Three for the Price of One

You never know what you're gonna find in my greenveggina! You just gotta peek in and hope for the best! Tonight, you lucked out! You're getting THREE recipes in one blog! Are you super excited or what?
Let's start with the asparagus (we'll do this alphabetically, k?). I had a bunch (a bundle? a head? a herd? a colony? lemme go google that real quick...k, it's a 'bundle') a bundle of asparagus that needed attention before much longer and a...(lemme go google)..a troop of mushrooms. A troop of mushrooms?! How cute is that! Now I'm absolutely imagining them dressed in uniforms standing at attention.

All mushrooms are to report to duty at 1800 hours. They will stand in formation in the kitchen sink and prepare themselves for Eradication of all Foreign Materials (EFM) whether they be chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear by way of Underwater Deployment (UD). Upon completion of EFM, all mushroom personnel will report to the Cutting Board (CB) for Parallel Division (PD) carried out by the Kitchen Sabre Squad (KSS). Mushroom personnel will then await further orders.
The asparagus battalion will complete EFM and report to CB for PD by the KSS. All asparagus and mushroom personnel will then report to the Baking Vehicle (BV) for a briefing with Sergeant Olive Oil and Corporal Rosemary. The BV will then be loaded into the Centralized Heat Facility (CHF) for such time as their commanding officer deems fit (10-15 mins at 450 degrees). Their mission is to neutralize the hunger of six civilians with a maximum of 68 calories per serving.

The onion battalion is to pick one volunteer to complete PD. Once PD is complete, Private Onion is to report to Stove Top Containment (STC) with Sergeant Olive Oil for Heat Application Training (HAT) along with two volunteers from the garlic battalion. Upon completion of HAT, Private Onion and Privates Garlic will be joined with (3/4 cup) Master Sergeant Rice for Submerged Tactics (ST) at Fort Vegetable Broth (2 cups). Once Fort training has been absorbed, Chemical Warfare Training will begin, including but not limited to 2 cans of drained Ninja Beans, 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper, and 1/2-1tsp Cumin assault. The objective is to neutralize the hunger of six civilians with a maximum of 233 calories per serving.

Two pounds of Red Potato Hand Grenades will be disassembled and submerged and heated in neutral liquid territory for the duration of ten whole minutes, at which time they will then be deployed to Colander Camp for Drainage Training (DT). Upon certification of DT, they will be relocated to Attractive Storage Containment Facilities (ASCF) and camouflaged in Liquefied Margarine and Parsley (LMP) (5Tbs margarine to 2tsp parsley). The objective is to neutralize the hunger of six civilians with a maximum of 170 calories per serving.

Ninja Breakfast

Top five reasons black beans are villains-

1. they have more enemies than friends
2. they're dressed like ninjas
3. they only leave their lair to wreak havoc
4. they taste like delicious evil
5. they are capable of producing a gas that can render a grown man unconscious

Tonight I wanted to feed my inner villain. So I made a breakfast that only a Mexican Mafia Ninja Assassin Street Thug would eat! If you like spicy, continue to read. If you are vegan or a strict vegetarian, you can skip this one. If you're a wimpy cry baby sissy puss that can't stand heat, go play with your dolls. If you get heartburn, go get a Pepcid AC and come back. This recipe is for macho burly tough guys who are watching their figures.  If you ever found yourself wondering what bad guys eat, this is it!

Homemade bad guy salsa-
2 tomatoes, chopped (I used one red and one brown)
1/2 lime, squeezed
3 green onions, chopped
1 jalapeno, chopped (get one with an attitude problem)
1 still-beating heart of a human sacrifice (optional)

Mix this all together and set aside in the fridge if you're into food safety, leave it out on the counter top if you're hardcore, or on a breezy window sill next to a petri dish full of Ebola virus if you're effing insane.

