A visit to Lynn's Paradise Cafe

After our tailgating weekend, we drove from Lexington to Louisville to see my friend Clare. She is recently engaged (yay!) and I hadn't been able to meet her fiance yet. Well, verdict in: he's adorable. And nice. And funny. And all around wonderful. The Nolands approve of this guy!

Clare was in Louisville for a wedding, and she made a reservation for the four of us at Lynn's Paradise Cafe. Have you heard of this place? Apparently it's been on the Oprah Winfrey Show, The Food Network's "Best Of," the Discovery Channel's "Christopher Lowell Show," CBS "Good Morning America," and Food Network's "Throwdown with Bobby Flay."

Needless to say, we had high expectations. And friends, they. were. met.  Aunt Ellen, these pictures are for you. 

How cool is the outside?

A view from our table

Close up of the tree

These are legs.

More legs!

So. So. cool. I wish my license plate said FLY-SWA.

Even their uncool chairs were cool.

Breakfast didn't disappoint either. Zac ordered biscuits and gravy...

and I got a mushroom scramble with a side of MAC and CHEESE. Which yes, they offer as a side at breakfast.

The monstrosity on the right is the mac and cheese. I ate almost no eggs because I was eating so much mac and cheese!

I can't go to Clare's engagement party next weekend, so I brought her a gift. I embroidered their monogram on a dish towel and used it to wrap a newlywed cookbook. Adorable, if I do say so myself!

Me and Clare

We had SUCH a good time with Clare and Chris, and it was so much to visit Lynn's Paradise Cafe. Has anyone else ever been there??

Lots for lunch!

I pack my lunch almost every day. You know I'm cheap, so I like that I save money when I pack my lunch, and I tend to eat healthier too.

A few weeks ago I ordered a new lunch box. You've probably seen it on Pinterest - it's called the Easy Lunch Box and I'm officially obsessed.

My order came with four containers and a cooler pack, which perfectly fits two coolers and an ice pack. I don't even put my lunch in the fridge - it just sits under my desk until lunch time and it's still perfectly cold. It was only $20, and it came with a bunch of stuff.

I think the best way to explain it to you is to let my past few weeks of lunches speak for themselves. I pack two containers every day - one is snacks / mini meals (usually one in the morning and one in the afternoon) and the other is my lunch.

Leftover calzone, carrot sticks, granola thin

Strawberries, pretzels, knock off goldfish that were disgusting

Leftover pork roast, smashed potatoes, fruit snacks

Carrot sticks, string cheese and triscuits, granola thins

Tortilla chips, avocado chicken salad, carrot sticks

English muffin pizza (for the toaster oven at work), carrot sticks, strawberries

Pretzels, weight watchers string cheese (it's yummy), dark chocolate almonds, grapes

Leftover tacos, fruit snacks, grapes

Pretzels, carrot sticks, apples with caramel

Buffalo chicken eggrolls with ranch (more on that later), caprese pasta salad, raw asparagus

I've never really liked the actual packing of my lunch, but it's fun to do it when you have little compartments to fill. They are deceivingly big - and will help you with portion size. The individual bags of baby carrots fit exactly into the mid-sized compartment, which means you can buy a big bag and portion accordingly. One serving of goldfish crackers fits perfectly into the small compartment.

This would be perfect for kids going to school, too, but I love it as a grown up going to work! I didn't get anything for writing this post -- I just seriously love the lunch box. You can visit their website if you want to get one for yourself!

Do you have any ideas for other things I can have in my lunch?

Magic Chicken

Zac and I have been eating like we go to fancy restaurants every night recently, and it's awesome. You know Zac loves to cook, but we were in a rut where he was tired of making all the same things. I was happy to do my small part and find some new recipes so that our menu was a bit more exciting.

Enter this magic chicken stuff. It probably has a real name, but this stuff is magic. It's quick to prepare, it uses ingredients you probably have at home, and you truly could make this for company. And it's delicious.

