I have to admit every so often I’m tempted by my boys Mac N Cheese. Something about that cheese and pasta brings back those childhood memories of comfort. But as you know I try to avoid pasta, it is one of the things you have to be very careful with a Lapband.

I was staring at my second half of a spaghetti squash sitting on my counter and had an epiphany. I realized with spaghetti squash I may not get that perfect little macaroni texture but I could get that ooey gooey cheesey yumminess with a cheese sauce on the squash.

One thing you have to do when you have made the choice to live a healthier lifestyle is find replacements for food that you love. But this does not mean that you have to give up flavor, actually you may find things that you will love even more than the original food. This recipe is a good example of this. When you try a real cheese sauce versus the packaged powdered you will never go back!

Pepper Ferguson

Healthy Mom = Healthy Family - That is my life motto and I hope to encourage it to be yours too. January 2011 I made the decision to lose weight and lost 80+ pounds. I saw my boys start getting active with me and I realized I wasn't only changing my life but also my boys.

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One of our families favorite recipes, before eating healthier, was baked nachos. But once you start counting calories and looking at carbs, you realize chips are really hard to fit into a low calorie diet.

So nachos have been one of those things that we gave up, until now!

I have been trying to figure out good substitutes for things we have eaten in the past or things I have been craving. Well I have been craving chips. I found out that you can eat a whole bell pepper for less than 50 calories and it fulfills that crunchy savory craving.

But then it came to me why couldn’t you use bell pepper for chips in recipes also. You could serve them with dip at parties or even make baked nachos!

Pepper Ferguson

Healthy Mom = Healthy Family - That is my life motto and I hope to encourage it to be yours too. January 2011 I made the decision to lose weight and lost 80+ pounds. I saw my boys start getting active with me and I realized I wasn't only changing my life but also my boys.

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One of the things that has been hard to let go of on my low carb diet is pasta. But I have found some alternatives to the traditional recipes that are lighter and healthier. Most do not include pasta but this one does include noodles, egg noodles.

I’ve considered making lasagna with zucchini “noodles” but hubby just doesn’t love zucchini, so instead I created this recipe for him. The recipe below asks for diced tomatoes, but I don’t include those for him as he doesn’t like tomato chunks. So they are optional if you are a tomato person.

This is one of the recipes that I am making a large batch at the beginning of the week and reheat it for the night hubby is at school. This recipe is amazing reheated! The flavors just meld and grow as the soup sits in the fridge, so make a little extra so you have leftovers!

I used this amazing meat I found at the store Jenny O Italian Seasoned Ground Turkey. Wow that meat is just filled with flavor and is so good. But if you cannot find this at your local store grab a package of turkey sausage.

Pepper Ferguson

Healthy Mom = Healthy Family - That is my life motto and I hope to encourage it to be yours too. January 2011 I made the decision to lose weight and lost 80+ pounds. I saw my boys start getting active with me and I realized I wasn't only changing my life but also my boys.

More Posts - Website - Twitter - Facebook

I was on Facebook and this post popped up showing Healthy Fettuccine Alfredo. l I’ve been thinking about making a white sauce for spaghetti squash for while. I went to check out Lindsay’s post and I was intrigued by her idea of creating a white sauce with cauliflower being the base.

I thought about making her recipe and just trading out the pasta with spaghetti squash, but I ended up making a few more alterations to suit my diet. I needed to get some more protein in the recipe plus I made my recipe make fewer servings as I will probably be the only one eating this in my household.

This turned out amazing! I will have to try using cauliflower for some more sauces, the flavor was so slight I didn’t even notice it. My sauce turned out pretty garlicky, so I changed the name of my recipe, but I love garlic! I did have one follower on Facebook ask if you could taste the greek yogurt. Yes there is a bit of tang to it. If that bothers you can cut the greek yogurt back to 2 tablespoons and consider adding 2 tablespoons of heavy cream.

Pepper Ferguson

Healthy Mom = Healthy Family - That is my life motto and I hope to encourage it to be yours too. January 2011 I made the decision to lose weight and lost 80+ pounds. I saw my boys start getting active with me and I realized I wasn't only changing my life but also my boys.

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Happy Dr Seuss Day!

