Perfect Iced Coffee; Cold Brewed!

I have never been a fan of coffee but after searching online for the best iced coffee recipe for Aleks and learning about cold brewed coffee, I kinda like it now.

He had asked me to find the best iced coffee so I googled the best iced coffee recipe and I read a handful of blogs and they all agreed that cold brewed coffee, was better than brewing a pot and pouring it over ice.

After making this coffee I decided to try it and it was delicious. That first day I tried it I ended up drinking three cups and I don't normally drink coffee. So I got a bit jittery. When I say a bit I really mean WAY jittery. So let this be my warning to you this recipe is to make a concentrated coffee.

After we finished off the ground coffee from Costco I went to my new favorite grocery store Sprouts Farmers Market! They have a bulk section with a coffee bean section with many different coffee flavors. What I like about this is that I can buy what I need and use it and my beans are always fresh. But this will work with already ground coffee of any type caffeinated or not.

From what I have read it's best to have coarse ground coffee. So at Sprouts I choose my whole coffee beans then I put it in the coffee grinder right there in the store. They have many options from coarse to espresso. I buy one bags worth and it makes 4 cups of grounds and with that I can make two batches.

Here is what you do. Take two cups of the ground coffee and put it in a two quart pitcher and fill up the pitcher with water. That's eight cups. Then stir it and make sure all the grounds are fully wet. Sometimes they like to float or get themselves in little air bubbles. So make sure they are all mixed up and let soak for 8 hours or over night. When I pass by I like to stir it because the grounds like to either sink to the bottom or rise to the top. I also think that stirring it might help the flavor a bit. But I could be wrong on that one.

In the morning take a mesh strainer and filter out the grounds. I go back and forth a few times times to strain it out. You can drink it like this but it ends up leaving little granules on the ice so after I strain out the grounds a couple times I use a coffee filter to get the last little bit filtered out.

At this point you can make yourself a cup or you can put it in the fridge to chill before serving.

Now for me one cup is enough because I hardly ever have caffeine. If you are counting calories like I am then you gotta measure. If you are not then you can do it by eye like Aleks. So I take a 12 oz glass and fill it up with ice. Then measure out a half a cup of the coffee and pour it in then measure out 1/2 cup of 1% milk and add that to your coffee. I use agave nectar which does have calories. About 30 to be exact but I would rather have the calories than use sugar less or artificial sweeteners because our bodies don't recognize it to burn it and then it turns to fat. Anyways, I use 1/2 a Tbl of the Agave nectar. Stir all up and and enjoy. This cup is a total of 85 calories. I think this is an awesome amount of calories.

If you want to you can throw this cup of iced coffee in the blender and make your own frap.

BBQing Guilt Free!

It is officially the BBQ season! I don't know many people, if any, who don't like a good BBQ with family and friends. The only problem I see with BBQs is that it can get pretty high in calories. I started a biggest loser competition about a month ago. The first week I lost 10 lbs and that put me in the lead. Then since then I have held on the the second place spot on the leader boards. So I have been trying to eat healthy and exercise everyday.

Normal BBQs have hamburger, steak, sausage, tons of snacks like chips and even salads that are all high in calories like potato salads and the like. So I have been thinking of what I could do to still enjoy the time around the grill with friends and family but still eat healthy and not go over my calorie allotment.

This is what I have come up with. Corn on the cob! Most BBQs have corn on the cob already but normally we slather on the butter. But I like to eat my corn on the cob pure. Nothing added. Now, I do think they are kinda high in calories all on their own, about 120 in one cob but I think this is a good snack or addition to the menu.

Here are a couple other veggie options for the grill. Kabocha. KABOCHA!!! I love kabocha. It is a Japanese pumpkin and the outer skin is green. I like to slice it up in little steaks and put them in a gallon Ziploc bag and put a tsp of oil and some salt and pepper and mix it all up. When you get to the grill you can just throw these on on the outside and let them cook. They get a little chard sometimes but its ok as long as it is cooked all the way through. Very tasty and not too bad in calories, around 50. You can have a few if you want. When I grill my kabocha I eat the skin as well as the meat. When I put my kabocha in Thai curry, I cut off the skin.

The other veggie idea I have for the grill is zucchini. Now you can cut them in slices length wise and put it on the grill like that but there have been times in the process of flipping or putting on or taking off the grill that they fall through the cracks. So what I like to do is cut in half length wise, then in half the other way and make little slivers and put them in a sheet of foil with a tsp of oil and salt and pepper. I also put quartered mushrooms but you can put whatever you want. Onions, yellow squash, tomatoes, eggplant you name it! Then just close up the foil and put it on the grill with the corn and kabocha.

Now meat. This is something that I, an omnivore, have a really hard time with. I love beef and pork but since I have been counting my calories I have noticed they are so much higher in calories than say chicken or fish. But never fear, they can still taste good at the grill. What I used was tilapia. One serving of 3-4oz is just over 100 calories. You can have twice as much fish for the same amount as one serving of beef or pork. So what I did was before heading out to the grill I rinsed the fish and dried it in a paper towel. Then packed it that way.

