Fish Prep Requires Proper Gadgets

When you purchase fish from the fish monger, your initial decisions will revolve around how much you want, and how ready to cook it is. For instance, do you want fillets ready to pan fry, or are you willing to take a whole fish and take care of the flesh, fins, scales, gills, and guts yourself? Do you want tail off or tail on? Fillets J cut or V cut? Pan dressed fish or whole round? Fish steaks? Do you want the skin on so that you get the good healthy fat, or deep skinned fish? Lots of decisions!!

The advantage of buying a whole fish uncleaned is the price. If you are willing to put in a little sweat equity as it were, you can save a bundle. In order to prepare the fish for eating, you will have a little work to do in the kitchen, and you will need to have the right equipment at hand. This article will tell you some of the things that can come in handy. They will likely pay for themselves over time, based on the money you save each time you buy fish at the market!

Here are the basic tools that will come in handy when it comes to fish:

- Glove hand covering is wise if you are dealing with things like shelling shellfish. Those oyster shells can cut you!

- Fish pliers are not just for when you are out in the boat catching the little guys. They come in handy in the kitchen for taking out salmon tines. The home improvement store can supply you with needle nose pliers, and you can clean them afterwards for kitchen use.

- Fish scaling has got to be the ickiest of all fish cleaning jobs, and you know that if you have ever cleaned a whole bunch of fish. While electric fish scalers exist, manual ones will serve you just as well.

- A fish gutting knife or two is essential. It is curved and especially designed for the task.

- Kitchen shears should be clean and sharp.The ones you use for cutting poultry will work, but again, make sure they are clean before using.

- Having a fillet knife is a good thing if you want to be like the pro chefs. You can live without it, but personally, it’s a good thing.

- If you are going to clean shellfish, make sure you have knives for clam, shrimp, and oysters.

If you are embarking on a weight loss plan that includes fish, like the diet HCG weight loss plan, all of these utensils will come in handy. Just assemble them before beginning the diet days. This way you will know in advance that you have on hand all of your necessary and useful HCG diet tools.

Vegetarian Dishes – Tips to help you Prepare a Delicious and Nutritious Plan

A diet rich in soy and whey protein, found in ...

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Today, weight loss plans is not a problem. A search on the Internet, you can see flood of options. In fact, the decisions are so many that it can be confusing to everyone looking for a particular diet like a vegetarian meal plan. This is delicious and healthy at the same time and will help you achieve your weight loss goals.

People want to lose weight not only for cosmetic reasons. Obesity can load a variety of health issues – one of the most embarrassing is the sleep apnea. It was observed that more than half of the sleep apnea patients are overweight. Furthermore, only 10% weight reduction in a 14 to 26% reduction in the incidence of sleep apnea lead!

So if you plan for a meal, delicious, nutritious, and provides variety at the same time looking, it is not necessary that you had to rely on animal protein. It is quite possible that a vegetarian dishes that you can use, create, especially if you are interested in your sleep apnea problem should be rectified by weight loss.

Why use a vegetarian meal plan for weight loss? The primary reason why this option is important because there is a growing trend in the world where most non-vegetarian prefer to be vegetarian in their eating habits. Therefore, it is from Weight Watchers, you could look at the vegetarian and takes not only on animal protein to be interested in the diet. There is no shortage of valuable food in a vegetarian plan. If only you know how to plan and what specific vegetables you need to your diet.

Here are some key features of this type of plan:

To prepare a vegetarian requires the following: Previous planning; knowledge of macro-nutrients and vitamins and minerals in the selected vegetables contain. It is important that sufficient amounts of protein, calcium, iron, vitamin B and riboflavin include in your diet.

You can use the main course of a vegetarian meal on two types of design: Combine egg white and milk products with grains, or combine cereals with nuts, dried beans or peas.

Hopefully the above ideas will benefit you if you try to lose weight in order to address their sleep problems with a vegetarian meal plan. Still, you can execute exercises to lose belly fat if you want too.

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Buffalo Meat and Planning Road Trip Snacks

July 15, 2011 by Lisa · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Easy Recipes, Healthy Eating, Simplify Life 
A picture of a collection of healthy (low-calo...