1 can ninja beans, drained (may be in disguise as 'black beans')
2 chipotle chilies in adobo sauce*, chopped (my computer has 'chipotle' underlined like it's spelled wrong and suggested I change the spelling to 'Chippendale'...so henceforth, chipotle will be known as Chippendale!)
1 white corn tortilla (more if you plan on feeding your fellow henchmen)
1 egg (see parenthesis above)
a fingertip grab of shredded monterey jack cheese ("a fingertip grab" is an official measurement starting now)

Heat a dash of oil in a pan and add garlic (oh ya! garlic! pretend '2 cloves of garlic' is listed above!), heat until starting to brown. Add ninja beans and your saucy Chippendale peppers. Heat through and add a shot glass of water if it gets too thick/dry for your liking.
While that's heating up, put your tortillas on a baking sheet and sprinkle with a little cheese. Toss in oven at 350 degrees just until your cheese has melted, top with about 2-3 big spoonfuls of your saucy Chippendale ninja mix. You should probably kill a pedestrian or shoot your neighbors window out with a rocket launcher right about now to secure your place as a hardened criminal. In a separate pan, fry your egg to your liking (I like to watch mine bleed when I stab it). I actually put my salsa on top of my beans and then added my egg but I believe vice versa would also be acceptable in most villain circles.
This bad boy weighs in at around 374 calories a serving so you don't have to worry about outgrowing your black spandex and matching cape!


*I just wanted to make this clear because the Chippendale peppers are what add the spice, I bought a can of them and only used two peppers, NOT two cans of peppers!! If you use more than two peppers, it's possible your intestines will fall out. If this happens, let me know and I'll tell you how to make sausage.

Homicide Cookies

I thought it'd be a good idea to make some low-calorie cookies tonight since dinner was so under budget, however, I'm saddened to tell you, while I was mixing the butter with the sugar...*sniff*..my 12-yr old hand mixer passed away. *wipes tears* I mean, I knew he was getting on in years but I wasn't expecting him to pass on so suddenly. *blows nose* One minute he was playing in the butter, and the next..*looks away from the camera*..I'm sorry, just gimme a min...
So here's the recipe for the murderous cookies that can BURN IN HELL FOR ALL I CARE!! *runs off sobbing* I HATE YOU, COOKIES!...

2 sticks butter or margarine
1/2 cup sugar
1 large egg  *Vegan Alert!*
1 tsp vanilla (I make my own..remind me to tell you how sometime)
2 3/4 cup flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 cup crushed hazelnuts
Nutella

Cream together the slaughterous sugar and the massacre margarine. Add your exterminating egg and your villainous vanilla. Mix together your felony flour and bloodshed baking soda and add it to your sugar/egg mixture..but mix it by HAND so it doesn't kill your poor defenseless geriatric hand mixer!
Scoop out 1/2 tsp of disasterous dough ball and place on cookie sheet. Fill your cookie sheet with these cutthroat cookie blobs and then go find the heaviest, meanest flat surface you have (I used the bottom of a drinking glass..full of dynamite)! Dip the end of your weapon in sugar and then smash the hell out of those damned ruffians! Once you have demobilized them, shove them into a blazing hot (350*) oven of death and leave them there until they have stopped screaming (about 8-9 minutes).
To make the tops, do the same thing but after pulverizing them with your sugar-coated instrument of torture, sprinkle them with the crushed hazelnuts. Then burn them alive like you did the last batch. To assemble, spread 1/2 tsp of Nutella on the bottom cookie and top with one of the nut-covered cookies. This should make around 6 dozen cookies, and cost you only 65 calories per sandwich. But don't let that deceive you! These evil circles of doom will wreak havoc and distruction on you. It's best if you drown them in milk and get rid of their bodies as quickly as possible.

Diet Air Soup

I made a soup tonight that I'm gonna share with you because it's good, it's (sort of) vegetarian/vegan, and it's 174 CALORIES PER SERVING!! THAT'S LIKE DIET AIR!! It serves six very hungry people and you could literally eat the whole pot for less than a fast food meal!
I bought a bag of pasta a while back because it was adorable (the little stars like in your Chicken and Stars soup) but then became a vegetarian and didn't really feel like making chickenless free-range organic peta-approved chicken-flavored broth and stars soup. Kind of loses it's gusto, huh? So I was talking to my vegan friend, Bean, a few days ago about my diet and ways to substitute meat for un-meat and she brings up beans and the magical properties of them. After that, I made my dinner menu and it seems like everything I came up with has beans in it! I'm fairly certain after this week, with all the magical properties I'll be absorbing, I'm gonna reach a new level of vegetarian magic and start shitting rainbows!

