This creamy white bean chicken chili is a super nutritious meal prep dish. Blending the beans and yogurt provides rich texture without the need for heavy cream.
I love easy recipes that I can batch prep on weekends for meals throughout the week. This white bean chicken chili is super simple and tasty! The beans are an excellent source of healthy carbs including fiber, and also provide some protein on top of the protein in the chicken.
To save time, purchasing pre-cooked chicken is a great option. A personal favorite is Costco’s pre-cooked rotisserie breast meat which doesn’t have the rubbery texture of some of the other pre-cooked options.
I found this dish to be very filling. Strongly recommend topping with some cilantro, habanero for heat, and a dash of mild cheese. Turkey also works great if chicken isn’t handy. For a plant based option, omit chicken (consider extra firm tofu chunks), swap the stock for vegetable broth, and use cashew yogurt instead of plain nonfat Greek yogurt.
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This creamy white chicken chili is a nutritious way to stay warm (and full). By whipping up some of the beans and adding some yogurt, this chili has a rich texture without the need for cream.
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Awarm and satisfying chicken veggie pot pie soup loaded with veggies and classic spices. Heaped with protein and micronutrients!
I absolutely love the flavors in pot pie, so created this healthier soup version loaded with veggies.
To add more color to the soup, I used Trader Joe’s “Carrots of Many Colors” and English peas. Increasing the colors in your diet with a variety of vegetables (and fruits) provides a broader spectrum of plant phytopigments. Many of these compounds (e.g. the polyphenol anthocyanin found in purple carrots), have antioxidant properties.
For the soup base, I used low-sodium chicken broth plus collagen protein as a thickener. Alternatively, you could use chicken (or turkey) stock and omit the collagen. Or, if you want to make a plant-based soup, omit the chicken or turkey and use vegetable broth, and instead add an additional 2 tbsp flour to the base.
Homogenizing the riced cauliflower, broth, collagen, oil, and flour with an immersion blender or in a high speed blender provides the soup a creamier tasting base without the need to add butter. I’m not into having a lot of kitchen gadgets, but if you make a lot of soup or stews an immersion blender is super handy.
Ward off the cold with this warming and satisfying pot-pie soup. It’s rich tasting and loaded with flavorful veggies!
Sweet and and spicy, this instant pot crispy honey chipotle BBQ chicken recipe is a surefire way to kick up the flavor.
The sauce is what makes this crispy honey chipotle BBQ chicken extra delicious. I used G. Hughes BBQ sauce (amazing taste for being sugar-free), however no problem to substitute with a different honey BBQ sauce. Chili powder is optional but adds a nice kick. The collagen acts as a thickener, however cornstarch would work just as well.
The broiling step is completely optional, but worth the extra few minutes to give the chicken a slightly crispy texture. Pair this high protein dish with carb of your choice. I’ve tried with corn tortillas as well as on a bun.
If you’re time constrained or find yourself struggling to plan meals in advance, an Instant Pot is an excellent investment. for fast cooking. It’s perfect for the occasions you have forgotten to thaw out meat in advance. I’ve thrown rock hard frozen chicken breasts in it and had a meal ready in under an hour. 😛 This is the one I have.
This sweet and spicy instant pot chicken recipe is a surefire way to kick up your meal prep flavors. Perfect for tacos or sandwiches.
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These veggie and cheese packed buffalo-style quesadillas are a great swap for typical quesadillas and will also crush a hot wing craving. Serve with veggies and homemade ranch dip.
I created two options for this recipe: peppers only or peppers plus chicken (see notes). The combo of mozzarella and feta make them super cheesy, and the peppers add a nice sweetness in combo with the buffalo sauce. Very filling too!
Cheese & Pepper Only version – 275 kcal, 25g Protein, 18g Carbs, 14g Fat
Cheese, Pepper & Chicken Version – 335 kcal, 35g Protein, 18 g Carbs, 15g Fat
As a basis for comparison, the child size chicken quesadilla from Rubios has 580 kcal, 33g Protein, 49g Carbs, and 29g Fat.
These buffalo-style quesadillas are an awesome swap for typical quesadillas and will also crush a hot wing craving.
Please let me know if you made these and enjoy!
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These lean little turkey burgers pack a lot flavor thanks to Trader Joe’s Green Dragon Sauce.
