Cream of Crab Soup

I found this recipe on the New York Times website and made a few changes to perfect it to my liking.  I added more Old Bay, substituted light cream for the originally called for half and half, and sprinkled in some parsley flakes. Hope you find it to your liking.

Ingredients:

1 medium onion, minced (I used a red one)
3 Tbsps butter
3 Tbsps flour
1 pint clam juice
1 to 1.5 tsp Old Bay Seasoning
Ground pepper & salt (I didn't use salt--it didn't need it)
1/2 cup dry white wine
1 pint light cream
1 pound crab meat
Parsley flakes--as much as you want

Method:

1. Saute onion in butter until soft.
2. Stir in flour and gradually whisk in clam juice.
3. Add Old Bay, S&P, wine, and light cream.
4. Simmer about 15 mins until soup gets thick.
5. Add crab meat and heat through--don't boil.
6. Serve with bread smeared with Kerrygold butter.

Fish Tacos

Ingredients :

-Tilapia Fillets
-Spanish Rice (I use Goya)
-15oz. Can Diced Tomatoes (I use the seasoned can)
-Hard/Soft shells
-2 limes
-Avocado
-Cilantro
-Onion
-Cheese
-Sour Cream
-Salt
-Pepper


Prep :

-Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

-Season Tilapia on both sides in a glass baking dish with salt, pepper and fresh lime to your liking.

-Begin prepping/cooking rice and add can of tomatoes.

-Place Tilapia in oven for 15 min. or until fish flakes with a fork.

-Prep the sides you may want, for instance avocado, cilantro, onion, cheese, etc.

-Remove fish from oven when ready and flake fillets with a fork. Mix with rice or keep separate, you choose!

-Place fish in hard or soft shell alone, with sides, rice, however you like and squeeze lime on top.


Muy bueno! Very simple and refreshing! If you have both hard and soft shells, try spreading a little sour cream on a soft shell and wrap it around the bottom of a hard shell (sour cream will hold them together). Fill with your Tilapia, rice and sides, enjoy!

Pan-Fried Chickpea Salad & Mustard Fish

Here's another protein packed recipe from the 101 cooks website...not only from those little flesh colored balls of protein wonders known as chickpeas and/or garbanzo beans, but also from the fish that you may choose to serve with them!

Tools from your Kit:

1 tbsp olive oil or butter (you choose!)
2 c cooked chickpeas, pat them completely dry once their out of the can
1 c chopped leeks
2 cloves garlic, chopped
zest of one lemon (we skipped this b/c we didn't have a zester. so sad.)
1/3 c plain yogurt (we used low-fat greek yogurt b/c that's what i eat)
1.5 tsp curry powder
dash of sea salt
1 or 2 tbsp warm water (you be the decider!)
1/2 c cilantro, chopped
1/4 c red onion, chopped (note: original recipe called for 1/2 c, but it was overkill. you may add at your own risk!)

Plan to follow:

Heat oil in large pan & then add the chickpeas. Saute over med-high heat, stirring occasionally, until they get a little golden brown. Add leeks and cook until chickpeas get a little browner and leeks get a little softer. Stir in garlic & lemon zest for the last minute of cooking.

Remove from heat and while this little mixture cools, make the dressing by combining yogurt, curry powder, and salt. If you want to thin it out (which we did), add 1 tbsp of warm water at a time (we added 2).

Toss the chickpeas w/ the 1/2 the dressing and most of the red onion and most of the cilantro. Taste then add as much of the rest of the dressing, onion, cilantro that you want!

Enjoy!

P.S. We served this as a side to "Mustard Roasted Fish" concocted by Barefoot Contessa and found on foodnetwork.com.

Fish: we used almost 1 lb of red snapper. It was a whole piece, but you could do 2 fillets instead.

Sauce:

4 oz creme fresh
1.5 tbsp dijon mustard
.5 tbsp whole grain mustard (we actually used dill flavored mustard instead...hey, it was from harry & david's!)
1 tbsp minced shallots
1 tsp drained capers

Method:

Preheat oven to 425. Use a ovenproof baking dish or line a tin pan with parchment paper.

Put fish skin down in the pan & sprinkle generously with pepper & sea salt.

For the sauce, combine all ingredients (as well as little salt & pepper) before spreading evenly over the fillet(s) of fish. Make sure fish is completely covered and bake for 10-15 mins (until fish easily flakes at its thickest part).

Voila: another protein packed food for your protein packed, muscle building diet!