Eating gluten-free is soooo much easier when you are eating dairy... for example, one of my comfort food staples, mac-n-cheese can be enjoyed and loved.

Let me give you the recipe...

Mac-n-Cheese with Chorizo

2/3 package of Catelli gluten-free penne (that's the amount I had left!)
2 cups of milk (1%)
2.5 tbsp corn starch
cheddar cheese to taste
parmesan to taste plus more for sprinkle on top
gluten-free panko to sprinkle on top
chorizo (gluten-free)

1. Cut up the chorizo and fry it until it's crispy
2. Boil the pasta until it's almost done, then drain
3. While the pasta is cooking, put the milk in a small saucepan with corn starch
4. Stir the milk until it starts to bubble and thicken up
5. Stir in cheese and let it melt
6. Mix the cheese, pasta, and chorizo and mix in a bit of mustard
7. Oh yeah, and salt and pepper it up!
8. Pour the pasta mix in the pan, sprinkle with parmesan and bread crumbs
9. Spray some cooking spray on the bread crumbs
10. Bake in a 425 oven for 15 minutes then broil for 5 minutes
11. Let set for 5 or 10 minutes

I really enjoyed this. I didn't want to get into figuring out how to make a roux or anything fancy, so corn starch in milk worked a treat. I loved the mac n cheese and will definitely be making it again!

Hope you like it too!

Gluten-free Chicken Pot Pie of Awesomeness.

After spending much of last year on the gluten-free bandwagon, I fell off the wagon towards the end of the year and after spending much of the end of the year feeling like poo, I am back on the wagon for this 2014.

And speaking of which, happy new year folks! May 2014 bring you peace and happiness, in whatever form you choose.

But back to me. It's been a week back on the gluten-free and I can't say that my life has changed, but I can say that I am feeling clearer headed, my stomach is less bloated and sore, and I am sleeping better. So there's that.

Tonight, I didn't want to venture out into the world, or into the cold, so I decided to cobble together a chicken pot pie to combat the stupid cold and the coming snow. And so I did. And so we ate. And so it went. (ha ha)

I read a number of recipes online for both biscuits and chicken pot pie. I wanted to figure out a way to make the kind of chicken pot pie I like, with biscuits and a slightly creamy sauce. I settled on some version of this:

I made the biscuits first, to let the dough settle, especially because of how sticky it can be.
(I made an altered version of this recipe from here: http://www.sugarfreemom.com/recipes/gluten-free-chicken-or-turkey-biscuit-pot-pie/)

You need:

1 cup gluten free flour (I used Bob's Red Mill, which I don't entirely love)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon xanthan gum 
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 cup butter - cubed
1 beaten egg (part in the sauce, part as a wash)
just over 1/2 cup milk 
chopped fresh parsley 
pepper to taste

Mix the dry ingredients. Add in the butter and mix. I never quite understand this step. I don't know how it's supposed to look, but I just whizzed it around in the mixer for want of better instructions. From there, I added half the beaten. I then slowly added in milk, just until it all started to come together. The amount you use will probably vary depending on the flour blend, etc. I then added in chopped parsley, pepper, and realized that at this step you could add in all sorts of tasty things. Use your imagination.

I then set the bowl of the raw biscuits over to the side and went on about the rest of the meal.

For the rest of the meal, I used the following:

1 lb or so of boneless chicken breast
some butter
1 cube of chicken bouillon 
2 stalks of celery, chopped
2 smallish potatoes, chopped (I don't peel potatoes but of course you can if your life is interminably long)
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
2.5 cups of chicken broth
1/2 cup of milk
frozen peas
french cut green beans (I used frozen)
thyme
3 tablespoons of corn starch

While I was mixing the biscuit dough, I was also poaching some chicken breast in water with bouillon and pepper. I cooked it for 15 minutes, took it off the heat, and kept the liquid it had poached in.

I put some butter in a large pan and once melted, I added the chopped potato, carrot, and celery. To this, I added the liquid from the poached chicken slowly while the vegetables softened. I added thyme, salt, and pepper and kept it cooking slowly. I would say it cooked for maybe 20 minutes or so? I chopped the chicken into little cubes and added it to the pan, along with the stock, the milk, frozen peas to taste, and green beans to taste. I let that come back to the boil.

In a separate little bowl, I mixed the corn starch with the leftover broth from the poached chicken (a couple of tablespoons). You can use water if you don't have any broth leftover. 

