Tag: Dairy Free

Fuel your body during COVID-19: Easy Veggie Soup with Sausage – (use old veggies that look ugly/go bad)

On By Thinks with SpinksIn Fitness, FoodLeave a comment
the veg

Hello everyone. Yup I had a fridge full of the ugly veggies that I took pictures of for my previous fuel your body post. I wanted to do something with them, so I decided to make it easy on myself and make a veggie sausage soup. You can totally make this vegan with no sausage, but with my family of pre teens they will riot if I don’t feed them.

I had onions, carrots, cellary that was starting to look wilting, and one stalk even looked a little anemic. I had tomatoes that were not firm any more, bell peppers that were wrinkly and not as beautiful, and a staple in my house Yukon Gold potatoes. I had one container of chicken stock, but you can sub veggie stock to make it vegetarian/vegan.

Our stores still don’t have all the products we are used to. Our shipping is over loaded. So I bought what was on sale, and what I could find. When I got home I realized I bought beer bratwurst. So I just went with it.

This recipe can be altered to be:

  1. Vegetarian/Vegan

This recipe is:

  1. Gluten Free (unless you make the bred below)
  2. Dairy Free
  3. Full of Fiber
  4. Full of nutrients
  5. Low in fat
  6. Low in salt

Anyway it came out fantastic. So here is what I did.

Easy Veggie Soup with Sausage

Ingredients:

Yield: 8 servings

  1. 4 cups of stock Chicken/Veggie your preference
  2. 4 really ripe soft tomatoes chopped
  3. 4 cups of Yukon Gold potatoes chopped
  4. 2 cups of carrots chopped
  5. 4 stalks of celery chopped even the leafy tops
  6. 1 yellow onion chopped
  7. 2 green bell peppers or 2 cups chopped
  8. 1 tablespoon of ginger sliced about the top part of your thumb worth of ginger
  9. 2 cloves of garlic chopped
  10. 2 cups of water
  11. 1 tablespoon of salt
  12. Pepper to taste
  13. Beer Bratwurst 5 casing cut removed and sauteed

Directions:

  1. Saute onions, ginger till fragrant, add meat that has been removed from casing, and saute till cooked.
  2. Add hard veggies and the rest of the aromatics, carrots, potatoes, garlic, and celery. Stir together to heat.
  3. Add stock, and water, bring to a boil and lower heat to medium. Let cook for about 10 to 15 minutes.
  4. Add soft veggies tomatoes, and peppers. Let cook another 10 minutes.
  5. Serve piping hot. I made home made bread with it, and the family gobbled it up. It made enough to have it for two nights with 4 people.

I will put a link to the bread recipe I used. It is a no knead dough, that uses yeast.

https://www.melskitchencafe.com/rustic-crusty-bread-a-simple-how-to/?fbclid=IwAR1pfUZw-Be0sV68x6MwE51elzx_49rAYZsfv8_nyxR2Xgj-SXh2s5RBHOA

This was a hit with my family. We had warm crusty bread. Delicious soup with so much depth of flavor. They gobbled it up.

I hope this post finds you and your family healthy and happy. Please stay safe, wash your hands, and take the precautions you need. Thank you for reading. Please feel free to ask any questions you may have. Would you like to see posts about baking breads?

Fuel my body, during COVID-19 shortages…Strawberry Banana Lime Oatmeal Breakfast Bake

On By Thinks with SpinksIn Fitness, Food, RecipeLeave a comment

Good morning… yup I hear my family fussing about hunger. So here is what I came up with this morning.

This recipe is:

  1. Gluten free if you need it(make sure to get the gluten free oats/means it is processed away from glutenous products)
  2. Can be dairy free
  3. Vegetarian
  4. Can Be Sugar free if you choose sugar alternatives (like Stevia, equal)
  5. Natural Sugar ( Like honey, or agave nectar) or omit the sugar all together.
  6. Has a good amount of protein and fiber to fill your family up.

Right now there is a shortage of eggs in my area. I had to go to 3 stores to find them. A lot of the pre-made or instant items are being taken, so you are left with rolled oats, some produce, milk if you are lucky, but soy, almond, and alternative milks are around.

This is a great recipe for using “ugly” fruit. Fruits and or Veggies that are not the prettiest, and have been picked over, are great in baked items. My banana was going the way of the Dodo, and had some bruises, however, it still baked up just fine.

Luckily for me??? Am I lucky? I am lactose intolerant. So I tend to have alternative milk products around.

I was able to find strawberries, bananas, limes, had coconut milk, and had non instant oatmeal at home.

I decided to make a tropical-ish baked oatmeal breakfast… Can we imagine we are away on a deserted island, I mean we have the isolation part right? Win!

