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Angela’s Cabbage Rolls

This is my spin on the traditional cabbage roll. I suppose it’s more Mediterranean since I added lamb, but this is generally a standard recipe. Now with pix! These are low carb and low calorie with high flavor! Updated Feb 2017.

Lamb and Beef Cabbage Rolls

WRAP:
10-12 leaves of savoy (or regular) cabbage, blanched
FILLING:
1 lb ground beef, 90/10
1 lb ground lamb
olive oil
1 large or 2 small shallot, small dice
1/2 red onion, small dice
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp dry thyme (or fresh if you’ve got it, minced)
1 Tbl fresh parsley, minced
1 Tbl fresh mint, minced (optional, I like it with lamb)
1 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp sweet paprika
1 tsp each salt & pepper
1 tsp red pepper flakes
1 Tbl Sherry vinegar (or red wine vinegar)
2 eggs
SAUCE:
2 small cans tomato sauce
1 14.5oz can of diced tomatoes, drained (I like fire roasted)
1 Tbl Sherry vinegar (or red wine vinegar)
1 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp pepper
1 Tbl parsley, minced
1 Tbl white or brown sugar
1/4 cup beef or chicken stock

Preheat oven to 350F. Put a 4qt pot of water on to boil with 2 tsp salt.

Put some olive oil in a skillet and sweat the shallot, onion and garlic over med low until translucent, about 5 mins. Set aside in a bowl. In the same pan, put tomato sauce and tomatoes with sherry vinegar, paprika, pepper, red pepper flakes, sugar and 2 Tbl of reserved shallot and garlic over low heat for about 10 minutes then hold.

Pull off 10-12 leaves of cabbage and remove the thick part of the stem (savoy has thinner stems than plain cabbage, so if you’re using savoy, the thick parts are only on the biggest leaves). When water boils, turn to simmer and toss in the leaves for about 1-2 minutes, until they become very green and translucent. Pour into colander and rinse with cold water. Hold.

Mix together meats, herbs, spices, vinegar and egg. Add cooled aromatics. Mix until combined, but don’t overmix or the meat will be dense.

Spray 9×12 baking dish with nonstick spray. Put about 1/2 of the sauce on the bottom of the baking dish. Add stock to remaining sauce in skillet.

Roll each cabbage leaf with about 1/4 cup meat mixture (more if the leaf is large). Start at the stem end and roll like a burrito, folding sides in. Place in baking dish, seam side down. Don’t overfill these or they’ll pop – aim for about 1/3 of the leaf covered in meat. You should have enough filling for 10-12 rolls.

Pour remaining sauce over rolls. Cover tightly with foil and bake for an hour at 350F.

I served this with roasted baby potatoes. Cut potatoes to bite size, toss in olive oil, season with steak seasoning, roast at 425F for about 15 minutes. The potatoes are about 120 cals per cup with 3gr fat and 15gr carbs. Approximately.

According to Livestrong, the nutrition for 1 roll + sauce is:
Cals: 174
Fat: 9gr
Carbs: 9gr

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Another Amazing Lamb and Barley Stew

This recipe is different from the previous lamb and barley stew recipe in that it has tomatoes and I used part of a boneless leg of lamb rather than chops. I think this is even BETTER than the first recipe, which is why it’s called Awesome! :)

Awesome Lamb and Barley Stew
Awesome Lamb and Barley Stew

Awesome Lamb and Barley Stew

~2 pounds lamb roast (leg or shoulder), cleaned of all visible fat and cut into 1-2″ dice
3/4 cup flour for dredging
2 tsp dry mustard
S/P: 1 tsp each
EVOO
1/2 cup red wine
2 Tbl butter
2 med onions, 1″ dice
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbl tomato paste
Bouquet garni: 5 thyme stems, 2 4″ rosemary stems, 3 bay leaves tied with butcher twine
2 carrots, small dice
2 stalks celery, small dice
1 14 oz can diced tomatoes with juice
1 cup beef broth
2 cups chicken broth
3/4 cup barley
1/4 cup chopped parsley
2 Tbl red wine vinegar
1 Tbl sherry or champagne vinegar

Heat a large dutch oven over med hi. Cover bottom with EVOO. Mix together flour, mustard and S/P in a bowl and dredge lamb chunks in it before browning in oil. Do this in batches so the lamb browns. When done, put in a bowl to stand by. Add oil as needed when browning lamb, then swab out excess oil when lamb is done. Pour in red wine to deglaze pan and get all that cooked flour off the bottom. Use a wooden spatula to scrape ALL the bits from the bottom of the pan. When pot is cleaned, pour the wine over the lamb that’s standing by.

Put butter in the pot and turn down heat to med. Add onions and cook for 5 mins. Add garlic and tomato paste and cook for 3-4 minutes – or until the onions and garlic are soft. Pour the lamb and wine mixture in and stir. Add the bouquet garni, carrots, celery and tomatoes. Bring to a simmer and simmer for about 5 minutes. Your stew should be VERY thick at this point.

