Cucumber Lime Chicken & Black Beans with onions & Peppers

I found some chicken tenders on sale.  Snapped up a couple of packages.  Today I used the first one for our lunch.  

One of my cucumbers from the weekend was a bit soft.  Not super crisp for a salad but not bad either.  I decided to see what happens when you bake chicken with cucumber.  It was tasty.  And easy.  I'm a huge fan of easy.

Black beans are a mainstay of our diet.  I did these with some onions, peppers, lime, cilantro, ancho & coconut.  Adding the lime to the beans inspired me to put it on the chicken too.  It was one of those inspirations that worked well.  (unlike a LOT of the others)

Cucumber Lime Chicken

Preheat oven to 350

Put chicken tenders (however many you want to cook) in a baking dish

sprinkle with salt.  Not much, just a bit

chop a large cucumber up and put it over the chicken.

Bake covered until the chicken is done. How long depends on how much you cook.   Mine took about 20 min.  The cucumber loses a lot of water and keeps the chicken moist and tender.

Remove from oven and squeeze the juice from 1/2 - 1 lime (depends on how much you cooked) over the chicken right before serving.  I added lime garnishes for people to add a bit more lime at the table if they wanted.

138 calories per serving

Ancho Black Beans with Onions & Peppers

2 cups of dried beans soaked over night

1 large onion sliced into thin rings

1 large red bell pepper cut into bits.  You can dice it nice and even or slice it into rough squares like I did.

4 fresh jalapenos sliced

1 large poblano pepper sliced, chopped, diced - however neatly you want to do it

Juice from 1 lime

1 teaspoon pepper

1 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoon dried cilantro

2 tablespoons ancho powder

3 cups chicken broth

1 14oz coconut cream

Soak and drain the beans preserving 2 cups of the water if you want, otherwise you'll need a couple of cups of water

Add the stock, water, peppers, onions, lime juice and spices to the beans.  Cook until the beans and veggies are tender and soft.  Stir in the coconut cream and serve.  

77 calories per serving

Fast, Gluten Free & Easy Broccoli Soup

My daughter loves to snack on broccoli florets but then I am left with a bunch of stems.  I do what I can to find uses for them and today that was soup.  Today was such a gray day that soup was a perfect fit.

Ingredients:  

Stems from 2 large head of broccoli - or use the florets too if you want.  chopped

1/2 cup sliced green onions

1 poblano pepper chopped into pieces

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon course ground pepper

2 cups whole milk

1 1/2 cups chicken broth

water for steaming

cheese, chopped green onions and ancho pepper for garnish

Steam the broccoli, onion & pepper until very tender.

drain and put the veggies in a blender.  Add the milk and broth.  Then blend the heck out of it.  I have a ninja blender and I love to ninja stuff.  Pour the soup back into the saucepan and add the pepper and salt.

Heat it up and cook until it's the consistency that you want.  Longer if you want it to be super thick, less if you don't.  We tend to go for less here.  Alternatively you could add a thickening agent like a bit of flour or starch.  I was going for simple, fast and gluten free,so we I didn't go that route.  

Serve with a bit of cheddar, some onions and a sprinkle of ancho pepper.  Paprika would work well too, but we put ancho on pretty much everything.

Chipotle Eggplant with zucchini

This one is kind of spicy, but I love spicy.  Eggplant and zucchini were on sale, so I stocked up - now have to use them before they turn.  You can never really "stock up" on produce.  Only buy enough to eat quickly!

1 medium eggplant  peeled and cut into strips about the size of homecut french fries (1/2 inch across)

1 medium zucchini sliced

1 small can chipotle peppers in sauce

1 clove garlic, minced

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

1 tsp lime juice

1/4 cup olive oil for cooking

In a large skillet cook all ingredients, starting with the zucchini because it takes a tad longer.  After it's started to get tender, add the eggplant and cook until the eggplant is translucent.  

Cilantro Lime Salad Dressing

I love citrus and spice.  This dressing was strong, but very very tasty

In a blender or food processor mix the following:

1 jalapeno pepper
1 small (1/4 inch) piece ginger root
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1 tablespoon ancho pepper
Enough cilantro to fill 1/4 cup when you squish it up
1/4 cup lime juice
4 tablespoons honey
3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1/2 - 3/4 cup olive oil   I did 1/2 cup, but I like things strong.