Want to make it for dinner tonight? You can!

Chicken Asparagus Roll-Ups
Recipe from Allrecipes.com, found via Pinterest

• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 1 lemon, juiced and zested
• 2 teaspoons dried tarragon
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 16 spears fresh asparagus, trimmed
• 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
• 4 slices provolone cheese
• 1 cup panko bread crumbs

1. Preheat oven to 475 degrees F (245 degrees C). Grease a baking dish. In a bowl, mix together the mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, lemon juice, lemon zest, tarragon, salt, and pepper until the mixture is well combined. Set aside.
2. Cook asparagus in the microwave on High until bright green and just tender, 1 to 1 1/2 minutes. Set the asparagus spears aside. Place a chicken breast between two sheets of heavy plastic (resealable freezer bags work well) on a solid, level surface. Firmly pound the chicken breast with the smooth side of a meat mallet to a thickness of about 1/4 inch. Repeat with the rest of the chicken breasts.
3. Place 1 slice of provolone on each chicken breast, and top the cheese with 4 asparagus spears per breast. Roll the chicken breasts around the asparagus and cheese, making a tidy package, and place, seam sides down, in the prepared baking dish. With a pastry brush, apply a coating of the mayonnaise mixture to each chicken breast, and sprinkle each with panko crumbs, pressing the crumbs into the chicken to make a coating.

1. Bake in the preheated oven until the crumbs are browned and the chicken juices run clear, about 25 minutes.

Remember, Zac is fancy, so he made a few edits. He substituted fresh thyme from our garden for the tarragon. We also put some of the sauce inside the roll-ups between the cheese and the asparagus. YUM.

Zac said it tasted like "if chicken they serve you at banquets was actually good."  It was super yummy.


And this is how my dinner is plated every single night. Those nights I spent home alone while he was working late restaurant hours were worth it.

It was super yummy with couscous. I hope you make it and love it too!


The one thing that's different from when Zac was working in a restaurant? His sous chef. The one we have now is a little bit furrier...

We like to "do Derby's voice" and say what we think he would say in a funny voice. Can you see it here? He's probably saying/thinking: "Hey Mom! I got you this potholder and brought it into the living room in case you need it in here because that's how much I love you and I just want to help and can I have some chicken if you don't eat it all because it's 7:02 PM right now and you were supposed to get me dinner at 7:00 PM but don't worry you're still my favorite person in the entire world."

The Most Delicious Mac & Cheese

Anytime I need a new recipe, I tend to go to Stephanie's blog Macaroni and Cheesecake and do a search there. She tries out so many wonderful recipes, and we must have similar tastes, because I always agree with her feedback. And our blogs were designed by the same person, so in blog life we're identical twins. Our little girls at the top look like sisters!

Last Friday, Zac and I were watching the news and they were covering a local fish fry... which of course, immediately had us craving macaroni and cheese. We've made decent mac and cheese from scratch in the past, but I remembered seeing a new recipe on Stephanie's blog recently and thought we'd try that one. Stephanie is on a quest to find the world's creamiest mac & cheese, and I'm happy to join her on that journey.

Side note / gluten update: It seems like I still feel okay if I cut way back on gluten. Right now I'm eating it one or two times a week and not having any side effects. Except for the one week where I sort of kept doing that a lot of times and then I didn't feel so hot. So - mac and cheese with no more gluten throughout the week is okay. Mac and cheese every day is not okay - for many, many reasons.


I couldn't eat this gloriousness without sharing it with you. I mean, look at it!

Ours looked that good too. Actually, ours was a little bit creamier because I splashed a bit more evaporated milk than it called for (per Stephanie's feedback). And it was DE-LISH.

