Cream of Broccoli Soup

Let's continue warming ourselves up with lovely veggie soups this week.  Best of all, you can put the soup into a freezer bag, seal tightly and freeze for future use.  Just zap and sip!

Every single time I make Cream of Broccoli soup I look at it and say ‘I’m not gonna like this’ – but I always do!  I guess it’s not so purty as you’re making it but it turns out great.

So yes, you suppose correctly.  Pretty much any kind of vegetable can be made into soup, there is more or less a basic pattern to it but they all taste great.  And to make really great soup you do need some way to puree it; either with an immersion blender (also called a stick blender) or a regular blender, but the regular blender is more of a hassle.

For those of you who are a certain age group, you will be required to sing along with Dana Carvey - …choppin’ broccoleeeeeee…choppin’ broccoliiiiiii, -  during the cutting of the vegetables.

I also secretly chopped up some zucchini and threw it in with the onions because I needed to cook it soon and because the Kid doesn’t like it – what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.  Since you’re going to puree it, you could sneak all kinds of stuff in there.

Cream of Broccoli Soup

serves 4-6

1 tbsp butter and 1 tbsp olive oil

1 onion, chopped

1 clove of garlic, chopped

16 oz broccoli florets, fresh (or frozen and thawed)

1/2 cup sharp cheddar cheese

4 cups chicken or veggie broth

1/2 cup milk or cream or half & half

2 tbsp sour cream

salt and pepper

In a large soup pot, melt butter and olive oil over medium-high heat.  Add onion and cook three minutes until soft, add the garlic.

While onions are cooking, roughly chop up the broccoli and throw into the pot, and sauté in the onions and butter for a few minutes.

Add the broth, cover and simmer.  For fresh broccoli, cook about 10-15 minutes and for thawed broccoli, cook about 3-5 minutes.

Stir in the milk, cheese and sour cream into the pot and puree until smooth.  If you like your soup a bit thicker, combine 2 tablespoons of water and 1 tablespoon of cornstarch in a separate dish and mix into the soup until thickened.

Season to taste with salt and pepper.  Serve with a little dollop of sour cream and a sprinkling of cheddar cheese if you’d like to appear all fancy and gourmet.

1/2 cup of soup = 1 vegetable serving and 1/4 fat serving, don't you think?

Print the recipe:  Cream of Broccoli Soup

Butternut Squash Soup

Is it just me or do you HATE eating salads when it's freezing outside?  Losing weight has made me cold all the time so this week, let's review some WARM COZY VEGGIE SOUPS....aaaaahhhhh that sounds so warm and filling....

This soup was so delicious that the three of us ended up eating it all in one sitting.

I have labeled this as 'easy' but the peeling and cutting up of the butternut squash was a pain.  If you are in a hurry you might want to buy it frozen, (as long as it doesn't have preservatives and stuff added to it) or find it already cut up in the produce section.

Next time I make it I might experiment with roasting it or putting it in the crockpot to soften it up.  Has anyone else tried that?

This soup would be great on all Stages of P10.

Simple Butternut Squash Soup

serves 4-6

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons butter

1 onion, peeled and chopped

1 clove garlic, crushed

2 lbs butternut squash, peeled and diced

3 cups vegetable or chicken stock or broth

salt and freshly ground pepper

parsley for garnishing

Heat the oil and butter in a large saucepan and gently saute the onion and garlic for about 5 minutes.

Add the squash and stock and stir well, bring to a boil.  Lower the heat, cover and simmer for about 25 minutes or until the squash is soft.

Blend the soup with an immersion blender or carefully transfer to a blender and puree until smooth.   If soup is too thick, thin with more broth or add a splash of cream or milk.

Season to taste and serve hot.

We enjoyed this garnished with Parmesan cheese and toasted hulled sunflower seeds.

1/2 cup of soup = 1 veggie serving

Print this recipe:  Butternut Squash Soup

Cheesy Crust Pizza-grain free!

What better way to wrap up pizza week than with my favorite recipe for pizza - enjoy!
PS:  run to the store, grab what you need and make this for dinner tonight!

This is the best grain free pizza crust I have tried to date AND BEST OF ALL - you can hold it like a regular crust pizza and it tastes like one too.  My family could not tell the difference and for those of us craving pizza, this recipe will make you happy and satisfied.

This recipe is courtesy of Free Coconut Recipes and not only does she post the recipe, she also made a video to show how to make it which was very cool…I’m not quite that cool yet.

