Baked Sweet Potato

To accompany the fish and mushroom risotto I made for supper tonight, I decided to use up a sweet potato I had laying around. I just tossed it in at 350F until I remember it was still in there. The skin of the potato had come away from the flesh, so I peeled it off, made some gentle indents in the potato and sprinkled it with sea salt.

Sweet, salty, and oh-so-filling, this is something I will definitely make again!

Homemade Chicken Avocado Ranch Rolls

These are what I made with my improvised rolls! Approx. 10 points per, and worth every one!

"Improvised rolls"
+ chicken breast
+ cheddar cheese (broiled for melty goodness)
+ sliced tomato
+ sliced avocado
_____________
= YUM!

I'm sure crispy bacon and caramelized onions would punch the flavour up even more.

Improvised Rolls

All the recipes I find online are for larger batches of rolls. I wanted enough to make a sandwich for supper with leftovers for tomorrow's lunch, so I improvised and tried my hand at creating a simple recipe (below photos). Tune in tomorrow to find out what I used the rolls for!

Before/after/after cooking:

Ingredients:

• 1 tsp dry active yeast
• 3/4c warm water
• pinch of brown sugar (about 1/2 tsp)
• A couple of dashes (about 1/4tsp) table salt
• 1c + 1/2c flour
• herbs/cheese to garnish (optional)

Instructions:

1. Stir these first three ingredients together in a medium-sized bowl and let sit about 10 minutes.
2. Add salt to mixture and stir.
3. Add 1 cup flour to the mixture and stir with a fork. Add more flour until it forms a ball, and sticky sides are coated with flour. Let rise about an hour in a room temp (or warm) spot.
4. Punch dough down. Add more flour so you don't stick to it.
5. Divide dough (I took 5 pieces), and knead each into a roll.
6. Place rolls on baking sheet lined with parchment paper and cover with damp tea towel for 20 minutes.
7. Uncover, sprinkle rolls with a couple drops of water and sprinkle any toppings on. I used oregano and parmesan cheese.
8. gently squish rolls flat (ish).
9. Bake at 350F until bottoms are browned and top is stiff when knocked on (about 12-16 minutes).

Nutrition info per roll (from batch of 5):
Calories: 111
Fat: 0
Carbs: 24
Fibre: 0
Protein: 4

Pork Tenderloin in a Slow Cooker? Never Again!

I decided to make a recipe I found for "Amazing Pork Tenderloin in the Slow Cooker". I followed all the directions provided to a T, but realized too late you shouldn't put a tenderloin in a slow cooker! While the taste was nice, the tenderloin cut was wasted, and cooked to falling apart, rather than sliceable texture. I think it would be excellent and hold shape far better with a loin. May try again.

NOTE: This should be made with PORK LOIN, NOT PORK TENDERLOIN!

Homemade Pop-Tarts

On Pie Day/Pi Day, I was looking for an option for single-serve pies to make for dessert, after a quick Google search, I found Brown Eyed Baker's recipe for homemade Pop-Tarts.

I made some with brown sugar & cinnamon filling (pictured), others with blueberry filling, and improvised an apple crumble with some of the scraps and other ingredients.

While definitely NOT low-calorie, these were fun to make, but I don't think I'd do this specific recipe again.

The Spaghetti Squash Experiment

I've made spaghetti squash in the past, but am always willing to try to get it to taste more like pasta. I didn't succeed this time, but gave it a valiant attempt with the topping. While the squash was in the microwave, I sautéed diced onion, minced garlic and diced tomato. To that, I added 1/2c pasta sauce,  1/4c 2% cottage cheese, and a few small home made meatballs (just extra lean ground beef with egg to bind it that I had premade, cooked, and frozen). Top it with a sprinkle of parmesan, and voilà! Supper!

Knockoff of Wendy's Baja Salad

I really quite enjoy Wendy's Baja salad. Lettuce, fresh salsa, guacamole, grated cheddar cheese smothered in piping hot chili. I was house-bound one day, and had some leftover chili on hand, so tried my hand at this.

It was also the first time I made guacamole, but certainly not the last! The guacamole was a bit of a mash up of a few recipes I found online. I basically mixed together mashed avocado, garlic salt, lime juice, diced onion and diced tomato.

Beef Sirloin Tip Roast with Mushrooms

Check out the recipe here.

It's easy and delicious. I recommend serving it with a potato side dish. For the meal shown in these photos, I tried my hand at hasselback potatoes.

Lemon Meringues

I've never made a meringue before. I've only eaten one or two. But did that stop me from trying a recipe that looked so easy and so low calorie? No, it did not! I saw the recipe on Jen's Favorite Cookies. The only thing I found to be a little confusing was that she didn't say how big you should make them - I'd compare it to a Hershey's Kiss or chocolate rosette. I also found mine started to lose the rosette look after a while... further investigation found the culprit: a lemon zest clog.

Admittedly, these did not photograph well... but hers looked great!

WARNING: the "dough" for these is incredibly sticky.

Nutrition information: serving of 6 pieces (from a batch of 300)
Calories: 14

Potassium: 5
Fat: 0
Carbohydrates: 3
Fibre: 0
Protein: 0
Weight Watchers Points Plus: 0

My rating: tasty and lemony, it was hard to stop after just a couple. I would only repeat this recipe if I was sharing it out with some friends. I ended up throwing quite a few away to prevent me from eating them.

Pepper Stuffed with Chili and Rice and Everything was Nice!

Mixed a 6-point serving of chilli with 1/2c. basmati rice (3 points) and spooned it into three pepper halves. Topped each with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese, and baked until glorious.