Fast, Easy, Healthy - Peanutty Sesame Noodles

Fast, Easy, Healthy - Peanutty Sesame Noodles Love the peanut sauce and sesame-flavored noodles from your favorite Asian restaurant and wondering how to make it at home? You can use regular spaghetti, some fresh vegetables, and an easy peanut sauce recipe to make it fresh in your own kitchen. The peanut sauce is very similar to what you have tried in Thai and Indonesian restaurants, and it takes just seconds to make, using premade teriyaki sauce, peanut butter, and sesame oil. Make extra sauce and use on chicken skewers, as a vegetable dip, or eat with fresh spring rolls. All the ingredients can be purchased at Trader Joe's. If you like these types of recipes also try the Black Bean Soup.

8 oz (1/2 a pkg) spaghetti 1 cup shredded carrot 1 cup sliced cucumber 2 green onions, chopped 1/4 cup roasted peanuts, crushed (optional) 1. Cook spaghetti according to package directions. Drain and rinse with cool water. Drain and place in large bowl. 2. Pour Easy Peanutty Sauce (recipe below) over spaghetti and toss until evenly coated. Add carrots and cucumber. Toss gently. 3. Top with green onions and crushed peanuts. Easy Peanutty Sauce 1/4 cup Trader Joe's Soyaki, or other bottled teriyaki sauce such as Veri Veri Teriyaki 1/4 cup creamy salted peanut butter 2 Tbsp toasted sesame oil 1/4 cup water 1. Whisk together Soyaki, peanut butter, and sesame oil until smooth. 2. Add water and mix until smooth. Serves 4-6 Variation: For extra protein, add chunks of leftover chicken or pre-cooked Just Chicken About Us: We're the authors of 3 independent Trader Joe's Cookbooks. Everyone loves Trader Joe's for their gourmet bargains, natural healthy products, unbeatable wine selection, and unique products from around the world. Our recipes feature Trader Joe's ingredients, such as sauces and other prepped items, in easy, healthy, and delicious meals that can be made in minutes - perfect for parents and busy people. Our cookbooks are available on Barnes & Noble, Borders, your local bookstore, or via our website Fast, Easy, Healthy - Peanutty Sesame Noodles

Popcorn Recipes - A Healthy Choice

Popcorn Recipes - A Healthy Choice Popcorn is fun and convenient whole grain snacks. It is an excellent source of fiber. It also helps steady one's blood sugar levels. Aside from this, it can be incorporated as a low-fat snack, having a lot of nutritional benefits.

By experimenting with some healthful ingredients on your popcorn, one can achieve a healthy balanced diet without any risks. Below are some of healthy popcorn recipes that can meet your daily needs, for a delicious and quick snack mixture. Peppy Popcorn Preparation Time: 10 minutes Ingredients: o 14 cups popcorn, air-popped o 2 tbsp. parmesan cheese, grated o 1/4 tsp. dried oregano o 2 tsp. paprika In a small bowl, mix oregano, paprika and cheese. Sprinkle these onto the popcorn and toss. It can yield up to 14 cups. You can also melt organic raw cheese with organic milk and pour this over the popcorn. Nutrition Data for 1 cup serving: 30 calories/0.5 grams fat Spicy Peanut Curry PopCorn Preparation time: 10 minutes Number of serving: 1 Ingredients: o 8 cups air-popped popcorn( no oil or salt) o 1 teaspoon chili paste (Sambal Oelek) o 2 tablespoons Better than Peanut Butter o 1 teaspoon curry powder Air-pop about ½ cup of corn kernels. Put peanut butter on a microwave cup. Add sambal with small amounts of water. Stir in order to make out a creamy and thick peanut butter mixture. Microwave it approximately 30 seconds. Fold the peanut butter mixture onto the popcorn. Praline Popcorn Crunch Ingredients: o 12 cups popped popcorn o 1/2 cup margarine o 1 cup firm-pack brown sugar o 1/2 teaspoon vanilla o 1/4 cup honey o 1 cup pecan halves o 1/2 teaspoon baking soda Grease a 15x10 inch baking pan and place the popcorn on top. Combine sugar, honey and margarine in a 1 ½ quart saucepan. Cook and stir constantly with a wooden spoon. Place this in medium heat until it boils. Cook this for about 5 minutes and then remove from the heat. Mix vanilla and baking soda then pour it over the popped corn. Next, add some pecans, stir until evenly coated and bake at 300 degrees for about 15 minutes. Stir gently for five more minutes and lay everything down on waxed paper. Lastly, allow to cool and break into chunks. Popcorn Trail Mix Full Recipe: 1 quart Yield: 3 cups Ingredients: 1 quart air-popped popcorn 8 ounces raisins 6 ounces dried fruit (apricots, apples, etc.), diced Add diced fruit and raisins to a large bowl of popped corn. Combine and toss thoroughly. Nutritional Information (based on 3-cup serving) - Protein 8g; Calories 651; Carbohydrate 162g ; Fat 5g; Saturated Fat 3g; Fiber 15g; Sodium 420 mg. Other nutritional ingredients that can be mix in popcorn are: - 1 /3 cup chopped dried fruit provides iron and fiber - 2 tbsp. soy nuts gives fiber and calcium - 2 tbsp. whole almonds gives protein, iron and fiber - 2 tbsp shredded Parmesan cheese gives protein and calcium - 10 pretzel sticks gives B vitamins - 2 tbsp. pumpkin seeds gives protein and fiber - 1 /2 cup dry unsweetened cereal gives iron and B vitamins While enjoying your favorite movies at home you can prepare popcorn in just a few minutes. There are many ways to include popcorn on one's healthy diet. Popcorn Recipes - A Healthy Choice

