Clean

Clean Greek Chicken or Fish?

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If you have been following my fitness journey (I’m not even
sure if that’s the right thing to call it, my fitness ramblings maybe? Whatever)
then you saw earlier this week I posted a 2 week clean eating menu plan that
included Greek Tilapia. I got the idea/recipe from one of my all time favorite
magazines Oxygen. I have been reading this religiously for years now, and
I love it. This was one of the featured reader recipes.

Now when I went about making this we had plenty of frozen
tilapia and a random piece of chicken in the fridge that we needed to cook. So I
made the same recipe both ways, it worked out because Chuck isn’t a huge fan of
fish, so I figured we would both be happy with this. Upon making these guys we
both agreed that the chicken version was better by a long shot. Like a super
long shot. I think it was the savory chicken juices, and tomato mixture that
did it.

Then I had to decide which to post on here, the one that I
told you I was going to post or the super delicious one I liked better. I
couldn’t decide, and it’s my blog anyway so today you get both. Maybe we can
have a vote to see what you guys like better?

Any who, this is a pretty quick and easy meal that is full
of flavor. I would serve it with something simple like quinoa, or brown rice
since there is a little extra broth that’s packed with flavor anything else
would probably be just too much.

Greek Chicken

1 lb of boneless skinless chicken breast

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

2 cloves of garlic, minced

2 tbsp dry white wine

Salt and pepper

1/2 cup kalamata olives, halved

1 cup chopped cherry tomatoes

2 tbsp chopped red onion

2 tbsp chicken broth

½ a lemon

2 ounces feta cheese (optional)

Prepare the chicken breast into paillard form. In a large skillet
heat oil over medium high heat and sauté garlic until it begins to become
fragrant, about 2 minutes. Add the white wine and cook for an additional
minute. Generously season the tilapia with salt and pepper before placing it
into the pan. Cook the chicken for about 3-5 minutes a side, or until it turns
opaque and the juices run clear. Reduce the heat to low and add the onion, tomatoes,
and olives to the pan along with chicken broth. Cook for another 5 minutes or
so, until the vegetables are tender. Squeeze half a lemon over the top and
serve warm with crumbled feta on top, if desired.

Greek Tilapia

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

2 cloves of garlic, minced

2 tbsp dry white wine

32 ounces Tilapia

Salt and pepper

1/2 cup kalamata olives, halved

1 cup chopped cherry tomatoes

2 tbsp chopped red onion

½ a lemon

2 ounces feta cheese (optional)

In a large skillet heat oil over medium high heat and sauté
garlic until it begins to become fragrant, about 2 minutes. Add the white wine
and cook for an additional minute. Generously season the tilapia with salt and
pepper before placing it into the pan. Cook the fish for about 2 minutes a
side, or until it turns opaque and the edges can be flaked with a fork. Reduce
the heat to low and add the onion, tomatoes, and olives to the pan along with a
couple tablespoons of water. Cook for another 5 minutes or so, until the
vegetables are tender. Squeeze half a lemon over the top and serve warm with
crumbled feta on top, if desired.

Clean Orange Chipotle Chicken Stir Fry

By Jessica

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So way back when I fell in love with this recipe from Cleaneatingmag.com (great place I tell ya). We are talking several years back, and as great as it is I haven’t made very much of it, probably because it’s not one of those quick and easy kind of things I like most of the time, and what vegetable do you serve with it? Well I decided to revamp the recipe into a stir fry, and made a few other additions, because we are trying to be healthy over here. It came out pretty darn good in my opinion, and now that it’s made that much easier (only 20 minutes!!!!) I think we will add it to the rotation a little more often.

For starters I used chipotle chili Powder because I already have it in my pantry, and I like recipes so much more when they don’t require a fancy ingredient I have to search the shelves for (chipotles in adobo sauce are not that popular in upstate NY apparently). I made it as basic as any other stir fry recipe, and added a few spices to the mix, like turmeric. I like turmeric because it turns
everything a really bright vibrant yellow, and I’m told it has all kinds of benefits like fighting Alzheimer’s and what not. I chose peppers and broccoli, because my love of broccoli runs deep, and peppers seemed like a good fit, plus we don’t eat them that often and variety is good for you too.

I just put it over plain rice because there was plenty of flavor in the recipe already, but I’m sure the cilantro rice in the original recipe would be a great addition as well.