After the mixture had reached the boil, I slowly stirred in the cornstarch mixture and brought back to the boil and cooked for a few minutes, until it started to heat up. 

I poured the mixture into a pan large enough to fit (it made way more than I expected, as I was just sort of throwing stuff in the pan). I took the biscuit mixture and put little dollops of it all across the top, watching in horror as some of them sunk into the mix! It didn't cover it completely, but I wasn't trying to. I didn't want it to be too bready in case the biscuits were rubbish. 

(Anyway, while all this is going on, you should be pre-heating your oven to 400 degrees.) 

Over the tops of the little biscuity dumplings, I brushed on the rest of the beaten egg and then threw the whole lot in the oven. 

Because my biscuits were so small, I needed only cook the entire lot for about 25 minutes. 

No word of a lie, it was delicious!  I was super happy with it, and am looking forward to the upcoming leftovers. Here's the inside:

Honestly, you could add anything you like.  I didn't add onions or garlic, though lots of recipes called for them. To be honest, I just didn't want my hands to smell. That being said, the end result was creamy without being overly heavy, but filling and warming all the same. 

As we embark on this new year, I am working on some new things including a new blog, new plans, and improving my diet and overall health. We lose sight so quickly of taking care ourselves and then once we start feeling crappy again, we just feel like it's the way it's always been. So enough of that crap. Enough of complacency. And maybe one baby step in that direction is the introduction of a delicious gluten-free pot pie. 

New York adventures

I was recently in New York for a legal technology conference and took the opportunity to visit for a day or so with my friend Chris, who is a man about town with the foodstuffs on offer in the Big Apple. He lives in Brooklyn and picked me up at the airport (making me feel like a movie star), because he is awesome. Soon after dropping off my gear at his place, we headed for the subway for a wild ride to our first stop on my New York food adventure: Bark Hot Dogs in Park Slope. Delicious dogs accompanied by disco fries and white birch beer (which I'm going to describe as a cross between wintergreen Life Savers and root beer - so not sure I'll ever order it again).

Very delicious, all natural etc. I had the classic NYC dog with sweet and sour onions and mustard. In the back is Chris' pickle dog. The food was great and I was particularly amused by the nine-year-old-going-on-25 little girl who sat beside me. She was interested in my opinions regarding the food and the beverages. Obviously I'm so very pretty and smart that everything I said to her needed to be repeated with great gravitas to her father. There is no doubt that I am a role model on the hot dog eating front, send your children.

 After hot dogs, we ambled around a bit to the Ample Hills Creamery for some of the best ice cream I've ever had. And I have had a lot of ice cream. I was tempted by the Mexican hot chocolate because I'm that way but in the end chose the salted crack caramel. Fantastic. The best part is that you get to make a very informed decision on what you're going to order because they let you try everything in the place, especially on a late January day when it's not exactly lineups around the corner in there. Not to mention, the store is crazy cute.

Now there are few things I enjoy more than street food and in Toronto, we do not have a good variety, so non-stationary food vendors were on the agenda as well. For dinner (before contra dancing!), Chris hunted down the Kimchi Taco Truck, which combined my love of food on the go with Mexican flair. Now in Manhattan, we grabbed our bags of deliciousness and walked up to Union Square to eat on a park bench on a very warm January night. I had a combo of the grilled Korean bbq short rib taco and the pulled chicken taco. Woah! Those short rib tacos were out of this world!!

The next day Chris invited me to join him and a group of friends for dim sum at a local Brooklyn restaurant (which I can't remember the name of) and it too was spectacular. We arrived early in order to get a table, which when we left through a horde of waiting and hungry diners, I understood. There were about eight of us, so we ordered many delicious things to share. It's a good number of people because it lets you try many things but you don't have to have a lot of anything. So a couple of dishes stood out, one was chicken feet, which was the only thing I was not brave enough to eat but was the choice of the birthday boy for whom we were gathered to celebrate. While the feet were not my favourite dish of the weekend, they did come out as the best photo.

I did however take a chance on the jellyfish dish as I'd never eaten it and all the rest of the food was pretty excellent so I figured this was as good a time as any. It was tasty although the texture was a bit more rubbery than I enjoy. There was also some octopus mixed in with the dish and it was all good.

So overall, probably my best-ever dim sum experience. And it was followed by a bit of Chinese new year celebrations on the street, which were enjoyable and left me with glittery bits in my hair until well into the following morning when I finally got to bed!