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Everyone likes to take a road trip with their family and have some fun on the road. Even better when the kids are coming along for the ride or to a favorite destination. If you’re taking the road trip in a car, family meals, food, and snacks are usually a priority for all parents to make a checklist of what they’re bringing in the car.

buffalo meat is the new healthy “red meat” and parents and kids like it without knowing their eating it. Buffalo jerky is a family favorite that can easily be traveled with and eaten in the car without any mess.

Buffalo Meat and Meal Planning for the Family Road Trip

Aside from getting to the destination with smiles on everyone’s faces, a good healthy snack can really add to the energy level and making sure that everyone has a full belly and ready to get out and explore once you’re at the final destination.

It doesn’t matter if you’ve brought along snacks made from beef, buffalo meat, chicken or any other type of meat, it simply needs to taste good for the family to be happy.

Fruit snacks and vegi slices are another great source of nutrition and family friendly snacks. Not only are they healthy for you but the kids tend to love getting a fruit stick or fruit snack that they can munch on while going down the road. Parents are smiling because they just need to throw away the wrapper.

No matter where you’re headed, or what the weather is like, always be prepared with plenty of snacks and drinks for the road trip.

Family meal planning, while at home and on the road, is a staple in any family “checklist” and can save the day when everyone is Hungary, or if you’re traveling and can’t find a good place to stop for a quick meal or snack. Get your kids feedback on what they enjoy, you may be surprised at what they say!

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The Health Benefits Of Almonds

June 14, 2011 by guest · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Feeling Healthy, Healthy Eating, Simplify Life 
Shelled almonds (Prunus dulcis)

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Are almonds good for you? Yes, indeed they are.

These crunchy morsels are a tasty favorite that appears in a huge variety of dishes, from sweet to savory and everything in between.

This is great for you, the eater, because they are also a powerhouse of good nutrition, but why are almonds good for you?

The first of many almond health benefits that you should be aware of is that they are high in protein. They also contain no cholesterol, and there is some research that indicates that they help to fight the buildup of cholesterol in the body.

They are low in saturated fat, which can be harmful to the heart, and high in the “good” unsaturated kind of fat. They are also thought to play a role in actually helping to keep the heart healthy.

The health benefits of almonds also include the fact that one ounce of these nuts, which is around 22 or 23 of them, has about the same amount of calcium as four ounces of milk. Most everyone knows that calcium is good for the bones and teeth and is important, in combination with magnesium, in helping to combat osteoporosis.

In addition, that same ounce of almonds has about 35% of your daily allowance of vitamin E. This vitamin has antioxidant properties and there is some evidence to indicate that it may help to prevent and fight certain types of cancer.

As you can plainly see, there are many different nutritional benefits of almonds that make them an important addition to healthy cooking. The fact that they are also delicious and convenient as a snack or addition to a wide variety of dishes is simply a bonus.

While by no means a complete replacement for the vegetables that are so often the bane of children everywhere, they make for a healthy, fun snack that builds strong minds, strong bodies, and keeps the heart going strong for years to come.

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Benefits of Green Tea Extract

green tea

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Who would have thought that green tea would reach the status it has today? I you are talking about health and wellness, green tea is on top of the list. Before, only the Chinese, Japanese and perhaps the Britons drank tea.

Today, because of all the goodness it can offer, everybody wants to drink green tea and green tea is now very expensive too. Just look at the price tags in your local groceries.

So, why should you drink green tea extract? Because it can give your body a lot of benefits. If you are not sure yet if you should drink green tea or not, read on and find out all the good things it has to offer.

Green tea is one of the advancement of the 21st century. Green tea lowers the cholesterol level in your body, slows down arthritis, prevents the growth of cancer cells and of course, it assists people who want to lose extra weight.

Just those four benefits alone is enough to encourage people to drink a lot of green tea. There are more than 1,800 studies all around the world which found out that green tea is also a very powerful antioxidant.  It has substances like catechins and polyphenols and the most powerful is epigallocatechin or ECGG.

Among all the substances, ECGG is considered the most powerful because it has 25 to 100 times more antioxidants compared to Vitamins E and C. All these substances from green tea keep your DNA intact and stabilize the cell membranes.

One of the things women love is green tea weight loss capabilities.  As a matter of fact, a clinical trial of men eating high-fat diet was given green tea. Green tea boosted the body’s ability to burn calories by 4.5%. With all the goodness green tea has to offer it is no wonder that it is highly valued today and people are willing to spend a lot of money for it.