1 cup dry star-shaped pasta (also called Stelle or Stelline..the brand I bought was Colavita)
1 can low-sodium kidney beans
1 can diced tomatoes (I used Rotel tomatoes and green chilies)
1 medium onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic, minced (anybody wanna make out?)
1 envelope vegetable beef soup mix (I couldn't find any vegetable)
6-8 cups water (depending on how soupy you like it)

In a large pot, saute your onions in as little oil as you can get away with. Add enough garlic to melt a clan of vampires and let that cook just a few minutes. Add your magic beans, tomatoes, soup mix and water. Let this simmer a little bit (20 mins or so?) and add pasta. Now, this adorable little pasta stuck to the bottom of my pan, for some reason, and I let it sit for too long and it swelled up into cosmic soup-eating sponges! I had hardly ANY water left in my pot! This is the third exclamation point I've used in a row!
When I make this again, I'll make the pasta separately instead of adding it to the soup. Also, 1 cup dry pasta makes a LOT of cooked pasta. It tasted fine but be prepared to have leftovers or make less.
I wanted to find some kind of vegetable soup mix to use as a flavoring and looked in the soup aisle and the seasoning aisle before finally finding this stuff. It's good and it's actually a little spicy, but it has a hint of beef in it. It's not like there's a steak floating around in there but the ingredients list "beef extracts" which makes me think there's like cow sweat or something in there. It's not technically vegetarian/vegan unless you use vegetable soup mix but I couldn't find any and since there's no meat added and it's just excrement of cow, I'm pretending it's vegetarian, k?
Moving on, I made myself a salad buffet to go with this. I chop my veggies as I buy them and store them all separately in tupperware in my fridge so it's easier to add them to my dishes. So I had a plate of salad (very little dressing) and a slice of garlic toast (the kind you buy in the freezer section) and had a very filling meal for 424 calories!!! DID YOU HEAR ME?! A WHOLE MEAL FOR 424 CALORIES!! THAT MAKES ME TYPE IN ALL CAPS!!

Spinach Enchiladas Verde

I stole this recipe from a vegetarian cook from Austin, TX that goes by the name Nicegirl512 on allrecipes.com. I thought her recipe was effing delicious and I didn't change a thing! Usually on cooking websites, cooks will post a picture of themselves or part of a real name. She didn't post either so I get to use my imagination and invent her myself! In my head, Nicegirl512 is tall and lean (she's a vegetarian, you know), has dark hair, tan skin (she lives in TX!), looks awesome in cowboy boots and cut off shorts, has a pet Border Collie named Rufus, loves book stores, uses recycled shopping bags, paints in her spare time, and leaves change for the crippled kids fund at the local gas station (she's 'nice', remember?). And her real name is Julie.
Julie starts her mornings by taking Rufus for a jog around the neighborhood, going through the park and waving at all the usual people. She gets home, feeds and waters the dog, and gets ready for work. She's a dental assistant for Dr. Bleedinggums and a favorite of all the patients. She always has an extra pen handy and knows the current date. She even hands out free samples of the new floss when the Dr. isn't looking.
She's a hard worker but knows to leave work at work and focus on her real life when she leaves the office. She gets in her old but reliable pickup and heads home, stopping at the local market on her way to pick up stuff for dinner tonight, which she will be serving to a few friends. Here's her list-

1 cup light sour cream

1 (7 ounce) can green salsa

1 bunch fresh spinach, rinsed and thinly sliced

2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese

1 (10 ounce) package corn tortillas

I literally copied and pasted that from allrecipes.com! So that technically IS her list!! She says bye to Dana, the checkout girl with bad skin and Ebert, the 98-yr old bagger that moves slower than snail snot but is too cute to fire.

Rufus is thrilled to see her when she walks in so she stops to pet him and tell him what a good boy he is for not eating the throw pillows and then lets him out to play in the backyard. Her friends won't be here for another hour and dinner only takes 35 mins to make so she has time to change from her work scrubs to something cute and casual.

Back in the kitchen she preheats her oven to 350 degrees and washes the spinach. She mixes the sour cream with the green salsa and puts a thin layer of it in a 9x13 dish. Then she spreads a little of it on each tortilla and sets the rest aside. She divides her spinach evenly among all the tortillas and tops them all with the cheese. Then she rolls them each like burritos and lines them up in her dish. It's that baking dish that her mom gave her when she turned 18 and moved out so she's thinking of her mom's cooking while she's making her own. She tops it all with the rest of the sauce and cheese and puts it in her preheated oven for 20-25 mins, or until it starts to brown and all the cheese has melted.