I left Chris on Sunday afternoon and headed to Midtown to check into the hotel and get into a work state of mind. That night I met a lawyer friend and some of her colleagues and ended up having a really fun time dancing the entire night away. Her flight was delayed and my plans for a swishy Mexican place in Chelsea didn't work out but my favourite Times Square-area standby Virgil's barbecue was called up to the plate and didn't disappoint. From the gang who had never eaten bbq before, there were smiles all around. That's the way they roll at Virgil's. Good, solid bbq that you just can't get in Toronto.

After dinner there was much dancing and carousing and when we finally got back to our hotel in the 3:30 a.m. range, my companions were hungry. So off to Ray's Pizza for some pie. Not the greatest but it hit the spot and allowed us the chance to have a meaningful conversation about health care policy with a lovely man from Seattle.

On the Monday night, I went out with one of my fellow editors and her sisters who had come down for a little r&r. We ended up at a tapas restaurant near 42nd and 8th. Nothing spectacular but a big selection of tapas and a very enjoyable variety of sangrias. A fun night out with new people, can't beat that! (bad pic taken with ye olde BlackBerry). The hit of the evening, I would hazard, were the dates wrapped in bacon. They just work.

Over the course of the next few days, ate quite a bit just around the hotel. The usual oatemeal for breakfast at the Astro Diner at 55th and 6th, which I always try to do when I'm at this conference. Had an excellent Chipotle burrito bowl (fast and convenient) and tried this odd French restaurant/sushi bar mashup Rue 57 again and had a fairly spectacular chicken pot pie.

Now all over Manhattan are these halal food carts that serve up gyros and chicken and the like. Apparently the one that is at the corner of 53rd and 6th is the most awesome. There is always a line up there, particularly late at night on the weekends after the bars close. It's quite a sight. So as I was wrapping up the trip, I decided to have my final lunch at the cart. It is a giant plate of happiness (with a Diet Coke) for $7. Underneath all that delicious white sauce there's a mouthwatering blend of lamb gyros, chicken, rice and salad. Enough food to keep you going for the whole day. Just bring breath mints because there's a big garlic punch.

So long and thanks for all the eats!

I feel like chicken tonight...

As a girl who has only recently embraced the vegetable as friend, I am still finding ways to incorporate them into my life that will trick my brain into eating them happily.  Case in point?  BBQ chicken dinner night with twice-baked potatoes.  Oh sorry, were you wondering where the vegetable came in?  No silly reader, it's not JUST the potato!  Them there potatoes had SPINACH lurking within!!!

Oh yes, bbq chicken is lovely.  And green beans lightly steamed with some salt, pepper, and lemon is a delight.  But the twice baked potato was DIVINE!!!  I sauteed some spinach (or did I microwave it?  hrmph) and, after baking the potato sans foil in the oven for about an hour, I cut the spud in half, scooped out the innards, mixed in some light laughing cow and spinach (and salt and pepper), and then stuffed the shells with the filling.  Sprinkled a little bit of grated old old cheddar on top (grating gets you the feeling of lots of cheese for very few points) and baked for about 15 more minutes.  You can't beat that sort of feel-good comforty food!!!  And pretty points friendly!  (I don't know about you, but I tend to save about half of my daily points for dinner.  It's how I eat and how I am comfortable keeping track... you???)

Another Delicious Day -- With More Chili Fries.

It's a sickness. I get these crazy cravings and find something I like, then make it over and over.

This weekend was no exception, and I had to make some Super Bowl Kick-Off Chili Cheese fries...


Oh yeah. I cooked that chili all day. I started with one onion, one fat carrot, half a red pepper, a stalk of celery, and some garlic all chopped up, then cooked slowly with some cooking spray and a bit of water. When soft, take out and then add the super lean ground beef. Use some paper towel to soak up any fat from the meat... Then add the veggies back in, along with chili powder. Stir up then mix in a litre of V8. Cook for hours and hours on the stove until it's super thick and the veggies are super soft. (I didn't add beans because G can't eat them, but they would be lovely here...). I gave G a bowl of chili for lunch tomorrow and I divided the other serving up into two containers of low-fat refried beans to have burritos for lunch! Can't wait!

The fries are oven baked, one potato each, cut into strips, sprayed with cooking spray and tossed with more chili powder, salt and pepper then baked at 450 for 15 minutes, turned over and then cooked another 10 or so. Fantastic! Top your crispy fries with delicious chili and some fat free sour cream... YIPPIE!

But that's not ALLLLL we ate today...

We started the day with a new recipe that G made... Oatmeal Pancakes...


