Elana’s Pantry

Mango Chicken

My favorite thing about the picture above? The cilantro on the Mango Chicken and in the glass cup is from my garden. Now, that’s something to get pumped about considering I barely have a yard. And what little yard I do have is taken over by a trampoline for the boys.

We live close to town which was really important to me after living in Manhattan for 17 years. I wanted to be able to walk to restaurants, a grocery store and a book store without having to get into the car. Well, everything I just mentioned is a mile away from my home –about a 15 minute walk. I throw on a back pack and the boys and I are off on foot. It is so much fun to explore the neighborhood with them.

Anyway, back to my garden. Because we live close to town, we don’t have a big lot. It’s kind of like brownstone living. The houses while fairly large, are quite close together and the yards are sparse. This year, we dug up all of the flowers (well just about all) and planted edibles and we have hit the total jackpot this month. Salad galore and herbs too.

In terms of the recipe below, I must thank Elise over at Simply Recipes once again. In my humble opinion, she has the best chicken recipes on the web. They are fantastic! This is my adaptation of her Mango Chicken. I removed the heavy cream, added coconut milk and made a couple of other changes as well.

Mango Chicken
1 ¼ pounds chicken breast, cut into 1 inch cubes
¼ cup grapeseed oil
1 large onion
1 red bell pepper, diced
2 garlic cloves, sliced
1 tablespoon fresh ginger, minced
1 teaspoon curry powder
1 teaspoon celtic sea salt
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
1 cup water
½ cup coconut milk
1 mango, peeled and diced

1. In a large saute pan, warm oil over medium heat
2. Add onions, stirring occasionally, cooking until soft, 5-10 minutes
3. Add red pepper, ginger, garlic, curry and salt, cook 5 minutes
4. Add vinegar, water, coconut milk and mango to pan, bring to a boil briefly, then reduce heat
5. Add chicken pieces, return to a low simmer
6. Cook for 8-10 minutes until chicken is cooked through –cut open largest piece to check
7. Garnish with cilantro
8. Serve

Serves 4-6

This dish is fun, festive and easy to make. I hope you like it as much as we did!

Salmon with Cucumber Chile Relish

The salmon series continues, as does my love affair with Cook’s Illustrated. The recipe below is another one that I have adapted from this fantastic magazine.

On the comments front, my cup overfloweth. I am so happy with the participation, support and community that is developing on this site. Recently, one of my favorite readers, Courtney, asked a question about meal planning. If any of you have suggestions, please feel free to offer them to her in the comments section. You may also notice that I have recently added a feature whereby the most recent comments are posted on the bottom right side of the page (towards the end of the navigation bar). This is a good way to stay current on all the chat that is happening over here between readers. A wonderful way that we can all learn more from each other.

I like cooking salmon this way as it takes away the fishy flavor; adding relish completes the process of de-fishing the fish! This dish is great all year round, though particularly lovely for a spring dinner served with asparagus.

Thai Chicken Soup

I have to give full credit for this photo to my boys. They helped me stage the shot and then sat with me at the computer to crop and size the photo. They are becoming such little artists, having far surpassed me in this arena.

The delicious Thai soup above is based on a recipe from Cook’s Illustrated. My friend Deb got me hooked on this magazine last year when she gave me a subscription. The recipes in Cook’s use fresh interesting combinations of ingredients and often are not overly complicated.

We ate this soup for dinner tonight; I downed the bowl in the photo above as soon as I finished snapping the pictures; it is sweet, rather spicy and very comforting. After he finished his, my younger son said, “it was good; this is a happy, happy, happy soup.” That is a direct quote!

I am hoping that with more soup we can build more community. Many people have been leaving comments over here of late which is wonderful. I also want to take a moment to encourage people to respond to each others comments.

Jeanne, one of my regular readers, asked a question here. I hope that any of you who have experience in figuring out which foods work best for you will feel free to jump in and respond to her comment, it’s great when we can support one another…Now, back to soup!

This soup also works very well with leftover chicken. Leftovers are a great thing in so many ways. They save us trips to the store as well as time in the kitchen.

