I don’t know about you, but when its icky outside, I want to bake.  It’s been tough these past two weeks not to make my artisan bread in 5 minutes, or my chili stuffed baked potatoes.   Since I stocked up on canned pumpkin at Aldi the last time I was there, I decided to make pumpkin scones.

Thanks to Tastespotting, I found just what I was looking for at Cate’s World Kitchen.  I did improvise just a bit – I left out the cloves (because I don’t like them) and did the whole thing in my food processor – I think the butter incorporates best in a food processor – just be sure not to over process otherwise our scones will be really dense.

And after I drizzled my 12 mini scones, I still had 1/2 the glaze leftover, so I separated the two to get the right calories – each glaze adds 20 calories to the scone – not too bad!

Pumpkin Scones

(printer friendly version here)

Makes 12 servings (without glaze:  165 calories, 6 fat, 25 carbs, 1 fiber and 2.3 protein)

A great to use up a bit of canned pumpkin.

Ingredients

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425. Put parchment paper on your baking sheet.
2. Put all the dry ingredients in a food processor with the regular blade. Pulse until combined.
3. Add butter, and pulse until the butter is like tiny pebbles.
4. Add canned pumpkin and pulse until just combined.
5. Divide dough in half. Make each half into a six inch circle, and make 6 scones out of each. Bake for 15 minutes.

Spicy Glaze For Pumpkin Scones

Makes 24 servings (20 calories, .1 fat, 5.1 carbs, 0 fiber 0 protein)

A little drizzle over my pumpkin scones really kicks this up a notch!

Ingredients

Directions

Whisk the dry ingredients, then add milk and continue to stir until smooth. Drizzle over scones.

Hells yes I deemed this insulin worthy!  This is actually all I had for breakfast:  185 calories, 31 carbs, 2.3 fat, 6 protein and 1 fiber.

Tony and I went to Friday’s for lunch.  I wasn’t sure how South Beach friendly it would be because 1.  I love the deep fried green beans; 2. I love their Jack Daniel’s bbq bacon cheeseburger; 3. I love, love, love their fries!

I did good though!  I had a bowl of their broccoli cheddar soup and a bruschetta wedge salad.  Both were really good!

I may have saved my carbs for this:  Sam Adam’s Winter Ale on tap – its the first time I’ve seen it this year and I could not pass it up – maybe because I’ve been reading Andy’s Beer Monday’s – but I totally wanted it!

We did a great grocery shop – the meat prices were insane so I stocked up:  homemade Italian sausage: $1.39 a pound, sirloin tip roast: $2.39 a pound, ground sirloin: $1.69 a pound and . . . . boneless, skinless chicken breasts . . .

They were sold in 10 pound bags, fresh, not frozen.  My job this morning is to trim it and vacuum seal all my meat products for the deep freeze.  I spent $100.01 and have the following menu:  (can you tell I got a deal on red lentils?  a 2 pound bag for $2!)

Breakfast:

• black bean egg burrito
• Mexican baked eggs
• broccoli cheese italian sausage casserole (I’ll have this 3 times this week – it makes a lot)

Lunch:

• pizza stuffed peppers
• spicy red lentil chickpea stew over brown rice
• Moroccan style chicken with lentils
• spicy red lentil and tomato soup
• low carb cauliflower mac and cheese

Dinner:

• sirloin tip roast, two cheese polenta and fresh green beans
• Italian stuffed peppers
• chicken marsala over homemade whole wheat pasta
• rosemary garlic pork loin with roasted butternut squash with rosemary and balsamic vinegar
• buffalo chicken chili

I bought some tomatoes to make the base for our stuffed peppers – simply cooked tomatoes, fresh basil, olive oil and garlic – Tony is my best taste tester – he seriously has a much better palate than me – and I always lack salt to most of my dishes!

I made Tony his bacon wrapped meatloaf – the one leftover he is sure to eat 😀  Maybe I should submit this one to BSI bacon?   Nope, I am going to come up with something better – you have until next Sunday to submit your bacon recipes to Jen! 😀

I had the rest of my ancho chili Mexican soup – 2 servings since each serving is only 104 calories!  On the side I tried to make chili fries.   I saw Rachael Ray do a version using bread crumbs, I just used parmesan cheese.  While all the batter didn’t stick, the flavor was really good.  And while she baked hers, I deep fried mine – only took 2 minutes vs. 18 minutes in the oven.  I made a dipping sauce of 1 tablespoon of sour cream mixed with 1 tablespoon taco sauce and 1 teaspoon Chipotle Tabasco.

I had almonds as a snack later on in the night.  I didn’t even realize until this morning that my calorie intake was so low yesterday!

• 1295 calories, 105 catbs, 54 protein 62 fat and 14.8 fiber
• 49% of calories from fat

So I am going to be bizzy in my kitchen this morning!  😀  After Hannah gets off of work we are meeting my Mom at Goodwill, then she’s coming over for dinner.  Since she lives alone, I try to make things she normally wouldn’t fix just for herself – she loves a good roast!

Have a great day! 😀