Now back to 'real' food

Creamy Tomato-Rice Soup
Superfoods: Cook Your Way to Health Copyright 2001

4 cups canned chopped tomatoes, undrained I used a 28-oz can
4 cups water I used a little less since I used less tomatoes
1 ½ cups cooked white rice, divided
1 cup chopped celery
2 tsp. onion powder
2 tsp. Italian seasoning
1 ½ tsp. minced garlic I used garlic powder
¼ cup tomato paste
1 tbsp. sugar
¼ tsp. black pepper
½ tsp. Mrs. Dash seasoning I used salt - baby steps
1 tbsp. dried parsley

Combine tomatoes, water, ½ cup cooked rice, celery, onion powder, Italian seasoning, minced garlic, tomato paste, sugar, pepper and Mrs. Dash seasoning in a large saucepan or soup pot. Bring to a boil over high heat; reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer 30 to 45 minutes. Remove pot from burner, uncover, and let cool 20 to 30 minutes. Transfer soup to food processor or blender and process until smooth (this may need to be done in several batches). I used my immersion blender. Return soup to pan; add remaining rice. Cook soup over medium high heat until hot. Sprinkle with parsley just before serving.

Serves: 6 Per serving: 120 calories, 1 g fat, 26 g carbs, 0 mg cholesterol, 3 g fiber, 3 g protein

It's time to get back to cooking non-sweets, and cooking healthier to make up for my holiday indulgences. Well, not just my holiday indulgences but my level of health has declined greatly since having my son and I really need to shape up.

I've been meaning to start making a new soup every week, to take for lunch, and I finally got around to doing that. I liked this recipe because I had just about everything on hand. It turned out quite spicy which surprised me. I was a bit heavy-handed on the fresh ground pepper or maybe it was the garlic, or something in the Italian seasoning. I really liked the punch but this could really be seasoned any way you'd like to season it.

The texture was nice. Not quite the same as a cream-enriched soup but satisfying. I've always liked my tomato soup made with milk or cream. I wonder if some evaporated skim milk or fat-free half and half would work in this.

I've had this cookbook for quite some time. It was written by the 'America's healthiest mom', Jyl Steinbeck. It has a wonderful variety of recipes yet they're all quite severe - fat-free, low-sodium, low-sugar. This would be an excellent cookbook for anyone who has to eat well for serious health reasons. Otherwise, for anyone just striving to eat healthier, I think some modifications would need to be made to many of the recipes, such as substituting low-fat ingredients for fat-free ingredients.