Simple Salad and French Toast Oatmeal

Tonight I needed to just keep it simple for dinner. We have get to go to Evan's orchestra concert tonight so I didn't want to spend much time in the kitchen cooking or cleaning up. Also, we really haven't been eating enough of our greens lately if you can believe that. I know some of you think that is all we eat around here. I do love to eat salad almost everyday. It makes me feel good and keeps me full for a long time. Plus it is pretty quick since I usually have everything ready to go. But I do like variety if I am going to eat salad as often as I do. So this is what it looked like tonight.

We had a spinach and romaine mix topped with some chicken breasts I marinated in balsamic vinegar and some Greek seasoning and cooked on my fake George Foreman grill. I also added sliced avocado, sun-dried tomatoes, and caramelized onion. I chose a balsamic vinaigrette tonight for the dressing, but I think Newman's Own Sun-Dried Tomato would have been even better if I only  had some!

For the record my husband was super happy to eat a salad for dinner tonight. Know why? The avocado and the onions. He may have been seen licking the last few out of the pan before he washed it up tonight!! And it was 5:45 when I sat down to type this so I cooked and we ate and cleaned up very quickly. Goal met!

So I wanted to share something else that I stumbled across the other day on a blog. It was a recipe for French Toast Oatmeal. Incredible! I was hooked with just the title and then I fixed it, also rather quickly, and devoured it. I shared one bite with Miles. I think he was sorry he didn't pick oatmeal.

That is pure maple syrup melting in my bowl! Holy Yum!

Can you believe that I actually followed her recipe exactly? No changes whatsoever! So you can visit her incredible blog called "The Edible Perspective" and get the recipe and see her beautiful pictures by clicking here. She is a photographer also and has won awards for the photography on her blog. While you are there click on her recipes link and see all the amazing recipes she has for all kinds of different oatmeal and breakfast foods. I am going to try some of her buckwheat bakes next. She has lots of vegetarian, vegan, and gluten free recipes also if you are interested in those.

I now must get out of these sloppy cooking clothes and go to the concert. I really am actually looking forward to it. Evan has come a long way since the beginning and he is doing a chamber piece with a few of his best buds tonight. I have been hearing lots of Christmas music coming from his room as he practices so it should be a festive night!

Enjoy your evening!

Sun-Dried Tomato and Feta Chicken Roll Ups

Well I am home from a very fabulous weekend with my girlfriends scrapbooking! We go on this trip annually and it is where we get the bulk of our scrapbooking done for the year. I completed 50 pages! Together we finished 218 pages and we are pretty proud of ourselves. We also eat way too much on this trip. They make it easy for us by providing such delicious meals and snacks. The problem is we are too sedentary to really need that much food and there is a small issue with a lack of vegetables for me. (I forgot my V8 this year.) Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining in the least. I loved the Saturday morning breakfast of oatmeal and yogurt with all kinds of fruit toppings and brunch yesterday was a delicious egg bake. We also had sandwiches on homemade bread, taco salad, and chicken cordon blue. The highlight of the trip comes Saturday afternoon when they do the cheesecake parade. That is right, a parade for cheesecake!

We all stand up and clap to some very fun music as he parades his cheesecakes around. Then they go cut them up and we go enjoy! I picked pumpkin and a slice of green grape cheesecake. They are small slices so no worries. There are SO many different kinds it is hard to choose.

Here we are Friday night just getting started really!

Needless to say after a weekend of indulging and a lot of sitting I came home feeling pretty stuffed! Since Miles was home with the kids by himself all weekend he didn't do too much cooking either. It is possible that no one ate a single vegetable all weekend long. So we declared today and probably tomorrow to be a phase one kind of day. By that we basically mean no carbs, no sugar, and no fruit. We will then eat fairly strict the rest of this week with limited carbs and fruit but still no sugar. That's the problem with indulging too much! You can do it for a couple days but then you have to be strict for several days to even things out.

So tonight I made a little invention. Even though we will be eating strict I still want my food to taste great and feel like it is something special. I made a sun-dried tomato paste tonight that I rolled up inside some chicken breasts. Miles' words, "Oh my gosh! Did you write this one down?" I think we have a winner folks!

First place some sun-dried tomatoes in a bowl of water to soak. I used about 1/2 cup of julienned tomatoes. Next you need to pound your chicken breasts flat with a rolling pin or mallet and set them aside. The recipe for the filling will do about 4 chicken breasts. You could probably sneak out a fifth if you needed too.

Give the tomatoes at least 10 minutes to soak and then grind them up with a little of the water. To this I added 1/4 cup of feta cheese, 2 tsp. of chopped basil (jarred), one tablespoon each of balsamic and olive oil, and 3 garlic cloves minced.

It was having a hard time getting chopped and mixed well so I took it all out and microwaved it for 30 seconds then gave it a few more whirls in the food processor. It came together nicely after that. I also added a bit more feta at this point.

Spread it generously over your flattened chicken breast.

Then roll up the chicken starting with the most narrow end and place some toothpicks in to hold it in place. Put in a pan seam side down and cover with aluminum foil. They go into a 400 degree oven and cook for 30 minutes. I decided after eating them that a couple minutes less would have been perfect! They weren't really dry but they weren't super moist. So just watch them closely.

While my chicken was cooking I did my favorite trick with green beans. I had already steamed them in the microwave for 5 minutes. Then I put them in a pan with some olive oil, a little chopped red onion, red wine vinegar (be generous), and sliced almonds. Saute them for about 5-7 minutes.