Yummy! These were really really good and very filling, which is something I don't generally find pancakes to be. In fact, I rarely eat pancakes for breakfast because while I find them to be delicious, I also find that I am hungry right after! Not so with these... three pancakes were five points, I think.

For lunch, knowing that chili fries were coming, we had a low point lunch of broccoli soup that G made last night alongside a grilled cheese sandwich...


I cooked the sandwich in a non-stick skillet with a little cooking spray. The sandwich consisted of two slices of Weight Watcher's bread (1 pt) with some tomato slices (0 pt) and one slice each of low-fat cheese slices (1pt). The soup was about 1pt for a bowl based on the Recipe Builder, so we got away with that delicious and filling lunch for about three points.

Oh yeah. It's all doable if you just do it.

For the rest of the game, we've got some pirate booty to snack on (which is higher point than I expected, but I was just SO excited to see it in the store here... I used to love it when I lived in the States, but have never seen it for sale in Canada!) and lots of water and MAYBE some PC hot chocolate in a bit...

And COME ON Saints... sheesh!

Alfredo suckfest.

Like many people who didn't get fat overnight, I love love love Fettucine Alfredo. (Or maybe, just like me who ate alot of heavy pasta dishes.) Add some chicken, a little diced tomato, extra cheese, and yeah, I could eat my dinner and yours and the rest of whoever else happens to be nearby. I really love it.

But it's not particularly healthy, and so it's something I don't have very often. In fact, I haven't made it in months and months. So, with G being out of town (and her not being a huge fan of the original dish) I decided to whip up a "what I had on hand" version of the recipe in the new Cooking Light magazine.


Barf. The sauce tasted like diet alfredo sauce, like the kind that comes on frozen dinners, and it was just really not substantial. The original recipe called for bacon, which I didn't have, and I did mix in some fresh parsley and tomato to try and make it not taste like total crap, but it didn't work. Diet-y and not at all pleasant, I really could not believe how unpleasant it tasted. And I even used extra cheese!

If you have the January/February Cooking Light and you have tried this recipe, please let me know and I may try it again down the road, but for now, thanks but no thanks.

I didn't make a full recipe, and so the points came out to be 7 for a serving. Not really worth it, but whatever.

Oh-My-Gosh-Paprikash!

Beef paprikash. Amazing.

I found the recipe in one of the British magazine's I read, but I can't for the life of me remember which one! But it was simple, brown some stewing beef dusted with a little flour, add some sliced onion, garlic, red pepper and a bunch of mushrooms with 1/2 teaspoon of smoked and regular paprika with dill and cumin, cook for a bit then add in some beef broth and stewed tomatoes. Cover and put in the oven to cook for a couple of hours. Stir in some chopped parsley and serve. YUM! It came out to be about 6 points a serving, so a goodly dinner amount...

I served it with some delicious cooked orzo and a dollop of fat free sour cream. It was an amazing dinner which made superb leftovers and really was extremely satisfying. I loved having it with orzo (also remarkably low point) and the fat free sour cream tastes exactly like regular sour cream.


I highly recommend this, and the recipe above, while not very specific, gives you a general idea of how you can make it and what to do. It's deliciously low point and feels really decadent.

Bad Photos. Delicious Breakfast.

G is away at a conference, so I was alone for my breakfast hunting and gathering this morning. I woke up with a solid craving for chili and eggs and potatoes. It is also a running day, so I knew that I needed a complete breakfast that would warm me up as I headed out into the extreme cold for my run this morning!

So I pondered, and after a second and a half, I knew exactly what I wanted... chili cheese fries with scrambled eggs on top. And so I turned on the oven to pre-heat to 450 and dreamed of the deliciousness awaiting me.

First, I made the french fries...


Simple. Cut up a small to medium potato into reasonably sized matchsticks. Place in a bag, spray with cooking spray, salt, pepper, and add a little chili powder (or whatever you like). Shake it up. Spread on a foil lined sheet that is also covered in a bit of spray in a single layer and put in your 450 degree preheated oven. Cook for 15 minutes, putting an ice cube in the mix (or just in the oven) in 7 minutes. At the 15 minute mark, turn them over and put them back in until cooked and browned. Mine took another ten minutes or so to get crispy and brown.

Then take the fries, place them in a bowl and cover with heated prepared chili, grate on a little cheese, and add some scrambled eggs with a bit more cheese on top.


