Gluten Free Pasta Primavera "Concoction"

I often make "concoctions" for dinner and tonight was no exception. I would call tonight's concoction Gluten Free Pasta Primavera. Just FYI, my hubby is a SUPER picky eater, so I always dread his nightly phone call on his way home from work to ask me what's for dinner. He always hopes I say something like Lasagna or Meatloaf, but usually it's more like "ummm it's kinda like a ____ but with a ____ and a ____ instead of a ____. 

And tonight was no exception. I knew two things, I wanted to use up some veggies for dinner and I wanted to cook the Annie's Rice Pasta & Cheddar that's been sitting in my pantry. So I came up with this...

The noodles, veggie/chicken mixture and sauce

The noodles

The veggie/chicken mixture

Gluten free Pasta Primavera

Pasta Primavera with extra Parmesan and pepper!

Gluten Free Pasta Primavera

Yield:  4 servings

1 box Annie's Rice Pasta & Cheddar

2 cups assorted veggies, chopped (I used onion, red pepper, grape tomatoes, broccoli)

9oz cooked chicken breast (I keep this recipe in my freezer for recipes that call for pre-cooked chicken breasts)
1/4 cup gluten free Italian dressing
1 Tbs cornstarch
1-1/4 cups milk
1/4 cup Kraft Parmesan cheese

Directions:

1. Cook Annie's Rice Pasta according to directions, drain.
2. Saute veggies in Italian dressing until crisp-tender. Add cooked chicken and cook a couple minutes longer until heated through.
3. In a large pot, combine cornstarch, milk and cheddar cheese packet from the Annie's pasta. Bring to a boil while whisking constantly. Reduce heat and continue whisking for about another minute. 
4. Add in the rest of the ingredients to the sauce (noodles, veggies & chicken, Parmesan), and stir to combine. Serve.

I topped my serving with extra Parmesan and lots of freshly ground pepper.  Enjoy!

Gluten Free and Weight Loss

Have I lost any weight since going gluten free 6 weeks ago? Nope, not really, or at least nothing drastic.  Well actually I did lose about 7 pounds but then I gained 2 pounds back, so I'm down a total of 5 pounds. 

I know that losing weight wasn't the main purpose of this lifestyle change... but I was really-REALLY hoping it was going to be a big side effect of it. Especially since I gave up my all-time favorite breakfast, a sandwich. Yes, up until 6 weeks ago I used to eat a sandwich for breakfast every single morning. My favorites were toasted cheese with mayo (sometimes with dill pickles on it), or turkey and cheese with mayo. Now my usual breakfast is two rice cakes with peanut butter and jelly, shouldn't that count for something? ;)

I even just tried doing the low-carb thing for a (little) while, but after 3 days of losing a pound a day, I started gaining instead over the next 4 or 5 days, so I gave that up pretty quickly. So I decided to just stick with gluten free and try and eat less carbs and sugar overall.

If I had to pinpoint the problem I would say that my love of cheese (on everything), and my love of wine are probably the things that are holding me back from seeing better weight loss results. But, I'm just not ready or willing to give those two things up at this point in time!

Do you have any tips for losing weight while going gluten free?

Super Easy 3 Ingredient MexItalian Meat Sauce

Tonight I wanted to make something super simple for dinner with what I had on-hand. I wanted something like a spaghetti sauce but over rice... so I came up with this. The sauce only has 3 ingredients!

This was honestly one of the simplest recipes I've ever made, but it tasted great for what it was. You could add any seasonings or extra veggies that you want, but I'm just saying it was also fine without.  (I actually started to chop up bell pepper to add to it but then changed my mind and decided to stick with the simplicity of the 3 ingredients!). I think this would also be good with ground beef instead of the chicken.

 The 3 ingredients, plus rice to serve it with...

 The sauce while it was cooking...

Plated and ready to eat...

 Leftovers to take to work for my lunch tomorrow!

Super Easy 3 Ingredient MexItalian Meat Sauce

Yield:  6 servings

1 jar of pasta sauce

1 cup of salsa

9oz cooked chicken breast (I keep this recipe in my freezer for recipes that call for pre-cooked chicken breasts)

Rice for serving

Directions:

1. Place chicken, pasta sauce and salsa in a medium sauce pan.
2. Bring sauce to a boil, stirring occasionally to break up the chicken meat. Then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes.
3. Serve over rice.

I put Parmesan cheese over my serving. Tasted great!

Gluten Free Cream of Chicken Soup

Use this recipe in place of 2 cans of cream soup for recipes.

Cream of Chicken Soup

Yield: 2 cans

2 cups milk

3 Tbs corn starch

3 packets (or 3 tsp) of chicken bouillon granules

Directions:

1. Whisk corn starch into the cold milk in a saucepan.
2. Add the chicken bouillon granules and heat to a boil while whisking frequently. Reduce heat and simmer about a minute until thickened.
3. Use this soup in recipes in place of one 2 cans of creamed soup.

