Mama Moira's Kitchen...

Just to set the record straight, like it matters, is that I am neither Italian nor Jewish. I must admit, I steal from their heritage kitchens all the time.

There is nothing more therapeutic than a good chicken soup. One of these days, when I can consider eating even a modest amount of carbs again, I would like to learn to make matzo balls. There is something so soulful about the combination of a rich chicken stock combined with bits of chicken and sauteed vegetables. I also love, love Italian food. Pasta is right out for me, of course, but I can still enjoy that mind numbing joy of tomatoes, garlic, onions, fennel combined in a slowly simmered sauce... Huh? Oh wait. Where was I?

When I was in the airport in Atlanta not long ago I bought a mess of cooking magazines (including one of my top favorites, Saveur) to read on the plane. Since we are all poor during this recession I hardly ever buy cooking magazines any more (even though I used to be addicted and had subscriptions to at least three of them). I can look at them online but it isn't the same. I love the glossy pages and lovely, professional pictures of foods I will most likely never make.

Some of my favorite recipes are for foods with which I am not familiar; like, I love the recipes for Italian Christmas Eve dinner with all the myriad seafood dishes but the one that caught my eye this time was the recipes for Sukkot, the Jewish holiday of celebration and thanksgiving. The recipe in Saveur calls for some traditional ingredients like raisins and honey, rice... and a couple of other things I can't have because a) I am a low carb kind of girl and b) if I put fruit in a meat dish I think my husband might divorce me. I compromised by making it more Sephardic (which for me is just a fancy way of saying I substituted a bunch of ingredients to make it more Italian and less fruity). My kitchen is now filled with intoxicating scents and I am about to float away on them.

Holishkes (Stuffed Cabbage Rolls ala Cathy)
Based on a recipe found in Saveur
Serves 4

1 large head of cabbage, cored
Olive oil
2 small onions, peeled and finely chopped
2 ribs celery, finely chopped
1 TB fennel seed
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
1/4 cup tomato paste
1 cup red chard, sliced into thin ribbons then chopped crosswise
1 32oz can pureed tomatoes
1 lb ground lean ground chuck (or ground lamb would be delicious, too)
3 TB beef stock
1/3 cup shredded carrots
1 tsp paprika or smoked paprika (my personal favorite)
1 egg, lightly beaten
Salt and pepper

Bring a large, deep pot of salted water to a boil over high heat, add the head of cabbage using a giant fork and cook, pulling off each leaf as it cook with some tongs, about 2 minutes per leaf until you get 9-10 leaves. Let drain and cool on some paper towels.

Heat a tsp or two of olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat, add onions and celery. Saute but do not caramelize. Add the fennel seeds, garlic, chard and the pepper flakes. Continue to saute until both the onions and celery are translucent and your kitchen is fragrant. Add the tomato paste and stir until incorporated. Add the tomato puree. Stir then simmer until the sauce starts to reduce, thicken and again become very fragrant, about 30 minutes.

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Combine ground beef, beef stock, carrots, paprika, egg and salt and pepper. Don't over-mix or the stuffing will be tough. Lightly stir using only your fingertips until all the ingredients are incorporated.

Lay out your cabbage leaves like little green dishes. Divide the filling between all the leaves. Fold the leaves up one by one by folding in the sides, then rolling the other way into a tidy ball. Place the rolls into an 8"x8" (or 9"x9") baking dish that you've sprayed with non-stick spray. Once all the rolls are in there, cover with the tomato sauce. Bake until the filling is cooked through, about 45 minutes. Let rest for 5-10 minutes before serving.

If you don't care much about being Kosher, you could sprinkle the top with feta cheese or Parmesan as an added touch. I don't use cheese as there is so much flavor already I don't think it needs it.

Mazel tov, amore!

Flexibility and tacos...

A post 2 days in a row! I'm en fuego!

Going low/no carb is not always easy when you are trying to feed yourself and feed your family satisfactorily. Usually I will make a soup or a stew or a protein/vegetable combination. Usually they are happy with that... unless my husband is yearning for tacos. He would not be happy with merely a taco salad. That just wouldn't be fitting.

