Carla Hall's Provolone Encrusted Bacon Grilled Cheese Sandwich OZZIFIED

Believe it or not, without the fondue, this decadent sandwich is under 300 calories!

·         2 sm. slices Rustic sourdough, French or other low glycemic white bread – 83 calories

·         1 slice low-fat cheddar cheese, cut in half or ¼ cup shredded light cheddar – 80 calories

·         1 slice bacon, cooked – 35 calories

·         2 slices ultra-thin provolone cheese – 80 calories (if you can’t find ultra-thin, just cut a slice regular provolone into 2 half-circles – it will fit the smaller bread slices perfectly)

·         Light misting of olive oil - 20 calories (10 calories per side)

·         1 serving (2oz) Simple Reduced Fat Fondue (recipe below) 145 calories

Directions:

1         Put the low fat cheddar on both slices of bread.

2         Top with a slice of bacon, broken in half to cover the sandwich.

3         Put the two halves together with the bacon in the middle.

4         Spray the sandwich on both sides with a light misting of olive oil. If you don’t have a mister, put a light coating of butter. It’ll change the fat and calorie count, but it’ll be delicious!

5         Grill the sandwich on both sides until the bread is lightly browned and the cheese has started to melt.  

6         When the sandwich is flipped to grill on the second side, begin heating a slice of provolone in a nonstick skillet.  When the sandwich is done grilling on both sides & the provolone is looking lacy, place the grilled sandwich on top of the hot, lacy provolone cheese. When the cheese on the bottom is browned, place the second slice of provolone on top of the sandwich then flip and cook until the cheese is brown all around. (If you want to save on dishes, fold one slice of provolone in half & lay on top of the grilled side while the bottom continues to grill. Flip once the second side is done grilling, then top that side with the second slice of provolone, folded in half)

7         Remove from pan & cut into strips. Dunk into the fondue & take a big bite. If you’re skeeved out by double-dipping, cut the sandwich into bite sized chunks or ladle the fondue into individual cups. Don’t worry about the fondue getting too cold this way – it won’t last long enough for that to happen – well it didn’t at our house, anyway!

Simple Reduced Fat Fondue Recipe:

·         ¼ pound (125 grams) reduced fat Swiss cheese

·         1-1½ tsp flour

·         ½ c white wine, preferably dry, optimally a German wine

·         1 -2 TBSP grated Parmesano Reggiano cheese

·         1 garlic clove, sliced in half

·         Fresh grated nutmeg

Directions:

1         Shred the Swiss cheese if it isn’t already shredded. If you’re only able to find reduced fat Swiss in slices, roll the slices and cut into shreds with a sharp knife.

2         Toss the Swiss cheese in the flour, coating as much of the shreds as possible.

3         Rub the garlic clove, cut side down, in the pot.

4         Add the wine & heat, DO NOT BOIL.

5         When the wine comes to a slow simmer, add the Swiss cheese a little at a time, stirring constantly with a non-reactive (wood or plastic, no metal) spoon, until the cheese/wine mixture is smooth (discard the excess flour, if any).

6         Add the nutmeg/Parmesan mixture. Continue stirring until all is incorporated.

Makes enough fondue for four small or two Carla-sized sandwiches. This recipe is easily doubled, tripled or even quadrupled.  I’ve deliberately made the measurements simple to increase proportionally so there isn’t a lot of waste/waist - spelling depends on where leftovers live @ your house :-p

November 8th's The Chew - Country yes, Western…not so much

Found myself slightly offended when The Chew cast was dressed in Western style cowboy clothes but talking in faux accents that sounded more like Gomer Pyle, “Aint” Bea, and other rural Southern media archetypes.  One only need hear a person say a word like athlete to know the difference. Out here in the west, it sounds like a 3 syllable word  beginning with a short A (ath-uh-lete) whereas in the deep South, it sounds like the 2 syllable word it is but takes longer to say and begins with a long A (Ayyyeeeth – leeyt).

