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January 3rd

A rainy day means a good day for staying inside and cranking the oven!

One of the things that is frustrating when trying to eat healthy is the amount of recipes that call for Cream-of-Something Soup. The first ingredient in the canned variety is water (fine), second is mushrooms (good), third is...vegetable oil? Notsomuch.

I have lots of recipes from my childhood that I don't make often because of the aforementioned Cream-of-Something Soup, so I decided to see if I could make it myself. The internet to the rescue, as Gimmie Some Oven had a recipe. Even better, all of these ingredients are stuff I usually have in the pantry, except for the mushrooms: broth, milk, flour, salt, pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, thyme.
That's a koa wood pepper grinder we got while in Maui to benefit The Pacific Whale Foundation.
Even our kitchen accessories are fancy, yet sustainable.
This could not have been easier or faster--it literally took me 8 minutes from start to finish to make this. And it looked and tasted mostly like it's canned counterpart.  Next time I make this, I will use more flavorful mushrooms (I used white because that's what I had in the fridge), reduce the amount of flour, and cook the flour in a smidge of butter first, as recipe footnote suggested.  You can make this up to one week in advance and store it in tupperware in the fridge.

What did I use this in? In the recipe for Chicken Eugene, which was uncreatively named "Chicken Things," by my parents when Amy and I were kids. This is the staple of Church Ladies everywhere. 

I have adapted it over the years by using light sour cream (not fat free--the light version just adds skim milk and vitamin A palmitate), center cut bacon, and ham instead of the chipped beef. The first time I made this, Chris asked me "wtf is chipped beef?!" I guess you either grew up on that or didn't.  Guess he's never had this delightful recipe (warning: hilarious cussing) that I was tortured with as a child.  (This one was Not Good.)

Breakfast
  • Two mini omelettes (160 - recipe coming tomorrow)
  • Quarter of an avocado (80)
  • Earl Grey Tea with sugar (20)

Lunch
Snack

  • Green tea with farmer's market honey (30)



Dinner

  • Shredded chicken in a Trader Joe's habenero lime tortilla with tomatoes, cilantro, avocado, and sour cream (275).
  • Homemade brownie (150) with milk (100)


Total: 1330 vs. 1400 calorie goal

 Exercise

  • 40 minutes of exercise bike
  • 35 minutes of yoga

In conclusion, Kate!


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