Friday, November 13, 2009

Only the Good Friday, November 13, 2009


Nothing like the photo of a cute Grandkid to start off a "Good" post.

I've been fortunate over the years to still be upright. That's "Good" in and of itself. But I have struggled a lot with my attempt to corral my diabetes. I've had periods of time when I've done well as well as periods of time when there has been no control at all. Today, I'm feeling motivated and inspired and that's "Good". It won't help me live forever, but it will make me feel better emotionally and physically while I'm still here. You see, my goal is to live until I die, not just be alive until I die.

So today, for a Only the Good Friday post, a theme started by Shelly Tucker at This Eclectic Life, I'm going to post a recipe for an easy to fix dish that is healthy and "Good". The recipe is in a narrative style, no ingredient lists, baking time etc. Hope that doesn't rattle anyone. If you need a regular Better Homes and Gardens type recipe, let me know, I'll provide one.

Have a great day and find some "Good" in your life today.



Crustless Quiche

Okay, I've eaten myself into a sugar based high that'll have me crashing down to a tired mass laying on the sofa. I'm looking down and can't see my toes. It's time to stop this nonsense and make something good and healthy for myself.

Today, I will make a nice light Crustless Quiche. I say crustless, because I don't need any more pie shell pastry, and a good quiche, made this way, without crust, holds together just as well. For the Diabetic, no crust means no sugared larded flour and therefore less of those dangerous type of carbohydrates.

It's very easy. I use a glass or ceramic deep dish pie pan. I spray it with Pam or wipe it down with Olive Oil and set it aside.

I take eggs, I use between nine and a dozen eggs. I break six of them into a blender. I take the other three to six and separate the yolks from the whites. There are many methods of doing this. I use the shell to shell method because if I miss a bit of yolk, it's no big deal with this recipe. I put the whites and the whole eggs in a blender. I do this to just cut down on some of the calories and the cholesterol.

I also take some cheese. I like to use Swiss, but I also use Muenster. Use any kind you want. Use about an ounce, maybe two ounces tops. Put that in the blender with the eggs. I use soy milk. You can use regular skim, 1%, 2% or Whole milk if you want. If your counting calories, Skim is best. If you are counting carbs, use the soy milk. I like the West Soy brand of Organic Unsweetened Soy Milk. I use about a Cup or Cup and 1/2 of the Milk and pour it into the blender. I find that using soy milk over cows milk is not any different in taste, especially in baking, and gives me health benefits. I also use soy milk on my morning bowl of cereal.


This is the product I use.

I mix on high for a few minutes. It chops up all the cheese and fluffs up the egg and milk mixture. I set this aside and go back to my pie pan.

I use a lot of different concoctions, but with the Swiss or Muenster cheese, my favorite is to use fresh spinach, thinly sliced onions and fresh mushrooms, sliced. I like Portobello mushrooms, but use any kind you want. Simply cover the bottom with sliced mushrooms and put the sliced onions on top of them. Take the spinach and pile it on top of the onions and 'shrooms. This is all fresh, not sautéed or steamed, but raw fresh veggies.

Now, pour the mixture from the blender over the stuff in the pie pan. Try to make sure everything is covered. Push the spinach down into the liquid as you pour it into the pie pan.

In a preheated oven set at 325 degrees, place the pie pan in and watch it. Go check it every ten minutes or so to see if the the center is still liquid. Check with a toothpick in the center, and when it come out clean, the quiche is done.

Take it out of the oven, put it on a rack to cool down a bit. Slice into pie slices and serve. Great with fresh fruit. In Winter, apples and pears slices, maybe a few berries and banana. If you want, sprinkle a little grated cheese on top just before you take it out of the oven.

This is low carb, very low carb. Also low fat. You only used a little cheese and a negligible amount of soy milk. You can eat mushrooms, onions and spinach all day without harm and you only use six whole eggs. That's 1 egg per serving when you slice it into six pieces. No crust, no fat.

Use your imagination and make one with a can of black beans, onions and garlic. (I use those green chiles chopped up in this one) Try the Monterey Jack or Cheddar cheese with that. Serve it with salsa and a dollop of low fat sour cream. Or go with other veggies and combinations. Make them up, just use the same procedure for making it crustless and you'll use less calories and be more healthful. Broccoli/Cauliflower, or green pepper and onion. Roasted Red Peppers. If you use a root veggie like carrots or potatoes, you may want to par boil them a little to take the crunch off of them.

This dish is a meal when served with fruit and/or a small salad. It is very low in calories and low in carbohydrates and fat.

Here is some information about the Soy Milk I use and Regular Milk. Regular milk has a minimum of 11.3 grams of Carbohydrates per Cup for whole milk. Skim is higher, with 11.9 grams per Cup. Soy milk is much lower, west Soy Organic unsweetened, like the kind in the picture, has only 5 grams Per Cup, four of which are fiber. Much of the carbs in regular milk is from sugars. Once again, a big difference on how the different types of carbohydrates affect your blood sugar. This is great information for the diabetic who is trying to lower overall blood sugar.

So, to recap, use eggs, but make some of them yolk less. Use Soy Milk instead of regular milk. Use fresh vegetables and a little cheese instead of a box of Velveeta, and bake this without a crust in a glass or ceramic pie pan. You’ll make a great breakfast, lunch or dinner meal, low in fat and calories and good from the standpoint of glycemic control.

This will get you started on that after focus of eating better overall and losing a few pounds before the holidays. Add a bit of exercise and a few meals per week like this and you have the start of a few pounds slipping away from your body and plenty of energy as the weeks go by.

