Monday, March 25, 2013

Skinny Turkey Meatballs


I thought I would start the week off by sharing this easy, tasty and super healthy recipe for turkey meatballs.

The recipe has been featured on a few diffent blogs and comes from fitness pro Jamie Eason.  You can find her HERE with a lot more recipes, nutrition and excersise advice.  Jaime makes these as "muffins" in a muffin pan, however when I tried that they got a bit stuck to the pan:(  This shouldn't be a problem in a silicone pan (which I don't have) but I just started making these as meatballs on baking sheet and have had no problems.  My only other piece of advice is not to skimp on the veggies. The turkey is so lean and doesn't have the fat to provide extra moisture so they might get a little dry.


 I love to make a batch up on the weekend and use them for my lunch throughout the week.


I usually have these with a mixed green or spinach salad.  This day I served them up with some steamed brown rice and roasted brocolli (LOOOOVE roasted veggies!!).


Ingredients:
* 2 lbs ground turkey (or chicken)
* 3 egg whites
* 1 cup quick cooking oats
* 1/2 tsp ground cumin
* 1/2 tsp dried thyme
* 2 tsp dry yellow mustard
* 2 tsp black pepper
* 2 tsp chipotle pepper spice
* 1 tsp salt
* 2 tbsp garlic powder (2 cloves minced)
* 1 small onion (finely chopped)
* 2 celery stalks (finely chopped)
* 1/2 cup mushrooms (finely chopped) optional
(I usually make half this recipe)
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Spray muffin pan with canola or olive oil or line a sheet pan with parchment or non-stick foil.
3. Mix all your ingredients together in one large bowl.
4. Roll the mixture into balls and place in muffin pan. Muffins should be about the size of a racquetball. 
5. Bake for 30-40 minutes. (I turn mine half-way during cooking if on a sheet pan)
Source:  adapted from Jamie Eason

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Jelly Bean Easter Egg Cupcakes

Here is a sweet, simple and fun dessert  for your Easter celebration.  I made these for my daughter's preschool celebration and everyone seemed to love them.  

All you do is take your favorite vanilla cupcake recipe (or use a box mix to keep things simple).  Then add some swirly frosting to mimic Easter grass and top with speckled jelly bean eggs.


 I found my speckled jelly bean eggs at Target but I've also seen them at the grocery store.


Use the "grass" piping tip to achieve the Easter grass look.  If you do not own one of these you can find them at a store like Michael's ...or just spread some frosting on with knife (nobody will mind...:))

A look at our day:

HAPPY EASTER!!


Ingredients:

Vanilla cake mix (homemade or from a box)
Buttercream dyed green (homemade is best)
Jellybean eggs


Directions:

Bake the cupcakes according to directions.  Let cool completely.  Make the buttercream.  

Using the "grass" frosting tip, pipe swirls onto the cupcakes.  Top with jellybean eggs.  Enjoy!


Source:  Chef Mommy original


Saturday, March 16, 2013

KitKat-M&M Cake


A few weeks ago, we celebrate my son's 8th birthday.  8 already...still kinda mind boggling for this mama :/ Anyway, this year I decided to just keep things simple (in theory anyway) and have a few of his friends over for dinner (he picked the menu) and cake.  

My little foodie picked homemade buffalo wings, Cesar salad, mozzarella sticks with marinara and pizza of course.  So when it cake time to pick a cake, I decided to keep things simple.  

I had seen this KitKat/M&M cake on the blogosphere for some time and thought it looked fun and would be perfect for this party. This cake doesn't require too much work to achieve the overall fun look.  I used a good chocolate boxed cake mix, make homemade chocolate frosting (just b/c I hate the taste of canned frosting) and then added the KitKat's and M&M's.  


Everyone got a kick out of the cake and one serious sugar rush!

Ingredients:
Cake - (your favorite; homemade or from a box, chocolate, vanilla, etc.)
Chocolate frosting- (your favorite; homemade or canned)
KitKat- broken into 2 piece sections
M&M's
Ribbon (to tie around the cake)

* The amount of ingredients you'll need really depends on what size cake you are making.


Directions:
1.  Bake the cake according to recipe and let cool completely.  Slice off the tops of the cake layers and frost the cake completely.
2.  Carefully press the Kitkat bar sections into the frosting, all around the cake.  Ideally, you'll want a 1/2  rim on the top of the cake to hold all the M&M's in place.
3.  Pour the M&M's on the top of the cake.
4.  Wrap decorative ribbon around the cake.


Source:  Inspired by multiple sources on the web