Butternut Squash and Parmesan Bread Pudding

Here's a great Fall recipe that you might enjoy!

Ingredients

3 cups (1/2-inch) cubed peeled butternut squash
Cooking spray
1/2 teaspoon salt, divided
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 cup chopped onion
1 garlic clove, minced
2 cups 1% low-fat milk
1 cup (4 ounces) grated fresh Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, divided
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
3 large eggs
2 large egg whites
8 ounces (1-inch) cubed day-old French bread (about 9 cups)

Preparation

Preheat oven to 400°.

Arrange squash in a single layer on a jelly-roll pan coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle with 1/4 teaspoon salt. Bake at 400° for 12 minutes or until tender. Remove from oven; reduce oven temperature to 350°.

Heat oil in a medium nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion; sauté 5 minutes or until tender. Add garlic, and sauté 1 minute. Remove from heat; cool slightly.

Combine remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt, milk, 1/2 cup cheese, pepper, nutmeg, eggs, and egg whites in a large bowl, stirring with a whisk. Stir in squash and onion mixture. Add bread, and stir gently to combine. Let stand 10 minutes. Spoon into a 2-quart baking dish coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle with remaining 1/2 cup cheese. Bake at 350° for 45 minutes or until pudding is set and lightly browned.

Yield

6 servings

Nutritional Information

CALORIES 304(30% from fat); FAT 10.3g (sat 4.8g,mono 3.7g,poly 0.9g); PROTEIN 18.1g; CHOLESTEROL 122mg; CALCIUM 406mg; SODIUM 823mg; FIBER 4g; IRON 2.1mg; CARBOHYDRATE 35.3g

Pumpkin Muffins

These sound delicious! Just perfect for a fall brunch!

Pumpkin Muffins
Low Calorie Recipe

Ingredients:

2/3 cup nonfat dry milk
6 tablespoons flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
Sugar substitute to equal 12-teaspoons sugar
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Two eggs
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup grated carrots or zucchini
4 tablespoons raisins

Directions:

Combine sifted dry ingredients in separate bowl. Combine wet ingredients. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients slowly. Bake at 350-degrees. for 20 minutes.

Recipe makes six servings.

Nutrition information per muffin:
Calories: 115
Total Fat: 2g
Carbohydrates: 19g
Protein: 6g

Bananas

We love bananas in our house, but my daughter Jillian is really on a kick right now of wanting a banana for a snack every evening. So what are the health benefits of a banana?

Creamy, rich, and sweet, bananas are a favorite food for everyone from infants to elders. Sports enthusiasts appreciate the potassium-power delivered by this high energy fruit.

Bananas are one of our best sources of potassium, an essential mineral for maintaining normal blood pressure and heart function. Since the average banana contains a whopping 467 mg of potassium and only 1 mg of sodium, a banana a day may help to prevent high blood pressure and protect against atherosclerosis.

The effectiveness of potassium-rich foods such as bananas in lowering blood pressure has been demonstrated by a number of studies. For example, researchers tracked over 40,000 American male health professionals over four years to determine the effects of diet on blood pressure. Men who ate diets higher in potassium-rich foods, as well as foods high in magnesium and cereal fiber, had a substantially reduced risk of stroke.

A study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine also confirms that eating high fiber foods, such as bananas, helps prevent heart disease. Almost 10,000 American adults participated in this study and were followed for 19 years. People eating the most fiber, 21 grams per day, had 12% less coronary heart disease (CHD) and 11% less cardiovascular disease (CVD) compared to those eating the least, 5 grams daily. Those eating the most water-soluble dietary fiber fared even better with a 15% reduction in risk of CHD and a 10% risk reduction in CVD.

In addition to these cardiovascular benefits, the potassium found in bananas may also help to promote bone health. Potassium may counteract the increased urinary calcium loss caused by the high-salt diets typical of most Americans, thus helping to prevent bones from thinning out at a fast rate.

Do you jump rope?

