In the Mood for Comfort Food

As you can probably see, lately I've been in the mood for my favorite kind of comfort food: casseroles. There's just something about a big baked dish of hot goodness that satisfies like nothing else.

Today I made a healthy version of the cottage pie. Typically it's made with ground beef, mashed potatoes, butter and vegetables. To keep things lighter, I used a combo of banana squash and sweet potatoes for the topping, and opted for ground turkey instead of beef. I also added more flavor by throwing in a dash of cayenne pepper. The heat really goes well with the sweetness of the potato.

Enjoy!

Cottage Pie
adapted from Eating Well

Olive oil spray
1 cup chopped onion
1.25 lbs 93%-lean ground turkey
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 tablespoon tomato paste
1 cup reduced-sodium beef broth
6 ounces baby spinach, chopped
3/4 teaspoon salt, divided
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder, divided
1/2 of a banana squash, microwaved until soft
1 large sweet potato, microwaved until soft and peeled
1/4 cup low-fat buttermilk
1/3 cup finely shredded Parmesan cheese
Cayenne pepper if desired

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 2. Heat oil spray in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add onion and cook, stirring, until beginning to soften, about 2 minutes. Reduce heat to medium, stir in turkey, flour and tomato paste, and cook, stirring, until the turkey is mostly browned, about 6 minutes. Add broth, scraping up any browned bits with a wooden spoon. Bring to a boil and cook, stirring occasionally, until the broth is the consistency of thick gravy, about 4 minutes. Stir in spinach, 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder; cook until the spinach is just wilted, about 1 minute. Remove from the heat.3. Place squash in a fine-mesh sieve and gently press on it to extract excess liquid. Transfer to a bowl. Put sweet potato into the bowl with the squash, add buttermilk and mash together until smooth. Stir in the remaining 1/2 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder and a few dashes of cayenne if you like. Pour meat mixture into a 9-inch baking dish. Top with mashed squash/potato mixture, and spread over so the meat mixture is covered. Sprinkle with cheese and bake for 15 minutes.

Makes 6 servings. Each serving has 253 calories.

When You're Craving Something Hot & Cheesy

It's been raining a lot here lately, which is just fine by me considering I have been glued to my computer with deadlines for the last couple of weeks. This kind of weather (and pending deadlines!) always tends to bring out the little comfort food devil in me: mac & cheese, casseroles and large pasta dishes are what I crave.

With this Italian Eggplant & Turkey "Lasagna" that I made up recently, I can get all that warm, ooey, gooey goodness without the fat and calories. It's real comfort food that add any extra padding...

Italian Eggplant & Turkey "Lasagna"

2 large Italian eggplants, cut lengthwise into ½ inch wide strips
1.25 lbs of ground turkey (7% fat – the 1% fat stuff is way too lean/dry)
½ onion, minced
½ bell pepper, red, minced
¼ cup Eggbeater or other egg substitute
Handful of fresh basil, chopped
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon ground fennel spice
2 cups marinara sauce (I used Vons brand which has 50 calories a cup – it was just tomato/basil flavor)
1 cup low-fat grated cheese (I use the low-fat Mexican shredded mix from TJ’s or Kraft)
¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese, grated from a block of Parmesan with a microplane grater
Salt & pepper

Preheat oven to 375. About 20 minutes before starting this dish, take slices of eggplant and immediately sprinkle salt on both sides of each slice. Place slices on a baking rack set on a cookie sheet. This will keep the eggplant from turning brown, and will draw out some of the water. Set aside. Cook up the onion and bell pepper in a saute pan until translucent, adding salt and pepper to taste. Set aside. In a large bowl, mix raw ground turkey and eggbeater with about 1 teaspoon of salt and a dash of pepper. Using your hands, mix in the cooked onions and peppers and fresh basil, oregano and fennel spice into the ground turkey.

To assemble: Take each slice of eggplant and pat down with paper towels – they will absorb excess water from the eggplant. Now you are ready to assemble the dish. In a 9 x 13 rectangular pan or glass dish (if using pan, might want to line with foil), place a layer of eggplant, a layer of the raw turkey mixture, and 1 cup of marinara sauce. Repeat for one more layer. Finish it off by putting the entire cup of grated cheese on the top layer, plus the ¼ cup of Parmesan cheese on top of that. Cover with tinfoil and bake for 40 minutes. Remove from oven and remove the tinfoil, then place back in the oven for 5 minutes to let the cheese get bubbly on top.

Makes six servings. Each serving has approximately 253 calories if you use the exact ingredients I've listed above. Enjoy!

The Spicy Stuff of Love

OK, I will admit it: I love spicy food. Not food so spicy that you can't taste any flavor, but food that's spicy enough to encourage a happy mist of salty sweat under the eyes while overwhelming the tongue with a myriad of savory hits. My go-to place for this kind of torturous fun is Daisy Mint in Pasadena.

I almost always start with the fresh and mild Summer Rolls, with a side of sweet peanut sauce. This prepares my palate for the assault that is always part of my time at Daisy Mint: The Spicy Beef Salad. Now, I know what you are thinking: it can't be THAT spicy. But that tangy, deceptively thin dressing is absolutely loaded with burning hot chili essence. It's the kind of spicy that makes you a bit worried for the next toilet visit (you know what I'm talking about). However, I eat it with absolute glee anyway, because I love this type of pain...it hurts SO good!

My friend opted for the Spicy Spaghetti with chicken, which would have been perfectly spicy to me had I tasted his before diving into my wicked hot salad first. But after that, this dish tasted like a sweet poof of sugar fairies. OK, maybe I'm exaggerating, but you get my point.

P.S. I am opting not to post about Colorado for now because I'm working on a story about the trip for a mag and have to give them first option...

Culinary in Keystone, CO

I'm at Keystone Ski Resort in Colorado, working on a weekend getaway piece for Intermezzo. The natural beauty of this place is utterly breathtaking, and the food has been incredible. Last night I had the "Foie Gras Club" - seared foie gras, toasted brioche, parma crisp, tomato relish, petite mache, huckleberry gastric with a foie-stuffed sekel pear - at the Keystone Ranch Restaurant last night. Insane! More soon...