Then I really found myself baffled when Carla Hall started making cheese grits in a skillet on a set that was decidedly Western with its brand marks, saloon doors, etc.  I’ve lived in the West my entire life and had never even seen let alone tasted grits until I visited the South.  Media synergy is behind many a stretch when it comes to tying in the latest project they’re trying to pimp with the program du jour, so the disconnect between The Chew’s dressing like cowboys but cooking and talking like Paula Deen finally cleared up when it became obvious that today’s show was just a tease for the upcoming CMA awards on ABC.  They were going country-western, not just country, and the western part of country-western showed up when Tim Love made his ribs with a new take on how to eat beets.

Mario’s wings and Alabama BBQ sauce was a disconnect for me as well. I think of wings as a Buffalo NY thing that spread throughout the US. I’ve been to Alabama and the wings were fried there like they are in Buffalo, not grilled, and served w/ blue cheese or Ranch dressing.  The white BBQ sauce was served with just about everything else you can think of, chicken, ribs, bread, even French fries, but not chicken wings.  It’s a staple in northern Alabama, served with just about every grilled or BBQed dish in that part of the state. Go a couple of hours south, like to Montgomery & it’s hit or miss. Drive an hour or so across the state line into Tennessee, Georgia or Mississippi, & it’ll be hard to find someone who’s even heard of it, let alone serves it, and good luck finding it in as far south as Mobile unless you go to a chain restaurant like Big Bob Gibson’s which started in Decatur, AL but is now found across the South. I’ve eaten at the one in Monroe, NC which would’ve been fine if I were in the mood for ‘Bama style BBQ. Unfortunately, my mouth was watering for NC style BBQ with that spicy vinegar sauce – which is not on their menu, even in NC.

There are about as many recipes for White BBQ sauce as there are families in northern Alabama. Some use sugar like Mario did, others, like Big Bob Gibson, don’t. Some use lemon juice, others don’t. Some use cayenne, others don’t. Some use granulated garlic and/or powdered mustard, others don’t. The only ingredients that every one of the recipes has in common are mayonnaise, prepared horseradish, salt, pepper & vinegar … and even that is up for debate. Some use white vinegar like Mario, others like Big Bob Gibson, use apple cider vinegar. 

I make a lower calorie version using no sugar, heavier on the horseradish & vinegar while lighter on the mayo – both in amount and type.  Mario’s called for 2 cups of mayonnaise, which is more mayo than most Alabamans use in their recipes. Their versions tend to be more like a sauce and less like the dip Mario made.

My Light & White ‘Bama BBQ Sauce

• ½  cup Best Foods (Hellman’s in the East) Light Mayo with Olive Oil  
• ¼ c white or cider vinegar depending on what I have
• 2 TBSP prepared horseradish
• fresh ground black pepper, cayenne pepper to taste

Wisk them all together and serve with grilled or BBQed meat or poultry. It is great on one of those grocery store rotisserie chickens. For a quick dinner, serve on sandwich rolls with the sauce drizzled on the chicken with more on the side for dipping.  We use it a lot at home on hot sandwiches made with leftover roast, but our favorite is as an accompaniment to Beer Can Chicken, where an opened, full beer can is stuffed into the cavity of a whole bird, then set upright onto a grill over a drip pan and cooked using indirect heat. 

Carla’s Grandma’s Biscuits & Sausage Gravy Ozzified & Chicken Fried “Fake”

Chocolate on The Chew today - nothing I could modify to come closer in line with my diet than Daphne's yummy desserts.  Don't feel bad for me though - I'm too full for dessert anyway because I made Carla Hall's biscuits and sausage gravy and used them in a whole new way, Ozzified of course.


Carla’s Biscuits and Gravy  were already Ozzified beyond belief. 