Add in the beef and chicken broth, stir and bring back to a light simmer. Cover the pot and keep at a slow simmer for one hour, stirring occasionally. At the one hour point, add in the barley, cover and simmer another 30-40 minutes, until barley is softened. (You shouldn’t have a lot of fat in this stew. If your lamb was fatty, you may need to skim off the fat before you add in the barley. If you trimmed the lamb thoroughly, this is a low fat stew.)

After barley has cooked, add parsley and the vinegars. Check your salt level again.

Serve with crusty bread.

Yield: about 2.5 quarts. This stew freezes beautifully.

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Missy Kat Health Update 2

We went to see the vet yesterday and get a once over and bloodwork. Missy has lost some of the weight she gained, sadly. She is at 6.2# down from 6.8#. But she is still looking a lot better than when we started the Total Cat diet.

As I was expecting, Missy’s BUN (Blood Urea Nitrogen) was a bit elevated from the higher protein diet. At the start it was 35 and now it’s up to 43. (Normal range is 14-36mg/dL) Although I was expecting this, now I need to do something to try and bring it down. My plan is to add some egg whites to her food to see if that helps keep protein high and make it easier on her kidneys. I already serve the food wet and add low sodium broth to it, to encourage her to get more fluids, which is helping with dehydration.

Her constipation has gone away with this diet, which I’m very happy about. She’s becoming a bit more incontinent (she has some wee pee when she sleeps), but hey, it happens to all of us old ladies. Vet did a quick ultrasound to check her bladder and all is well. It’s just old age making her leaky. I can relate. ;)

Other than that, the vet was impressed with her fur being very silky. Missy has always had soft bunny fur, but it is very shiny and silkier now with the homemade diet. The vet is pleased with her overall health at the age of 15+. :)

Overall, a good visit and I’m pleased with the homemade food. I give her the goldenseal supplement to help her kidneys and I am going to start adding Omega-3s to the mix as well. I also add a digestive aid just for good measure and that might be helping with the constipation. I am considering a phosphate binder for the high BUN, but I’d like to try the egg whites first.

She eats about 4 oz of food per day, which is right in the middle of what she should be eating. I’d like her to eat more, but she just eats when she’s hungry. Animals are pretty good at self regulation. She does have a Hobbit schedule of about 7 feedings a day. I’ll continue these updates over the course of 2016.

First installation here.
Second installation here.

[Missy died in Aug of 2016. I think the homemade diet did help her for a while. She was a VERY old cat! I still miss her. -A 2017]

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Virgin Mobile USA Support Tips

In light of the truly sucktastic service we’ve gotten from Virgin Mobile USA this week, I felt I should write a post in the hopes that it might help others who use VMU but can’t get things to work. Most of this post has to do with iPhones in particular, since that is what we have experience with, but I’m sure a lot of it will help with any device you have using the Virgin (which uses the Sprint network) service. This post is about USA service only. BTW, Sprint is dying and it will take VM with it. I wouldn’t advise spending a lot of dough on a phone with either of them. It’s a shame, we’ve used VMU for over a decade. I’ll miss them, shitty customer service and all. :(

Basic Virgin Mobile FAQ:

– Virgin Mobile shares bandwidth on the Sprint network in the US. This used to be a good thing, now, not so much. Sprint is dying. America is the land of the oligopoly and eventually there’ll be just AT&T for phone and satellite TV, but for now there is Verizon (CDMA network) and AT&T (GSM network). VM uses the CDMA network. That means the phone must be CDMA. You cannot use a CDMA phone on a GSM network or vice versa. Here is an article about bringing a phone to Verizon, FYI.

– NO, VMU will NOT be getting [insert iPhone model] back in stock. Every VSU employee will tell you “Yes! It’ll be any day now!”, which is a lie. The front page of their site is a lie. The fact is that VMU buys their iPhone stock and then it sells out. Their inventory is finite. Just buy a phone off of eBay. Which is generally not a problem, just make sure it’s a VMU phone with a clean ESN. If it’s a 5 series, you’ll need to also buy a new card for it (it is a UICC card, which is just a newer generation SIM card).

– YES, a used iPhone 5 and up WILL require a new UICC card. Do not listen to the VMU employees that tell you otherwise. NO you do NOT need a card for a 4 series phone. Actually these require NO CARD in the slot. All iPhones require a card from series 5 onward. You can buy these on ebay, too. They are labeled Sprint, T Mobile, Boost and VM.

– VMU has really horrible support. Which is probably why you’re here. It will not get better, so it’s something you must make peace with. Hopefully something in here will help you.

– Don’t even bother with trying to use the website to swap phones. Just suck it up and call.

– The Twitter people (@VMUcare) suck just as much as the phone people. Don’t bother.

– If you have a “support” person who clearly does not understand what you are calling about, just say goodbye and call back. You may have to do this many times. Be prepared to spend a LOT of time on the phone. You simply have to persevere and keep cycling through support people until you find one that has a clue. No way around it.

