I gilded the lily and doubled up on the tomatoes and zucchini.

I thought I had eaten nearly every configuration of tomatoes possible, but this simple one, from the folks who founded Earthbound Farm (think all those organic salad bags at the supermarket) was new to me, at least in this pasta rendition.

Zucchini and tomatoes go together like cookies and milk (OK, how about celery and carrots?). The most classic combination is ratatouille, which includes both of the aforementioned plus eggplant and bell peppers. I guess I just hadn’t thought of preparing these two alone with pasta, which was so fresh and summery and delicious, we’re going to eat it as many times as we can before the good tomatoes disappear.

Biggest plus: weeknight fast. While you’re eating it, I bet you’ll keep saying something like, “This tastes like it came from a really good restaurant.”  If you don’t that say that then you made it wrong, in which case I want you to email me for virtual cooking lessons.

2 to 3 fresh tomatoes (about 2 cups) cut into 1/2″ cubes (or halved grape tomatoes)
3 T. extra-virgin olive oil
1/4 cup minced fresh basil (NOT optional)
1/4 cup minced fresh parsley (optional)
Pinch of red pepper flakes (optional for you, mandatory at our place)
12 oz. spaghetti (I like linguine)
2 medium zucchini, cut into 1/2″ cubes
1 garlic clove, minced
Salt and pepper

Put tomatoes, 2 T. olive oil, basil, parsley and red pepper flakes into a medium bowl. Sprinkle with salt and allow to marinate for about an hour.

While pasta is cooking, heat remaining 1 T. olive oil in a nonstick skillet and add zucchini and garlic. Cook, shaking pan, until zucchini is crisp-tender and beginning to brown, about 4 to 5 minutes. Season well with salt and black pepper.

Drain pasta and transfer to a large serving bowl. Add tomato and zucchini mixture and toss to combine. Add more salt and pepper if needed.

This can be served warm or at room temperature.

Serves: 4 generously
WW Points per serving: 7 (6 if you provide for leftovers, which we did)

Note: I halved this recipe and used 6 oz. of dry pasta.

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Whatever-is-in-the-fridge stir-fry

Late Saturday afternoon I pulled a mysterious looking zip-lock bag from the freezer in hopes of finding something to cook for dinner without having to go to the supermarket. I couldn’t make out what was in the bag until it had defrosted for a few minutes in a bowl of water: half of a flank steak, cut down the middle to look like a pork tenderloin.

It quickly became the impromptu stir-fry star of whatever I could find in the fridge. Broccoli? Yes. Red bell pepper? Ditto. Onion? Of course. Garlic? Always.

I looked up several beef stir-fry recipes and settled on the one for which I had the most ingredients. This is adapted from America’s Test Kitchen’s Light and Healthy 2010 Cookbook.

If you don’t have dry sherry or hoisin sauce (although I highly recommend keeping a constant supply of this stuff in your pantry. There’s even an article about it here: type “Why Stir-Fry?” into the search square), just go with what you’ve got. It’ll still be delicious. How can you go wrong quickly sauteing fresh veggies and meat? Again, this is not rocket science, trust me.

Stir Fry Sauce:

1/2 cup low sodium chicken broth
1/4 cup dry sherry
3 T. hoisin sauce
1 T. low-sodium soy sauce
2 t. cornstarch
1 t. toasted sesame oil

Stir-Fry

12 oz. flank steak, halved lengthwise and sliced into 1/4″ thick slices
2 t. low-sodium soy sauce
2 t. dry sherry
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 T. grated fresh ginger
3 t. canola or peanut oil
1 red bell pepper, cut into 3/4″ pieces
1 bunch broccoli, florets cut into 1″ pieces
1/2 cup water

Combine sauce ingredients and set aside.

Toss beef with soy sauce and dry sherry. and let marinate for a few minutes.

Heat 1 t. oil in a wok or nonstick skillet over high heat. Add beef and stir fry until lightly browned, about 2 to 3 minutes. Transfer to a clean bowl.