You can make this the night ahead and heat it up in the morning. You can also remove from the pan and wrap completely, and freeze if you have leftovers.

Enough talking here is the recipe:

Strawberry Banana Lime Baked Oatmeal

Ingredients:

  1. 2 cups of rolled oats
  2. 1/3 cup of granulated sweetener ** (or leave it out)
  3. 1 1/2 cups of milk (sub almond, soy, coconut)
  4. 1/2 cups of milk (sub lime juice, orange juice, or water)
  5. 1 tsp baking powder
  6. 1/2 tsp salt
  7. 8 oz/221 grams of Strawberries
  8. 1 each/100 grams ripe banana
  9. 1 egg
  10. 1 lime zested (optional)
  11. 1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

  1. Set oven to 375 degrees F
  2. Mix the dry ingredients, oatmeal, sugar, baking powder, salt, mix in half of the strawberries, and half zest
  3. Grease or spray a 2 quart pan, and put dry ingredients down. Layer fruit on top.
  4. Whisk together wet ingredients, milk, juice, egg, vanilla
  5. Pour wet ingredients over
  6. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, depending on oven. Take it out when top of the oatmeal is browned nicely.
  7. Enjoy hot, or let it cool down and enjoy at room temperature.

I hope you get a chance to try this. It is adaptable to other fruits, and keep in mind it is a great use of fruits that are not the prettiest.

This serves ~ 6 servings. Total calories depends on the ingredients you use. But about 200 to 250 calories.

** Use any type of granulated sugar or sugar substitute that you can measure same as sugar. Honey is sweeter on the pallet. So conversion is 1 cup of sugar to 1/2 cup to 2/3 cup of honey.

Thank you for reading. You can use this time to adapt your goals and try something new. You can still stick to your healthy lifestyle its just going to take some tweaks and ingenuity. Have a great day and stay healthy.

Quick Note: Don’t throw away those squeezed limes. You can slice them up and put those in your water, for lime flavored water.

Fuel my body, during COVID-19 shortages? Berry Chia Coconut Pudding!

On By Thinks with SpinksIn Fitness, Food, RecipeLeave a comment
I had to make it instagram pretty.

So in this time of toilet paper, and hand sanitizer shortages. Shortages on meat, shelf stable staples (rice, noodles, beans, canned goods), and water. (This is the case at least in the good old U.S.A.) I noticed the foods that are readily available still are the highly processed granola bars, terrible chips/snacks (although those are going quickly too), fresh veggies, and the healthy food section.

I am going to put up recipes in this Fueling My Body During COVID-19 Shortages, that utilize the health foods (such as chia, vegan protein powders, quinoa and the likes), veggies that are getting left behind, and other products it looks like people are not using.

Interesting to note, the first pastas to go were the spaghetti and angel hair pasta. The linguine were left behind, people were not buying it. Do they not know you can still use that pasta in many pasta dishes? Even substitute it in spaghetti dishes. It may not be traditional but it will still feed you and your family.

So for today I made a berry chia coconut pudding. Aside from the coconut milk which I was out of. All these ingredients I regularly have in my pantry. Because I love to use them in my foods.

Enough with the expounding or lets be honest my prattling on, here is the recipe.

Berry Chia Coconut Pudding

Ingredients:

  1. 6 tablespoons/ 60grams of Chia seeds
  2. 1 tablespoon/23 grams of honey
  3. 1/4 cup/20 oz of coconut milk
  4. 1 whole/108 grams of ripe banana
  5. 1 cup/131 grams of frozen berries

Optional Toppings:

  1. 1 tsp/15 grams yogurt (omit for dairy free, vegan)
  2. 2 tbs/20 grams frozen berries
  3. pinch of desiccated coconut

Directions:

  1. Blend together a banana, and a cup of frozen berries. If you need to splash a little coconut milk in it to allow for better pureeing.
  2. Measure out chia seeds, and milk and mix together in a bowl.
  3. Pour in fruit blend. Taste… it is plenty sweet with the fruit, but I wanted a more dessert like taste for this so I added the 1 tbs of honey to the mixture.
  4. If you are going to make it pretty spoon it in to the individual serving cups
  5. Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours or overnight like I did.
  6. Serve alone, it is delicious, or add berries, yogurt if you have it and desiccated coconut.

Yield: 6 servings

Calories 696, Fat 37 g, Fiber 35.8 g, Carbs 85.1 g, Sodium 9.5 mg,
Protein 14.8 g

1 serving:
Calories 116, Fat 6.2 g, Fiber 6 g, Carbs 14.2 g, Sodium 1.6 mg, Protein 2.5g

It is delicious. My entire family loved it. This is a great thing to make ahead of time, for meal prepping. It will last covered for up to 7 days in the refrigerator, if it lasts that long, because my family will eat it all before 7 days are up.

