4 QUICK & HEALTHY Recipes Your Family Will ACTUALLY EAT! Delicious Easy Healthy Meals In Minutes

4 QUICK & HEALTHY Recipes Your Family Will ACTUALLY EAT! Delicious Easy Healthy Meals In Minutes

Hey friends, I love this time of year where it’s a little more laid back and we’re spending more time outside in nature. Whether we’re planting tomatoes, on vacation, or watching t ball games, something about it always kinda triggers me to stop and think about what I’m eating and how I’m treating this old body. And it’s not a shocking revelation that I could do alot better. And I’ve been slowly incorporating some small changes in my daily life in a way that they’ll become natural choices for me, better choices for me. So today I’m sharing some easy, healthy, and flavorful recipes. They’re fairly low carb and low calorie, full of veggies, healthy fats, high in fiber and protein to keep you full! Best of all they’re inexpensive, quick and easy to make and your family will actually eat these! And I’m sharing some of our trip to the National Cornbread Festival and why I will never buy anything but @lodgecastiron Blacklock collection pieces from here on out!
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Tonight’s Recipes:
Printable versions (or Pinterest links, if you prefer)
Chicken Club Lettuce Wraps: https://inthekitchenwithmommamel.com/recipes/chicken-club-lettuce-wraps/
Frittata Florentine: https://inthekitchenwithmommamel.com/recipes/frittata-florentine/
Balsamic Chicken Tortellini Salad: https://inthekitchenwithmommamel.com/recipes/balsamic-chicken-tortellini-salad/
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hey friends I love this laid-back and relaxing time of year where we’re all getting to spend a little bit more time outside enjoying nature it always stir a little something up in me that makes me think about what I’m putting into and how I’m treating this old body of mine and it’s no shocking Revelation that I could do a whole lot better for me so recently I’ve been incorporating some small changes into my daily lifestyle that will hopefully become natural choices better choices for for me so today I’m sharing some healthy easy and flavorful recipes they’re fairly low carb and low calorie they’re packed full of veggies and healthy fats and they’ve got lots of high fiber and protein to keep you full and best of all they’re quick and easy inexpensive to make and your family will actually eat these look at those beautiful ingredients today we’re going to make a really light lunch or dinner these are chicken club lettuce wraps the first thing I’m going to do is get all of my veggies washed up before I cut them and I’m going to wash my little lettuce boats the way I’m going to do my lettuce is just to cut the very end of a head of Roma off then I’m going to find me some really sturdy pieces from end to end and I’m going to rinse them out and dry them very carefully hoping not to break them now we’re going to mix up our little dressing or sauce I’m going to use about a four of a cup of Dijon mustard and a four of a cup of sour cream and I’m going to crack in a little bit of black pepper and give this all just a little stir this pre-pulled rotisserie chicken has become one of my favorite Splurge items at the grocery store I find it at Aldi it’s also available at Walmart back at their Deli counter and I’m just going to pull out some of the bigger pieces here and I’m probably just going to use maybe right at a cup of that chicken it might be a little bit less I’m just going to rough chop it up into a little bit smaller pieces but I did want it to stay kind of chunky you can use shredded chicken if you like bake it up cook it in the crock pot your instant pot however you like to do your chicken this is just something that I’ve really enjoyed having on hand I do lots of things with this throughout the week chicken salad I just put it on top of salads for lunch in case it is I’m just using it for all kinds of stuff I’m going to take my clean cherry tomatoes and I’m just going to dice them up into smaller bite-sized pieces since I’m just making about three of these here that is probably going to be enough let’s do one more I’ll fill it full I’ve got an avocado that is very very right may be a little too ripe to dice up but we’ll see and of course if you don’t like avocado you don’t have to have this in yours these little things are totally customizable to whatever you like that’s the thing with avocados they’re usually too rip or not rip enough it’s hard to get them right at the point that you want to eat them now I’m just going to build my little lettuce wraps here going to start with my rotisserie chicken and I chose the biggest leaves that I could because y’all know I like to cramp stuff full and it looks like I did good with my chicken I’ve got just the right amount for three of these now I’m going to put a little avocado on each one of them and these are so good for you and if you’re trying to not eat meat you don’t have to put chicken in here you could fill this full of any kind of veggies that you wanted there I say even tofu my son-in-law he tried to trick me with some macaroni cheese bites that were actually tofu he didn’t fool me let’s put these pretty little Tomatoes right on the top I’m going to sprinkle in just