Healthy Eating Commences Now

I’ve set a goal. I know I’m never going to be back to my perfect size. Never gonna happen. But I’d like to get close to that size… or around the corner from it. Or just in the neighborhood. I’d like to lose 10 (really 15) pounds. I’ve been eating more fruits and vegetables, and trying to avoid the bad (or really, really good!) stuff. I’ve even been using my pool for laps every morning. We’ll see how long that lasts!

This salad is an attempt to recreate a lentil salad I had while on a friend’s sailboat recently. It was so good that I kept eating it. And eating it. And eating it. You get the point, right? The best part is that the salad was definitely healthy. All I remembered were lentils, caramelized onions and herbs. I’ve made something similar, but I’m pretty sure it’s totally different. Either way… its yummy and great for my new healthy eating regime!

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October 15, 2009 | Filed Under Healthy Eating, Salad, Vegetarian

2 Critiques

I Pita the Fool

I’ll admit it, I’m a fan of Mr. T. I used to watch the A-Team as a kid… anyone else? Hmmm… I think I just showed my age. For a short time used I even used the “Mr. T” voice on my GPS. However, I got tired of him calling me a fool if I missed a turn. Its all fun and games until you really start to feel like one! lol!

Anyway, I had some free time last week and decided I was in the mood the bake. After thumbing through my cookbooks, came across this recipe for pita bread. Since I had all of the ingredients on hand, pita it was! This was my first time making it, and I even impressed myself. Who know pitas were so easy to make and yet SO complicated looking! It really is fascinating how you can put a thin, flat piece of dough on a hot surface and it will balloon and turn into a beautiful pita. The best part is the dough is good in the fridge for up to a week. This means you can have fresh pita at your whimsy… Now THAT is good stuff, my friends!

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June 11, 2009 | Filed Under Bakery, Vegetarian

17 Critiques

Making Curds and Whey

I’ve always been a lover of cheese… every kind of cheese. From the stinky stuff in French restaurants to the most mild mozzarella. I found this recipe recently to make cheese at home and knew I had to try it. I didn’t even know you could make cheese at home with such simple ingredients. All you need for this recipe is buttermilk, milk and salt, no chemicals, rennet or anything else. I used organic whole milk, but you can also make it with 1% or 2%. So easy and amazingly delicious. To fancy it up, I browned the cheese in a dry non-stick pan and it made a perfect appetizer. It is also just as yummy eaten plain.

The recipe said salt was an optional item , but I think it is really necessary. I only added a generous pinch of fleur de sel and it was extremely bland before brining. It was fine after brining, but the exterior is definitely saltier than the interior when you brine. The texture is similar to Queso Blanco. It has a nice bite and mild flavor. Next time I’m going to experiment with some smoked sea salt and maybe even herbs. It was so easy, I see myself making fresh cheese at home on a regular basis.

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April 23, 2009 | Filed Under Vegetarian

9 Critiques

Waste Not Want Not

What do you do when you find some sad looking, rubbery broccoli in the depths of your refrigerator? Me… I make soup. We’ve been eating out often lately due to our hectic schedule and I’ve been neglecting my crisper drawer in my fridge. Digging through, I found broccoli, zucchini, a little fresh basil and a few red peppers on the cusp of being inedible. So dinner was cream of broccoli and zucchini with roasted red pepper garnish. Contrary to popular belief, cream of broccoli need not be fat laden with tons of cheese. I finished the soup off with a little bit of half and half, but it was not really necessary. Too bad the parsley was well beyond salvage, because it would have made a nice fresh garnish… you can’t win ‘em all!

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March 5, 2009 | Filed Under Soup, Vegetarian

18 Critiques

Grilled Pear Salad

As with most of you out there, one of my New Year’s Resolutions is to eat healthy and lose a pound or two (or three, or four…etc.) Since I’m not a big fan of exercise, I choose to watch what I eat instead. I can get Stephan to eat salad, but he prefers a piece of steak on top of a few lettuce leaves. That’s my idea of a yummy salad, but not necessarily a healthy one! To increase the yummy factor and decrease the fat factor, this salad is packed with flavor from grilled pears, blue cheese and candied pecans. Grilling pears brings out the sweetness and caramelizes the outside. What’s not to like?
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February 2, 2009 | Filed Under Salad, Vegetarian

16 Critiques

Happy New Year Y’all!