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What You Need to Know Before You Buy the Best Juice Extractor

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Did you just recently discover the beautiful things that juicing can give you? Are you interested in purchasing the best juice extractor you and your family can use for fresh fruits and vegetables?

Very good. You are on your way to better and healthier lifestyles. But, before you go to the store and buy a juice extractor, there are things which you need to know about juice extractors and things which you should look for.  There are various models and brands of juice extractors today; it can be fairly confusing as to which one you should purchase.

In order to be able to be able to make juice recipes for health, read the outline below of the specific things which a good juicer should have.

Ease of use. You want a juice extractor which is very easy to use and very easy to clean up. If what you get is the exact opposite, it will be so annoying; you will not even try to use the juicer anymore. It would defeat the purpose of purchasing a juicer in the first place.

A kitchen appliance which is very complicated to operate will be thrown to the back of the cabinet and it will only gather dust. It will seldom see the light of day. A juicer which is very difficult to clean up is also useless. You will dread the thought of cleaning it that you will no longer use it.

Yield. You will want a juicer which will give you more juice and not pulp. It will be a waste of money if you have to buy dozens of fruits just for a glass or two of juice because the juicer is not doing a good job.

Look at the product specification and check the percentage of juice vs. pulp or waste it yields. One thing which you should keep in mind is that juicers which eject the pulp outside yield less juice than those which do not. You would also need to ask yourself if it is very important for you to get pulp-free juice or not.

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Gorgeous Lemon Chicken

May 30, 2011 by guest · 2 Comments
Filed under: Cooking, Easy Recipes, Healthy Eating, Simplify Life 
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I remember when I met my wife she told me that one of favourite dishes was any kind of Chinese food and seeing as I had not set foot in a Chinese restaurant up until that point I was a bit dubious.

We went to a Chinese restaurant the following night and I am a little bit of a fussy eater believe it or not so i plumped for Lemon chicken and then found that I had a new favourite dish, I loved it so much I started experimenting by making it myself from scratch and making it slight differently as I love to be creative.

So here is my lemon chicken dish that I serve up regularly to family and friends, I hope you like it.

Lemon Chicken

Ingredients:

  1. Chicken breast strips
  2. 1 crushed garlic
  3. 1 chili chopped
  4. 2 tbsp of cornflour
  5. 1 egg white
  6. 1 tbsp of soy sauce
  7. 1tbsp of sugar
  8. chicken stock
  9. 4 lemons
  10. Salt
  11. Black pepper
  12. Groundnut oil

Preperation:

  1. Put the cornflour, chicken, egg white, salt and a dash of oil into a large bowl and mix thoroughly, place in the fridge and leave to soak for approx half an hour.
  2. Heat a wok and add a dash of groundnut oil and heat until it starts to smoke.
  3. Remove from the heat and add the chicken out of the mix you prepared earlier, remember to constantly turn the chicken otherwise it will stick to the pan.
  4. When the chicken is a nice white colour remove and place to one side.
  5. Clean the wok and add stock, lemon juice and sugar along with the garlic and chili and get to the boil.
  6. Once boiling add in the cornflour then simmer for a couple of minutes and add the chicken, stir fry to make sure the chicken is cooked and add your pepper.
  7. Add rice to complement and you have your perfect lemon chicken.

There you go one of my favourite chicken breast recipes an here was me thinking about giving you a dull potato salad recipe.

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Potato Salad Rocks! Potato Salad Staple

Potato Salad

Potato salad is one of the staples of mine when I’m eating a large amount of salad which tends to be in the summer. I absolutely love it and think it is tasty and delicious, I do however have one problem with it and that to be fair it is a little bland.

The fact is that every time I invited my family or a group of friends over to have some salad and a BBQ with me It usually didn’t really get eaten, so I tried hard to come up with a different twist on potato salad and I think I have, I have created a spicy hot potato salad that still accompanies BBQs very well but also has that extra hot zingy taste that is missing.

