My Bizzy Kitchen

A New Cuisine! Philippine!

Saturday morning I woke up at 7 without a problem and got on with my day.  Yesterday?  I slept in until 7:30!  (I need to leave for work by 8:05).  But luckily, being the speedy person to get ready, I made it to work on time – and hardly any traffic – wish every day was President’s Day!

Out of the 12 containers of Chobani they sent me, I only have three left, so I think I’ll be over the breakfast parfaits for a while!  This one comes in at 6 WW points.  (3 points for the yogurt and 3 points for 1/4 cup granola).

When it got time to run I checked weather.com – a balmy 40 degrees and sunny!  I decided to do a walk/run/sprint – 2 minutes walking, 2 minutes running and 1 minute sprinting.  I did that for 50 minutes!

While I was running I found a cell phone on the ground.  The battery had popped off but the back was right by the phone – I was able to put it together and it turned on.  When I got back to the office, I called the last person called and left a voicemail hoping I could return it to the rightful owner.

I had it sitting on my desk when it rang and it said “Mom calling.”  So I answered it and the first words out of her mouth was “where did you find it?!”  I explained that I found it when running and they she stopped and said “wait a second, who is this?”  Turns out she thought I was one of her daughters!

I explained where I worked and she came and picked it up.  You know the neighborhood I run through with the huge houses?

That’s where they live.  Pretty sure I should have gotten a $100 reward – ha!  But that was my good deed for the day.

So this was my first attempt at making a Philippine Dish.  I still don’t know much about the cuisine, but if this dish is any indication, I think I’ll love it.  If you have any Philippine dishes you want to share with me, I would appreciate it!

I got this recipe from Gio at The Hungry Giant.  I did make a few changes – one I used pork stew meat because it was on sale for $1.99 a pound.  I also couldn’t find shrimp paste (still not exactly sure that that is!).  I weighed out the pork after it was cooked and it was 18 ounces, so each serving (makes 4) 4.5 ounces of pork, 2 ounces of the sauce, with 1/2 cup of cooked brown rice and steamed broccoli is 12 WW points.  WORTH EVERY ONE!

Binagoongang Pork Adobo

• 1.75 pounds raw pork (shoulder, stew meat) (will be 18 ounces cooked)
• 1/4 cup white wine vinegar
• 3 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon oil
• 1/4 cup minced garlic (his recipe called for 2 heads of garlic!)
• 1 teaspoon black peppercorn
• 1 tablespoon red pepper flakes
• 1/4 cup water
• 2 tablespoons coconut cream (his called for 6 ounces, but when I looked at the back and saw 2 tablespoons was 110 calories, I decided to scale it back to 2 tablespoons – turns out the sweet/heat balance was perfect)

Marinate the pork with the vinegar, soy sauce and brown sugar for 30 minutes.  Heat oil in pan.  Take the meat out of the marinade, let the sauce drip back in the bowl, and brown the pork in batches.

Add garlic and peppercorn and cook for about a minute or so.  Add in remaining marinade, chili flakes and water.  Simmer for about an hour or until meat is tender.

Add in coconut cream and simmer for 15 more minutes.  Its such a simple sauce but the flavor is the perfect balance of sweet and heat.  I shared it with a co-worker who said “the flavor is spot on!”  However, after reheating the pork in the microwave, a few of the smaller pieces got a bit tough.  I think next time I’ll use pork shoulder, because believe me, there will be a next time!

On Sunday night Tony asked “is the menu already planned for the week?”  Of course the answer was yes, but I said “what do you feel like?”  His answer?  Taco Salad with Fritos!

He wanted this on his taco salad too!

His salad:  taco meat, black olives, tomatoes, bean dip, avocado, cheese and fritos and lettuce, the only green I can get Tony to eat:

Mine:  2 ounces taco meat, 1/2 ounce cheddar cheese, cucumber, carrots, black beans, corn, avocado, baby spinach, lettuce and my dressing was 1 tablespoon of light ranch mixed with my salsa.  A delicious 8 point salad!

