Turkey and Broccoli Noodle Casserole

Pin It Made this yesterday and it was delish!  Original recipe called for chicken, but I scored a deal on turkey last week, so I substituted turkey.  I made some minor changes to Gina's recipe and the resulting points+ value is 8 for mine.  Still a great deal!

Chicken wing craving officially taken care of!

Pin It I read or heard someone mention recently that they used hot sauce on chicken nuggets and that they tasted like boneless hot wings (if I remember who/where I heard/read this I'll come back and give credit where credit is due!).  What a great idea!  I had some of the PC Blue Menu Chicken Chunks (you can visit my post here for my original review on them) left and I'd picked up some Frank's Hot Sauce at the grocery store last night.  I cut up a red skinned potatoes into french fry shapes, tossed them with some safflower oil, salt, pepper and a tiny bit of chipotle chili powder and baked them with the chicken in the oven for about 25 mins (flipping half way).  After it was all cooked I dipped the chicken tenders in the hot sauce...YUMMY!!!!  Who needs chicken wings at 3 points+ each when you can have a serving of chicken chunks with hot sauce for 5 points+ (or a serving and a half for 8 points+ like I did tonight!)  I will soooo be making these again.  For one serving of the "fries" and one serving of the "wings" it would be a total of 10 points+...a super deal if you ask me.  The fries were way better than anything I'd get at a restaurant.  I added a side of steamed broccoli and carrots (free, of course).  Voila!  Here it is :

I feel like chicken tonight!

Pin It I was pleasantly surprised to find Prime chicken breasts (boneless, skinless) in the small packages on sale for $3.88/lb when I went to the Superstore tonight!  Not an advertised sale, so I was very happy to find these.  Prime never goes on sale for this price! 

My recipe of the day is Hungry Girl's Finger Lickin' Good! chicken strips (photos below).  I had tried her Lord of the Onion Rings 2.0 a while back and they were not bad.   Like the onion rings, this recipe used Fibre One (Fiber One in the US) cereal as the coating.  I didn't have any egg beaters, so I used 2 egg whites, a touch of egg yolk and a splash of skim milk instead.  I served the strips with dijonnaise dressing and roasted sweet potatoes and red peppers.  YUMMY!!  They were really good!  I think next time I would dip them in BBQ sauce, honey or maybe honey mustard.  The dijonnaise wasn't bad, but it needed something a bit sweeter.  The original recipe called for garlic salt and pepper, but I just used a mixture of my own spices (maple curry spice and spicy tomato sauce seasoning from Epicure)...might be good to throw in a bit of Parmesan cheese too :-)

before cooking

whole meal deal

Crispy chicken strips

On another note, I "chopped" my hair off last night!  Not really short, but I did lose about 4 inches.  I have to say I LOVE IT!!  My stylist has used a hot air styler on my hair in the past and tonight they were on sale 30% off!  PLUS I had earned enough SalonRewards points to take another $25 off...at full price I don't think I'd have splurged on an item like this, but with this new style, I was thinking about getting a large barrel curling iron, plus I need a new round brush...so all in all, I think I saved money!  It's called an Isinis Ceramix Hot Air Styler with Ceramic Barrel and it's so cool!  You dry your hair about 50% of the way (depending on how thick your hair is...mine is fairly thick) and then you use the styler, which is like a round brush, curling iron and blow dryer all in one! 

Here's a photo of my new do that I took myself last night.  BEWARE: no makeup and my hair appt was right after my workout at the gym...and I'm not great at self-photography!

It's a salad...it's a stir fry...it's...

Pin It Super supper!  Last night I was in a great rush when I got home.  I had 50 minutes to do a 30 min workout (wii yoga), make supper and get out the door...bringing my supper with me.  I started by stir frying some veggies (peppers, mushrooms, corn, red onion) and chicken in 2 tsp of olive oil and lots of spices.  I thought I'd just have that.  Then I got the idea to make a salad.  Then I decided to throw them together!  I used a bit of Blue Menu California Dressing on last night's supper and it was DELISH!  I decided to have almost the same thing tonight, but had Blue Menu Lemon Poppy seed Dressing instead of the California dressing.  It was almost as good as last night's, but not quite.  Last night's was out of this world.  I did put a tad too much Chipotle Chili Powder in it...that's not to say I'll back off next time (other than I'm almost out and I need a trip to the US to get more...half the price in the US!!).