Add another 1 t. oil to skillet and add the bell pepper. Cook until crisp-tender, about 2 minutes. Transfer to the same bowl with beef.

Add broccoli and water to skillet, cover and steam 1 to 2 minutes. Uncover and cook until liquid evaporates and broccoli is crisp-tender, about 2 to 4 minutes longer.

Make a well in the center of the skillet and stir the garlic and ginger into the broccoli. Return the beef/bell pepper mixture to the skillet. Whisk the sauce and add it, stirring constantly until thickened, about 1 minute. Serve with brown rice.

Serves: 4 (Perfect dinner-for-two one night and leftovers for the next)

WW Points per serving: 6 (without the rice)

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The original recipe included fresh green beans, and I’ve made it that way once. Although I like green beans, I preferred eggplant in this dish (hence the ratatouille similarity) and substituted it. If you’re more of a green bean lover, use them instead.

Stews are almost-soups. If you want, you can eat it with a spoon in front of the TV. At last, a bowl of goodies that won’t go straight to your waistline. OK, so I may be stretching it with the “goodies” moniker. Couldn’t fool you ice cream pros, could I?

How about thinking of this as healthy comfort food that takes little more effort than dialing up the pizza delivery?

Serve with a whole wheat roll as an entree, or alongside grilled chicken or fish

2 T. extra-virgin olive oil
1 large onion, thinly sliced (I used Vidalia)
3 garlic cloves, minced or pressed
12 tiny whole Yukon Gold potatoes
1 lb. eggplant, peeled and cut into chunks (or 1 lb. green beans)
1 red bell pepper, sliced into strips
1 green bell pepper, sliced into strips
3 fresh thyme or oregano sprigs
3 small zucchini, cut into 1″ chunks
1 14-1/2 oz. can diced tomatoes (or 3 to 4 chopped fresh tomatoes) and their juice
Salt and pepper to taste
Fresh basil
Grated fresh Parmesan cheese

Heat oil in a large Dutch oven. Add onion and garlic and cook slowly until soft, about 10 minutes. Arrange potatoes on top of onions, then add the eggplant and peppers. Lightly salt layers. Add thyme sprigs. Add the zucchini and top with the tomatoes. Cover pot tightly. If you don’t have a tight-fitting lid, place a piece of aluminum foil over pot and then add lid.

Cook over very low heat for about 45 minutes, or until the vegetables are thoroughly cooked. Add water if there isn’t enough liquid. The vegetables should be “meltingly tender”.

Turn off heat and allow pot to cool slightly. Nancy says this dish is best just slightly warm, but I like it almost hot. Sprinkle with chopped basil and some grated Parmesan cheese, if desired.

As with most stews, this is even better the next day. The eggplant and zucchini will begin to break apart, but that’s their nature. Go with the flow and smile. You’re doing a good thing for body and soul.

Serves: 6
WW Points per serving: 4

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Chicken Caesar Salad has had a relatively speedy evolution: it first appeared on the menus of upscale restaurants and then quickly got demoted all the way down to the bottom of the fast food chain. You can now order one at the drive-thru, and what you get is this: limp romaine lettuce and salty processed chicken pieces bound together by fake-Caesar dressing and served in plastic. Do me a favor and don’t invite me to dinner that night.

In its most classic rendition, Chicken Caesar Salad can be downright delicious. Real Caesar dressing is a creamy combination of eggs, oil, garlic, anchovies, lemon juice, Worcestershire Sauce and Parmesan cheese. The eggs and oil are what make it so creamy, and therein lies the challenge of lightening it up. How do you do creamy without fat?

Once again, the folks at Cooks Illustrated have come up with a solution. Their lower-fat Caesar dressing gets its creaminess from a combination of buttermilk and light mayonnaise. The buttermilk gives it a tang that completely tricks you into believing you’re eating something rich and fattening.

And yes, there are anchovies in the dressing. If you’ve ever had this salad in a restaurant you ate anchovies, so as my girlfriend Kaye’s mother Dottie says, “put on your big girl panties and get over it”.