I also like easy and fast. I mean, I have enough to do without making my own tortillas and cunningly fashioning them into a magical Mexican dinner, especially if I don't get to eat them. I cheat and buy grocery store taco shells. I also buy pico de gallo, pre-shredded cheese and bottled hot sauce. I know, I know! But remember this dinner on the fly, in a hurry, one that doesn't come out of a box or a drive-thru.

So, my family happily crunches away on their tacos and I get taco salad. We eat a lot of tacos since it is one of my husband's favorite dinners. I don't mind since it really is easy and pretty nutritious; however, I tire of the same old taco salad sometimes. Occasionally I will mix it up, using shredded cabbage instead of lettuce. Cabbage has a lot more going for it nutrition-wise than regular lettuce. Sometimes I shred up some chard or use shredded broccoli that you can get in bags at the grocery store. However, last night I did something delicious... I caramelized 2 peppers (1 red, 1 green) and an onion and used that as a base for my salad, sprinkling some shredded cabbage on top for crunch. It turned a mere taco salad into something decadent and divine. With some of the taco meat, pico de gallo, shredded cheese, hot sauce and a dollop of fat-free Greek yogurt, I felt like I was eating something amazing.

Sometimes it takes a little imagination, a lot of flexibility and the willingness to try something a little different. It is what keeps me going and (somewhat) sane.

I'm all about the flavor today...

You know, sometimes you just have to forget about any dietary restrictions and just think about the food. It just so happens that on this day I thought about the food, the flavor, the fullness factor and not the carbohydrates... and it just so happens that I came up with a very low carb meal. And it was damned delicious. So there.

Two days ago my husband (who trends towards the fatty, the salty, the processed) said he bought a carton of cioppino from a local gourmet grocery store. He was "jonesing seafood," he said. This is coming from the man who also made himself a "formed, pressed turkey roll" for dinner last night. I should trust his opinion?

Anyway, his comment about cioppino got me thinking... and jonesing. What is not to love about a good cioppino? It is made from a flavorful, spicy tomato broth enhanced with a variety of available seafood... clams, mussels, shrimp, crab, white fish, whatever looks good.

Supposedly, cioppino was invented by fishermen originally from Portugal, Italy, France and/or Spain who made their homes in San Francisco. Suffice it to say it is an American dish with Mediterranean accents. It has the herbs and the tomatoes and the seafood... it could fit in almost anywhere surrounding the Mediterranean Sea. I have always loved it and it is my gauge for restaurants around here (and I live in the Tacoma/Seattle area so I know my seafood). If their cioppino (or equivalent) is good... then they probably know their seafood. This is my recipe... inspiration taken from a bunch of recipes and my own tastes. The recipe is a LOT easier than it looks and after all, it is all about the flavor...

Cathy's Cioppino
Serve 4-6

2 tsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
1 fennel (or anise) bulb, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 - 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes, according to taste
1 tsp dried rosemary
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp dried summer savory
(or 1 TB dried Italian seasoning or Herbs de Provence for the rosemary, oregano and savory)
1 cup dry white wine
2 cans fire-roasted tomatoes
1 6oz bottle clam juice
3 cups (or more) low-sodium, fat free chicken broth
Seafood of choice... here's where it gets weird. You can mix and match and add or subtract as you wish. Listed are my choices:
4 fillets of white fish, cod or tilapia or halibut, cut into bite sized chunks
1 lb. fresh manila clams, rinsed REALLY well
1 lbs shrimp; clean, deveined, tail left on
Small handful of fresh parsley

Heat oil in a large soup pot until a flick of water skitters across the surface. Add the onions and saute until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the green pepper and the chopped fennel. Saute until the vegetables are tender but not browned. Add the garlic, the red pepper flakes and the other dried herbs. Saute another 5 minutes until the garlic is fragrant.

Pour in the white wine. Scrape the bottom to release any delicious brown bits that might have formed on the bottom of the pan. Cook until the wine does not have any more alcohol smell and is almost evaporated. Add in the cans of tomatoes. Stir and bring back to a simmer. Add the clam juice and the chicken broth. Cover and simmer on low for 30 minutes.

