Comfort Food

You can have your stroganoff and eat it too! Most stroganoff recipes are served over rice or a big pile of noodles. You don’t have to do that. You have other choices.

This is a great comfort food. Make a big pot and pack it up for lunches on future days for a nice hot meal on a cold day.

You’ll think you’re eating at an Italian Grandma’s house when you taste this.

The inside of this pie bake tastes just like Midwest comfort food. You won't even notice the potatoes are missing. It has just enough carrots to remind you how sweet they are. Same for the peas. The onion, celery and the mushrooms give it the depth of flavor you'll remember from childhood. The topping isn't your average pie crust. This one is low carb. So it's not like a biscuit either. I'm still trying to perfect low carb biscuits, so this is sort of a cross-breed.

Two things I love about living mid-South: fried green tomatoes, and tomato pie.

Serve this at your next family event instead of potatoes and you’ll save 30% of the carbs.

Can be a vegetarian entrée or a side dish. SUPER Yummy because as the squash bakes it becomes sweet.

When you need some serious cold weather comfort food, ratatouille hits the spot. This shortcut ratatouille-inspired recipe was submitted by dieter Angela. She Zolafied the original recipe and created a delicious ZReduction veggie sauté that can be made in less than half the time of a traditional ratatouille.

When I was young I loved going to Chi Chi’s and ordering the chimichanga. Now that I know all the carbs from the tortilla it was wrapped in are a bad idea, I decided to make a lower carb casserole version.

Made this tonight and was very happy with it – it would count as your vegetable and your meat although you could definitely add a green salad. I found it to be very filling.

This is a meaty chili with some veggies tossed in for crunch factor. Makes a satisfying lunch.

This is a great Zola to Go! dish, perfect for those cold days for lunch.

Angela says, "I love pizza, so I was looking for alternatives. I was disappointed to find cauliflower crust is not much lower in carbs than a traditional pizza crust. I came across that recipe for a meatzza crust and was pleasantly surprised. It satisfied my pizza craving, and I could have a slice of pizza without needing a fork! For those pizza cravings, here’s a recipe for a meatzza crust."

For a change of pace you can try a unique meatloaf. This one comes with an optional extra sauce in case you want to really ramp up the flavor.

A delightful chicken dish that tastes very French. This is super easy to make and dieters are enjoying it all over the country.

This is a great crock pot recipe. Super simple but really tasty.

This is an easy preparation with a homey vibe, when you want comfort food this is a sure bet.

At first you’d think chimichangas would be high carb. The good news is they have low carb tortillas at the grocery store that taste the same as the traditional. Look for the low carb versions.

This soup is super easy to make.  If you are a fan of southern food this will hit the spot.

What makes this Zola lasagna is a reasonable amount of pasta. Most lasagna recipes run at least 3 or 4 layers of noodles. This one has 2. And I promise, you won’t miss the other two layers.

Serve in soup bowls with a protein of choice. In Z2 this is your veggie portion. You can have plain salad greens on the side if you need more. It’s very filling though.

I remember my first introduction to scallops like it was yesterday. As I took my first bite and swooned I knew these were to become a new favorite.

Lobster thermidor is a classic dish. It’s decadent because of the cost of the lobster but it also has one of the dreamiest sauces you can possibly imagine.

Orzo is a wonderful, tiny pasta. This is the most requested side dish recipe I get from dinner guests–but watch your portion size. Enjoy!

Light and dreamy. If you like pumpkin you’ll love this smooth and easy dessert.

This recipe is for all the vegetarians out there. Thank you dieter Nancy for this photo. For you non-vegetarians this makes a great side dish to go along with a grilled meat. We had this last night with grilled Andouille sausage and had a lovely meal.

This is a classic Italian dish. The one you order at Olive Garden will have WAY more pasta than this dish will have. That’s okay. The shrimp are the real star of this dish. Plus, you’ll be better off without all that starch. 

If we had a gourmet comfort food category this recipe would be the first one. Its easy to make, very satisfying, and tastes delicious. A great meal for a rainy day.

This is fast to make and is a wonderful comfort food addition to your recipes.

This is a yummy, satisfying soup.

This casserole tastes just like a zippy chicken enchilada without the major carbohydrate intake.

This meatloaf makes six servings. When you serve it, remember that your crunch item is already included, so no breadstick or crackers with this meal.

Fried till golden using coconut flour.

Tastes very much like the traditional version but this one doesn’t include higher carbohydrate vegetables like carrots and potatoes. Still quite delightful, though. Brings back memories of grandma.

For all you cabbage lovers out there, this recipe is a ZReduction take on a German classic. While you can whip this dish up in about 30 minutes, red cabbage tastes sweeter the longer you cook it -- so if you are on ZReduction and like your cabbage a little sweeter, cook it low and slow until the flavors mellow and meld to your liking.

You have a hankerin’ for Fried Chicken? This will fit the bill.

We have to thank Dieter Claire for inventing this recipe. She modified the fruit parfait recipe and developed a strawberry "ice cream" recipe and this recipe with frozen mandarin oranges. She says, “it’s like an orange creamsicle.” YUM!

This tastes a lot like my mom’s bean soup with the addition of tomato and zucchini.

One of my favorite Cajun meals is chicken mamou. Mamou in Creole is basically grandma. So this is “grandma('s) chicken.”

Talk about easy to make. This soup is done in a flash. If you’re like me you’ll make a triple batch. You can freeze the portions and just add shrimp bits when you go to serve it.

As the weather gets colder and the nights get longer this makes a wonderful soup. Or if you get a cold while on Plan Z this might be just the ticket!

A good old American favorite with a Mexican twist.

I found this recipe online. I didn’t have to do much to make it Zola. It tastes very much like a cheeseburger. The way to make it exciting though is to make sure you pile on the toppings that you like on your burger. You can feed the whole family with this and no one will miss the bun.

My husband loves shrimp and grits. His mother was from Arkansas and they ate grits often. Trouble is grits are very high carb. Traditional grits are made from cornmeal. I took an inspiration recipe and came up with my own version of shrimp and grits. There is just enough corn in here to help you get the corn flavor without the cornmeal. And there’s enough cheese in here that even though you’ll be using almond meal (aka almond flour) for your grits base, you won’t taste the almond.

We were really happy with the way it turned out and I think you could adjust the seasonings to your own taste if you want more garlic or more salt, etc.

This lasagna has no noodles. Standing in for the noodle layers are zucchini sliced the long way.

This dish can be made a day ahead and reheated.

What’s the difference between chili and taco soup? Broth, of course. There is more broth in taco soup is more so it’s thinner than chili. The internet tells me that chili is technically considered a stew. Go figure.

This is a throw it together FAST meal for any weeknight. It is not a spicy dish but you can if you wish, add hot sauce at the table for a little extra zing.

This stew will contain your meat and vegetable portion, serve with salad greens for a complete meal.

These meatballs are my take on an authentic meatball recipe from New York city. These actually have a cheesy element to them that make them super yummy. BIG YUM!