Carla gave so many tips on how to make biscuits light and fluffy, the most important of which was to not overwork it. It made me want to smack myself upside the head & say, “OF COURSE! Why didn’t I think of that???”  I already knew that kneading bread developed the gluten to make it denser & that overworking pie crust makes it tough. It was more of a DUH moment than an AHA one.  By seeing EXACTLY what she meant by when the dough was done enough to drop, I saw why my biscuits never quite measured up to my own grandma’s.  A short time later, a Bisquik commercial came up so I decided to make Bisquik biscuits using Carla’s tweaks & OMG!!! They came out unbelievably fluffy & light, & I was even using the Heart Smart version!   

The tricks that worked were 

• to use a 40% Greek yogurt to 60% milk ratio for the liquid (both were 2% milkfat)
• working it like Carla did, just until incorporated
• dropping it onto the baking sheet (I use a well-seasoned stone) by the spoonful. Carla baked hers @ 500 degrees for 5-8 minutes, but I followed the box directions and baked them @ 450 until they were golden brown.

After seeing umpteen episodes of the Dr. Oz Show with him exhorting us to eschew low fiber white flour products & to make it a habit to eat fiber dense whole grain products instead, I have tried making whole grain biscuits on numerous occasions. To say the results were disasterous would be an understatement, unless my goal was to create an edible hockey puck for the NHL. Because of these failed attempts, I wasn’t going to try again until I had an AHA moment when Daphne was described as putting the yum in psyllium husks.  I decided to experiment with Carla’s recipe and technique by adding a tablespoon of psyllium husks into the Bisquik before I added the yogurt/milk mixture. Oh Heck Yeah – they were AWE-SOME!!!!  

I don’t know if Dr. Oz would approve or not, but I can tell you that the fiber content per batch was quadrupled.  There are probably some glycemic issues with the heavily processed white flour & being a schoolteacher doesn’t qualify me to speculate on whether my additions counteract any of those issues.  

The biscuits were great on their own and held up well under Carla's Sausage Gravy. Her use of turkey sausage, olive oil and butternut squash were already Ozzifications even Daphne could love so I wasn't going to change a thing until I saw a post on The Chew discussion board by someone who could not find turkey sausage @ her grocer.  I suggested meatless sausage as an alternative because I’ve used it before – even served it to people convinced that every vegetarian meat alternative tastes horrible.  Unless they read this blog, they’ll STILL never know what they raved about as sinfully delicious was actually a plant-based protein found on the health food aisle of my local Safeway. The trick is to add enough olive oil to replicate the mouth-feel of its greasy, pork-based cousin and like Carla suggested, to add more sage etc. if the brand you buy isn’t sausage-flavored enough for your taste. 

Anyway, it got me thinking - since we have both turkey sausage and meatless sausage in our stores, I did a little label comparison and decided the meatless sausage is the better choice for our household.  Of course it all depends on brands – some turkey sausage includes turkey skin & fat which isn’t much better than pork, and some of the meatless choices can be very high in sodium so READ YOUR LABELS! There’s no point in swapping out pork sausage if the so-called healthy alternative is not any better for you. 

The meatless brand I used had 

• 10 fewer calories
• 2.5 grams less fat
• 1.5 grams more fiber
• 20 mg less sodium per ounce 

than the turkey sausage, which adds up, especially when one link of turkey sausage is nearly 4 oz.

I also can tell you that the biscuits and gravy were soooo good for breakfast that I modified them both again, this time for dinner, which is why I'm too full for sweets.  I added rosemary and goat cheese along with the psyllium husks to make savory biscuits just right for the dinner table, and put the gravy on a faux chicken fried steak I made using a Boca burger coated in wheat germ.  We called it Chicken Fried Fake – I won’t pretend that it was as good as a real chicken-fried steak, but it was tasty enough thanks to Carla’s “sausage” gravy – even Ozzified it’s delicious!

Sweet Treats Ozzified: Dark Chocolate Frozen Banana

I absolutely LOVE Goo Goo Clusters and would have made Carla Hall's Chew Chew Clusters in a heartbeat if I'd had access to Marshmallow Fluff. We have both national brand and store brand marshmallow crèmes, but Marshmallow Fluff is nowhere to be found. If I wasn't such a Goo Goo Cluster fiend, any old marshmallow filling might do, but since no other brand I've tried comes even close in quality to Marshmallow Fluff, I reluctantly decided to postpone making Carla's Chew Chew Clusters until I can replenish my stash.



