ArcaMax

I’m Irish and particularly fond of St. Patrick’s Day. By the time you read this, Chicago will have dyed the river green and I will have witnessed the event. They do it the weekend before St. Patrick’s Day now, so when the holiday lands later in the week they manage to make an entire week-long celebration. I don’t celebrate all week long but I definitely partake in some of the festivities. I have friends coming from Wisconsin the day after St. Patrick’s Day and we will be laughing all weekend long.

The color of Irish celebrations is Kelly green, so today I thought I’d share some of my favorite things; my favorite green things...

Read the full column at PlanZDiet.com

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Pork Loin Roast in a Slow Cooker
Baked Salmon with Bragg's Sauce

Cabbage Soup

This is a ZReduction recipe. A snap to put together. All the ingredients spend a lot of loving time together in the pot to make an amazingly simple and flavorful soup. This will make a great weeknight meal. You might even have leftovers for lunch the next day! Thanks to one of Plan Z’s own, Carolyn, for “testing” this recipe out in her kitchen.

Servings: One serving is 1-1/2 cups

Ingredients:

1/2 of a large head of cabbage, chopped
1 cup chopped celery
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 cups of beef broth
2 cups of chicken broth
4 cups water
2 pounds ground beef, browned and drained
a 15-oz can of Hunt’s (100 percent natural) tomato sauce
a 15-oz can of Hunt’s tomatoes (100 percent natural), with peppers, celery and onions
2 tsp Truvia
Salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:

Add the cabbage, celery, onion, garlic, beef broth, chicken broth, and water into a stock pot and cook until the veggies are tender. Then add the ground beef, Hunt’s tomato sauce, Hunt’s tomatoes, and salt and pepper to taste. Bring everything to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes. At the very end add 2 tsp of Truvia and simmer for 10 more minutes to let the flavors combine.

BONUS RECIPE

I’m also offering up as my St. Patrick’s Day gift to you, my mother’s apple crisp recipe updated to eliminate white sugar.

My Mother's Apple Crisp

This is a ZReboot 3.5 recipe. For me, there’s something about the smell of apples baking with cinnamon and nutmeg that conjures up fond memories of my mother in the kitchen. She taught me as a small girl to make apple crisp so I did it often. At one point I converted the recipe using Truvia and some oats as well as almond flour. Technology has changed and we now have Swerve or ZSweet. These sugar substitutes caramelize so it gets the crunchy top I was missing from the original Apple Crisp Recipe. Truvia won’t caramelize. I have used regular flour in this one (hence Z3.5) because per person it’s not much and it’s a treat. Just treat it… as a treat. This also makes a wonderful little breakfast the next day. Just keep your portion small; about a ½ cup.

Serves: 6

Ingredients:

3-4 large apples peeled and cut into thin wedges (I used Honeycrisp. Granny Smith works great too)
½ cup of regular flour (you can also try coconut flour for fewer carbs. If you do use coconut flour please note that your crumble won’t crisp up as well)
½ cup of Swerve or ZSweet sugar substitute (Order this on line. These are great, new products but I have not found them in a store yet).
1/3 cup of butter, melted
1 egg
½ tsp of cinnamon (or to taste)
½ tsp of nutmeg plus a little more for dusting (or to taste)
Pinch of salt

Instructions:

Grease the bottom of a 9-by-9-inch ovenproof pan. Spread in your apple wedges.

In a bowl add the flour, egg, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg. With a fork mix the dry goods and egg to make a crumbly mixture. Pour that over the apples and spread it out to cover the surface.

Drizzle the melted butter over the top. It won’t cover every bit. There will be spaces in-between. Now, I put a whisper of additional nutmeg over the top.

Put in the oven to bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes or until the top begins to brown a bit.

Serving Suggestions:

You can serve this warm or at room temperature. One of my favorites is actually serving the crisp the next day for a small breakfast. When you store it, I do it on the counter rather than refrigerator. The top will be crispy in most parts. When I cover it, I only cover the cut edge. I find that if I cover the whole top the crispy crust turns moist. Same thing happens when I put it in the refrigerator; hence the counter storage. Most often if you serve this to a group you won’t have any leftovers anyway!

Enjoy!
Cheers,
Zola