Healthy Cooking for One

It's not always easy to cook a meal for just one. I don't know about y'all, but when I make a regular recipe, I always end up with a ton of leftovers that just go to waste. I forget about things and they get fuzzy in the back of the fridge. Bleack! That's a waste of money and, worse, of food itself.

If an effort to get back on track and make my lap band work as well for me as it should, I'm trying to cook and eat healthier meals. I can eat a lot of veggies if they're tender, and that's not such a bad thing! Today I decided to make my favorite glazed carrots and some spinach with a slightly Asian twist. Everything turned out fabulous!

Glazed Carrots
1 cup carrots
1 teaspoon butter
1 teaspoon minced garlic
1 teaspoon brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon fresh grated ginger
1 tablespoon orange juice.

Cook the carrots in boiling water (or in the microwave if you have one) until just tender. Drain and set aside.

In the same saucepan, melt the butter and gently cook the garlic for a couple of minutes. Add the ginger and cook another minute. Keep the heat low so the garlic doesn't burn. Add the orange juice and brown sugar.Add the carrots and toss to coat. Season with salt and pepper to taste.


Sesame Spinach
1 cup frozen spinach
1 teaspoon minced garlic
couple splashes of soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
1 teaspoon olive oil

Cook the spinach and drain. Set aside. Put the olive oil in a pan and gently fry the garlic for 2-3 minutes. Add the spinach. Season with soy sauce and sesame oil.

This would be excellent with bok choy too, I think.

The carrots have about 110 calories and around 4.5 grams of fat per serving. The spinach has about 81 calories and 7 grams of fat. You could probably reduce the fat by using nonstick cooking spray instead of oil, but things like Pam aren't available to me here in Turkey.

Recipes were analyzed on http://caloriecount.about.com. It's free and you can utilize their food log and activity log as well. Great site!