WIAW: Curry Chicken with Coconut Rice & Spinach Artichoke Quinoa Bake {2 Recipes!}

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I'm back!  I haven't fallen off the face of the planet or anything.  I just sometimes need a little bloggy break (said the girl who blogs once a week--ha ha!).

Back with daily eats.  This day has 2 really good recipes I will share with you!

Breakfast: Egg Toast & Berries

This is basically how my breakfasts have looked for a week now.  Over easy egg, wheat toast, strawberries & coffee.  It's a no brainer!

Snack: Cereal

Back to my cereal snack after a hiatus of about 2 weeks.  I love, love, love chocolate toast crunch!
Everybody keeps their froyo spoons for cereal, right?
Nope, just me?  Okay...

Lunch: Curry Chicken w/ Coconut Rice & Veggie Medley

Today we had the BEST lunch leftovers ever!!!  Got this recipe from Bev Cooks and totally didn't even look at the recipe while cooking.  Typical of me, really.  Here's how I made my version:

Curry Chicken w/ Coconut Rice & Veggie Medley
serves 4

3 big, frozen chicken breasts, thawed and diced.
curry powder, paprika, salt & pepper
1 cup jasmine rice
1 can coconut milk
1/2 cup chopped cilantro (plus more for garnish)
1 zucchini, diced
1 yellow squash, diced
1/2 yellow onion, diced
1/2 red pepper, diced
1/2 green pepper, diced
1 ear of corn, cooked, then cut off the cob
1 cup baby kale, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tbsp coconut oil (maybe more)
salt & pepper, to taste
1/2 lime

Get your jasmine rice, cilantro and coconut milk in a rice cooker.  For some reason, mine did not cook it completely in the 20 minute run time, so I turned the cooker back on and added 1/2 cup of chicken broth (so it would not run out of liquid).  Season the rice, once it's cooked, with some salt (to taste).
Heat a large skillet on medium heat, add oil to coat, throw in the zucchini, squash, onion and peppers to cook for about 7 minutes, then throw in the kale and corn.  Remove from the pan and set aside.
In the same skillet, add more oil if needed and throw your chicken in to cook.  Season liberally with curry powder, paprika, salt & pepper.
Serve it up, squeeze some lime over the top and garnish with cilantro.
Soooo goooooodd!!!!

Snack: Orange Veggie Puffs

I brought an orange to work, but was too lazy to peel it.  I snacked on some of these when I got home.  Because...veggies, am I right?

Dinner: Spinach Artichoke Quinoa Bake 

This was a really good meal!  It is pretty healthy and meatless.
Plus it made a ton, which I promptly packed up for lunches for the week!
I served it up alongside some roasted brussels sprouts.

Spinach Artichoke Quinoa Bake 
serves 6-8

1 1/2 cups uncooked quinoa

2 cups water

1 tbsp olive oil

1/2 yellow onion, diced

2-3 cloves garlic, minced

1 lb frozen spinach, cooked per package directions

1 can artichoke hearts, chopped

2 tbsp lite butter

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 cup reduced fat milk

1/2 cup plain, fat free Greek yogurt

1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

1/2 cup reduced fat feta cheese

Salt and black pepper, to taste

For the Parmesan Panko Topping:

3/4 cup Panko bread crumbs

1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

canola oil spray

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9x13 baking dish with cooking spray and set aside.

Cook quinoa in rice cooker. Remove from heat and fluff with a fork. Set aside.

In a medium skillet, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the onion and garlic. Sauté until softened, about 5 minutes. Add spinach and artichoke hearts. Season with salt and pepper, to taste. Remove from the pan.

In the same skillet, add 2 tablespoons of lite butter and flour and heat over medium heat. Whisk continuously until a paste forms. Whisk in milk. Increase heat to medium/high and bring to a boil whisking the whole time. 

In a large bowl, combine quinoa, spinach and artichoke mixture, flour/milk mixture and greek yogurt. Stir well. Stir in the shredded mozzarella and feta cheese. Pour mixture into prepared baking dish.To make the topping, combine Panko bread crumbs and Parmesan cheese in a small bowl. Sprinkle over the quinoa bake and spray with canola oil.

Bake for 35-40 minutes. 