Alton Brown’s Stove Top Macaroni & Cheese
Source: Alton Brown, Food Network via Macaroni & Cheesecake

Ingredients:

1/2 pound elbow macaroni 
4 tbsp. butter
2 eggs
6 oz. evaporated milk (fat free is fine)
1/8 tsp. ground cayenne pepper
1 tsp. kosher salt, plus more for boiling
freshly ground black pepper
1/4 tsp. ground dry mustard
10 oz. shredded sharp cheddar cheese

Directions:
Bring a large pot of water to boil.   Add a sprinkling of salt, then boil your noodles according to package directions.  Once al dente, drain the pasta and return it to the pot.  Add the butter and stir until butter has melted.

Meanwhile, in a separate small bowl, whisk together the eggs, evaporated milk, cayenne, 1 tsp. salt, pepper and mustard.  Once the noodles are cooked, drained and the butter has melted, stir the milk mixture into the noodles until incorporated.  Add in the cheese and stir over low heat until cheese has melted, approximately 3 minutes.  Serve immediately.

It makes a ton of mac and cheese. It would be more than enough for a family of four, especially if you ate it as a side dish. It heats up okay... not great. I think homemade mac and cheese is always a bit gritty when you heat it up the next day. This is about the same as all others when it comes to leftovers.

Yeah, it's yummy. Go make it immediately.

It's...... BACON!

After some heavier posts about strengths the past few days, I'm going to switch gears and talk about... BACON!! Hopefully what you love about this blog is my ridiculous variety of posts. Apologies in advance to any of my vegetarian and vegan friends. You can skip this one!

This wrapped up my silverware at a breakfast meeting yesterday. Serendipity? I think yes.

We made bacon last night and I realized I'd never shared with you our method of cooking bacon that I absolutely adore. We make our bacon in the oven, and it's awesome. It doesn't get bacon grease all over your kitchen, cleaning up the pan is much easier, and you can control how crispy your bacon is much more easily.

To make bacon in the oven, line a jelly roll pan with parchment paper. You can do it without anything on the pan if you don't have parchment paper, but clean up is much easier if you have it. You can put the bacon as close together as you need to - practically touching is fine.

Bake at 325 degrees for 15-20 minutes, or until it's reached the "doneness" that you like. You can flip it halfway through if you want, but you don't have to.

When it's finished, let the bacon grease harden a bit, then lift off the parchment paper and throw it away. You'll still need to wash the pan, but it's much easier than when it's completely greasy.

And then... enjoy!

See Ya Later, Gluten!

This post will likely seem random to a few people, because if you don't know me in real life, you don't know that my stomach hurts. A lot. Like oh, every day. Sometimes multiple times a day. And for my entire life. As in, as a baby, I had stomach aches on breast milk, which is supposedly quite rare.

I've tried everything. According to the GI doctor, there's nothing wrong with me, this is just my lot in life. So pro is that I'm not dying. Con is that sometimes it sure feels like I am.

My younger sister gets similar stomach aches and decided to try going gluten-free just after Christmas. Within a few days, she felt completely better. She has hardly had any issues in the past month, which was good enough reason for me to try.

And it's about all I have left to try. I tried tracking my food, giving up dairy, every OTC product that exists, and to no avail. Which, if I have a gluten sensitivity would make sense, since gluten is in almost everything.

                                                         

The last time I ate gluten was Monday night (February 13).  The last time I had a stomach ache was Tuesday the 14th. I won't say that I'm 100% yet (apparently it can take a little while to "detox" from the gluten) but I feel so much better. Amazing. Enough for me to have drank the kool-aid (not literally. That probably has gluten in it).

My friend Ashley has Celiac. She has it rough. Like, so so so so much worse than me. She's been gluten free for over a year, so she sent me some great advice. If you're curious about giving up gluten, read on!