Here’s the link to Free Coconut Recipes' Gluten Free Pizza Crust.

http://www.freecoconutrecipes.com/index.cfm/2010/2/1/glutenfree-pizza-crust

I have posted the same recipe below with my little tweaks, one of which is that I took the recipe and used 1 1/2 times the ingredients and that was enough to fill a large square baking sheet, which comes out to about 12 pieces of pizza, which is just right for us. 

But you could make extra dough and make personal sized pizzas if you'd like...



I was in a hurry so I just threw on sauce, cheese, cooked organic ground beef and some fresh chopped ham.  But next time I’m definitely gonna charge this up with some freshly sautéed onions and garlic and veggies.

Also – I’m going to make this crust and then slice it up to use as bread and see how that works…

Cheesy Pizza Crust-grain free

Makes 12 pieces – one large baking sheet

Crust:

3 cups (12 oz) whole milk organic mozzarella cheese, shredded

3 large organic eggs

3 tablespoons flax meal

3 tablespoons coconut flour

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Cut 2 pieces of parchment paper out for baking sheet.

Coat hands with olive oil.

Mix cheese, eggs, flax, coconut flour, and baking powder together until a sticky wet dough is formed. Spread with a spatula (or your hands) to 1/4 inch thickness on a baking sheet lined with one piece of parchment paper.

Bake for 30 minutes in preheated oven. Halfway through the baking process, flip crust over by sliding it off the baking sheet with the parchment paper, placing the second piece on the sheet, and turning the crust over unto the new sheet and peeling the old paper off. Return to oven until done baking.

Remove from oven, slide off of parchment paper, and flip over again for cooling. Once crust is cooled, top with sauce, cheese, pre-cooked veggies or meats (see below). Set crust with toppings under the broiler on high for a minute or two until cheese is melted and bubbly. Slice and serve.

Toppings:

2 cups (8 oz) shredded mozzarella cheese

12 oz pizza sauce

Choice of veggie toppings-cooked: bell peppers, onions, garlic, spinach, olives, mushrooms, zucchini, etc.

Choice of meat toppings-cooked:  ground turkey, diced chicken, diced nitrate free sausage

Fresh or dried basil

Fresh or dried oregano

1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese



Sorry I started slapping on sauce before I remembered to take the picture of the crust!



Pizza Quiche

Continuing on with pizza week - let's start Wednesday off with a slightly less easy recipe but still, delicious and it made GREAT leftovers - even for breakfast... 

This was a great warm dinner and an even better reheated lunch the next day.  I had a packet of Boboli pizza sauce in the freezer that I defrosted and used for a topping, and the funny thing is, it was too sweet for our tastebuds.  I used extra garlic and red onions and that was very good.  Pretty much anything you'd use on a pizza would be good in this except for maybe pineapple.

Pizza Quiche

makes 8 servings

adapted from Maria's Delicious and Nutritious Journal

1 cup cottage cheese

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tbsp oregano

6 oz shredded Mozzarella cheese ( 1 1/2 cups)

3 Tbsp grated Parmesan cheese

1/4 cup chopped onions

1 clove garlic, mashed or minced

7 eggs

TOPPINGS:

3 links organic chicken sausage, cut into small chunks

Olives, peppers, sun dried tomatoes, mushrooms...

Marinara sauce for dipping

Preheat oven to 350°F.

In a large mixing bowl combine cottage cheese, baking powder, salt and oregano.  Mix in the cheeses, onions and garlic.  Then stir in the toppings.

Beat the eggs in a separate mixing bowl and slowly stir them into the other mixture until completely combined.

Pour  into a 10” pie plate greased with olive oil.

Bake at 350°F for 40 minutes, until puffy and lightly browned. A knife inserted into the center of the quiche should come out clean. Let rest for 15 minutes.  Serve with a drizzle of marinara sauce.

Print the recipe:  Pizza Quiche

Grilled Portobello Pizza

This week let's talk PIZZA....pizza is one of my triggers.  I can't resist it, and don't tell anyone else, but back in the days of my first marriage when I hated life and loved cheese, I would order a Pizza Hut small six-cheese pizza and eat it myself....talk about a food coma! 
Of course now I love life and still love cheese but I don't get it from Pizza Hut.

Let's start off our Monday with an easy way to get your pizza fix - completely vegetarian!

Today's recipe is courtesy of Cindy Elder - she is an experimenting machine!  She's always throwing stuff together and coming up with neat ideas.  I LOVE this one!  And like she says, you can change it up any way you'd like and come up with your own version of...

Grilled Portobello Pizza

makes 1 serving

recipe courtesy of Cindy Elder

Try this pizza different ways - Asian, Italian, Mexican, curry, chicken...endless possibilities. Like the potato topper phase years ago!