Other uses for leftover chicken? I use it to make a simple Mexican salad for dinner (salad greens with black beans, guacamole and salsa) and to add an extra hit of protein to this sesame noodle dish.

As you can see from the recipes on this blog, while I don’t eat the SAD (Standard American Diet), I do not feel deprived. I focus on the foods I can eat, create as much variety as possible and savor every morsel I put into my mouth! All in all, I feel happy and grateful to have access to the beautiful fresh foods that nourish me day in and day out.

Passover Round Up

Passover is this Saturday! I have been cooking up many Pesach dishes of late and am happy to provide a round-up below.

A couple of notes:

I did not include a vegetable dish in the above list. Generally, I like to serve steamed broccoli or broiled asparagus with our Passover meal. I have linked to a squash pie recipe that I use during Passover as our squash “kugel.”

As you will notice, matzoh is conspicuously absent from the above list. I purchase a gluten-free oat matzoh for my boys, however, I do not eat grains, so I create an almond flour matzoh for myself to use as a vehicle for the Hillel Sandwich. My husband says the matzoh that I make is so bad, that I have deemed it unworthy of ‘blogage’.

Happy Pesach to you and yours!

Elana

Chipotle Orange Chicken

As some of you know, I write an op-ed column for The Daily Camera, covering political, economic and environmental issues. As we face increasing food prices and shortages worldwide, food becomes a more important aspect of such aforementioned matters.

This week, my column was called, The Politics of High Fructose Corn Syrup. In it, I discussed our government’s gigantic corn subsidy and our country’s growing waistlines. When I awoke this morning, my husband asked if I had received any online comments to the article. Here is a portion of the only response I have received thus far:

“Ms. Amsterdam is wearing blinders”

Such remarks make me think of Dooce. She prints out all her nasty comments and runs over them in her driveway. I won’t be doing this. I don’t have a driveway.

Besides, things are actually looking up; spring is here (for today at least). The sun is shining. My children are on a street corner shouting their heads off selling lemonade (that they made themselves while I was still lollygagging in bed reading the paper) and hawking their ultra-expensive, politically correct, wooden Waldorf toys to increase profit margins.

I myself am on a baking marathon this weekend. Yesterday I made Kelly’s Bars three times. My baseball team (I’m coaching little league) gave their tacit seal of approval, devouring bars 2.0 even though they were a bit underdone. When I came home, I made bars 3.0 and am probably just one trial away from posting them here.

Today, however, I am sharing my roasted chicken recipe with all of you. This dish, which is my children’s current favorite entrée, will be the main course at our Passover Seder. Its sweet flavors are just right for a festive celebration.

A while back, after posting my Rosemary Apple Chicken recipe, one of my favorite readers (she comments frequently under the name ~M), asked if I had other suggestions for roasted chicken recipes with fruit; she inspired me to come up with this tasty dish. Happy Pesach ~M!

Chili Chicken

I have discovered a great new website, myfeasts.com. I found it through tastespotting.com, my all time favorite site. If you ever find yourself in a “dinner quandary,” I highly recommend a visit to tastespotting; the photos are gorgeous and provide much meal planning inspiration!

Alas, I digress, this post is about myfeasts. The site is a bit of a mystery, as I could not find an “about” page. Was I just missing it? Or is this excellent chef to remain an enigma? Regardless, the recipes are incredible and have been the catalyst for me to take a dinner detour from Italian; we have been in a pasta, pesto and chicken parm rut. Asian food here we come!

This Chili Chicken recipe goes well with the veggie stir-fry recipe below. For the chicken dish, I switched out some of the ingredients, such as sugar, cornstarch and soy sauce to suit my dietary plan, changed the directions and added some garlic. Either way, this Chili Chicken is amazing; as I devoured it, I was transported back to my days of gluten-filled eating in New York City Chinese restaurants!

This stir-fry recipe for Napa Cabbage with Shiitake Mushrooms is my own; I hope you enjoy it!

This high-protein, low carb Chinese food makes for a good gluten-free, grain-free, mighty delicious meal. My husband, who has no food restrictions whatsoever, enthusiastically ate it for dinner last night.

