Justin & Meredith Winokur's Kitchen Cooking Notebook
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KitchenKatalog: Blog 353
Wednesday, September 15, 2010, 08:53 PM
I was in the mood for a steak-type things and this what I came up with. I used about 6oz of very lean steak. It was not the highest quality, but it was fine. I marinated it in a bit of olive oil with white wine, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper. I then cooked it on the griddler. I used high heat and it seemed to cook well with some red inside still. It was pretty good but the balsamic flavor was a bit too pronounced. I will work on that for the future. And, maybe higher quality steak cubes. I liked that they were extra lean though. Then, I put them on a lightly toasted whole wheat roll and used Weight Watcher's lite Colby Jack and Sargento light prov.
The broccoli was just steamed with some lite parm and garlic powder.
Steak...6 (it was very lean)
Cheese...3
Roll...3
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 403, 2010-09-15_205303
Tuesday, September 14, 2010, 08:30 PM
My goal was to cook at Meredith's without buying anything new and this was the end result. The main focus was the "cream" sauce. My original attempt was a bit of skim milk, water, and dry skim milk powder at a much higher concentration. Still getting used to gas, it boiled by accident so I had to try again but this time with just powder and water. I was fairly successful. After mixing the powder and water for a bit over medium-low, I added some whole wheat flour, some grated parmesan and then a lot of dijon mustard. Whisking it made it all come together nicely and I ended up with a fairly thick sauce. It was a bit gritty but that is to be expected. If I made a "cream" sauce again, I will use evaporated milk, but I didn't want to go and buy it.
The asparagus was cut into pieces and steamed. I sautéed the chicken with just salt and pepper.
The entire sauce as 7 points for the milk powder and 1 for the cheese. There was also some leftover so I will say 3/person. The chicken is 3-4 and the pasta is 3.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 400, 2010-09-14_203059
Monday, September 13, 2010, 08:51 PM
I was in the mood to try something adventurous so I made dough pockets. I made the dough loosely based on this. I basically took 1/2 cup of whole wheat and 1/2 cup all purpose flour, a tiny bit of olive oil and egg beater, and yeast (of course). I added water and flour until it felt right. I am starting to get an idea of how it should feel. The dough was really, nice in the end. Also, I am a total convert to the beater blade then dough hook method. Good compromise of speed and cleanup.
Anyway, while it was rising, I sautéed some spinach, mushrooms and onions. Then I made italian seasoned chicken pieces, and some beef with jerk seasonings. I also sliced a peach, put some splenda and cinnamon on it, and then toasted that for 10 minutes. Finally, I microwave poached an egg.
I made a pocket with spinach mix and chicken, then I made one with the mix, some beef, some ricotta (skim) and FF cheddar. Then I made one combined with beef, chicken, spinach and cheese.
I made a breakfast pocket with the egg, canadian bacon, and cheese. For the dessert pocket, before the second rise, I kneaded some splenda and cinnamon into the dough and I sprinkled it with sugar after it was formed but before the oven. The rest got an egg/water wash.
I baked at 375 but I will go hotter next time because they grew in the oven more than they should have before cooking. Oh well. It could have also been from the relatively large amount of yeast.
They were all very good. I need to get better at rolling and forming the dough. Also, because I tried to stretch the amount I made, I made the dough too thin at times. Still, it was all very good.
On the plate is the three savory pockets with extra spinach and beef mixture topped with cheese. On the dessert plate is the dessert pocket with extra peach. For the peaches, I also tried to sprinkle some sugar on them and brulee them to mixed success.
The jerked beef was very good. Maybe next time I will just use that without spinach.
The photo below the dessert plate is all of the fillings. Points below that!
Points: The dough had 4 points of white flour, 3 of whole wheat and lets say one of oil and other. It made 5 potions so lets say the four was 6 points and the breakfast one tomorrow is 2.
There was 4 points of extra lean beef and 2 points of chicken. There was a total, including breakfast tomorrow, of 2 points FF cheddar and 1 points ricotta. The canadian bacon and the egg on tomorrows count as one.
So, for tonights dinner, there was 6 (dough), 4 (beef), 2 (chicken), 2 (cheeses), 1 (peach), 1 (extra sugar) for a total of 16. It was high but a lot of food. Could have gone with less.
