Healthy Family Recipes

healthy family recipes

Bacon Jalapeno Egg Salad

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Bacon Jalapeno Egg Salad

Couldn’t be simpler.  We’re heading into the school year, and I’m in search of easy yet (of course) tasty lunch recipes that fit in with my health goals, and here’s a prime example. Lunch boxes (with cooler pack) at the ready.

BACON JALAPENO EGG SALAD

6 large eggs, hard boiled
1/2 cup mayonnaise (preferably homemade, as in here or here!)
1 jalapeno, seeded and chopped
3 scallions, chopped (both whites and greens)
1 teaspoon brown mustard
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/2 teaspoon salt
4-5 pieces bacon, cooked and chopped or crumbled

Mash the eggs together with a fork to desired chunkiness. Stir in remaining ingredients except bacon (keep separate if you can, for texture purposes; but if you need to put it all together in advance, it’ll still be fine). Chill together at least an hour before serving. Stir in bacon right before consuming, optimally.

— posted by Anne

Chimichurri No-Potato (a.k.a.Beetabaga) Salad

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Golden Beet and Rutabaga Salad with Chimichurri

Ah, May Day. We just had our first picnic of the year, and cliche though it might be, I like nothing better than a good potato salad. I made a great one with chimichurri last summer, but I’m also watching the carbs and mostly avoiding starches, so I thought I’d try recreating it with less-starchy, more nutrient-dense root vegetables instead.

The combination of rutabagas and golden beets was fabulous with the chimichurri!  I decided to add a little roasted garlic into the mix, too for another layer of flavor, especially since we’re roasting the vegetables already. Highly recommended. Now say “Chimichurri Beetabaga” 5 times fast.

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Chimichurri Roast Potato Salad

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Roasted Potato Salad with Chimichurri Sauce

Have you tried chimichurri before? If not, you are seriously missing out. It’s commonly served with steak or other grilled meats, originating in South America, including deep roots in Argentina in particular. Variations on the basics of the sauce abound, but a few near-constants are parsley, cilantro, olive oil and garlic, garlic, garlic – so although its original intent was as a carnivorous condiment, it’s also perfectly suited to vegetarian and even vegan contexts. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted to try it on pretty much everything short of ice cream.

So, as it happens, I was contemplating making a chimichurri steak salad to bring to a birthday potluck this weekend, but knew there would likely be plenty of vegetarians in attendance. What better blank slate to showcase the flavor-fest that is chimichurri than potatoes? I decided to try making it into a potato salad.

Results: INSTANT PICNIC PERENNIAL. I will be looking for excuses to make this all summer long. See if you don’t feel the same way! …

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Jack O’Melons, and Ensuing Spicy Watermelon Salad

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If you had to choose only ONE fruit that completely embodies the height of summer, it would have to be watermelon, right? I mean, there are plenty of other runners-up and honorable mentions in the bounty of summer fruits (I’m particularly partial to berries of all kinds), but watermelon is the essence of the summer picnic, afternoons in the shade, and silly, seed-spitting fun. Donna will be sharing some dazzling watermelon carving coming up soon, but as I had some picnics to attend, I thought I might as well try my hand at carving too.

I’ve seen some pretty spectacular fruit carving skills in my time,  on cruise ships past and as recently as BlogHer Food 2012, where attendees had a chance to get creative at the Supervalu booth. I’m realistic enough to know that my aptitude for sculpture isn’t going to hold a candle to these – instead, I thought I’d run with the one type of carving I DO have experience with, however rudimentary. Who says you can only make a jack o’lantern with a pumpkin?

Of course, the innards will be consumed rather differently. Might I suggest the following spicy salad, ingredient amounts to be interpreted liberally:

Spicy Watermelon Salad with Lime and Cilantro

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Thai-Inspired Chicken Salad – For All Your Summer Picnic Needs

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Tantalizing Thai Chicken Salad

One of my favorite discoveries since moving to Portland is t local chain of groceries known as New Seasons. It’s akin to Whole Foods, but with much more emphasis on local, sustainable, and environmentally responsible. They value their employees and treat them accordingly. Their goods are impeccably sourced. All this AND it’s a foodie’s paradise.

(Donna, I can’t wait to shop there with you next time you visit!)

Along with their bucolically voluptuous produce section, I love browsing their prepared foods. This is no mere deli counter -their creations are creative and delicious, running the gamut from healthfully decadent to decadently healthful. I’m always on the lookout for a good chicken salad, so their Lemongrass Chicken Salad naturally piqued my interest. They have recipe cards for some of their inventions, but not this one, so I winged it with the ingredients they print out on every takeout container and made a few little modifications …

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Red, White and Blueberry Cookie Tarts

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Berry cookies

What’s better than cookies or fruit tarts? Cookies that are morphed into fruit tarts.

These pretty little cookie tarts are super easy to make and so festive! Isn’t it nice of Mother Nature to give us Americans strawberries, raspberries and blueberries just in time to create red, white and blue desserts? God Bless Mother Nature as well as America!

I used sugar cookies from a bakery, but if you want to make your own, so much the better. If you’re feeling a little more ambitious, you could make our Five Minute Homemade Puff pastry. No, we are not making this up: it really does take only five minutes of prep time from scratch.

The cream cheese frosting recipe (below) I used is my favorite all-time frosting that I have made in 30 years. It is light, fluffy and so flavorful. It really shouldn’t be called “frosting,” it should be called “heavenly fluff.” I use almond extract so as not to muddy the color, and almond is a delicious flavor with most any other dessert ingredient. It’s used sparingly here – one of those background flavors that makes you say “Hmmmm  . . . what’s in here???”

Happy Fourth Everyone!

The inspiration for these tarts came from Patriotic Cookie Tarts at Red Couch Recipes. Fabulous Fourth Idea!

FLUFFY CREAM CHEESE FROSTING

Makes enough frosting for 24 cookies, 4 to 5 inches in diameter

2 cups powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon extract (I used almond)
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 3/4 cups whipping cream

Whisk together in a mixing bowl the powdered sugar, salt, extract and cream cheese.

Whip the cream until stiff peaks and fold into cream cheese mixture.

Use immediately, or cover and chill until ready to use.

— posted by Donna