Dinner's ready just as her friends arrive. Rachel, Carrie, and Abel all arrive together but Will shows up five minutes later in his own car because he just bought it so he feels it's necessary to drive it everywhere even tho carpooling is better for the environment. Carrie tells Julie she loves her hair and Julie tells her about her new shampoo while Rachel plays with Rufus. Abel heads to the kitchen to put away the bottle of white wine he brought over while Will is pulling a beer out of the fridge. Will uses Julie's favorite dish towel to twist the cap off, which it snags, and he tosses it on the floor in the corner.

Rachel says dinner smells awesome and Julie offers to dish it all up on her new handmade plates she picked up at a nearby Indian Reservation for three times as much as you could buy at Pier1 Imports because the lady that was selling them was adorable. Will complains there's not a side dish so Julie puts some corn chips and salsa on the table to which Will complains it's not his favorite brand. Julie suggests maybe next time he can supply the chips and she cheerily offers plates to Abel, Rachel, and Carrie.  

Everyone is enjoying supper and Julie informs them it's only 321 calories per serving when Will spots Julie's Wii and says he's the ultimate champion at Wii Baseball and sets it all up to prove it to everyone, even though they all told him they were sure he was and he didn't need to prove anything. Will immediately begins to complain that her Wii is different and the controls don't work right, even though the game hasn't even started yet. Also, her Wii is slower and "looks dirty". Julie takes the girls and Abel to the bathroom to show them the new color she painted and how she framed in her mirror herself to give it a whole fresh look for under $50. Everyone is impressed and telling her what a great interior decortator she is while Will is swinging his arms around like an epileptic monkey and cussing at the video game. Tired of looking like an ass, Will blames his score on Julie's dirty Wii and pulls another beer from the fridge.

An hour and seven beers later, Will is teasing Rufus by "pretending" to set his tail on fire with a lighter even though Julie has asked him to stop three times now. She also asked him to please not feed Rufus any more salsa and to use the bathroom inside and stop urinating on the begonias. Annoyed with Will's deteriorating behavior, Abel tells him he's had too much to drink and he needs to just sit down and relax. This annoys Will, as he's too drunk to understand big words like 'deteriorating'. Will tells Abel to piss off and Abel tries to calm him down by singing Kumbaya. Will hates Kumbaya and uses an empty beer bottle as a weapon, swinging it around as awkwardly as he had the Wii controller earlier that night. He gets a little too close to hitting Julie in the head with it so Abel uses his 12 years of martial arts experience to subdue Will by throwing a chair at his face. It works and Will is knocked unconscious. Abel apologizes to Julie for getting blood on her chair but Julie says it's fine and not to worry about it at all, then offers A Bitchin' Fruit Snack as dessert and they all head to the kitchen for homemade cinnamon chips and fruit salsa. Rufus sees his opportunity to seek revenge on Will and walks over and pees on his face. Will, too drunk and unconscious to move, drowns on the dog piss but nobody realizes that until the next morning.

The moral of the story is, this dinner is really good but if you make it, don't invite Will. He's an ass.   

Frogmore Stew

OOOOOOHH-WEEEEEEE!!! Do I have a treat fer y'all!!! This here recipe is wat we cawl "Frogmore Stew" but don't yew go worrying yur purty little head over nothin', it ain't got no frogs in it! There are a few things yew'll need in order to fix this here dish. For one, you gotta have indoor plumbin'. Have ya got indoor plumbin'? If not, yew can always go on down yonder to the Jenkin's farm. I hear they got themselves a real dandy of a sink right there in their kitchen! So yur gonna take a big ol' pot and fill it with warter, like several quarts of warter. Get that there pot a warter on the fire, or stove if yur real fancy, and get it goin' good n hot. Yew know that there seasonin' called Old Bay? Well, it ain't go no calories! YEE-HAW! So go on ahead and put enough of that there Old Bay in yur hot warter to choke a mule! I'm talkin' 2/3 to 3/4 cup of it! I ain't playin' 'round now! Go on and put it in there! Then, yur gonna put in some ears of corn. I hear nowadays you'ens can get it all frozen like. Like it done snowed in Jew-lie! So go on and get yurself some of that there snowed-in corn (I like the half ears) and put it in yur boilin' seasoned warter. Go on down to Bob's garden and see if he'll give ya some of his homegrown poe-taters! The ones with the red skin, if he's got 'em! Take as many as he'll give ya and warsh them in the river on yur way home. Go on and quarter them and put as many in yur pot there as yew want. When all the cousins stop on by, I have myself a right big crowd so I'ma always puttin' in lots a taters!
Some of those weird city folk don't like eatin' nothin' but veggies so if yur one a them and yew ain't eatin' any meat, like steak or pork chops, y'all can have this as a side dish for yur salad or chicken. If'n yew ain't one of them folk, yew can go on ahead and add some snowed-in shrimp after yew done let your corn and taters cook a minute (or ten). Go on an add yur shrimp and then chop up some smoked sausage. I like that skinless kind cuz I ain't got no teeth to be chewin' it with. You'ens can get watever kind ya like. Put that there in yur pot and let it heat up just long enough to go take a turn swingin' from the rope at the river and come on back.
Now wat yur gonna do is to put one of them bowls with holes in it in yur slop bucket, or sink if yur one a the Jenkins, and dump yur whole pot in so all the warter drains out but yew still got yur supper. Roll out some newspaper on yur table and dump that all over yur paper and let all yur cousins just dive on in there and help themselves! And yew got yurself a real swell supper that the whole town's gonna be talkin' 'bout! And for jest 'bout 386 calories per person (serves 8), yew'll still be fittin' in yur best overalls! YEEEEE, DOGGIE!

