Loving Mom, On a Budget

As I said in a recent post, Nick and I are planning a cruise wedding for sometime in 2012. With this wedding looming, we're continuing to work on saving money as much as possible. Nick and I both love to give gifts, but it's hard to give wonderful gifts when you're trying to save money.....or is it?? Today is Mother's Day and I have to be at work all day, so last night (while Nick was at work) I invited my mom over for a special Mother's Day Eve dinner.

Mom, I love YOU!

For the protein I pan seared some wild-caught salmon, because I only feed my mom the best fish! My mom suggested adding some maple syrup as a glaze, which sounded like a great idea to me. It turned out fantastic.



I served this quinoa salad as the side dish, which was a simple combination of quinoa, dill, reduced fat feta cheese, cucumbers, red peppers, tomatoes and a bit of EVOO.


Have you ever toasted salmon skin for a snack? I know that sounds so strange, but a lot of the omega-3's are concentrated in the skin. I took off the skin, added some salt and pepper, toasted it until it was nice and crispy, and we ate it as a little snack after our meal.


I know it may not look very appealing, but it was quite delicious and satisfying.


For our beverage we had some very "fine" wine, aka an eight dollar bottle of Big House Red.



If you are friends with me on Facebook, and you know my last name, you'll understand why I bought this wine. I've had it before and loved it. It's a California wine and it's a mix of several grapes (and no merlot included, yeah!). If you can't read the wacky writing below, read about the wine here.


And for dessert I made some of my famous low fat chocolate peanut butter ice cream. I simply made my original vanilla ice cream (with almond milk and half and half) and added some unsweetened cocoa powder, whole peanuts, and some chunks of chunky peanut butter.

After dinner I gave my mom with a poem I wrote for her. Who says you have to spend a lot of money to show love??!!

QUESTION: How did you show your mom you loved her today?

If you are a mom yourself, happy Mother's Day to you!

Spinach Pesto and An Evening with Mom!

Happy weekend everyone! Tomorrow and Tuesday I will continue with my "America's Toxic Environment" posts, and I'll also include some of your fantastic comments, but today I wanted to switch gears for a moment and show you the "gourmet" meal Nick and I prepared for our mothers (and for our first dinner party in our new home!).

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY TO ALL MOTHERS OUT THERE!

Nick works today so we decided to celebrate Mother's Day with our moms a day early. At first we planned to take them to dinner, but then we figured we'd save money, and have a lot more fun, if we prepared a meal for them at our new home. We wanted to use our new grill.....


But one of the pieces was bent on arrival, so it was impossible to put the darn thing together!


So instead we created the meal indoors. The menu was very simple because both of our mothers are trying to watch their weight and eat very healthy (I respect that very much!). Here is the menu we came up with, and how much money we spent/saved:

Hor'Dourves

Pseudo Antipasto: Slices of Cheese, Kashi 7 Grain Crackers, Marinated Red and Yellow Peppers, Green and Black Olives


(Total cost: ~ $10 )

Main Course

Rice Bran Spaghetti Noodles, with Spinach Pesto and Slices of Marinated Flank Steak





(Total cost: ~ $16 )

Dessert

Angel Food Cake, Served with Fresh Organic Strawberries and Lite Cool Whip



(Total cost: ~$6)

Drink

Black Mountain Vineyard 2009 Pinot Noir
(we may have gone through two bottles....)



(Total cost: ~ $30)

Total cost of meal: ~$62

Spinach Pesto Recipe
(Source: SuperFoods Rx, by Steven Pratt, M.D.)

2 cups raw spinach
1/4 cup chopped walnuts and almonds
3 garlic cloves
1/2 cup T parmesan cheese
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

Instructions
- Blend all the above ingredients, in the proportions you have chosen, in your blender/food processor/Magic Bullet!





- Prepare your spaghetti according to the directions on the box (we used rice bran spaghetti)

- Mix the spaghetti with the pesto sauce

- Serve, OR add meat if you wish......

- We added ~3 ounces flank steak on top of our spaghetti with pesto sauce.


ESTIMATED Nutrition Facts For One Full Meal
Which Includes:

Antipasto (3 olives, 2 crackers, 1 ounce cheese, 2 slices pepper)

1 cup rice bran spaghetti
1/2 cup pesto sauce
3 ounces flank steak

1 slice angel food cake
4 strawberries
1/4 cup lite Cool Whip

6-8 ounces red wine

***1100 calories, 35 grams of fat (mostly unsaturated, good fat), great source of vitamins C & A, and the mineral iron, good source of fiber ***

Those stats make a girl very happy. I don't know what that face is....

Was this the healthiest meal ever? Absolutely not. Was it healthier than the same meal at a restaurant? I'd be willing to bet my life it was! I can only imagine how many calories this meal would have been at a restaurant.... It was also much cheaper, as this meal would have cost close to $140 dollars at a restaurant, if you include the wine, antipasto, dessert, 4 dinners, and the tip (20%, always).

Coming Up

Tomorrow I will continue with my "Toxic America" posts. I'm pretty passionate about this issue, and I can tell many of you are too! Thanks for reading today, and have a great Mother's Day!