recipe: creamy shrimp fettucine

The last meal. The final meal before the diet kicked back in. Did you have one on Sunday? I'm normally really good about eating healthy but I have clearly not given any bleeps about it for the past two months or so. Now it's time to crack down again, but not after one meal full of terrible, terrible things.

By terrible, I obviously mean delicious... just ingredients that I tend to ban from my kitchen: Butter, cream cheese, and pasta.

Now that I got your mouth watering and you wanting to cheat on your diet [which I say is totally okay once a week, preferably Sundays], here's what you need, via Lauren's Latest: 

• fettuccine pasta
• shrimp [I buy frozen then thaw it out so I don't have to make a whole lot for one person]
• stick of butter
• 1/3 block of cream cheese
• minced garlic
• diced tomatoes
• lemon juice
• parsley, salt and pepper
  
  And I added:
  
• diced red peppers
• a little swirl/dump of white wine- any kind
• couple shakes of Old Bay because, duh.

 It's really easy to make and very quick. The shrimp/sauce is done in the time it takes to cook the noodles, and it's really hard to over or under cook any of it.

For the full recipe, click here! 

By the way- that wine is the bomb. My coworker Toby gave it to me for Christmas. It's called "Back Dat Glass Up" from Notaviva winery in Virginia. They pair every wine with music, which is making me want to visit the winery ASAP. Who's coming with me?!

love,
elizabethany

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recipe: skinny tex-mex pasta bake

Living alone again means that when I cook a dinner, I normally eat it for a couple days.. so when I can make something that is great for eating leftovers, I'm all sortsa pumped.

This casserole was perfection.

Meat, carbs, veggies... all in one delicious dish that I can heat up in the microwave day after day and it still tastes just as delicious. PLUS.. it's fairly good for you as long as you're not on the Atkins kick again.

WHAT YOU'LL NEED:

• 1 can 10.75 ounce Campbell's Healthy Request Cheddar Cheese Soup
• 1 can 10.75 ounce Campbell's Healthy Request Tomato Soup
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 1 lb ground turkey
• 1 can 4.5 ounce green chilies
• 1 10 ounce can Rotel Mild tomatoes
• 1 15 ounce can Black Beans
• 1 15 ounce can Sweet Corn
• 2 cups cooked whole wheat penne pasta
• 1 tbsp + 1 tsp chili powder
• 1 tsp cumin
• ½ tsp onion powder
• 1 tsp garlic, minced
• 1/2 tbs dried cilantro

TO DO: 

1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees and spray a casserole dish.
2. Cook the garlic, onion, and meat in a large skillet until turkey is cooked through.
3. Drain any grease and add in cheddar cheese soup, tomatoes, chilies, 1 tbsp of chili powder, cumin, and salt/pepper to your liking. Cook 3-5 minutes. 

4. In a separate bowl, whisk together tomato soup and 1/2 cup of water.
5. Add that mixture to the cooked pasta, and layer that on the bottom of the dish. 

6. Layer the meat/cheese mixture on top of the noodles. 

7. In another small bowl, mix together the corn, black beans, 1 tsp chili powder, 1/2 tbsp cilantro. 

8. Bake for 15 minutes and voila! It's delicious and ready to eat! 

It seems like a lot of ingredients and dishes and such, but it was really easy to make and saved me a lot of time for the rest of the week... so I'll definitely be making it again. 

love,

elizabethany

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pinspired recipe: cream of chicken spaghetti

Tomatoes: Not my thing.. but for some reason, different recipes with a slight hint of them make my mouth water. They look good, just don't taste fabulous.

A lot of recipes that have been catching my eye have included Rotel tomatoes, which I can handle thanks to their spice, size, and mix with chilie peppers. This angel hair/spaghetti pasta with chicken was one of those recipes.

It said 7 ingredients were needed, but I used even less. A solid five is all you need for a good 6 servings!

• 2 cans of cream of chicken soup [or mix in cream of mushroom/cream of celery/whatever]
• 8 ounces of angel hair pasta 
• 2 cups of chopped, grilled chicken
• 1 can of RoTel tomatoes and green chilies
• 8 ounces of greek yogurt [or sour cream if you're not counting calories]

Easy how-to: 

1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees
2. Cook pasta according to package
3. Mix pasta, cans of soup, tomatoes, chicken, and yogurt together, and put in 9x13 baking dish
4. Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes. 

The original said to add cheese to the top and put back into the oven until melted, but it was so creamy you really don't need to do that. I honestly don't even think it would make it better if you weren't worried about the added calories. 

FYI: The pasta was absolutely delicious. 

Bonus: I love leftover pasta and this was freaking fantastic a couple days later... still just as creamy!

Even if you're not a tomato person like me, the juices from the RoTel add a lot. You can work around the chunks if necessary.

Just make it.

love,
elizabethany

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