Lean ground turkey (99/1 or 93/7) is a staple food in my weekly meal prep. Usually I throw it in a pan as-is with whatever seasoning I’m in the mood for….lemon pepper, taco seasoning, hot sauce, harissa, or simple salt and pepper.
One great way to turn ground turkey into a portable snack is to make sliders. For this, my go-to seasoning is Trader Joe’s Green Dragon Hot Sauce plus Everything But the Bagel Seasoning. It takes boring dry turkey and converts it to magical deliciousness – that’s all I’ll say. If I’m in a huge rush sometimes I throw these in a plastic bag and eat as a snack on the road. More often than not, I put them in pitas with some lettuce – and extra Dragon Sauce.
Green Dragon Hot Sauce is a mild sauce, and NOT made with bits of real dragon. No dragons are harmed in the making of these burgers.
Not true.
Important note for this recipe to ensure you get juicy sliders – as you form them in your hands use only your fingertips and just enough pressure to make the shape. We want to keep them airy. If you over-compact the mixture the burgers will turn out tough and dry. During cooking, the patties will puff up a bit, make them flatter again by lightly pressing down on them with a spatula.
An entire 16 oz package of 99/1 lean ground turkey has 104 g of protein, 0 g carbs, and 6 g of fat. I chose to divide the mixture into 11 patties to get just under 10g of protein per burger. Divide how you wish – make fewer or more depending on your plan and how you want to eat them.
Green Dragon sauce is an awesome blend of hot peppers, tomatillos, and garlic that when mixed into extra lean turkey creates a juicy flavorful burger with just a tiny kick of heat. These sliders are great as a stand alone on-the-go protein snack, or in a sandwich. Tasty, simple, and quick weekly meal prep food!
Please let me know if you’ve tried this recipe for your meal prep, and how you like them!
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I’m not ready for Thanksgiving to be over. Seasoned with sage and garlic, this healthy turkey cranberry hash uses riced cauliflower as the base with a bit of crunch from almonds and celery. This dish takes very little time to make and is great for meal prep!
Cauliflower is a staple food in my diet. It is awesomely versatile – on it’s own it has little taste, but readily absorbs other flavors while cooking. Just as importantly, it has an outstanding micronutrient profile with high a content of dietary fiber, Vitamin C, K, and folate.
Frozen riced cauliflower is sold at all major grocery stores, Target, and Costco. I keep a stock in my freezer for whipping up quick meals – all it takes is about 5 minutes in the microwave. If you have the time, you could also buy fresh cauliflower and rice it yourself.
Regarding the macros, I set up this recipe for 20 g of protein, 10 g of fat, and 13 g of carbs for a total of 220 Calories per serving. It is readily adjusted to your needs:
Increase/decrease protein by adding more or less turkey
Increase/decrease fats by modifying the amount of almonds
Increase/decrease carbs by modifying the amount of cranberries
All of the thanksgiving flavors, without the bread, sugar, and extra fats 🙂 This is healthy turkey-cranberry hash uses riced cauliflower as the base. Great for meal prep and makes great use of leftovers! Macros are adjustable to meet your needs.
Please let me know if you tried this recipe!
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Deliciously sweet baked apple stuffed with high protein oat vanilla maple filling. Amazing flavors with a fraction of the sugar and fat!
This is a great snack to get an apple pie a la mode flavor fix with lower calories, while also getting dose of protein. This beautiful treat is delicious direct from the oven or cold. These apples are also highly portable – I’ve been packing them in Tupperware this week as part of my meal prep to snack on after a workout. Half of one of these apples is only 150 Calories.
Honeycrisp apples were used here, but any variety will do. Size and type may impact the baking time; you want the apple to still be a bit firm after cooking.
Given the apple already has a relatively high amount of carbs, I used a minimum amount of rolled oats in the filling mixture – just enough for taste. Steel cut oats also work great if you prefer those.
For the fats I incorporated sunflower butter, however almond butter also works nicely. The addition of hemp hearts adds a delicate nutty flavor and some texture to the filling. Crushed toasted almonds or walnuts would be a great substitute if you don’t care for hemp hearts.