I feel it necessary to issue a caveat here: while this is healthier than the original recipe, it is not a no-fat dressing. That is why it is so good. Better a moderate portion of this than a vat of the homogenized no-fat stuff. Life is only so long. Amen.

Dressing

1/4 cup buttermilk
2 T. lemon juice
2 T. light mayonnaise
2 t. Dijon mustard
1 t. Worcestershire Sauce
2 garlic cloves, minced or pressed
3 anchovy fillets, rinsed (I bought anchovies in a tin and froze the extras in single portions wrapped in foil)
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. pepper
2 T. olive oil
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Puree all ingredients except the Parmesan in a blender or food processor (I used a small processor) until smooth. Stir in the Parmesan. This makes about one cup of dressing. You’ll need 1/2 cup dressing to serve four, so refrigerate the rest. It makes a great dip for crudites.

Salad for Four

4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves (6 oz. each), cooked and cut into 1/2″ pieces (I grilled my chicken)
2 large romaine lettuce hearts, washed and torn into 1/2″ pieces
Croutons (see recipe below)

Toss the romaine in a large bowl with all but 1 T. of the 1/2 cup dressing and divide evenly between four plates. Add the chicken to the empty bowl and toss with the remaining 1 T. dressing. Evenly place the chicken atop the lettuce. Sprinkle with the croutons.

Croutons

4 cups French bread cubes, cut into 1/2″ pieces (include crusts)
Olive oil spray
1/4 t. salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place bread cubes on a large baking sheet, generously spray with the olive oil spray and sprinkle with salt. Bake until golden brown, about 20 minutes, shaking the pan halfway through to promote even browning. Allow to cool before serving. These keep well in an airtight plastic bag.

Serves: 4

WW Points per serving: 7

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The term dates back to the ancient Romans, who believed that Sirius, the Dog Star, was the cause for hot weather. Sirius is in the constellation Canus Major (Large Dog) and is the brightest star in the sky next to the sun. Thus its brilliance and its fortuitous position in a canine constellation gave it special meaning to ancient peoples. When the star shone brightly at sunrise, they knew they were in for a heat wave.

Throughout history, “dog days” became synonymous with summer heat and all of the aberrant behavior that seemed to accompany it. In the children’s novel, “Tuck Everlasting”, the author wrote, “”These are strange and breathless days, the dog days, when people are led to do things they are sure to be sorry for after.” (See picture above!)

If you’re trying to watch your weight during this sultry time of year, you’re apt to relate to that statement in spades.

Full-fledged cooking is out, with the exception of heating up the outdoor grill. Here’s a cool salad, adapted from Cooking Light, that is very refreshing. It’s got a lovely curry flavor and lots of fresh fruit in it. If you don’t want to cook the chicken breasts, pick up a rotisserie chicken on your way home and toss this together in just a few minutes.

Cool, fruity, exotic! Accompany with whole wheat crackers or a baguette.

The original recipe called for low-fat mayonnaise as the only binder, but I used half greek yogurt because it’s a great no-fat substitute. If you want to further reduce the WW points in this salad, you can use all yogurt, but I think mayonnaise gives it a creaminess that’s worth the extra calories. After all, life is only so long.

1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breast, cooked and cut into 1″ chunks
1 cup seedless red grapes, halved
1 cup peeled, diced apple
2 T. currants or raisins (yellow are good)
1/4 cup Hellman’s Light mayonnaise
1/4 cup fat-free plain Greek yogurt
1 t. honey
1 t. curry powder
1 t. fresh lemon juice
1/4 t. salt
1/4 t. pepper
2 T. sliced almonds, toasted

Combine fruit and chicken in a large bowl. Stir together mayonnaise, yogurt, honey, curry powder, lemon juice, salt and pepper in a small bowl and pour over chicken mixture. Gently fold together and sprinkle with almonds.
Cover and chill.

Serves 4 (a generous cup per serving)

WW Points per serving made mayo/yogurt : 7
WW Points per serving made with all yogurt: 5

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I used three kinds of beets, including golden and variegated. The beautiful colors are jewel-like.

