Ingredients:

350g pasta

1 can cream of mushroom soup

1 can tuna chunks

1 large onion

100g mushroom

garlic

olive oil or any available oil

chicken cube or salt

Procedure:

Saute garlic and onion. Add the sliced mushroom after 5 minutes. At this time you can put the chicken stock/cube or salt. Cook for about 10 minutes.

Pour the cream of mushroom soup and cook until the sauce becomes thick stirring occasionally.

Drain tuna and pour in the pan. Cook for another 5 minutes.

This is another of my favorite healthy salad. It's very simple but great.

Ingredients:

• Lettuce
  
• Carrots
  
• Olives
  
• Mozarella
  
• Olive Oil
  
• Salt
  
• Lemon
  

Procedure:

Basically just mix them all and you're ready for a healthy snack.

This is a simple recipe for Coconut Macaroons

Ingredients:

• 1 coconut or a pack of desiccated coconut.
• 1 can condensed milk
• 2 small eggs
• 100g plain flour

Procedure:

Grate coconut and extract the milk. Set the milk aside.

Pour two-thirds of the condensed milk and mix with the coconut sap.

Beat the egg and add to the mixture.

If it is too wet add some flour until the mixture is not too wet nor too dry.

Preheat oven.

Pour misture in a molder and cooked in low-medium heat for 45 minutes.

Enjoy your macaroons.

One of my favorite healthy snack is haystack. Well, for some it's actually a main menu but since I grew up in the Philippines, rice is the only staple food for me and corn chips are for snacking.

Actually, my husband thinks my haystack is not 100% healthy because corn chips contain preservatives. But rather than eating them alone, I thought that haystack is making it a healthier option.

So here's my simple Corn Chips Delight

You need:

• cucumber or lettuce
• tomato
• grated cheese

Additional optional ingredients:

• baked beans or monggo guisado
• onions
• black or green olives

Procedure:

• Cut each ingredient in relatively bite sizes just like you would do in a salad.
• Crush corn chips and just mix them all together.
• Enjoy your healthy snack.

For the obvious reason that brown bread, pasta, and rice are more fibrous and therefore they easily get flushed down. Also choosing brown from white reduces the risk of diabetes 2 because white bread and rice have more sugar.

Hubby and I always buy brown version all the time.  Personally, I think that browns taste so much better apart from being healthier.

Do you prefer your rice al dente or soggy? I bet you like it al dente like most people do.  For every cup of rice use one cup of water. That's it! Whether you are using a rice cooker or an ordinary pot, this measurement will surely make your rice al dente no matter what.

Even fastfood in restaurants like Jolibee, MacDonald, KFC and the likes, their rice is soggy most of the time and I don't like it very much.

Another technique when cooking rice is to add some salt. For every cup of rice add 1/3 teaspoon of salt to enhance the taste of rice.

I used to think cooking pasta was such a tricky job. I even thought it was easier to make rice than pasta. But actually, they are just the same.

So here's the easy steps to cook pasta.

• Boil the water. (One and a half liter for every 250 grams of pasta)
• Add salt when the water starts to bubble or as soon it is warm enough. Don't wait till the boiling point as it won't seep through the pasta. Use approximately one teaspoon for every 250 grams of pasta.
• As the water boils, slowly put the pasta and stir with a wooden spoon so they won't stick together. You don't need to put oil. Just stir them as soon as you placed them in the boiling water. 
• Lower the fire and constantly stir every 3 minutes.
• To check if the pasta is cooked, take one and bite into it. If you see the middle is still whitish or hard leave it for a little bit more. If you want your pasta to be al dente or firm, remove from the fire as soon as you don't see a white spot in the middle of the pasta. Most pasta takes 10 minutes to cook.
• Drain it and put oil preferrably olive oil so the pasta won't stick to each other.

First, I think it's important that we get acquainted with what we love to eat--pasta.  Most Filipinos -- including me -- only know spaghetti. And no matter what pasta is used, if it is with tomato sauce and beef or vegemeat for vegetarian then it's spaghetti. Now, you're about to kiss your ignorance goodbye. LOL! Don't worry was in the same shoes until I married my Sicilian husband.

• spaghetti -- is the most common pasta, the long stick
  
• macaroni -- is the bended pasta which is hollow inside
  
• conchiglie -- (pronounced as Kong-Kil-ye) it's the one that looks like a shell, used by Pinoys to make sopas (soup)
  
• penne -- is like macaroni which is hollow but it's straight with slanted ends
  

For a more comprehensive list check Wikipedia's List of Pasta.

Each type of pasta can be cooked with tomato sauce and meat and the recipe is called according to the type of pasta and the sauce. Example, macaroni and tomato sauce, macaroni cheese, spaghetti and tuna etc, etc.