Dinner Round Up

That troubling question, “what’s for dinner?” troubles no more! Of late I’m feeling quite confident about answering this question, having built up a decent repertoire of main dishes for the family.

Here’s a list of entrées that are getting us through the dinner hour with ease:

I can see that the seafood department needs a bit of work, we are definitely chicken heavy. However, this chicken “heaviness” probably reflects the fact that my favorite taste tester (husband) loves chicken and eats seafood mostly under duress. He is basically a meat and potatoes kind of guy and has been amazing about compromising and eating more kid friendly foods and things that work well for me.

I make adjustments as well. When we have chicken parm, I bake mine in a separate dish, omitting the cheese. While this might not seem monumental, it is for me, a former cheese-a-holic. I’ve now been completely dairy-free for almost a year.

Even the boys compromise, eating their share of “adult” foods. How does that work? I usually argue and negotiate with them for a bit, until ultimately they try what is in front of them. They are great sports and actually have learned to like the foods I serve.

Of course, there are nights when I simply make them a big bowl of mac-n-cheese with a side of broccoli while we eat salmon. However, if I can get my younger guy in my lap, he will usually try anything on my plate (food always tastes better when it’s on mom’s plate), then he’ll scoot back into his chair and ask for a helping of his own. That’s what happened recently when I made the dish below.

Adding one more option to the dinner menu, I recently converted my chicken piccata recipe into cod piccata. The capers and parsely complement this mild fish quite nicely and I often find myself slurping up the sauce and last slivers of fish with a soup spoon.

Cod Piccata
1½ pounds cod
½ cup blanched almond flour
½ teaspoon celtic sea salt
½ teaspoon all purpose chef’s shake
5 tablespoons olive oil
5 tablespoons grapeseed oil

1 cup chicken stock
¼ cup lemon juice
¼ cup brined capers
¼ cup fresh chopped parsley

1. Cut the cod into 6 pieces
2. Mix together flour, salt and chef’s shake
3. Rinse the cod pieces in water, then dredge thoroughly in flour mixture, until well coated
4. Heat olive oil and 2 tablespoons of grapeseed oil in a large skillet on medium high heat; add half of the cod pieces and brown well, about 3 minutes per side
5. Transfer from skillet to a plate, and repeat with remaining cod
6. Place plate of cod in warm oven while preparing the sauce
7. Add chicken stock, lemon juice, and capers to skillet and use a metal spatula to loosen the browned bits and incorporate them into the sauce
8. Reduce the sauce by half then whisk in the remaining 3 tablespoons of grapeseed oil
9. Plate the cod, pour the sauce over it and sprinkle with parsley
10. Serve

Serves 4 to 6

My original piccata recipe is based on one from simplyrecipes.com, a favorite site of mine. So to give credit where it is due, I must thank Elise! I love her recipes and ideas.

Tastespotting.com also keeps me creative during the dinner hour. I check out the beautiful photos on this blog daily. It is constantly updated, featuring the best recipes and pics from food blogs around the globe.

All in all, I am so thankful for the creativity of other bloggers and the abundance of organic, delicious food in my home!

Parsley Pesto with Sundried Tomatoes

Traditionally, pesto is made with basil. This time of year, it’s not so easy to find organic basil at a reasonable price. Really, the time for basil is summer. And we’re definitely not there yet. Not even close, out here in Colorado.

And yet, I love pesto. All those good greens ground up into delightful, fresh flavors.

Last night, in the mood for something delicious and healthy (in that order), I made pesto using parsley. I always keep parsley in the fridge –it’s a staple for me, as are lemons and garlic. I consider these types of ingredients the building blocks of good food; hence, keeping these items in my kitchen is a must!

Further spurring me in the parsley direction? I ate at the Kitchen recently and this fabulous restaurant has been using copious portions of this herb in several of their salads and main dishes. They recently rolled out a new menu which is completely inspired. If you’re ever in Boulder, I highly recommend this restaurant!

In the meantime, here’s my parsley pesto –a delicious way to get your greens in the winter.