What’s “Good” about this , at least for me, is that I am thinking about doing something to help myself out health-wise. It also tastes “Good”, and is “Good” for you in many ways. I’ve had a terrible stomach flu all week since last Saturday. I went to the doctor yesterday to find out I have some kind of bug that must run its course. This morning, (and most of last evening), I have felt great, finally. Having lost my appetite while being sick, I have a “Good” start on losing a few pounds and working on my own health, the most pressing problem for me has been my blood sugar control as I am a diabetic. So, this feels “Good”, and it’s exceptionally “Good” that I am doing something about my health.

Sorry I didn't take pictures. I know I need to get better about this as a picture of the bubbly quiche would say a thousand words. Let me know if you try it, and for sure let me know if you liked it. If you have questions, e-mail me or ask in comments.

Peace to All.

8 comments:

I, Like The View said...

lovely granchild!

(-:

I remember, many years ago, making quiche for lunch with a boyfriend and his American friend. . .

. . .the guy was diabetic (it turned out) and, when I was just about to serve lunch, he asked me if there was sugar in the pastry. . .

do Americans really put sugar in pastry?!

I make pastry with 1/2 fat to flour (and the fat is half butter, half lard) - so I said "no"

(when I make quiche, I bake the pastry blind, first, and then brush beaten egg over it and pop it back in the oven for five minutes - to seal the pastry, so it doesn't go soggy when I put the filling)

the boyfriend's friend said it was the best quiche he'd ever eaten. . .

but next time I make quiche, I'll try it your way!

(-:

susan said...

Long ago I knew a very successful middle aged lawyer who had recently been diagnosed with diabetes. For such a smart man he really didn't get the fact he had to start making healthy choices. Instead, he continued eating junk food and injecting more insulin which he thought would act as an antidote to the sugar. It didn't and the results were as you'd imagine.

Your granddaughter is very beautiful and, along with her siblings and cousins, provides a very good reason for you to stay around as long as possible. You also have friends here and in the real world who feel the same way. Nice recipe :-)

Mel said...

No crust equals no flour equals no gluten!
Woooooohooooooo!!!

Here's one I can try--and I will! Mostly cuz I LOVE spinach and mushrooms and onions.
I wonder if I can con himself into quiche for breakfast?!
k....well, lunch perhaps?

Starting off the with cutie and leading into a simple and yummy sounding recipe--VERY good!

Thanks for lightening my Friday evening sir. It was one of 'those' kinda days, so this was indeed welcomed!

(And no, ILTV--I've never put sugar in pastry. But I hear tell some folks do.)

Mel said...

Of course you realize I'm half braindead and little of what I'm typing makes sense....LOL It really was a longggggggggg day!

*hugs*

Spadoman said...

Thank you for stopping by at Round Circle.

I, LTV.... No sugar in the pastry, but carbohydrates are sugar in and of themselves. I worded that wrong when I said "sugared larded flour". It is lard and flour and the "sugar" is the carbs to the diabetic. Anyway, no sugar in any of my recipes for pastry crust.
Your pastry sounds great. I've had plenty of pastry crust in my life. I guess this is an attempt to cut back here and there from time to time for health's sake.
That lovely Grandchild is my youngest and her name is Gracie. I told her that one of my friends thinks she's lovely.

Peace, and thanks again for coming here.


susan... So many smart people find themselves powerless over making realistic and long lasting changes in their lives pertaining to diet and lifestyle. Like your lawyer acquaintance, I am one of them. My first heart attack at 36 years old should have made me do a lot of things differently, but I didn't. Is that the cause of my health problems? Maybe, but maybe not. I don't have an answer of why we know we need to do something but we fail to act. Maybe it's because having diabetes won't kill me today, so I eat a cookie, whereas drowning would, so I stay away from the turbulent stream.
Thank you for your compliment about my youngest Grand daughter. Thank you for your kind words.
Peace.

Mel... Sorry you had a rough day. Glad you got through it. I never thought about the no flour, no gluten thing, maybe this is one you can use. It's really good with whatever you put into the egg mixture. By the way, that soy milk I use is organic soybeans and spring water, that's it!
Take care and be well, thanks for stopping by. Hope your days are better and better.

Peace.

Unknown said...

When the kids were home, I cooked for them. Now that the nest has emptied, I rarely cook. The lack of structure in my eating habits is really showing.

I'm going to try your quiche recipe. It's too easy and yummy to pass up.

Your little granddaughter is a sweetie. She must make you guys so happy. :-)

Roderick Robinson said...

Good technique showing a picture of a grandchild. I work on the principle everybody would rather see Zach than me and it seems to work.

It's tough fighting the flab although for brief encouragement you could ask yourself who needs to see their toes? Back in 1965 I managed to lose 4½ stones (a stone is 14 lb) and I retained a tweed jacket I'd worn at the height of my Man Mountain phase as an awful reminder of what it had once encompassed. But there's a heavy irony about why I put most of it back on. I moved to America!. Ah, the lunchtime cheeseburgers at Riggs Lounge on Pittsburgh's Northside.

I've advanced a cockamamie theory that cutting down on food is harder than cutting down on heroin because you have to eat. As always the argument is never external (eg, You have a grandchild worth living for) it's an internal dialogue between you and the other you. Best of luck, and peace indeed.

On that latter point a friend of mine living in Massachusetts sends me photos of something the vets do in his town every year. Every soldier killed on the allied side, whatever nationality, each gets a large piece of board with his/her name and rank, which is attached to a separate light standard or telephone phone. A lot of effort but not as much as those "names" have put in. Peace again.

Roderick Robinson said...

Should be telephone pole.