DECEPTIVELY DELICIOUS
That’s the title of a book that my mother gave me a few months ago, on the advice of my sister. (Thanks, Mom and Sue) This is not an advertisement — consider it a review. Click here to see the book.
Great book. Written by Jessica Seinfeld, wife of famous comedian Jerry Seinfeld. Concerned about nutrition and her kids’ pickiness, Jessica began sneaking blended vegetables into their ordinary favorites.
This works like a charm with smaller kids. With my older kids, who seem to have their nose in my kitchen business all the time, it’s not quite as successful. They eat, yes, but with suspicion. With the help of my husband, my older kids have learned to eat what is served, even if they don’t like it. We’re still working on the little ones.
“Deceptively Delicious” introduced us to the idea of putting peanut butter and brown sugar in muffins. They are OH-SO-GOOD! When you top them with a little extra brown sugar and put sweet potatoes or pumpkin into the batter, they are quite a crowd-pleaser. This can be done with any basic muffin recipe of course, and you could easily use applesauce or bananas, too.
Some of Jessica Seinfeld’s tricks are really great ideas - adding yellow squash puree to your Macaroni and Cheese, for instance, will fool your youngsters pretty easily. Some of her dessert recipes however, are still so loaded with sugar that I think you are fooling yourself if you think you are serving healthy food. A half cup of spinach puree in your blueberry bars doesn’t delete the cup of sugar. Anybody who has read many of my posts will know that I use sugar regularly, so I don’t want to sound like a hypocrite here, I just can’t fool myself into believing that anything with that much sugar should be considered healthy. I’m not accusing Jessica Seinfeld of this, either. She qualifies that sweets should still be very limited, but offers a way to redeem them a bit. It’s a good idea, really.
Jessica includes in her book a lot of other tips that will help you improve your child’s diet; offering a healthy veggie tray in that ‘hungry hour’ before meals, pureeing a lot of foods once a week (or less) and freezing in small amounts to use later, a great healthier cupcake recipe for the unavoidable school treats, plus a lot more.
I guess my summary is this: Great tips, great recipes. Don’t fool yourself - not everything in the book should be automatically considered health food. Also: don’t forget that eating foods that we don’t really like is an acquired skill and your kids should learn to do this, it really is essential in the long run.
Happy Cooking!
10 Great Ways to Start your Day
Breakfast can be the most challenging meal of the day, it seems. Everyone is in a rush to get out the door or get started with their agenda for the day. We are told again and again that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, but we just don’t know how to make time for it. Below are some of my favorite and easy breakfasts to make. This post is inspired by a new favorite of ours, which I am putting at the top of the list:
2. Taco Egg– This is simply a scrambled egg with chopped jalapeños and some cumin added. Serve on a soft tortilla and even with some salsa if you like it.
3. Banana Bread — Click here for the recipe. Make banana bread the day before or even in large batches and freeze.
4. Yogurt and Fruit Smoothie — Any flavor of yogurt (even plain) with some soft fruit added and blended makes a great breakfast. I recommend frozen mangoes, bananas, strawberries, cream of coconut, blueberries, peaches, etc.
5. Cottage Cheese with fruit — A quick favorite of mine; some low fat cottage cheese, pineapple tidbits and chopped cashews. Surprisingly filling when you add the nuts.
6. Homemade Bagel, with cream cheese of course — another one to make ahead of time, obviously. But oh-so-delicious. Click here to view my post on making bagels.
7. Almond Granola — buy it or make it yourself, granola is the healthiest cold cereal you can lay your hands on.
8. Pumpkin Nut Muffins — oops, I haven’t posted this one yet, I will put the recipe up tomorrow. A basic muffin with Pumpkin, peanut butter, and chopped nuts. Make the night before and surprise everyone in the morning.
9. Egg in the Toast — For people who love “dippy” eggs. Heat a bit of oil in a skillet, cut a hole in a slice of bread. Place the bread in the skillet and drop an egg into the middle. After a couple of minutes, flip gently and cook until the white is set. Don’t forget to toast the “hole” in the skillet, too!
10. Easy French Toast — A little more time and labor are involved, but the kids always love French toast. Click here for instructions.
Obviously, these all vary in the amount of preparation required and their nutrition levels. I hope you see something new on the list or something you haven’t had for a while. It’s always nice to change the routine a little bit.
Corned Beef Hash
Corned Beef Hash is one of those old-time favorites of my husbands. Strangely, this is one that my own mother never made and it took me a few years to understand why DH raved about it. I imagine lots of folks picture corned beef hash as one of those greasy-spoon-diner breakfasts that is never made or served anywhere else. I’ve no idea how many people are keen on trying this out for themselves, but it’s not that tricky and is really delicious, so let’s give it a shot…
First off, you need some corned beef. Now, this is pretty easy to obtain from the deli counter of any grocery and you can just ask the worker behind the counter to cut off a chunk for you instead of slicing it real thin-like. Personally, I quit buying corned beef at the deli because of the extremely high prices. I buy a do-it-yourself hunk of corned beef at everyone’s favorite warehouse — Sam’s Club. It comes in a moderate size (about 3 pounds, untrimmed) that my family easily polishes off in one meal. I usually buy two. If you decide to buy it this way, click here to read my method of cooking it. Corned beef that you do yourself will be more tender and will fall apart the way you want it to for hash. Deli beef will have to be cut into bite-sized chunks.
As I mentioned, I like to cook two packages of corned beef. One gets consumed right away, usually in Reuben sandwiches or just plain with sauerkraut. The second I hide away from the seemingly always hungry people in my house for a day or two and then surprise them by pulling it back out and making cold meat sandwiches or corned beef hash.
Corned Beef Hash
serves 6
1-2 c. shredded or chunked corned beef
3-6 redskin potatoes, diced
1 sweet onion, preferably a Mayan sweet or Vidalia
1/4 c. olive oil
3 T. flour
1 c. skim milk, chicken broth, or a combination of the two
salt and pepper
First off, dice the potatoes, rinse in cold water, and drain. Pat dry with paper towels. If you’re not crazy about putting that much work into it, buy some Ore Ida hash browns, they will be just as good.
Next, chop the onion and get it sizzling with the oil over medium heat in a large skillet. Add the potatoes and leave them alone for a few minutes while one side browns. (I used to fuss over hash browns and always ruined them by stirring too much. Leaving them to sizzle on their own is much better.)
Meanwhile, mix the flour and milk or broth in a shaker container or whip them together with a wire whisk. When the potatoes have begun to brown, slide a spatula underneath them and flip. They don’t need to remain in one large piece, but stirring them up too much causes your corned beef hash to turn to a pile of gooey, mushy potatoes. Once flipped, add the corned beef and wait for the other side of the potatoes to brown.
The last step is to pour the milk/flour mixture over all and let the heat thicken it to a white gravy. Add salt and pepper as desired. If you’re really trying to please someone, serve with eggs.
ENJOY!