Trials of a Long Haired Girl

  Happy hump day friends!  Now that I have finally gotten an Instant Pot, I'm determined to use it more often.  I was craving Philly Cheese Steak so I hit up Pinterest and found this Instant Pot Philly Cheesesteak Pasta .  It was pretty tasty!   Ingredients:  1 lb ground beef 1 cup of onion - diced 1/2 tablespoon garlic - minced 1 1/2 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce 1 teaspoon kosher salt 1/2 teaspoon pepper 1 cup of bell pepper - chopped 2 tablespoons ketchup 2 cups beef broth 8 oz pasta - ziti, penne, shell. It is not recommended to use egg noodles. 6 oz provolone cheese - sliced I had already browned my ground beef during meal prep so I didn't follow the recipe exactly.  The original recipe calls for Olive Oil, but I didn't use it and just sprayed my IP with Avocado Oil.   Put your already browned ground beef into the IP.  Add the onions and garlic and cook for 1 minute.  Add the salt, pepper, Worcestershire sauce, and green...

Mexican Chicken Spaghetti 2 chicken breasts approx 1 lbs., boneless, skinless, cut into cubes 1 medium onion diced 2 cans rotel 2 cans cream of chicken soup 8 oz spaghetti noodles uncooked, broken into thirds (basically half a box you'd find in the store) 8 oz Cheddar Cheese, cubed 1 c chicken broth Add onions and cubed chicken into your pot, spread out across the bottom.  Use the Saute feature to cook the chicken a little (so that the outsides turn white). Pour 1 can of Rotel over this mixture Break your noodles into 3 equal parts (so they’re shorter) and sprinkle them on top don’t throw in in big chunks because they’ll come out clumped too, sprinkle Then pour your 2nd can of Rotel over the noodles In a bowl whisk together cans of cream of chicken, mushroom, and broth until smooth Carefully pour into your pot Close lid and steam valve and set to pressure cook, high for 8 minutes Quick releasing the pressure when done cooking the chicken and noodles is best Remove the lid after coo...

Happy Hump day friends!  It's time again for a What's Cooking Wednesday!  Today I am sharing with you how I changed up this  Easy Slow Cooker Taco Pasta  for the crockpot.  Between trying to use up stuff in my freezers, pantry and fridge and allergies for those in my house, I modified the recipe to make it fit better for us.   I modified it as follows: 1 cup uncooked bell pepper(s), d iced 3 Tbsp  reduced sodium taco seasoning 12 oz.  uncooked whole wheat pasta 1 cup,   uncooked onion(s), c hopped 20 oz  uncooked ground bison 3 cups h omemade chicken stock (skimmed of fat) 15 oz can of  Simple Truth Organic black beans 1 cup of  Trader Joe's Mexican style shredded cheese Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the beef and season with salt and pepper. Cook the meat, stirring often, until browned. Drain and then transfer beef to slow cooker. Add the bell pepper, onion, tomatoes, salsa, taco seasoning...

Happy Hump day friends!  It's time again for a What's Cooking Wednesday!  Today I am sharing with you how I changed up this Olive Garden Copycat Recipe for the Zuppa Toscana for the crockpot.  However, I am trying to use up stuff in my freezers, pantry and fridge so I modified the recipe using what I have on hand and trying to purchase as little as possible. I modified it as follows: Simple Truth Traditional turkey sausage, 16 oz. browned uncooked onion(s),  3/4 cup Kirkland Signature Sliced bacon,  6 slices, diced minced garlic,  1 tsp chicken stock, 4 cups Simply Potatoes Diced potatoes,  1 cup Kale/Spinach Mix - 2 cups Kroger Half and Half - 3/4 cup Cook your sausage in a large skillet and brown over medium heat. Drain and set aside Place your onion and bacon to the skillet and saute over medium heat until the onions are translucent. Place sausage, onions, bacon and garlic in your crock pot along with broth and potatoes. Cook on...