1 package frozen corn (the kind I buy comes with 8 half ears)
3 lbs red potatoes, quartered
1 lb smoked sausage, cut in bite-size pieces
1 lb frozen (or fresh) shrimp
2/3-3/4 cup Old Bay Seasoning

Boil Old Bay in a large pot (the biggest one ya got!) in 4 quarts of water. Add frozen corn first and let it cook about 7-10 mins before adding potatoes. Let that cook another 5 mins and add shrimp and sausage. When your shrimp turns pink (or heats through if it's frozen), drain the whole pot and you seriously CAN dump the food on newspapers on your table! Or use dishes if you're prissy. Don't forget napkins!

Bitchin' Fruit Snack

Fruit was invented by the gods as a way of saying "We can make candy grow from trees because we have magic powers and you don't...nana nana boo boo!". *Epicurus once said, "Not what we have but what we enjoy, constitutes our abundance...like this bitchin' fruit snack!" **And I believe it was the great Socrates who said, "If all fruit salad were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart. But that's why I'm like way way smarter than all of them cuz I would totally bring a super big stick and fight them all to the death!" ***And we all know the prophecy of Nostradamus, "Near the veggie platter and within two bowls, There will be snacks the like of which was never seen, Hunger within parties, people put out by peels, Crying to the great immortal God for seconds." ****And last but not least, let us not forget the words of the wise German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, "HOLY CVAP! Zis fruit schnack iz schtupendous! It makes my neepoles tingle vith ecztozy!"
So without further ado, I give you..A BITCHIN' FRUIT SNACK!

2 kiwis, peeled and diced

2 red apples, cored and diced

8 ounces raspberries

1 pound strawberries, stemmed and diced

3 tablespoons sugar-free fruit preserves, any flavor

10 (10 inch) flour tortillas

butter flavored cooking spray

2 Tps cinnamon sugar

If you don't want your apples to brown at all, toss them in a little lemon juice before mixing with the rest of the fruit. Otherwise, mix your nasty brown apples with your raspberries, strawberries, and fruit perserves, leaving your kiwis to add last so they don't get too smashed. Put them all in a super pretty bowl and let them hang out in the fridge while you whip up your homemade cinnamon chips.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Spray your tortillas lightly with your butter spray and, using a pizza cutter, slice them into wedges. Sprinkle them with your cinnamon sugar and bake for 8-10 mins. Let them cool completely (so they get crispy) before serving them with your fruit salsa. This should serve about 10 people, making this fruit snack around 350 calories per serving! YUM!!!

*Epicurus did not say that.

**Socrates said something sort of close to that but not really.

***Nostradamus probably said that but someone messed up his quote.

****It's possible I completely made this up.

Low-Calorie WHAT?!

WHO WANTS PIZZA?! Okay, okay! Settle down! Let's just jump right into it since this is PIZZA we're talking about! I'm going to set this up like a buffet so you can figure out your own calories, k?

