Simple Crock Pot Italian Wedding Soup with Kale

I just came back from a month long trip to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where I was born and raised. We have an amazing soup there called Italian Wedding Soup, which, I just found out, is not actually Italian.

At any Italian restaurant (or often any restaurant) in Pittsburgh, you can order a bowl of Italian Wedding Soup. My favorite kind is the light version served at the chain restaurant Olive Garden. Since I was not very cultured and didn't travel much before moving out of Pittsburgh, when I went to the Olive Garden in California I tried ordering Wedding Soup. It's not usually on the menu in Pittsburgh because it's such a popular item and everyone knows it's there--you just have to ask for it. But the California waiter had no idea what I was talking about.

I always thought Italian Wedding Soup was an Italian tradition. Though, apparently, Italian Wedding Soup is a Western Pennsylvania tradition started by immigrants to the area. According to my quick research, Italian Wedding Soup is a mistranslation of a soup called "marriage soup," which is actually Spanish.

Here is a quick version to make in the crock pot using kale instead of the traditional spinach. Italian Wedding Soup is usually made with really tiny meatballs and pasta. Unless you make the meatballs yourself, you might not be able to find them small enough, but you can always cut slightly thawed frozen Italian meatballs into quarters before putting in the crock pot.

Ingredients:

1 small package frozen italian meatballs (15-20)
5 oz can low sodium chicken, rinsed and drained
32 oz chicken broth
2 cups kale, stems removed and chopped (can also use spinach)
1 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 yellow onion, chopped
1/4 cup-1/2 cup pastina pasta
parmesan reggiano for serving

Directions:

1. Add meatballs, chicken, broth, spices, and onion to slow cooker and stir to combine. Cook on high for 3 hours.


2. Add pasta and kale (or spinach) to the pot, and cook for an additional hour on high. Serve
topped with parmesan reggiano if desired.

Chicken and Rice Casserole with Almond Milk

I'm still waiting for Campbell's to come out with a soy or almond milk based cream canned soup. I'd be able to make all of my favorite comfort food recipes in a cinch. Although, making it yourself is probably healthier and more delicious, even if it's a bit more time consuming. I love this chicken and rice casserole dish because it's basic and simple. The almond and broth base is just what I use in my Dairy Free Broccoli Cheddar Soup and Green Bean Casserole recipes, and it's applicable to any recipe that calls for a cream based condensed soup.

I usually stick with the simplest form of this recipe since I am a busy working girl and have little patience for vegetable peeling and chopping, but you can add other vegetables to this dish to make it colorful. Chopped celery is an easy one, but I also thought of using frozen mixed veggies, broccoli, kale, and even sun dried tomatoes. Mixing in some fresh chopped herbs makes it fragrant and pretty. The recipe I used here is the most basic way I would make it. 

The most important aspect is the flavoring and thickening of the almond milk, to give it the consistency and taste of a cream of chicken soup. I definitely recommend almond milk over another dairy free milk for it's flavor.

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon minced garlic
2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 yellow onion, chopped
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, quartered
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 cup uncooked brown rice
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
1 cup sweetened almond milk
2 tablespoons fresh parsley, coarsely chopped
*Optional: shredded carrots, chopped celery

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. In a large saucepan, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add onions, salt, pepper, Italian seasoning, and paprika and cook for about five minutes or until onions are tender. This is also where you should add any other vegetables you wish to include in the dish. Add minced garlic and cook for 30 seconds more.

2. Add 2 tablespoons of flour to the onion and spices mixture, stirring quickly to combine. Cook for 30 seconds to a minute, and then slowly whisk in chicken broth until well combined.

3. Next, stir in almond milk and 1 cup of uncooked brown rice. Remove from heat and pour mixture into a large casserole dish.

4. In a nonstick pan, heat additional olive oil over medium high heat. Add chicken breasts and a dash of chicken broth and sear until lightly browned, about 2 minutes each side. Remove from heat and place chicken breasts on top of rice mixture in casserole dish.

5. Cover the casserole dish in foil and cook for 45 minutes. Rice will be fluffy and chicken moist. Top with fresh parsley.

        

Dairy Free Chicken Broccoli Alfredo

I love cheesy pasta dishes. I was disappointed when I went back to Pittsburgh in August and had lunch at one of my favorite restaurants, Joe Mama's, realizing that all of my usual orders were smothered in cheesy sauces: Hug Yo Belly Gemelli, Herbed Chicken and Penne, Nonna's Gnocchi... Another Pittsburgh restaurant, Eat 'n' Park, was a common place for me and my husband to go for a quick lunch or dinner. Our usual was their Chicken Broccoli Alfredo. In college we loved to go to The Underground at Carnegie Mellon, where we would get a plate of hot pasta topped with creamy Alfredo sauce and marinara. The point is, I used to order Alfredo all the time.