Happy Hump Day friends!  I am back for another edition of What's Cookin Wednesday!  Some day I will figure out how to make my kitchen more recording friendly, but right now, I'm just trying to figure it out.  I actually picked out a couple of recipes that I wanted to try.  We're expecting some cold weather around my area, which I'm sure some of my northern friends would laugh about, but it's cold to me.  The first one I decided to try was the Skinny Chicken Fajita Soup .  Sometimes I really just feel like recipes are a suggestion that worked for someone else and might work for you.  I definitely tweaked it a little bit for our family.  Honestly, my chicken wasn't cooked so I decided I'd just use my canned chicken.  Here's what I did: 2 - 5 oz. cans of chicken breast 2 - 10 oz. cans of Rotel Tomatoes 1 - 15 oz. can of Black Beans 1 - 32 oz. container of chicken stock A couple of shakes of taco seasoning because it was handy and I did...

Happy Hump Day!  I hope everyone is having a great week!  I wanted to take a moment and share a recipe that I have found and tweaked a little for my family.  I found this recipe on Pinterest and thought it might be a good way to use up some of my pantry items.  Ingredients 1 pound of uncooked boneless skinless chicken breast(s) , diced 1 cup of diced carrots 1 cup of diced celery 12fl oz  Kroger Evaporated Milk (I used the Simple Truth Brand) 8 oz. package of Priano Tomato mozzarella tortellini (purchased at Aldi. 32 oz./4 cups of Simple Truth Organic Vegetable Stock, Fat Free Dice chicken into small, bite sized pieces Peel and dice carrot into small pieces Add to slow cooker along with broth and seasonings Cover and cook on high for 3-4 hours or low for 6-8 Turn slow cooker to high and add evaporated milk and dried tortellini For a thicker soup, stir cornstarch with an equal amount of water until smooth and add to soup - I did not do this. ...

Happy Wednesday a/k/a Hump Day friends!  It seems most of the folks on my social media are also experiencing cold weather.  My part of Texas is currently in the 20's at night.  I am not a big cold weather fan, but I have to say that one of my favorite things when the weather is cold...and this goes back to me being a little girl...is a nice cup of hot chocolate.  So, here is my dilemma, as many of you know, I don't eat much in the way of sugar substitutes.  Swiss Miss Milk Chocolate packet is 4 SmartPoints per serving...whaa??  Yep, 4 SP per serving.  I could have 4 and that would eat up my daily points on the MyWW Purple plan but would I really want to use ALL my SmartPoint allotment on hot chocolate?  Um, let me think about it, no.  So I have been on the hunt for something that would give me that hot chocolate fix without breaking my SmartPoint bank.  I found this low carb hot chocolate recipe  and thought it might work.  O...

Happy hump day friends!  We've made it to another one!  So I actually made this a couple of weeks ago and again this week, but it was so good so I wanted to share!  As I have said, my daughter has decided to go meatless, so some of my all time favorites are not longer options right now.  I know, I know, I could make more than one meal, but I don't want to do that.  So, I found a recipe for a  Crockpot Vegetarian Pasta e Fagioli Soup .  I used some substitutions because I was focusing on what I had on hand.   Here's the ingredients she has listed: Ingredients 3 large carrots peeled & sliced 3 sticks celery chopped 1/2 medium onion chopped 4 cloves garlic minced 1 (28 fluid ounce) can diced tomatoes with juices 1 (19 fluid ounce) can white beans drained 1 (19 fluid ounce) can red kidney beans drained 4 cups vegetable broth 5 dashes Italian seasoning 1.5 cups ditali or ditalini pasta  Salt & pepper to taste ...

Happy Wednesday a/k/a Hump Day!  Hope you are having a good week!  I decided to do something different this week.  Since fall is technically upon us and I wanted to prepare something different for my daughter for her lunches.  I used this recipe for Vegetable Lo Mein .  I left out the broccoli and the mushrooms.  I used whole wheat spaghetti noodles since that's what I had on hand.  My daughter enjoyed it, but said she wanted more sauce.  I'll keep tweaking it, I suspect, until I come up with the perfect mix for her.   I am looking forward to Texas weather cooling down!  

Well, hello, and happy Wednesday a/k/a Hump day!  This has been a busy weekend and a weekend of trying new things.  As I may have mentioned, I am trying to focus on some lower carb options.  I found a recipe for cauliflower hash browns and decided I would try to make them as an additional to breakfast casserole.  Unfortunately I didn't have 2 packages of cauliflower rice so I decided to halve the recipe.   Here's what I did:   I used my one smaller package of cauliflower rice (10 oz. package), 1 cup of the Simple Truth Organic Cheddar and 1 egg and I added some salt, pepper and garlic powder.   They were a little more eggy than I would have preferred but I didn't have the same amount of cauliflower that she had.  They are really tasty and made a good addition to my breakfast casserole.  I'm looking forward to having them this week.  Did you try any new recipes this week?  Maybe any of the recipes I've shared?...