Taste for seasoning... add salt and pepper if necessary.

Add the seafood. Bring back to a low boil then cover and cook for 10 minutes. Check to see if the clam shells have opened and the shrimp shells are pink. Do NOT eat any unopened clams. That would be bad. Serve in bowls with a sprinkling of fresh chopped parsley.

This is some good stuff. It is all about flavor and spice and local ingredients. I hope you are local to seafood, if you are, you are truly blessed. Mmmm. Good stuff.

Beans, beans, the magic fruit...

I'm bored.  Bored, bored, bored.  I came very close to eating an enchilada the other day, that is how bored I am.  Dogs and cats are happy eating the same things every day.  Their little digestive systems get upset if you change up their food all the time.  Humans are different.  We like variety.  Without variety, depression sets in, then you eat an enchilada and that's all she wrote.  So, what do we do about boredom?  We find something new!

Beans.  Do they have carbs?  Yes... BUT they are really high in fiber (13g per cup - which can be very beneficial for someone who is eating a high protein diet), high in protein (15g per cup), are naturally low in fat and packed with beneficial healthy stuff like antioxidants, folic acid, vitamin B6, potassium and magnesium. (Prevention.com).  Even though they are higher in carbohydrates than the other more common sources of low fat protein, beans are not a bad thing when eaten in moderation.  And they help keep me sane in terms of varying my food intake so I don't succumb to boredom (read: eat enchiladas).

Canned beans are supposedly as good for you as dried beans.  Granted, they are convenient because they don't need to be soaked and cooked for a long time to make them edible... but, most brands add a lot of salt (I am now a rabid label reader) and I am sorry but the mucous-y looking goo in the can is not appetizing.  They can be rinsed and all that but it is also rinsing away some of the nutritional value.  My new habit is to prepare a 1lb bag every week, which lasts me all week.  That way I only need to go through the whole soaking and cooking thing once a week.

The cooked beans are delicious in all kinds of ways... I mix them with cooked turkey meat and serve over shredded cabbage with pico de gallo for taco salad.  I add a scoop to soups or stews for flavor, protein and texture.  Sometimes for breakfast I heat up a small bowl of it, add some chipotle sauce and a little shredded 2% cheese and serve with an over-easy fried egg on top.  Mmm, breakfasty goodness.  If you're concerned about gas, either take some Beano before you eat or chew a couple of Papaya enzyme pills afterward.  Works like a charm.  Believe me, I had to learn the hard way.  No one needs that, even for the superior health benefits of beans.

My recipe was derived from the one posted by Rancho Gordo, an excellent source for dried heirloom beans (Rancho Gordo New World Specialty Foods).

Beans, Delicious Beans

1 lb. dried beans (pinto, kidney, black or almost any other variety)
Chicken stock - low sodium or homemade (amount varies)
2 tsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2 carrots, diced
2 stalks of celery, diced
1 red pepper, diced
1 jalapeno, de-ribbed, seeded and chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
Salt and pepper
Spice of choice (optional)

Pour the bag of beans into a sieve or colander.  Rinse well and pick through the beans in case there are any small pebbles or other foreign matter that doesn't belong.  Pour the rinsed beans into a large bowl.  Cover with chicken stock until the stock covers the beans by 1 inch.  Cover, put in the refrigerator and leave 4-6 hours or overnight.

Next day, in a large soup pot, heat the oil on medium-high heat until a bead of water skips across the surface and the oil shimmers.  Start to saute the vegetables... onions first until they start to get translucent, adding each vegetable one at a time until all are incorporated.  Finally, add the minced garlic and toss with the vegetables until you can start to smell the garlic aroma.

Pour in the beans AND the chicken stock to the vegetables.  Conventional wisdom used to say to discard the soaking liquid but now the thought is that we might be discarding some of the nutrient value down the drain.  That is why the beans are thoroughly rinsed and picked through before the soaking process begins.  Add more stock to ensure that the beans and vegetables are still covered by about an inch of liquid.  Bring the beans to a boil then cover and put on the lowest temperature possible while still maintaining a simmer for at least 2 hours.  Add salt and pepper to taste or any other seasoning like cumin or curry powder.  Test the beans at that point and add more stock if it seems low.  Beans should be slightly soupy as they will continue to absorb liquid.  Continue cooking at the low simmer until you deem them perfect.

