A Way Around Tomatoes

Last night, my laptop broke. Long story short, it's been acting up for a while and I guess yesterday was the day it chose to die. It won't start up. It turns on and then attempts to start up Windows, but fails, and goes through a series of messages on the screen saying it's attempting to fix the problem. My uncle, who works on computers for a living, says he thinks the hard drive crashed. Of course. So, now I get to use my tax return money to buy a new laptop instead of paying off my credit card and putting the rest in savings. Fortunately, my mom is an accountant and did my taxes this morning per my request and was able to get me enough back to pay for a new laptop and still have enough to put a dent into my credit card. So, I guess it could be worse. The reason I'm venting about this on here is because my entries will be a little jumbled this/next week until I get a new home computer. This entry, for example, should have been written last night as I cooked this meal last night, but ... you know ... my computer's broken!

So, tilapia! I've eaten it previously and so it wasn't as foreign to me as the Mahi Mahi in the previous recipe. I went to my little farmer's market down the street from my work and picked some up, and almost forgot it in the freezer at my office! This recipe also calls for spinach and tomatoes. Spinach I wasn't too reluctant about. I've eaten it before, in spring mixes and what not, and Andrea constantly raves about how much she loves it and that I should start calling her Popeye. The tomatoes, however, I was not super excited about. I managed to get through the tomatoes in the Spicy Garlic Lime Shrimp recipe, but I diced them so small I could barely tell they were in there. This one, I was afraid I wouldn't be so lucky. Then I had an idea! BLEND THE SUCKERS! So, I did! It created a marinara-type liquid, and so I put them on top of the fish as sauce instead of veggies. Hey, I didn't exclude or substitute!

Final results? The fish was good. Again, I liked the spice mixture on the fish. The instructions say to mix the hot sauce into the spices and then add to the fish, but it didn't really work (that's what the dark clumps on the fish are) so I think next time I would just put the hot sauce directly on the fish, mix the dry spices and add them afterwards separately. But the taste was fine. I'm really glad I blended the tomatoes. Although it made a mess, it thickened up nicely in the oven and almost tasted exactly like marinara sauce. The spinach ... was questionable. It was partly my fault because I don't think I washed it enough. There were little crunchy bits in it. This may have been caused from baking the spinach instead of cooking it on the stove in water like Andrea does, but who knows. I won't place full blame on the recipe or my lack-of-washing - I think it was a mutual fault. Overall, I would definitely make the fish again, but I really don't know about the spinach. I think I'd like to try Andrea's method of cooking it next time and see what that does.

Spicy Tilapia with Spinach

From the Official Medifast Lean & Green Cookbook

Ingredients:

10 ounces raw tilapia

3 cups spinach

1 cup diced tomatoes

2 teaspoons olive or canola oil

¾ teaspoon paprika

½ teaspoon hot sauce

¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes

¼ teaspoon garlic powder

Instructions:

Instructions can be found in the Official Medifast Lean and Green Cookbook

Yield:

1 Lean, 3 Green, 2 Healthy Fats, 2 Condiments