Now this doesn't look delicious because it's yellow (still trying to work out the lights in the kitchen) but believe me when I say that this is amazingly delicious. So much so that I am going to make myself another plate of chili fries for dinner. (Oh, and really low point. One potato was 3 points, chili was 1.5 for 1/2 cup, cheese was 1 pt, and the eggs were 2 for one whole egg and one egg white. 7.5 points for a feast fit for a queen... totally worth it.)

Despite being low point, it gave me the energy I needed to embark on my run and to successfully finish in my best time yet. And now, I am off to pre-heat the oven for fries round 2!!!

Another Roast Dinner...

Rotisserie chicken...how did I ever live without you? Truly one of my most favorite things at the moment is to buy rotisserie chickens for dinner ideas. Whether you eat it plain, mix it in tacos, chop into baked pasta, whatever, it's so easy. And at Reither's grocery store, I can at least feel marginally good about the whole meat thing.

The other day, I stopped on my way home and bought just such a roast chicken, and brought it home. Turning the oven on warming, I kept my bird warm while I made some fixin's. Quick cook polenta (LOVE IT) and a quick cook of grape tomatoes and quartered fresh mushrooms, and dinner was served!


Come on, look at that great chicken dinner!!! (And I know, the plate comes out blue because my colour is all off. If I ever can stop buying stuff for losing weight, I promise to buy a new lens and a flash...)

Matzoh Ball Soup.

Some times you just want some comfort. Matzoh Ball Soup provides that comfort. Well, specifically, G's matzoh ball soup provides that comfort! This is so great, chicken stock that G made from scratch, with some carrot mixed in because it's my favorite, and big fluffy matzoh balls. The balls are from a mix, but were really fantastic. I am not a fan of soup for dinner normally, but really enjoyed this warm soup!

While J is away G will play

J is in OK so G is guest posting!

From my research, I see that Jamaican goat curry is a special dish that is made for the holidays. Well being neither Jamaican nor celebrating the Yuletide, I thought I'd give it a go.

The goat meat has been in the freezer since the end of our meat CSA a few months ago. J is not keen to eat it, so I thought I'd make some goat dishes while she was in OK visiting her family for the holidays. So goat curry it is.

Note: You need to start this process the night before!

First of all, I realized that Jamaican curry powder is not the same as regular Indian or the high-test Sri Lankan stuff we have in the cupboard, so I had to make my own. Happy to report that I had all the ingredients on hand so no troubles putting together this brew late at night. The main difference is that Jamaican curry powder has allspice (or pimento as it's called on the island). This is a mild one because you add scotch bonnets to the sauce later for heat. So I gathered all the indredients:

• 2 tbsp coriander seeds
• 1 tbsp cumin seeds
• 1 tbsp fenugreek
• 1 tbsp poppy seeds
• 1 tbsp anise/fennel seeds
• 1 tbsp black peppercorns
• 1/2 tbsp allspice seeds
• 1/2 tbsp mustard seeds
  
• 1 tsp ground ginger
  
• 2 tbsp ground tumeric

Toast all the seeds in a dry frying pan.


Let them cool, then grind them in a coffee grinder or mortar and pestle. Add the ground tumeric and ginger and stir it up so you have a nice fine powder.

The next step is to create the marinade. Take the following ingredients, cut them up and throw them in a blender.

• 2 onions
• 2 green onions
• 2 scotch bonnet peppers (or more if you're feeling extra bold)
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 1 tbsp of chopped fresh ginger
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp ground pepper
• 1/2 cup of water
  

Waz it all up. Add more water if you need it to make a nice paste. Then add 2 tbsp of the curry powder and stir it all up nicely together.

Now add 2 lbs of goat meat to the marinade. Ours had no bones, which was lovely for eating, but generally it actually tastes better if you cook it with meat on the bone. I put it all in a baggie and got the marinade all over the meat and then slapped it in the fridge overnight.


Next day when you're ready to cook it up. Take the meat out of the fridge and scrape off the marinade. Put it in a bowl and save for later.

Then put some oil in a large frying pan and brown the meat.

Once it's good and brown add the marinade, 1/2 lb of chopped up carrots and 1/2 lb of chopped up potatoes (use WHITE potatoes as they don't fall apart when you cook them for hours on end).


Cover the whole lovely concoction with water and simmer for 1.5 hours or until the meat is tender. Add more water if you need it as you go along. I added it a few times so the lovely sauce didn't stick to the bottom.