Happy Wednesday a/k/a Hump day!  I honestly don't remember if I have posted this recipe before, but it's basically my Mom's meatloaf recipe that I tweaked.  I have tweaked it for crockpot and now for meatloaf muffins.  I decided that this would be an easier option for me and my family for lunch.  Here's my basic reecipe: 1.25 lbs/20 oz. of Bison 2/3 cup of Panko 1 Egg 1/2 cup of Bell Pepper 1/2 cup of Onion I opened a 15 oz. can of Tomato Sauce, but it looked like it was too much tomato sauce. Prehead the oven to 350 degrees.  Mix your ingredients together.  I weighed my mixture and then divided it by 12 since I was making muffins and I wanted them to be pretty much equal.  After putting each one into the muffin tin, I topped with tomato sauce.  Then  I realized I forgot to season it, so I seasoned afterwards.  I cooked the meatloaf for approximately 20 minutes.  They came out looking very tasty.    I am pairi...

Happy hump day!  You know that moment when your dinner preparations go EXACTLY as planned?  That did not happen with this recipe.  In all seriousness, I started out with a pretty basic Ravioli Lasagna Bake  recipe and then I realized that I needed to add some more protein in it since I have one that doesn't want to eat meat and I just happen to have some Ricotta cheese.  Then I found the Million Dollar Ravioli Lasagna recipe.  Ultimately, I did a variation of these recipes.   Unfortunately, I ran out of Mozzarella cheese and had to wait on my husband to get home from Trader Joe's with more mozzarella.  I thought we had some stashed in the freezer, but we did not. I used the Zero Point Marinara recipe, Kirkland Parm and some Mozzarella along with the ricotta and some organic ricotta and spinach ravioli.  I followed the cooking directions from the Ravioli Bake.  Overall, it turned out pretty well.  Well enough that my fami...

Happy hump day, friends!  So, I decided to do something different rather than eggs this week.  I remembered seeing a sheet pan pancake recipe and decided to give it a whirl since I found some of the newer Lily's chocolate chips that I've been seeing everyone posting (the Semi-sweet baking chips and the milk chocolate baking chips) about finding.  I found mine at Sprouts when I went to pick up Almond Coconut milk for myself and A2 for my oldest son.  Being determined on Monday night to get some stuff prepared for the week, I promptly went home and looked up the recipe on Pinterest.  Once I entered it in the Weight Watchers Recipe Tracker and determined it was only 4 Freestyle SmartPoints, I decided that would be breakfast for the remainder of the week.  I will boil some eggs to help get some protein in as well.     I used 2 cups of Kodiak Buttermilk Pancake Mix, 2 eggs, 1 cup of Almond Coconut Milk, 1 banana and 28 grams of Lily's Semi-Sw...

Happy Wednesday a/k/a Hump Day friends!  So I managed to make some flounder that everyone actually ate! *Pat self on back*  Seriously, it was pretty tasty.  I used this recipe as my guide.  Her recipe was super easy, but I used what I had on hand. I used 5 flounder fillets, Penzey's Season Salt, juice from a whole lemon, a just a small pat of butter.  I am curious about the seasoning and am looking forward to making it again.  We had steamed broccoli and Kraft cauliflower mac and cheese on the side.  Honestly, Kraft isn't my favorite like it used to be, but the cauliflower pasta wasn't too bad.  I would definitely use this recipe as my base again.  It was easy and so good.  No tartar sauce was needed for me and that says something!  Hope you have a fantastic day!

Happy Wednesday a/k/a Hump Day friends!  How's your week going?  I do have a recipe to share, but I have to tell you, Monday did not go quite as I'd planned.  I was exhausted, it was a rough night with the CPAP so I felt like I hadn't slept well.  DH and I agreed we would go "out" for lunch.  Well, my choice at the deli in our building was not a great choice and used the remainder of my points for the day.  So I started plotting and planning what I would eat for dinner...DH thought he was going to have to work late...so I offered to bring him lunch.  As this week is so busy, with a Bible Study beginning Tuesday night with EndTimes Ministries , then our regular Wednesday night service.  Given that, I knew I had to get shopping done on Monday night.   Now for the recipe.  Have you seen those CeCe's Veggie Co. Noodled (spiralized veggies) and more recently Riced?  I purchased the CeCe's Veggie Co. Riced Organic Veggie Medley ...

