stuffing the chicken and wrapping it in pastry – this should be about what it looks like. I cut the sheet horizontally, placed a 1/3 of it on the bottom, laid the chicken down and then wrapped the other 2/3 over the top and pinched the two together*

 *Insert perfectly crispy/ flaky breaking sound here*

*an inside look at what heaven looks like*

]]> http://lemonsandlunges.com/2013/09/14/comfort-food-alert-chicken-deliciousness/feed/ 1 http://lemonsandlunges.com/2013/09/06/falalalala-let-your-ingredients-sing/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=falalalala-let-your-ingredients-sing http://lemonsandlunges.com/2013/09/06/falalalala-let-your-ingredients-sing/#comments Fri, 06 Sep 2013 06:22:00 +0000 http://lemonsandlunges.com/?p=301

It’s funny how your life and priorities change as you get older.  How you become what your high school self would consider the LAMEST person EVER. And how you just love every minute of it.  When I was in high school, the moment any friend’s parents were going to be out of the house for longer than 4 hours we were concocting a plan to have a party and have every person we’ve ever know be there to enjoy some Beast Ice and Boone’s Farm (if you know, you know) in a basement or garage.  Now, I won’t even answer the door if you come over unannounced.  I mean I will, but I won’t like it.

Now, my “social hour” is during boot camp (I do have friends… right guys?? Are you out there?? But during the week, it’s me being lamer than your Grandma.) As much as I love creating and finding fun recipes, sometimes there’e something to be said for letting your food have a little “alone time” of its own and just letting the main ingredients sing.  The summer provides so many naturally flavorful fruits and veggies – I try to take advantage of that as much as possible.  Tonight, I let my dinner components stay home from the ingredient party and kept it really simple.  This is the kind of clean eating that gives you no excuses – it’s simple, low carb and will make your body feel great.

Tonight we dug into Grilled Lemon Pepper Salmon on a bed of sauteed garlic spinach with heirloom tomatoes on the side.

Ingredients:

• 3/4 pound of wild caught salmon (cut in half)
• 1 large bunch of spinach, washed and chopped
• 2 small cloves of garlic, chopped
• 1 tsp. olive oil
• 2 heirloom tomatoes, sliced
• 1 lemon
• Lemon Pepper Seasoning
• Salt to taste

Preparation:

Preheat grill.  Season salmon with lemon pepper and salt (optional). Grill for 7-10 minutes, skin side down until fish flakes easily with fork.

During the last 4 minutes of cooking, saute garlic in olive oil over medium heat, about 30 seconds.  Add spinach and a pinch of salt and stir while it wilts.

Plate sliced tomatoes, spinach and salmon on top.  Sprinkle with lemon and serve immediately.

The key to Camping for Foodie success is preparation.  I prepped the night before for about an hour and I was able to put together meals all weekend quickly and super easily.  To make this easier to digest, I’m going to separate this into two posts.  Today, I’ll run down the night before prep!

Please note this picture of Adam: He insisted I get on higher ground to take this photo of him.  We were about 200 feet up and the angle he requested makes him appear like he’s on the ground. bahahahahaha. So much for drama.

Night Before Prep:

Chop the following produce:

• 4 peppers (red, green, orange or yellow), 3 chopped and 1 sliced
• 1/2 onion, chopped
• 1/2 onion, skewer-sized (slice a few pieces just for the sauteed peppers and onions)
• 5 cherry tomatoes, halved
• 1 green onion, chopped
• 1 avocado, cubed
• 1 mango, cubed
• 1 zucchini, thick sliced
• Cantaloupe, cubed
• strawberries, halved
•  grapes, whole

Throw last three produce items in a tupperware and store in fridge.  Grab a few for yourself to snack on while you prepare the rest.

Make this Mango Avocado Salad.  Store in tupperware in the fridge. Comes together in less than 10 minutes and keeps for up to four days!

I began boiling the water for the Best Ever Pasta Salad while I was making the Mango Salad. Once pasta is done, make pasta salad.  Store in tupperware in fridge.

Chop 1 lb. top sirloin and add to a gallon ziploc bag with 1 chopped pepper, 1 skewer-sized onion, 1 chopped zuccini and this marinade.  Lay flat in fridge overnight.

Saute the sliced pepper and onions in a little olive oil.  Once tender crisp, transfer to a small tupperware in fridge.

Bag the tomatoes and green peppers in a small ziploc bag. Store in fridge overnight.

Bag all ingredients for meals together in separate plastic shopping bags. That made it soooo much easier to just grab a plastic shopping bag out of the cooler for each meal and know all the items were in it, rather than having to dig around for an hour like it’s your Tory Burch.

