Sometimes, we all get a pizza craving. For me, it usually strikes at the worst time; I’ve spent all day eating healthy, being good, working out. And then, suddenly, the intense impulse to eat an entire pizza by myself hits. It just seems too easy. It’s just pizza! I can get it delivered to my door! Oh, and breadsticks, because I love breadsticks.

But at the end of the day, eating a day’s worth of calories and carbs isn’t a good choice. But how do I get rid of that pizza craving? You know, the desire for pepperoni, cheese and sauce? How on earth do I shake that? Through trial and error, I found the solution. And it includes three of my favorite salad greens ever: spinach, arugula and romaine. You’ll get tons of nutrients, including iron, along with some major flavor. Combined with tomatoes (full of lycopene, one of the best minerals out there), mozzarella cheese, fresh basil and tons of other yummy ingredients, your pizza craving will fade to only a memory and you won’t be left feeling guilty for eating two days’ worth of food while watching Law and Order: SVU.

Pizza Salad

You’ll need…

• about 1 cup of spinach
• about 1 cup of romaine
• about 1/2 cup of arugula
• 1 tomato, sliced (or cut into wedges, or diced — however you like your tomatoes!)
• about 4 slices of dry Italian salami
• 1 handful of basil
• about 1/2 cup of mini-mozzarella balls
• about 3 tablespoons of olive oil
• 1 teaspoon of minced garlic
• salt and pepper to taste

How to make it:

In a bowl, whisk together the minced garlic and olive oil, plus a little bit of salt and pepper. Set aside.

In a large salad bowl, combine the spinach, arugula and romaine lettuce. Add the tomatoes and mozzarella. On a cutting board, dice your slices of salami into bite-sized pieces. Also, roll up the basil leaves into a little bunch and dice. Combine with the salad and toss. Add the olive oil and garlic and toss until well combined. Add more salt and pepper to taste. Serve with a slice of Italian bread!

Note: This recipe makes one large salad. If you’re really hungry, you can eat the whole thing. If you’re not, you can probably share it.

[Image via Photoanatomy/Shutterstock]

Before I began, I had a lot a questions like “What is clean eating?” and “What foods are clean?” Well to be honest, even after doing loads of reading since my first post on the subject, I am still not entirely sure, so I have decided that I am going to slowly, but smartly, build my way up to much healthier eating. My first stop has been to cut out fried foods, microwaveable meals and simple carbohydrates (whole-wheat spaghetti = yum!).

So how has this been working out for me? I believe that a writer, like any artist, needs to be fully dedicated to her art – even if that requires perseverance in the face of pain, terror and piping hot broccoli soup. Yes, you read that right.  Broccoli soup.

Always a planner, yours truly scheduled herself to have two of her wisdom teeth taken out earlier in the week – which most of you know is no picnic. Yet, a week of yogurt, soup and healthy frozen yogurt didn’t sound so hard.  In fact it sounded quite refreshing – and easy.

Monday (surgery day) and Tuesday went by largely without a hitch – there isn’t much in the way of fried foods that can be slurped down and we had stocked up on yummy “drinkable,” healthy foods over the weekend.  However, on Wednesday, things took a turn for the worst  — I decided to have broccoli soup.

What do I have against broccoli soup? Well, I never got to taste it…not before I accidentally dropped it all over my lap!  The soup was so hot that I had to go to the ER to get checked out! Upon diagnosing my second-degree burns and observing my swollen right cheek, the ER doctor elegantly pronounced, “You’ve had a rough week.” Yes, doctor, yes I have.

Hopefully next week will be a little less exciting and I will be able to spend more time coming up with yummy meals and recipes to do while on this challenge.  (Right now I am sticking to Gazpacho…)

I love spicy food. Okay, that’s kind of a lie; I’m a bit of a wimp when it comes to spicy foods. I’m that person who gets teary-eyed and needs milk present at all times. Needless to say, my “spicy” or Mexican-inspired dishes are rarely all that spicy, but they are easy to customize, so you can always add more of your favorite spice (or hot sauce, or whatever you love).

Why am I talking about spicy food? I’m currently lying in bed with the flu and there’s nothing like spicy food to clear up the sinuses. I have a voice like a miniature frog; aches and pains like I’m about to give birth; and it feels like there is a small balloon locked up in my head that won’t deflate. I made spicy enchiladas to help — and of course to get some veggies in me.

