After battening down the hatches to anything new on their dinner plates for the past few months, I’m sensing the kids might be about to open a window. Well, maybe not opening exactly. Maybe more like cracking. The problem is that they egg each other on at the table. Julian will have a fork almost to his mouth and if Esme says she doesn’t like the pasta sauce he will put it down. Working in our favour is Julian’s new favourite book, Little Pea by Amy Krouse Rosenthal, about a little pea who prefers spinach to the candy he’s expected to eat for dinner. Thank you Amy Krouse Rosenthal for getting my two year old to chime, “Me love spinach!” Thank you so much. And Esme seems to be coming around again to trying new things.

So I’m acting fast and bringing back some of my own favourites. Like salad. How I’ve missed salads… Traditionalists among you will scan this recipe and feel like it cannot be a Green Goddess without tarragon. I hear you. But I just find tarragon so bossy. And looking at the way the Green Goddess has changed over the years I felt okay with tweaking it to my own liking. This salad also mimics one I have a couple of times a week from a cafe around the corner from the SPC office, Cafe Bernate. They call it a Verde and it’s hardy enough to get me through my typical 3 pm carb cravings. My version is really easy to make. Once you’ve steamed the asparagus all you have to do is some chopping and you’re done. For now we’re strictly a sauce on the side kind of house when it comes to the kids but I love the creamy, richness of this dressing. So worth the bit of effort to get beyond my usual balsamic and olive oil combo. 

photos by Maya Visnyei 

Green Goddess Salad

2 or 3 handfuls of Boston or Bibb lettuce
1/2 avocado
1/2 English cucumber
1/2 bunch (maybe 6 or 7 stalks) of asparagus
1 handful of cherry tomatoes
1/4 cup feta cheese, crumbled

Dressing

1/2 avocado
3/4 cup buttermilk
2 Tbsp chives, basil (you could use tarragon, dill, parsley, etc)
3 tsp white wine vinegar
1 tsp anchovy paste
((1/2 cup scallions

Method

Put all of the dressing ingredients in a blender and whiz away! Have a taste and see if it needs a bit more buttermilk to thin it out or a splash more vinegar to brighten it up. It’s meant to be quite creamy but feel free to adjust it to your likeness.

Trim the tough ends off of your asparagus and steam them for 3 to 5 minutes. Plunge them in cold or ice water to stop them from cooking – and to keep them super green – once they’re just tender.

Wash and dry all of your other veggies. I like my lettuce sliced into thin strips and then cut in half. I’m not a fan of having to figure out a polite way to fold a big old piece of lettuce in my mouth and if I’m trying to encourage my kids to eat salad I want to make it easy for them, too! Arrange your lettuce on a large platter or on each plate – as you like.

Take your half, pitted avocado in one hand and score the flesh into cubes. You can just use a table knife. Then run your knife under the flesh to pop out the little squares of avocado. Scatter them across the lettuce.

Cut up the asparagus into small pieces, about 2 inch lengths. Toss those on. If you want to be fancy you can use a vegetable peeler to take off stripes of skin off your cucumber, leaving alternating stripes of skin – then slice them into rounds. So not necessary but Esme likes it. Scatter the cucumber and tomatoes over your salad. Slightly dress the salad before covering in feta.

And if your kids won’t eat it, all the more for you!

It’s the home stretch, people! There are only 11 weeks of lunch making left in the school year… God, that doesn’t sound so good, does it? Well, there’s more behind us than ahead of us anyway. I’ve had a pretty good run this year with not too many lunch boxes coming home untouched. Still, it feels like time for a a little refresh for the final season of the school year. Esme loves tuna  and doesn’t need it to be too gussied up – in fact, she’s the only person I know who’d rather not have any mayo touching her tuna sandwich. But she does like it in combination with other ingredients so I came up with this tuna and black bean wrap which has summery, Mexican flavours. I made a light dressing with a bit of olive oil and lime juice to replace the dreaded mayo. Even though this sammie tastes light and bright, it’s quite a hearty lunch. If you can make this with enough time for the mixture to sit in the fridge for half an hour before you make your wrap it really does taste better.