I also made a little rub to put on before I put it on the BBQ. I put salt, pepper, chili powder, cumin, and garlic powder. Then I put that in a separate Ziploc bag and headed on out. At the grill I cut a lime and squeezed in over the dried fish then dipped that in the rub. Then on to the grill.

It doesn't take too long to cook so I would wait till everything is about ready to eat. I am making the fish into tacos or you can just eat it as it is. So when I put the meat on the grill I also put on my tortillas to heat up.

When the meat is done build your tacos, all I put on mine were a squeeze of lime, some sliced up cabbage and some avocado. So very yummy and low in calories. If you eat a corn on the cob, two kabocha slices, zucchini and two tacos the total calorie intake it a whopping 438 calories! That is awesome if you ask me. I have watched Hell's Kitchen and when they have a challenge to make a healthy low calorie dinner the goal is 750 calories! My meal is a little over half of that! That leaves room for watermelon or even seconds! Who doesn't like seconds?

Who Loves Cauliflower? After this Everyone Will!

I have loved cauliflower for years now. I have only just recently been cooking with it though. I used to love it at my favorite Indian restaurant in Hawaii. India Cafe. My friend Cris and I would go there all the time! We loved it! Anyways, they had this amazing cauliflower korma! My mouth is watering just thinking of it! It was so soft and tender and it seemed that it just soaked up the flavors of the spices and coconut milk it was cooked in.

Well, I haven't figured out how to make that myself, even though this past minute I have been thinking of how to make it. But there are things I have cooked cauliflower in that are very tasty. I like to put it in my Thai curry recipes, in my quinoa mac and cheese, and lately I have made pizza bites and roasted cauliflower from recipes that I have found on Pintrest.

My friend Cris who would go with me to India Cafe had given me this list of whole foods and what their health benefits are. I still have that paper after all these years. That paper says, "Cauliflower, cruciferous family member that contains many of the same cancer-fighting, hormone-regulating compounds as its cousins, broccoli and cabbage. Specifically thought to help ward off breast and colon cancers. Eat raw or lightly cooked."

Aleks, his sister and I were talking about cauliflower last night and he brought up how people say that we should eat colored foods and that they are more nutritious than white foods. Most diet people say to stay away from white things like white bread, white rice or potatoes and is cauliflower really that good for you? So I looked it up online, from what I found it confirmed what the paper that Cris gave me and said that there were many health benefits. One that we really liked was that it helps in the fighting of cancer and also in the prevention of cancer.

Yesterday I made two recipes, cauliflower pizza bites and roasted cauliflower. These were the recipes that I found on Pintrest. They turned out real good. The pizza bites, since I made them in regular muffin tins so they came out to be 50 calories each. If you want them smaller you can put them in mini muffin tins for a total of 25 calories each. The other cauliflower recipe I made was roasted cauliflower. Aleks says it's the best thing I ever made. Which was surprising because he loves my cooking and there are some pretty amazing things I make, if I do say so myself.

So here are the two recipes I made yesterday.
Cauliflower Pizza Bites that I got off Pintrest by Damy Health

First you got to grate the cauliflower. This could take just a little while. If I had a food processor then I would probably try that but I had to use a cheese grater.

Put the grated cauliflower in a pan and let cook till tender.

While its cooking separate 2 eggs. It should make about 1/4 cup of whites. Save the yolks. I did and I am keeping it for some curd.

Then add 1 cup of cottage cheese to the whites and add 1 tsp of dried oregano 2 tsp of Italian seasonings. Damy says parsley but I didn't have any so... I also put a squirt of Saracha in mine as well.

Damy says  that hot sauce and coconut oil are optional. I didn't use the coconut oil because that would add a bunch of calories and that would defeat the purpose. Then 1/4 tsp of garlic powder. Blend that up in your food processor, like I said I didn't have one so I used the blender till smooth. It worked fine.

Then add the wet mixture to the cooled cauliflower. I didn't let mine cool too much because I am kinda lazy and I wanted to hurry up and make them.

Damy says that you got to press the mixture into the pan otherwise they fall apart. So I pressed my "dough" into the pan. It is wet so it's not like packing brown sugar its mostly just like making sure there are no air pockets.

Then you throw it in the oven at 450 degrees. Let it cool in the pan for 5 minutes so it has time to set and wont fall apart.

If you notice on my pan it has those little black dots That is the Pam that I used to coat the pan. After being in the oven it makes those spots. I just wiped them off. No big deal.

The recipe said that to make two cups of grated cauliflower you would need about a whole head but I only needed 2/3s of mine. It must have been a huge noggin! So with the remaining I cut it up and roasted it.

I also found this recipe on Pintrest  to came from Design Her Momma.

 Cut the florets into bit sized pieces and in a bowl put the juice of 1/2 a lemon and 1 Tbl of olive oil and salt and pepper. Normally when I make things like this I like to use my big glass bowl but I had just used it and had already put it in the dishwasher and started it. So I used this Tupperware which actually turned out to be a genius idea. I'll show you in a minute.

 Then throw in the cauliflower and put on the lid. Shake the Tupperware till it is all coated with the lemon oil mixture! How easy was that? I think I will make it like this from now on! Although I think next time I will add cabbage.