Veggie Enchiladas

You’ll need…

• 3-6 small tortillas (not the burrito size – fajita size or smaller if you can find them) (the amount of rice you use in each enchilada will change how many you’ll need!)
• 1 cup of rice
• 3/4 cup of water, plus 1 cup of chicken stock
• 1 clove of garlic, minced
• 1 can of black beans, drained
• 1 can of corn, drained
• 1 can of fire-roasted tomatoes, partially drained (just open the top of the can halfway and pour out a bit of the liquid)
• about 1 handful of spinach
• 1 small can of green chiles
• about 2 tablespoons of adobo sauce or hot sauce, depending on what you like
• about 1 tablespoon of taco seasoning
• about 1 cup of cheese, shredded (I like cheddar but use your favorite!)
• about 1 cup of red sauce (you can buy canned enchilada sauce that is pretty good!)

How to make it…

In a small sauce pot, bring the chicken stock and water to a boil. (Cover it with a lid to hurry this along!) Add your 1 cup of rice and stir once. Reduce heat to medium-low and cover with a lid. Keep an eye on this, but don’t stir. It can take anywhere from 8 to 18 minutes for rice to be done.

In the mean time, saute your minced garlic in a little bit of cooking spray in a large pan (if your pan doesn’t have high sides, use a large pot to be safe). When the garlic is just starting to brown (you’ll smell garlic throughout your whole kitchen), add the drained beans, corn, chiles and tomatoes. Add the spinach and allow to wilt. Stir to combine. Add the hot sauce or adobo sauce and taco seasoning. Stir.

Check on the rice. When it’s done, add to the veggie mix. (This is why using a large pot comes in handy!) Stir to combine thoroughly. Spoon some of the rice onto a tortilla and roll. Place in a baking dish spray with nonstick cooking spray. Repeat until you’ve used all the rice.

Once the baking dish is full and you’ve used all your rice, top with enchilada sauce and cheese. Put in the oven at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes or until the cheese is bubbly.

Enjoy! I like to serve these with a bit of sliced avocado (my favorite food ever) and some chips.

Eating Clean: The act of eliminating foods that are processed and/or nutritionally devoid.  (This includes choosing complex carb products over simple – i.e. brown rice over white rice.)

Advocates of “eating clean” tout a laundry list of benefits – more energy, better skin, weight-loss, and better muscle definition, etc…  They say that one should see a different within a couple of weeks – so I thought, how about a month? Then I thought, why keep all these benefits to myself? As your kindergarten teacher would say, sharing is caring!

So how is this really a challenge? As a recent college grad trying to make my way in the big city (NYC) with a roughly 50-60 hour work week on average, my schedule is pretty tight – especially if I want to fit in regular workouts, maintain my friendships and read CollegeCandy! [Editor's Note: Awwww!]

Originally, I had sort of thought it would be an easy challenge since I usually make a point of eating as healthily as possible. Well, as I went to the grocery store to do some preliminary research, I noticed that one had to be focused on finding foods that fit the criteria for “eating clean.” Shockingly (or maybe not), some of the worst offenders were the “healthy” or “diet” choice options. Now I realize that successfully completing this month’s challenge is going to take commitment, and so the next week will be about making a plan to deal with any potential pitfalls – i.e. working late at the office (a major point of concern in my line of work).

I just want to emphasize that this challenge is not about promoting a new diet fad nor a quick fix for rapid weight-loss.  In fact, in some ways it’s about just the opposite – it’s about forcing myself to take a hard look at what I am putting into my body on a day-to-day basis.  It’s high time that I deal with the inescapable fact that I cannot recognize half the ingredients present in my dinner – without a degree in Biology or Chemistry…

Feel free to join in and share your own experiences and of course yummy recipes are always appreciated!

No, I’m not talking about a new diet from the Kardashian Klan (God, can you even imagine what that would entail?). This DASH Diet, which stands for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension, was named the number one diet for the second year in a row by U.S. News. Though it was designed for individuals suffering from hypertension — not those specifically looking to lose weight — the diet is one of the most nutritious and most-well rounded out there.

If you’re looking to kick off 2012 by revamping your healthy eating habits, check and see if the DASH Diet works for your lifestyle.

Processed foods are generally not good for us, regardless of how they are advertised. I’ve lived with roommates who firmly believed that they were on wholesome, perfectly nutritious diets all the while subsisting on Power bars, frozen TV dinners from the health food section of our local grocery store and Gatorade. Just because a product is advertised as a health food does not make it one! A trip to the grocery store quickly confirms this simple, yet often forgotten principle. In fact, many of the foods advertised as “energy bars” or nutrient packed “protein powders” are some of the most dangerous foods you could possibly consume. Take for instance PowerBar’s Triple Threat Chocolate Peanut Butter Crisp. Putting aside the fact that the name of this bar doesn’t sound healthy to begin with (albeit it does sound decadently delicious), let us pretend that we fall for the claim that this bar provides “long lasting energy” as marketed on the packaging. Now, let us begin to become enlightened about why this PowerBar can do no such thing and doesn’t even taste decadently delicious for Pete’s sake.