Don’t worry, I haven’t become Paula Deen… but I do have a confession. Deep down inside, beneath my half Japanese exterior hides… a country girl. I grew up a military brat (Dad was a US Marine) in the great southern town of Tallahassee, Florida. If you’ve never been there, Tallahassee is much more like Georgia or Alabama than Florida. Strangely, I live much further south (in Ft Lauderdale) now, but it is much more “Northern” down here. Weird.

Anyway, black eyed peas are a very traditional Southern fare for New Years Day. Ingesting the little black and white beans are supposed to bring you good luck. Some say that the beans resemble coins and this is why they bring you wealth in the new year. Although I don’t think they look even remotely like coins, I still feel the need to eat them on New Years Day, with homemade Southern Cornbread. Don’t want to mess with the Southern traditions!

After all of the heavy holiday feasting, I’ve done a bit of a healthy twist on the beans and made it into a cold bean salad. I wrote the recipe with canned black eyed peas, but I prefer to use dried black eyed peas that are soaked and cooked with a ham bone, which is what I did here.

Hope everyone out there has a Happy and Healthy New Year!
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January 1, 2009 | Filed Under Dinner, Vegetarian

10 Critiques

Ease into Fennel

We are back from Germany, and after all that bread and sausage eating, its time for some low-fat food. This soup is the first thing I’ve cooked in over two weeks, and it is uber low-fat, and very flavorful. I googled carrot and fennel soup and came across quite a few, but decided on this one (with a few minor changes) from Orangette, a fabulous, fabulous food blog.

Most people don’t know what fennel is… I actually had someone stop me in the grocery store, asking me what this strange bulbous veggie in my shopping cart is. It seems people either love or hate fennel. It has a slight licorice flavor, and a wonderful crunch when eaten raw. Its fabulous thinly sliced in a salad. This soup has a combination of carrot and fennel, but the fennel definitely plays a supporting role in this soup, as the sweet carrot flavor really shines. Give fennel a chance!

I will warn you, however, this soup tastes (and is) very healthy. Although I liked the soup, Stephan didn’t care for it, and said it tasted like baby food! Gotta love brutal honesty!
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January 10, 2008 | Filed Under Soup, Vegetarian

7 Critiques

Cut the Cheese

We eat a lot of cheese in my house, and every once and a while, it’s time to clean out the fridge. What do I make with all the random hunks of cheese in my fridge? Macaroni & Cheese!!! But, no fear, this isn’t the mac-n-cheese you remember. Its made with great, flavorful cheeses and topped with a crunchy panko crust. It was definitely the most fattening thing I’ve made in quite a while, but dangit, it was good! The recipe is adapted from Alton Brown’s on the Food Network.

I served it as a main course with a tomato, cucumber and red onion salad.
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October 17, 2007 | Filed Under Dinner, Vegetarian

4 Critiques

Got your gourd?

Now that its fall, I like to make fall themed foods. Pumpkin is one of my all time favorite fall foods… Pumpkin bread, pumpkin muffins, pumpkin pasta… Just all things pumpkin. I even have a pumpkin candle that I only feel its right to burn during the fall. Don’t forget the Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks too, its out of this world! For this recipe, you can adjust the amount of pumpkin to add, but I like my risotto more pumpkiny (if that is a word.)
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October 15, 2007 | Filed Under Dinner, Vegetarian

2 Critiques

Yo Quiero Quesadilla

I’m not one to order quesadillas at Mexican Restaurants because they are usually loaded down with some obscure yellow cheese and just oozing with extra fat. So this is my take on (somewhat) healthy quesadillas. I use Queso Blanco, which is the perfect cheese for quesadillas, as it doesn’t melt and get all gooey and oily. Its also very mild, and really meshes well with the roasted red pepper and caramelized onions. You can use any type of filling for quesadillas, from chicken to chorizo to different veggies. Just make sure everything is cooked first.

I usually serve it with yummy fresh roasted corn salsa, which I make often when fresh corn is abundant.

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