This is gluten free, vegetarian, and without the yogurt dairy free and vegan.

Lets use this time, when we are unsure of what is happening in our world. When the normal foods we eat are not around, or being snapped up fast. Lets try some new things if this is new to you. If its not help your loved one try out the “new healthy” foods. They may like them, and we will come out of this pandemic hopefully healthier, and with healthier eating habits.

Thank you for reading and I will post more recipes of healthy foods I make with what I can find at the grocery store. Tell me what you think and if you have any questions. Stay kind to each other, and help your neighbors. Stay safe and strong.

Chimichurri Burrito Bowl Lunch Meal Prep

On By Thinks with SpinksIn Fitness, FoodLeave a comment

If you are new to my blog. I am a Chef. I have both a culinary and baking and pastry degree. I am on a fitness journey that I will be on for the rest of my life.

I like to cook, and like any chef I like to eat. Now I try to eat with the thought of fueling my body for my fitness journey. We truely are an amazing bio machine and we need good foods to fuel it.

I train Martial Arts 5 to 6 days a week for upwards of 10 hours a week total. So to support that I need to eat well. Now do I always eat well? Do I always pass up that cupcake. Heck no! But I do try to make good decisions.

Enough rambling so here is what I made. A chimichurri burrito bowl. This bowl is full of protein, gluten free, dairy free, low fat, contains lots of veggies, slow digesting carbs, and most importantly has lots of flavor.

I took a short cut and got chicken that was pre marinated at the grocery store, but I regularly make chimichurri sauce on my own and will include that in this recipe.

Chimichurri Burrito Bowl

Yield: 5 servings for lunch

Ingredients:

  1. 3 bell peppers that I charred on the gas stove, and placing them in a bowl with plastic wrap to steam
  2. 1 jalapeno that I charred on the gas, and placing them in a bowl with plastic wrap to steam
  3. 1 onion that I charred on the gas stove, and placing them in a bowl with plastic wrap to steam
  4. 1.5 lbs of chicken marinated in chimichurri
  5. 3.75 cups of brown rice cooked
  6. 10 tablespoons of black beans
  7. 5 tablespoons of salsa – Optional
  8. 5 pinches of cilantro – Optional
  9. salt and pepper to taste
  10. granulated garlic to taste

Directions:

  1. Cook brown rice to directions on package
  2. Char your veggies over a BBQ or on a gas stove. Place them in a bowl with plastic wrap to steam them.
  3. Cook your chicken marinated in chimichurri
  4. Chop up veggies, and lightly sautee them in a pan, adding pepper, salt, and granulated garlic to taste
  5. Heat up canned black beans, drained
  6. Add 3/4 cup/ 112g of brown rice to bowl, add 1 cup/130 g of chicken to each bowl, add 1 cup/148 g of veggies to bowl, add 2 tablespoons/52g of black beans, add 1 tablespoons/32 g of salsa.

Chimichurri sauce

Ingredients:

  1. 1/2 cup olive oil
  2. 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
  3. 1/2 cup finely chopped parsley
  4. 3-4 cloves garlic , finely chopped or minced
  5. 2 small red chilies , or 1 red chili, deseeded and finely chopped (about 1 tablespoon finely chopped chili)
  6. 3/4 teaspoon dried oregano
  7. 1 level teaspoon coarse salt
  8. pepper , to taste (about 1/2 teaspoon)

Directions:

Mix all ingredients together. Let sit for at least a few minutes. Letting it sit for 2 hours before use is much better. Marinate meat over night, reserve some for topping.

Nutritional Stats:
Calories 555, Fat 8.7 g, Fiber 11.7 g, Carbs 65.1 g, Sodium 1553.5 mg,
Protein 45.8 g

I hope you get a chance to try this recipe. You can reduce the sodium if you are concerned by omitting the salsa, and taking some of the salt out of the chimichurri sauce.

It was/is delicious and easy to make. It took about 40 minutes to prep for a whole week of lunches.

Try it out. Thank you for reading, if you liked this please let me know and feel free to share.

Chocolate Protein Pancakes

On By Thinks with SpinksIn Fitness, FoodLeave a comment

I wanted pancakes, but I wanted healthy and I wanted to stay on track so I made these. They don’t have any extra sugar in them other than what is in your protein powder, and bananas. A bit of honey is what they needed to top them off. They were delicious, and exactly what I wanted.

This is gluten free, dairy free because I use (Vega protein powder), vegetarian, full of protein, low in fat, and have fiber in them.