Check out my friend Rhonda – her husband likes spicy shit like me and she MADE HER OWN HOT SAUCE!   As soon as I finish the 13 bottles I have in my house, I am making this!

Don’t forget to submit your BSI – Potato Recipes!  Winner gets two jars of my baja fresh salsa!

BSI is Back! Again!

I love Sundays.  I love lingering over the Sunday paper, drinking coffee – its probably the most laid back day for me.

Not to say I am not bizzy though!  I did end up deep cleaning my pantry, computer desk and back room.  Let’s just say Hannah was impressed with my cleaning skillz!

Since I ate such a late breakfast, it ended up being brunch.  I had a 3.5 ounce bagel sammie with some clementines on the side – 11 points.

I never officially ate lunch, but I counted about 4 points of licks and tastes as I was cooking for the week. 

Some of the new readers might not know what BSI is.  It stands for “Blogger Secret Ingredient.”  Basically an ingredient is chosen, announced on Monday and you have a week to submit a recipe using that secret ingredient.  You would email your link or recipe to the host of the week, they will display the recipes on Sunday, then pick a new host for the week on Monday.

The only problem is that sometimes hosts get busy, and weeks might go by without a winner or new host.  So I think going forward, I will host every week and see how that works out.  Thoughts??

To start this week off, I decided to choose:  potato!  Super cheap and versatile.  Please send me your potato recipe links in the comments section – or you can email me your recipe at mybizzykitchen@gmail.com.  You do not need a blog to participate.  And you can use recipes from your archives too!

I decided to make potato gratin.  I went to Skinny Taste to get an idea on how to make a lighter version.  While I only used two potatoes, I decided to run her recipe through eTools.  She said using 2 pound 4 ounces of potatoes, light butter, and reduced fat cheese, each serving (nearly a cup) came in at 3 points plus. 

Um, I got 5 points per serving, using 50% reduced fat cheese.  Even if she used the 75% reduced fat Cabot cheese, not sure that would shave off 2 points per serving.  Has anyone ever questioned Gina’s points on her recipes before??

So here is my version, using real butter and regular cheese.  Makes six servings at 5 WW points.

Potato Gratin

• 2 large potatoes, peeled and slices thin (my 2 potatoes weighed 1 pound 4 ounces)
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons flour
• salt and pepper
• 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
• 3 ounces shredded cheddar cheese
• 1.5 cups skim milk

Put the milk in a pot and warm over medium heat.  Add salt, pepper and garlic powder.  Slice potatoes pretty thin.  Heat oven to 425.  Spray bottom of pan with Pam.  Layer potatoes, then dice up 1 tablespoon of butter and sprinkle over layer, then dust with 1 tablespoon of flour, then add 1.5 ounces of cheese, and repeat with second layer.

Pour hot milk over the top.  Bake for 45 minutes, or until the potatoes are tender.

Even though it was 35 degrees I decided to grill bone in chicken breasts to go with our potatoes.  Although I ended up finishing the chicken in the oven because I didn’t have enough charcoal.  It’s hard to find charcoal in February!

After Hannah had a serving she said “why do potatoes have to have points?!”

Cheesy and delicious!

Our bone in chicken breasts were huge – one covered almost my whole plate!  So I cut mine in half and had it with buffalo sauce – 6 oz. of chicken with my potatoes, dinner comes in at 11 points.

So send me your potato recipes!  The winner will get two jars of my baja fresh salsa!

Here are a few of my past BSI entries:

BSI – Cherries - Grilled cherry salsa:

BSI – Beets:  Beet Hummus:

BSI: Lemon – Grilled pork chops with lemon thyme sauce:

Hope you have a great day!

Tony’s Nurse . . . words from the one and only TONY!

I must admit one develops and close relationship with a lady whose fingers are buried 5 inches deep into ones stomach cavity. A certain amount of trust and closeness are required for such a harsh treatment. We meet three times per week. During the treatment I lay on the couch helpless as a baby lamb.