Orange Chipotle Chicken Stir Fry

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1 lb boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into bits size
pieces

1 tsp chipotle chile powder

½ tsp ground cumin

½ tsp turmeric

1 tbsp pure maple syrup

Juice from one orange

1 tsp orange zest

1 small yellow onion, chopped

1 medium red bell pepper, chopped

1 medium yellow bell pepper chopped

1 head of broccoli

Heat oil in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add chicken and cook for about 5 minutes, stirring regularly. Add spices, syrup, juice, and zest cooking for another minute, stirring well to combine. Stir in the veggies and cook for another 5 minutes until just tender. Serve warm over cooked rice.

D4One: Shrimp Fried Rice

By Jessica

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Fried rice is probably one of the easiest recipes ever, and shrimp fried rice is only about 1/8 of a degree more difficult. It’s also something that can be made pretty easily from pantry staples, so no additional shopping is needed. I made this recipe the easiest I possibly could, even cutting out a lot of chopping and shucking by using frozen peas and carrots. Of course you can also use fresh veggies, I do suggest cutting them up pretty small, and at least tossing the carrots in the pan at the same time as the onion so that it cooks all the way through, and otherwise it’s basically all the same.

This recipe, though suited for one is pretty easy to double, triple, or even quadruple to feed a crowd. I was able to stretch this recipe for one to feed both me and Chuck by steaming up a large batch of Asian style veggies. We are trying to keep it a little healthy over here.

PS. This one is clean too.

Shrimp Fried Rice

Prep time: 5 mins

Cook time: 20 mins

Total time: 25 mins

Serves: 1 serving

Ingredients

4 oz. of Shrimp (about 9 medium shrimp), peeled & deveined
1 tbsp low sodium soy sauce
1 tbsp low sodium teriyaki sauce
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
½ a small onion, peeled and chopped
1 egg
½ cup of frozen peas and carrots
½ cup of cooked brown rice
handfull of green onions, chopped (optional)

Instructions

In a small bowl combine soy sauce, teriyaki sauce and ginger then add shrimp and toss. Allow them to marinate at room temperature for about 10 minutes.
Preheat a large sauté pan with oil over medium high heat. Add the shrimp and sauté for about 30 seconds a side, or until they begin to turn pink. Remove from heat and set aside.
Reduce the heat to medium (you may need to add some more oil) and add onion to the pan cooking for 2-3 minutes, or until they begin to turn translucent.
Add the egg right into the pan and using a spatula mix well, breaking the yolk and cooking through.
Then add the vegetables, and rice tossing well to mix and heat through.
Stir in the shrimp, and green onion to the pan and again mix well.
Serve immediately with an extra drizzle of soy sauce.

Sunday Dinner: Asian Style

By Jessica

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A few Sundays ago, if you follow me on instagram you know I made
a boat load of wontons. What you don’t know is that I made an entire Asian
inspired Sunday dinner that day. I meant to post it last week, but life got in
the way, it happens.

Regardless, I spent a peaceful afternoon watching New Girl and
folding these little babies. I used this recipe pretty much to a tee (Check this
girl out she knows what’s up), because let’s be honest I have no clue what I’m
doing here with most Asian flavors, aside from soy sauce. The one main difference
is that I followed the instructions on the back of the wontons package to
create the shape you see. These came out magnificent! I loved them! Like totally
completely loved them, and have big plans to make them again in the future,
maybe with a few more changes/additions. I did however get uber fancy and make
my own dipping sauce.

Wonton Dipping Sauce

¼ cup rice wine vinegar

¼ cup soy sauce

1 tablespoon sesame oil

2 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp sesame seeds for garnish

Whisk all ingredients together in a small bowl and serve.

In addition to these guys I made Korean Style Beef in the crockpot.
It was totally inspired by this recipe, also from Damn Delicious, she’s
totally my new food blog crush can you tell? Anyway I wanted to make something
that was clean, so I took her photos, and general idea and made it my own. It
came out AWESOME! I am seriously proud of this one. It’s super easy and healthy
what more can you ask for? It’s definitely going into the I-have-to-work-too-late-to-cook-anything
rotation.