I haven't done much jump roping, but my girls want to give it a try, so we just bought a new one... I found this good article on the myths associated with jumping rope. Jump Rope - An Excellent Exercise.

Guess I don't have an excuses any more, do I? lol!

Soups On!

Last night at our TOPS meeting, we talked about eating healthy soups! Yummm, I love soup! The weather is starting to change, and it's the perfect time for some good soup.

I found a great website this morning called Healthy Soup Recipe and just like the name says, it is filled with healthy soup recipes! It has step by step instructions for making the soup and even gives you pictures of each step! Now this is my kind of recipe! lol!

I'm going to try the Healthy Chicken Chowder soup.

My favorite soup to make is Vegetable soup in the crockpot. Here's a similar recipe to what I usually make:

A flavorful crockpot soup recipe with potatoes, tomatoes, and corn.

Crockpot Vegetable Soup Recipe

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 pound soup bones and 1 pound stew beef, cut in 1/2-inch cubes
• 2 quarts water
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon celery salt
• 1/4 cup chopped onion
• 1 cup chopped carrots
• 1/2 cup celery, diced
• 2 cups potatoes, diced
• 1 can (12 to 16 ounces) whole kernel corn, undrained
• 1 can (14.5 ounces) tomatoes, diced
• 2 turnips, peeled and finely chopped

PREPARATION:

Place the beef, water, salts, onions, carrots and celery in slow cooker. Cover and cook on low for 4 to 6 hours. Remove the soup bones and chop any meat clinging to the bones; return to pot. Add potatoes, corn, tomatoes and turnips. Cover and cook on HIGH for 2 to 3 hours longer.
Serves 10 to 12.

52 Ways to Lose a Pound a Week

Here is a great article from Prevention.com.

You can lose weight and keep it off forever. How can I be so sure? Besides mountains of research from leading experts, there are thousands of Prevention readers who have successfully done it. Over the years, their letters and e-mails have been filled with practical tips, as well as the pride and pleasure of people who feel great about themselves. They can run, jump, play on the floor with the kids, wear sexy clothes--newly empowered to do whatever they want.

Click here to read the rest of the article.

What a week...

Once again another crazy week in our household... yes, it was nice to have a long weekend over Labor Day, but it made things at work even more crazy than usual....

Becca has had a pretty crappy time of it lately healthwise.... She complained last week of having pain in her lower back, and we were afraid that it was her kidneys because she's on a pretty high does of motrin for her abdominal pain. Luckily, it wasn't that.... but it was a lower lumbar strain. Our pediatrician referred her to a massage therapist and she felt that that might help. So, we made an appointment with a woman that a friend recommended. She went on Wednesday. She spent over an hour working on her back and her head.

We gave her Becca's whole medical history (boy did that take some time!) from her daily Headaches which are going on almost 3 years now, to her abdominal pain since last October, to them finding her bladder cancer in November, being diagnosed with PCOS in January, to the continued abdominal pain.... anyway, she tried several types of deep massage that she hopes may help her. She worked on her back, abdomen (because there are back muscles that actually can cause pain in the abdomen) and her neck and head.

She warned us that she'd feel like she got hit by a Mack truck 24-48 hours after she worked on her, and she was right.... Becca came to my office after work Thursday in tears. Her head pain was about 8 and she couldn't even think straight. She was supposed to go to work, but she called in sick and went home... she couldn't make it to school the next day either because the head pain was so bad. She also could barely move her neck. Luckily by Friday afternoon, things started to ease up and she started feeling better.

This morning, she said her head is pretty much back to normal (normal meaning pain but tolerable) but that her abdominal pain was actually a bit better and the back pain was gone! So I guess it was worth it, besides the two days of hell she went through.....

Unfortunately, her therapist had emergency gall bladder surgery Saturday morning! Can you believe it??? Not sure what we are going to do now.... We were supposed to call her Monday and let her know how things were going.

Please keep Becca in your prayers on Tuesday as we head to the Urological Oncologist for Becca's second bladder scope since her surgery. We needs lots of prayers that there is no sign of the cancer returning!!!!

Hope you all have a great week!