For protein, Trutein Vanilla was used. For the cinnamon, adjust the amount to your liking. After baking, the core is dense and cake-like. The additional filling placed on top of the apple makes it really decadent and its a great dip for the “lid”/top slice.
Given that apple has plenty of natural sugar, to keep the sugar lower I used Walden Farms sugar-free pancake syrup in the filling and also drizzled on top of the apple after baking. Traditional maple syrup or pancake syrup also works if you don’t like the taste of artificial sweeteners (however it will add additional calories).
Enjoy!
High protein baked apple with warm vanilla maple filling.
Give this recipe a try and let me know how it tastes!
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Measuring food: tradeoff between accuracy and practicality.
If you are trying to lose fat or gain muscle you may have received the generalized advice – just eat less, or just eat more. What does this actually mean? It’s an unfortunate oversimplification and we need to go a few steps deeper to make it practical. In order to manage our food intake, we need to have some idea of our current portion sizes, and then adjust them up or down to meet our goals.
After you have determined your total daily energy requirements, you will need to select foods and decide by which method you will measure portions. Without any form of measurement, it is challenging if not impossible to assess caloric intake with any degree of confidence. We need a way to track and be accountable to ourselves.
“What gets measured, gets done”
– William Edwards Deming
There are trade-offs between accuracy and practicality to consider in measuring; at certain times in your long term plan it may make more sense to weigh foods on a scale, while at other times a simple visual estimation with your hand is adequate. Using a food scale is beneficial to understanding exactly what your food portions should look like, and some people desire this higher level of control. Some accuracy is lost by measuring food volume with cups and teaspoons/tablespoons, but it is more practical as most people are already familiar using these tools. If you have never tracked food before or are simply dining out and away from your food scale, the great news is that you have a natural measuring instrument in your hand already…..literally, it’s your hand.
Friends don’t let friends eat nasty chicken! This is a fast, simple method to cook juicy chicken breasts – perfect for weekend meal prep.
Chicken breasts are a staple in my diet, so I make sure they taste good. They are high in protein, lean, and relatively flavor neutral so can be spiced up in almost any combination imaginable.
They are one of those foods that are super delicious when prepared well, but can also be a rubbery or dried out nightmare if not done right. I don’t like eating things that taste like tires, so I went on a mission to identify a fast, failsafe way to cook chicken tenderloins and breasts.
This chicken comes out MOIST, every time. The best part is that you don’t need to turn on the oven or stove…. it’s all about the George Foreman tabletop grill! Using a batch style process, you can cook 1-2 lbs of chicken breasts in less than 30 minutes. I like to use breast tenderloins as it saves me the step of butterflying whole breasts.
In this example, I use just salt and pepper for seasoning however you could use just about anything. I keep a supply of this chicken in the fridge and eat it throughout the week. I usually throw it on lettuce, toss on cooked vegetables, or put in soup. It also makes great chicken salad.
You Will Need:
1-2 lbs of chicken breast tenderloins, or butterflied chicken breasts, fridge temperature
Cutting board
1 extra large bowl
1 piece of aluminum foil
Tabletop grill, such as the George Foreman grill
Canola spray oil
Cracked black pepper and sea salt
Instructions
Lay out the chicken on the cutting board while the grill heats up
Add salt and pepper to the top side of the chicken
Chicken on the grill!
After 4 minutes of cooking
Place cooked chicken in bowl
Cover bowl with foil immediately
Before starting, ensure your chicken is not frozen. It should be cold, at refrigerator temperature. If you are using full size chicken breasts, butterfly them first.
Step 1: Plug in your tabletop grill and allow it to heat up. Do not spray any oil on the grill just yet.
Step 2: Take your chicken out of the fridge and lay out the pieces on a cutting board.
Step 3: Add salt and pepper on the top face of the chicken, amount to your liking.
Step 4: When your grill reaches temperature, lightly spray the top and bottom grill surface with oil.
Step 5: Place your chicken tenderloins, (salt and pepper side down), onto the grill. The size of my grill let’s me cook 6-7 tenderloins at a time.
Step 6: Sprinkle salt and pepper onto the top side of the chicken pieces, amount to your liking.
Step 7: Close the grill, cook for 4 minutes
Step 8: THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT STEP: Remove your chicken pieces from the grill and place them into the large bowl. Immediately cover the bowl with the aluminum foil.