a little bit of these real bacon pieces you could definitely fry you up some bacon but we didn’t have bacon this morning and I wasn’t going to make some just for this recipe today’s actually mine and Patrick’s anniversary 31 years together that’s over half my life friends and he wanted sausage so he got sausage this morning he got some anniversary sausage my little dressing here is still pretty thick which is good I like that because these are probably going to be pretty messy to eat so it’s probably a good thing this dressing is a little bit thicker how pretty is that okay let’s see how I can eat this what sort of like a little taco let’s give her a try this is so yummy all the good stuff that you love and that little dressing that’s delicious it’s got a real little zip to it it just kind of wakes everything up these would be so cute for like a little brunch or something to like an appetizer but this makes me a really good dinner right here guys they’re crunchy and light and so fun to eat low carb low in calories and I didn’t do any cooking and you could use any kind of toppings that you want Maddie would love it if I changed it up and made some little chicken caesar wraps for her definitely give this one a try I’m really excited today I’m making something that I love but I’ve never made one I’m going to make us a little frittata today I’m going to start by mixing up my egg mixture this recipe said to use six egg white whites and then three whole eggs yolk and everything or if you wanted to use all egg whites you would use the whites of 12 eggs so since I bought this a liquid egg white let’s just give it a try I’m going to use what would be the equivalent of 12 egg whites in this this is my first time ever using these and it gives you the measurements on the side and the whites of 12 eggs equals out to two two and 1/4 cups of these liquid egg whites we’re going to season these egg whites up with half a teaspoon of Italian seasoning about 1/4 of a teaspoon of garlic powder give it about 1/4 teaspoon of salt and 1/4 teaspoon of black pepper going to get all of this Twisted together and then we’re just going to set it aside so we’ll have it ready to go when we need to pour it in our Skillet going to go ahead and get just maybe a tablespoon of oil heated up on top of the stove you you want to make sure that you’re using an oven safe Skillet because we are going to put this under the broiler and I can’t wait to tell you about this new Skillet here in a minute while I’m waiting for that to come up to heat I’m going to half these little grape tomatoes just going to put this on part of it Patrick’s not a fan of those but I’d really like some you need about a/4 of a cup of diced bell pepper Red Pepper would be beautiful in here but I’ve eaten all of my red bell pepper I just had these few little pieces of this uh orange bell pepper that I haven’t snacked on this week so that’s what we’re using and I have a small Vidalia onion and I’m just dicing it up into really small pieces I’ve got about three pieces of bacon that I’ve already chopped up and I’m using regular bacon this recipe called for turkey bacon but I’m just not into that yet if I don’t have to cook turkey bacon I can eat it but I just can’t see it and cook it and then eat it it tastes great but it just don’t look like real bacon to me I’ve got this on about medium heat and I’m just going to let my bacon get all cooked through and while this is cooking up let me tell you about the skillet I got this at the lodge factory store down in South Pittsburgh Tennessee me and Patrick went down there for the cornbread Festival I’ll throw in a little footage of that for you here at the end of this video if you want to stay to um to the end and watch it but I got this in what they call their seconds area it looks perfectly fine to me they’re very particular at lodge about their cast iron they have really high standards that all their products have to meet so they sell their seconds in their little Factory Store there what immediately drew me to this Skillet was this handle I thought it was pretty it’s kind of you know like curved and it’s got some cutouts in it but then it’s going to be hot here in a minute then I went to pick it up and I was like wow that seems light well they’re so helpful down there at the lodge store the fell heard me tell Patrick you know how much lighter this cast iron skillet was and this is a 10 and 1/4 in Skillet and just for this recipe may be a little bit large you probably just need about an 8 in Skillet but I couldn’t wait to use this one anyhow back to the story he heard me tell him Patrick about how much lighter this was and he said yes this is our black lock collection and if you look at the sides here this Edge right here it’s thinner than most of their other cast iron and this black lock selection is about 25% lighter it’s not as thick on the edges but so it’s like 25% lighter than the regular cast iron but it’s triple seasoned all of Lodge products are already pre-seasoned for you you still need to keep up with seasoning them you know like after you use them and stuff like you do any cast iron but this one is triple seasoned so this is my first time using it I thought it was beautiful and for everyday use I’m not out on a campfire a thinner not so heavy