If you want to use the spaghetti that is shown in the photo above, you can order it directly from Papadini over the phone –they do not have online capability as of yet. I am a big fan of their high protein pasta from lentil beans. Such a good thing, to eat pasta sans the high-carb hangover afterward!

Top your high-protein, gluten-free pasta with this power packed parsley pesto –parsley is considered a superfood– and you have a dish that not only tastes good, it’s good for you too! Enjoy.

Fish Sticks

For some reason, I can’t get out of my winter funk. We’ve had a few beautiful sunny days, yet I still feel as though I need to go into a small cave and hibernate. I feel such a stunting of my creativity during these dark days (we’ve had a lot more dreary ones than sunny) and a complete lack of drive. I think part of it is all of the illnesses that my family has been through during the past month and our time in familial “retrograde” –we seem to be emerging slowly (emphasis on the slowly more than the emerging). Life these days just feels like walking through glue.

To give myself some energy, I’ve been continuing my protein streak and also trying out variations that the boys might eat. Tonight I made these delicious gluten-free fish sticks and served them with steamed kale on the side. The fish sticks are very kid friendly, as is just about anything fried. Given that they’re rather high in protein, I find them adult friendly too, and quite tasty.

Make sure to serve this heavier dish with some steamed veggies (broccoli or kale work well) or a big salad to balance out the meal.

Chicken Piccata

It’s been almost a week since I last posted something here. It seems my entire family has gone into retrograde and I have been nursing everyone back to health for the last month –including myself. The nasty flu that blew through Colorado had me down for ten days straight. I haven’t had one that bad for quite a long time.

On a food note, I continue to be inspired by Elise over at simplyrecipes.com. Last week she posted a delicious looking chicken piccata recipe. Once I found the time, this motivated me to come up with my own gluten-free, dairy-free version. If you decide to make this, please comment below and let me know how it turns out, as well as any suggestions that you may have.

This chicken piccata recipe adds one more protein dish to my family’s dinner table–we have been in a bit of a chicken parm rut lately, not that there’s anything wrong with that!

Before I even finished taking pictures of this dish, I began to “sample” it. It is deliciously lemony and refreshing, quite tangy with the capers; while the parsley adds a nice subtle flavor to it as well.

Shrimp Cakes

After preparing a plethora of Valentine’s sweets, I once again have post-holiday “dessert burnout” syndrome. Thus, I now find myself constantly craving protein –for breakfast, lunch, dinner and even snacks.

I will be eating a lot of these tasty little seafood patties in this new faze of protein craze. Hence I am delighted to share one of my favorite recipes with you –this one for simple, savory shrimp cakes.

This gluten-free, high protein recipe for shrimp cakes is one of E’s favorites and also my husband’s. J won’t eat it unless under duress, preferring grilled cheese and quesadillas to just about anything I make these days. Alas, we had a good run for so many years where he was completely adventurous in his eating.

Now he is a pure carbo-holic asking me to pack him a lunch of sweetened, flavored yogurt with fruit leather. I have defied this wish of his and lunch comes home untouched day after day. Yesterday, after another virgin lunch came in the door, I asked him what was up and he said, “Mom, if you’d only pack me something good, then I would eat it!” Ok, yogurt and fruit leather, here we come. Can’t starve the boy.

As for myself? I’m sticking with the shrimp cakes.

The Salmon Series

As I have mentioned here before, I am always looking for inspired ways to eat salmon. First priority, disguising the fishy flavor!

Well, low and behold, last night as I sat on the couch making my way through the latest issue of Cook’s Illustrated (my dear friend Deb subscribed me as a gift last year), I found a section on cooking salmon. I was so inspired that I decided to test out the recipe for tonight’s dinner.

I do like Cook’s, however their recipes are a bit fussy for me, so here you will find my take –a simple version of one of their magnificent salmon recipes.

This simple, healthy salmon recipe was a hit all around tonight at dinner. My favorite taste tester said he was surprised at how little fishiness there was to the salmon –a huge compliment in this neck of the woods. It’s so great when those fresh, easy, healthy dinners turn out to be winners!