Recipe adapted from two peas & their pod

We had this for lunch today and it's really good as leftovers!

After dinner, I made a quick little mug cake by combining 2 tbsp dry sugar free devils food cake mix with 2 tbsp almond milk and microwaved for 45 seconds.

Topped with a scoop of cinnamon ice cream, it was not a bad end to the day.

Have a great rest of the week!!!

WIAW: Meals in 20 Minutes or Less & A Puppy Update!

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Hi, hey, hello!  Hope everyone is having a great week so far.

Well today (yesterday, actually) was all about quick and easy meals.  Some days I have plenty of time to prepare extravagant and time consuming meals, but I don't have the motivation to do so.

So, I thought I would share with you what I do when that situation pops up.

Breakfast: Part I

This bar was eaten on the way to boot camp at 5 a.m.  Well, I ate half of it before and half after.  I usually go eat my pre-workout snack in the kitchen, but that is where Bizzy is doing her kennel training.  So, I didn't want to wake her up and get her all excited to start the day when it was so early.  I snuck out all sneaky-like and ate this en route to my workout.

Breakfast: Part II

Boy, do I eat alot of eggs.  Not really.  Maybe eggs 2 or 3 times a week, but it seems like I always have eggs on Tuesdays.  Meh.  Well, I had a half liquid egg white half whole egg omelet with smoked salmon in it and an everything bagel thin with a Laughing Cow cream cheese wedge (fun fact: this is not actually cream cheese..it's just flavored to taste like it).  And coffee, of course.

Morning Snack: Parfait

Gosh, I was craving some sort of carb for snack today, like a muffin or a piece of toast.  Luckily, I didn't have those things and I turned my fruit and yogurt into this:

A totally satisfying parfait, FTW!

Lunch: Taco Salad

I made this quick 15 minute meal for Monday's dinner and enjoyed the leftovers for lunch.  Chopped some lettuce, browned some lean beef in taco seasoning and opened some cans of beans and corn.  Top it off with some salsa and guac and you got something going on right there.
I did have some lunch dessert.  I went home for lunch, so I had the last piece of coffee cake from our family brunch on Sunday.  Coffee on the side.

I was pretty stuffed from lunch, but did enjoy a couple of mint M&Ms because I am a picture of health.

Ok, so we went for Indian food a few weeks ago and it was underwhelming.  I thought I'd whip up a quick Indian inspired dish using this junk:

 Well, it wasn't junk, but it wasn't homemade, either.  Buuuut, it was delicious.
All I did was grab an already cooked rotisserie chicken from the grocery store, picked it apart and threw it in a skillet with 3/4 of this jar of sauce and heated it up.  I also added about 1/2 tsp of curry powder, because this wasn't "curry-ish" enough for me.

Some store bought naan bread, microwavable brown rice and grilled zucchini rounded out the meal.

Soooo good and super quick!  Can't wait to have leftovers for lunch today.  

Dessert was a super yummy (but almost too sweet) Mike's Hard.  I have to buy anything that says "blood orange" on it, because I'm a sucker for it.

Time to overload you with Bizzy pictures!!!

If you didn't read last week's WIAW, Bizzy is our new puppy.

 This is Bizzy, me and my guy.  He's awesome.

We have had Bizzy for one full week.  She is a 6 month old daschund beagle mix.

Puppies are super fun......and sometimes super exhausting!
This girl is always busy.  Hence the name ;)

She spent all weekend outside with us being her crazy self, so she needed a bath.  This is her after bath picture.  Probably one of the most unflattering pics of myself.  But look at her cute, wet ears!

Bizzy loves the couch.  She acts like a little princess.

She's getting better at walks.  She still is a little spazzy on a leash.

 Her first puppaccino!  If you go to Starbucks, they give you whipped cream in a cup for your dog (upon request).  She's a little one, so she just got a top filled with whipped cream.

She's still not co-habitating too much with Baby & Boscoe (the cats).  She freaks them out, but they are getting more and more curious about her and come up to the baby gate to sniff her and such.  She's chased both of them (not in an aggressive way) and they are not too thrilled about it.  But we're all hanging in there and hopefully all will be harmonious by next week!

Until then..have a lovely week!!!