1 portabello mushroom

1 cup assorted veggies, chopped

1/2 tablespoon butter

Garlic powder or other seasonings

1 tablespoon cheese, grated

Wash mushroom and remove stem. Put in the oven under the broiler, at high (but not highest) heat, and let it cook on both sides.

Meanwhile, sauté veggies in butter, (to your taste; I used red onion, bell pepper, zucchini, and later added chopped tomato) seasoned as you'd like (I used garlic powder) for about 5-6 minutes.

Remove mushroom from oven, turn upside down, carefully spoon veggies on top (inside the cap); return to oven and heat for another 5 minutes or so.

Add grated cheese and return to oven until cheese is melted. 

Chocolate Chiapioca Pudding

Let's continue with this week's 'Ideas with Chia' - here a dessert you'll love!

I loves me some chocolate pudding and I'm also interested in using chia seeds so I was eager to try this recipe.  I have a mixer at home and I'll use it at the drop of a hat so I did a cheater version and put everything in the mixer bowl and just turned it on every five minutes until it was ready.

I can't really tell you how much sweetener to use - it's a Jersey thing...no, but really, it's personal preference.  And I kept adding agave and it just didn't taste right, so I added some Truvia and that did it for me.  Wait until it thickens up a little and add the sweetener, mix, taste and then see what more you'd like to do. 

OH - and guess what else?  I had this after dinner one night and I had energy to get up and go - so out I went grocery shopping - and I also did a lot more chores around the house that night than I usually would so this will give you some 'get up and go'.   Best of all, the Kid, who continually mocks my chia gel ate a big bowl of this and thought it was tapioca - so neener neener on her!

One morning I had forgotten to make a new batch of chia gel for my smoothie so I plopped in some of this pudding instead and it worked just fine!  Pudding Smoothie, anyone?


It tastes better than it looks!



PS:  Isn't 'chiapioca' a cute word!  I can't take credit for it though, I got that from Robert on the WB Facebook site. 

Chocolate “Chiapioca” Pudding

makes 4 servings

adapted from Maria's Delicious and Nutritious Journal

3/4 cup chia seeds

2 cups unsweetened vanilla almond milk

    (or use plain almond milk and add a little more vanilla extract)

 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

pinch of salt

sweetener of your choice (agave nectar, Stevia or Truvia) to taste



In a bowl, mix all the ingredients together and then let the pudding set up for a few minutes.

Stir the pudding every five minutes.

After sitting for 20 minutes the chia seeds will thicken up and it resembles tapioca pudding.

Print the recipe:  Chocolate Chiapioca Pudding

Chi-Asian Salmon

Let's continue with an entree we can make this week to go with our 'Ideas with Chia'...

Normally Bubba doesn't care for salmon so I've been racking my brain to find something so deliciously Asian that he can't help but like it.  I also took the liberty of removing the skin from his piece of salmon and turned out that was most of the problem right there, just couldn't appreciate a nice crispy piece of salmon skin.  So, if someone at your table is complaining, try removing the skin and see if that helps them (it's a texture thing).

This was just a great quick and easy dinner and while the salmon was marinating I roasted some broccoli to go with it.  I almost thought about making Tamari Broccoli but even I managed to realize that was a bit overboard.  Balance, balance, balance people!

Oh, and coconut sugar is my new favorite thing BECAUSE it's pretty much the brown sugar substitute of the P10 party!  So I gotta say you do want to use coconut sugar instead of just any sweetener 'cause you wanna get that awesome brown sugar/tamari thing going on.

Or, you could serve this nummy piece of fish over a bed of cool crisp greens and add a sliced avocado.  Shoot, now I gotta go make this again so I can try that....

Chi-Asian Salmon

4 pieces of salmon, about 6 oz each (or one large fillet if you prefer)

3 tablespoons coconut sugar

2 tablespoons tamari

1 teaspoon rice wine vinegar

1 teaspoon chia seeds

In a small bowl mix the sugar, tamari and rice vinegar.

Pour the mixture into a ziplock bag and place the salmon in the bag. Marinate the salmon for 20 minutes.   (this would be a good time to start some veggies roasting in the oven).

Turn the oven on to the broil setting. Cover a baking sheet with foil and put the salmon skin side down on the foil.

For the smaller pieces, broil for about 8 minutes;

for the large whole filet, broil for about 15 minutes or until the fish is thoroughly cooked and flakes easily on a fork.

Sprinkle the salmon with chia seeds and serve.