Toppings-
1 tomato, sliced- 22
1 red onion, sliced- 40
1 jalapeno, sliced- 4
1 artichoke, boiled without sin- 64
1 (7.5oz) jar artichoke- 200
2 cups fresh infant spinach- 14
1 medium cucumber, peeled- 24
Olives, pitted- there are roughly 25 calories in 4 olives (olives require math!)
1 cup broccoli, chopped- 30
1/4 cup fresh basil- 1 (yep! 1 calorie!)
1 medium green bell pepper- 30
1 medium summer squash (any variety), peeled- 31
1 cup mushrooms, chopped- 15

Evil Toppings (Vegans and Vegetarians, you may procede to the sauce section)-
1 cup feta cheese (like anyone could choke down that much!)- 396
1 cup mozzarella cheese- 320
16 paper thin red dead animal circles- 140 (double check the epitaph on the back of the package for acuracy)
1 lb sweet Italian ground dead piggy- 1020

Sauce-
You have two options- traditional (red) or Pif's favorite (garlic butter). This is going to be tricky to figure out since there are gajillions of different brands... SOOO, what I'm gonna do is post a link to a recipe to  make your own! You can either follow that or buy a premade can/jar of sauce and figure out your calorie intake...but NO cheating!!
Red sauce- http://lowcaloriecooking.about.com/od/saucesandgravy/r/Pizza-Sauce.htm
You see where it says "1/4 tsp Sin"? Just ignore that part! You won't miss the taste and the Pope will thank you for it!
Here's a quick recipe for garlic butter sauce if you are like me and turn your nose up at that red crap-

1/3 cup butter or margarine (Vegans, watch your magic powers here!)
1 clove garlic, minced or crushed (I use more than this usually but I'll keep it tame for now)
2 tsps dried oregano
2 tsps dried basil

Melt the butter, mix everything together and voila! Awesome Sauce that weighs in at about 549 calories (for the whole pizza, mind you! Less if you halve it and make two pizzas! It's like, buy one get one free!)

Ok, now here's the tricky part! THE CRUST! You have endless options here! I encourage you to check the nutrition panel on the back of any packaged crusts you choose, as I am not there to do it for you. But here's another smorgasbord of ideas-

Pillsbury canned Thin Pizza crust (found by the biscuits)- 900 calories (for the whole thing) 180 if you can manage to eat just 1/5 of it (I can't).
Boboli 12" Whole Wheat Pizza crust- 720 (180 for a quarter of the pizza)
One large flour tortilla- 280
One medium pita bread- 124
One slice Italian Flatbread Focaccia- 180
One large slice of Italian bread (slice, NOT LOAF)- 81
One cup whole wheat pasta (if you want a casserole instead)- 210
One Asiago Cheese bagel- 330

So, what you choose as your crust will make a big difference on your caloric intake. I listed several 'single serving' options for you since pizza toppings can turn into an all out brawl when it comes to agreeing amongst friends/family members. If you go with one of the multi-serving crusts, I highly suggest you figure out your calories first, cut that bad boy in servings according to what you want to feed yourself, and force others to devour the rest OR wrap it up tight and store it in a bank vault BEFORE you begin eating! I know I can't have it laying around my house or I manage to trip and fall on it mouth first while walking by.

Here's a sample of a Pif Pizza-
Focaccia crust- 180
2 Tbs Awesome Sauce- 140
jalapeno slices- 2
1/4 cup mushrooms- 4 (I round up)
1/4 red onion, chopped- 10
1/4 tomato, sliced- 5.5
1/4 cup spinach- 2 (rounded up)

Total- 343.5

Have fun assembling your custom pizza and let me know what combinations are your favorites!

Cranberry Spinach Salad

This salad will have you and everyone at the table fighting to the death for the last helping! I stole this recipe from a lady named Jamie "I'm a Genius Salad Maker" Hensley and made a few moderations to fit my caloric needs. It's simple to make but I'll still walk you through it. Here's your list of ingredients-

1 Tbs of butter (or margarine or vegan fake butter)
1/4 cup almond slivers (155 calories)
1 bag of baby spinach (cuz I love feeling like I'm eating an infant...also, I believe this comes in a 6 oz bag which has a whopping 40 calories FOR THE WHOLE THING!)
1/3 cup dried cranberries (130 calories)

for the dressing-
1 Tbs poppy seeds
2 Tbs sugar (96 calories)
2 tsp minced onion
1/4 tsp paprika (I used more because paprika doesn't scare me)
2 Tbs olive oil (220 calories...I'm not even kidding!)
2 Tbs cider vinegar
2 Tbs white wine vinegar

