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A few days ago, right after Mother’s Day, Mia and I were really tired and headed off to the Olive Garden for lunch. We normally skip restaurant meals as they are usually high in sodium but lack of energy prevailed and the Olive Garden won!
I was surprised when Mia ordered Chicken Parmesan; she said “what’s not to like? fried chicken and pasta!” — typical Mia.
Chicken Parmigiana is an American revamp of a classic dish from southern Italy based on eggplant usually made by breading and frying chicken breast, covering with sauce and cheese and baking in the oven. While I have made Chicken Parmesan through the years, I never really liked it left-over, and needed a new approach! I needed to find a way to make this a part of a healthy, week-night dinner and give it legs. [...]
I drove to SLO today and decided to drive the scenic route through the Nipomo Mesa, wind my way along the coast through Arroyo Grande and then through the Edna Valley. The drive is beautiful and peaceful and one always encounters roadside produce vendors.
My tomatoes aren’t quite ripe yet so I purchased a couple of pounds of delicious, vine ripened and sweet tomatoes along Los Berros. I love to visit this little stand in the small, warm valley below the mesa where juicy, ripe, tomatoes are piled in baskets for one to choose and pay on the “honor system”.
Caprese is a remarkably easy to prepare salad and should be made of only the very freshest ingredients! Vine ripened tomatoes, Mozzarella Bufala, fragrant Basil Leaves and copious amounts of the best olive oil are the foundation for one of the tastiest salads available!
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Souvlaki is a wonderful food that is made with cubes of meat. Depending upon the local it can be very small bits of meat up to 1″ cubes. The meat, traditionally lamb, it marinated in lemon and olive oil and Mediterranean herbs and spices and finely skewered on wooden sticks and cooked over coals.
Souvlaki can be a hand food or plated for dinner. As a sandwich it is usually served wrapped in a pita with a salad like a Gyro and served with sauces and fried potatoes. When plated as a dinner the Souvlaki are served with rice and a Greek Salad.
Today, as taste change pork, beef and chicken are commonly used to create the Souvlaki. The skewers of meat are served with tomatoes, cucumbers, onions and Tzatziki sauce and very often with fried potatoes and rice. The marinade will vary with the cook and can range from lemony to garlicky, heavy on the oregano and sometimes thyme. Once cooked the Souvlaki are seasoned to taste with salt and pepper.
The first time I enjoyed Souvlaki was at a Greek Festival in Southern California and the tender lemony chunks of chicken were served wrapped in bread with shredded lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber and hommos. It was delicious!
My Souvlaki are marinated in a combination of olive oil and freshly squeezed lemon juice to which I have added a mixture of ground garlic and fresh oregano. I like to use chicken and so I only marinate for a couple of hours, if using lamb I would marinate over night.
Souvlaki is a wonderfully easy and deeply satisfying meal to make. The high satiety value is achieved by the liberal use of garlic, black and red peppers and finally by using a finishing salt which clings to the tongue a bit. [...]
Tzatziki sauce is a wonderfully fresh, crisp yogurt based sauce. Crisp cucumbers combine with yogurt. Tzatziki varies with the cook and locality and while the name might change a bit, Tzatziki is a mainstay of Mediterranean Cuisine. Tzatziki is a great way to enjoy the healthy benefits of yogurt and fresh cucumbers. [...]
There is an absolutely wonderful sauce served with Schwarma in Lebanese Restaurants. I love it! Lebanese Yogurt Garlic Sauce is not only a must on Shwarma but makes an exceptional dip with vegetables and flat bread. Garlicky and satisfying this dip is based in healthy yogurt and is very easy to make.
I usually use fat free, Greek Style Yogurt because it is creamy, delicious and very good for you. Yogurt Vegetable sticks such as red peppers, celery, carrots and snap peas are each equally at home with this wonderful dip. [...]
 As Spring nears I am aching for Spring foods; and salads are definitely on my short list!
At a potluck party recently, a friend of ours, Pamela, brought her Kale Salad. Mia had tasted the salad a couple of times and each time remarked about how very delicious it was, and now it was my turn to experience it. I am not being gracious when I say it was delicious!
Kale is a wonderfully healthy vegetable related to other brassicas such as broccoli, brussels sprouts and cauliflower. As a leafy green it excels at providing beta carotene, vitamin C, vitamin K, calcium and cancer fighting anti-oxidants. Chopped, kale is thought to have powerful anti-cancer properties. How much better to chop and then bruise it to release all of the available Sulforaphane! [...]
 I love this food blog I found a couple of years ago which is written by Jaden Hair called Steamy Kitchen. Jaden is a funny read, takes lots of photos of her work and I just love to visit her site (link is to the right). It would appear she is doing very well in the blogosphere and has now published her first cookbook and hit the TV circuit. Of course, I couldn’t wait to add her cookbook to my collection of 5,000 other cookbooks I thumb through every once in a while. Jaden Hair’s cookbook is wonderfully perfect because it has lots of pictures to excite the appetite and inspire the cook!
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 Fresh beets are a delicious, naturally sweet, and very good for you vegetable that should be a part of any diet. High in folates and betacyanin, the stuff that give them their intense color, beets are powerful for fighting cancers, reducing cholesterol levels and fighting heart disease and reducing inflammation. Anyone of these benefits should make them a must have part of a healthy diet. [...]
A favorite in our family is tomato soup and throughout the Winter I usually make a pot of it each week. Whenever I serve tomato soup I am usually asked for the recipe. Since I have never had a recipe I promised Tracy I would write down what I did the next time I made it and place it on my blog.
This is an incredibly easy to make, tasty, healthy soup which is easy on the budget. [...]
 I don’t think I had ever eaten bagel until I was an adult, at least not a memorable one. When I was a kid, living in our small town, the only bagels available were in the “special” section of the frozen food case. There were maybe three packages of “plain” or “egg” bagels at the end of the food case. It wasn’t until the Silvers moved onto our block I never knew anyone who actually ate them.
As an adult I started seeing “fresh” bagels in the bread section of our supermarket and loved them. I could choose plain, egg or onion and once I toasted them and spread a half-pound of cream cheese on them they were to die for. Later, Mia and I encountered a Noah’s Bagels whilst at a seminar in Portland, OR; The incredible bagels at Noah’s were huge, chewy and topped with an enormous amount of deliciousness. I was hooked. [...]
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