Yummy and Healthy Taco Salad Dip

In 2009, K's and my world was turned upside down.  K was diagnosed with genetic congestive heart failure/dilated cardiomyopathy.  While the beginning was rough and the unknown was gut wrenching, things have gotten better and everything is being controlled very well by medication.

With any heart condition you have to watch your sodium.  We started to watch labels a lot more and research low sodium recipes.  One thing that we liked was tacos and taco salad dip, but they were extremely high in sodium when using the taco mix packets from the store.  So I found a recipe for taco seasoning (sorry it was long ago I don't remember where it came from).

Taco Salad Dip

Ingredients

• 2 packages low fat cream cheese
• 3 Tbsp sour cream
• 1 Tbsp chili powder
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• 1 Tbsp paprika
• 2 cups baby spinach (or lettuce)
• 1 small tomato
• 1/2 cup onion
• 1 cup sharp cheddar cheese
• Black olives (optional)
• tortilla chips 

Directions

1. Allow cream cheese to come to room temperature to soften up.
2. Cream together cream cheese, sour cream and seasonings.  (If you need a little salt flavor add up to a 1/2 tsp of salt.)
3. Spread evenly over a 9x13 pan.
4. Chop lettuce, tomatoes and onion.  Layer veggies over cream cheese mixture.
5. Sprinkle shredded cheese over the top.  Refrigerate and serve with tortilla chips.

Serves 18

Nutrition Facts

Calories: 80 | Fat (g): 6 | {Saturated (g): 4 | Polyunsaturated (g): 0 | Monounsaturated (g): 2} |
Cholesterol (mg): 21 | Sodium (mg): 116 | Potassium (mg): 90 |
Total Carbs (g): 3 | {Dietary Fiber (g): 0 | Sugars (g): 1} | Protein (g): 3

I have had so many compliments on this dip, I know you will love it.  Also you can take the 4 seasonings and use it with one pound of ground beef/turkey to make taco meat.

Enjoy and God bless,

-L

Update: Cleaning the Clutter

It has almost been a week since I had to get the house cleaned up.  So far so good.  Every night I have, at a minimum, been picking up any dirty dishes and loading the dishwasher.  Tonight I need to empty it, this is normally where the problems start to happen.  Normally I just leave the clean dishes in there and then pull out what we need when we need it.  The problem here is that then the dirty dishes sit in the sink and on the counter.  THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN THIS TIME!  I am loving having a clear counter and space to work (our kitchen is cramped enough as it is).  When I cleaned last time, I found a way to put more things in the cabinets, which gives me even more room to work.

Since my kitchen won't need the extra TLC this weekend, I am trying to figure out what room to hit next.  We have lots of stuff to clear out.  Maybe I will start on one of the bedrooms.  We have 3, K & my room, M's room, and a spare room for when the parents visit.  Each room poses its own set of problems.    But I am starting to digress, as this was just going to be a short update.

Thanks for letting me put my words out there.

God Bless,
-L

Cleaning the Clutter

I find that anytime I am trying to improve myself, if I go full force into a challenge, I fail.  Examples would be dieting, if I restrict myself too much, I get fed up and just stop.  Or cleaning, if I try to get everything done all at once, I get burnt out and get overwhelmed.

This leads me into my next step to bettering myself.  It all started when my mom called to say that her and my dad are coming into town for a day this weekend (they live 2.5 hours away). As a result of that phone call, this week has been a mad rush to clean the house.  Our house has always been cluttered (complete opposite of my parents), we have a small house, minimal closets and too many things.  I always try to do an extra good job cleaning it up when I know they are going to be in town.  Most people would say that guests don't care, but my parents do.  I definitely hear about it if it is not up to their standards.

Now, yes, this sucks that they have high standards for my house, but it is also a good thing, because K and I take care of the things that we have been putting off.  Like the wrapping paper and bows on the spare bed.  M's extra toys closed off in the spare room (taking up what feels like the entire floor).  The kitchen table that is full of mail and M's daycare crafts.

One goal for myself is to get better at keeping down the clutter.  I want to try and straighten up a little bit each day.  This may be that I take 5 minutes or 30 minutes, but I want to try and do something everyday.  I find so many times that I say, "Oh, it can wait until tomorrow", or "I'm too tired", or "It isn't that bad".  Well it might not be that bad right now, but it is going to get that way if I keep letting it happen.  As much as I would love to have a house keeper to take care of cleaning and straightening up for me, it is not in the cards right now.

I must learn how to incorporate this into my life.  Once I made a calendar with all the household cleaning chores on it.  That worked for a while, but it was kind of a pain to setup each month.  Unfortunately we do not a have a typical life schedule like M-F work & weekends off, so I have to plan around when we are home.  If anyone out there has any tips, that would be great.

I hope you have a safe and happy 4th of July.

God Bless,
-L

Protein Brownies - Healthier and So Good

Last week I needed to submit a healthy recipe for my Employee Wellness program. I thought about salads, healthy pastas, and then I started thinking about deserts. So many people think that if you are trying to be healthy you can't have desserts or that you have to use fruit for your desserts. I am not knocking fruit by any means, I love fruit, sometimes too much. Sometimes though, you just need more than fruit.

Sometimes you need CHOCOLATE! So I decided to make healthy brownies. Now I was not going to submit a recipe that I had not tried, so I made K, M and my co-workers be my guinea pigs. Needless to say there was no arguing when you put a pan of brownies in front of someone. Now when you tell them that the brownies are healthy, you get some weird looks, but no one said they were bad and a few went back for seconds (they must be good).

Healthier Protein Brownies 

Based on It Works The Ultimate Brownie

 Ingredients 

• 16 oz Creamy Roasted Almond Butter 
• 2 Eggs 
• 1 1/4 cups Agave Nectar 
• 1 tbsp Vanilla Extract 
• 1/2 tsp Salt 
• 1 tsp Baking Soda 
• 1/2 cup Mini Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips 
• 4 scoops Rich Chocolate Ultimate ProFIT 

Directions 

1. Preheat oven to 325* 
2. In a large bowl, blend almond butter until smooth 
3. Blend in eggs (one at a time) 
4. Blend in agave and vanilla extract 
5. Blend in Ultimate ProFIT, salt and baking soda 
6. Fold in chocolate chips 
7. Grease a 9x13 pan and pour batter into pan 
8. Bake at 324* for 35-40 minutes 

 Yields 24 brownies

Nutrition Facts

Calories: 199 | Fat (g): 11 | {Saturated (g): 2 | Polyunsaturated (g): 2 | Monounsaturated (g): 6} |
Cholesterol (mg): 18 | Sodium (mg): 191 | Potassium (mg): 131 |
Total Carbs (g): 20 | {Dietary Fiber (g): 2 | Sugars (g): 18} | Protein (g): 6

Enjoy and God Bless,
-L