The Chew made a lot of sweet treats today, and as funny as Rachael Ray's "Girl Math" is where a whole grain ingredient like multigrain pancake mix justifies using an artery-clogging one like bacon, out here in the real world making more sweets to sit on the counter singing their Siren song to me along with the packaged treats we already have on hand for next week's Trick or Treaters makes no sense. Instead, I made an Ozzified version of a chocolate shell topping similar to Magic Shell, the commercially available liquid topping that becomes a hard shell when put on cold things like ice cream.



While I agreed wholeheartedly with Mario Batali today when he said he could never get tired of plain vanilla gelato, I felt his kicked up version with crumbled Amaretti cookies and whipped cream could use a little chocolate. A quick drizzle of this topping on the gelato would be perfect. When used on sherbet, it tastes like a bittersweet orange truffle.

The process is simple: 

• Melt a high cacao content dark chocolate (60-75% cacao) either over a double boiler or in a microwave oven
• Stir in some virgin coconut oil in a ratio of 1 tsp coconut oil to 1 ounce chocolate. 
• Keep at room temperature until ready to use 

4 ounces chocolate mixed with 1 TBSP coconut oil makes for a richer, more intense chocolate flavor & is enough to cover two smaller bananas or top three scoops of ice cream Store any leftovers in an airtight container at room temperature.


This topping also makes a great chocolate covered frozen banana. The video shows this being made with a banana that was frozen while still in the skin, but these directions are much easier: 

• Slice a banana in half 
• Insert a stick into the middle of the cut end 
• Wrap in plastic wrap and freeze 
• Once the bananas are frozen, coat with the chocolate/coconut oil mixture 
• If you want nuts (it's yummy this way) roll the chocolate covered banana in some chopped walnuts before the topping hardens 
• Return to the freezer until ready to eat

Pumpkin French Toast and Skinnygirl Sangria - Brunch Day Ozzified

Made an Ozzified and simplified version of Carla Hall’s Pumpkin French Toast with the Apple Cider Syrup and washed it down with an Ozzified version of Daphne’s cocktail for brunch on Sunday.  Both were great hits and far less calories than the ones shown on The Chew last Friday.

If it seems odd that I was able to Ozzify something Daphne Oz made, it isn’t. I made only a couple of tweaks but saved a huge amount of calories. Organic blueberries, organic peach chunks, organic strawberries, organic grapes, and melon chunks (they’re peeled so organic is unnecessary, IMHO) were frozen in some fruit juice for half of the guests & the rest were frozen in Crystal Light for the people who were calorie counting. Daphne had used peach puree with sugar – my fruit cubes had no added sugar and maintained their inulin-rich fiber because they weren’t pureed.

I used sparkling mineral water because it has extra calcium – a bonus we learned on today’s The Chew because calcium when consumed with inulin is great for your bones. I also used Bethenny Frankel’s SkinnyGirl White Sangria for the alcohol – it only has 26.4 calories per ounce which is lower than most other sangrias. Some drank it with the sparking water and some drank it with only the sangria.

It came as no surprise that Carla’s Pumpkin French Toast and Apple Cider Syrup was in need of a major Ozzification to be served in my home.  

I simplified & Ozzified making the syrup by 

• reducing organic apple cider with blue agave nectar and a little cornstarch
• Using Omega 3 buttery spread instead of butter 

Spicing pecans looked like too much bother, so all I did was throw in some rough chopped walnuts (I didn’t have any pecans) into the syrup just before it was finished reducing. Not only was it easier, but it saved a lot of calories as well.

I made the pumpkin mixture the night before and soaked the bread in it overnight as Carla suggested, but I used 

• vanilla coconut milk instead of milk
• vanilla soy creamer instead of cream
• whole grain bread instead of challah
• nonstick spray instead of butter for the griddle 
• omitted the sugar and vanilla because there was already sugar and vanilla in the coconut milk and soy creamer. 