I gave it up for awhile, refining my tastes by ordering complex pasta dishes at Italian places and trying new things with more nutrion. But lately I've been craving cheesy things. The only solution to that is to experiment with dairy alternative products and to create masterpieces. My dairy free chicken broccoli Alfredo is definitely a masterpiece. It tastes better than the real thing and I'm serious. I could eat this everyday!

I used the best tasting dairy free alternatives: Smart Balance Light Buttery Spread, Blue Diamond Almond Breeze Almond Milk, and Tofutti Better Than Sour Cream. Aged parmesan cheese has very little lactose, 0mg per serving, so it's not going to bother lactose intolerant people in small amounts. In large amounts it will, so if you eat a lot be careful or take a Lactaid pill. It can't be eaten by people with a milk allergy. For a completely dairy free version, I recommend using Vegan Grated Parmesan Cheese Alternative by Galaxy Nutritional Foods. There's also a parmesan cheese alternative on the market called Parma!. It's made with walnuts, salt, and nutritional yeast. I haven't tried it yet but I'll blog about it when I do.


Ingredients:
3 tablespoons Smart Balance Light Buttery Spread
1 cup almond milk
1/2 cup Tofutti Better Than Sour Cream
1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon water

1/3 cup parmesan cheese or parmesan cheese alternative
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley, plus more for garnish


2 chicken breasts, sliced and grilled
1/2 lb of linguine
1 1/2 cups fresh broccoli

Directions:

1. Make sure your chicken breast is cooked or almost finished before starting the sauce, pasta, and broccoli. I cut mine into four thin strips and grilled them with my George Foreman Grill the same time I started the pasta. I also recommend broiling for a grilled chicken taste. Start pasta by following the directions for cooking on the back of the box. Prep broccoli for quick light microwave steaming by putting it in a dish with a tablespoon of water and covering it.

2. Once your pasta and chicken are cooking, start the sauce. Melt Smart Balance in a large saucepan over medium heat. After it is melted add almond milk, sour cream, and garlic powder. Whisk to combine.
                          
2. Dissolve the cornstarch in water in a small dish and gradually add to milk mixture, whisking constantly to avoid lumps. Bring sauce to a simmer. Cook for five minutes or until mixture has started to thicken. Add parmesan cheese and whisk to combine.
                         
3. While the sauce is thickening, steam fresh broccoli for two minutes in the microwave. Go back to the sauce, remove from heat, and stir in 1 tablespoon of fresh parsley.

4. At this point, you can cut your chicken into small strips and combine all ingredients in the saucepan to coat with the Alfredo sauce, or you can layer them: pasta, chicken, broccoli, and sauce. Garnish with a sprig of parsley and mangia!

Dairy Free Chicken Pot Pie

Chicken pot pie is the perfect comfort food for a cold winter night, unless you're lactose intolerant. Then it can be quite uncomfortable. Most recipes call for milk, cream, or creamy condensed soup. Here's a simple pot pie recipe that I crafted to be dairy free! It's also very good for you. A chicken pot pie made with ingredients that are not low in sodium can contain over 1,000mg of sodium in a single serving. All that salt is unnecessary! Replace it with flavor. There are a few extra steps than the canned soup method, but it's still fairly simple and totally worth it. Remember to rinse your shredded chicken breast after draining the liquid from the can to reduce the sodium content.

Ingredients
1 box refrigerated pie crusts, softened (FYI: Pillsbury crusts contain hydrogenated oils which = trans fat)
3 tablespoons Smart Balance Light Buttery Spread
1/2 yellow onion, chopped
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups low sodium chicken broth
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
1/8 teaspoon ground sage
1 12.5 oz can Valley Fresh low sodium chicken breast, drained and rinsed
1 4.5 oz canValley Fresh low sodium chicken breast, drained and rinsed
2 cups frozen mixed vegetables, rinsed (corn, peas, carrots, green beans, lima beans)

Directions

1. Heat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit. Place one pie crust inside a 9 inch glass pie pan--don't trim excess just yet!

2. In a large saucepan, melt Smart Balance over medium low heat. Add chopped yellow onion, sea salt, and pepper, and cook until tender, about 2 minutes.









3. Stir in flour until blended, and quickly follow with chicken broth, gradually adding the broth while stirring constantly. Add thyme and sage. Cook for about two minutes or until mixture starts to bubble and get thick.

4. Stir in shredded chicken and mixed vegetables until well combined. Let cook for two more minutes, stirring frequently.

5. Remove from heat and spoon complete mixture into prepared pie crust. Top with the second pie crust and seal the two crust together with a fork. Fold the extra over and under the edge of the pie pan. This will prevent the crusts from separating while baking. Trim the excess dough underneath the edge.

