Hungry Girl

This weekend, I felt inspired to BAKE!

You can’t have a blog called “No Thanks to Cake” and not have a tendency towards saying “Yes Please” to cake…

Truth be told: I love cake. I love cookies. And… I die for Red Velvet.

But, since I’ve started my healthy living journey, I’ve had to really think about when I want to say “Yes Please” and choose other moments when I say no.

One of the keys to having your cake and eating it too is to come up with healthier alternatives to your favorites, which is what I do best here at NTTC.

Today’s recipe is a twist on a Hungry Girl recipe I tried years ago… pumpkin + cake mix = amazing muffins! Now, considering that it’s Valentine’s week, I decided to make a beautiful red velvet version of this recipe. I hope you love it as much as I do.

Red Velvet Pumpkin Muffins

Adapted from Hungry Girl

Serves 12

INGREDIENTS

1 can pumpkin (not pumpkin pie mix)

1 box Red Velvet cake mix

cooking spray

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Empty your can of pumpkin into a large bowl.

2. Add cake mix and combine with a hand mixer. Note: The batter will be EXTREMELY thick. You will be tempted to add water. DON’T! Just go with it… trust me!

3. Spray a muffin pan with cooking spray and add your batter to the muffin pan, splitting it evenly between the 12 compartments.

Remember, I said the batter would be thick…

4. OPTIONAL STEP: This batter cooks a little differently. Those peaks you see below won’t flatten out, instead they’ll just cook into that shape, like little mountains.

You can make your muffins prettier by smoothing out the tops of the muffins before you bake them. I do this with the back of a teaspoon. Run your teaspoon under hot water, and then use it to smooth down the tops of the muffin. You’ll have to run your spoon under hot water after every second muffins smoothing. In the end, your muffins “batter” will look like this.

5. Bake your muffins at 400 degrees for 20 minutes, and behold the beautiful muffins you will have created…

They’re SO pretty!!!!

And they taste JUST as delicious as they look. Because they’re made with pumpkin, the muffin is quite dense (they actually feel heavy!) and filling as a result. You’re not going to be disappointed, I promise! I’ve also used this same recipe with different cake mixes: Spice Cake and Devil’s Food Cake mixes also make rockin’ muffins… experiment with other flavors, too!

Per 1 muffin serving:

CAL 181; FAT 3.5g; CARB 37g; FIB 2g; PROT 2g; WW Points Plus: 5

Pasta Amatriciana

Watermelon Gazpacho

Creamy Avocado Basil Alfredo

Two recipe posts in a row??? How excited are you?? And how excited was I to get to eat all of this lovely food??

I wish I could tell you that I ate this last night, but I’m blogging to you from the Marriott in Salt Lake City, Utah. I had this tasty dish over the weekend, and thought it really hit the spot!

Today when I go to asian restaurants, I order the steamed chicken and broccoli with no rice, but there was a day where I just LOVED the Orange Chicken… and the Sesame Chicken. Any fried chicken bites in a sticky sauce, we were BFF. So, when I caught HG on the TV a few weeks ago making an innocent version of my favorite treat, I had to try it.

Now, there’s a LOT more ingredients than my usual recipes in this one. However, you very likely have them in your cupboard. I had everything but the onion and the chicken – - seriously!

Hungry Girl’s Sweet ‘n Sticky Sesame Chicken

From Hungry Girl

Weight Watchers Points Plus: 7

Serves 2

INGREDIENTS

10 oz. raw boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into nuggets

1/8 tsp. each salt and black pepper

1/4 cup fat-free liquid egg substitute (like Egg Beaters Original)

1/4 cup whole-wheat flour

1/4 cup fat-free chicken broth

1 tbsp. cornstarch

2 tbsp. sugar-free pancake syrup

2 tbsp. seasoned rice vinegar

1 tbsp. ketchup

1/2 tbsp. reduced-sodium/lite soy sauce

1/2 tsp. sesame oil

1/2 tsp. crushed garlic

1 tsp. sesame seeds

2 tbsp. thinly sliced scallions

Optional: red pepper flakes

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Spray a baking sheet with nonstick spray.

2. Place chicken in a quart sized ziploc bag and season with salt and pepper. Top with egg substitute and toss to coat. Put flour in wide bowl. One at a time, shake nuggets to remove excess egg and coat with flour.

3. Evenly lay on the baking sheet. Bake for 10 minutes, or until chicken is cooked through.

4. To make the sauce, combine broth with cornstarch in a nonstick skillet; whisk to dissolve. Set heat to medium low.

Add syrup, vinegar, ketchup, soy sauce, sesame oil, and garlic. If you like, add a sprinkle of red pepper flakes. Mix well. Cook and stir until thick enough to coat a spoon, 2 – 3 minutes.