It is as it happens the only way that this wound will heal. While it seems counterintuitive to me; apparently opening and draining fluids from me through a black sponge stuffed into a surgical opening will hasten my recovery.

With all of the above said my nurse and I have plenty of time to discuss our lives and histories. She does however confuse me, and makes no excuses for doing so.

My first point:

The Philippines are a bunch of islands, kind of thrown into the South China Sea with Malaysia to its southeast. It is in the middle of the ocean, surrounded by water. My able and talented nurse cannot swim and hates the water.

Secondly:

Based on all of the programs where guys travel everywhere in the exotic Philippine climate to eat native cuisine, there is common element; fruit. It seems that plantains and pineapples grow from every roof. My classically trained nurse hates fruit.

Thirdly:

When is asked if her family was effected by the tsunami she laughed at me and said “I’m not from Japan!” seems fishy to me.

There is much more I have to learn about her. She hates yogurt (Biz gave her some Greek yogurt and she said she ate it, but hated every bite), on that point we agree. She became engaged in Venice while backpacking through Italy. She loves very spicy food (eww), and has two lovely children.

I have several months to get to know more about the Philippine enigma, I will update you as more abnormalities surface.

Tony (that is my only name!)

Thanks for the lovely guest post honey!

I have a lot of food to make this week, so I will make this short and sweet.  I also have to deep clean my pantry today.  The other day I spilled A WHOLE container (like 3 cups!) of sesame seeds and it was raining sesame seeds all over.

I love canned potatoes.  They are cheap and delicious – Aldi sells this brand for .59 cents a can.

I cooked them in some Pam, salt and pepper, then scrambled an egg with them.  I had some leftover steak that I needed to cook up, so I topped my potato mixture with 2.5 ounces of steak.  No cheese was even needed!  Breakfast comes in at 7 points.

I went to the grocery store (spent $93) and then got my eyebrows threaded – I got a woman who literally did it in like 60 seconds so the pain was minimal.

Tony asked if I brought home anything for lunch.  It’s funny, because that used to be our routine, I’d be out and about, text him to ask what he wanted and bring home a cheezy beef or gyros.  He hasn’t eaten real food for so long, that it never even crossed my mind!

So I made hot dogs.  His with relish, mustard and celery salt (and tomato if I had any) and I just had yellow mustard and spicy pickles.  Can you tell I was hungry, my one and only shot of my dog came out blurry.  But in case you are wondering, that’s not too much mustard.

My Mom got me these pickles Austin when she was visiting my brother and his family.  Since I am her favorite child, its only natural that she thinks of buying me shit when with my sibling.  And they are amazingly delicious – super thin, tangy and spicy all at the same time.  Lunch came in at 7 points.

As I was meal planning with Tony, I mentioned steak and baked potatoes and he said yes, but he wanted the steak to be thin.

I decided to make a chimichurri sauce for my steak – it really wakes up a steak and slaps it in the face.

Chimichurri Sauce (makes 1/2 cup – 1 tablespoon is a serving for 2 points)

• 1 cup packed cilantro
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup white wine vinegar
• 2 gloves garlic
• 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt

I put this in my mini food processor – my regular food processor was too big.  Just chop until all the leaves and garlic are chopped.

My dinner:  5 ounce of thin steak (5), tablespoon of sauce (2) and a 7 ounce baked potato with light margarine (5).  Dinner is 12 delicious points.

Hannah and I went to the gym yesterday too!  I ran 2.5 miles in 25 minutes!!  I am still trying to build up my speed and stamina in running.  If I were to keep that pace up, that means I can run 5 miles in 50 minutes – which would shave 8 minutes off my previous best time!

Thanks again Tony for your wonderful story!  Hugs!

Weekly WI and Party Pizza Friday!