Skillet is perfect for me and it’s doing a fine job on this bacon so now that it’s on its way let’s go ahead and put in our onions and our bell pepper we’re just going to get all this sauteed down here till our peppers and our onions are soft and our bacon is nice and done all the way through and crispy and the recipe that I’m using is for servings and if you use turkey bacon and lowfat mozzarella cheese it should be about 177 calories per serving I know mine’s going to be a little bit more because I’m using the you know the real bacon not the turkey bacon of course you could use ham or sausage or anything in here if you ain’t worried about how many calories or anything that’s in here just uh do whatever you’d like to there now that I’ve insured that my bacon is all done all the way through I’m just going to take about a cup of spinach and I’m just going to press this right in to my bacon and let it start welting at this point I did cut my heat down from like medium to like a medium low and now we’re going to pour our eggs right over the top of this this is my first time ever doing this so I’m going exactly like the instruction said it says to move the cooked eggs as they start cooking up to move them towards the center so that the uncooked eggs can kind of like run up underneath of that and you just want to cook this until everything’s kind of thick oh mine looks like it’s getting done I’m going cut it down a little bit more you just want it to be you know like kind of thickened not necessarily cooked all the way through I think that I’m about there I’m going to make sure all my spinach is distributed back through here evenly my bacon and everything okay I’m just kind of going to smooth this little thing out looks pretty thick to me so I’m going to pull that off of the heat I’m going to pop my little Tomatoes all down one side of this then I’m going to put that about half a cup of mozzarella cheese All Over the Top If you had some fresh herbs like some basil or something like that it’d be really good to put in here now we’re going to put this under the broiler for Just 2 to 3 minutes until you know the cheese looks nice and melted and brown then we’re going to pull it out let it stand for 5 minutes before we cut into it friends you can teach an old dog new tricks a brand new recipe brand new ingredients those liquid egg whites I had never used that before cooking in a brand new Skillet and of course I wanted to tell you all about it I loved the egg whites I loved the SK Skillet I love this recipe I’ll definitely be making this again for breakfast lunch or dinner I think you’ll like it too came out really nice it came out of my Skillet really nicely looks really pretty it is pretty isn’t it get me a bite here without dropping it full of bell peppers onions I didn’t put any garlic I used garlic powder M that’s really really good really really good I think the egg whites are the way to go that was so easy so yummy this is a really big serving too there’s some bacon this is great I’m really proud of myself for trying this wasn’t that hard I always get these when I’m out somewhere cuz I thought it was really hard to make but it’s not it’s just a fancy name we’re going to make something brand new that I’ve never made before this is a Balsamic tortillini chicken salad going to start out by cooking my tortillini up and I’m just using a cheese tortillini just boiling it for about 8 minutes then I’m just going to drain it off off and put it in a big bowl and set it aside now we’re going to mix up our dressing I’m going to start with an eighth of a cup of a really good Italian salad dressing an e of a cup of balsamic vinegar about 2 tpoon of honey and just a tiniest little bit of crushed red pepper going to get all this mixed up and set it aside and these sound like odd measurements but I’m actually halfing this recipe I’ll leave you a link to the full recipe below the full recipe would feed six people and each serving is under 500 calories I’ve got one chicken breast and I’m just going to very thinly slice it before I cook it that way it will all cook up a little bit quicker like I said I’m half in this recipe so I’m just using one boneless skinless chicken breast I’m going to go back through the middle of this chicken breast where it was really wide and go ahead and cut that into about half size pieces got a little bit of oil in my Skillet here and I’m just going to put that chicken breast right down in here and I haven’t seasoned it yet so I’m going to give it a pretty generous liberal little seasoning with some anti no no this seasoning has salt pepper I believe pepper onion powder garlic powder it’s just a really good allpurpose seasoning I use it a lot and I’m just about out and we’re just going to cook this chicken about 2 or 3 minutes here on each side till we get it pretty well done the recipe called for shredded carrots but I’ve just got some little baby carrots and I’m just going to cut them in half and then I’m just going to cut them in little bitty thin pieces to the best of my aties I’ve also got just a little handful of graped tomatoes and I’m just going to slice them right down the center in halves I don’t think I’m going to cook these down with the other vegetables I’m just going to leave leave my tomatoes fresh like