I also add sauteed greens, more sauteed vegetables and experiment with different spices to keep the flavors interesting.  Black beans take really well to Mexican type spices, cannellini are especially good with Italian spices and lots of garlic.  They can be left whole, partially mashed or creamed completely for a satisfying vegetable dip.  Beans help keep those boredom blues away.

Slightly pickled...

Yes, I know, it has been a whole month since I posted last.  I've been busy!  I've been working mostly from my sister's house trying to watch her kids and mine and do my work at the same time.  Money saving, to be sure, but nerve wracking as well.

Anyway, I've been doing really well.  I bought jeans yesterday a size smaller!  Yay!  They are a tad tight but at the rate I am going they should feel great before long.

I am into my fourth month of eating essentially carb free.  I thought I would get tired of it by now so therefore, commencing to eat a loaf of bread or a pie or something but not so!  I am treating it like I would alcoholism or an extreme food allergy.  I can't just have a little, I can't have any at all.  That strategy seems to be working for me so I am going with it.

One of the most difficult issues for me is still snacking.  Sure, I can have cheeses and salami, etc. but they are high in fat.  Chips are right out.  Vegetables and dips are good but you have to be careful about the dips, that they are not too high in fat.  I have spoken before about pickles.  Pickles are good.  Pickles are tasty and spicy and satisfying. Pickles have no fat.  Although some pickles contain sugar!  Yes!  Demon sugar.  Not good.

I love bread and butter pickles, you know, the sweet cucumber slices that taste so awesome on sandwiches.  Unfortunately those kind of pickles are loaded with sugar so I set out to find a way to make some at home that were just as tasty but not so carb heavy.  I tweaked the recipe some to add some additional vegetables and the Splenda.  I don't remember where I found the original recipe so I will send some "I'm sorry" vibes out to the internet.  If I could remember, I would credit you, oh writer of easy and delicious pickle recipes.

Bread and Butter Mixed Vegetable Pickles

3 kirby cucumbers (about 1 lb.), trimmed and thickly sliced
1 small yellow or red onion, thinly sliced
1 small head cauliflower, broken into florets
4 small carrots, quartered then cut into 3" lengths
1/4 cup kosher salt
2 1/4 cups white wine vinegar
1 1/4 cups Splenda
3 tsp. mustard seeds
3 tsp. celery seeds
1 tsp. ground turmeric

1. Put cucumbers, onions, carrots, cauliflower and salt into a large bowl and toss well. Add 3 cups ice cubes, cover bowl with plastic wrap, stir occasionally and refrigerate overnight.

2. Drain cucumbers and onions well, discarding the salty water; set aside.
Put vinegar, Splenda, mustard seeds, celery seeds, and turmeric into a very large
pot, stir well, and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Add the cucumber–
vegetable mixture and stir well. Allow liquid to return just to a boil.  Stir several times
about 5 minutes then remove pot from heat. Transfer pickles and their liquid to a
large, clean plastic container. Set aside to let cool to room temperature, then cover
and refrigerate overnight. Serve pickles the next day or store for up to 1 week.

Delicious!  You can eat these as much as you want and not feel guilty one bit.  I chop them up and put them into salads, put a heaping chopped pile onto a bowl of chili with my fat free Greek yogurt.  Of just eat them out of hand as a part of a deli tray.

Low carb does not mean snack-free.

Thank God.  Amen.

Monday. Ugh.

It is the Tuesday after a three day weekend (Memorial Day).  I know it's Tuesday but it FEELS like a Monday.

I wasn't too bad this weekend as far as food goes.  I managed to not eat any of the forbidden foods:  bread, pasta, rice, potatoes.  I did consume too much alcohol and we know that alcohol turns RIGHT into sugar.  Bleah.  No wonder I am draggin' ass today.

So, I need a restorative.  What to do?  Curry!

