Sweet Potato Chips, Swordfish, and Asparagus

Tonight we had one of my favorite foods - asparagus! I have no idea why I enjoy it so much, other than its tender, juicy texture with its healthy, green flavor, with a hint of lemon and butter. Also, we had sweet potato chips (an experiment that turned out quite well) and a delicious bit of swordfish. Paired with a refreshing chardonnay, it was a great meal. Here's how we did it:

Sweet Potato Chips:
1 sweet potato
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp sea salt

Asparagus:
1 lb asparagus
2 tsp olive oil
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tbsp butter

Swordfish:
2 swordfish fillets
1 tsp lemon juice
non-stick spray
salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375. Wash and peel sweet potato, cut in half lengthwise, use vegetable peeler to slice thin semicircular chips from the ends. Using a basting brush, spread 1 tbsp olive oil on baking sheet. Place thin pieces of sweet potato on sheet, avoiding as much overlap as possible. Brush remaining 1 tbsp olive oil on top of chips. Sprinkle sea salt over chips. Bake for 10-15 minutes (depending on your oven), rotating and flipping halfway through.

After washing asparagus, cut off tough ends, and cut remaining stalks in half. Place in skillet with olive oil over medium heat. Cook for approximately 8-10 minutes, until tender. Remove from heat, add butter and lemon juice, mix well.

Brush swordfish with lemon juice, adding salt and pepper. Spray skillet with nonstick spray, and cook swordfish approximately 5 minutes over medium heat, until thoroughly cooked. Serve with lemon.

Cost:
Sweet Potato Chips: about $1.25
Asparagus: about $2.75
Swordfish: about $7.00 for two steaks
TOTAL: $11.00 for the meal, about $5.50 per person

Nutrition Facts:
Sweet Potato Chips
- note sodium content depends on how much you add, if you like salty chips it'll be a lot higher
Asparagus
Swordfish

So overall, this was a pretty healthy meal. Full of fiber and Vitamin A, and the fat content could be reduced by leaving out the butter if you needed to. But still - delicious, healthy, and affordable (once in a while, at least). It's still way cheaper than if you had the same at a restaurant!

Since my boyfriend loves salty fried foods, I made the chips for him especially (with significantly less oil - since it was baked, and less salt) but decided I love them too! I highly recommend them.

Citrus Chicken and a Revelation

Today was great - our dishes finally came, so we can eat off of these awesome polka dotted plates instead of out of stainless steel pans and mixing bowls! We celebrate by going out to the grocery store and getting some rice (and other things). So in addition to tonight's recipe, I've decided to start incorporating as much information about costs as possible. In response to girlyjock's post about childhood obesity, I want to show that eating healthy, delicious food, is truly affordable and not very time intensive.

So today's recipe is: Citrus Chicken and Rice with Mixed Green Salad

• 1.5 lbs boneless chicken breasts
  ($3.00 - we got it on a buy one get one sale, so we got 3 lbs for $7.50, and only used about half of 1.5 lbs for this meal)
• 1 cup long grain brown rice
  ($0.50 - we got a large bag for $2.69 and this is the cost for tonight's meal)
• water, salt, pepper
  (negligible cost)
• 3/4 cup Dole Pineapple Orange Banana juice
  ($0.50 - we used a small part of a $2.17 carton of 100% juice)
  
• 1/2 bag premixed Dole Italian Salad blend
  ($1.25 - we used half of a bag that was on sale for 2 bags for $5.00)
• 1 tomato, italian croutons, miscellaneous trail mix
  ($1.50 - probably overestimated)
  
  
• Total Cost = $6.50 give or take, for two people, or $3.25 per serving
  
  To make, simply mix all salad ingredients together. For the rice, cook as recommended, adding 1/4 cup of juice near the very end. For the chicken, begin cooking in skillet with spices, adding 1/2 cup of juice once the chicken has been flipped once. The juice will help keep the chicken moist and tender, and add a little flavor to the plain brown rice.
  

So it's really not very expensive to eat delicious, healthy food. My boyfriend agreed that it was delicious, after telling me I needed to make dinner because I was the "expert" since I had a blog. I guess I didn't let him down!

On a side note, we also shared a bottle of California Riesling with dinner, to complement the citrus notes in the chicken and rice. This white wine probably cost us all of $5.00, because we stocked up on cheap but tasty wines when the supermarket was having a sale - buy 6 bottles and save 25%.

I guess my biggest advice today would be to buy nonperishables while they're on sale. Or even if it is perishable and can be frozen, like meats, fishes, shredded cheese, bread, frozen fruits and veggies, take advantage of the sale! Keep the freezer filled with healthy items and leftovers, and you won't have to reach for the ready-made high sodium, high calorie, high fat foods.

Numero Uno

So I have another blog, but I realized that people who want to read about yoga and renewable energy might not want to read about gourmet cooking, or vice versa. So I decided to separate them. I want to create this to document my journey of exploration... if you want to put it that way. Now that my boyfriend and I have an apartment of our own, we're trying out all these fantastic new recipes. I want to make the good ones again, and keep myself from making the same mistakes twice - so here is where I will keep notes.

So tonight we had a delicious pizza with a mixed green salad and some tasty lime-oriented beer. The approximate recipe:

1 whole wheat pizza crust (we used Boboli, which was delicious and easy)
1/2 cup tomato sauce
1/2 small eggplant, sliced, lightly fried in olive oil
1 cup fresh baby spinach
1/2 cup shredded mozzarella
1/4 cup shredded medium cheddar, for some variety

Spray the pizza pan (crucial! we forgot to do this once and had very crispy pizza), put down the sauce, spinach, and eggplant, sprinkle cheese evenly on top, and follow baking instructions on crust package.

It was delicious! To go along with it we had a salad with:

mixed baby field greens
handful of cherry tomatoes
handful of chopped sweet red and green bell peppers
some baby carrots
some raisins
delicious Raspberry Hazelnut Vinaigrette dressing

So that was tonight. Last night was even better. We had a baked penne casserole:

1 1/3 cup (uncooked volume) penne
14 oz organic diced canned tomatoes
1/2 cup baby spinach (we should have used more)
1 cup shredded mozzarella
1 cup grated Parmesan
some garlic powder, fresh ground pepper and sea salt, oregano to taste

Cooked the pasta, put everything in the casserole dish with most of the Parmesan on top, baked it in the oven for about 25-30 minutes. Definitely should have taken it out a little sooner, as the pasta sticking out of the tomato juice had gotten pretty hard.

To go with that, we had a Caesar Salad (from a bag.. for shame!) and a delicious Louis Jadot Beaujolais. Now that was tasty.

I hope to make whole wheat blueberry pancakes tomorrow morning with a honey-fruit syrup. We'll see if I have the motivation!