I asked around and got some ideas from folks and decided to try Zucchini Spaghetti. Was pretty good. I only sliced up one zucchini, would most likely need two for the amount of sauce made.
I had to go to Bed Bath and Beyond to pick up the Oxo Julienne Slicer needed to make the 'noodles' (Thanks mammoth357 for the info!)
From hyrysk
2 cups/one jar Walden Farms Tomato Basil Sauce
½ cup water
1 Tbsp. Garlic
1 tbsp. Onion powder
½ tsp oregano
Salt to taste
Course ground pepper
½ tsp. basil
1//3 tsp. dried parsley flakes
Pinch crushed red pepper flakes
½ pack of Spleda
Usually let it simmer for 30 minutes or until it starts to thicken a little. If you don’t wan’t to make meatballs. I cook a pound of ground beef and add it to the sauce right before its done.
The noodles (ok, I'm not a real chef, so here goes...) I got a cast iron skillet and put maybe 1/4 of an inch of EVOO, got it nice and hot and put the sliced zucchini until it turned a little translucent. If you cook too long, they just fall apart. The site I got the info on cooking it said to put a slightly smashed clove of garlic while heating the oil, then remove garlic. I tried using garlic powder and it turned into a ball of crud. I put the garlic powder over the dish when done.
Ah, what a nice break from chicken!!!
Slicing up the zucchini and browning ground meat.
Walden Farms tomato sauce with added spices and meat.
ok. I don't know what i am doing wrong. I bought the hand held OXO julienne slicer, but I can't get it to make julienne. ?????
I ended up laying my zuch down on it's side. I was about to cut my fingers off. Just run the thing along one side longways. Make sure the safety plastic is flipped the same way.
Wow, this looks good! I would have never thought of zucchini for the "pasta". I've only substituted with spaghetti squash in the past so this makes for a nice change.
OK...pardon my being a newbie........ How would this be counted in my daily food? Is this used as a dinner because it has 8 oz. of hamburger?
Actually that's a good question. If you used the whole jar of sauce, there should 6 servings of meat sauce (a serving of WF sauce is 1/4 cup to stay within the 0/0/0 rule and the jar serves 6). But 8oz protein spread across 6 servings wouldn't be nearly enough to cover the whole protein allotment for one meal. I'm not sure how you would count it if you actually ate the entire recipe of sauce.
OK...pardon my being a newbie........ How would this be counted in my daily food? Is this used as a dinner because it has 8 oz. of hamburger?
This is how I counted it. The zuch was my veggies, the Walden Farms sauce was ZERO everything, and then the pound of very lean ground beef. I think I will end up with three servings out of this one.
This is how I counted it. The zuch was my veggies, the Walden Farms sauce was ZERO everything, and then the pound of very lean ground beef. I think I will end up with three servings out of this one.
Just be careful when you are doing multiple servings of the walden farms - it's zero everything when you use the serving size on the jar...but they can say 0 calories if it's under 3 cal per serving, and 0 carb if its under 1 carb per serving. They can still add up if you stack servings.
Did you add any other protein? 8oz divided by 3 is 2 2/3 oz of protein, you would need another 4-5 oz protein to meet the IP requirements for dinner.
Not wanting to be a party pooper because this is a great recipe that I will be trying - but it's tough to figure out how to count. I will probably use this as a lunch serving and just eat a smaller protein portion at dinner.
I made this tonight with LizRR's red pepper/tomato puree- it was delish. My husband and I are doing this together, so I made noodles out of one med. zucchini, then made the sauce with 1 roasted red pepper and two plum tomatoes. Put in tons of garlic and italian seasonings throughout. Browned my meat and threw that in and let it simmer while I was cooking my "noodles." It was awesome. So I figure between all of those things, I had four cups of veg (two for each of us) plus the meat. Though we did get a little short-changed, because the three year old had some of the sauce, too (with macaroni, I'm not optimistic enough to give zucc noodles to a toddler!).
It was so, so good. My husband felt like it wasn't enough, he wanted more "noodles"- but I was concerned about keeping the serivings within limits. Not sure I am measuring these vegetables correctly, maybe he could have had more? And it cooked down more than I expected it to, so we lost volume there. But I will definitely make this again. Doing the puree is likely cheaper than WF sauce, and then there are no worries about servings, as long as you're following plan for tomatoes.