Even with all these Ozzifications, the bread souffled into a light and delicious treat tasting just like Carla said it would - like a pumpkin doughnut. 

Carla Hall's Onion Rings - Ozzified!

I’m with Carla Hall - I LOVE onion rings, one of the most vilified sides in the history of fast food.  I rarely eat them now that they’re on nearly every top ten list of the worst foods you can ever eat, so when I do eat them, I want them to be GREAT! I want my splurge to be crispy, crunchy perfection, not a sad, soggy mess. I’m sure Carla would agree that the best way to ensure they're the tastiest is to make them ourselves. 

Yesterday, I took Carla’s recipe and Ozzified it. Yes, I know the show was about our last meal on Earth and like Clinton Kelly said, if the world’s going to end, who cares about nutrition? Well, I’m pretty sure I’m going to be here tomorrow and even though this version may have a bit more nutrition than the original recipe, they’re still a splurge – a little added fiber isn’t going to neutralize all the fat that’s giving it that great crunchy goodness. That’s akin to the line of thinking I had when I used to wash down a Big Mac with a diet Coke. Yes, it had fewer calories than a full sugar soda or the shake I’d have preferred to order, but it still was a heart attack in a Styrofoam clamshell.

I followed Carla’s recipe and instructions with the following modifications:

• I used whole wheat flour and a little ground flaxseed meal in place of the white flour
• used sparkling mineral water in place of the high sodium club soda
• added some psyllium husks to the panko crumbs for even more fiber. 

Keep in mind, whole wheat flour doesn’t stick to the onion  as easily as refined white, so I dipped the ring into some water before the flour step.Don't skip the flour step or the batter won’t cling to the onion on its own – it needs the flour step to give it something to grab onto. Also, the batter is denser than Carla’s so I added more sparkling water to make it thin enough to coat the ring without becoming a cakey mess but not so thin that the panko/psyllium husks had nothing to stick to.

Carla's tip about the instant potatoes was killer – every one of them came out crispy. The final result was to die for delicious – and very much worth it.  I couldn't eat them all, and because I was in a hurry to get to a college football game, I inadvertently left the uneaten ones on the baking rack overnight. The football game I went to was by far the most surprising one I've ever seen - we had a fake referee (who was really a streaker) whistle a play dead. While he was running around the field naked, a melee ensued between the two teams that cleared both sidelines with the fighting spread out over 60 yards. 


Even more surprising was that the onion rings were still great almost 24 hours later - so crispy and delicious that I popped one on my veggie burger with a little no-salt ketchup for lunch. Unbelievably good, but believe this...if the world were ending, that veggie burger would've been a luscious, beefy Lola Burger!

Feeding America … & My Family

I’ve become increasingly frustrated that the recipes aren’t online earlier than one hour before the show because my grocery store is a good five miles from my house. Even the über-proprietary Martha Stewart puts her recipes up on the same day, HOURS before it airs. I have to admit that since The Chew came on the air, I no longer feel the need to watch her hour-long infomercial for all things MSLO. All I want are some recipes, some healthy living tips and some lifestyle tips on a show where the commercials come BETWEEN segments and aren’t the impetus behind the segments themselves.

Today the short notice wasn’t the problem - it was the number of choices. Usually, I’m able to quickly narrow it down to one or two dishes to make based on what I have on hand and how likely I am able to get anything not in my pantry. Today, the only thing I knew I didn’t want to make was Carla Hall’s pot roast because I still had tri-tip from Saturday’s cookout in my fridge and didn’t want to add even more beef to my rapidly expanding inventory of leftovers.

After reading the recipes, I realized that while I had some ingredients for each of the dishes, I didn’t have 100% of ingredients for ANY of the dishes. I decided to watch the show first in the hopes that it would make my choice easier – which it in fact did, but not in the way I expected.

