HMR Five Bean Casserole - Becomes.... West African Peanut Stew - Maafe!

The HMR Five Bean Casserole is pretty good.

And you can do a number of things with it - my favorite is making it into Peanut Stew.

Peanut stew is, typically, root vegetables with chicken, and of course, peanuts and peanut butter..  Which is not exactly hmr material.  So, what to do, what to do.

Well, this is what you do

The simple adds are

PB2 - yes, that wonder of modern science, freeze dried, defatted peanut butter.
Cilantro
Green Onions
Jalapenos
HMR chicken soup

Get to add Vegetables?  Time for some fun

Cooked Sweet Potato or Butternut squash are classics
Sweet corn
Fresh or canned tomato
Garbanzo beans (1/2 cup equals one serving of veg)
Cooked potato
Diced red peppers

This is a delicious stew - really!

Leek and Potato Soup - 100 calories a cup!

I like this soup in the fall when leeks are cheap.  As in 69 cents each.  When they are $2.69 each, I don't like them as much.  Plus, they are cheap when potatoes are cheap also - 50 cents a lb - so a big win on the budget front.

To determine calories, you must of course base it on what you use.  Your calorie count will vary...

Ingredients

Leeks (3 @54 calories each, 162 calories total)
Yukon Gold Potatoes, peeled (18 ounces @ 26 calories per ounce, 468 calories total)
Swanson or Progresso Chicken Broth, low sodium (8 cups, 15 cal per cup, 120 calories total).  Or go with vegetable broth.
1 cup water (free)
salt and pepper to taste (free)
Thyme to taste (free)

Yields 8 cups, so 94 calories per cup with what I used.

Cut the dark green portions of the leeks off, slice in half the long way, then slice fine.  Put in a big pot of water and swish around to get the dirt out of them.  Drain.

Add to big pot and sweat (that is, cook at low to medium heat till they soften).  You don't need oil, butter or anything else.  They will release moisture as they cook down.  Salt with about a teaspoon of salt and a teaspoon of pepper.

Peel and slice potatoes into 1/4 thick slices.  I do it this way because they then cook evenly no matter how big the potato is - every slice cooks at the same speed.

When leeks have gotten soft (10 to 15 minutes), add potatoes, thyme, broth and water.  Cook at medium until potatoes are soft

Put half at a time into a blender, blend till smooth - be careful and put a towel over the blender and don't fill it more than 1/2 way - to much is a good way of blowing the top off, burning yourself and painting the walls with the soup.

When pureed, serve.  Good hot, good cold.

Creamy Tomato Soup, no dairy, low calorie

I updated the recipe, with calories - call it 100 calories per cup.  The math is close enough for a liberal arts major such as myself.

Creamy Tomato Soup - non dairy, low calorie.  Vegan if you like (skip the chicken stock)

Indian-Spiced Roasted Squash Soup

From Cooking Light

Pretty interesting recipe.  Very low calorie, and very low fat.

It is a fairly mildly spiced dish - not one of those very spicy Indian dishes.  It also has an interesting surprise in the middle.

This is a savory dish, although you might think of acorn and butternut squash as sweet. However the surprise (the yogurt/honey) is a great juxtaposition of flavors.

Ingredients


1 cup chopped onion
4 carrots, diced
1 (1-pound) butternut squash, peeled and cut into (1/2-inch) cubes
1 (8-ounce) acorn squash, halved
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
2 cups water
1 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 teaspoon garam masala
1/4 teaspoon ground red pepper if you like, or not
2 (14-ounce) cans fat-free, lower-sodium chicken broth
Salt to taste
1 container (sm) Greek Plain Yogurt
6 teaspoons honey

Recipe

Cook Vegetables.  You can roast them (which will add flavor) or boil them.  Basically, get them soft

When cooked, toss in pan, mix with spices, cook a little longer - I think this helps "bloom" or open up the spices some

Toss in food processor with 2 cups water or vegie or chicken stock, pulse till smooth or whatever consistency you like

Scrape back into pan, add up to two more cups stock, bring to boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes

Add whatever salt you need to taste

Combine yogurt and honey

Serve soup with a dollop or two of the mixture.  I served it hot, but I think room temp would be fine.  Probably the yogurt mix would stay on top better.

You could probably also use garlic, ginger or coconut milk in this dish.

Cioppino -Bouillabaisse - Gumbo - Big Words - Ooh La L

Food is really pretty much the same all over the world.  Sure, different spices.  Perhaps olive oil in one area, butter in another.  But in the end, many of the dishes are the same, basically.  Except the names.

And the names are great.  I mean, who would not want to eat Cioppino?  Bouillabaisse? Gumbo? Sign me up.

How about Fish Stew. 

Doesn't really have that name, that certain j ne c'est quoi.

But in the end, they are all just fish stew, gussied up perhaps, made with crab one place, mussels the next.  This added, that.  Still all just fish stew.n

Of course here in Wisconsin, unless you are the fish slayer, fish comes frozen.  Not very exciting.  Probably why we are the capital of fish frys - beer batter coating, deep fried, big pile of french fries and coleslaw and some tangy tarter sauce on the side - you would never know it is frozen.  Especially after knocking back 3 or 4 brandy manhattans (sweet, of course).