It's okay to make this well ahead of time. It gets more delicious as it sits. I made it in the morning (and the whole house smelled very fragrant all day!) and ate it with my dad that night. Went out and bought some roti from the local Jamaican restaurant because even though I'm energetic in the kitchen, making the breads does not appeal to me. The dude behind the counter also pointed out that making the roti would probably have taken longer than making the curry, so I was glad not to have gone down that road!

So I served it up with roti, some chopped up banana (weird you say, but the bit of sweet is delicious with curries), rice and peas, and some raita (yogurt, chopped up carrot, onion, tomato, salt, pinch of garam masala). It may not be pretty but it was DELICIOUS!!!

Chili me this Batman...

Chili. It's good. I love a big pot of chili with meat and beans and tomatoey goodness.

But G can't eat beans anymore (booooo!) and so chili has not made much of an appearance this fall. Until I decided that we would give beanless chili a go. Dare we try chili without the lovely lovely beans? Would we be forced to have it with spaghetti like Cincinnati chili? NO!


Not only does the chili not need beans, it can be full of weird stuff and still taste good. (New camera coupled with it getting dark at 4:30 means pictures are suffering once again. Sigh.)

This chili was a breeze to make, seemed a little iffy, but was absolutely delicious. I promise. REALLY! Make some...

Take some onion, carrot, yellow/red pepper, garlic, and sweet potato, chop it up to all about the same size, and cook in a little bit of cooking spray in a very hot pan. Add drips of water if it feels like it's sticking. After it's cooked for a bit, put it chili powder, oregano, dried mustard, and a sprinkle of dried ginger. Take out of the pan. Start browning the leanest ground beef you can find, breaking it up the whole while. If the meat is greasy, strain and spray with water to remove as much fat as possible (I find this is really important to ensure that any leftovers aren't overly greasy). Add the veggies and stir through. Add a big can of diced tomatoes, and heat through until a lot of the liquid has evaporated and the veggies are soft. Serve on soft polenta with a little shredded old cheddar.


We were so not sure about this one while it was cooking, but not only was it positively delicious, it was even better the next day. The chili had a bit of heat from the chili powder with just a little bit of sweet from the carrot and sweet potato. They got very soft in the cooking, so it wasn't even a little cloying. The polenta was just a nice (and low point) alternative to rice! Enjoy!

Baked pasta...

Sometimes, I just can't get enough of something new that I've found that I like to eat. When that something ends up being low on the Weight Watcher's points scale, everyone's a winner.

This is my recent favorite...


It's so easy...

Take a whole wheat cheese tortellini. (If you follow points, you have to find one that fits your allotment.) Boil it until almost done, but not quite. (I made one cup (5.5 points) for just me.) While it's boiling, preheat the oven to 425. Once the pasta is done, mix in your favorite sauce (homemade or jar, up to you...the one I used was .5 points for 1/2 cup serving) and stir in a little bit of parmesan cheese. Then pour into individual ramekin, top with a bit more parmesan cheese (I used .5 ounce for the whole thing... 1.5 points) and bake for twenty minutes.

It's FANTASTIC and only 7.5 points for quite a lot of pasta. I served it with a salad with one point dressing and it was really really a filling dinner and a good comfort food warm fuzzy hug.

(About the points, I don't snack during the day, so I tend to have my points break out like this: 5 or so points for breakfast, 5 or so points for lunch, and the remaining 10 or so for dinner. This is perfect for me, as it gets me an egg sandwich (see below) or some such thing for breakfast, a tv dinner or leftovers for lunch, and then a good filling dinner. It fits the way I like to eat. I know when I've said to other people that I like something that's 10 points, they wonder how I fit it in... that's how!!!!)

Risotto, I love you!

Phew. It's all good. The change in eating habits (I won't say 'd-i-e-t') has been going really well. I have lost TWENTY pounds as of today. *applause and bow thank you* I have two more to go to my goal!!! Yippiee!

I've totally benefited from the world wide web and it's bevy of recipes, but none more so than Gina's Recipes, a fantastic site with amazing recipes. And it was here that I first tested her delicious and super easy risotto. I figured the points out a little differently than she did, mostly I think because of the way we calculated the wine. (For anyone doing WW, how do you calculate cooked wine in a recipe???) But the flavour was spot on, and I had it with a little baked crunchy chicken to add a protein kick to the meal...

Yummmmmmmmmy. The risotto was rich and creamy, the chicken just added that little bit extra, and I was all manner of feeling high on comfort foody goodness. I am not going to repeat the recipe here because it's hers, but I highly highly highly recommend that you go over and try it out. It's just an amazingly delicious meal.