Mediterranean Night - Greek Lettuce Wraps with side salad

Armed with ground beef, a head of romaine lettuce, garlic and tomatoes from the garden I dove into Mediterranean night at our house. I gave up on the idea of making burgers with my Greek seasoning and settled on seasoned meat piled on lettuce leaves and topped with a fresh batch of tzatziki and a Greek salad on the side.

In order to pull this off, I stopped at that trusted Alberton's again for cucumber, feta cheese, a lemon, a small can of sliced black olives and a quart of Greek yogurt (which I prefer the thicker consistency when making tzatkiki) and scrambled for home.

After chasing the  cucumbers thought the grater  I tossed all the ingredients for the tzatziki together (its always better the longer it sits), and then moved on to browning the meat, washing the lettuce and prepping the salad. All in all it went together very fast and I must say, it was pretty darn tasty!

After a long day at work, and coming home to another August rain storm, this was warm and savory and still good for me.

Due to rain I skipped my walk outside and dusted off my Pilates DVD this morning, I have allot of muscles that have forgotten that they have purpose, and they are telling me so!

Now to get busy on next weeks options, I'm seeing grilled zucchini in my future, what do you think?

Just in case you missed the recipes here they are again.

Greek Seasoning added to meat
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/greek-seasoning-2/

Tzatziki
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Tzatziki-Sauce/Detail.aspx?event8=1&prop24=SR_Thumb&e11=tzatziki&e8=Quick%20Search&event10=1&e7=Recipe

Greek Salad
Toss the following ingedients all together and serve
Chopped English Cucumber
Chopped Tomatoes
Sliced Black Olives
Feta Cheese (I used the sun dried tomato variety)
Bottled Italian dressing of choice

Chicken Egg Drop Soup

I decided that tonight was going to be soup night, why wait when it sounded so good this morning. After getting off the train I beat feet for the Albertson's store that is on my way home. Got lucky to find that they had their organic brands on sale so I took advantage, grabbed the ingredients I knew I didn't have at home and for just over $10, plus the ingredients I already had on hand, I have enough soup for a couple of meals.

 With all the ingredient in the picture and armed with the recipe I posted earlier (http://barefeetinthekitchen.blogspot.com/2013/01/egg-drop-soup.html) I produced a light brothy soup with enough meat and veg to easily hold us until morning without the need for a bunch of snacking before bed. The one thing I think I would do differently is not waste my time fussing with the brussels sprouts, and just finely shred some cabbage, the flavor would be basically the same, and allot less work.I also thought about adding some frozen peas, but I will save that for another time.

If you need it to be completely gluten free switch out the soy sauce for Tamari sauce and you would be good to go. The corn is a starch, but with only a half cup in the whole pot and plenty of protein in the soup, I figured I would be pretty safe to not set off a sugar spike for me.

I have a husband that has had a mental block since childhood when it comes to chicken soup, they raised chicken on their small farm and they ate allot of chicken, and amazingly enough he even said he liked it. I guess this will be a combination to record and reproduce again next time I'm in need of some chicken soup, even when I'm not sick. 

So with two bowls consumed, I'm ready for a little kitchen clean up and then to find a soft spot on the couch.  Tomorrow morning I will rise at 4:50am to tackle my third day of early morning walks with the dogs, wish me luck!

 And don't worry, I doubt I will be making a habit of multiple posts each day, but right now I'm excited to have this new project and I'm always excited when it comes to playing with food in the kitchen.

Have a good evening and happy cooking!

Getting Started

Good Afternoon Everyone,

I've decided to try my hand at blogging again, but this time I have a new message, and focus and a goal (I had those things the last time, it's just a new topic). I, like many others that work away from home, and even those who work at home, there is always a reoccurring theme, "What's for Dinner?"

I have become a firm believer in the old saying "Failing to Plan, is Planning to Fail". If I don't plan at least a few meals for the week, by the end of the week, we have eaten out more than we have eaten in. My pocket book is much emptier than when I start, and I usually end up feeling poorly due to the quality of the food I have consumed all week.

So here it is, The Goal:
To plan at least three meals per week to be prepared at home, and eaten as a family.

My intentions is to plan my week, and see where best to put those three meal, and pick the three meals to prepare, recipes you can build a shopping list from and have everything ready for the week.

To top it off this week I've received the proverbial kick in the back side by my doctor, and thanks to that kick, I'm here thinking about how I should be doing this and how this will assist in keeping me on track. So I ask that you bare with me and really help hold me accountable to sharing healthy options for eating, and things to do to improve our health (or at least mine).

Food issues are on the fore front for my family, I have two wonderful daughter's in law that are both gluten free (with husbands that should be) one of the girls is dairy free (milks, creams, & cheeses), I am diabetic which means I need to be sugar and starch free (breads, potatoes, rice & pasta) which all in all can be a challenge when we all get together for meals. So option that can be easily modified for each dietary need is important too.

Being that it's part way into our week, I'm only putting a couple of ideas on the table, and if you have something you would like to share with everyone, please feel free to send me an email with the recipe or time saving hint and I will look at incorporating it into my upcoming posts.


Recipe #1
To start this process, an idea for one dinner this week is a result of buying a Costco rotisserie chicken and having some leftover chicken that needs to be used. I've taken the attached recipe for Egg Drop Soup and will be modifying it to use my my leftovers and create something homey for the colder rainy nights we have been having lately and it should be pretty simple to pull off.

Using the attached recipe, I'm adding chucked up leftover chicken, a can of water chestnuts drained and sliced into thin strips, a half a cup of frozen corn and a cup of brussels sprout leaves (cut brussels in half and remove core to release the leaves). I figure I will need to increase the stock to handle the volume of the added ingredients, but it's one of those dishes where you can wing it with leftovers you have in the frig to make something hearty to feed the family. http://barefeetinthekitchen.blogspot.com/2013/01/egg-drop-soup.html


Recipe #2
After attending a Wildtree (http://shop.wildtree.com/pages/cfHome.cfm) party last night, we came up with a recipe idea that I'm going bring to the table. One of the spice blends they sell is a Greek blend (which I ordered!) that we decided would be really great mixed into hamburgers with feta cheese and then topped with a Tzatziki sause (http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/claire-robinson/easy-tzatziki-recipe/index.html) which is easy to make ahead and keep in the frig for when you are ready, or you can purchase it ready made a some grocery stores like New Seasons or Whole foods. Any extra tzatziki is wonderful served with crackers, raw vegetables, pita bread or naan for snacks later in the week.

My plan is to have the burgers with a Greek type salad of romaine lettuce, cucumbers, feta cheese, olives, tomatoes and red onion, (artichokes  hearts would be a great addition if you are into artichoke, which I'm not), and a vinaigrette dressing.  If you are bread eaters, you could easily put these burgers on a bun or serve it with grilled Pita or naan.
You can purchase Greek seasoning at the grocery store, but you may have to shop around, I don't know how easily you will find it but I did come across a recipe for making your own blend if you want to try your hand at it. (http://allrecipes.com/recipe/greek-seasoning-2/)

So that's my ideas for the week, maybe they will inspire you to plan ahead for your week, to make changes in your eating habits, or just have some fun with food in the kitchen. 

If you would like ideas for something specific, leave me a comment and I will check it out. I hope you join me in my adventure with food.

Coral