Recipe: Hearty Rice Skillet

Appraising Your Success
The end of the week is a good time to review the past week of your SWEET Life and count up your accomplishments. Your goal is 5-6 times per week for each aspect of the SWEET Life: Sleep, Water, Eating, Exercise, and Tranquility. If you didn’t achieve some of your goals for the week, then next week, focus on those areas more and think about how to fulfill them more consistently.
How do you feel at the end of this week? Are you better rested? Do you feel relaxed? Are you more energetic? Do you feel generally healthier? Continue with the SWEET Life and you’ll experience all of these feelings!

Topic of the week -- Recipe: Hearty Rice Skillet

Here’s a recipe for an easy, low-fat, all-in-one meal. It has beans for protein, mixed veggies, and brown rice. It has a stew-like consistency and is great with bread. It’s a little sweet, which is why the recipe calls for hot pepper sauce; however, don’t include that if you’re serving it to kids. To lower the sodium content, use low sodium versions of the ingredients.

Hearty Rice Skillet

Prep: 5 min. Cook: 20 min.

1 15-oz. can black, garbanzo, or kidney beans, rinsed and drained
2 cups loose-pack frozen mixed vegetables
1 14-oz. can stewed tomatoes, cut up
1 cup water
¾ cup quick-cooking brown rice
½ teaspoon dried thyme, crushed, or dried dill weed
Several dashes bottled hot pepper sauce (optional)
1 10-oz. can condensed tomato soup
1/3 cup slivered almonds, toasted
½ cup shredded mozzarella or cheddar cheese (2 oz.)

In a large skillet stir together beans, vegetables, undrained tomatoes, water, uncooked rice, thyme or dill weed, and, if desired, hot pepper sauce. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Cover and simmer 12-14 minutes or till rice is tender.

Stir in soup; heat through. Before serving, sprinkle with almonds and cheese. Makes 4 main dish servings.

Nutrition Facts per serving: 329 cal, 9 g total fat (2 g sat fat), 8 mg chol, 1206 mg sodium, 53 g carbo, 7 g fiber, 18 g protein. Daily Values: 39% vit. A, 81% vit. C, 16% calcium, 24% iron

Source: Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book 11th ed. (1996). Meredith Corporation: Des Moines, p. 61.

Have a SWEET week!

Suzanne