Anyways after its all mixed up and coated then put it in a pan. The first time I made it I put it on a cookie sheet this time I put it in my new Le Creuset pan that Aleks mom gave me.

After its all arranged then grate some Parmesan on top and roast for 25-30 minutes in a 450 degree oven. This is a yummy snack. 

If you use a whole head of cauliflower and separate it into 6 servings then each serving is only 50 calories. Not only is it good for you but super super tasty. I think I am going to go get some out of the fridge right now!

PS. You probably noticed the change in the pictures about half way through. I used an app on my phone for the second half of the pictures. I should have done them all but I messed up and didn't know how to bring the pictures back to edit them. Anyways, all this to say, I am trying to take better pictures and I would love it if you could let me know which ones you like better. 

Quinoa Mac and Cheese

This recipe for Quinoa Mac and Cheese has been evolving since just before Christmas. Aleks left for Arizona four days before Christmas. I was sad about that because it was going to be our first Christmas together. So his dad and I decided we would have "Christmas" the night before he left. Aleks wasn't too stoked about that but I told him it was our way of getting the holiday with him.

His dad's girlfriend was going to make a ham and while deciding on what else to make Aleks said that an awesome baked macaroni and cheese would go good with the ham. So I did some research and found this recipe. Emril Lagasse had a contest for the Best Mac and Cheese Ever and so I decided to use this recipe.

Aleks said it was his favorite thing we ate at that meal. Later on I visited Aleks in Arizona at the end of January. He told me that his sister wanted me to make the mac and cheese. I had thought he told her about it but instead it was his dad. So I made it again. Another success.

As I have been browsing Pintrest and saw quinoa mac and cheese recipes but it seemed that they really were macaroni made out of quinoa flour. So I decided to make my own recipe. I used the recipe that I used from christmas and decided to add cooked quinoa, broccoli and cauliflower.

With these additions it made the recipe a little bit healthier. At first I only used the quinoa, broccoli and cauliflower but Aleks' sister said she thought that it might be good with a bit of the pasta mixed in for extra texture. So this will be todays addtion to my list of quinoa recipes. So far I have posted about Black Bean Quinoa Burgers and Quinoa Tabbouleh Salad you can read about them here. 

The first thing I would do is get the quinoa on to cook and get the garlic in the toaster or oven to roast. To cook the quinoa you put one cup of water in a pot with two cups of water. Then put it on to boil. Once it boils then take off the lid and turn off the stove. Let the quinoa sit on the stove for 15-20 minutes till cooked.

For the garlic, take the whole head and cut the top third off horizantally. I use a little olive oil and salt an pepper and put the top third back on. The wrap it up in a sheet of foil and throw in the toaster oven or regular oven for 45 minutes at 400 degrees.

While those are cooking then take a package of bacon and cut them up in one inch squares and cook in a big pot.

While that is cooking then dice up two big shallots.

Grate the two cheeses, 6oz of gruyere and 8oz of extra sharp chedar cheese.

In a big pot boil water and put the pasta and the veggies into it. Cook for as long as the package directions call for. Normally its for 7 or 9 minutes. I have used many different kinds of pasta for this recipe. Really you can use whichever kind you want. Macarroni, the short macarroni, squiggly noodles, shells, penne or any other kind you have in the cupboard.

Once the bacon is cooked and crisp then set them aside and drain most of the grease out then add a stick of butter to the bacon pan and let melt with the left over bacon fat.

Once it is melted add the shallots.

After they have turned translucent then add a 1/2 cup of flour making a rue.

Stir together to make a thick paste. It should look somewhat like this.

Add a quart of milk. The recipe above calls for whole milk but any kind you use would work. I use half whole and half 1%. I would whisk it in in two batches.

While that is on the stove take out the garlic. Just squeeze the head and the garlic cloves will squish out all nice and soft.

After all the garlic is out of the husk it will look like this.

Take a knife and smash it into a paste.

Add the smashed garlic to the milk and rue mixture.

After the garlic, milk and rue are all mixed together the slowly add small batches of the cheese.

I go about a handfull of  cheese at a time.

This will slowly thicken the milk mixture.

While the sauce is cooking on the stove get the cooked quinoa and veggies into the baking pan.

Once all the cheese is added and smooth then pour the cheese sauce over the quinoa, pasta and veggies that have been put in a 9"x13" pan. Carefully stir it together so that the cheese sauce is evenly distributed. This normally  fills the pan to the brim so be careful.

Once you have finished stiring it together then top with 1/2 cup of breadcrumbs and 1/2 cup of shreaded parmesan mixed together.

Top with the bacon pieces.

Then put the pan in the oven for 20-30 minutes till the cheese at the edges are bubbly and the topping has slightly browned.

Take out of the oven, serve and enjoy.

Ingredients 

1 cup dry quinoa - cooked
8oz pasta
3 cups broccoli and cauliflower
8oz extra sharp cheddar cheese
6oz gruyere cheese
1 quart milk
1 package bacon
1 stick of butter
2 shallots
1 head of garlic - roasted
1/2 cup parmesan
1/2 cup breadcrumbs