Andie Mitchell's Blog, page 45

Linguine with Broccoli and Crispy Bread Crumbs

I might dream about dinner all day, but I’m not always great at planning for it. Most nights I arrive at 6:30 feeling pretty unprepared. It’s always then that I ask myself, On a scale of 1 to pathetic, how sad is the vegetable drawer right now?  Extra pathetic. So you can imagine why some of my...

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Weekly Coffee Date

photo by Jenn Elliott Blake What an incredible week. I swear, even though I’ve done it once before, it just never feels natural to publish a book, to pluck it off a shelf in a bookstore, or flip open a magazine and see that book there. If it ever does begin to feel natural, or ugh routine, I’ll know I’ve...

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Chocolate Souffle with White Chocolate Sauce

Before I start raving about this lovable chocolate soufflé recipe, I have to thank you for showing up, once again, as the best friends a girl could have. Thank you for supporting me and Eating in the Middle: A Mostly Wholesome Cookbook! I love you for it. Now! On to the chocolate soufflé recipe (the 253-calorie chocolate...

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Eating in the Middle is Published!

Today is cookbook day! Eating in the Middle: A Mostly Wholesome Cookbook — my first cookbook, and second book, is published!! Now you can walk into every bookstore, all the Barnes & Nobles, any room in my mother’s house…and rest assured you’ll find two very special photos of me on book covers: one in plaid, one in a bikini top. And...

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Panzanella Salad with Chickpeas and Feta

If one sign of getting older is constantly remarking at how quickly time passes these days, then I’m aging rapidly. I blink, and it’s Monday again. I look up, and the month’s over. I swear I go to sleep and–spring! I didn’t expect to be saying this, but I already miss the coziness of winter....

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Cashew and Basil Chicken Lettuce Wraps

photo by Aran Goyoaga

I’m back with another recipe from my cookbook that I can’t wait for you to try! 

One Saturday night about a year ago, I went out to eat at a local Chinese restaurant. Somehow, a week later, I found myself still thinking about—still craving—the incredible chicken lettuce wraps I had. It wouldn’t be quite so remarkable if it weren’t for the facts that a.) we’re talking lettuce, and b.) no part of lettuce is cake.

Naturally, I had to recreate them at home.

photo by Aran Goyoaga

These wraps manage to strike a delicate balance between sweet and salty (thanks to a hoisin-soy sauce), crunchy and tender, rich and refreshing. If you love cashews, love basil, and want to try the best chicken lettuce wraps around, they’re absolutely for you!

There are 79 more delicious recipes in my cookbook, Eating in the Middle: A Mostly Wholesome Cookbook, and I need you to see and taste all of them! Preorder now to get the book on the day it comes out: March 29th!

Order the book here:

Amazon | Barnes and Noble  |  Target  |  IndieBound

If you preorder, email me at andiemmitchell@gmail.com with either your confirmation number or a screenshot of your order, and you’ll be able to start cooking through my cookbook with me (and get immediate access to a bunch of cookbook recipes!). You’ll also be able to join me and Gina of Skinnytaste.com in our private Facebook group!

 

PrintCashew and Basil Chicken Lettuce Wraps

Makes: 4 Servings

Serving Size: 3 wraps

Calories per serving: 371

Fat per serving: 16g

Ingredients

½ cup unsalted cashews
¼ cup low sodium chicken broth
3 tablespoons hoisin sauce
2 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon cornstarch
2 teaspoons canola oil
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 pound lean ground chicken breast
2 scallions, white and light green parts, chopped
½ cup roughly chopped fresh basil leaves
1 head Boston, bibb, or iceberg lettuce

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350. Spread the cashews on a baking sheet and toast until golden and fragrant, about 10 minutes. Let cool slightly and then chop the cashews.
In a small bowl, whisk the chicken broth, hoisin, soy sauce, sugar, and cornstarch.
In a large nonstick skillet, heat the oil over medium-high heat. Add the garlic and cook, stirring constantly, until fragrant, 30 seconds to 1 minute. Add the chicken and cook, breaking up the meat with a spatula, until browned, 4 to 6 minutes. Add the scallions and the hoisin sauce mixture and cook, stirring frequently, until the sauce thickens slightly, about 2 minutes. Stir in the fresh basil and cashews.
To serve, divide the lettuce leaves among 4 plates and spoon the chicken mixture into each of the leaves.