The first ingredient is corn syrup. Corn syrup, only slightly better than its cousin high fructose corn syrup, is the nutritional equivalent of sugar. The next ingredient is soy crisps, a combination of soy protein isolate and rice flour. Mmm, tasty. Soy protein isolate is a highly processed soy product that retains none of the original nutritional value of the natural soybean and raises levels of insulin like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) in the blood, subsequently hastening the growth of our cells and the aging process. The manner in which soy protein isolate is processed and manufactured is freaky too. It involves acid washing it in aluminum tanks. I’m not sure what the purpose of acid washing is, but I do know that a significant aluminum load manages to make its way into the final product. Nitrites and chemical flavoring are also used to add flavor. These chemicals have been linked to the development of certain cancers, allergies and even Alzheimer’s disease. So far we would be damaging our cells with a big helping of processed sugar and cancer causing processed junk. Let’s see what else this “energy” bar has to throw our way. Next we’ve got a chocolatey coating. Oh look, more sugar! Some oil and whey! Mmm. More wholesome goodness for us to chew on. Whey is the liquid remaining after cow’s boob milk has been curdled, so not only is it bad for us, but it’s gross too. Just like soy protein isolate, whey is a processed protein which raises IGF-1. Excess protein is simply not lifespan favorable.

After reading the ingredient list (see actual list below), it becomes obvious that the ingestion of this “energy” bar will provide no more energy than if we simply blended a bunch of sugar, processed proteins, salt and oil. Even though calling it a “drop dead prematurely” bar would probably not be the best marketing strategy, it would be much more accurate. There is a restaurant in Dallas, Texas called Heart Attack Grill, which I’m told is quite successful, so I don’t know. Perhaps a “drop dead prematurely” bar would do quite well in grocery stores. It might peak the interest of children around Halloween.

Ingredients:

CORN SYRUP, SOY CRISPS (SOY PROTEIN ISOLATE, RICE FLOUR, ALKALIZED COCOA), CHOCOLATEY COATING (SUGAR, FRACTIONATED PALM KERNEL OIL, COCOA, WHEY, NONFAT MILK, SOY LECITHIN, NATURAL VANILLA FLAVOR), WHOLE OATS, DRY ROASTED PEANUTS, SOY PROTEIN ISOLATE, INULIN (FROM CHICORY), NATURAL FLAVORS (CONTAINS PEANUT, MILK, SOY LECITHIN), RICE CRISPS (MILLED RICE, SUGAR, SALT, BARLEY MALT), SALTED PEANUT BUTTER, VEGETABLE GLYCERIN, AND LESS THAN 2% OF PEANUT FLOUR, ALMOND BUTTER, SALT, SOY LECITHIN, MINERALS: CALCIUM PHOSPHATE, POTASSIUM PHOSPHATE, FERROUS FUMARATE (IRON), VITAMINS: ASCORBIC ACID (VITAMIN C), VITAMIN B6 HYDROCHLORIDE, RIBOFLAVIN (VITAMIN B2), THIAMINE MONONITRATE (VITAMIN B1). CONTAINS ALMOND, MILK, PEANUT AND SOY INGREDIENTS. MADE ON EQUIPMENT THAT ALSO PROCESSES WHEAT.

The moral of this short blog post is that processed foods advertised as health foods are not necessarily healthy. The less you use foods that come in packages, boxes or wrappers, the better. There are a few processed products that make the nutrient density, body lovin’ cut, but we need to do our homework and read the labels if we decide we are in the mood to open a can or unfreeze a TV dinner.

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Potatoes are a staple of most diets. True, you really shouldn’t eat them everyday (despite really wanting to), but for a quick week night dinner, they are a great staple to know how to cook.

White potatoes – such as russets and fingerling potatoes – are the most traditional, but I really love to use yellow or red potatoes, which are smaller and therefore, cheaper to buy only 2-3 of them for a single meal. I won’t pretend potatoes are packed with nutrients; as far as nutrition goes, potatoes are well known for being high in carbohydrates, but very low (on their own) in saturated fat, cholesterol and sodium. They are great sources of vitamin C, potassium and manganese.

This recipe is very easy and very yummy. I like to use Yukon gold potatoes, but feel free to use russets, fingerlings, or whatever potato (or root – sweet potatoes and carrots would be yummy too!) you want.

Garlic Roasted Potatoes

You will need…

Salmon. Cooking this delicious fish is a little bit terrifying at first. What do you do with it? How do you know when it’s done? Do I need a non stick pan?

