Thanksgiving 2012: Recipes, Part 1

Gobble, gobble! (That's the sound flamingos make too, right? Haha.)

I hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving (if you celebrate it of course)! We had a really nice day; a couple of mishaps in the kitchen, but the only thing that ended up burnt were the crescent rolls, and they were not even missed. (But next year, I am just buying finished rolls instead of baking them. I think I burnt them last year too!)

This year's feast was carefully photographed and documented, all for my readers at Low Fat Dressing. :) But there are a LOT of dishes, so I will probably break this out into a couple of posts.

We started the morning off with some fruit salad. It came in handy in trying to keep the calorie count down!



First up was an appetizer, goat-cheese-stuffed dates wrapped in bacon.



I had a package of unpitted dates from Whole Foods and there was already bacon for The Sandwich, plus I was inspired by the last few weeks of dinners with Shopping Friend. I had to do it!

It could not have been easier. I sliced through the date and removed the pit, then used a teaspoon to stuff the cavity with some goat cheese. I cut the bacon slices in half and wrapped them around the dates. Baked it in my toaster-oven at 375 for 20 minutes, and voila!



Next time I might make a maple-balsamic glaze to coat them in as well, but they were amazing even without it. They do well with a quick microwave reheat too! Shopping Friend, you can make them too, with smaller dates and no goat cheese. :)

One of the other things I did this holiday was track my food on the LoseIt! app on my iPhone; turns out adding in recipes is almost easier than using the Bar Scan option to log your food. For recipes, you simply enter the amount of each ingredient you are using (or scan them) and how many servings it will make, then each time you eat it you can select from your recipe list.

According to LoseIt!, each stuffed date was 64 calories. I had 3. :)



We had the dates with a delicious cranberry-pomegranate cocktail. No pictures, but you all know what red liquid in a wine glass looks like. :)



I probably should have measured the liquids better but I would rather overestimate calories than underestimate them.

The second appetizer item I made was a vegetable soup. I didn't make it with the intention to serve it with dinner; instead it has been a filling, tasty addition to my leftover sandwiches every night.

The recipe originally came from Multiply Delicious; I changed the seasonings so much I decided to re-write it here (also because my FB friends have been asking for it.)



Butternut Squash-Carrot-Sweet Potato Soup

Ingredients
1 medium onion, diced
1-2 cups butternut squash cooked (I had a container of frozen, but 1/2 baked squash would work too)
3-4 large carrots, peeled and cut into 1" cubes
1 large sweet potato, peeled and cut into 1" cubes
minced garlic
cinnamon
nutmeg
salt and pepper
chicken broth




Instructions

Cut butternut squash, carrots, and sweet potato into 1-inch even sized cubes.
Heat a large pot or dutch oven over medium heat.  When hot add olive oil and once oil is hot add onions and garlic, and saute until tender.
Add in squash, carrots, sweet potatoes, garlic, salt and pepper, and chicken stock and bring to a simmer, cooking until squash is tender (about 20-30 minutes).
Carefully add mixture to a blender or food processor and puree, or use immersion blender.
Add content back to pot and stir in cinnamon, nutmeg, and more salt and pepper as needed.

When reheating, add in more chicken stock to thin the soup again.





I have eaten it 3 times already and the rest just got bagged and frozen for coming weeks. 91 calories a cup!

I'm going to skip ahead to dessert; we had a small pumpkin cheesecake from Whole Foods which was amazing...



...but I also made pumpkin-oatmeal cookies, from a recipe from my friend Amanda.



Pumpkin-Oatmeal Cookies

Wet ingredients:

1 stick of butter, softened
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup pumpkin puree (approx.)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Dry ingredients:

1 1/2 cups old fashioned rolled oats
1 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
heaping 1/2 tsp Chinese 5 spice powder (optional; I did an extra heaping teaspoon of fresh cinnamon instead)
1/4-1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Optional:
dried cranberries
chopped candied ginger



Instructions:

Preheat oven to 375.
Mix butter and sugars together, then add in the rest of the wet ingredients. Then add the dry ingredients until well mixed.

Bake 12-14 minutes, until they feel mostly firm in the center, with just a little give.
Makes approximately 30 cookies, 105 calories each according to LoseIt!




The nice thing about the soup and the cookies is that you can make them now if you have leftover pumpkin or any potatoes or veggies. Just because Thanksgiving is over doesn't mean these recipes have to be put away until next year!

Next post: potatoes, stuffing, veggies and turkey!!