THE Low Calorie Recipe Thread of Awesomeness

happysquidmuffin · September 2020

Mushroom Lovers’ Soup
Vegan, low-cal, meal-prep

393 g/ 13.9 oz/ 7 cups sliced white mushrooms
370 g/ 13 oz/ 6 cups sliced brown (crimini) mushrooms
93 g/ 2 stalks/ 1 cup diced celery
24 g/ 4 small/ 1/3 cup chopped green onions
2 tbsp/ 30 g minced garlic
2 tsp Better Than Bouillon Mushroom Base
2 tsp Better Than Bouillon Seasoned Vegetable
2 tbsp/ 10g nutritional yeast
1/4 tsp each black pepper, ground sage, ground thyme
1/2 tsp crushed rosemary
2 tbsp/ 16 g cornstarch
5 cups water, divided

1. Add 1 cup water to large wok or pot over medium heat. Add mushrooms, celery, green onions, & garlic. Cook, stirring intermittently, until the mushrooms start to shrink.
2. Add 3 more cups water. Add the bouillon, nutritional yeast, and all herb seasonings. Bring to a boil.
3. Stir the cornstarch into 1 cup cool water, add to pot, stir frequently. Lower the heat.
4. Simmer until slightly thickened. Remove from heat, let cool, divide into portions.

This is great eaten as is, or served over rice. I have made mushroom gravy/soup many many times, and it’s different every time. Add more vegetables, change up the herbs, the bouillon flavors, use potato starch instead, etc. You could stretch this a lot further by adding 1-2 cups chopped cabbage, and some regular onion. This particular batch was the largest I’ve made so far, with a huge amount of beautiful, gigantic mushrooms.

Yield: exactly 7 cups of soup.
Per 1 cup serving:
54 calories
.2 g fat
9.1 g carbs
4.3 g protein
426 mg sodium
1.6 g fiber
2.3 g sugar

happysquidmuffin · September 2020

Skinny Peanut Buster Parfait

2/3 cup/ 85 g Halo Top Vanilla Bean light ice cream (100 cal)
.75 oz redskin Spanish peanuts (120 cal)
4 tbsp/ 10 g Fat-Free Reddi Whip (10 cal)

Fudge Sauce (30 cal)
2 tsp cocoa powder
1 tsp PB Fit peanut butter powder
1 tsp granulated erythritol
.5 tsp granulated sucralose
.5 tsp sugar
1/16 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp unsweetened vanilla almond milk
tiny pinch xanthan gum

Mix the dry fudge sauce ingredients until thoroughly combined in small container. Add vanilla & almond milk, stir well. Let sit in fridge at least a few hours. It thickens into this lovely, almost pudding-like consistency! Stir well again just before serving.

Layer the ice cream, peanuts, and fudge sauce to your heart’s content. Top with fluffy whip.

Skinny PB Parfait: 230 calories
12.3 g fat
254 mg sodium
29 g carbs
7.3 g fiber
13.4 g sugar
13.3 g protein

Regular DQ PB Parfait for comparison: 710 cal
31 g fat
350 mg sodium
95 g carbs
3 g fiber
71 g sugar
16 g protein

Wow.

PAPYRUS3 · September 2020

regarding that DQ PB Parfait...so scary cause as a little kid, that's what I'd always have when my family went there...

happysquidmuffin · September 2020

PAPYRUS3 wrote: »

regarding that DQ PB Parfait...so scary cause as a little kid, that's what I'd always have when my family went there...

I’ve had my fair share of these throughout my life... I’m just slightly grossed out by the nutrition profile now. I don’t think I can handle that much sugar all at once anymore.
And Dangit!
The Skinny PB Parfait has 260 cal total, not 230. Oops.

PAPYRUS3 · September 2020

^yes...I'm fairly sure that DQ 'thing' wouldn't be very enjoyable for me now either...along with just about all those things I use to love as a kid (cotton candy being one too😫). Thanks for sharing

happysquidmuffin · September 2020

I hate this app almost as much as I love it. Had a post all done, and the app crashed as I was uploading a photo. Not the first time it’s happened either. I was stupid and hadn’t copied my text yet. I wish the app wasn’t so buggy. It crashes on me randomly almost every day. Now I have to start over. /rant

happysquidmuffin · September 2020

I don’t have a stand mixer with a whisk, or a super-duty food processor, or even ice, but I wanted to try protein fluff since I’ve heard good things. Here’s my version with frozen banana.