I sliced up the chicken and served them up with the green beans and some salad. Remember we are eating strict so we needed to have 2 vegetable servings tonight. I don't mind though. I was vegetable deprived. I ate salad for lunch too. It felt good to be back to my normal diet. My body is really thankful too! I also think that these would be great just smothered in the sauce if you don't want to take the time to roll the chicken.

Even though I have to eat strict the next few days it is worth it and this is why. My little girl poured over her completed pages for quite some time last night. Her brother was equally thankful and excited to see his pages too. Portion of goodness, you bet!

I think now I will have some hot tea and catch up with the DVR. It has been a while and we miss each other!

Recipe:

4 chicken breasts pounded flat

1/2 cup sun-dried tomatoes soaked in water

1/3 cup feta

2 Tbsp. chopped basil (I used jarred but fresh is good too)

1 Tbsp. balsamic vinegar

1 Tbsp. olive oil

2-3 cloves garlic, minced

Directions:

When tomatoes are soft, drain the liquid reserving 1/4 cup, and place in a food processor. Chop up finely with the liquid. In a small bowl place the rest of the ingredients listed (except the chicken) and add the tomatoes. Microwave for 30 seconds and put all ingredients back into the food processor. Spin until mixed well.

Spread a generous amount over each chicken breast. Roll up starting with the narrow end and insert toothpicks. Place seam side down in baking dish and cover with aluminum foil. Bake for 28-30 minutes at 400 degrees. Slice and serve immediately.

Sun-Dried Tomato Spread for Lunch

As promised I have been working on lunch ideas. I always need lunch to be quick! For most of our marriage I have been fortunate enough to have Miles come home everyday for lunch. I think it is a true blessing to steal that extra time together. However, it also makes one more meal I have to prepare everyday verses shoving an apple and a few crackers in my mouth when I get hungry. What usually happens is I look at the clock and say, "Oh no! It is 11:30 and Miles will be home soon. What can I fix for lunch?" I rush to the kitchen and get working. I will admit that many days we have leftover dinner and that makes it a little easier but I like to have some things on hand that can make it quick when I don't have leftovers. This sun-dried tomato spread is one of them!

This is quite simple to make and I use it in a variety of ways not to mention it tastes divine! It is a recipe I found in an issue of Runner's magazine where they were posting some quick meal ideas for runners.

You do need a little time to make the sauce but once the sauce is made you can make very quick meals. I like to make extra to keep in the fridge so we will have some on hand for several days.

You need to start by soaking some sun-dried tomatoes in water for about 30 minutes. You are supposed to go run for those 30 minutes! Any amount of water is fine. You will discard most of it and reserve 1/4 cup of it to mix in. Then blend the tomatoes in a food processor until fine.

Then you will add these ingredients to the food processor: olive oil, roasted red peppers, garlic, walnuts, oregano, and a pinch of cayenne. You can buy chopped walnuts to save time or pre-chop them a little so they can get ground up very finely. I also chop up the roasted red pepper a little before it goes in the food processor. You want to have a nice smooth texture.

(The actual recipe is posted below)

Yesterday for lunch I spread some of this delicious sauce on a whole wheat tortilla.

Then I topped it with feta cheese, my favorite!

Then of course I had to add something green.

Then a few more veggies for some crunch and to make it more filling because I didn't want to add any meat to it this time. So cucumbers and tomatoes it was!

Then I drizzled just a little of this Greek dressing on top and rolled it up.

 I grabbed a cluster of grapes I had already washed from the fridge and ate my lunch. I was in and out of the kitchen in about 6 minutes. Faster then you can order at the drive through, pull ahead to pay, and get your meal I would say! Plus much more nutritious for sure and pretty filling with all those veggies in there.

 SUN-DRIED TOMATO SPREAD

(Runner’s Magazine Aug. 2011 issue)

10 sun-dried tomatoes halves (approximate - add more if you like)

1/3 cup roasted red pepper

¼ cup olive oil

2 garlic cloves

¼ cup walnuts

2 Tbsp. fresh oregano

Pinch of cayenne

Salt to taste

¼ cup fresh mint (optional - I have never added)

Soak sun-dried tomatoes in water for approximately 30 minutes. Reserve ¼ cup of the soaking liquid and blend in a food processor then add remaining sauce ingredients and blend until fine. 

I do have another post I did about this recipe here that is the actual full recipe from the magazine. It works well for dinner too! Add some chicken to your wrap or pita bread or make a salad and top it with a few dollops of the sauce in lieu of dressing. I did spread it on whole wheat dollar buns with some rotisserie chicken, spinach, feta, and sliced avocado for our Sunday night feasting with small group and it went over pretty well I think! Just PLEASE try it! The flavors are so amazing and you will not be sorry you have this in your fridge when you forget it is almost lunch time like I do!

In other news...............

My floors are about 75% finished! The trim needs to be nailed back up and the tile layed in the entry. Then I just might be able to put the living room back together!

My baby girl got her glasses today! I think she looks super cute but didn't I pay extra to not have that glare on those lenses???????? I hope it is just the way the sun is coming in the room behind her! She has been happily wearing them since she came home from school without a complaint. Let's hope it stays that way!

This golf ball has been my best friend for the last couple days. I think I have plantar fasciitis. I have been trying to increase my mileage and this is the nasty pay off I get! I have been keeping a couple golf balls in the freezer and rolling my foot over it several times a day to try to relieve the pain. I never thought I would say this but.....I haven't been able to run since Monday and it really stinks! I am a little bit panicked. Ugh! You would think I would be happy to have an excuse not to work out.

I now must get dinner started for tonight! On the menu is Couscous Cakes, Miles' very favorite, a side salad, and hummus with pita for dipping! Vegetarian it is!