"First off, gluten affects people differently. The one thing that I think is pretty obvious when you start looking into it is that we are a society eat way more gluten than we should--and in that way it affects everyone to some degree. You will start to find out really quickly (if you are being very strict) that we use gluten as a filler in a lot of our foods. So, the good news is that I think most people that cut gluten feel better to some degree because we just consume more than we are made to in the first place. Some people, once they "detox," can reintroduce the gluten foods they like, and just scale back on the amount of (what I would call) "bad gluten" you eat without even knowing it. Some people also have a gluten allergy--which can lead to the GI issues--some have an intolerance, and then others have Celiac which leads to more violent reactions that get worse over time because the disease causes damage to your intestines when you eat gluten. Good news--when you cut gluten you will see more benefits than just the tummy problems clearing up. Another friend cut gluten and her mental health drastically changed! I know I noticed I had a lot more energy and was less "foggy" and she noted the same things.

Okay, so what is gluten? To really detox you have to be really diligent in checking labels. It's annoying at first, but quickly becomes second nature. Also, you just stop missing the things you cut out, I promise! Gluten is a by-product of wheat. Wheat includes a lot of things like barely and some other grains.  

Here are the things to look out for (some you will know, some you may not, all of which have gluten):

Wheat (Duh)

Flour

Barley

Malt

Oats (You can find gluten free oats--it depends on how they are processed.)

Soy Sauce (I put this because it is used in a lot of meals--more than you think!)

Any Wheat Germ, etc.

Caramel Color (Found a lot in soft drinks, juice drinks, baking supplies (vanilla extract, etc.) and candy)

Modified Food Starch (Found in almost everything. Used as a filler. Check the Allergy Info or Research.)

Modified Corn Starch (Same as above. Non-modified of both of these are fine!)

You'll find that although that list is short, it rules out a LOT of food because of the last three--which is kinda disturbing when you think about it because none of those are naturally found in food. 

What you CAN eat:

Rice (Any Kind)

Any Rice Noodle

Quinoa 

Glutamate (You'll see it as an ingredient. Not actually gluten.)

Obviously anything listed as gluten free

Any and all alcohol EXCEPT Beer and Malt Beverages. But all liquor is good because of the distillation process it does through. :)

Safe things to eat out:

Mexican food is relatively safe--just substitute corn tortillas.

Thai food is relatively safe because they don't usually cook with soy sauce.

Meditteranean food is pretty easy. They really don't use flour too much in anything other than soups.

O' Charley's potato soup. I list this because it is important to me.

Chipotle Bowls. This is THE MOST IMPORTANT to me.

Balsamic Dressing (Most other dressings are a no go.)

Skyline. Seriously. Gluten free chili, baby!

Coke Products!!! (As of April 2011 they changed their process to make everything gluten free!)"

Ok, it's Tara again. It sounds like a lot, but it hasn't been as bad as I thought it would be. I actually had a much harder time cutting out dairy. You can still eat potatoes, corn tortillas, some chips... and honestly, I didn't need to eat that much bread anyway. And I feel better, which makes it easier to keep going.

So, it's early. And who knows where this will go, but for now, it's helping so I'm going to stick with it. I guess I just want you to know so that if you bring me dinner you'll make it gluten-free.

Did I trick you? Were you really going to bring me dinner?? Because my poor husband could probably use a night off from cooking, and pizza is out of the question now!

Breakfast + Pizza = Delicious

I have always been a fan of breakfast pizza. I honestly can't remember when I had it for the first time, but I love breakfast, and I love pizza, and I love breakfast pizza.

Last night we were trying to decide what to have for dinner, and we were struggling to come up with something. It was one of those nights where we were missing one key ingredient from everything we could think of, nothing really sounded good, and it was cold and snowy, making going to the grocery store impossible.

I headed to my Pinterest "Eat It" board for inspiration, and that's when I saw it. Breakfast pizza.

                                

We (who am I kidding? Zac) had already made something else from this blog, and it was awesome. Breakfast pizza for dinner it was.

And it was delicious. And then some. I love Stephanie's blog, Macaroni and Cheesecake, and I think you will too, if you visit. She has some really awesome recipes to steal.