  • 4 large eggs
  • 2 ripe bananas
  • 3/4 cup rolled oats, uncooked
  • 1/4 cup chocolate protein powder ( I use Vega)
  • 2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1 tsp coconut oil, for cooking
  • fruit garnish (I had frozen fruit)
  • Honey for serving

Directions:

Take all ingredients and blend together in the blender.

Cook them as you would a regular pancake.

Keep in mind when you cook anything chocolate it can be hard to tell when something is done due to the darkness of the batter.

Calories/Stats: Serving Size 2 servings, sans honey and fruit

Calories 800, Fat 31.6 g, Fiber 11.5 g, Carbs 80.7 g, Sodium 835.9 mg, Protein 56.7 g

I hope you all get a chance to try this out. Let me know what you think, and if you have a chance to try it out.

Breakfast during a snow storm…eating healthy no matter what the weather.

On By Thinks with SpinksIn Fitness, Food, OpinionLeave a comment

Alright its cold outside, and we are having a winter snow storm here. Being snowed in is no reason to not eat well. Some people get snowed in and just throw their hands up and eat anything. Believe me it is tempting to just make some cinnamon rolls and coffee. Wrapped up in my electric blanket… But I had to stay strong. =)

This protein packed avocado toast was my breakfast. It is so tasty and filling.

I have here two pieced of whole grain toast. Two eggs I cooked, 1/2 of an avocado, and about 12 slices of cucumber.

Protein packed avocado toast

Ingredients:

  • 2 whole eggs
  • 1/2 avocado
  • 12 slices of cucumber or about 33 grams
  • 2 slices of whole grain toast
  • 1/2 tsp of oil to cook eggs in

Direction:

Cook eggs, slice veggies, and toast bread. Assemble with avocado first, it will glue things together, then cucumber, and place a fried egg over top. Enjoy!

Calories472, Fat30.4g, Fiber12.2g, Carbs34.9g, Sodium428.2mg, Protein20.5g

Healthy Lunch Recipe… Fried Egg on an Avocado and Tomato Cucumber Salad.

On By Thinks with SpinksIn Fitness, Food, OpinionLeave a comment

I prepped only three lunches this week for myself, because I knew I would have time to make food for myself at lunch time on Tuesday and Thursday. I wanted to make one of my favorite meals.

It has 10.9 grams of protein in it and is so flavorful. It is made of whole foods except the soy sauce. That can be left out if you wish, and substituted with just a pinch of salt. Not only is this super tasty but is so pretty to look at.

This is quick and healthy fast food. =) You don’t need a culinary degree to make this, just a pan, and a few minutes.

One of the rules in culinary school you learn is that you eat with your eyes first, then your nose, and you mouth. What that means is if the meal looks appealing to you, you will enjoy it much more. Just take a look at those garish colored foods. They do not automatically make you think mmm I want to tuck into that.

Anyway, here is what I made, the recipe and the stats for food:

Fried Egg on an Avocado half, and tomato cucumber salad

Recipe:

Yield: 1 serving (to scale up just multiply by the amount of people you have)

  • 201 g heirloom cherry tomatoes sliced in half ( I used approximately 10 tomatoes
  • 155 g cucumber, chopped into bite size pieces ( I used approximately half of an English cucumber.)
  • 9 g of green onion chopped (I used one whole green onion, green and white parts)
  • 1/2 tsp balsamic vinegar
  • 1/4 tsp soy sauce (alternately you can use a pinch of salt)
  • 1/4 tsp of Olive oil (I used an EVVO that had garlic in it as well)
  • 1/4 tsp lemon juice
  • Lemon Zest to taste
  • I large egg fried
  • 1/2 tsp veggie oil

Directions:

  • Cut avocado in half, and score avocado, and sprinkle with sea salt if you wish
  • Cook egg, with a 1/2 tsp of vegetable oil
  • Cut heirloom tomatoes, cucumbers, and onion, add to a bowl.
  • In another bowl assemble, the balsamic vinegar, soy, olive oil, lemon juice, and lemon zest.
  • Pour dressing over salad and toss
  • Plate and then enjoy

Caloric Stats for this meal:

306 calories, 21.7g fat, 10g fiber, 19.6g carbs, 213.7mg sodium, 10.9g protien

I hope you get a chance to enjoy this recipe. I have also alternately just made the salad and had a boiled egg with it or, eaten two avocado halves with two fried eggs on it. Change it and make it yours. Enjoy and keep eating well. Let me know what you think.

Tips:

  1. Acidulate the other half of the avocado, and put it in a ziplock bag. You can use it the next day or later for a snack and the acid will keep it from turning brown.
  2. Score your avocado before placing egg on it. This will make it easier to eat if it is just under ripe.
  3. This meal was only 300 calories and it did not meet my protein requirements for this meal so I added another egg. As with any recipe alter it as you need for your body.