This recipe works perfectly for this Chicken Broccoli Divan recipe.

Chicken Broccoli Divan

Tonight I made Chicken Broccoli Divan for dinner. Hubby and I both thought it turned out really good! We're supposed to be low-carbing but we decided to have a tiny bit of rice with it. I also added some cauliflower to the recipe because I didn't have quite enough broccoli.

Before going in the oven...

Out of the oven...

Finished product...

Broccoli Chicken Divan

Yield:  6 servings

1 lb cooked, cubed chicken breast

1.5 lbs steamed, fresh broccoli

1 recipe of gluten free cream of chicken soup

1/3 cup milk

1 tsp mustard

salt & pepper to taste

2 cups shredded aged cheddar 

splash of white wine (optional)

1/4 cup parmesan cheese

Directions:

1. Whisk together the gluten free cream of chicken soup, milk, mustard, salt & pepper and splash of white wine (if using).
2. Arrange chicken and broccoli in a baking dish and top with cheddar cheese.
3. Spread the soup mixture over top and sprinkle with the parmesan cheese.
4. Bake at 375 degrees for 25 minutes.

Cauliflower Crust Pizza

Last night I decided to try this low carb cauliflower pizza crust I keep seeing in my online low carb/gluten free searches. It actually turned out really good and I had leftovers to bring to work the next day!  It doesn't taste exactly like delivery, but it's a darn good substitute and I will definitely make this again!

This is the crust before baking...

Cauliflower Pizza Crust - before baking

 This is the crust after baking...

Cauliflower Pizza Crust - after baking

 With the toppings...

Cauliflower Crust Pizza - topped and ready to bake

 The finished product ready to eat...

Cauliflower Crust Pizza - ready to eat!

Cauliflower Crust Pizza

Yield: One 14 inch pizza (feeds 2 to 4 people)

Crust:

1 head cauliflower, shredded (about 4 cups)

2 eggs

2 cups shredded cheese (I used 1 cup aged white cheddar/1 cup mozzarella)

1/2 tsp dried oregano

1/2 tsp onion salt

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/8 tsp fennel (I always grind fennel for recipes, just a personal preference)

Pizza Sauce:

I used Babzy's Pizza Sauce recipe.

Toppings:

I used a 3 meat pizza meat pack (ham, salami and peperoni)

But I think Ham and Pineapple or any other toppings of your choice would also be great!

1-2 cups shredded mozzarella

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
2. Line a pizza pan with parchment paper (or grease the pan really well).
3. Shred the cauliflower into crumbles (I used a cheese grater). Then place cauliflower into a large bowl and microwave for 9 minutes.
4. Once the cauliflower is done, you can let it cool a bit, or mix in the other ingredients right away (like I did).  Once all the crust ingredients are mixed together, spread or pat the crust onto the the pizza pan and bake in the preheated oven for about 20-25 minutes. Watch it closely near the end and take it out if it gets to brown. You want it to be golden, but you don't want it to burn!
5. Remove the crust from the oven and turn the oven to the broil setting.
6. Spread the pizza sauce on the baked crust, then add your toppings and cheese.
7. Broil the pizza until the toppings are hot and the cheese is melted and bubbly. (mine took about 6-7 minutes but I had it on the middle rack, not too close the the broiler). 
8. Cut the pizza into 8 slices and serve.

My husband and I split the pizza and I found 2 pieces to be plenty for my dinner and saved my other 2 pieces to eat for breakfast the next morning (LOVED the cold leftover pizza this morning at my desk at work!). My husband on the other hand ate all 4 of his pieces for dinner.

1 Month Gluten Free!

I've been gluten free for a whole month now. (Yay me! That's pretty much the longest I've ever stuck to any type of diet or "eating plan"). I thought I would try it for 2 weeks to see if it helped with my myriad of tummy issues and health problems... and although I'm still slightly on the fence, I feel pretty darn good so I'm not ready to give up this new way of eating yet! 

I must admit that I was really hoping to lose a few pounds by going gluten free as an added bonus, but that hasn't happened (well, truthfully I have lost a couple pounds, but nothing drastic).  So as of yesterday I've added a low carb spin to my gluten free diet to see if that helps me to shed a bit of weight (before my cruise a month from now... eeek!).

I'm obsessed with looking for recipes, but on the other hand I always have to put my own spin on every recipe that I find. Hence the name "The Recipe Seeker" because I'm always seeking the "perfect" recipe, which I never really find.  Anyway, I figured it would be fun to start keeping track of what recipes I actually make, note the changes that I make and take photos.

Looking forward to it!