Turkey

We try to eat healthy when we can.  One of the many things we have done to add a dash of "better for you" into our meals, is replacing a lot of ground beef, with ground turkey.

My favorite would be the turkey tacos.  They do not taste any different!  They are delicious!  Another thing for taco night, to cut out a million more calories, and fat, from my meal, is to replace the sour cream with plain non-fat greek yogurt.  It tastes a little different, but with all the taco seasoning (which I make at home, it is really, really easy!) you really don't notice it.  I love my sour cream, even with french fries, or chips, so I promise, I am not lying about the yogurt on the tacos.

Turkey Tacos: (sorry I don't have pics, but turkey night isn't until next week)

1 lb ground turkey

1 tbl chili powder
.5 tsp paprika
.5 tsp garlic powder
.5 tsp onion powder
.25 tsp crushed red pepper
.25 tsp oregano
1.5 tsp cumin (When I open this up, Joshua and I both exclaim that this is where tacos come from)
1 tsp sea salt (We use sea salt, you can use whatever.  I have tried garlic salt, it wasn't bad)
a dash of black pepper (or more to taste)

Shells, or tortillas, or bowls (whatever you want!  Sometimes we just have taco salad, with cool ranch Doritos.  Well Joshua does, I don't like Doritos, so I use tortilla chips)

Combine the seasonings in a small bowl.  Cook the turkey in a skillet, or wide shallow pan, until completely cooked.  I do it over a med-high heat.  Then add in the seasoning mixture.  I don't usually drain anything, because there isn't much to drain, and when I add in the seasoning mixture, it soaks it up, while it flavors the turkey.  Sometimes you might need to add a little water to the pan, if the seasoning is too thick on the meat.  Sometimes I have had to do this, and sometimes I have not.  I have not changed anything that I am aware of.

Fill up your ______ (<--- insert bowl, shell, tortilla, etc) and enjoy!

Some toppings I enjoy are refried beans, black olives, plain non-fat, greek yogurt, Ortega taco sauce (mild), Mexican blend shredded cheese, and recently I tried avocado.  :)




Another one of our favorites, turkey spaghetti!  The same concept applies.  You just replace the ground beef, with ground turkey.

Last night however, I tried something new.

I tried turkey meatballs!  They were a big success!
I used a recipe I found on Pinterest.  The actual recipe is gluten free, and calls for a couple gluten free ingredients.  I wish I could have made them how they were intended, but I didn't have everything, and it was too cold to venture out yesterday.

This image is from the blog Because of Madalene, which is also where the recipe is from.  In case anyone wanted to try the gluten free recipe.

Here is what I made (sorry again, no pictures, we just ate it too fast, and dinner was after 8 last night because of meetings at Joshua's new job).

Turkey Meatballs

preheat the oven to 350

1 lb ground turkey (make sure it is thawed, if you are like me and freeze most of your meat)
1 slice of wheat bread (cut into small cubes, about half an inch)
2-3 tbsp 2% milk (depending on your size bread, ours took 3)
1.5 tsp garlic powder
.5 tsp garlic salt
1 small handful of shredded cheese (we used asiago, but I think any that you prefer would be fine)
1/4 C. Italian bread crumbs
dried oregano
dried basil
ground black pepper
extra virgin olive oil

(for the oregano, basil, and pepper, I let Evelyn help, so we did not follow a precise measurement, just a few shakes of each)

Take your bread cubes, and put them in a small bowl.  Add the milk to it, and let it absorb.  If you need more milk, add more, but you basically want the bread to be swollen with all of the milk, so it starts to fall apart.  But not too much milk, or it will just be swimming.  Let it sit about 4-5 minutes.

While it is sitting, gather all of your other ingredients into a med-large mixing bowl.
Don't mix them until you add the soaked bread cubes.
Then just use your hands, and blend the mixture until it is well incorporated.  Madalene instructed on her blog, that you wouldn't want to over mix, or you would get tough meatballs.  So I tried to be focused on blending, but not overly mixing.

When your mixture is complete, heat some EVOO in a skillet, or shallow, wide pan.  I used enough to coat the bottom of mine, and heated it under medium-high heat for about 1 minutes.  Then I started rounding the meat, into little balls (I made mine about an inch and a half big).  I covered the pan with them.  I cooked  the bottom side for about 2 minutes, then I flipped to the other side for another 2 minutes.

While they are cooking in the pan, prepare your cookie sheet.  I usually put foil on top, for easy clean up.  When they are done on both sides (the other sides of them will start cooking because of all the other meatballs in the pan heating them), scoop them up (with a spoon, not your hand!) and put them on the cookie sheet.  Then pop them in the oven for about 8-12 minutes (depending on how hot your oven gets, or how big your meatballs turned out to be).

While they were cooking, I made my spaghetti.

When they were done, I put them on a plate with paper towel, to cool off a little.  While they were cooling, garlic bread went into the oven for about 10 minutes.

Everything came together, and was ready at the perfect time :) just 2 minutes after Joshua walked in the door, yay!  Then we stuffed our faces until I couldn't move.  Evelyn had 4, seriously, 4 meatballs all of her own.  On top of her dinner.  So I would say this was a good meal, and we will make it again.

It was so easy!


I love it when it becomes easy to be at least a little healthier :)