If you say you don’t like beets, you’ve probably only tasted the ones that come in a can or a jar. The difference between fresh and canned beets is profound, I think. Perhaps it will help to know that typical red garden beets are a close relative of sugar beets, which provide us with the white sugar that eventually ends up in much of the processed foods we hate to love. So don’t say you’re completely off beets. You probably eat some version of them every day!

Following is a recipe for roasted beets that you should try, because beets are healthful, because they’re unfairly maligned (due to the tinny flavor of the canned ones) and most of all because they are downright delicious.

Here’s what you do: Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Cut greens away from beets, leaving about 1/4″ of stem. Scrub them well and place in a baking dish. Add 1/4″ of water to dish and cover tightly with foil. Roast small beets for approximately 30 to 40 minutes. Larger beets will take up to 60 minutes. Beets are done when a knife slips through them easily.

Remove from oven and allow to cool a bit. Then cut stems and slip off skins. You can serve them warm, at room temperature or cold. I cut them into chunks, drizzled them with light balsamic vinaigrette and served them with slivers of basil and chunks of goat cheese alongside a green salad. I roasted plenty of them, refrigerated whole extras and cut them up for salads for several days.

By the way, although beets are usually considered to be a winter vegetable, they’re best in the summer months when you can get the smallest, most tender ones at farmers’ markets.

Moosewood Restaurant is a famous vegetarian restaurant in Ithaca, New York. They’ve been publishing cookbooks, many of them award-winning, almost since they opened their doors in 1973.

No, my version isn’t completely vegetarian–I added shrimp. Can’t leave well-enough alone.

I added shrimp and sugar snap peas at the last minute.

Rice

1 14-oz. can artichoke hearts
1 1/2 cups brown rice
1 t. salt
1/2 t. saffron, crumbled

Vegetables

2 cups finely chopped onions
1 cup finely chopped celery
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 T. extra-virgin olive oil
1 t. dried thyme (I used fresh)
1 red bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1 lb. asparagus, cut into 2″ pieces
1 1/2 cups frozen green peas
1 14-1/2 oz. can diced tomatoes
salt and pepper to taste

First make the rice: drain the artichoke hearts, reserving the brine from the can. Quarter the artichoke hearts and set aside. Add water to the brine to make 2 1/2 cups liquid and combine it with the rice, salt and saffron in a heavy saucepan with a tight-fitting lid. Cover, bring to a boil, reduce heat and very gently simmer until rice is tender, about 40 to 45 minutes. You may have to add a bit more water if the rice is too dry. (I cooked my rice in a Japanese rice cooker. Easy and foolproof.)

When the rice has simmered for about 25 minutes, start the vegetables. Saute the onions, celery and garlic in the olive oil in a large skillet. Add the thyme, bell pepper and asparagus; cover and cook, stirring frequently, for 5 minutes. Add the peas, tomatoes and reserved artichoke hearts. Stir gently, cover and continue to simmer for another 5 to 10 minutes, until the vegetables are tender. Add salt and pepper to taste. I added a good splash of Frank’s Original Hot Sauce. You could also sprinkle on some crushed red pepper flakes.

To serve the paella, spread the rice on a large platter or bowl and top with the vegetables and their juices.

As pictured, you can add about 1/2 lb. of shrimp to this. Lay the shrimp atop the vegetables during the last few minutes of cooking time to steam them.

Serves: 6

WW Points per 15 oz. serving: 6

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Everything cooks together in one big Dutch oven.

The moment Spain won the World Cup on Sunday I got a text from my friend Laura that read, “You have to put a paella recipe on the blog to honor Spain.” Laura, you are a woman of good taste and exceptional timing.

Paella is considered by many to be the national dish of Spain; if you travel around the country you will get different versions of the dish everywhere you go. Most include rice and some sort of seafood and/or meat. This recipe, adapted from Cooks Illustrated, contains some of both.

