Black as my Soul Tilapia

Yum. Be jealous. I had Blackened Tilapia, Roasted Potatoes and Baby Portabella Mushrooms for dinner. Want the recipe? I know you do.

Blackened Tilapia

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• 4-6 Tilapia
• 2 T Paprika
• 2 t Salt (or to taste)
• 2 t Lemon Pepper
• 1-1/2 t Garlic Powder
• 1-1/2 t Ground Red Pepper
• 1-1/2 t Dried, Crushed Basil
• 1 t Onion Powder
• 1 t Dried Thyme
• 1 C unsalted butter, melted

How to make it

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• Heat iron skillet on high 5 minutes.
• Mix all seasonings in a bowl.
• Dip fillets in melted butter and coat with seasonings. (I drizzle the spices on each piece of fish to get an even coating. Don't be afraid to coat heavily)!!
• Place fillets in hot skillet and cook 2 minutes on each side.
• Makes 4 servings.
• Enjoy!!!

And then, ya know - Baby Portabellas. Again. I know. You can be jealous. I will say - the cast iron skillet is vital to the fish. If you don't have one.....well get one. Not just for this recipe, there are SO many reasons to own a good, heavy bottom, cast iron skillet. Sometimes if you are lucky you can run across them at Goodwill.

I'm also pretty much exclusively using coconut oil for cooking now. I just love this stuff. The research on saturated fats just doesn't work out the way 'They' would like us to believe. Take the time to read it. And using something like corn/vegetable oil? Think about how much WORK has to go into making that. How much work do you think your body has to do to digest that? No thanks!

Mwah! Happy cooking.

When everything seems uncertain....

You can come home and make delicious Vegetarian Enchiladas.

I have this awesome friend that I go to nursing school with, and this is her recipe. I ran across it the other day while cleaning out my inbox (I had asked her for it) and decided that I MUST make it. Try it. Trust me, you won't be disappointed. I am going to simply copy and paste her email in (and add a few notes of my own).

Filling:
One large white onion, chopped (next time, if only for color, I will use a purple onion)
Two sweet peppers (yellow, red or orange), chopped (a green one would add even more color)
8 oz box of cherry tomatoes, cut in half
One can of black beans (drained and well rinsed)
Half of 8 oz bag of cheddar (you will use the second half on top)
Taco seasoning to taste (I used about half of packet of taco seasoning)
8 Burrito sized tortillas
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Saute the onions and peppers until just tender (still slightly crunchy) and then mix together in a big bowl with the rest of the ingredients. (I used coconut oil, about a T to saute the veggies)

Fill eight tortillas, roll up tight and place them in a 9x13 baking dish. Cover with an entire jar of Frontera enchilada sauce (Frontera sauce really makes a huge difference ... it's the tastiest and everything else tastes like butt compared to it, in my opinion). Sprinkle the remaining half of the bag of cheddar on top. Bake at 375 for 30 minutes, and you're done.

I completely agree with her notes on the Frontera Sauce. Unless you have another favorite, you should really try that one. I choose to only make 6 of them, and reserve the remaining filling to put into a Quesadilla the next day. They. Are. AMAZING. I serve them on top of a bed of lettuce with some sour cream. If you are trying to stick to a slimmer amount of calories, you could do them in smaller tortillas, you could use 2% cheese, and I used about a tablespoon of coconut oil to saute the veggies in, you could either use less, or use something a bit lighter. You could serve a decent size salad and you'd be good.  

Because I know that I would be curious - here is the nutritional info. I don't have an after picture. They were gone before I could get the camera out.

Calories		375.1
Total Fat		14.9 g
	Saturated Fat	8.5 g
	Polyunsaturated Fat	0.4 g
	Monounsaturated Fat	2.8 g
Cholesterol		29.8 mg
Sodium		826.4 mg
Potassium		336.5 mg
Total Carbohydrate		44.5 g
	Dietary Fiber	6.5 g
	Sugars	3.3 g
Protein		16.5 g

Hard Week

Lots of .... stuff happened this week. And, at the same time, nothing happened at all.

The Rose has been with her Daddy for the last 10 days. It's been hard to say the least. If you noticed me online a lot more than usual, well that would be why. I knew it wasn't going to be fun, but it was REALLY hard. I missed her. She apparently, gives me a reason to kinda get up and out of bed. And change clothes. Which explains why I haven't really left the house too much, LOL!

The other major reason would have to be because it's my finals week. Lots of studying. But not enough. I got sucked into too many....shall we say side projects? I spent way too much time indulging in the solitude, and not enough time cracking the books. We'll see how my grades reflect.

I cleaned, I made a mess, then I cleaned again. I made a youtube play list. Eh. It happened. And it's about 20 minutes from being over. Then - we head to Michigan for a week. And I am leaping out of my skin excited.