Is Butter Healthy?

Butter has been wrongfully accused of being unhealthy for a long time thanks to poor science and shady goings-on.

Before the idiocy and subterfuge, butter was rightly regarded as a healthy and nourishing food. Unlike most of the vegetable oil products on the market today, including canola oil, butter has a long history of safe use and enjoyment by humans. Is Butter Healthy? Oh Yes! 1. Source of the Critical-for-Health Vitamins A, D and K Vitamins A, D and K are three of the most beneficial vitamins for the human body. They work together. Each one is needed to help to utilize and balance the other. Issues of toxicity are not a problem if they are consumed together in natural foods like butter. And you can't find this potent trio in plant foods/oils. Butter that comes from naturally raised, 100% pasture-fed animals, has been found to have higher levels of these crucial vitamins, particularly vitamin K, than butter made from the milk of feedlot animals. If 100% pasture fed butter is too expensive for you right now, or too hard to source, don't worry. Just get the best butter you can afford right now, with nothing more than salt and cream as ingredients, ideally, but a bit of added color isn't necessarily a big concern. You'll still get a fairly high level of nutrient value compared to what you get in most vegetable oils. 2. Nice Balance of Fatty Acids Butter, contrary to what many people have been lead to believe, is not super saturated. Approximately half of the fat in butter is a mix of monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fat, mostly monounsaturated (about 30%). And the omega 6 to omega 3 ratio is quite good in the polyunsaturated portion, which is a plus. That said, there is no reason to fear the saturated fat in butter, particularly the special form of saturated fat that it contains: medium chain triglycerides. Sometimes referred to as "medium chain fatty acids", or simply MCT, this is an easy to digest fatty acid (particularly useful for people with digestive disorders) with notable health benefits. I recommend that you to Google to find out more about MCTs and how they benefit human health, and why butter is a good source. 3. Low in Lactose Due to the very low levels of lactose in butter, lactose intolerant people can usually tolerate butter very well. If not, they can consume butter in the form of good quality ghee. Unlike most of the vegetable oil on the market (including most of the certified organic, minimally processed vegetable oils) butter is a healthy and natural food with a long history of safe use by humans.

My 5 Minute Healthy Chocolate Fudge Recipe - Yes It's Healthy

As a Certified Nutrition Specialist, I like to find ways to prepare delicious foods that most people can't believe are actually healthy for you. If you have a sweet tooth like me, I'm sure you've tried to find ways to still enjoy sweet treats, but also try to make them healthier than typical junk food desserts.

The major problem with most so-called "healthy" desserts is that most companies attempt to make them healthier by reducing the fat content and thereby increasing the sugar content or artificial sweeteners... there's nothing healthy about either of those!

Easy Peanut Butter Cookie Recipe

Below is my famous healthy chocolate-peanut-butter fudge recipe that takes only 5 minutes to make and is really simple. The great thing is that I use no added sugars, no artificial sweeteners, and all healthy fat sources. You'll see why below.