6. Cut five slits in the center of the pie to let steam escape. Bake fifteen minutes to brown crust, then reduce heat to 350 and cook for twenty-five to thirty minutes. If crust starts to burn, you can carefully cover the edges with foil. Let pie stand for at least 10-20 minutes before serving. The longer it sits the easier it is to serve, but if you are really hungry you should just dig in.

Dairy Free Buffalo Chicken Dip

I never thought I would be able to eat this stuff again! I mean, the main ingredients are three types of cheese. I used a combination of cream cheese alternative and non dairy cheese to make this highly addictive dip much healthier than it's original version. It's completely free of lactose, trans fat, and the only cholesterol in it is added by the lean chicken! It tastes so amazing and so close to the original version you won't even notice the difference! Even if you can eat dairy, don't eat the regular version of this dip again--this recipe eliminates so much of the fat and cholesterol that you should not be putting into your body. Trust me, this is good.

Ingredients

• 8oz This Is Not a Tub of Cream Cheese This Is a Tub of Non Dairy Spread from Trader Joes
• 2-3 tablespoons Franks Red Hot Sauce (depending on how spicy you want it)
• 5oz canned chicken
• 1/3 cup Daiya Chedder Style Shreds

Directions
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.



2. Soften the cream cheese alternative in the microwave for 30 seconds, then mix all ingredients together until well blended. It's easier to blend if you mix the cream cheese and Franks first.


3. Bake for 20 minutes to melt it all together and OMG the result is divine. Enjoy with some lime tortilla chips and tell me how much you love it.

Pesto Chicken with Sun Dried Tomatoes and Pine Nuts

Relief for the Lactose Intolerant:

One of the saddest parts about being lactose intolerant is the inability to eat cheese. I really miss it. This is especially difficult when favorite foods contain cheese, like pizza for instance. Fortunately, there are options! My love for pizza and other cheesy recipes has led me to discover many delicious modifications that, though they will never be the same, are still good replacements that leave me quite content. 

Soy cheese is a great discovery, although the soy flavor is too overpowering to enjoy by itself. When it is combined with other flavors, however, it makes a great cheese replacement. I have some amazing pizza recipes coming up that use a mixture of soy mozzarella cheese and goat cheese crumbles to replace real mozzarella. It is more than delicious and also a much healthier option, since much of the fat from the cheese is eliminated. It's practically grease-less pizza! Goat cheese contains less lactose than soft dairy cheese, and when used sparingly (or with the help of a Lactaid), can be digested without any problems.

Also, lactose intolerant people can handle small amounts of Parmesan Cheese, and other hard, aged cheese because most of the lactose is broken down in the aging process. Actually, the harder the cheese, the older it is, the lower the lactose. It's even better if it's aged goat cheese! So while a piece of cheese pizza leaves me in agony for hours, a piece of eight month old Parmesan cheese or Aged Goat Gouda is just fine, and helps to satisfy that cheese craving. That being said, it is okay for lactose intolerant people to use Parmesan or Parmigiana Romano Cheese in their recipes, as long as they don't overdo it. Pesto sauce is acceptable, as long as it is not mixed with butter and cream, which some recipes call for and many restaurants use.

This Pesto Chicken recipe only contains a small amount of aged Romano Cheese--store bought pesto sauces usually contain it. You can make your own pesto sauce without cheese, but if you are a busy girl, you don't really have the time or patience to do this. I do have a simple homemade pesto recipe, but I would much rather use the already made, digestible,  and conveniently available Classico Pesto, which you can find at your local supermarket.

Pesto Chicken with Sun Dried Tomatoes and Pine Nuts

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts, sliced in half to make four thin pieces
Pre-made Pesto Sauce
1/2 cup julienne cut sun dried tomatoes
2 teaspoons olive oil
3 tablespoons pine nuts


Directions
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. 
2. In a small bowl, drench the sun dried tomatoes in the olive oil and leave them to soak for a minute.
3. Line a large glass baking dish with foil, and place the sliced chicken breasts so that they do not overlap.

4. Use a basting brush to brush each side of each chicken breast with a generous teaspoon of pesto sauce.

5. Top each chicken breast with the olive oil soaked sun dried tomatoes.

6. Cover the dish with foil, and bake for 25 minutes.


7. While the chicken is baking, toast pine nuts in a small pan over medium heat for five minutes or until light golden brown. They will toast quickly, so be careful not to burn them, and you also may want to make more, because you will eat them as you are waiting for your chicken to cook.


8. When baking time is up, remove foil and top the individual chicken breasts with the toasted pine nuts. Serve with a green vegetable or a serving of pasta. Simple, healthy, and delicious!