Tomorrow's breakfast is 2 (dough), 1 (cheese), 1 (egg/bacon) for 4 points total.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 394, 2010-09-13_205117
Sunday, September 12, 2010, 10:28 PM
The crab cakes were made with greek yogurt instead of mayo. I think I put too much in because they were slightly mushy. I also used a bunch of spices including garlic powder, cayenne pepper, onion powder, some old bay and a bunch of others. There was also pre sautéed onions. Also some egg beaters and ground fiber one bread crumbs. In addition to a bit too much greek yogurt, I also think some larger chuncks would have been better. That is due to both the crab and the amount I mixed it. I then broiled them, flipped and kept broiling until they were done. Half way through the first side, I moved the rack closer to get some more crisp.
The broccoli was just steamed and the bread was from earlier in the day. We had a avocado going so Meredith made a small amount of guacamole. It was very good.
Points for crab cake (made 6 +1 slightly smaller):
1 lb crab...7 (from the nutritional label)
greek yogurt 1.5
egg...0.5
Not bad for 7 cakes.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 389, 2010-09-12_222849
Sunday, September 12, 2010, 07:13 PM
We made bread based off of the Joy of Cooking Whole Wheat recipe, with the addition of some rosemary (crushed with the mortar and pestle). Also, I proofed the yeast first. As I noted with the gnocchi recipe, I used the beater blade then the dough hook.
Overall, it was just okay. Not incredible. We need to play more. I had a pan of water to make a better crust but it was still not incredible. As you can see in the photo below, it did not form an nice of dough as I am used to. I did knead it a lot so that shouldn't have been an issue. I used the instant thermometer to tell when it was done which was convenient. Points below photo. We estimate it made about 16 slices.
2 cups real flour...800/0/0
2 cups Whole Wheat...880/2/24 (less than the older whole wheat I had)
2 tbsp butter...200/22/0
Total, 1880/24/24. per serving, 117.5/1.5/1.5-->2 points a slice.
Note that the flour had one less gram of fiber than my older one. Using that instead, it would be the same points but an even 2 grams per slice.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 363, 2010-09-12_191325
Sunday, September 12, 2010, 07:12 PM
Meredith was in the mood for something sweet and this was the result. We based it off of this recipe (halved) but made some notable changes. We skipped the honey butter. We used apple sauce for oil (didn't have canola and EVOO may have been strange), we didn't use cloves (didn't have it) and we skipped the walnuts. Also, we used whole wheat flour and egg beaters. Finally, we went somewhat heavy on the spices
I was a bit surprised that the recipe calls for baking power and not baking soda considering it has buttermilk. Generally, when the recipe is acidic (from buttermilk), baking soda is fine. Only if it is not, do you use baking powder. And when it is semi acidic but not acidic enough, you use a combo. This just used baking powder.
Anyway, it was pretty good. We halved the recipe and it was just enough for two people.
Points (for 2):
Flour...440/2/16 (so 4/person)
1/2 cup Low Fat Buttermilk...1
Brown Sugar...1
egg beaters...0.5
extra/???...0.5
6 points/person is not bad. We topped them with apple sauce, nothing, fat free cool whip, and butter spray.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 351, 2010-09-12_191220
Sunday, September 12, 2010, 07:12 PM
Not too special but I wanted to note the technique here. I put 3 Tbsp of popcorn kernel in the large glass bowl with the microwave cover loosely on top. I tried two batches. The first, I sprayed them with pam. The second without. While both popped well, the pammed ones held their seasonings (Emril Cajun) better than the unpammed (curry). Also, I had some un popped ones but I was afraid of burning the rest so I stopped. Next time, Kettle Corn (splenda!!)
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 353, 2010-09-12_191258
Saturday, September 11, 2010, 12:16 PM
The gimme lean was cut and cooked on the Griddler with the way my dad showed me. It worked well and they were good. I also made the zucchini chips again with the jerk seasoning and sesame seeds. It was pretty good but could have used a bit more time cooking. Finally, toast and some figs (which we needed to eat because they would go bad)
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 348, 2010-09-11_121648