Isn’t it just perfect that Dr Seuss Day landed on a Friday! Here we are on Frittata Friday and I made this frittata to use for a St Patrick post, but then realized it’s perfect for Dr Seuss Day.

I thought this might be a good way to try and sneak some greens into my boys. Zane didn’t like them – Zarek did, but don’t listen to Zane he doesn’t like kiwis because they are green.

I thought for fun I would interview Zane about Dr Seuss and Green Eggs and Ham since he is just starting to learn to read and is really getting into these books!

Interview with Zane:

What is your favorite Dr Seuss book?

Green Eggs & Ham

Why do you like that book?

Because Sam is so funny because he thinks Cat in the Hat likes green eggs and ham.

Did you try green eggs?

Yeah, but I didn’t like them.

Why do you think it is important to try new things?

Because you might want to know if you like it.

Pepper Ferguson

Healthy Mom = Healthy Family - That is my life motto and I hope to encourage it to be yours too. January 2011 I made the decision to lose weight and lost 80+ pounds. I saw my boys start getting active with me and I realized I wasn't only changing my life but also my boys.

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This is such a quick and easy meal – plus it would be an awesome one to add to your freezer for those crazy days. You can quickly make up a couple batches place them in Handi Foil’s awesome containers with lids and toss them in the freezer for days you don’t want to cook.

This is such an awesome recipe that both my boys enjoyed it! Even crazy picky Zane, it did take about 15 minutes to get him to try it, but that child just is not a meat eater (my husband is baffled by this). But after he ate it he gobbled the rest down. So I promise this is a very kid friendly recipe!

This post was sponsored by Handi Foil, all opinions are my own.

Pepper Ferguson

Healthy Mom = Healthy Family - That is my life motto and I hope to encourage it to be yours too. January 2011 I made the decision to lose weight and lost 80+ pounds. I saw my boys start getting active with me and I realized I wasn't only changing my life but also my boys.

More Posts - Website - Twitter - Facebook

I am currently working on making large batches of one dinner to serve on the nights that TJ, hubby, is at school. I was just finding it too hard to get the energy and motivation to cook on the nights he didn’t come home in the evenings. I was making bad choices and just snacking through the evenings, which then led me to have trouble calorie counting, then I just gave up and ate whatever.

It’s time to start battling the evening meals and the evening snacking! So on Sunday I make a large meal – so far I have been focusing on soups. Then on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays I eat that meal.

I thought for sure I would hate it by Thursday, but it has been great. With the soups I can add different toppings or if its a chunky soup I have even served it on top of spaghetti squash.

You can either serve this soup as a chunky broth based soup or pull out your hand blender and blend it to a smooth creamy soup. The seasoning in this also has a nice bite to it, but feel free and alter the cayenne pepper to change the heat. I actually topped the bowl pictured above with some greek yogurt (you can use sour cream if you want to), it was so good!

Pepper Ferguson

Healthy Mom = Healthy Family - That is my life motto and I hope to encourage it to be yours too. January 2011 I made the decision to lose weight and lost 80+ pounds. I saw my boys start getting active with me and I realized I wasn't only changing my life but also my boys.

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As I was researching tortilla soups and what makes a tortilla soup I learned a lot. There seems to be two different thoughts on Chicken Tortilla Soup. There is the thin soup with crumble tortilla chips in it or there is the thick soup that you use corn tortillas to thicken the soup to make more of a thick creamy soup. For me a thick hearty soup always wins out and that is what I was used to.

The reason I was researching for this soup is because there is one point I wasn’t sure how to describe in the recipe. You put your tortillas in the soup and let them melt or disintegrate or combine or … well you can see my trouble. I was trying to figure out the easiest way to describe how the tortillas basically blend into the soup and thicken it. As you can see I still haven’t come into the best way to describe this. Basically you are using the corn tortillas to thicken the soup, you can use Masa Flour also, but tortillas are just easy.

You can top this soup with crushed tortillas, sour cream (or greek yogurt) and other yummy things, but just remember to add the calories to your food journal.

Pepper Ferguson

Healthy Mom = Healthy Family - That is my life motto and I hope to encourage it to be yours too. January 2011 I made the decision to lose weight and lost 80+ pounds. I saw my boys start getting active with me and I realized I wasn't only changing my life but also my boys.

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