Tropical mango smoothie

I thought I didn't like mangos but they taste good in a smoothie. I find it odd that some of my favorite smoothies lately are with fruit that I thought I didn't like.  I found this on goodhousekeeping.com and I'm pleasantly surprised. My alterations are in green, and I added the yogurt for the protein.

1/2 cup(s) pineapple juice, chilled                 1/2 C pineapple juice - I had

                                                                        fresh pineapple in the fridge

1 cup(s) diced mango                                         1 C frozen mango

1  banana, sliced                                                 1 banana

2 teaspoon(s) fresh lime juice                           1 squirt of lime juice

1/2 teaspoon(s) grated, peeled fresh ginger       dash of dried ginger

3  ice cubes                                                       1 cup peach greek yogurt

Read more: Tropical Mango Smoothie - Good Housekeeping

Beef Stroganoff

This dish is one of our favorites by far! I'm sure I will be making this for a long time. I tried to lighten it up a bit and swap out some things for healthier ingredients. I'm still getting used to the whole wheat noodles so I decided to mix both together and it was definatly better than just all whole wheat. They do have lower sodium cream of mushroom soup but honestly it was just something I couldn't swap. It ruined it last time.


1 Tbs soy sauce
1 Tbs worcestershire sauce
1/2 C light sour cream
1/4 C skim milk
1 onion chopped
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1/2 C mushrooms chopped
16 oz whole wheat egg noodles
1 package (1.25 lbs) ground turkey

Looks gross but its SOOO good!

Boil egg noodles and start browning your meat. Season with pepper and add in the onions and mushrooms. Once the meat is cooked add in the cream of mushroom, sour cream, soy sauce, and worcestershire. Add milk to your desired thickness. I always add a little more soy or worcestershire to my liking. That's it! Super easy!  

 

BANANAS!!! B-A-N-A-N-A-S!

I thought my smoothie kick was wearing off until I discovered what was missing. I didnt have any bananas left and was making smoothies without them. The smoothies were fine, just not that yummy. Really the bananas were making that much of a difference so I bought one bunch of yellow and one of green banay-nays so I wouldnt run out again. My new favorite is blueberry banana. I dont even really like blueberries but Im really diggin the smoothie.

This time I measured it for you!

1/2 C plain yogurt

1/2 C skim milk

1 Banana

1 C blueberries

As you can see I gave the Magic Bullet another try (I was too lazy to wash the blender) and I found that it doesnt work as well with frozen fruit. Ive also noticed with the blender that the milk and the yogurt need to start on the bottom and then it can get mixing. As you can see with the Magic Bullet I put the frozen fruit on top and it did a much better job.

Stuffed Peppers

Well soccer practice got cancelled so I had plenty of time to make dinner tonight. Ive been waiting to use my Jennie O hot turkey sausage and decided I wanted to make something with the bell peppers I had in the fridge. I did my normal Allrecipes.com ingredient search and didn't really find anything so I went on JennieO.com and found a stuffed pepper recipe that I used as a guide. I was really excited because I have never made them before.

Ingredients
• Four Six bell peppers, any color or a combination
• 2 teaspoons garlic-infused or extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 package JENNIE-O TURKEY STORE® Sweet Lean Italian Turkey Sausage
• JENNIE O HOT Lean Italian Turkey Sausage
• 1 (15-ounce) can Italian-style or regular tomato sauce
• Tomato paste and can of crushed tomatoes
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil or 2 teaspoons dried basil leaves 
• Frozen basil
• 1 (16-ounce) can great northern beans, drained and rinsed
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan or Asiago cheese
• 1/2 cup cooked brown rice
• http://jennieo.com/recipes/recipe_detail.aspx?Id=1174

Cut peppers lengthwise through stems keeping stem halves intact to hold stuffing. Discard seeds and veins. Cook in boiling salted water 5 to 6 minutes or until crisp-tender. Set aside.

 Remove the sausage from the casings and crumble in a skillet for about 5 minutes.  Add tomatoes, basil, and cooked brown rice and simmer.  Rinse and add beans and simmer for an additional 5 minutes.  I added tomato paste to thicken the mixture. I was quite proud of myself because I came up with the tomato paste idea all on my own.

 Before and after adding the tomato paste

Scoop the mixture into the peppers and sprinkle with parmesan cheese. Bake in the oven at 375 for about 20 minutes.

Chores!

I can remember doing dishes when I was younger, we would have a scrubber and a loader. I always wanted to be the loader so I didn't have to dive into the sink of eight family members after dinner. I look back and I'm actually glad that we had to do chores all the time. I like that it taught me how to do a TON of things to take care of where I live. Some of my "favorites" (or shall I say the ones that I thought were easiest) were always washing the windows, cleaning the bathroom (I know but it was one of the quickest choices), dusting, and unloading the dishwasher. I'm sure my Mom would find this amusing but I'm glad that we were taught how to do a lot of things. Even though we had 3 girls and 3 boys Dad tried to get us outside as much as he could. The girls inside boys outside trick didn't work all the time. We dreaded going outside, ugh those Saturday mornings. I will say though that I now know how to plant flowers, weed, cut the grass, clean the pool, weed whip, use the edger...snow blower... leaf blower... the list goes on in that giant back yard! I chuckle as I write this because we hated doing all of this stuff.

It took Lee and I awhile to figure out housework routines and what not but now its not too bad. I think living in an apartment helps. Ive realized that not everything has to be done the way I was taught, like if the cups face up or down in the cupboard. Everyone has their own way. Lee always found it annoying that I would scrub the dishes clean and then put them in the dishwasher and I always hated unloading unclean dishes. Well I found another one of my favorite things, Cascade Complete! I barely have to scrub anymore, I guess the commercial was right when it said powers away 24 hour stuck on food. Its the little things in life! Ha!