– There is a glitch in the VMU system that will render your iPhone 4 series unable to send/receive calls when you update the OS. Virgin support is apparently unaware of this and cannot help you. But I can. Simply call ##873283# and your phone service will be restored. I am not sure if this applies to 5 series (or 6 series) iPhones. I’ll update this when Nick updates his 5c. **He did have to call this number to turn on phone service on the 5c after he got the card working. This seems to have been worked out with iOS 10+. I’ve not had to use the # since iOS 10 on my 5c OR my new 5s.**

How to buy a new iPhone and get it activated with VMU:

– Go go eBay and look for phones specifically labeled Virgin Mobile. Make sure they have a clean ESN – which means they are not stolen and/or bricked.

– If you are buying a 4 series iPhone, you’ll need to REMOVE the SIM/UICC card that might still be in it. My phone had been used with TMobile, apparently, there was a card in the slot. I know this because when I called to activate the phone, it kept giving me an “incompatible SIM card” error. Of course the “support” person in Philippines did not know what this meant. I am a nerd, so I knew to pop out the card, but the “support” dude kept telling me I had to take the phone to Apple. Yeah, NO. 4 series iPhones do NOT need any card in the slot to work with VMU. Ignore whatever else you’re told, just pop out the old card and then call VMU to activate. You can google how to remove a SIM card, it’s a snap.

– If you are buying a 5 series phone, you’ll need to buy a NEW SIM/UICC card for it. They sell those on eBay, too. Once you get your new phone and the card, this is where the fun begins. And by fun, I mean soul sucking hell. :( You’ll have to call VMU to get the phone and its card activated. The problem is that most of the “support” people don’t know how to do this. They will attempt to activate the phone w/out activating the card, which, of course will not work. It took my husband FOUR DAYS to find a support person who could understand this issue and activate the UICC. Once the card was paired with the phone’s id#, all was well – BUT you’ll probably have to call the super secret number (##873283#) to get phone service working (no longer w/ iOS 10). **I got a good support guy who got my 5c working in minutes. That is rare!**

Those are the biggest issues with iPhones and VMU. They won’t get any better. My advice is to go with another provider if you’re just setting up cell phone service (TMobile, maybe?). As I said at the top, Sprint is dying and with it, Virgin Mobile USA. We assume another provider will buy up the bandwidth and service (Verizon most likely) but the heyday of good VMU service is gone. We’ll stick with VMU until it dies. I, personally, love my $30/mo unlimited text/talk and 1gb data. It works for me and I can deal with spotty support. I don’t need a lot of hand holding.

Do not get into a contract with any provider. Just buy the phone that will work with one of the two networks and then shop providers. Like I mentioned, there are only two networks in the US and AT&T (GSM) is dominant. Their non-contract division is called Cricket. Even tho I detest AT&T, I think Cricket is the best choice for non-contract. If you have a Virgin/Sprint phone and want to switch, your only choice is Verizon – which may or may not take your phone. TMobile is still around and they offer good deals. I’ve no idea how they are service and support-wise.

Cell phone service is as screwed up as broadband and TV in the US. It won’t get any better. Just try to find the best deal you can and don’t be afraid to change if you’re not happy. I think too many people in the US are afraid to change their providers. In addition, make sure to support efforts to break up and/or regulate our broadband, TV and cell services. The reason American services are so bad is due to the government being paid off by monopolies and oligopolies that collude to keep prices high and service low. You must speak out about this to your US House Reps and Senators. American cell service sucks because we let it suck. Remember: we are a third world country when it comes to broadband/TV/Phone services.

Good luck with your cell phone service! I hope something here may have helped.

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Asian Chicken and Chickpea Stew

This recipe started off as more of a Moroccan type stew, but somehow ended up with an Asian taste profile – but with chickpeas! It is light, low fat, low carb and very tasty! This is a small recipe that makes about 5 cups. Double if you want plenty to share or freeze.
asianchickpea

Asian Chicken and Chickpea Stew

4 boneless/skinless chicken thighs, cut into 1″ chunks
S/P
EVOO
1 medium onion, diced
1 small or 1/2 large red bell pepper, diced
1 leek, sliced (white and center tender parts only)
1 small pkg of creminis, sliced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp cumin
.5 tsp dry mustard
.5 tsp ginger
.5 tsp coriander
.5 tsp smoked paprika
2 Tbl soy sauce
1 Tbl fish sauce
2 Tbl mirin
1 Tbl tomato paste
juice of one lemon
1 can chickpeas, drained
2 cups chicken stock
juice of one lime
.25 cup chopped parsley
Cooked Rice for serving

Cut up chicken and season with S/P. Sauté veg in evoo until soft. Add chicken and spices, cook over med hi for about 5 minutes. Add sauces and tom paste; cook for another 5 mins. Add chickpeas and stock, bring to simmer for about 10 minutes. Add juice of lemon and half the parsley and cook another 10-15 minutes at low simmer. Check for seasoning. Serve with lime juice and parsley garnish. Optional but recommended: serve over a quarter cup of rice.

Calorie counts based on 1.25 cup serving with rice (courtesy Livestrong.com)
Calories: 388
Fats: 12 grams
Carbs: 23 grams
Fiber: 2.5 grams
Protein: 24 grams