So I have just tried my last recipe from a somewhat well known site that starts with and "H" and ends with "ungryGirl". No one wants to eat food that tastes like cardboard no matter how many calories they're saving! I am bound and determined to find delicious recipes that aren't loaded in saturated fat and calories. I am convinced that most people still have their taste buds and are looking for a way to have their cake (or breaded chicken as it was tonight) and eat it too.
First, a little background-- My husband and I were recently married (April of 2010) but when we met 6 years ago, I couldn't cook at all. I even burned toaster waffles. Early on in our relationship, I wanted to surprise him with breakfast when he woke up, so I made arrangements with his roommates to leave his apartment unlocked. I hauled grocery bags filled with eggs, potatoes, bacon, tortillas, pancake mix (What? You didn't think I was going to make them from scratch, did you?), syrup-- everything I needed to make him a spectacular breakfast spread...down two flights of stairs, across the apartment complex, and into his unit. I tiptoed through the front door and listened. Sure enough, he was still sound asleep.
I unloaded groceries and laid them all out on the counter so that I could see exactly what I had gotten myself into. Filled with confidence, I pulled several skillets out of the cupboard and arranged them on the stove. I cut the potatoes for my own homemade hash browns. I had never made them before, but how hard could it be? I mixed the pancake batter with as much strength as I could muster, and whipped the ever loving Hades out of the eggs. I seasoned them with Tony Chachere's Original Creole seasoning (who doesn't love Tony's) and added a little extra fresh ground black pepper, and counted out the tortillas.
The apartment was still quiet, so I knew I was good on time. I cranked up the stove and began my masterpiece. Long story short, my masterpiece ended up with my now husband waking up to the smell of burnt potatoes, scorched eggs and the sound of the smoke alarm. Not exactly the surprise I was looking for. How I still managed to get a proposal, I will never know, but one thing was for sure. I was going to learn how to cook it if killed me!
Fast forward 6 years and MANY hours of Food Network later, I started to learn my way around the kitchen. Ask anyone we know, and they would swear it was my cooking that made him fall in love with me....they didn't endure the disasters that my poor hubby did to get me to this point. I started to enjoy cooking, and actually looked forward to standing in front of the stove with a glass of wine in one hand in a wooden spoon in the other after even the most grueling day at the office. I still have culinary disasters from time to time, but even I must admit, most of what comes out of our kitchen is simply sublime.
Lately I have embarked on a new endeavor. We aren't getting any younger so I decided to start cutting calories where I can. Some swaps were simple. Replacing white bread for whole grain, switching to Brummel and Brown spread instead of full fat butter on our green peas....common sense. In my search for healthy alternatives I ran across the aforementioned website and fell in love. They offered low calorie versions of almost all of my guilty pleasures. There was chocolate cake, gravy, even a sub for that sinful stadium cheese goo that they put on nachos (you know you love it). I couldn't WAIT to get to work. I loaded up on all the essentials on the HG 2010 shopping list and got to cooking. There was just one problem....
The reviews of these recipes were 4 and 5 stars, but they all tasted like CRAP! How was ANYONE supposed to eat this junk on a regular basis? The chocolate cake boasted "you'll never miss the calories" and "tastes just like chocolate cake!" I've got news for you...when you replace all the oil and eggs in devil's food for a can of pureed pumpkin, it's no longer chocolate cake. It's chocolaty, pumpkiny, boot leather! And I like pumpkin! The "cheese goo" had the most unnatural texture (yeah...worse than boot leather) and tasted like gooey cardboard. The gravy....I'd rather not talk about it....
Despite how terrible every recipe I tested was, I decided to give the HG signature dish a shot. They have devoted several recipes to this swap for everything from chicken tenders to buffalo wings-- even salmon. It's chicken breaded with Fiber One Cereal instead of breadcrumbs. I must admit...I knew better than to get my hopes up, but it was so bizarre that it just HAD to taste good, right? WRONG! I tasted the ground cereal and spice mixture before I dredged the chicken and decided it was WAY too sweet, so I added extra salt (like a week's worth of sodium in one meal is really healthy). I gave this "breading" every chance it had to be delicious, held my nose, and started cooking. I was appalled at the outcome. In six years, I haven't had something that bad come off my stove and it was perfectly cooked! I ran to the cumputer an cancelled my email subscription...that's when it hit me.
There HAS to be a way to cut the calories that you don't need and still end up with something edible. I have been making delicious food for years and sure there is some butter here and there, but very little would have to be changed to cut the calorie count a little more. Healthy meals don't have to taste like cardboard! And so, here we are. I was so worked up that I started a blog. From now on I am going to share every low (or lowER) cal recipe that actually tastes like real food. Brides, grooms, singles, we all need somewhere we can go where there is harmony between health and flavor. No longer will we stand for inflated claims of bad food!
Stay tuned for the next recipe! Obviously tonight's dinner is not worth posting. :0)
