Baked Pizza Pasta

I made this the other night, and although I started with another recipe, I just wanted to make this easy and I know my husband likes meat, so I used some turkey pepperoni I had left over.  This was simple and good, although not full of flavor.  There are 276 calories in 1/12 of the total.  Aaron and I gave this a 7, Owen gave it a 6, and Noah gave it a perfect 10.

1 lb pasta
6 c marinara sauce
1/2 c parmesan cheese
34 pepperoni slices
2 c Italian blend cheese
Italian seasoning, to taste

Cook pasta until al dente.  Preheat oven to 400 and grease 13x9 in pan.  Mix pasta and marinara together.  Layer half in the bottom of the prepared pan, then cover with pepperoni, and 1/2 the cheeses.  Repeat, and season with Italian seasoning.  Cook for 20 minutes in the oven.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!  I am so grateful for my life, my family, and most especially my Savior.  We love all of you!  Have a safe and filling ;) Thanksgiving.

Chicken Enchilada Soup

We used to have this all the time when we lived in Mexico, and I hadn't made it for such a long time, but I was looking for something good and filling, and easy, and I happened to remember this recipe.  My sister Sonia is the one who introduced us to this soup, and I'm glad she did!  Sorry for the picture, I almost forgot to take it, and there are no tomatoes or cilantro in it to add color, so it looks terrible, but I promise the soup is delicious!  For 1/8 of the total, the calories are 434.  Kind of high, if you use half and half like you are supposed to, it will be less, I used more cream and a little milk because I didn't have any half and half.  Aaron, Noah and I gave this a 9, and Owen gave it an 8.

Chicken Enchilada Soup

 

1 lb boneless skinless chicken      2 chicken bouillon cubes

3 T. butter or margarine        2 c half and half cream

1 clove garlic            ¼ to 1 tsp. hot pepper sauce

½ c chopped onion Fresh cilantro and/or parsley (dried works as well)

4 oz can chopped green chilies            1 can (16 oz) cream-style corn (optional)

½ to 1 tsp. ground cumin                    2 c shredded Monterey Jack cheese

1 c hot water                                      1 med tomato, chopped

Cut chicken into bite-size pieces. In a large pan, brown chicken, onion, and garlic in butter until chicken

in no longer pink. Add green chilies and cumin. Pour in water and add bouillon. Bring to a boil.

Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 5 minutes. Add cream, cheese, corn, cilantro, and hot pepper sauce.

Cook and stir over low heat until the cheese is melted. Stir in tomato. Simmer until tomato is heated

through. Serve immediately. Garnish with more cilantro or parsley if desired. Yield: 6-8 servings

Yogurt Pancakes

Thanks to my awesome brother-in-law for these yummy pancakes!

 

My sister Sonia and her husband went to a bed and breakfast in Utah and had these pancakes, which are really good, and Joe asked for the recipe, which the B&B kindly gave him.  They have shared the recipe with me, and now I am sharing them with you :).  These made 18 pancakes for us, and each pancake was 95 calories using skim milk and Greek yogurt.  Use any flavor yogurt to get new pancakes each time.  Grandma was here with us, and she and I gave them a 9, Noah gave them an 8, and Owen and Aaron gave them a 7 because although they liked them, they wanted chocolate chip pancakes.  Oh well :).

 

 

Yogurt Pancakes

 

Sonia and Joe

2 eggs    2 cups flour

1 ¼ cups milk    3 T sugar

2 T oil    2 tsp baking powder

7 oz yogurt, any flavor    ½ tsp salt

1/8 tsp baking soda

 

Mix all wet ingredients and then add dry ingredients, beating just until mixed. If too thick, add a little more milk. Cook like normal pancakes. Very yummy and moist. Will go further than regular pancakes.



Crustless Pumpkin Pie, or Pumpkin Pudding

This is one of those great crockpot recipes from the cookbook 365 Days of Slow-Cooking.  This is definitely my favorite crockpot cookbook, and this is another winner.  The calories for 6 servings are 296 calories/serving.  Here's what you do.

16 oz canned pumpkin
1 T pumpkin pie spice
2 T butter, melted
2 eggs
4 oz cream cheese softened
3/4 c sugar
1/2 c flour
2 t vanilla
1/2 t baking powder

Mix these all together and cook in a greased slow cooker for 3-5 hours.  Top with whipped cream. 

So easy, Aaron gave it a 7, Owen gave it a 6, and Noah and I gave it a 9.  You can tell who likes pumpkin around here :).  This is a great, easy, no fuss alternative to pumpkin pie.  It tastes great and requires so little preparation.

Chicken Pizzaiola

This is such an easy meal.  Owen gave it an 8, Aaron and I gave it a 9, and Noah gave it a perfect 10.  This is Chicken Pizzaiola from Cook's Illustrated, and we really like this meal.  It's tasty and quick to make.  I use turkey pepperoni to cut down on the calories, but other than that I follow the recipe exactly.

1 lb chicken tenders
turkey pepperoni
1 c grated parmesan
1 c grated mozzarella (I use a little more)
3 c marinara sauce
salt and pepper
Pasta to serve

Preheat oven to 450.  Salt and pepper the chicken pieces well (do not undersalt!).  Spread the parmesan in a dish and coat the chicken pieces liberally with parmesan.  Grease a 9x13 pan.  Pour marinara in the bottom.  Place chicken pieces on top.  Cook for 15 minutes, then carefully (sauce splatters and it's hot!) remove the pan from the oven and increase oven temperature to 475. 
Cover chicken pieces with pepperoni slices, then cover with mozzarella cheese.  Cook for an additional 5 minutes, until cheese is melted.  (I cooked mine a bit longer.)  Serve with pasta.

This ends up being about 275 calories per serving, and this recipe makes 6 servings.  So great!

Pumpkin Apple Spice Muffins

These were a really good, easy muffin.  We liked it, and Jonah helped me make them by banging measuring spoons and cups together while I made them :).  I found the recipe here, and am glad we tried these.  I love me some pumpkin, so I'm glad they turned out well.  Noah and I gave them a 9, and Owen gave them a 7 because he didn't like the apple chunks.  He said otherwise they would've been a 9.  I followed the recipe exactly, so here it is from the tastykitchen.com website.
1-⅔ cup All-purpose Flour
1 cup Sugar
1 Tablespoon Pumpkin Pie Spice
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
¼ teaspoons Salt
¼ teaspoons Baking Powder
1 cup Pureed Pumpkin
½ cups Butter, Melted
2 whole Large Eggs, Lightly Beaten
1 whole Granny Smith Apple, Peeled, Cored, And Finely Chopped
* * * * * *
FOR PUMPKIN SUGAR CRUST:
3 Tablespoons Sugar
1 teaspoon Pumpkin Pie Spice

Combine first 6 ingredients in a large bowl. Make a well in the center of the mixture. Combine pumpkin, butter, and eggs in another bowl and add to the dry ingredients, stirring just until moistened. Fold in chopped apple and spoon into greased muffin pans, filling two-thirds full.
Combine 3 tablespoons sugar and 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice; sprinkle evenly over muffins. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Cool on wire racks.

These were super simple and they turned out well.  I only got 20 out of the recipe, rather than the 24 the recipe said, and so each muffin was 141 calories.