I store mine in the fridge, but it does get a bit hard between uses.  If we dont' use all at one meal I just let it sit out and warm up a bit for the next time then give it a good shake.  It never lasts more than 2 meals.

makes an excellent dip for grilled or baked chicken.

Gluten Free Pasta & Cheese

8 oz gluten free pasta.  I used brown rice/quinoa from Trader Joe's this time.  Any will work.

2 cups shredded cheese.  Cheddar is best, for this version I used something called "Mexican blend"  Straight cheddar will make it a yellower dish.  This one has lots of white cheeses so it's only kind of yellow.  For a full out yellow mac & cheese toss in some American.  I hate American, so that's not happening for me.

1/3 cup ricotta

1/3 cup grated parmesan - not dry - the moist stuff from the fridge section

1/4 cup provolone

1/3 cup onion

1/2 cup diced peppers - bell, poblano, whatever you have

1/4 teaspoon ground pepper

1/4 teaspoon ancho pepper

1/4 teaspoon garlic salt

1 tablespoon gluten free all purpose flour (coconut flour works too, but is drier, so more milk might be needed)

4 tablespoons butter

1/4 cup masa harina

2 tablespoons butter cut into the harina to make crumbs

2 cups milk

 1/4 cup heavy cream

-----------------------------

Heat oven up to 350

make noodles according to package directions, drain and set aside.  

In saucepan combine 4 tablespoons butter, onion and peppers.  Saute until onion is soft.    Add spices, milk and cream.  stir constantly until boiling.  Mix in the cheeses and cook, again stirring constantly until bubbly and thick.  

Mix together with the noodles and put into a baking dish.  Make sure the sauce is well mixed.  

Old fashioned noodles & cheese add bread crumbs at this point.  I have yet to find a gluten free bread that I consider edible - especially given the price.  I made a topping crumb mix from butter and masa harina.  

Cut the 2 tablespoons butter into the masa  If you're not familiar with cutting butter into flour, Betty's Kitchen has a great tutorial.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RAONX3BZZU

Sprinkle crumb mix onto the noodles and bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes.  Everything should be piping hot and the top should be a little crunchy.

nutritional information is based on 6 servings.  It's a heavy dish and super filling.  I was super surprised that it came back with a b-.  After adding the cream, milk & butter I was fulling expecting a D.

Poblano peppers stuffed with spicy brie

A quick dish for 2 (or more if you double/triple/etc it)

2 large poblano peppers - seeds removed and sliced open lengthwise

4oz brie cheese

4 peppers from a small can of chipotles in sauce

4 1 inch slices of pre made polenta from Trader Joe's.  (or about 1/2 cup if you're making your own)

Steam the peppers until they are tender

While they are cooking mix the brie and chipotle peppers in a food processor.  I tried to do it with a hand mixer, but that failed miserably.  So much for being too lazy to get the food ninja out.  

When the peppers are tender layer the polenta in the middle and top with the cheese mixture.  Wrap each pepper in tin foil and bake until hot and the cheese is all melty.  

Each pepper is pretty filling, so I just serve one with a salad.  This dish got a C rating because of the brie.  You could easily substitute a cheese with lower fat/calories, but I wanted the specific taste of brie.  A bleu cheese mix would also be tasty I think.  chipotles not from a can would also lower the sodium quite a bit.

Tomato Chili Heart Shaped Tortillas - gluten free

I made these little tortillas as a replacement for pita bread.  I like my humus and carrots are fine to dip in it, but occasionally I miss pita.  These are a great substitute - and they're cute.

1 1/4 cup masa harina (not corn meal)

1/4 cup tomato sauce

1 1/4 cup water

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon red chili powder

Heat a skillet to slightly lower than for normal tortillas.  Mine was 2 lines over medium

Mix ingredients in a bowl - adding more water or masa to get the right consistency.  You want that wonderful feel of brand new play dough.  Silky soft, not dry, not sticky.

roll out dough or do the time consuming method of using a press.  That's what I did since I am awful about getting the dough even

Cut out hearts - do all them at once, before cooking.  They cook too fast to do them at the same time.  Use heavy plastic or wax paper and gently peel the hearts off.  It's easy to mess up a lobe if you go too fast.

cook 20 - 25 seconds on one side, 35 - 40 seconds on the other and then 20 or so seconds on the first side again.  On the last flip they should puff up like little pillows.

A serving size is 3 hearts