Happy Hump Day friends!   We made it to the middle of the week!   I tried a new recipe this week and it was delicious!   I made something that I would have never tried to make years ago…I made eggplant parmesan.   It was baked so a little healthier.   As always, I thought I had all my ingredients and I hadn't really used my panko in a while and I didn't have quite enough.   We made it work by crushing some garlic croutons.   I feel good about how it turned out though and we're excited to have it again.   I used this recipe from Delish.   I did substitute the Trader Joe's Lite Mozzarella and I tried not to overdo it with the cheese.   It turned out to be 8 Freestyle SmartPoints.  I served mine with grated zucchini.  My son, who is allergic to zucchini, had his with spaghetti squash and my husband and daughter has rotini because  I didn't realize I was out of spaghetti.  Hopefully you will get it a try if you like ...

Happy Wednesday a/k/a Hump Day!  We're halfway through the week.  I don't recall if I shared it or not, but on Father's Day, I opted to make a cake that popped up in my Instagram feed that seems to be a WW favorite.  It is a 2-ingredient cake using an Angel Food Cake as the base.  The one I made for Father's Day I used a can of crushed pineapple.  I really enjoyed it but it was a bit sticky.  After some searching on Pinterest, I saw multiple pins for more 2-ingredient cakes using pie filling as the second ingredient.  So, at the request of my son, I made the 2-ingredient cake using strawberry pie filling.  It got puffier than I anticipated and, if I'm honest, I didn't read the recipe that I found on Pinterest very well.  I did not realize that it made more than a dozen.   Ultimately, I wound up making 2 donut pans and a dozen cupcakes in the muffin pan.  The  recipe  I originally looked at said it would ...

Happy Hump day friends!  Hope everyone is having a good week thus far.  You know that moment when you are struggling to figure out what to have for dinner or you know one thing and you need to plan a meal around it?  Well, that happened to me.  I don't eat a lot of bread daily, sometimes it's one slice with my eggs or garlic bread with dinner, or dinner rolls or biscuits but not something I have all the time.  I had rolls that I needed to use before they went bad so I was determined that we were going to have that...but I wasn't sure what else.  Then...inspiration struck...memories from sitting in The Black Eyed Pea hit.  I would fix a veggie plate.  Would my family like it?  They definitely did enjoy it!  That night had salad, fried okra (cooked in the air fryer) and shells and cheese.  It had some variety and a little something for everyone.  I have really figured out that this may be one of my new favorite meals.  Let...

Happy Wednesday friends!  Hope your week is going well.  The previous muffin recipe turned out pretty well, but I decided to try a different one.  The muffins, honestly, I didn't focus on the points simply because my daughter doesn't need to focus on that.  I'm focusing more on getting her protein.  I used this recipe as my guide:  Weight Watchers One Point Chocolate Chip Pecan Muffins .  First off, I think I might have been better served to double the recipe or use the mini-muffin cups because these turned out to be flatter and more cookie-like rather than muffin like in my opinion.  I used the same recipe as a base and used my new donut pan to cook it.  Although this time, I used 2 Tbsp of mini chocolate chips.  Using that recipe and making it in the donut pan, it's 2 Freestyle SmartPoints.   I think it's pretty tasty and my children were not complaining that I baked.  I hope you try it and enjoy it!

Happy Wednesday a/k/a hump day, friends!  I am looking forward to a wonderful Wednesday.  As the week continues, I'm feeling more positive about my food choices.  I know I mentioned my DD has decided to go vegetarian.  As such, I've been trying to find some additional sources of protein for her.  I keep seeing those in the WW community talking about the Kodiak Cakes and making muffins and the baked donuts out of them.  Last time I went to Costco, I bought a big box.  I decided to make my DD some muffins using the Kodiak Cakes as my base.  It will be a good addition of protein.  I used this base recipe as my test recipe.  Kodiak Cake Chocolate Chip Muffins 1 cup of Kodiak Cake Mix 1 cup of Water 2/3 cup of milk 1 egg Whisk together your ingredients.  Spray your muffin tin or use liners (I use liners).  Add your fruit or your chocolate chips (in my case chocolate chips since my daughter enjoys chocolate chip muffins)....