Yes, curry.  I need something packed with vitamins and spiced to make me sweat out the toxins of an indulgent weekend.  I don't pretend to be any sort of an expert on making curries.  My curries are of my own devising.  They are neither Thai nor Indian but I suppose they are based more on the Indian type.  Loosely defined, a curry is a mixture of vegetables (and meat) cooked in a sauce of strong spices and turmeric.  Seriously?  That could be almost anything.

Curry powder can be purchased in most grocery stores.  Or you can make your own garam masala (a blend of spices), which I have done and it beats the heck out of the store bought kind.  Unfortunately, the homemade stuff flavor fades fairly rapidly once the spices have been ground so I go through it too quickly.  I usually just use the store bought kind.  The madras type of curry powder is extra spicy.  Sometimes the situation calls for just a little more spice.  This is one of those times.

Curry
Serves 6-8

1 large onion, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped
1 large handful sliced red chard leaves
1 Japanese eggplant, cubed
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 TBS grated fresh ginger
3 tablespoons curry powder
8 oz poached chicken meat
6 oz cubed firm tofu
1.5 cans reduced sodium chicken broth (or 2 1/3 cups)
1/4 cup fat free Greek yogurt
1 tablespoon toasted sesame seeds

1. Heat a large Dutch oven over medium high heat.  Spray with non-stick cooking spray.

2. Add onion to Dutch oven; cook until soft, about 5 minutes.  Add carrots, celery and chard.  Saute another 5 minutes.  Add eggplant cubes.  Saute 5 minutes.  Add garlic, ginger, and curry powder. Cook, stirring, 1 minute more.

3. Add the proteins.  Incorporate, making sure all the chicken and/or tofu is covered in the spices.

4. Stir in the chicken broth.  Bring to a boil then immediately turn down to a simmer, cover and cook for at least 20 minutes, until all the vegetables are soft.

5. Remove from the heat.  Stir in the yogurt incorporating well.  Serve and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

** NOTE ** Play around with the ingredients.  As with all my recipes, they are just a jumping off point.  Add different types of proteins.. lamb is good, all chicken, all tofu, whatever.  Add different vegetables   Go crazy.

A big bowl of this spicy concoction will put you right and make Wednesday a lot better than Tuesday.  Oh yeah.

Spice Goddess

Make me sweat, I'll be your friend.  More on that later.  The hardest thing for me is the lack of snack foods available.  Think about it... all the good snack foods have carbs: chips, crackers, thin slices of party bread, popcorn.  Sometimes all I need to get me through is a couple of bites of whatever.  I don't need to stuff my face, I just need to take the edge off.  So, what to do?

SPICE!  (That's where the whole "make me sweat" thing comes in.)

Chilies contain a wonderful chemical called capsaicin.  Capsaicin is a known digestion enhancer and natural appetite suppressant.  Eating something spicy also tells your body you are eating something good, flavorful and satisfying.  Chomping on a big, spicy pickle in the afternoon is all you need to get through until dinner.  If you do decide to use pickles to soothe that jones, read the label.  Make sure it is not a sweet pickle or one that uses sugar in the brining process.  Otherwise that kind of defeats the purpose... you might as well have eaten a big slice of pie!  Well, okay, maybe not but still, you get my point.

I also love hot sauces... Tabasco, Tabasco chipotle, sriracha.  Make a low carb chicken soup, pack in lots of vegetables, use Mexican oregano and smoked chipotle powder as your spice then throw some Tabasco chipotle sauce on top right before serving.  WOOO!  Spicy, hot goodness.  You will feel full and satisfied and ready to salsa.  I swear.

Back to snacks, I also utilize fat free Greek yogurt.  It has no fat, it's low carb and very filling.  Greek yogurt has been strained so it is very thick in texture compared to American style yogurt.  More on the virtues of Greek yogurt another day but right here I will just say I mix it with hot sauce and a tiny pinch of salt.  Okay, I know, most people mix in sugar and/or fruit... I'm a more savory gal myself and I am convinced the spiciness makes me feel more satisfied.

So in conclusion, satisfy your spice tooth!  I just made up that term.  I need to patent it, stat.