photo by Maya Visnyei

Tuna & Black Bean Wraps

makes 4 wraps

1 x 19 oz. can of black beans, drained
1 x 5 ox. can of tuna
1/2 cup chopped fresh tomato
1/2 cup chopped red pepper
1/4 cup finely chopped red onion
1/4 cup olive oil
3 Tbsps lime juice
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
2 handfuls of chopped lettuce, washed and dried well
1/2 an avocado, sliced
4 tortilla wraps

Method

In a large bowl, toss together beans, tuna, onions, peppers, oil, lime juice and salt and pepper. Don’t over mix or your tuna will break up into tiny pieces and personally, I prefer some chunks. Cover and place in the fridge for half an hour or overnight for the flavours to combine and develop.

When you’re ready to assemble your wraps take your bowl out of the fridge, add your chopped cilantro and give it a stir. Lay your tortillas out on your work surface. Place your lettuce down first (this will keep your tortilla from getting soggy), then scoop the tuna on top, then add a few slices of avocado. Make a rectangle of filling in the middle of your wrap. Pull one side of your wrap over the filling and tuck it in snugly. Now fold over both ends of the wrap. Then keep roll the whole thing over until it’s closed. Wrap it snugly with plastic wrap or parchment paper if you’re packing this in a lunch box.

I have no time at all for pretty much everything. This includes making sure the kids have clean uniforms, remembering to pack lunches, and getting a chance to wash my hair. If all or any of these things happen during any given week, it’s reason to celebrate.

Even though I work outside of the home three days of the week only, I have two other jobs I do in my “spare”  (hahahaha funny!) time from home. I also have quite a lot of small children. I love to cook, but I have no time during the week to make anything terribly interesting. Dinner ends up being thrown together in a panic, or we end up feeding the kids something quick then feeding ourselves after they go to bed. Ideally, I’d love us to all sit around the table and share a meal. (Preferably without arguing or fart jokes, but I’ll settle for a meal at the same time of day to begin with.)

If I was one of those organised mums you read about in glossy magazines, I would prepare the entire week’s meals on the weekend, neatly label them, and place them in my beautifully defrosted freezer. In reality, I’m lucky if I can get a bag of peas in between the 7” of frost. I loved Jamie Oliver’s “30 Minute Meals” television programme and the book is great, but they are only ready in 30 minutes if you happen to have a prep team and sous chef hanging around in your kitchen. Nice idea in theory, though.

My saviour has been my trusty slow cooker. Chuck stuff in the crock pot in the morning and hey presto, dinner’s ready when I get home. It’s like magic. Magic in the form of a 70s appliance. Our current favourites are chilli, chicken tikka masala, and this amazing slow cooked pork taco recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/slow-cooker-pork-tacos-recipe/index.html?soc=share

I love anything involving pig – it’s cheap, tasty, and it gives us bacon. Pork shoulder has been half price over the last few weeks, so I’ve been stocking up and putting them in the freezer (which is the only time I have anything remotely “plan ahead”  in my freezer.) If you do use a frozen joint, make sure you put it in the fridge around 2 days before you stick it in the slow cooker. A large joint like this will take a while to defrost and you don’t want to put it in the slow cooker frozen. If you do, you’ll need to tack on much more cooking time.

This recipe involves a lot of ingredients you can’t get easily in the UK. If you can’t find the chillies used in this recipe, you can use whatever dried ones you can find (Tesco often has chipotle chillies in their world foods section, for example.)  It looks like a bit of a fuss with the frying step, but it makes a big difference to the flavour. You can absolutely make this without frying the spices, but the flavour won’t be as deep and intense.

I serve this as tacos for the kids, and my husband and I have this on salad with a big pile of guacamole, salsa, and fresh lime squeezed on top. This makes a lot of pork, so it’s a good one to feed a crowd.