Things to remember in your dry foods bag:

• Heavy Duty Tin Foil
• 4 skewers
• Paper Towels
• Anti-bacterial
• Baby Wipes
• 2 steak knives
• Paper plates, cups and utensils
• Grill utensils
• Mustard
• Lemon Pepper seasoning

Now that you’re prepped – stay tuned for all the Camping for Foodies recipes tomorrow including…

Lemon Butter Campfire Salmon with Mango Slaw

Hungryman Camping Breakfast

Healthy Hiker’s Lunch

Soy-Marinated Sirloin Skewers with Grilled Asparagus and Best Ever Pasta Salad

• And the best camping secret EVER!

One reason why I love summer cooking so much is the easy clean-up when you grill up your dinner.  Today was suuuuper hot in San Diego and after an extra sweaty session of boot camp, all I could think about was eating a light, fresh dinner.   Adam is back from another out of town trip and the last thing I wanted to do was waste any time cleaning dishes, so this dinner hit the spot and checked all the boxes – Clean Eating, Low Carb, Fresh Ingredients, Easy Clean-up.  CHECK!

This would be a great meal for this weekend as well!  Any fun plans for Labor Day?  Not laboring, I hope. That’s unpatriotic, tell your boss I said so and proceed to your bbq/pool party/etc.. Adam and I are going to Joshua Tree for some hiking, camping and off-the-gridding, I’m really excited to figure out some creative camping food.  This gal doesn’t do hot dogs more than once a year.  And I’ve already been to a baseball game, so…. you do the math.

Chicken Chipotle Skewers with Avocado Creme

Ingredients:

Chicken

• juice of 1 lime
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1/2 t kosher salt
• 1/2t  chili powder
• 1/2t paprika
• 1/4t  cumin
• 1/8t cayenne pepper
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 1/2t light brown sugar
• 1 1/2t minced chipotle in adobo
• 1 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts cut into 1 1/2-inch pieces
• minced fresh parsley, to garnish

Avocado Cream Sauce

• 1 avocado
• 1/2 cup nonfat greek yogurt
• 1 clove garlic
• Juice of 1 lime

Directions

Whisk together the lime juice, canola oil, salt, chili powder, paprika, cumin, cayenne pepper, garlic, brown sugar, and chipotle in a pie plate. Add the pieces of chicken and toss to coat. Cover the plate with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes (or up to an hour), stirring and turning the chicken once at the halfway point as it marinates. (OR just toss it all in a gallon ziplock, shake it up and lay flat on in the fridge – turning once)

Preheat grill to medium-high heat. While it’s heating up, thread the chicken onto skewers (throw away any remaining marinade). Transfer the kebabs to the grill, and cook, turning every few minutes so all sides are browned, until an instant-read thermometer registers 160 F. Transfer the kebabs to a plate, tent with foil to keep warm, and allow to rest for at least 5 minutes.

Meanwhile, make the avocado sauce: Split the avocado in half and remove the pit. Scoop out the flesh and add to the bowl of a food processor along with the yogurt, garlic, and lime juice. Process until the sauce is smooth, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary. Season the sauce to taste with salt and pepper. Sprinkle the kebabs with the minced parsley to garnish, and serve with the avocado sauce for dipping.

Side: I added a tomato, avocado, cherry tomato and bacon salad.  Just chop everything up; add salt, pepper, a drop of Tabasco and a tiny bit of olive oil and you’ve got a perfect summer side!

My junior year of college our school built a new gym that got national attention for how state of the art it was.  I was back earlier than most from winter break and was excited to be able to check out the new digs before it was overrun by the rest of the returning students.  Let me preface this story with the fact that I was no gym rat and was very unfamiliar with most of the equipment.  So, obviously, I pretended to know EXACTLY what I was doing as I made my way down to the the weight area.  I saddled up to a machine and began working on my stretching.  About one minute later, one of the more popular guys in our school locks eyes with me from across the gym… and STARTS APPROACHING.  ”Clearly, he’s impressed by my fitness level and knowledge and is coming over to ask me to be partners… in the gym and out ;)” were my exact thoughts.

Well, JK (we’ll call him that for now), finally gets over to me and asks if I know that the machine (that my foot is in the strap of, with my leg is over my head), is an arm machine.  AN ARM MACHINE. Well, no I did not. Thanks.  So, I did what any other girl in my position would do, I immediately shot back with, “Yeah, I know.  This is just a stretching technique my trainer taught me.” 

Then, I removed my foot from the hand strap, after a three minute struggle because shoes are bigger than hands, and left the weight area with my butt cheeks clenched in horror.