Paella is seasoned with saffron, the world’s most expensive spice (because it comes from the hand-picked stigmas of saffron crocus flowers). So far as I know, there is no substitute for the taste of saffron, but you can use turmeric to get the same yellow color. If you decide to splurge on a tiny bit of saffron, which is how it’s sold, it will keep in a tightly sealed jar for at least two years. Hey, you only live once. Take a risk, but for the taste-faint-of-heart, I warn you, saffron has a unique, albeit fabulous, taste.

I suggest that you make this dish your own. It can easily be altered to cater to your taste preferences without any changes in the cooking times. For instance, we like foods spicy so we add either Tabasco or Frank’s Original Hot Sauce to our paella.

If you’d prefer to forego the seafood or the sausage, by all means do so. I’ve even made completely vegetarian paellas that were delicious and chock-full of vegetables, including artichoke hearts and sugar snap peas. The main thing is to cook the rice together with the other ingredients in the oven so that the flavors meld. This recipe is made with brown rice, which takes a bit longer to cook but has a wonderful texture.

My mother used to make a huge pan of paella whenever she had a crowd over for dinner. (She also made a killer jambalaya.) It’s perfect for entertaining because people can serve themselves what they want right from the pot.

OK, so this is a bit labor-intensive by American microwave-and-eat standards, but it goes together quickly and once it’s in the oven it’s a no-brainer. Whining is not allowed on hungry poodle.

Serve the paella sprinkled with parsley and lemon wedges. All you need is a great salad and some Spanish wine.

1 lb. shrimp (21/25 count), peeled and deveined
6 garlic colves, minced
1 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs, trimmed of excess fat and halved crosswise
1 red bell pepper, seeded and cut lengthwise into 1/2″ wide strips
8 oz. Spanish chorizo or linguica, sliced 1/2″ thick on the bias
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 can (14 1/2 ounces) diced tomatoes, drained, minced, and drained again
2 cups long-grain brown rice
3 cups low-sodium chicken broth
1/3 cup dry white wine
1/2 teaspoon saffron threads, crumbled
1 bay leaf
1 dozen mussels, scrubbed and debearded
1/2 cup frozen green peas, thawed
Chopped parsley
1 lemon, cut into wedges, for serving

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Toss shrimp with 1/4 t. salt, black pepper and 1 t. of the minced garlic. Set aside. Season chicken thighs with salt and pepper.

Heat 2 t. of oil in a large Dutch oven an add red bell peppers. Cook, stirring occasionally, until their skins begin to blister and turn black. Transfer peppers to a small plate.

Add another teaspoon of oil to the pot and add the chicken pieces. Brown on both sides. Transfer to a bowl and add the chorizo to the now-empty pot. Cook until well-browned. Place in the bowl with the chicken.

Add the onion to the pot and cook until softened; stir in the remaining garlic. Stir in the tomatoes and cook about 3 minutes. Add the rice and coat it well with the tomato mixture. Stir in the chicken broth, wine, saffron, bay leaf and 1/2 t. salt. Bring to a boil, cover the pot and place in the oven.

Cook for 30 minutes. Remove the pot and add the chicken and chorizo, pushing them down into the rice mixture. Replace lid and transfer to oven. Cook another 15 minutes. Remove from oven and add the shrimp. Insert the mussels into the rice hinged-side down so that they stand upright; arrange the red bell peppers in a pinwheel pattern and scatter peas over top. Cover and return to oven and cook until shrimp are opaque and mussels have opened, about 12 minutes.

Allow paella to stand, covered, for several minutes. Discard any mussels that don’t open and remove bay leaf. Sprinkle with parsley and serve with lemon wedges and hot sauce.

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Why don’t more people roast chicken at home? Is it because plastic-wrapped, rotisseried (and overdone) birds are readily available at the supermarket? Or is it because we’re all so very busy, running around like chickens with our heads cut off? It may be a combination of both, plus the fact that many of us never learned the basics of cooking, which, while too bad, is not irreparable.