My healthy chocolate-peanut-butter fudge recipe (peanut butter can be omitted if you prefer plain chocolate):

Extra dark chocolate bar (3-4 oz bar works well -- look for at least 70% cocoa content, between 70-85% -- this minimizes the sugar content) 4 or 5 Tbsp of your favorite organic nut butter (almond butter, cashew butter, peanut butter all work well) 2/3 to 3/4 cup of organic coconut milk (great source of healthy saturated fats from medium chain triglycerides - MCTs) 2 tbsp rice bran (additional healthy fiber source) 2 tbsp oat bran (more healthy fiber including soluble fiber) 1/2 cup raw pecans, almonds, or walnuts (yes, more healthy fats, antioxidants, and tons of vitamins/minerals) 1/2 cup dried cranberries or raisins (optional based on your tastes) 1 tsp vanilla extract a little stevia to lightly sweeten (stevia is a natural non-caloric sweetener as opposed to harmful artificial sweeteners)

Start with the coconut milk, nut butter, and chocolate bar in a medium saucepan and put it on the lowest heat possible. Continuously stir as the chocolate, coconut milk, and nut butter melts together. Once these melt together add in all of the other ingredients and stir together very well.

Once everything is mixed well together, spread the mixture onto some waxed paper laid out in a baking dish and throw it in the fridge to solidify.

Now you have some of the healthiest chocolate fudge ever known to man!

Keep in mind that you still need to keep your serving portions small because this is still a calorie-dense snack even though it is super-healthy. The good news is that it is lower in sugar and calories than typical fudge and has loads more nutrition than any typical fudge.

Enjoy! Tell your friends that Trainer Mike Geary gave you this recipe.

My 5 Minute Healthy Chocolate Fudge Recipe - Yes It's Healthy

Check out these 5 tips to Get a Flat Stomach faster with no bogus diet pills or useless "abdominizer" gadgets.

Good luck with your fitness goals!

Mike Geary,
Best Selling Author - The Truth about Six Pack Abs

Easy Ways to Cook Mega Healthy

Cooking healthy is essential for a diet rich in vitamins and nutrition. What we eat improves or damages our health, so it is imperative to cook with health and wellness in mind.

To have a healthy diet, certain ingredients need to be limited when cooking. A typical diet and recipe tend to be high in sodium. Reduce the amount of salt called for in recipes by one-half to one-fourth. You can also try using low-sodium ingredients, like soy sauce and tomato-based products, instead of salt. To limit the amount of fat when preparing dishes, decrease the amount of margarine and butter called for in recipes by at least one-half. Cooking spray is also a much lower fat alternative to oil. (If you choose to cook with oil, use one of the healthy oils, like macadamia oil, peanut oil, canola oil, coconut oil and olive oil. The bad oils that should be avoided are walnut oil, sunflower oil, sesame oil, flaxseed oil and soybean oil.)

Easy Peanut

Adding flavor to food can also have healthy benefits, in addition to a better taste. Garlic has been shown to help heart and digestive problems. It also assists in fighting infections, diabetes and parasites. Lemon juice has been shown to cleanse the liver, fight infections, purify the blood and strengthen bones and teeth. Controlling constipation, gas, bloating, diarrhea and heartburn are other healthy advantages of cooking with lemon juice.

A healthy diet consists of lots of fruits and vegetables, which are rich in vitamins and nutrition. To add more vegetables to dishes, replace some of the meat with vegetables, like broccoli. (Limiting or decreasing the amount of processed meat in a diet also has healthy benefits, as it is said to reduce the risk for cancer.) Choose the leafier, darker vegetables, like spinach, kale and carrots, over lighter ones, like celery and iceberg lettuce. The darker vegetables are much higher in vitamins and provide more nutrition. Also, increase the amount of fruit when you cook by adding chopped fruit to desserts and baked goods. Or better yet, stop cooking desserts and instead serve fresh fruits.

It is important to prepare meals with plenty of fiber for a healthy diet. Fiber is found in the peels of fruits and vegetables, like apples and potatoes, so don't peel fruits and vegetables. Cook beans more often and serve them as a side dish. One cup of kidney beans has 13.1 grams of fiber. Another option to increase the amount of fiber to dishes is to add one tablespoon of flax meal or wheat germ to baked goods.

Food is directly connected to one's health, present and future, so make the most of the meals you prepare. Stop cooking to eat, and begin to cook for better health and wellness.

Easy Ways to Cook Mega Healthy

Gina Clark writes on nutrition and fitness. Visit her blog for healthy tips to improve the quality of your life.