So I’ve tried the last flavor of new Chobani, Passion Fruit, and I think its my favorite of the three, although the blood orange is a close second.  My fruit parfait: strawberries (0), blackberries (0), yogurt (3), 1/4 cup granola in between (3).  Breakfast comes in at 3 points.

My office had an impromptu lunch yesterday, so I didn’t run at lunch.  While pizza was ordered (you all know how I loves my pizza!) I stuck with the plan and had my 8 point taco salad.  I didn’t take a picture of it because we were eating lunch in our conference room, but thanks to Google images!

Except mind didn’t have any black olives!

Can someone explain to me why Friday afternoons are the slowest work afternoon? I wanted it to be 5:00 so bad because guess what Tony wanted for dinner? PIZZA! 

Not just any pizza – he was flipping channels the other day and Michael Chiarello was making a pizza with potato and pancetta.  You all know I could have pizza every day, so I jumped on this band wagon.  Try as I might, I couldn’t find the recipe online, so we adapted a similar recipe from Guy Fieri.  Remember when I was Guy Fieri for Halloween?  This picture still makes me laugh out loud!

I already had pizza dough in my fridge, so I took it out and let it come to room temperature for about 20 minutes.

I love pizza dough that’s been in the fridge – it develops so many flavors.

Potato and Pancetta Pizza (makes 1, 14 inch pizza)

• 1 ball of pizza dough (about 8 ounces for a 14 inch pizza)
• 1 cup Yokon Gold potatoes
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon olive oil, plus some for brushing
• 4 ounces of pancetta, diced
• 1/3 cup diced red pepper (my side)
• 6 ounces shredded mozzarella cheese
• 2 tablespoons freshly grated pecorino romano cheese
• basil (my side)
• 1 teaspoon lime juice and lime zest  didn’t have limes so I used lemon juice and zest (sprinkled over my side)

Preheat oven to 450.

Bring a pot of water to boil and add salt.  Add three potatoes to the pot and cook just until the potatoes are tender, but not fully cooked – about 8-10 minutes.  Remove the potatoes from the water and place on a paper towel to dry and cool.  Once cool enough to slice into 1/4 inch thickness.

While the potatoes are cooking, cook the pancetta over medium heat, until most of the fat has rendered out and its crispy.  Drain on a paper towel.

Roll out the dough to desired thickness.  Place the sliced potatoes on top of the pizza, so that the entire surface is covered.  Drizzle with olive oil over the top of the potatoes and bake for 10 to 12 minutes, just until the potatoes start to brown.

Remove the pizza from the oven, sprinkle with the cooked pancetta, peppers, red pepper flakes (the peppers are my side only!) and top with both cheeses.  Place the pizza back in the oven and cook for about 7 more minutes until all the cheese has melted and the top of the pizza begins to brown.

Garnish with black pepper and chopped basil.  Let the pizza sit for a couple minutes before cutting – drizzle with lime juice and lime zest. (lemon juice and zest)  Cut, serve, and unbutton your pants.

Pancetta is very salty, especially when you crisp it up, so that’s why I didn’t season the potatoes.

I scored this chunk of pecorino romano cheese for $3.30!

I ended up mixing rosemary and lemon zest for my side of the pizza – I actually loved the citrus notes.

Can you tell which side of the pizza is mine?

I only had two pieces

So I was right about my WI – it was a wash:

The running saved me this week.  Turns out I can’t have Fritos in the house!  I did my fair share of undocumented snacking this past week, so my mantra this week?

If I bite it, I must write it!

Some of the items on my menu next week:

Nicole from Prevention RD: chicken marsala (one of Tony’s favorites!)

Mellissa from I breathe . . . I’m hungry:  corned beef and cauliflower hash.  (um, yes please!

Tony and I were talking about our filipino health care nurse and we both agreed we’d never had any type of filipino cuisine.

As luck would have it, my store has pork stew meat for $1.99 cents so I’ll be making Binagoongan Pork Adobo from Gio at The Hungry Giant.

What’s on your menu this week?  Hope you have a great Saturday!