Chili/Soup

On a particularly chilly day last week, my mom mentioned that she had made hamburger soup. Hamburger soup is something she would make quite often for us when we were younger. The soup is easy to put together and also falls under my definition of healthy.

Hamburger soup:

1) Brown half of a package of ground beef in a large sauce pan or Dutch oven on med-hi.

2) Add half of an onion, chopped or thinly sliced, and 3 carrots that have been thinly sliced. Cook for about 2 minutes

3) Add a peeled and diced potato

4) Add a 14 oz can of chopped tomatoes (I used chopped tomatoes with Italian seasonings)

5) Add a bay leaf, and a Tbsp of dried oregano

6) Add enough beef broth to cover. About 1.5 cups

Bring to a boil, lower heat, cover and simmer until the potatoes are tender, roughly 30-40 minutes

This made enough for 4 servings. You could also add some diced celery at the same time as the onion and carrots, I had forgotten to pick some up though.

The next night I made a chili. It's a recipe from Ellie Krieger, who has a show on the American Food Network called Healthy Appetite. I like her philosophy about food, which is basically that no food is off limits, but some foods can be eaten everyday, and some should only be eaten every once in a while.

I only made half of the recipe (using my leftover half onion, and half a package of ground beef from the night before). I left out the red bell pepper, because I had forgotten to pick one up. I also used 3 chipotles in adobo (which made it quite spicy so only do that if you like things spicy). Also in her recipe, Ellie adds 2 cups of water to the chili, which I left out.

I'm glad I left out the 2 cups of water, because I feel that the chili was thin enough. I have never used carrots in a chili before, and I don't mind them as an addition. You can serve it as is, or topped with some grated low fat cheddar and tortilla chips. (As seen in the top picture of this post)

This weekend I had some friends come up from Calgary. On Saturday night we had "make your own" pizza night, and Sunday morning I made Eggs Benedict. The pizza left me with chopped onion, red bell pepper, green bell pepper and sliced mushrooms for leftovers. The Eggs Benedict left me with back bacon. To use it all up, last night I made fried rice.

I heated up about 1 tbsp of safflower oil in a large pan, and sauteed the veggies (leftover from pizza night, and a half cup of frozen peas) for about 4 or 5 minutes. I took the veggies out of the pan, added another tbsp of oil and then 1.5 cups of cooked, cold jasmine rice. The rice has to be cold in order for it to fry. Once the rice was glossy (about 2 minutes), I added the veggies back to the rice, and tossed in some chopped back bacon. Then I added a sauce made from combining 1 tbsp of soy sauce, mirin, honey, Chinese cooking wine, rice vinegar, and a tsp of Sriracha sauce.

I think fried rice is the way to go to get rid of leftovers. Just about any veggie or meat will work in it.