Did you watch the Oscars last night?! I did not. Want to know why? Because Donny & I decided to watch 45 episodes of Orange is the New Black. Ok, 45 might be a bit of an exaggeration, but we did watch OITNB all day yesterday. It is just such an awesome show! It has very dry humor throughout it, but also has a lot of drama and suspense. I love it.
Donny suggested that I watch it while he was gone on his last trip so I assumed he had seen Season 1. I watched all of Season 1 and then a few episodes of Season 2. When he got home he informed me that he had only seen like 3-4 episodes…. whoops! He had some catching up to do. He is now caught up to me so we can start watching episodes I haven’t seen yet! There goes my free time…. if only I had self-control!
On an extremely unrelated note, I have been striking out hard core when it comes to the Colorado Lottery. What the heck? Aren’t you suppose to win something every 4-5 scratch tickets?!?! That must not be true because the Friday before Valentine’s Day I had five $1 scratch tickets and didn’t even win my money back on any of them! No, not even one measly dollar. Then yesterday we bought five $3 scratch tickets and struck out on those as well! I have been on quite the dry spell lately. Prior to last week I had not been buying more than 2 at a time so I just figured the people before or after me won. Now, when there are five losers in a row I have a problem! By problem, I mean first-world problem. Poor Melissa, she isn’t winning anything when she is gambling. Hahahaha now that I have that off my chest.
Quinoa. Oh how I love quinoa. I eat it pretty often and it goes with almost anything. You can substitute it for rice or pasta and it works great. It is whole grain and has a ton of protein in it! In fact, one cup of quinoa has 5 grams of fiber and 8 grams on protein. You cook it similar to how you would rice and it has a slight nutty flavor to it. It is very versatile — great on a salad, can be added to any soup recipe, perfect as the base of a side dish, etc.
Another thing I enjoy is hot wings…not exactly clean eating, but delicious. I prefer boneless wings myself, but I have heard those “aren’t real hot wings”. Now let’s get one thing straight, these Buffalo Chicken Quinoa Bites will never be able to replace hot wings. They have the buffalo sauce flavor and the chicken flavor, but if you have a real craving for hot wings then just eat some dang hot wings! With that being said, these are a great clean-eating alternative to hot wings. They are full of fiber, protein, and, of course, taste like buffalo sauce! You can make a double batch of these and freeze them as well. Take them to a party or football game for a nice appetizer, eat them as a snack, or take them for lunch alongside a green salad.
If you are not a fan of buffalo sauce then you could substitute BBQ sauce or another sauce of your choice. I prefer spicy, so buffalo it is! I tossed the chicken in buffalo sauce but didn’t add any more to the mixture. I chose instead to pour/dip the bites in the sauce. Feel free to add more buffalo sauce to the mixture prior to baking.
- 1 cup quinoa, cooked
- 2 cup cooked chicken, diced
- 1 cup part-skim mozzarella, shredded
- 2 egg whites
- 1/4 cup Frank's Red Hot Wing Sauce, plus more for dipping
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Put the chicken in a medium sized mixing bowl. Pour the Frank's Red Hot Wing Sauce over the chicken and mix until chicken is coated.
- Add the quinoa, 1/2 mozzarella and the egg whites to the bowl. Mix until well combined.
- Distribute the mixture into a greased mini muffin tin, filling each cup to the top and pressing the mixture down to compact. Top each with the remaining mozzarella cheese.
- Bake for 20 minutes. Allow the bites to cool before removing them from the muffin tin.
- Pour additional wing sauce over the bites or use more wing sauce for dipping. Other sauces may be substituted for the wing sauce.