they are and put them in on the top of the salad when I get it all combined the recipe also called for fresh asparagus but the asparagus at my store didn’t look so good so I’m going to use some frozen asparagus and I am going to steam it in this bag in the microwave for just about 2 minutes to get it unfrozen get my steamed broccoli out here and this broccoli does look a whole lot better than what I saw at the store 100% And I’m just going to run my knife through this and chop it into thirds it’s been brought to my attention that I called that asparagus broccoli I do know the difference it’s asparagus now that our chicken is got a little bit of color on it it’s cooked through I’m going to take about an e/ of a cup of that little marinade and I’m going to pour it right in here and we want to get this chicken good and coated in it m that smells good just about a minute just to get it nice and coated then we’re going to take that chicken and toss it right in this bow with our talining back over here at the frying pan I’m just going to drizzle in a very little smidgen of oil add in this asparagus and I did try to Pat the water out of it just a little bit where it was steamed just going to let this cook up just a couple minutes it’s not really going to take much it’s already cooked it’s been stained this is another one of those recipes where you still want your veggies to have a little bit of crispiness to them going to go ahead and put my carrots in here and let them start sautéing up as well now we’re going to take our veggies and put them right here with our chicken and our tortillini now we’re going to take our remaining sauce and we’re just going to thicken it up just a minute but we want to make sure that it’s going to get just a little bit sticky enough to stick to everything like the tortillini and stuff now we’re just going to take that and put it right in here with everything in our Bowl give it a really nice gentle tossing and if this is half of that recipe this is three servings these are really generous servings I took the liberty of sprinkling in some shredded parmesan cheese and kind of mixed it into this this was so delicious warm and the leftovers were great cold too so definitely think about meal prepping this and put this in containers and just grab and go with this for lunch all week long and don’t feel like you have to stick exactly to the recipe put in any veggies that you like I was thinking about maybe some artichoke carts down in here would be really good or maybe even Wilt a little cabbage down in here this one’s great friends it’s my favorite night of the week which is that night of the week where we just grab all the little bits and Bobs of stuff that’s left over in the fridge and freezer we’re going to make dinner out of it I have some oil heating in the skillet right over here but I’m going to start here with some reff fried beans I plan on putting these inside of some wraps but people can also just eat them as a side dish as they want if they want to too I think that refried beans are great just like they are but I do like to doctor them up a little bit I’m just putting in some sour cream also like to throw in just a little handful of cheese I’m just using some cheddar a lot of times I’ll just use some taco sauce like you would put on a Taco but tonight I don’t have any open so just going to use a little bit of ground cumin and just a little bit of chili powder just give them an extra little something something we will get all this stirred in together and just let this come up to you know a little warmth here and get everything all Incorporated over here I heated up just a little bit of olive oil I’m putting in some frozen chopped green peppers and I’m also going to put in some frozen diced onions these are handy little help ERS that I just love to have on hand both of them in my freezer for nights like tonight and we’re just kind of eating off leftovers and eating off what we have we’ve always got plenty I mean the way that I keep my pantry and my freezer we’ve always got something that we can pull out and do something with we’re just going to let this just kind of soften up here and while that’s going on I’m going to take this 90c microwave Rice this is my microwavable brown rice I actually bought this a while back to go with a chicken dish for Patrick and I didn’t end up making it so I’m going to put it in these tonight for him now that we got these pretty softened I’m going to put in a little probably a tablespoon full of minced garlic just let it sauté about a minute or so I’m going to put just a little bit more olive oil in there and then I have this rotisserie pulled chicken this is probably about half a pound half of this package left and I’m just going to dump it in there if we got any big pieces I’m going to break them up a little bit it smells delicious going to take the same things I did to our refried beans which is some ground cumin I’m not measuring tonight we’re just sprinkling a little bit of chili powder these are the kind of meals that I love to make just get in here and you you know see what you can come up with you can use any kind of seasonings that you want you can use any veggies you want any chicken pork beef just no ve no meat use whatever you want I’m also going to put some