Sweet Pepper Tuna Cucumbers

I do best with a protein-rich diet when I'm trying to lose weight and I wanted to incorporate a generous dose of veggies, so I threw this together for lunch. It's certainly nice to look at, and it shares some qualities with a really good canape recipe given to me by my friend Melissa.

Sweet Pepper Tuna Cucumbers
2 mini sweet peppers, sliced

1 very large cucumber, sliced
1 small can of Tuna, drained
1 1/2 T low fat cream cheese, softened
1 rounded t capers
1/2 t minced onion
1/2 t chili powder
1/4 t garlic powder
1/4 t pepper

In a bowl, mix together the drained tuna and softened cream cheese, add capers and onion, then add in all the spices and mix until thoroughly blended. Drop the blended mixture onto cucumber slices, place one slice of sweet pepper on top, then garnish with more chili powder for extra flavor and color if desired. Chill in the fridge until cold, then serve.

Ratings from the Experts*: My hubby's not a big tuna fan, so I took the burden upon myself to eat every last one of these as I sat here writing this post. What a burden it was... I kid, I kid! I give this a solid 9/10 for the fact that it's a tiny bit salty but I think that could be remedied by simply washing the capers and rubbing them off before adding to the mix. But the mix itself was a good blend. The chili powder really gave it a nice flavor and brought it all together.

Gluten Free Play Dough

My son is even more severely gluten intolerant than I am, so I've been leery of letting him play with regular Play Dough since it contains gluten. I looked all over Pinterest for recipes, tried one this morning, and it was an utter disaster. It more closely resembled pineapple chunky oatmeal than play dough. So I switched gears and found a recipe on About.com from the Celiac Sprue Association and gave it a try. It worked beautifully except for the fact that the actual cooking instructions were way off base, so I changed those to tell you a more accurate process.

Gluten Free Play Dough
1/2 c rice, potato, or sorghum flour
1/2 c corn starch
1/2 c salt
2 tsp cream of tartar
1 t cooking oil
food coloring of your choice

Mix the dry ingredients together well, then add in the wet ingredients, stirring until blended. The mixture will be very very watery and you'll wonder how in the world it's going to thicken up, but it will. Cook and stir constantly on medium heat for 5-10 minutes or until the mixture forms a ball. Once the dough isn't sticky to the touch, take it out of the pan and let cool a bit, then knead it more by hand. Let it cool completely before storing the dough a sealable plastic bag.

I love how simple this recipe is. This morning I just brought my son in to the kitchen, gave him a few pots and pans and a couple of spoons to play with while I worked on the play dough. In less than 15 minutes we had a wad of playdough even larger than a regular play dough can carries! I made 2 colors today, but I expect we might add some more colors to the collection next week since my son loves it so much. And that makes me a happy momma. :)

Cheese and Turkey Stuffed Mini Peppers

I have been recovering from abdominal surgery, so I haven't been able to cook much at all (Dr.'s orders... I promise!) Instead I've been stuffing my face with far too much food generosity from my in-laws, and eating out more than I should since I haven't felt much like cooking. I've gained about 5 lbs I think and I've about had it... so it's back on the healthy eating bandwagon today so I don't feel so much like an overstuffed Italian sausage. These little beauties are my new obsession (the peppers, that is). They are Mini sweet bell peppers and they are so great for me since I love bell pepper but can't ever seem to use a whole pepper in a dish. And they also make gorgeous little finger food like this!

I wanted a pop of protein, so I grabbed some cream cheese and roasted turkey lunchmeat from the fridge. The following is the result.

Cheese and Turkey Stuffed Mini Peppers
2 T. Cream cheese
3 mini peppers
2 slices, thinly sliced oven roasted turkey (Land o' Frost is what I used)
1/8 t. garlic salt
1/4 t. Italian seasoning

Slice the tops off the mini peppers and remove any seeds from the interior. Cut the slices of turkey into three portions and stuff one portion in each of the three peppers. In a small bowl or measuring cup, mash together cream cheese with the seasonings until well blended. Smear generous amounts of cream cheese mixture into the peppers on top of the turkey, be sure to fill them to the top! Now, enjoy.


Ratings from the Experts*: 10/10 from me, for snacking it's a filling, healthy snack that packs a healthy protein punch in addition to a nice serving of veggies.