Step 9: Set the bowl aside, and repeat the entire process again for your remaining chicken, making sure to transfer each batch to the bowl and re-covering with the foil immediately after.
NOTE: allow the entire covered bowl of chicken to come to room temperature on the countertop before transferring to a storage container and putting in the fridge. This resting time ensures the chicken stays juicy. Note that the bowl will contain some extra juices, which you can also dump into the storage container and use when you eat.
Enjoy and let me know if you tried out this method!
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A brief review of rice. Is brown or white better for you? What kind should you be eating?
Anatomy of Rice
Brown rice is a whole grain; white rice is basically naked brown rice. During the milling and polishing process the bran (the “brown” of brown rice) and germ are removed, leaving only the endosperm. The bran is a protective layer that contains some fiber, vitamins, and minerals. The germ contains a little bit of fat, protein, and some other micronutrients.
My second grade drawing showing components of a rice grain.
Nutritional Comparison
Utilizing the USDA FoodData Central database, I generated the table below for side-by-side of 100g cooked long grain brown rice versus 100g cooked enriched long grain white rice. Numbers noted in parenthesis are the percentage of the US Recommended Daily Intake (RDI) for each vitamin and mineral. Vitamins and minerals that had a value of zero or in cases where there was no difference between white or brown the two were omitted so that we can focus on differences.
Fiber: White rice has less fiber than brown rice, but overall rice is generally a lower fiber food. Eat vegetables and fruits regularly and the amount of fiber in serving of white or brown rice will play a minor role in your daily fiber intake. That being said, foods containing fiber are generally more more satiating and blunt glycemic response, so brown rice may be a better option if you are working on losing weight or are at risk of Type 2 diabetes. Less fiber can also be a good thing; white rice is friendlier to digest if you are having gut issues.
Vitamins and Minerals: As you can see it’s a mixed bag with brown having higher content of certain vitamins and minerals in some cases, and fortified white in other cases. If you have a relatively balanced diet and/or take a multivitamin, I would not be too concerned with these differences as you decide what type of rice you want to eat.
Glycemic Response: Glycemic Index (GI) and Gycemic Load (GL) are gauges to understand the impact of a food on blood sugar levels. GI is a comparison against 50g of a reference food (glucose, score 100), whereas GL is a more practical because it takes into account the portion size of a food. Glycemic Load = GI/100 multiplied by the net grams of carbohydrate in the serving (net excludes dietary fiber).
GI and GL are slightly higher for white rice, which you may want to take into consideration if you are at risk of Type 2 diabetes. Based on current research, eating brown rice helps support lower blood sugar levels and reduces the risk of Type 2 diabetes. However, it’s also important to place GI and GL within context of practical eating. These measurements are taken on isolated foods – I don’t know about you but when I have rice, I’m not just eating rice. I’m usually eating it with vegetables, meat, or other things. These “mixed meals” have a high influence on digestibility and therefore can change/blunt the glycemic response.
Other Notes
The naturally occurring metalloid Arsenic is found in both white and brown rice, but is higher in brown rice. Arsenic is toxic to humans and associated with certain cancers, heart disease, and Type 2 diabetes. Presently, consensus is the benefits of rice in our diet outweighs the Arsenic risk; eating rice in reasonable amounts is acceptable. As a risk mitigation ensure your diet is not based too heavily on rice, and reduce exposure level by thoroughly pre-washing your rice (Arsenic is water soluble). Arsenic aside, I wash my rice anyway because it provides a fluffier texture.
Brown rice contains lignans, natural polyphenol compounds that some studies indicate protect against heart disease and can lower total cholesterol. Other health-protective benefits may come to light as further research is conducted.
Key Takeaways
Both white and brown rice are excellent carbohydrate sources. There is no reason to restrict yourself to one type as a healthy adult in a balanced diet.
Brown rice is more micronutrient dense, however these differences do no warrant selection of one type of rice over another.
If you are trying to lose weight, brown rice may be a better option as the high fiber content can provide a greater feeling of fullness.
If you are are risk for Type 2 diabetes or cardiovascular disease, or have high cholesterol, studies indicate that brown rice may be a better option provided consumption is within recommended servings.
Like all foods, eat reasonable portions and do not rely on rice as a main source of nutrition.
