Lamb and Feta Lasagna

This month’s Cooking Light has a feature on lightened lasagnas.  Can’t beat low-cal lasagna!  Oddly enough, the lightest of the bunch was a lamb and feta.  Two things we both loved, lower-cal…that’s a winner!  I did not deviate from the recipe except to use my own tomato sauce instead of canned, and it was very good as-is…the only change I would make besides would be to add some spinach for some bulk and color.  I would stay to stick with an actual marinara/tomato sauce over just the canned crushed tomatoes – whether homemade or a jar, it will lend more flavor.  Definitely a great “light” lasagna!  This made a ton so plenty of leftovers for lunch, or a lazy cooking night…always a good thing!

lamblasagna

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Baked French Fries

A year ago I went on a business trip to Brussels (and London after), and I have definitely been thinking a lot about those nine days in Europe this weekend!  Beyond the fact that it was a wonderful, fun, life-changing trip, the food was awesome. 😉  So to celebrate this weekend, I made Moules Frites, or mussels and chips, served with some delicious Belgian beer and a baguette to soak up the broth from the moules.  Here is the recipe for the fries, which is a tried and true one for me.

frenchries

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Lentil and Chicken Soup

I spent a couple of weeks hemming and hawing over making this soup because I kept finding things I’d rather make instead.  Mistake!  This was awesome, filling, and very low cal.  I got this from Skinnytaste, where I consistently have good luck.  I tweaked this recipe to use chicken stock instead of water for cooking the lentils to give them some extra flavor.  If you have any homemade stock, that would be even better.  You could make this vegetarian, but I’d bulk it up with some potatoes or another root to give it substance.  This makes a TON of soup, plenty to freeze and take to lunch!

lentil_chicken_soup

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Corn Salad

A colorful and fun side salad, this is one I’ve served mostly with Latin or Mexican themed meals.  It has a lot of flavor and dresses up chicken and pork especially well, I have found.  This would be a good one at a picnic or BBQ.  If you can do fresh corn with this, great – about 3 -4 ears.  If not, a bag of thawed out frozen corn would be fine too.

cornsalad

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Cuban Rice Cooked in Black Beans

This is one of my absolute favorite dishes, great as a main or side.  I usually make this with carnitas or fish tacos, and then take the leftovers to lunch for a week. 🙂  I got this recipe eons ago from Epicurious, originally from a book called “Latin Grilling,” and I love it exactly how it is written.  A very festive and flavorful way to make rice.  You could lighten this up by using some turkey bacon, and I have tried this with brown rice as well as white…brown rice was also excellent.  Just required more cooking time of course.

Recipe!

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Asparagus with Lemon and Feta

This is a bright take on asparagus, a vegetable we serve a *lot* since it’s Shawn’s favorite.  I usually roast it with just a bit of salt and pepper, but this was very fresh and went well with chicken; I think it would do well with fish too.

  • 1 bunch asparagus
  • Kosher salt and pepper
  • pinch of garlic powder
  • Half a lemon, juiced
  • 1/3 cup reduced-fat crumbled feta

Roast or steam asparagus, whichever you prefer.  Slice into small pieces and toss with salt, pepper, garlic powder, lemon juice and feta cheese.

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Slow Cooker Garlic Chicken

This was a very simple dinner in the slow cooker that tasted like it was far more work than it actually was.  We really liked it; I didn’t make any changes to the original except to use split breasts only.  Next time I might throw in some thighs or drumsticks, but just the breasts were excellent – very tender and flavorful.  I think bone in is necessary to the flavor, and we just removed the skin before eating.  I served this with asparagus for a very, very filling dinner.  I originally got this recipe from a website called Recipegirl, and will definitely to back to see what else she’s got!

garlicchicken

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Cheesy Baked Spaghetti Squash

I’m becoming awfully fond of spaghetti squash…I don’t think we’ve encountered a recipe yet that we haven’t liked.  This one was a winner for sure, and definitely satisfied my craving for some good old fashioned comfort food.  I got this one from Skinnytaste, and spiced it up a bit…we loved it.  The original recipe called for two squash, but that was too much for us.  I did not cut the sauce for one squash, and it was still fine (but a smidge soupy).  It was also ridiculously low calorie and made a ton, so there are plenty of leftovers for lunch.

cheesysquash

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Slow Cooker Asian Pork Tenderloin

This was a very easy, healthy recipe for the crock pot that I got from Cooking Light.  I halved the meat called for in the recipe because I only had one tenderloin on hand, but I didn’t halve the sauce….I thought it would be dry otherwise.  I also added some snap peas and red peppers into the final produce, and used shirataki for the noodles.  It was excellent!  Made a lot, and very tasty leftovers for lunch.

garlicpork

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Salad in a Jar

This isn’t so much a recipe as a method of preparing salad, but this has made it super easy to bring salad to work.  I’ve seen it all over the intarwebs and wanted to give it a try.  I made 5 jars worth and it stayed fresh throughout the week.  Note though that I did not add the dressing to the jars themselves, but kept it in little cups on the side.  But for a half an hour of effort (including making two kinds of dressing), we had salad for lunch for the week!  I did a Greek and an Asian variety, but the possibilities are pretty endless, and if you make your own dressing you can keep it pretty low cal.

saladinajar

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