Costco sells what many people consider to be the perfect roast chicken. But when I checked the sodium count for their tasty bird, I found it to have an astonishing 460 mg. of sodium for a mere three ounces of meat. That’s Costco value for you–you buy a chicken and they toss in the salt lick for free.

Look, even if you don’t claim to be a cook, it’s not difficult to roast a chicken at home. All it takes is a good chicken (I buy free-range), some herbs if you have them, a lemon and olive oil and some balsamic vinegar to splash on at the end.

1 3-to-3 1/2 lb. chicken
1 lemon
1 onion, chopped coarsely
2 carrots, chopped coarsely
fresh herbs (I cut a combination of thyme, rosemary and sage, but you can use any or all of these)
olive oil
salt and pepper
balsamic vinegar

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Dry chicken thoroughly and salt liberally inside and out. I use a tablespoon of kosher salt, which sounds like a lot but isn’t. Also sprinkle with black pepper. Cut a lemon in half and stuff it inside the along with the fresh herbs. Tie its legs together to keep everything inside. Lightly coat with olive oil (you can spray it on with an olive oil sprayer) and place atop chopped vegetables in a pan just large enough to hold the bird.

Place 1/4 cup of water in the bottom of the pan and place it into the oven. Roast for about 55 to 60 minutes, or until an instant-read thermometer reads 160 degrees when placed into the breast or 165-170 degrees in the thigh. (If you’re roasting a bigger bird, from 4 to 4 1/2 lbs., it will take about 60 to 65 minutes.) If you don’t have an instant-read thermometer, the juices from the leg should run clear when pierced. Just try not to overcook it; if it’s dry, overcooked chicken you want, buy it at the supermarket.

Remove from the oven and baste all over with balsamic vinegar. This gives the bird a beautiful brown color and lots of wonderful flavor. Cover with foil and allow to rest for 15 to 20 minutes.

Slice and serve with more balsamic vinegar. You can also squeeze on the lemon from inside its tummy if you like lemony chicken.

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Make these for the 4th and stick little American flag toothpicks in them to keep them from toppling over!

Our quintessential national holiday, the 4th of July, requires all-American fare, but in recent years I’ve forgone grilling hamburgers in favor of less fat-filled entrees such as chicken. I wrote a blog a few months back about being chickened out. Never truer words were written.

Enter the slider, until recently a restaurant/bar treat that you can now make at home thanks to Sara Lee’s new (to me, anyway) Mini Buns. which have only 90 calories. There might be other brands of minis out there as well; they’re all basically meant to be used to make less gargantuan sandwiches.

I’m back in the burger business, although in a continued effort to keep it healthy, I’ve used ground turkey here instead of beef. You can certainly use ground beef if you choose.

This recipe is adapted from the Weight Watchers web site; their recipe makes regular-sized burgers using ground chicken (and you already know how I feel about that). Each of these little burgers has about 3 ounces of meat, a fat slice of home-grown tomato and romaine, some spiced-up barbeque sauce and a few blue cheese crumbles, which give them a buffalo sort of kick. Yum.

1 lb. 93% lean ground turkey
1/4 cup dry bread crumbs, plain
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1/2 t. salt
1/4 cup barbeque sauce
1 t. hot pepper sauce (I like Frank’s)
5 slices ripe tomato
Romaine lettuce
5 slider buns
2 T. blue cheese, crumbled*

In a small bowl combine barbeque sauce with hot pepper sauce. In a large mixing bowl combine turkey with bread crumbs, onion, salt and a tablespoon of the barbeque sauce mixture. Using wet hands, form into 5 patties; brush the tops of the patties with some of the remaining barbeque sauce.

Place burgers on grill sauce side down; brush top with remaining sauce. When you turn the burgers over, place the slider buns on the grill to toast them a bit.

To serve, place a burger onto each bun and top with a slice of tomato, some lettuce and a few crumbles of the blue cheese. I spread my blue cheese on the top of the bun.

*Don’t like blue cheese? Goat cheese works just as well. Or you can always default to cheddar.

Makes 5 burgers

WW Points per burger: 5

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