Here are some pics of my super supper / stir fry/salad:

Operation Hunan Chicken..and free weights

Pin It My friend Cheryl and I have discovered (re-discovered?) a local Chinese food place that ROCKS.  It's a place I went to as a kid, but over the years it went down hill.  A couple years ago they were bought out by another local Chinese food place (that I loved, but was about 20 mins away) and their menu improved so much!  We love their Hunan Chicken.  Really, what's not to love? Chicken, veggies, yummy sweet/salty sauce...oh my.  I have been craving it literally for months.  I told myself I could only have it very early in the week (like within a day or two of weigh in) because of the sodium.  I'm so afraid that sodium will make me retain fluids on weigh in day!  It kills me when I eat right, exercise and the scale doesn't reflect it, so if I know it's salt-related...grrrr  Ok, all that to say, on Tuesday (yes, late in my WI week, I know) we did it.  Hunan Chicken, Chicken Chow Mein and an EGG ROLL!  I love egg rolls.  The Hunan Chicken and Chow Mein (1 cup of each) was 9 points+.  I left out the fried rice (10 points+ per cup!!!!) and had myself an egg roll instead (I think it was 5-6 points+).  Yummmmmm  It was so good.  But now I feel like I had my fix and I'm OK for a while.  I just had to share.  I can't believe I went that long without having it.  I think it was early fall when I had it last..

Last night I had a session with my trainer and she convinced me to try (again) free weights for my upper body.  I have a fear of free weights.  I have this fear that I'll be holding these heavy items over my poor little head and will DROP one on my face.  Now I don't know about you, but I kinda like my face withOUT the dent in it.  So, I put my fears aside and gave it a try.  I have to say, one thing I hate about free weights (other than the skull crushing possibility) is the metallic smell that you get on tour hands...ewwww.  It went OK.  Other than leaning forward with weights in my hands makes my arms look like deflated balloons and I want to tuck the loose skin into the sleeves of my t-shirt (that would not really be possible, but you get the point).  My other concern is that my right rotator cuff bothers me - believe it or not, a water aerobics injury! I might have to break down and go see my doctor for a physio referral to get it fixed...I hate bothering my doctor for non-emergency things!

OK, no gym tonight.  I think I've got a touch of the flu and just didn't have it in me to go.  I'm off tomorrow and am going to tour our new Canada Games Centre fitness facility (pool, gym, indoor running track, etc.) and to sign up for my membership....yay!!!  It doesn't open until March 5th, but I am so excited.  From now until then I am going to the gym next to my office...I might make it to the gym tomorrow, otherwise I'll have to wii my butt off :-)

Chicken a la Tanya

Pin It
I set out to make Chicken a la King tonight...upon starting to cook I realized I didn't have any mushrooms...that's OK, I'll substitute canned peas :-) Then I didn't have pimentos...that's OK, I have fire roasted red peppers...anyways, the long and the short of it was, I made up my own recipe! Picture is my supper, which I've just started eating - yum!! Will post the recipe later.

Here is the recipe (please note - all measurements are approximate...I really didn't measure anything!)

Tanya a la King

1/2 cup butter or margarine
1 small green bell pepper, chopped (1/2 cup)
1 Can of peas (drained, but leave a bit of juice in)
1/2 Flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
2 cups milk
1 Can of vegetable broth with onions (any broth will do)
4 Cooked/chopped chicken breasts
2 Roasted red peppers chopped (I used the ones from the jar)
1 tsp red pepper flakes (optional)
2 Tbsp parmesan cheese
3 cups hot cooked rice

Melt butter in big pot (I used my Dutch oven) over medium-high heat. Cook pepper in butter, stirring occasionally, until bell peppers are tender.

Stir in flour, salt and pepper, and add broth if it’s too sticky. Cook over medium heat until mixed; remove from heat. Stir in milk and remaining broth. Add more milk as needed. Heat to boiling, stirring constantly. Boil and stir 1 minute. Add red pepper flakes and cheese. Stir in chicken; cook until hot. Serve over rice.