Mix all your dressing ingredients together and set it aside...do NOT drink this..although all that vinegar might make a good colon cleanse. Melt your butter in a pan and add your almonds, stirring to evenly brown. This will not take long so keep your eyes on it!
Rinse the cooties off your spinach and tumble dry on low heat for 15 mins. Cool iron if necessary...oh wait..wrong thing. Drain excess water off spinach and put in some fancy schmancy bowl that will make your guests oooh and awww. Add cranberries, toasted almonds, and toss with dressing. Coat it well so it gets all super flavory but then you may wanna think about draining off the extra dressing (cuz it's just fat waiting to solidify to your ass).
Now, here's where it gets tricky!! If you divide this salad amongst six people, you'll only be eating 123.5 calories! Actually, probably a smidge less than that because you drained off the extra ass fat, right? I can burn off 123.5 calories simply by typing "123.5 calories"! So..I ate the whole salad. It's 741 calories and I ate the whole damn thing in about two days.
This would make a scrumptious side dish for a formal dinner or even church gathering (if you're allowed to attend those) or picnic. I cut mine with a razor on a mirror and snorted it with a straw.

Sandwich Insanity

I had a sandwich for lunch a few days ago that I would kill a bus load of starving virgin pygmy strippers to have again so I'm gonna start this blog off by sharing that with you. First, you start with bread. You can have any bread you want but keep in mind this will be the majority of this meal's calories so if that's something you're worried about, choose wisely. I went with a big fat kaiser roll from the bakery of my local market. Next, you're gonna need veggies and lots of 'em! Here's what mine consisted of- sliced and cored cucumbers (for whatever reason, the seeds annoy me), sliced and cored tomatoes (maybe I'm just prejudice about cores?), alfalfa sprouts (cuz they're awesome!), sliced red onion...umm..what else was in there? I think that was actually all the veggies I put in there but I'll list some other options for you at the bottom. Then, to ensure that this wasn't TOO healthy, I mixed 8oz of cream cheese with one of those envelopes of dry Italian dressing mix that you can pick up in the dressing aisle. I used maybe 2 Tbs of that and spread it on my bread, then stacked all my veggies on top and mixed a tiny bit of olive oil with red wine vinegar (you could use apple cider vinegar instead) and drizzled that on top of all my veggies, put my bread lid on top, and set a heavy dish on top of that for about 30 mins...because I enjoy putting my food through compression torture before I eat it. I could seriously make out with that sandwich all day but, unfortunately, it didn't last longer than 30 seconds. Just talking about this sandwich makes me wanna stop what I'm doing right now and make 6 billion of them so everyone on the planet can have one! If you're human #6,000,000,001..sorry, you gotta make your own! WARNING: if you are vegetarian or vegan, do not add cream cheese to your sandwich or you will lose all your magic powers! This sandwich would still be overly delicious without it so I see no need for a substitute, however, if you're feeling cheated you could always add a slice of one of your fake cheeses or whatever it is you people eat. Ok, so try this sandwich and lemme know what you think! If you add meat, cheese, or salt to this, I will rip your face off. You may add pepper if you feel it's necessary but salt was invented by the devil and if you add it to your sandwich, the planets will fall out of alignment and hell's gates will open and you'll have released all the demons of chaos and swelling and then we're all in a heap load of trouble! And who wants to be responsible for all that?! Skip the salt. So let's recap in traditional recipe form-

Your favorite bread
1/3 cucumber, sliced (and cored, if you're prejudice)
1/4 tomato, sliced
1/4 red onion, sliced
1/3 cup alfalfa sprouts
8 oz cream cheese (you'll have tons of leftovers!)
1 package dry Italian dressing mix (I think it's around 1.5oz?)
1 Tbs olive oil
1 Tbs red wine vinegar (or apple cider vinegar)
other options (be sure to add in your calories!)-
avocado
jalapenos (if you like spice!)
basil
green onions (if you don't care for red)
lettuce
bell pepper
sliced olives
fake vegan cheese
pepper
salt...NO!

When I made mine, I actually meaured it all out and figured up the calories- 330...for the entire sandwich! But now, of course, I can't remember exactly what I measured out. So you'll have to wing it but don't freak out...this sandwich would be hard to mess up (unless you add salt, which is just 'sin' spelled with different letters).