In the back of my mind throughout today’s episode was how unlikely it would be for someone needing a food bank to have all the ingredients for any one of today’s dishes on hand if a foodie like me didn’t. Then it hit me between the eyeballs that the point of today’s show wasn’t that everyone would have every ingredient on hand, but that with a little imagination, anyone could put together a nutritious, filling dish with whatever they did have on hand, even if it comes from the food bank. Voilà!  I had my idea – I would make Carla’s Penne Ragu using ingredients from most of the other dishes to make up for the fact that I didn’t have leftover veggies from pot roast, then donate the money I would’ve spent on those dishes to Feeding America.

Here’s what I came up with:

• Olive oil – just enough to coat the bottom of a deep frying pan 
• 1 small sweet potato, peeled and grated 
• ¼ of a red onion, roughly chopped 
• ½ carton sliced baby portabella mushrooms 
• ¼ bulb of fennel, roughly chunked 
• Leftover protein (I used tri-tip beef) 
• 1 tsp turmeric 
• one pizza delivery envelope of crushed red pepper (use fresh-ground black pepper if you don’t like spicy) 
• cinnamon to taste 
• 4 oz 11 minute Penne 
• 4 cups boiling water 
• whole wheat Panko crumbs

1. Put on the pasta water in a pan 
2. preheat a deep frying pan over medium-high heat  with just enough olive oil to thinly coat the bottom. 
3. Put the pasta in the water. Add the grated sweet potato then the onion into the fry pan and stir. 
4. When the sweet potatoes begin to stick and the onions start to soften, add the fennel and stir again. 
5. Add the mushrooms and stir again. If it is too dry, add a cup of the pasta water. Stir. 
6. By the time the mushrooms start to soften, the pasta should be about a minute or two away from being done. Dump the pasta, water & all, into the fry pan. 
7. Add the meat Continue to stir until a nice gravy is rendered. It will thicken up as it cools so be careful to not overcook. 
8. Let sit while you toast up some breadcrumbs. I used what I had on hand - whole wheat Panko. 
9. Spoon the penne mixture into bowls and top with the freshly toasted crumbs.

I used tumeric from Mario Batali’s chicken dish, sweet potatoes from Daphne Oz’s pancakes, red onions from Michael Symon’s tacos, crushed red pepper and penne from two of Carla Hall’s dishes which means I will be donating the $25 I saved NOT making the entire dish to Feeding America – if I can find the link on The Chew website…which as of yet I have not been able to do.

Flash Fried Chicken Mash-Up & Reverse OZ-mosis – October 14, 2011's The Chew Recipe Redo

Carla Hall did a great job reducing the calories in her Grandma Thelma’s fried chicken, but she didn’t get it down as low as Rocco diSpirito's flash-fried chicken that he made on GMA last summer. Carla's recipe still looked good to me, so I did a mash-up of both their techniques for healthy fried chicken that’s also delicious – probably because it’s actually fried and not baked. Her tip of leaving the chicken to sit in the flour for 15 minutes made a huge difference.

• Simmer the chicken (I used boneless, skinless chicken breast) in some low sodium chicken broth. I added some fresh garlic for more flavor.  
• When the chicken is just cooked through, put it in a paper bag with seasoned whole wheat flour, I used cayenne, smoked paprika and black pepper. Let it sit for 15 minutes the way Carla did. You can add flaxseed meal to the flour mixture if you want. 
• Heat some oil in a skillet, preferably cast iron. The oil is ready when the handle of a wooden spoon bubbles after being dipped into the hot oil. (Thanks for the great tip, Mario!)
• Flash fry the chicken until golden brown, about a minute. Because the chicken is already cooked through, all you’re doing is creating the crust. This method drastically cuts the amount of fat absorbed into the chicken because it isn’t in there long enough to soak up vast quantities of oil.