smoked paprika in here seasonings go a long way with leftovers or when you’re just kind of cooking out of what you have they make a big difference got another small Skillet here got some oil heating up in it cuz I like to fry these you could put them all on a baking sheet and bake them but I like to fry them got some flour tortillas here these are the soft taco size just knocked the chill off of them in the microwave going to start right here with just a a little bit of refried beans down you guys know I’m not going to touch this rice but I’m going to put a heap in handful on here for Patrick he loves these little ricey what are they called Patrick those things you get at Taco Bell chicken rice and bean Taco Burrito burrito I don’t know what it’s called and I’m going to put him a little bit of the chicken mixture whoops I dropped it off to the side that’s all right put it right back up here on top I have a feeling I’m getting too much going to put a little cheddar cheese dad you want a little pepper jack in yours now I’m just going to try my very best to fold this up I am the worst the worst first at this just stuff them way too full see what I can get going here it’s going to be coming out the sides now I’m going to take it and put it right in this hot hot oil going to let it get nice and brown on one side then we’ll flip it over and do the other side this is a weird shot but I got to show you this thing right here to open jars but you just slide it right back in here and then it catches the lid and you turn it to the right that is opposite I always want to go left but it pops the lids right off let me show you up underneath here this is what it looks like it has little saw teeth over here that are super sharp you can fit a large jar way down to a little jar you just slide it in and it’ll grab it I bought all the ladies in my life one of these at Christmas and I didn’t get myself one so here recently I got myself one and I’m loving it these might not look that impressive they might be down right scary looking to you but they were absolutely delicious they were flavorful full of all of the TexMex flavors which I love just a little bit of spicy not a whole lot but a lot of just warm deep flavors I loved this just the way it was I would have liked some black beans in here maybe but the refried beans were absolutely delicious in it as well I made a little taco salad on the side of mine I just took some tortilla chips put some lettuce up there reff fried beans salsa a little sour cream and cheese and this meal just couldn’t be beat I swear taking little bits of nothing and making something is my favorite thing in the world to do these are the best meals of the week in my opinion here is the entrance to the National cornbread Festival it’s held every spring in little downtown historic South Pittsburgh Tennessee it’s also the home of the Lodge cast iron Factory and store which we did get to tour the factory they shut it down it was clean as a whistle it was so interesting to see the process and how all of our favorite cast iron is made all the employees there were on hand for the festival answering any kind of questions ran in to my favorite YouTuber miss Karen Jones from Karen Jones food and family if you’re not following her you are missing out on a lot of good eating friends check her Channel out cornbread alley is where nine different charities have created their own very unique cornbread recipes you pay one price and you get a whole plate full of really unique cornbread and then you vote for your favorite and I got all of the recipes so guys we’ve got some really unique corn peaceful little stay it was not crowded we just really enjoyed our time here the next day we went up to Lookout Mountain we had never ridden the incline railway we’ve been a bunch of times to Lookout Mountain and we’ve always done Rock City and Ruby Falls so this was a lot of fun here we are going up the side of the mountain in the incline railway car it’s about a mile trip and they have two different cars that run up and down here’s a beautiful view from the top of Lookout Mountain we walked a couple of blocks over to Point Park it’s a Memorial Park it overlooks the Lookout Mountain Battlefield in Chattanooga and the vistor center has a lot of exhibits telling about the Civil War battles around Chattanooga and the area once you’ve been up the side of the mountain you have to come back down the incline railway pulls these trains up this steep mountain with a cable that way the wheels don’t have to worry about keeping traction they just kind of guide the train along the track you see us here where the train tracks split into a passing Loop so the car can pass each other and the two train cars counterbalance each other and it kind of uses the weight of one to help pull the other one up no road trip is complete without some sweet treats before you hit the road to come home we had a great time it was just peaceful and relaxing and it was nice just for the two of us to get away together if you’re interested in some recipes and tips on using your air fryer you need to check out this video right here or if you’re looking for an easy classic weekly meal plan I got you covered right here thanks so much for watching and until next time I send you love from my kitchen