Nutrition Information & Notes:

Nutrition Information for 1/4th of Entire Recipe: Calories 371, Protein 17g, Carb 40g, Fiber 6g, Sugar 6g, Total Fat 16g, Sat Fat 2g, Sodium 763mg

3.1

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Weekly Coffee Date

Life

 How comfortable would you be with planning my wedding? I ask because, with the cookbook coming out and a million everyday work and life things, I recently realized that all we’ve done towards wedding “planning” is talk to White’s Bakery about making a wedding cake–a vital security I just couldn’t continue living without. Daniel and I are hoping for next year in early June, in Massachusetts where both of our families are, and I’m dead serious when I say I want our rehearsal dinner to be at Shake Shack. I can’t tell if anyone will let me do that.

News

What’s wrong with the American diet?

(LA Times)

According to a study published Wednesday in the medical journal, BMJ Open, “ultra-processed” foods—frozen pizzas, breakfast cereals, soda, and more—made up 58% of all calories Americans consume in a typical day. They also delivered 90% of the added sugars that Americans ate and drank.

“John Goodman Likely Won’t Maintain His Weight Loss”

(Entertainment Weekly)

On Wednesday, John Goodman appeared on the Today Show to promote his new movie, 10 Cloverfield Lane, and when Savannah Guthrie praised his “fabulous” weight loss, he joked, “Just wait another six months and I’ll be back to normal. That’s the way it usually goes.”

But earlier that morning, Goodman was more open on Howard Stern. “I decided to stop stuffing food into my mouth every five minutes. Turns out I was just eating all the time…It’s been a year and half, I did it slowly,” he said. “I used to go on these diets, take three months and lose about 60-70 pounds, feel great, and reward myself with crap-ola…[But] I took it slow. I just wanted to change my lifestyle,” Goodman added. “You look in the mirror everyday and go, ‘I gotta deal with this the rest of the day, I gotta deal with this schmuck?'”

It’s so relatable to me, and if you’ve struggled with your weight for many years, to you, too. When we spend years succeeding and failing, we can’t help but arrive at new success with mixed feelings. It’s a bittersweet cocktail with one part exhilaration, one part exhaustion, and 2 parts worry that we’ll never make it last.

Women

All-around super woman and forever Sookie St. James in my heart, Melissa McCarthy recently said that when she hears young women say, “I am not a feminist,” she told Redbook, “I always think, ‘Oh, that sounds so dumb.’ And I don’t mean that in a hateful way. It just sounds so ill-informed. Do you think women should be paid less? You don’t believe in equality for women? I think people have worked hard to put a negative spin on the word.”

And when it comes to building positive body image, McCarthy says, “There’s an epidemic in our country of girls and women feeling bad about themselves based on what .5% of the human race looks like. It starts very young. My message is that as long as everybody’s healthy, enjoy and embrace whatever body type you have.” AMEN

Design

The Makerista

Lately, and don’t ask me how I turned down this avenue, but I’ve become obsessed with Pinterest-ing Ikea design hacks. It’s exactly as fun as it sounds (so, either not fun or very, depending on how old you are in your heart). My favorite ideas: using Ikea’s Billy Bookcases to create built-ins with a little elbow grease and some crown molding, nightstand upgrades with new hardware, floating cabinets using the Besta Cabinets (and topping them with a piece of marble or slate)…the list is endless.

Food

Rainbow Marshmallows | Bakers Royale

[Healthy] Minty Green Shamrock Shake | Love and Lemons

What’s New with You?

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Millet and Veggie Breakfast Tacos

When a book’s manifesto begins like this, you almost can’t help but love the author:

There is no ideal diet.

I believe you can benefit from a cleaner, greener diet. But that doesn’t mean you need to eat exactly what I eat. While there are some precepts for a clean, toxin-free eating…there are many ways to eat healthy.

I’m not into labels. This isn’t about being a vegan, vegetarian, or flexitarian. If you want to come up with a name for what this is, knock yourself out, but the most important thing is to eat foods that make your body feel good.

That is from my friend, Amie Valpone’s, new book, Eating Clean: The 21-Day Plan to Detox, Fight Inflammation, and Reset Your Body, and it perfectly expresses who Amie is: compassionate, gentle, and genuine. She wants the best for you and me. Eating Clean is both cookbook and eating clean guide. In the first half, Amie dives into clean living: what ingredients might be causing you unwanted symptoms, why gluten, caffeine, dairy, and soy are problematic for many people, which household and beauty products might be negatively impacting the way you feel, and more. She shows you, in as loving a way as anyone can, how to clean up your diet and lifestyle and rid both of toxins. Her focus is on how much your health can improve once you get your body working for you, not against you. The second half of the book is filled with over 200 delicious and detox-approved vegetarian and vegan recipes–free of gluten, dairy, soy, peanuts, eggs, corn, eggplant, white flour, refined sugar, and any ingredients that come from a can.