If you want to make your own breakfast pizza, here's the recipe:

Breakfast Pizza

Source: Macaroni & Cheesecake

Ingredients:

Your favorite pizza crust - we used a Betty Crocker Pizza Crust mix, and it was awesome. Tasted homemade. Don't judge. It was a weeknight.

1/4-1/2 cup part skim ricotta cheese (enough to spread a thin layer over the crust)

6 eggs

1/4 cup milk

salt & pepper to taste

1/4-1/2 cup shredded 2 % monterrey jack cheese (We used cheddar).

1/8 -1/4 cup bacon crumbles

Directions:

Spray a large skillet with cooking spray. In a small bowl, add eggs, milk, salt & pepper to taste. Whisk together to break up eggs. Pour egg mixture in skillet and scramble eggs. Once scrambled, allow to cool about 5 minutes.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Spray a round baking sheet with cooking spray and spread your pizza dough out into a circle about 12 inches or so. Spray dough with cooking spray and spread a thin layer of ricotta, leaving about an inch of dough on the outer edge.

Top with scrambled eggs, bacon crumbles, & shredded cheese.

Bake for approximately 13 minutes, or until crust is golden brown.

Stephanie, thanks for providing our dinner inspiration last night, and for letting me steal your recipe. Everyone else, check out her blog for more delicious inspiration!

Homemade Caramels

You're probably knee deep in holiday baked goods, but I made these delicious caramels tonight and wanted to share the recipe with you.

I remember my mom making these when we were little, and they taste just as good when I make them. They're pretty easy to make, but definitely a pain in the butt. Worth it in the end, but not the easiest holiday yummy to make.

Homemade Caramels

1 cup butter

2 1/4 cups brown sugar

1 cup light corn syrup

1 can sweetened condensed milk

1 tsp vanilla

dash of salt

Melt butter in saucepan. Add sugar and salt, stir in syrup. Mix well, gradually add milk and stir constantly. Cook and stir over medium heat to firm ball stage, or 245 degrees. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Pour into well buttered 11x17 glass pan. Cool, cut into squares and wrap.

That's the official version of the recipe. But in case you're actually going to make it, here's the real deal stuff you need to know:

1. This is a STICKY endeavor. Be prepared.

2. Get the ingredients ready ahead of time. The caramel takes all of 20 seconds to burn on you.

3. Don't stop stirring this thing. Ever. Because it will burn on you. (Yes, this happened to me!)

4. Over butter that pan. There is no such thing as too much butter in that pan (see #1).

5. It doesn't matter if you accidentally add the milk before the syrup, or forget the vanilla completely. Because I did that today and they still taste good!

6. If you don't have a candy thermometer and don't know that 245 degrees looks like, stir until your arm goes numb. That's probably about the right temperature.

7. Cut them small. These are super duper sweet and you don't need a huge piece.

I wrap mine in squares of wax paper that I cut myself. They are all so mismatched. I would suggest cutting them on the longish side so you can twist the ends all pretty.

There you go. Did I frighten you away from ever making them? They really aren't that bad, and the recipe makes A TON. Great for parties and neighborhood gifts!

Are you still baking/cooking for the holidays?

Whoopie!

I was born in New York, but we moved away when I was two years old. For as long as I can remember, we've lived far away from our extended family during the holidays. When we were younger, our aunts and uncles used to send gifts and they would arrive a few days before Christmas. My mom used to let us pick one present to open each day while my dad was at work (he is a lunatic about not opening presents one single second early).

When a present arrived for me this year from my godmother, I apparently still thought those rules applied, and I opened it right away! I'm super glad I did - because what a fun present! She sent a whoopie pie pan, and a cute recipe book for different whoopie pie flavors.

If you've ever had a whoopie pie, they're sort of like cupcakes that are way easier to eat.  They're supposed to look like this:

             

There's no limit to the different cakes and fillings you can use, which makes them extra fun. My book club came over last weekend for a Christmas book exchange / potluck, and I decided to make them my whoopie pie guinea pigs. Funny enough, almost everyone brought a recipe they had never made before (and they were all delicious).