Spicy And Hot Potato Salad

Ingredients:

  1. New potatoes washed and either halved or quartered.
  2. Salt and Pepper
  3. 1 Tbsp of mustard
  4. 1 Tbsp of Worcestershire sauce
  5. 2 Tbsp of mayonnaise
  6. 1 onion chopped into fine pieces
  7. 1 jalapeno pepper cut into small sections
  8. A good mix of black and green olives
  9. Some hot relish

Preperation:

  1. Combine the onion, pepper, olives and relish into a bowl and mix thoroughly.
  2. Combine the mayonnaise, Worcestershire sauce, mustard and salt and pepper into another bowl then add the two bowls together and mix very very well. Pour the contents over the potatoes once they have been boiled for five or six minutes and gone soft to the touch. Make sure all the potatoes are covered well in the mix.
  3. Place them in the fridge and allow to cool for a couple of hours or so.
  4. Serve.

There you have it a spicy twist on the humble yet good potato salad recipe Now to accompany that with the BBQ I would of been cooking I need to make some baked BBQ chicken breast recipes Delicious.

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Lasagna, a Great Family Meal

May 25, 2011 by guest · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Baking, Cooking, Healthy Eating, Simplify Life 
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Why Families love to Make Lasagna

Is your family grumbling about eating the same old four or five meals week after week?  Looking for something you can have fun making and that will be enough to feed your family all while offering lots of different ways to prepare it?  Try lasagna.  Here’s three reasons why.

The Layering Game

When preparing lasagna, you’re allowed to have a little fun.  Layering your ingredients is the name of the game when it comes to this tasty dish.  Just start with your main ingredient and then add a layer of cheeses and then a layer of lasagna pasta noodles.  Save some mozzarella cheese to put on top at the end and you’re done.

It’s Big Enough For Families

One thing cooks worry about a lot is if what they’re making will feed everyone.  With lasagna, there’s no need to worry.

Like many other Italian meals, the pasta in lasagna will expand inside your stomach and help you to feel full.  That’s why one good sized serving will probably be enough for most people to eat.  If you need to make more than one pan, just double your recipe and have an extra pan on hand and ready to go.

Plenty of Variations

Lasagna is quite possibly the most versatile dish there is.  Let’s look at just a few of the kinds you can make:

Chicken
Beef
Sausage
Tofu
Vegetable
5 Cheese

It’s easy to run out of dinner ideas, especially if you’re the one who does all the cooking in your family and you don’t have a lot of time to prepare things.

Making a basic lasagna recipe for your family will be a fun activity, feed your entire crew and you’ll never run out of options.  So toss that tired hungarian goulash recipe, and make lasagna the next dinner in your family’s meal lineup.

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Mikey’s Masterpiece Barbecue Sauce Recipe

Some chicken, pork and corn in the barbeque

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Summertime is almost upon us. It is time to clean the barbecue and get ready for cook-outs!  One of the most popular outdoor meals is the good old barbecue.  So saddle up and let’s get ready to make the most important part of the meal.  The sauce!

The usual barbecue sauce recipe is made by using ketchup and molasses.  Ketchup has long been he favorite way to barbecue chicken. It is so easy to prepare and use the tried and good bbq chicken recipe.  For a change try to make the  bbq chicken recipe long used in the Southwest and as well as the western states of the country. Try the vinegar and mustard sauce for a change.

Prep Time- 15 mins
Cook- 30 mins
Total- 45 mins

Makes about 2 1/4 cups

Ingredients:

1/4 C water
1 C  mustard
2 tbsp chili
3/4 C vinegar
1 tsp blk pepper
1/4 C brn sugar
1/2 C sugar
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp liquid hickory smoke
1 tsp white pepper
1/2 tsp soy sauce

1.  Mix together with the remainder of the ingredients and place into a large saucepan. The other ingredients should be added to the mixture later.

Caution: This sauce might be too spicy if you are cooking for your kids.  If this is the case simply use a pinch of chili powder, and cayenne pepper.  That should make the sauce mild enough for children to enjoy.

2.  Simmer for about half an hour.

3.  Add remainder of ingredients, stir and simmer for 10 minutes longer until ready to be used on the cleaned chicken and place on the barbecue.

That’s it! Now you are ready to coat your meat and grill up a great meal.  This recipe is great for any meat, whether you are cooking delicious spare ribs, or using it for a bbq chicken breast recipe.  Save some of the sauce for later if you want to use it as dipping sauce if you like.

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