Banana Protein Fluff
109 g/ 1 medium ripe banana, frozen (97 cal)
85 g/ 6 tbsp nonfat plain Greek yogurt (45 cal)
24 g/ 1.5 scoop Designer Protein Lite Vanilla Cupcake (90 cal)
7.5 g/ 1 tbsp Jello-O Sugar free cheesecake pudding mix (23 cal)
1 tbsp monkfruit (& erythritol) sweetener
.25 tsp vanilla powder (4 cal)
tiny pinch xanthan gum

Add all ingredients (except for xanthan gum) to food processor & blend until smooth & fluffy. Stir in xanthan gum at the end.

260 calories
.4 g fat
24.2 g protein
42.2 g carbs
8.9 g fiber
16.1 g sugar
460 mg sodium

This was very sweet, flavorful, creamy and filling! I was surprised at how long it actually took to eat, and how full I felt after eating it. I remembered to take a photo after I already started eating it, so it’s in a new, smaller bowl so it looked better haha. This was really tasty and I would definitely make again. I think some ice would have added even more volume without compromising the flavor.

On a side note, I bought some monkfruit sweetener to try out and I really like it. It doesn’t have that sweet slight aftertaste of sucralose, and it’s not bitter like stevia. I think stevia is my least favorite. I’ll have to use it up somehow, but I think I’ll be using a lot more monkfruit erythritol. My Winco now carries it in the bulk section.

ssooooz · September 2020

Omlettes are always a winner 😁

sushi9234 · September 2020

I have a low calorie fudgy brownie recipe... Although I did use walden farms caramel sauce on top for extra sweetness

Ingredients:
Dry:
- 1/2 cup rolled oats
- 1/2 cup cocoa
- 1/2 cup sweetener of choice (I used stevia)
- 1 tsp baking powder

Wet:
-3/4 cup yogurt (or greek yogurt)
-1/4 cup almond milk
-1 whole egg or 2 egg whites (only a couple calories of difference here)

Extras:
-walnuts 1/4 cup

Mix and bake 20 mins at 400 F

Calories: about 50 calories per brownie with the walnuts (makes 9)

( You can add other topping but adjust calories accordingly)

happysquidmuffin · January 2021

I’ve been working on an interesting experiment: Cauliflower Noodles.
I just attempted this for a third time (first was ok and second was DISASTROUS), and I think I’m close. My only complaint is that these were a little soft on the bottom and I had to be very careful removing the baked pasta sheet from the parchment paper. Any suggestions for how to get these to cook drier on the bottom without upping the calories significantly would be appreciated.

Caulinoodles

600 g (1 whole small head) raw cauliflower

Wash, cut, and steam the cauliflower until soft. Let cool.
Squeeze the water out of the cauliflower as much as possible using a nut milk bag, reserving the cauli-water in a bowl. Weigh the pulp. Squeeze more water out or add a little water back in to yield 375g.

Put cauliflower pulp into food processor with:
22g/ 6-7 tbsp instant potato flakes
18g/ 2 tbsp arrowroot starch
5g/ 1.5 tsp xanthan gum
40g/ 5 tbsp all purpose flour
1 large egg
1 tbsp liquid egg white

Combine in food processor about 2 minutes, until smooth.
Spread on parchment paper on a cookie sheet (18x12?) as evenly and smoothly as possible. Will cover the entire bottom of the pan. Bake at 300 F for 30 minutes.
Let cool completely. Carefully separate the pasta sheet from the parchment paper. Roll up like a cinnamon roll and cut into thin slices. Unroll the slices into noodles.

The caulinoodles were surprisingly flexible, soft and similar to regular fettuccine, just thicker and less chewy.
I weighed the resulting noodles and the final weight was 300g. Recipe made 3 servings of 180 calories each, which was about 1 1/3 cups. So you get a little more volume for less calories than regular pasta, plus it’s made of mostly cauliflower so that’s pretty cool. Much more nutrient dense!

THE Low Calorie Recipe Thread of Awesomeness

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