I made red velvet cakes with buttercream icing. Nothing too fancy. Apologies now for my lack of food photography skills.

The batter is definitely more cake like than cookie like.

These first scoops turned out to be too big. If I had them to do over again, I would do about half as much batter in each one. The pan looks like a shallow mini-muffin pan.

You're supposed to brush the bottom of the pan with butter, but of course I didn't, so mine stuck. The nice thing is that it doesn't really matter, since they become a sandwich. I slapped some icing on those bad boys and turned them into cute little sandwiches.

They got good reviews and were pretty easy to make. Because the cakes are so tiny, they only have to bake for about 8 minutes. Apparently you can make them without my fancy pan, but that sounds overwhelming for this non-baker.

Have you ever made or eaten whoopie pies? What flavor combinations can you dream up? I think my next batch will be salted caramel filling on a chocolate cake... yum!

Potato Soup -- YUM!

When I saw this recipe on Kim's blog Newly Woodwards a few days ago, I instantly sent it to my husband requesting it for dinner. That night. He does all the cooking, remember? I know, I'm insanely lucky. He does a lot of other stuff too. He pretty much rocks. (And he still doesn't read this blog, so there's no ulterior motive for me saying that).

Kim's a better photographer than I am, so I am stealing her picture:

Seriously Kim, you have photographic talents. 

We made a few changes. We didn't have any green onions, so Zac used regular onions. We actually didn't add extra sour cream or cheese to the top, which if you know me at all, you'll know that those are two of my favorite foods and that's surprising.

And (if you know Zac at all), it won't surprise you that he added bacon. I thought that made it less of a quick, weeknight dinner, but we always cook our bacon in the oven, so he did it at the same time as the potatoes and it wasn't really much extra work.

Side note: if you don't cook bacon in the oven, you need to start. Immediately. Put parchment paper on a baking sheet, lay out your bacon, cook for 10 - 15 minutes (until it looks done) at 350 degrees. Cook longer if you like your bacon crispier. It tastes better, it's much easier, and you don't have to degrease your entire kitchen when you're finished. Win-win-win.

The best part about this dinner? It's going to be even yummier when I have the leftovers for lunch tomorrow! I love soup in the winter. Do you have any fantastic soup recipes I need to add to my recipe box?

Yum - Corn Salad

When I came across this recipe from Tatertots and Jello last week, I couldn't wait to try it. It looked so light and refreshing, not to mention delicious!

The best part is that it's made with ingredients you're likely to have already on hand in the summer time. I used fresh corn, and it was extra delicious.

We made it on Saturday night as a side dish for our shrip tacos. This salad definitely has a mexican taste to it, but it is definitely delicious!

As we were eating it, we actually ended up adding it to our tacos as part of the filling, and it was awesome. It is also great as a sort of salsa with tortilla chips. 

We will definitely be making this one again, and I thought you might want to try it too!

Derby Pie - YUM!

One of my very favorite treats is a traditional Southern favorite - Derby pie. I'm a few weeks late in sharing it with you, but it's so yummy and so easy to make that I think you'll forgive me!

I think it tastes exactly like a slightly undercooked chocolate chip cookie. YUM.

1/2 cup butter, melted
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup flour
2 eggs, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup chocolate chips
3/4 cup pecans or 3/4 cup walnuts (optional - I usually leave these out)
Unbaked pie shell


Mix all ingredients together in a bowl. Pour into pie shell, and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until top is brown.


That's it. That's seriously it. And it's super yummy served warm with a dab of whip cream... Enjoy!!

Mac & Cheese is my favorite...

I have a confession to make. I've kind of been avoiding you. It's not personal. It's just... we got this amazing camera for Christmas. And we don't know how to use it. So most of the pictures I take are blurry. And difficult to get off the camera onto my computer.