That moment when you realize you’ve been doing something wrong the whole time… awwkkkkarrd.  Well, I just recently found out that I’ve been doing something else wrong the whole time, thanks to my friend Matt (hheyyyyy Matt!!).  For years, I’ve been diligent about making sure I clean and prepare chicken properly to avoid cross contamination and last week I found out,  my efforts have been more dangerous than helpful!

So, I wanted to share with all of you, so you no longer find yourself putting your foot in the hand strap of chicken preparation.

BIG LESSON: Don’t wash that chicken!  Food safety experts have recently found that when you wash raw chicken, something called aerosolization happens — an invisible spray that’s going to potentially carry that bacteria for a foot or two feet. That means your cutting surfaces, food on the counter, utensils, etc. could all be getting hit with the spray.

You’re better to just pat the chicken down with a paper towel and the cooking process with take care of the rest.  Can you believe we’ve been doing it wrong all along??  How awkward.

Now that we know, let’s not kill ourselves with e-coli spraying around the kitchen and enjoy this skinny chicken alfredo “spaghetti”.  The recipe is made with spaghetti squash – and while it’s no noodle impostor as some people want to trick you into thinking – it IS a great alternative for a super healthy dinner. And this has tons of flavor and none of the guilt.  THAT’S doing dinner right, if you ask me.

Skinny Chicken Alfredo with Spaghetti Squash

Ingredients:

• 1 medium-sized spaghetti squash
• 1T light butter
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced
• 2T flour
• 1.5 cups of fat free milk
• 1T reduced-fat cream cheese
• 1 cup of fresh grated Parmesan cheese
• salt, pepper and red pepper flakes
• 2 small grilled chicken breasts (I seasoned them with salt, pepper, cayannne pepper and lemon & garlic Old Bay)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cut squash in half lengthwise, scoop out seeds and place in a shallow pan cut side down with 1-2T of water.  Cook for 45 minutes.

Remove from oven and let cool slightly. Once cooled,  use a fork to gently scrape the “spaghetti” strands into the center.  Set aside.

In saucepan, melt butter and add garlic.  Let cook on medium heat for 1-2 minutes, until soft and fragrant.  Whisk in flour, cooking for another minute while stirring. Whisk in milk until no lumps remain. Once hot, add cream cheese and stir until smooth. Remove from the heat. Stir in Parmesan, salt and pepper.

Spoon sauce equally into each spaghetti squash half. Gently pull up the spaghetti strands to coat as much as possible with the sauce. Top with extra Parmesan and place under the broiler of your oven for 2-3 minutes, or until golden and bubbly.

Sprinkle with red pepper flakes and serve with grilled chicken.

Holy moly.  I was NOT expecting that. And the fact that it came out of Ashton Kutcher’s mouth and was so thought provoking makes me uncomfortable.  However, it was out of Kelso’s mouth and it did make me take stock in a few things. Big takeaways: Opportunity looks like hard work; sexy is being smart, thoughtful and kind; build your life, don’t just live it.

It’s so nice to have the two of you, plus that homeless dude outside of bootcamp, reading L&L.  Thanks for paying attention to my little something that makes me feel like I’m checking the box on all three of those things. What is the thing that drives you?

As a thank you, I’ve prepared a super simple, summer-tastic, pizza that you’ll be coming back to all summer.  Promise.

Fresh Peach, Basil, Prosciutto & Brie Cheese French Bread Pizza

Ingredients

• 1 french bread loaf (preferably whole grain), sliced in half, lengthwise
• 1-2 ripe peaches, pitted and thinly sliced (Try to buy organic, these are part of the “Dirty Dozen“)
• 4 ounces of Brie cheese, thinly sliced
• 2 tablespoons freshly chopped basil
• 1 package of prosciutto
• 2 teaspoons olive oil, divided
• 1 cup balsamic vinegar
• dash of salt

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
2. Place bread on baking sheet and brush olive oil over each half. Sprinkle with a dash of salt. Top each half with brie cheese slices and peaches. Bake for 10 minutes. Broil for 30 seconds until cheese gets a tiny bit brown and bubbly.
3. Place vinegar in a small saucepan over medium-high heat; cook until reduced to 2 tablespoons (about 5 minutes).
4. Drizzle balsamic reduction evenly over pizza and top with basil and prosciutto. Cut pizza into wedges and serve

**I paired this with some roasted broccoli.  Chop up a head of fresh broccoli, shake it up with garlic, olive oil, kosher salt and fresh ground pepper.  Roast at 425 degrees for 15-20 minutes, stirring halfway through.**