The chicken went well with Daphne Oz’s baked sweet potato fries, but I have to admit that I did a little Reverse OZ-mosis. Normally I try to make The Chew recipes healthier by following Dr. Oz’s guidelines, but instead I made it a little tastier by using coconut oil instead of olive oil. Coconut oil has a flavor profile more compatible with sweet potatoes than olive oil.  

I also used fresh-grated nutmeg and a little cayenne in place of the salt & pepper. I'd like to say it's healthier because I omitted the salt and added heart-healthy cayenne and nutmeg, but since I used a less healthy oil - coconut oil is solid @ room temperature (in places north of Arizona, anyway) I'm calling it a wash. While it isn't as healthy as what Daphne made, it's certainly a whole lot better than regular French fries.

Follow Daphne’s directions except use coconut oil in place of the olive oil and nutmeg & cayenne in place of the salt & pepper. Don’t crowd them in the pan – sweet potatoes tend to steam and your “fries” will be mushy instead of crisp. I'm happy to report that these fries came out crispy on the outside and soft on the inside - there were no leftovers!

Ozzifying Michael Symon’s Lola Bacon Cheese Burger - a Recipe Re-do from The Chew on Oct 3, 2011

Ah, Michael, Michael, Michael, if your recipes continue to be the stuff of a cardiac surgeon like Dr. Mehmet Oz's nightmares, I fear this blog is going to appear as if I am picking on you nearly as much as you all pick on his daughter, Daphne Oz. 

Of the ten ingredients in your Lola Burger, I kept as is exactly TWO!  There are so many modifications needed to make this burger heart healthy that it could be called the the Hola burger - as in HELLO!!!! Your cardiologist is on line one! My Ozzified recipe Re-do is very tasty & doesn’t come with a side of bypass.

• You say 20-25% of saturated fat in your burger makes it delicious - current nutritional standards say saturated fat makes it a ticking time bomb. Add the rest of the fat found in your burger, such as the cheddar cheese, basting the egg in fat, etc. and nearly half of what you're stuffing in your face is artery-clogging saturated lard. 
• Fat is NOT your friend when it comes to hamburgers, unless you're Dr. Oz's friend Dr. Michael Roizen ... your Lola burgers are job security for him @ the Cleveland Clinic.

Carla Hall suggested those wanting less fat should make a smaller burger...Hola! That burger (recipe here) would make a slider look big in comparison to my Ozzified version:


Kept:

• Cracked black pepper
• Dill pickle slice

   Changed: 

• Replaced the high fat burger mix of 1/3 ground short ribs, 1/3 ground brisket & 1/3 ground sirloin with 100% ground bison meat, which is very lean - only 10% fat content
• 86ed the kosher salt and replaced it with low sodium bacon salt to compensate for the loss of the bacon flavor
• Nixed the pickled onions and put caramelized red onions in their place

Modified:

•  Swapped sliced Cheddar for 2% shredded cheddar.   Shreds mean you can use less.
• Replaced the refined white flour English muffins with a whole grain bun. They do make some whole grain English muffins but I've yet to find one out here that wasn't the head fakes Dr. Oz warns us about.
• Egg - I used an egg from chickens fed a diet rich in Omega 3 fatty acids & used a tiny amount of olive oil in a non-stick pan rather than baste it in grease the way Mario Batali did this afternoon. 
• Used no-salt catsup instead of regular catsup to reduce the sodium content of the Spicy catsup. Sracha has 100 mg of sodium per tsp which is more than enough for the sauce on this burger

   86ed altogether:

•   Bacon - make no mistake, I love bacon, but there is no need for yet a fourth protein in this delicious burger. The choice to dump this particular protein is based on the link between processed meats & some cancers. Once in a while won't kill anyone, so when I eat bacon, I want it to stand alone so I can savor the flavor. With all the other flavors here, the taste of the bacon will blend in - the low sodium bacon salt will fill the bill nicely without adding more calories and saturated fat in the process.

   

   This burger drips down your arm seductively - just like the original Lola Burger, but this food porn won't end up in cardiac arrest. Enjoy this recipe re-do with a side of sweet potato chips for a heart-healthy meal.