Salmon is in the air these days –my mother recently requested my salmon burger recipe which will definitely be appearing over here as part of the salmon series sometime in the near future.

Sesame Noodles

I find nothing as yawn-inspiring as a food blogger who “yums” at their own creations. I see it on blogs all the time. “‘Yum, yum and yum,’ and did I say, ‘yum?!’” I can hear them now, oohing and ahhing at their own creations. However, I may soon become part of this silly little navel gazing taste-bud gazing club.

Tonight I made sesame noodles. That old dish from the Chinese restaurants in New York. I didn’t think I’d be eating sesame noodles again, so I was overcome with enthusiasm -yum! Take that as a warning; the recipe might not be as miraculous to your palate as it is to mine.

You can also add scallions and broccoli to this dish as well as leftover chicken which gives it an extra hit of protein. I have been eating a lot of these gluten-free sesame noodles lately, seeking refuge from the cold weather in bowls of warm noodles, smothered in sauce –ahh sweet sesame solace.

Mac-n-Cheese

And now, time for something easy. After making far too many desserts during the holidays, I thought it might be good to share a recipe for a quick meal. Children and adults alike enjoy this simple, yet decadently rich pasta dish.

My boys never fail to devour this classic child-friendly dish –old time comfort food with a new gluten-free twist. They usually end up mopping the remains of the cheese sauce off their plates with the broccoli. I hope you enjoy this rich and creamy gluten-free mac-n-cheese as much as they do.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving. I find it challenging to write the word without giving some sort of gratitude. Each year, before we partake in our Thanksgiving feast, we go around the table and take the time to say a few words of gratitude, stating our thanks for things such a the food at the table, good friends and the roof over our head.

Thanksgiving and autumn in general seem to be such a good time to shed, simplify and return to basics. My favorite part of our Thanksgiving ritual each year is hearing what my boys have to say. My children ceaselessly remind me to be thankful for the most basic parts of my life and open my eyes to the wonders all around me.

With thanks given, I return to the topic of Newsletter #1: The Thanksgiving Menu. For those of you who are not signed up for my newsletter here’s what I’ll be serving this year:

The items above are recipes previously posted on my website. Just click the words and you will find yourself at the recipe. This is a year when I have had so much fun and have much to be grateful for. In that spirit, I wish you all a wonder-filled Thanksgiving!

Balsamic Roasted Turkey with Apple Stuffing

This week, I have been testing the Thanksgiving menu that I shared with those of you signed up for my newsletter. We had almost a full Thanksgiving dinner last Wednesday and leftovers Thursday and Friday. Needless to say, my husband was not too thrilled with eating turkey 3 nights in a row just a week before Thanksgiving.

Below is the turkey recipe I used for our pre-Thanksgiving feast. I will make it again this Thursday for the real turkey day. This recipe includes the basic steps for how to make a turkey and also provides a simple gluten-free stuffing. No fuss, so you can focus on side dishes, my favorite part of the meal.

Take note, because of the balsamic vinegar in this recipe, the turkey skin will be much darker than a bird cooked in the traditional method.

Rosemary Apple Chicken

Every Friday night, I roast a chicken. My children are willing to consume any chicken dish as long as it contains fruit. Such is our unspoken agreement.

This past week, I used apples to lure my children to their protein dish. The combination of rosemary with apples was a natural pairing and the balsamic vinegar, which caramelized during roasting, sweetly permeated the entire chicken.

As I served this up to my family and asked how they liked it, my younger son exclaimed, “Mommy, it’s AMAZING!” Needless to say, I’m quite happy with the outcome of this little experiment, which yielded good results on the very first try.

This delicious fruited chicken dish is great for guests, providing warm soft apples as comfort food along with a good dose of protein - all in one dinner.

Peach Chicken

Fall is a full time of year; especially for a Jewish family with children in a Waldorf school. Last week we celebrated Rosh Hashannah (Jewish New Year), yesterday was Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) and this coming Friday is Succot, the fall harvest festival celebrating the bounty provided to the Jews during 40 years wandering the dessert after the Exodus from Egypt. Whew.

