At Home with Kristi

I started making this a few months ago and its now one of Matthew’s favorites.

1. Brown 1 pound of lean ground beef

2. Add 1 packet of taco seasoning and 1/2 cup of water

3. Simmer for 5 minutes

4. Put the ground beef in the bottom of a casserole dish in an even layer

5. Take 2 small tortillas and cut them into smallish pieces (I use these low carb ones) and layer on top of the meat

6. Next take a can of refried beans (I use the fat free version) and spread over the tortilla layer

7. Next, add a layer of salsa

8. Cover the whole thing with a nice layer of cheese, I like to use a 2% milk Colby Jack

9. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes

10. Remove from the oven and let sit at least 5 minutes before cutting into it

11.  Serve with some Light sour cream and some fabulous guacamole

I have had this recipe floating around in my head for a couple weeks now and finally got around to making it today

Ingredients

• 1 cup fresh basil
• 1 ounce pistachio nuts
• 3 cloves garlic
• 2 ounces freshly grated parmesean cheese
• 1/8 cup olive oil
• 4 ounce marinated artichoke hearts
• 6 ounces cooked chicken breast
• dash Kosher salt
• 1 package mini Phyllo shells

Procedure

Heat oven to 350 degrees

Grate the cheese

Put the basil in the food processor and give it a spin

Add in the garlic and nuts and about half the cheese

Slowly drizzle in the olive oil (while the food processor is running)

Add the artichokes and salt

Process until nice and creamy

Mmmmm….

Get your chicken ready.  I used the Tyson Grilled and Ready diced chicken I had in the freezer, any kind of chicken breast will do though

Take out about half of the pesto mixture and put it in a bowl

Leave the rest of the Pesto in the food processor and add the chicken.  Pulse until the chicken is chopped up. Next time I will leave mine a bit courser than this

Remove from the food processor and put in the bowl with the rest of the pesto and mix well

Fill the Phyllo tart shells with the mixture and sprinkle with a bit of the remaining cheese

Arrange on a baking sheet

Bake for 12-13 minutes then turn to broil for 1 minute

Enjoy!

Nutritionals per 2 mini tarts (approximate)

This is a variation  of this recipe

(Printable version coming soon)

First, I grated some Romano cheese

I used about 2/3 of a cup of grated romano and a little over 1/2 cup of mozerella

Spread that on the bottom of a pizza pan (with sides) that has been sprayed with non-stick spray

Next measure out 6 oz of low fat cream cheese and put it in the mixer with 4 whole eggs, 1 tsp of Italian seasoning and 1 tsp garlic powder and mix until smooth

Then pour the liquid mixture over the cheese on the pan

Put that in a 350 degree oven for 25 minutes

Meanwhile, I made some homemade pizza sauce because all the commercial sauces I found had lots of sugar, but feel free to use whatever kind you want.

I started with tomato puree

Then added

• a few cloves of crushed garlic
• 2 tbsp Italian seasoning
• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
• 1 tsp kosher salt
• 1 tsp fresh basil
• 1 packet of Splenda

Then I set that to simmer while I got my toppings ready

Use whatever you want, as long as its low carb. I used a mix of regular and turkey pepperoni, onions, green olives and mozerella

Your crust should be about ready to come out of the oven now, it will be golden brown

Spread it with your pizza sauce

Load on the toppings

Sprinkle on the cheese

And return to the 350 degree oven for another 10 minutes

Remove and marvel at how good it looks

Slice it and serve

It really does taste like pizza, not “eggy” at all.