Marinades & Spice Mixes for Protein

September 26, 2014

I am making the assumption here that most of you who frequent my blog are trying to live a healthier and fitter life. For most of us, this means copious amounts of lean protein such as chicken and turkey (and beans and tofu for my vegetarians and vegans out there).

When I first embarked on my journey of living a healthier and fitter life, I really didn’t have a clue about how to prepare the meat that I cooked. Because I had lived in Asia my whole life, I made a lot of stir fry’s, but they would always disappoint in how bland and unflavorful the meat was.

Marinades & Spice Mixes for Protein

It was actually my boyfriend who encouraged me to experiment with a variety of spices and marinades to make my food taste better. There are lots of easy and little things you can do that can make a LOT of difference to the flavor of your food (and the happiness of your belly) without adding lots of unnecessary calories. I am excited to share some of my favorite marinades for protein with you 🙂

Photo by Bhaksar Dutta via Getty Images

Chicken

baking it whole (this keeps it juicy)! Depending on the size of the chicken breast, I like to bake it for 20-25 minutes at a temperature of 450 degrees fahrenheit, liberally sprinkled with Rachel Ray’s poultry seasoning, or salt, pepper, and rosemary
dijon mustard tastes fantastic with chicken and also makes for a delicious marinade. I like using this marinade from the Food Network. Get a ziplock bag and place your chicken breast in it along with 1-2tbsp of any vinegar of your choice, 2-3 tsp of either thyme, oregano or rosemary, 1-2tbsp of dijon mustard and a pinch of salt and pepper
I use the same methods above for turkey 🙂 Or I buy the roasted turkey slices at Safeway (an American supermarket) if I am lazy hehe)

Beef

I love doing a marinade with soy sauce (or low sodium soy sauce if you are watching your sodium intake). I tend to put beef strips in a ziplock bag, and fill it with enough soy sauce to cover the beef with it. I then add the juice of half a lemon, a tablespoon or two of curry powder and 1tsp of salt and pepper. If you are not a fan of spicy food, just omit the curry powder and replace it with 2 cloves of crushed garlic. This makes a great beef stir fry.

Fish

as with chicken, I love baking fish! My fave fish to bake are salmon and tilapia
I usually sprinkle some high quality salt and pepper on the fish, and squeeze the juice of half a lemon on top of it. I use the remaining half of the lemon and cut it into slices and place it on top of the fish before putting it in the oven.
adding some crushed garlic to the fish really helps enhance the fish as well. Give it a try!

Beans

my favorite beans are garbanzo beans (aka chickpeas) hands down! I do also like lentils, black beans and red kidney beans a lot though. I like to prepare beans for roasting or stir frying by coating them in olive or coconut oil (about 2tbsp per 1/2 cup) and then sprinkling them with salt, pepper and some cumin.
Again, adding some crushed garlic cloves to the beans will only enhance the flavor! And feel free to put more herbs and spices such as paprika.

Seasonings and marinades make a world of difference!

I hope these tips help create many flavorful and appetizing meals for you. They have certainly helped make healthy eating much easier and more enjoyable for me. Experiment and be creative; food is to be enjoyed after all!

Question: What is your favorite marinade or spice mix??

Honestly yours,
Alice

Friday Fare, Health

Friday Fare a collection of healthy recipes

January 17, 2014

Hey everyone! Welcome to the first edition of Friday Fare a collection of healthy recipes.

Friday Fare is going to be a regular weekly post (may become bi-weekly during the uni semester though unfortunately) where I will be posting healthy and filling breakfast, lunch, or dinner recipes. Why did I choose ‘Friday Fare’ as opposed to ‘Monday Meals’ or ‘Tasty Tuesday’? Well a) I wanted to be original and b) ….

Which is exactly what I will be doing. Posting a range of foods, especially of a particular type – the healthy and nutritious type 🙂

The first edition of Friday Fare features one of my favorite simple meals that can be eaten for lunch or dinner. What I made for you all today is a simple stir-fry featuring a lean protein – shrimp, carbohydrate source – sweet potato, healthy fats – coconut oil, and plenty of fresh vegetables. It only took me about 30 – 40 minutes to make (chopping, cooking and everything) and is such a delicious and nutritious meal! The photo below shows you all the ingredients you need to make this delicious stir-fry.

As you can see, you really do not need many ingredients at all! They are all relatively cheap as well, although I know shrimp is not that cheap but if you buy it frozen you can get some great deals. As you can see, I did not put a measurement on how much salt or cumin to use. This is because I think you should spice and salt the stir-fry according to how you like it. As a rule of thumb though, you can start off with a teaspoon of salt and cumin, and then add more if you like the flavors.

The secret to making my vegetables quickly and in a healthy way is my beautiful steamer … Ta da! I do not know what I would do without this baby. I literally chop up my veggies and throw it in my steamer and then put the steamer in my microwave for a few minutes. I know some of my old housemates will recognize the steamer, they loved using it 😉

Alright, now that you know what ingredients to use, and how to make the veggies, I will now tell you how to make it and nutritional value of this dish.

Healthy and filling shrimp stir-fry with sweet potato and steamed veggies

1. Make sure you have done your prep work – this includes chopping, getting all your spices out, and etc.

2. Throw the chopped broccoli and sweet potato in your steamer and microwave for 5 minutes. If you do not have a steamer, you can mimic the steaming action by placing the vegetables in a frying pan and adding about 2-3 tablespoons of water and then placing a lid on top of the pan. Check it every few minutes to see how soft the veggies are.

3. Whilst the veggies are being steamed, get a frying pan and heat the coconut oil in the pan until the coconut oil has melted (coconut oil is usually found cold-pressed so is in a solid state).

4. Then put your diced garlic and shrimp in the pan and fry until the shrimp is pink on each side. Lightly season the shrimp with some salt and cumin, and add half of your half tablespoon of chicken broth. Once the shrimp is cooked, place the shrimp on a separate plate for now (we will come back to it shortly).

5. Put your spinach into the frying pan with a splash of water. And no, not a Niagara Falls splash, just a tablespoon or so of water. This will create a nice steaming effect for the spinach. I typically just steam my spinach in the pan because since the sweet potato and broccoli take longer to steam and soften, if I add the spinach in with them, it will come out a pile of mush!

6. Now your sweet potato and broccoli should be steamed. Take them out of the steamer and add them to the spinach in the frying pan. After a minute or two, add the shrimp back into the pan so all the flavors mesh together.

Voila, and there you have it! A really simple, healthy and quite filling meal. If you do feel as if you want more food, feel free to add some more sweet potato, shrimp or veggies as you wish. Keep in mind that this will change the nutritional values of what I posted below. Adjust it to your own unique daily caloric needs 🙂 If you are weird like me, you can chop an ounce of Parmesan and nibble on that whilst enjoying the stir-fry (Parmesan has a surprisingly high protein content).

Mmmmmmm. As you can see, I am a chili fiend so added some chili powder to it. I hope you all enjoy the meal! Let me know if you would like me to post meals with specific ingredients, anything you can think of!

Nutritional Info
Calories: 343
Protein: 30 grams
Carbohydrates: 54 grams (mostly all from the sweet potato which has 41 grams in one cup)
Fat: 6 grams
Fiber: 14 grams

Honestly yours,
Alice

lean protein