I will admit: it took me a long time to conquer my fear of cooking salmon. But once I did, I realized it is basically the easiest, quickest way to a healthy, tasty dinner. This recipe is one of my absolute favorites. I use frozen salmon fillets — available at most bulk stores — in very good brands, which are easy to defrost in about 15-20 minutes when held under warm, running water.

Salmon is packed with nutrients, especially omega 3s, which are a necessary fat that the human body doesn’t produce on its own. Omega 3s reduce inflammation and help to reduce the risk for chronic diseases, like heart disease.

Salmon is good with pretty much anything, but I love to serve this recipe with brown rice.

Lemon and Parmesan Salmon

You’ll need…

• 1-2 salmon fillets (2 salmon fillets serves about 2-3 people)
• 1 tablespoons of Italian seasoned breadcrumbs
• 3 tablespoons of Parmesan cheese
• 3-4 tablespoons of lemon juice (about the juice of one lemon)
• 1 teaspoon of garlic salt

How to make it…
Prepare salmon fillets by drying them slightly on a paper towel (excess moisture in the pan isn’t good!) Begin heating a frying pan or skillet on low to medium heat; add a little bit of non-stick cooking spray just in case.

In a small bowl, combine breadcrumbs, cheese and garlic salt. Add the lemon juice and stir to create a crust. You should be able to form it and pack it pretty easily. Feel free to add a little bit of olive oil if it is too loose. When it’s to the right consistency, pack it onto the salmon fillets to create a thin crust.

Place the fillets in the skillet crust side down. Each salmon fillet will cook for about 4-5 minutes on each side. I usually determine whether they are done by cutting one in half in the pan. The inside should be pale pink and flake easily; if the inside looks dark pink and sort of wet, it needs to cook a little longer. If your fillets are having trouble getting done in the middle, put a lid on the pan, which will help steam the fish a little bit.

Note: Cooked salmon stays fresh for about 1-2 days if left to cool and wrapped tightly in aluminum foil. 

Hot Pockets. Tiny capsules of molten hot cheese and questionable meat products and even more questionable vegetables. For a quick lunch, they aren’t terribly satisfying. They’re also packed with fat… even the low calorie varieties are packed with salt and MSG flavorings that aren’t too good for you.

You know what’s an easy, healthy solution? Making your own at home. Don’t panic. It’s easier than it sounds. Plus, these guys are delicious.

The main vegetables I use are broccoli, carrots, tomatoes and spinach. Broccoli is a great source of vitamin E, protein, and calcium. Carrots are great sources of vitamin C and iron. Tomatoes are known for being excellent sources of lycopene, which is believed to prevent certain types of cancer. Spinach is one of the most nutrient rich foods out there – it’s a great source of fiber, iron, protein and a slew of vitamins

Quick and Easy Veggie Pockets

You’ll need…

• 2 packages of low-fat crescent rolls OR 1-2 packages of pie crust dough (whichever you prefer)
• about 2-3 cups of spinach, roughly chopped
• 1 head of broccoli, trimmed and cut into small pieces
• about 1/4 of a package of shredded carrots (or you can use a cheese grater to shred about 1-2 handfuls of baby carrots)
• 2 tomatoes, cored and diced
• 1/4 tablespoons of Alfredo sauce
• Salt and pepper
• A pinch of garlic powder
• 3 tablespoons Parmesan cheese
• Additions: shredded or chopped up roasted chicken or turkey, smoked mozzarella cheese, green and red bell peppers, onion, celery

How to make it…

Preheat oven to 350 degrees (or follow the instructions on whatever dough you are using).

In a bowl, combine broccoli, spinach, carrots, and tomato. Stir to combine. Add Alfredo sauce, salt and pepper, Parmesan cheese, and garlic powder. Stir to combine. The mixture should be just wet enough to stick together – but not soaked in Alfredo sauce.

On a cutting board, form about 6-7 square pieces of crescent dough (keep the triangles together) or trim pie dough into square shapes. Add about 2-3 tablespoons of the mixture (until it looks full enough to you) to the middle of each square and fold the dough over to form a pocket. Use a fork to press the edges firmly so they don’t come apart while  baking. Repeat and place all of the pockets on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or sprayed lightly with nonstick cooking spray.

Bake according the package instructions of the dough you used (usually about 10-15 minutes). These are great served warm or you can let them cool and wrap them individually in aluminum foil to take to class or work for a quick lunch!

(Don’t worry if you have left over filling. It can be kept in the fridge for about 24 hours and is great warmed up and tossed with a little bit of pasta!)