A Break From Makeup: Crab Stuffed Avocado

I'm so so sorry for the lack of updates.  I accidentally left my camera charger at my parents house so my Canon has been dead. :(

However I went home for the weekend and was able to retrieve it so hopefully I can start posting again!

To tide you over I wanted to share a recipe with you that I absolutely love.  Crab stuffed avocado!!

If you like avocado and crab then this is a must.  Its so delicious and tastes like a comfort food while being low calorie and healthy for you! Plus its super quick  and easy to make!

Calorie info thanks to My Fitness Pal

So here is my process:

1. Cut open an avocado and remove the pit

2. Mix 2 oz of crab, 2 Tbsp of cream cheese, and as many cut up cherry tomatoes as you desire.  I only used one because I didn't want the tomato flavor to be too strong.  I think I may have also added a tad bit of lemon juice. You can also add salt, pepper, cayenne, or your favorite seasoning to taste.

3. Plop half of the mixture into each avocado and sprinkle with your desired kind and amount of cheese.  

4. Stick it in a toaster oven for 10 minutes at 350-375 degrees.

These are so delicious, I've done this for three separate meals now.  For dinner I usually use a whole avocado but if I'm having it for lunch I cut the recipe in half.

A Break From Makeup: Scrambled Egg and Avocado Open Faced Bagel Breakfast Sandwich

So I don't really know what to call these as I just kind of threw a bunch of my favorite ingredients together this morning to make this yummy breakfast.  It was so good that I really wanted to share it with you guys!!

It looks kind of weird...I know...but oh my was it delicious.

Alright so on to how I made it!

Saute the mushrooms and garlic in 1/4 tbs of olive oil

Put your mini bagels in the toaster oven (or toaster) and get them toasting

Turn the heat down and crack the egg into the pan

quickly add avocado, cheese, spinach, and milk

Turn the heat up to the best temp for scrambling all the ingredients together

Mix in basil and parsley to taste

Scoop your mixture onto the bagels and enjoy!

I was going to initially make this a sandwich but there was too much filling for that to be possible.  The open faced method looks cuter anyway.

Not all the ingredients are listed in the nutrition facts for this meal because things like garlic and basil don't really contribute much calorie wise.  The sodium for this was a bit higher than I was expecting but the protein is nice.  The calories would probably be close to 400 if I would have had a full half an avocado to use...I had to scrape out some brown bits. However you could probably omit the cheese completely....I just really like cheese.  I think adding more mushrooms would have also been better.  This was flavorful enough to eat without the bagels, taking them away would make this much less calorie and carb dense.

Overall this breakfast experiment was a success and I will definitely be making it again!

A Break From Makeup: 400 Calorie Spinach Lasagna Roll Ups

In today's break from makeup I wanted to share these incredibly easy and insanely delicious vegetarian pieces of heaven.

I was looking online for a good lasagna roll up recipe because I live alone and I like cooking meals for one.  I get sick of leftovers really fast so a six serving pan of lasagna sits in my fridge forever and eventually goes bad :(

Anyway I found a decent one that included spinach but as with a lot of these recipes two roll ups were pushing 600+ calories! I usually like to keep each of my meals at 500 calories or less so I decided to try and make a lower calorie version of these cute roll ups.

Recipe screenshot and calorie count thanks to MyFitnessPal!

I decided to take the route of simple and delicious.  I skipped the eggs because I didn't think they were really necessary and also because I'm only making two so I'd have to use like 1/3 of an egg.  I also used cream cheese instead of ricotta cheese because I didn't have any ricotta. I think ricotta is lower cal than cream cheese but the cream cheese tasted so good and unique I'm not sure I'd sacrifice the taste for a few less cals :P

If you aren't a huge sauce person you could probably get away with a bit less than half a cup. I love sauce and still had some left over on my plate.

I also didn't measure out the spinach so I don't think I used quite half a cup but next time I will definitely be adding more.

To make these I first boiled the lasagna noodles then laid them out flat.  I spread the mixture of Italian cheese, cream cheese, and spinach onto each noodle, then carefully rolled them up.  I then dumped a bit of sauce in the bottom of a toaster oven safe bowl, placed the roll ups in seam down, and poured the rest of the sauce on top of them.

I sprinkled the rolls with basil and garlic before popping them in my toaster oven, uncovered. The seasonings  could have also gone inside the mixture but I forgot so they ended up on top.  I baked them at 350 for a bit less than 20 minutes, but if you are using a real oven it may take longer.  Online recipes generally suggested 375 for 25 minutes.

With light versions of the cream cheese, Italian cheese, and sauce this recipe could easily be reduced to only 350 calories or less.

I hope you enjoy this 400 calorie meal as much as I did!