Yet I like fish stew.  It is easy to make.  Fairly flexible.  Tastes great.  So, here goes.

Ingredients

4 potatoes, pealed and diced

1 bag frozen green beens

1 onion, diced fine

1 celery stalk, ditto

Got a green pepper?  Sure, dice that up also

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 tbs tomato paste

2 tbs Italian Seasoning (Penzeys)

1 cup dry red (or heck, why not, a dry white) wine

1 28 oz can diced tomatoes

2 cups stock (vegie, chicken, seafod)

1 tbs fish sauce

red pepper flakes

Fish, Shrimp, Clams, Mussels, Scallops, whatever.  Say 1.5 lbs, thawed.  More if you have mussels or clams in the shell going in.  Generally not an oily fish (so no salmon, for example)

Recipe

Cook potates, drain and rinse in cold water.  Cook till almost done.

Cook green beans (sure, nuke them)

Saute onion, celery, green pepper

After about 10 minutes, add garlic and italian seasoning

After 2 more minutes, tomato paste, cook till it starts to turn brown.  Don't forget to keep stirring

When the tomato paste turns brown, add wine

Cook wine down some - say 5 minutes

Add Stock.  Add fish sauce.  Add some red pepper flakes if you like a little heat

Cook for 30 minutes, medim low heat.  Don't skip this - it is what brings the flavor together

Turn heat to medium

Add green beans

in 2 minutes, add potatoes

in 2 more minutes, add fisheys

Cook no more than 5 minutes, serve.  Do not overcook the fish

This is a dish made for fresh, crusty, hot bread.  

NEW - IMPROVED - EVEN MORE AWESOME -Creamy Tomato Soup - no dairy, vegan

ALL CAPS so it must be true....

This recipe uses canned tomatoes.  The issue with canned tomatoes is that often they are a little acidic.  Well, the typical way of dealing with that is adding a little sugar.  Which kind of makes this a little less low calorie.

So - what to do?

Well, I had a rogue sweet potato on the counter, and I thought, why not?  Sweet potatoes, in addition to be slightly sweet, have a fair bit of fiber and vitamens.  And if it did not work, there was always sugar.

So, the same recipe, plus one sweet potate peeled, diced small.  It makes the soup a little more orange, cures the acidity issue, and makes the recipe all the more healthy.

Cream of Tomato Soup - what a great dish.

 Warm, comforting, and full of fat and not vegetarian. Whats a person a to do when they want one of the worlds great comfort foods but either can't live with the fat or are vegetarian?

For the life of me I cannot remember where I got this idea of a recipe, although clearly it is somewhat based on Tomato Bread Soup - a traditional italian soup that has stale bread in it.

My version pumps up the vegetables, as well as blenderizes the soup to make it creamy without the dairy (fake or real) product.

Ingredients (serves 4)


1 Onion, diced (44 calories
4 Carrots, diced (100 c)
2 Celery stalks, diced (18)
1 Sweet potato, peeled, diced small (114 calories)
4 cloves of garlic, minced (?)
2 cans tomatoes (diced, crushed or whole)with juice, no sugar added(don't drain) (180)
2 cups water or vegetable stock (20)
3 slices whole wheat bread, stale works great, diced (270)
1 tbl spoon olive oil (don't have to use, but some fat is good for you) (120)
Basil (fresh or dried)
Salt and Pepper to taste (if using regular canned stock you won't need additional salt)
Couple of dashes hot sauce (tabasco, sriracha, whatever)

So, call that 850 calories or so, making 8 cups of soup - so about 108 calories per cup of soup.

Now, is this precise calorie counting?  Of course not.  Calories on labels are a sham and inaccurate.  What type of wheat bread?  How thick is one slice versus the other?  However, it is close enough to know that this is a very low calorie soup, and it tastes great.  Personally, I call this a 100 calorie per cup soup.  Prove me wrong!

Plus, really super cheap to make

Possible additions -
1/2 cup dried red lentils (rinsed and drained)
1 can white beans (rinsed and drained)

Cooking Directions
Dice (finely) the onion, carrots, sweet potato, celery and garlic
Heat Le Crueset (type) pot over medium heat
Add 1 tbsp olive oil to hot pot
Add diced vegetables, saute till soft
Add Basil (or italian seasoning)
Add tomatoes, bread and vegetable stock, stir together
Add Hot Sauce
reduce heat and simmer for 15 minutes (stir as the bread has a tendency to stick to the bottom)
Pour soup into blender, blenderize (or use a stick blender in pot). Be careful with this - the soup is hot, so pour carefully, make sure you have the top on firmly, and I usually put a dish towel over the top too!  Don't fill the blender more than half way.  I star on the slowest speed, then ramp it up to bassomatic speed.
Pour back into pot
Adjust seasonings
Keep warm till serving.

Interesting adds include red lentils or white beans. Put them in when adding the tomatoes and stock (or water). Red lentils cook very fast, so it does not add to the cooking time (much).