During this time of year the Jewish holidays come unremittingly, like waves beating against the shore, one after the other. Don’t get me wrong; I do like the holidays, because even with such fullness, the season provides space for reflection –letting go of old ways and setting new intentions for the coming year. I enjoy the process even if I find the pace a challenge.

Now add to all of that our Waldorf festivals and sometimes I do want to run for cover. Next week my boys’ school will celebrate Michaelmas, the Christian analogue to Succot. Basically another fall harvest holiday, honoring the autumnal equinox and the shortening of days. The main character of Michaelmas is St. Michael, known, as the conqueror of the dragon and the saint of strong will; the heavenly hero with his starry sword who gives strength to people.

So, on these final days of Indian summer, as the air becomes crisp and we receive the last gifts of Colorado’s glorious peach harvest, we all celebrate the end of one season and the beginning of the next. For that, it doesn’t matter what your religion is.

Below, the dish I made for Yom Kippur this year before we began our fast. I served it with a big green salad and squash soup. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

This fruity, high protein chicken dish is delicious; in winter I use a bag of frozen organic peaches to bring back the sweet taste of summer. This recipe is based on “Roast Chicken with Balsamic Peaches,” from Real Simple magazine’s October 2006 issue.

Chicken Salad with Almonds

Even though the days of August are long and hot, the month seems to speed by every year, and this year has been no different.

Today the boys started school and my older son had his first viola lesson. He locked the viola case to keep his little brother out. When we arrived at the lesson, he realized that he had forgotten the key, leaving it at home in its “secret hiding place.” Needless to say, not much viola was played at that lesson. It was a lesson of a different type in terms of being patient and not blaming an eight year old for responsibility that he need not have been given in the first place.

When we arrived home from this “lesson,” I continued this week’s binge of food photography. I have been told by a little bird in New York that I need more entrées for my cookbook. The problem: while I have plenty of entrées, I love to shoot desserts. It is impossible to take a bad picture of a cookie.

Tonight’s project was a chicken salad with almonds. Given that it had plenty of fruit in it, the boys ate it heartily and without complaint. That’s dinner success in my book!

The whole family found this “one pot meal” light, yet hearty and satisfying. I took a huge bowl of this summery chicken salad with greens, fruit and nuts to my younger son’s back-to-school potluck last weekend and there was not a morsel left.

Salmon with Anchovy Olive Tapenade

I love to eat salmon. Actually, I love the idea of eating salmon. All those good omega 3’s. Lately, I’ve been on a quest to create salmon toppings that disguise the fishy flavor. Here’s one that worked well.

This gluten-free salmon recipe is great, though particularly tasty in summer when the salmon can be grilled outdoors instead of baked in the oven.

Dogs In a Garden

The boys have declared a salmon boycott and reserved their right to eat an alternate protein on salmon night.

Tonight, my younger son chose to exercise his boycott with a hot dog, organic beef, of course; not to sound snobby, but I make quite certain that when my children eat animal products, they are from clean sources (no hormones, pesticides, antibiotics).

He sat staring at the hot dog on his plate for a moment, then looked up at me and said, “Mommy, can I have a piece of lettuce?” As I walked to the fridge I realized he had adopted my favorite “junk food” meal as his own. Here it is.

Dogs In a Garden
hot dogs
romaine lettuce

mustard
sauerkraut

1. Cook the hot dogs (either in boiling water, a hot skillet or on the grill)
2. Place a cooked dog in a piece of romaine lettuce
3. Smother with your favorite condiments
4. Devour

The phrase, “Dogs in a Garden,” was coined by my good friend Rhonda at our Matrix Memorial Day barbecue. This gluten-free, grain-free, low-carb method of eating hot dogs saves room for the good stuff (think dessert) at a summer barbecue.

Pasta with Broccoli

Last night I spoke with Sean — one of the coolest people I know — and he mentioned that he missed seeing large photos with delicious recipes around here.

He just landed a huge new project, so I doubt he’ll be making pasta with broccoli anytime soon, though this tasty high-protein dish is an easy one, so maybe he’ll find the time.