Random Recipe Roundup

A lot of times when I'm trying to decide what to cook on any given day, I ask my family and/or boyfriend if there's anything they're craving, and then I look for a recipe to satisfy that craving.  Sometimes these dishes don't have any common theme or ingredient, so I have a hard time making a post out of them.  Now I'm going to take this opportunity to just sum up the past few months of cooking and share some recipes my family and I have enjoyed.

Danica's Five Ingredient Vegetarian Pasta Skillet - 5 PointsPlus for 1/6 of this skillet.

My family requested that instead of putting the tortillas in the skillet, I leave them out, and we would pile the goodness onto the tortilla.  This was absolutely delicious and extremely satisfying!!

This is a recipe I found on the Betty Crocker website - It's called Tortellini with Fresh Vegetables. The name is not all that exciting, but the meal was great!  (One serving - that size - is just 180 calories and 5 PointsPlus.

I know this doesn't look terribly appetizing, but my whole family loved it!  It's Hungry Girl's Saucy Eggplant-Patty Tower.  Mine didn't come out looking like hers simply because my eggplant was not perfectly shaped like my meatless burgers.  (One tower is 280 calories and 6 PointsPlus.)

This is something I just made for myself because it was fast & easy.  I love eggs, I love meatless burgers, and I love cheese - so this seemed like a perfect combination of the three.  It's Hungry Girl's Fast-Food Hamburger Scramble from her new 300 Under 300 cookbook.  One serving is 185 calories and 4 PointsPlus.  This was ok, but while eating it I discovered that I'm the type of person who would rather just have a cheese omelet with a meatless burger or cheeseburger on the side... Oh well, it was worth a try.

Another recipe from Hungry Girl's new 300 Under 300 cookbook - this is her Supremely Stuffed Pizza-fied Eggplant.  In my mind, you can't go wrong with anything eggplant.  Add some ground soy crumbles, some sauce, and some cheese - and you get this delicious combination.  One serving is 1/2 of a 1/2 of a stuffed eggplant, and it doesn't sound like much - but it was!  This clocks in at 170 calories and 4 PointsPlus.

My boyfriend LOVES lasagna (who doesn't?), but I don't think he knew what he was getting into when he picked this recipe - Hungry Girl's EZ Cheesy Lasagna for Two (also in her 300 Under 300 cookbook).  He was shocked when I told him I would be using eggplant in place of lasagna noodles.  To his surprise, he actually enjoyed it, and it was very fulfilling.  One serving is half of a 9x5 lasagna for 238 calories and 6 PointsPlus.

Getting sick of Italian food yet? NEVER! Yet another recipe from Hungry Girl's 300 Under 300, I made my family her Takes-the-Cake Ziti Bake.  1/4 of this 8x8 pan is just 286 calories and 7 PointsPlus - pretty good stats for some cheesy goodness!!  My brother always complains about too many onions, but everyone else loved it.  I would definitely make this again, and I don't think anyone would turn down eating it.

The next day I had some leftover ingredients from the ziti, so I made some sauteed spinach, mushrooms, and cherry tomatoes, with chopped garlic and basil.  Since it's all vegetables, it was 0 PointsPlus, under 40 calories, and a great side to go with the meatless burger I had.

Since apparently everyone I know loves pasta and is always craving it, I recently made yet another pasta dish.  I'm not complaining though, because I love it too.  I made some of Gina's Angel Hair with Zucchini & Tomatoes.  I obviously used penne instead of angel hair because that's what we had in the house.  To make 5 servings instead of 4, I used the same amount of pasta, but used extra vegetables - no one even noticed the difference.  One serving my way comes out to about 235 calories and 7 PointsPlus.

Since my mom made turkey for Easter (and I don't eat meat), I decided to be VERY DIFFERENT, and have pancakes - that's what I was really craving.  I decided this was a perfect opportunity to try Hungry Girl's Fab-Five Banana Pancake Minis from her 200 Under 200 cookbook since it's a single-serving recipe.  Clearly you can see I made 2 normal-sized pancakes instead of 5 mini ones, but they still tasted absolutely delicious!!  Including the 1/4 cup of sugar free syrup I had on the side, this meal is about 205 calories and 6 PointsPlus.

For Easter dessert, I really wanted cheesecake, my father wanted carrot cake, my mom wanted chocolate cake, and my brother wanted a little of everything.  We all ended up agreeing on apple pie.  I made Hungry Girl's Gooey-Good Fuji Apple Pie.  It looks amazing and tasted amazing, but it was IMPOSSIBLE to cut into 8 slices - the filling just slid all over the place.  We ended up eating it more apple cobbler style, but 1/8 of this pie is just 159 calories and 4 PointsPlus!!

Thanks to all of the amazing people who came up with these amazing recipes, and I hope you all try at least one of them.  I promise I wouldn't post something unless my entire family loved it, and most of these were super easy to make!  I'll probably start doing more of these recipe round-ups, since they're easy for me to write and easy for you to read.

So until next time... Happy Eating,

Steph =)

P.S. For copyright reasons, I can't re-type a recipe from a cookbook, but most of Hungry Girl's recipes are available on the internet somewhere.  Just search the name of the recipe, and you should be able to find it.