 

Amie believes in eating clean because she spent almost 10 years struggling with chronic illness. Her journey to just to feel well in the most basic sense has involved about a million tears, a near-death bed experience, dozens of specialists, false diagnoses, endless frustration, and years spent not knowing what exactly was wrong or how to treat any of her pain.

The only way she began to heal was when she focused on cleaning up her food and the environment around her–from her water to the cleaning products she used to her personal care and beauty products (and more). 

Reading Amie’s long journey to slowly heal herself inspires me and reminds me just how much the food I eat impacts the way I feel. There comes a point for all of us when we recognize that the old adage, “It’s what on the inside that counts” applies to our health, too. Food can heal us and it can harm us, and either way, we’re responsible for our choices.

These Millet and Veggie Breakfast Tacos are straight from Amie’s book! They’re from the breakfast chapter, but I’d eat them anytime. The ingredients are pure, simple, and just about perfect when all together–a reminder that eating clean doesn’t have to be boring. In fact, it’s so vibrant, so fresh, and when the ingredients aren’t overpowered by a million layers of other things (like cheese, which I’m totally guilty of smothering everything in)–you can really taste them, and that’s pretty lovely. The millet is hearty and kind of grounding if you know what I mean. It’s chewy, warm, and satisfying because it gets a little sticky, like rice. The bell pepper is always so nicely sweet, and especially perfect with meaty slices of portobello mushroom. A little bit of flavor with cumin, chili powder, and fresh cilantro, and that’s all you need!

Amie’s book is such a charmer, full of incredible insight, and just gorgeous to look at. Go pick it up in stores today or order online here:

Amazon  |  Barnes & Noble  |  IndieBound

PrintMillet and Veggie Breakfast Tacos

Makes: 4 Servings

Ingredients

1½ cups cooked millet
¼ cup finely chopped fresh cilantro
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lime juice
¼ teaspoon sea salt
8 gluten-free whole-grain tortillas (corn-free)
1 large ripe avocado, pitted, peeled, and thinly sliced
4 scallions, thinly sliced
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Portobello Mushroom and Red Bell Pepper Filling:
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 large portobello mushroom, cut into 8 slices
1 large red bell pepper, cut into long strips
¼ teaspoon ground cumin
¼ teaspoon sea salt
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Pinch chipotle powder
¼ cup thinly sliced radish, for garnish (optional)

Instructions

In a small bowl, combine the millet, cilantro, lime juice, and salt. Stir to combine and set aside.
In a medium skillet, heat the oil over medium heat. Add the mushrooms in a single layer. Cover and cook for 4 minutes, then flip and cook for 2 minutes more. Add the bell pepper, cumin, salt, black pepper, chipotle powder, and remaining oil, if needed. Cook for 5 minutes or until vegetables are cooked through, stirring often. Garnish with the radish. Keep warm.
To assemble, warm the tortillas on a baking sheet in a 350°F oven or in a dry skillet on the stovetop over medium heat. Place the warm tortillas on a platter or on individual plates. Divide the millet among the tortillas. Top each with the Portobello Mushroom and Red Pepper mixture. Top with the avo­cado slices, scallions, and salt and pepper to taste.

Nutrition Information & Notes:

Recipe from Eating Clean: The 21-Day Plan to Detox, Fight Inflammation, and Reset Your Body by Amie Valpone

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Cook through My Cookbook with Me!

I don’t know how this snuck up on us, but somehow Eating in the Middle is 4 weeks away from its release. Four weeeeks! On the one hand, I’m terrified and anxious and sweaty–similar to how I felt when It Was Me All Along came out last year, but on the other, I’m just so happy that it’ll finally be out in the world. Just knowing that in a month’s time, you will have it IN YOUR KITCHEN is so much better than every adjective I could think to put here: lovely, wonderful, great…It excites me enough to calm my nerves and at least enough to cool some of the sweat.

Because I want to celebrate every single week until the cookbook release date on March 29th, I’ve decided we should start cooking through it!

Join Me and Cook through my Cookbook!