Clean Crockpot Korean Style Beef

1/3 cup low sodium soy sauce

2 tbsp raw honey

1 tbsp sesame sauce

2 cloves of garlic, crushed

¼ tsp red pepper flakes

½ tsp ground ginger

2 lbs lean beef roast, trimmed of visible fat

10 mini sweet peppers, sliced thin

1 cup broccoli florets (optional)

Sesame seeds for garnish

In a small bowl combine soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic, red
pepper flakes, and ginger. Place roast in slow cooker and pour the mixture over
the top. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours or high for 4 hours. Remove the
roast from the slow cooker and shred the beef before returning it to the pot
with its juices and mini peppers and broccoli florets. Cook on high for another
30 minutes. Stir well and serve immediately.

To round out this meal I also added a little side salad of
bagged Asian slaw, simply because I felt more vegetables were required, and
after making all of the wontons I knew I would be to fried to make something
else.

Hope you guys enjoy this as much as I did. I’m also wondering what your favorite kind of take out is. I would really like to come up with some more easy, and clean takes on traditional take out so please give me some ideas!!

Leftover Chicken Croquettes with Smoked Cheddar & Squash Soup

By Jessica

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You may have noticed I have been into posting whole meals. I feel like it’s more real this way. Everything I post here is usually made right before we eat it. Occasionally I will make something ahead so I can get a good picture of it but it’s always eaten for dinner later or lunch the next day, besides some things just taste better after a few hours of sitting in the fridge, soups and stews especially.

What I’m getting at is that I hope you don’t mind that I do this sometimes. You know, bombard you with 3 or 4 recipes in one post. This is how we eat, what we eat all together I thought it might be helpful for people trying to come up with dinner menus, weeknight meals and other combinations. Plus I also get really excited about some of these recipes and combos and want to share them all at once.

This collection of recipes seems a little off at first glance but I’m telling you all the pieces fall nicely into place. The croquettes were developed out of necessity I have an abundance of leftover chicken, and we are kind of getting sick of chicken soup these days. My step mom Miss Amy has made these same croquettes before with turkey so I figured the same could be done with chicken. Now what do you serve with such a thing?
Squash soup of course! Chuck just really wanted it, and I really wanted Maple Walnut Salad Dressing, which goes so well with the smoked cheddar and apples, so let put it all together. What goes better together than soup and salad anyway?

The croquettes need liquid, whether it be gravy, salad dressing or some other kind of sauce it‘s definitely required because they are kid of dry
without it. They are a pretty blank canvas which I like because I wanted to taste more of the dressing; however you can jazz them up by adding some chopped up veggies or spices to the mix.

Leftover ChickenCroquettes

5 tbsp butter

3 tbsp flour

1 cup milk

2 cups cooked and minced chicken (you may want to use a food
processor)

½ cup bread crumbs

1 tbsp dried parsley

1 tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. In a sauce pan, melt the butter over medium heat, and whisk in flower.

Cook for 1 minute, whisking continuously.
Add milk whisking until well combined and cook for 1-2 minutes, until thickened then remove from heat and allow to cool. In a large bowl combine the chicken and cooled sauce, mixing well. The combination should be sticky, if it doesn’t start to form clumps then add a few bread crumbs a pinch at a time.

Sift together breadcrumbs, parsley and salt in a shallow dish or plate.

With your hands create hockey puckshaped disks. Coat the disks with the bread crumb mixture and place in a greased baking dish.

Bake for 30 or so minutes or until the croquettesbegin to turn a golden brown color.

Maple Walnut Salad
Dressing

¾ cups chopped walnuts

3 tbsp Apple Cider vinegar

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

3 tbsp pure maple syrup

Combine all ingredients in a small bowl or jar, then whisk or shake well to combine.

Squash Soup with Smoked Cheddar
and Apple

1 medium onion, peeled & chopped

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1 medium roasted butternut squash, flesh only

½ cup apple cider vinegar

4 cups Low Sodium vegetable broth

1 medium apple, peeled and diced

1/3 cup apple smoked cheddar

In a large thick bottomed sauce pan heat oil over medium high heat and sauté onion until it begins to soften and become translucent.

Add squash and broth to the pan. Cook for 1-2 minutes then with an immersion blender or in batches blend until smooth.

Over medium heat add apple and smoked cheddar and cook for 5-6 minutes stirring regularly.
Adjust seasoning and serve warm with extra cheese for garnish.

Clean

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