I'm just making excuses. Our life has also been kind of boring post-wedding!! I do have a few things to share with you, so if you can bear with the poor quality of my photo-taking skills, hopefully it will be worth your time.

For tonight, I'll bribe you back into being my blog friend by sharing the recipe for this awesomeness:

It's mac and cheese... and delicious. And not too terribly bad for you. Hey - it has 1% milk instead of heavy cream. I'm going to call that victory.

• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 1 cup finely chopped onion (about 1 medium)
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 1/2 cups 1% low-fat milk
• 1 bay leaf
• 1/2 cup (2 ounces) crumbled Gorgonzola cheese
• 3/4 cup (3 ounces) grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, divided
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups uncooked elbow macaroni (about 8 ounces)
• Cooking spray
• 2/3 cup (about 2 1/2 ounces) shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese
• 2/3 cup panko (Japanese breadcrumbs)
• 1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

• 1. Heat oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add onion to pan; cook 8 minutes or until tender, stirring occasionally. Add flour and garlic; cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Stir in milk and bay leaf; bring to a boil. Cook 2 minutes or until thick, stirring constantly with a whisk. Add Gorgonzola, 1/2 cup Parmigiano-Reggiano, and salt; stir until cheeses melt. Discard bay leaf.
• 2. Preheat oven to 375°.
• 3. Cook pasta in boiling water 5 minutes or until almost tender, omitting salt and fat; drain well. Add pasta to cheese mixture, stirring well. Place about 1/2 cup pasta mixture into each of 6 (1-cup) ramekins coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle evenly with mozzarella. Top evenly with remaining pasta mixture. Combine remaining 1/4 cup Parmigiano-Reggiano and panko; sprinkle evenly over pasta mixture. Spray lightly with cooking spray; sprinkle with black pepper. Bake at 375° for 25 minutes or until heated.
• 
  
• Add veggies and chicken if you want.... and then enjoy!!!

Our favorite easter treats

My mom sent me this picture today of my favorite Easter treat so I could start getting excited for Easter at her house tomorrow:

Yum!! They are made from rice crispie treats - and she has a pan that's shaped like those little bunnies.  A few dabs of frosting and some eyes, and you're ready to go!

They are delicious and cute and fun! Thanks Mom.... can't wait to eat one tomorrow!!

On eating healthier...

I have never paid much attention to what I eat. I'm lucky to have a naturally slender build, and it took awhile for what I was eating to catch up to me. Plus, I wasn't eating fast food very often, and I don't eat a lot of dessert, so I was probably eating pretty healthy - right?

Not so much. Because my pants are too tight right now. And I don't care what size you are, if your pants don't fit, they don't fit.

My sisters and my mother are all very healthy eaters, so I got some pointers from them. There was just so much I didn't know. Main problems with my diet:

• Cheese can't be the only food I eat. And I can't eat so much of it.
• Ditto when it comes to bread.
• I need way more protein and fiber.

So, I've begun a quest of healthier eating. Not necessarily dieting - just making a conscious effort to make healthier choices. I'm by no means an expert, but here are a few things that have made this easier for me:

• Snack, snack, snack! Eating every few hours takes the edge off your hunger, and keeps you from eating too much during meals. Plus, it keeps your metabolism working non-stop. Fruit and nuts are my go-to snacks.
• Choose stronger tasting foods. I love cheese (see above problem). If I put a stronger tasting cheese, like swiss, on my sandwich instead of say, American, I can use less but still get the taste. If I put mustard on my sandwich, I don't need nearly as much mayo. 
• Check serving sizes. This is what blew me away. The serving size for the chips I brought for lunch yesterday? 13 chips. Which is not at all the serving size I was usually eating. Oops.
• Drink water! I bought a huge rubbermaid container from the grocery store that I fill up each day with 64 ounces of water, and I make sure that I drink it all throughout the day.

What are your healthier eating tips?