Every weekend, starting this Saturday 3/4, I’m going to be sharing a new recipe from Eating in the Middle and a short cooking video! You can start cooking with me–using recipes before anyone else gets them–and be a part of the amazing Facebook group that I lead with my friend Gina Homolka of Skinnytaste.com! Since we started that group, I’m telling you, it has become one of my favorite things. Everyone in the group is working toward healthy living goals–some are weight loss, some are maintenance, some are simply focused on achieving balance–but no matter what, I’m constantly amazed at how honest, kind, supportive, and motivating each and every one of them has been–to me and each other.

Preorder + Email Me! You’re In!

If you want to cook along with the wholesome recipes in the cookbook leading up to the release date (!!): preorder the book (see the list of where you can preorder below) and send me a quick email at andiemmitchell@gmail.com (

Here’s where you can order the book:

Barnes & Noble

IndieBound

Amazon

Target

I would love to have you cook with me! PLUS I would love to have you join our Facebook group. Gina and I talk with the group every single day, multiple times, so if you’re interested in more frequent, more intimate, daily interaction, you would be welcome with open arms!

Thank you for all the love and support, my friends! It never ceases to mean the world to me :)

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Layered Pepperoni Pizza Dip

We have this one dip recipe in my family–a Mexican cheese dip that’s such a favorite that we make for just about every party. It wouldn’t matter if we were serving lasagna or glazed ham; we’re making this dip. Aren’t we considerate?

The recipe couldn’t be simpler…or richer: Mix 1 8-ounce block of cream cheese, 1 12-ounce bag of shredded cheddar cheese, and 1 small jar of salsa in a microwave safe bowl; microwave on high, stirring halfway, until melted, about 4 minutes. Stir and serve with tortilla chips. It’s a 5-minute cheesy miracle, obviously, but it’s not the lightest appetizer.

Now, I knew I couldn’t mess with tradition–at least not beloved recipes with only 3 ingredients that will probably be engraved on my my family crypt–so I decided to try making a new hot and cheesy dip. I wanted it to taste rich without breaking the bank calorie-wise.

So…pizza dip! Layered pepperoni pizza dip–cheesy and gooey and hot from the oven. It has all the Italian flavor of pizza: from the cheese to the sauce to the toppings. The bottom layer is cream cheese, seasoned with oregano, garlic, salt, and pepper. On top of that is a half cup of your favorite tomato sauce, then fresh scallions, basil, artichoke hearts, and olives. You finish the layering with shredded mozzarella and pepperoni, then bake until the dip is melted and gooey.

It’s a dippable pizza, friends! Grab your pita chips and dig in.

PrintLayered Pepperoni Pizza Dip

Makes: 8-12 Servings

Calories per serving: 89

Fat per serving: 6g

Ingredients

8-ounce package ⅓ less fat cream cheese, softened
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese (4 ounces)
½ teaspoon dried oregano
½ teaspoon dried basil
½ teaspoon garlic powder
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ cup your favorite tomato sauce
½ cup finely chopped scallions
¼ cup finely chopped fresh basil, plus more for garnish
1 cup canned artichoke hearts, packed in water, drained and chopped
¼ cup sliced black olives
12 slices turkey pepperoni

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Spray a 9-inch pie plate with cooking spray.
In a medium bowl, stir the cream cheese, ½ cup of the mozzarella, the oregano, garlic powder, and pepper. Spread the cream cheese mixture over the bottom of the prepared pie plate. Spread the tomato sauce over the cheese layer. Layer the scallions, basil, artichokes, and olives evenly over the sauce. Sprinkle the remaining mozzarella over the top then arrange the pepperoni over the cheese.
Bake until the cheese is melted and the dip is warm throughout, 18 to 20 minutes. Sprinkle with additional fresh basil and serve hot with baked pita chips for dipping.

Nutrition Information & Notes:

Nutrition Information for 1/12 of Recipe: Calories 89.2, Total Fat 6.1g, Sat Fat 3.7g, Carb 3.7g, Fiber 0.7g, Sugars 1.3g, Protein 4.7g

Nutrition Information for 1/8 of Recipe: Calories 133.9, Total Fat 9.2g, Sat Fat 5.6g, Carb 5.6g, Fiber 1g, Sugars 1.9g, Protein 7.1g

Two fabulous recipe inspirations: Averie Cooks and A Spicy Perspective

3.1

Photography by Ashley McLaughlin Photography

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