First off, the winner of the CLICK Protein Espresso Giveaway is……..
Congrats Ali! I will be emailing you in just a little bit to get your information!
I have a treat for you today! I made my first planned meal last night and it turned out wonderfully.
Before we get to that I’ll back track earlier.
The husband left to go to the gym while I was still cooking so I opted to just take it easy and hang out with the puppy.
We went on a nice walk. It finally warmed up a bit where I would be able to feel my hands and didn’t have to wear too many layers for the walk.
It has been freezing here the last few days. I’m just not ready for winter this year.
We had a great walk and it was so nice to have her back.
Wes and I headed back to the gym around dinner time before he went to study. We did some lower body weights for about 30 minutes and then parted ways so he could get some good studying in.
Last night was my first night of “meal planning” foods. I was going to do it the night before but we had some things come up so it didn’t happen.
I fixed some delicious Spicy Pumpkin Chili. It was delicious so I thought it was worth sharing the recipe with you all.
Spicy Pumpkin Chili
Ingredients
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 small yellow onion, chopped
1 green bell pepper, cored, seeded and chopped
2 jalapeños, seeded and finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 pound ground white or dark meat turkey
1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes, with the liquid
1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin
1 cup water
1 tablespoon chili powder
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
Ground black pepper, to taste
1 (15 ounce) can of kidney beans, rinsed and drained
Directions:
1. Heat oil in a large pot over medium heat and add onion, bell pepper, jalapeños, and garlic. Stir until tender.
2. Add turkey and cook until browned.
3. Add tomatoes, pumpkin, water, chili powder, cayenne pepper, salt and pepper and bring to a boil.
4. Cover and simmer, stirring occasionally for 30 minutes more.
5. Ladle chili into bowls.
I made this in the morning and then stored it until dinner. Wes’ study schedule keeps him in and out of the house so I need dinner to be available whenever he has time.
It is delicious and clean! The best of both worlds. The cayenne does make it pretty spicy, so if you aren’t a spicy food person either eliminate that or cut down on the amount.
It is perfect as the weather is getting cooler!
Do you like chili? Do you have a go to recipe?
Yum! Three things I absolutely love: pumpkin, warm soups/chilis, and healthy/delicious meals! Thanks for sharing, and glad meal planning went well!
Thanks! 🙂 It hasn’t been a perfect week of planning but it has been helping! I love soups/chilis this time of year! I can’t get enough!
ohh this would probably make David super happy, I like to make a big veggie chili he likes some meat 🙂
The best of both worlds 🙂
Ooh this sounds yummy!! 🙂 I love chili… I used to hate it as a kid.
I don’t ever remember having it when I was little. We mostly had soup – I love anything warm during this time of year!
Yum! This was the perfect recipe to come up in my blog feed today, I planned to make chili tonight and had bought pumpkin the other day for a recipe that only called for a half cup. Thanks for sharing 🙂
Hope you enjoy it!! 🙂
Love Chili – we have a great ‘traditional’ chili (had it last night in fact), and also a black bean sweet potato chili that I love. This looks cool as something different to try!
One cooking note – you should never use olive oil as your cooking oil. There are a few reasons:
– It is ‘low smoking’, so it will flare up and brown/burn much faster than normal vegetable oils.
– Olive oil is damaged by heat – the very properties that make it such a great oil to use are destroyed at much lower heat levels.
One chef friend suggested that the only heat olive oil should ever see is when you sprinkle it on your warm food. And when my work department took a cooking class as a ‘team building’ thing in September, the chef instructor had two oils on our stations – vegetable for cooking, olive for flavor and health.
Oooh black bean and sweet potato chili! That sounds like something I Would love to try!
Thanks for that info! I had no idea 🙂 I have vegetable oil as well I will use from here on out!
I would love to take a cooking class sometimes just to learn some of the basic things I don’t know – like what you just shared with me!
Yum! I love pumpkin chili – it is pretty hard to detect too which makes it perfect for my hubby (if he knows there’s something “weird” in his food he claims not to like it – haha)! Go on my meal planning list for next week!
Don’t worry my husband says he doesn’t like it either! But he didn’t even know it was in there 🙂 It was great!