This gallery contains 1 photo.
Can you tell how nervous I was to start? saraconner: Life & Style with Sara: My Kids Really Eat This – now available On Demand Want to watch the author of “My Kids Really Eat This” live and in action? In … Continue reading
This gallery contains 1 photo.
constantflux: (tumblrwater) This is Caroline. Beautiful smile, right? She’s smiling because she’s drinking clean water for the first time. She used to walk three hours every day to fetch dirty water. But not anymore. Her village just got a well. … Continue reading
Sometimes it’s just mentioning the name of the food that can turn up the nose of my kids. But change it a bit, don’t mention the name and wham, they like it. Totally by accident I again found this out. I didn’t purposefully omit “cauliflower” when I had my middle son try the soup I’d just made, because he of all my sons loves cauliflower. I just said, “Here try this.” It’s the other two who profess to “hate it”. That is until I made the soup. They saw it cooking and my youngest one asked what the smell in the kitchen was, so I showed him the cauliflower soup still in it’s adolescence. 
He looked and said, “Yuck! I Hate Cauliflower!” and walked away. Well, after I puréed the soup, and it no longer looked the same, I approached my cauliflower-loving middle with a spoonful. He ate it and requested another spoonful immediately, so my youngest sitting next to him and not wanting to be left out, said, “Hey I want some!” “Ok!”, I gave him a taste. And another, and another. And so on and so on. Well then my eldest wanted a taste. And another… so much for cauliflower hating. They all had more. I think the spices and appearance were just camouflaging enough that they were open to sample.
I adapted Spicy Cauliflower Soup from The Art of Simple Food byAlice Waters
Curried Cauliflower Soup
2/3 lg head cauliflower, chopped
2 Tbsp olive oil
1/2 onion diced
1 sm carrot, peeled and diced
3/4 tsp cumin seeds, crushed
3/4 tsp coriander seeds, crushed
1/2 tsp hot chili powder
1/4 tsp turmeric
salt and pepper
1 Tbsp fresh cilantro chopped or 1 cube frozen cilantro
1 1/2 cups chicken stock
1 cup vegetable stock
1 cup water
Sauté onion and carrot in olive oil. Stir in spices and remaining ingredients. 
Bring to boil then lower heat and simmer for 30-35 minutes. Purée with immersion blender. 
Optional garnish- – plain yogurt, mint and lime juice
We don’t have the most creative lunches. I try to make sure they get a balanced lunch. They’ll often get left-overs or a sandwich (turkey, ham, salami— all nitrate/nitrate, preservative free; real peanut butter and jam, egg salad, etc), carrot, celery and/or cucumbers, apple slices or apple sauce, hummus and pita chips, fruit leather, rice cakes, pretzles… Can’t think of what else. Sometimes the sandwiches are roll-ups using tortillas, slice of meat, shredded lettuce, and mayo.
Hope that helps!
If you freeze yogurt tubes and juice pouches, they’re good to keep things cold too.
Thank you so much! I’m sure if you ever have kids you’ll start them off well!
Thank you! I’ve always been interested in tapping my own trees. The kids and I have done it at a couple of local farms and some good friends do it.
This gallery contains 5 photos.
saraconner: “Life & Style with Sara” met “My Kids Really Eat This” yesterday when Vanessa Bronder Alward joined me in the studio to film my February show. Vanessa shared some of her easy, delicious, healthy recipes while I assisted and … Continue reading
Though chicken can seem boring at times, it’s versatility can make it wonderful. Chicken goes with so many different types of cuisines and flavors. It’s just about putting a bit of effort into changing it up from time to time. The supermarket had thin sliced chicken breasts on sale, so I bought some to stuff; they’re not worth the price difference otherwise. I’ve never actually made stuffed chicken breasts before but enjoyed them many times. My husband ended up coming home just in time to make these too! Wonderful thing about stuffed chicken breast is how versatile they can be: you can make all different kinds of stuffings — all types of vegetables or like this one, sausage and vegetable stuffings. It doesn’t take as long as one might expect too. 
Sausage, Mushroom, Spinach Stuffed Chicken Breast
8 pieces of thin sliced chicken breast or 3-4 pieces of regular breast, sliced lengthwise
1/2 med onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 Italian sweet sausage links, removed from casing (slice lengthwise and separate)
8 Crimini mushrooms, diced
1/3 package frozen organic spinach (thawed) or
4 oz. fresh spinach, steamed and chopped (squeeze out excess water)
Handful or two of shredded flavorful cheese (we used Quattro Formaggio from TJ’s— Asiago, Fontina, Parmesan, and Provolone)
Salt and pepper (check before salting as it might not need any)
2 Tbsp melted clarified butter for oven roasting
Tbsp olive oil for sautéing
Optional breaded coating:
Panko or regular breadcrumbs
3 Tbsp flour
1 egg
Preheat oven to 350F. Sauté onions with olive oil and when nearly clear, add garlic and sausage. Using a flat wooden spatula, break up the sausage as it’s cooking. Once it’s brown add mushrooms and continue to sauté until mushrooms are tender. Add spinach and mix well. Pour into a metal bowl and chill (in a pile of snow if you have as much as we do!) for a few minutes. 
Mix in the cheese and check for seasoning. 
Put Tbsp of stuffing mixture on chicken breast and roll. 
(Optional bread crumb topping would be done now. First dip piece in flour, then egg, then breadcrumbs.) Put clarified butter in bottom of pan so chicken doesn’t stick and pour a little over each roll. Pop in oven for 20 minutes and serve with your favorite sides. We served it with harvest grains, broccoli and snow peas.
My sons all loved this dinner, although my middle son complained about mushrooms being in it before he’d even tried it. He ate the entire dinner anyway. The boys ended up eating the chicken like sushi rolls with their fingers (no grandparents around to disapprove). 
Bonus: I had leftover stuffing mixture that I turned into a layer of lasagna the next night. 
No, this is not about Taco Bell’s beef filling that only has 35% beef in it. Recently my husband got some “boneless short ribs” also known as “Flanken short ribs” from a meat supplier. Super tender and quite high in fat content, my husband had never used the cut before but found it’s very popular for Korean dishes. He found a great marinade online. We had friends coming over for dinner so it was the perfect opportunity to share with them.
Beef Kalbi
2 lbs boneless short ribs of beef, sliced to ~1 inch thin
Marinade:
2 kiwi, peeled
2 cloves garlic
1 med shallot
2 Tbsp Mirin
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp rice wine vinegar
2 Tbsp brown sugar
Toppings:
toasted sesame seeds
1 scallion sliced
Mix all ingredients except beef, sesame seeds and scallion in food processor until well blended/chopped. Put beef in plastic bag with marinade for at least 2 hours (overnight is preferable). Take beef grill over open flame or in cast iron skillet over high heat for just a few minutes (turn to get both sides) so the inside is still on medium-rare side. Slice and top with scallions and toasted sesame seeds. BTW-– in Korea some people use 7up in the marinade.
We all loved it so much! My friend’s daughter thought so highly of it she referred to it afterwards as “Stephen’s Steak”. We did also serve chicken drumsticks coated in Penzy’s Mural of Flavor herb blend and panko bread crumbs. We made it again the other night because it went over so well. Kids loved it each time.
At least this beef is stll all real beef and now I have good reason why I’ve only eaten at Taco Bell once.
Can’t seem to upload any photos! Hope to put them up later.