Slow Cooker Pork Tacos

3 whole ancho chilies
3 whole pasilla chiles
4 cloves garlic, unpeeled
2 to 3 chipotles in adobo sauce
1/2 medium white onion, roughly chopped
3 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
2 Tbsp honey
1 Tbsp cider vinegar
Kosher salt
2 tsp dried oregano, preferably Mexican
3 3/4 cups chicken broth
4 lbs boneless pork shoulder (untrimmed), cut into chunks
Freshly ground pepper
2 bay leaves
1 cinnamon stick
Corn tortillas, warmed, for serving
Assorted taco toppings, for garnish

Method

Put the ancho and pasilla chilies and the garlic in a bowl and add 2 to 3 tablespoons of water. Microwave on high until soft and pliable, about 2 to 3 minutes. Stem and seed the chilies and peel the garlic.

Transfer the chilies, garlic, chipotles, onion, 2 tablespoons olive oil, honey, vinegar, 1 tablespoon salt and the oregano to the blender; puree until smooth.

Heat the remaining 1 tablespoon oil in a large skillet over high heat; add the chili sauce and fry, stirring, until thick and fragrant, about 8 minutes. Pour in the broth and reduce until slightly thickened.

Season the pork all over with salt and pepper and transfer to a large slow cooker. Add the bay leaves and cinnamon stick, then pour in the sauce. Cover and cook on high until the meat is tender for about 5 hours, or cook on low for 8-9 hours.

Have I mentioned I’m freaking out about having to pack lunches? I have, haven’t I? The upside is that it’s forced me into research mode and I’ll be posting more ideas for lunches as they occur to me and I can test them out. I’m pulling this idea out of our birthday magazine. Salads-on-Sticks are great for parties but they’re also ideal for any packed lunch, whether you’re on a late summer picnic or need to fill a lunch box. I’m giving you three combos below, but you could really use anything that will stay on a stick. Most grocery stores sell wooden skewers of varying lengths – go for a smaller one. You can always trim them with kitchen scissors if they’re still too big to fit in your food containers. Everything looks cuter on a stick and hey, maybe this will increase the odds that lunch gets eaten at school. That happens, right? Kids always eat the lunch you pack for them? Don’t burst my bubble… 

photos by Maya Visnyei

Caprese on a Stick

12 cherry tomatoes
8 baby boccancini
12 – 16 small-ish fresh basil leaves

Chef on a Stick

4 pieces of thinly sliced turkey, cut in half and then folded in half

8 cherry tomatoes
8 1×1 inch cubes cheddar cheese
½ avocado, cut into 2 inch chunks

Waldorf on a Stick

½ Granny Smith apple, cored and cut into 2 inch slices
1 – 2 leaves of romaine lettuce, cut into 2 inch strips
1 stick celery, cut into 2 inch slices
8 – 10 seedless red grapes

Method

Alternate ingredients on your wooden skewers. Just be sure you put a good firm item on the ends. For instance, the cheese chunks are good as a last item on your Chef on a Stick to keep the folded slice of turkey from unfolding.

Our lovely Lisa is on a well deserved holiday (crossing our fingers that none of her kids come down with chicken pox this year!). So, we’re bringing back an oldie but goodie from her. It’s a perfect salad for a hot summer night! – C.M

I was just about to write something about the hot and lovely weather, when the sky went black as the clouds rolled in. Sorry about that. In the hope that the sun might appear again (doubtful as we’re having a long weekend for the Queen’s Jubilee and as history proves, we’re due for torrential downpours), here’s a very sunshiny recipe for a grilled shrimp salad.

I hate using the word “deconstructed” because it makes me sound like a food snob, but this is a… um… taken apart version of guacamole, born out of laziness. I love guacamole and shrimp, but couldn’t be bothered to whip up some guacamole. Come to think of it, I don’t know why I thought it would take any extra effort. Somehow chopping and throwing in a bowl seemed less cumbersome than chopping and mashing up in a bowl.

I also love this salad with grilled squid, which is not only tasty, but quite a lot cheaper. Halve the squid and cut a crosshatch pattern on it with a sharp knife before grilling, and cook over very high heat for not more than a minute on each side. Overcooked squid is rubbery squid, which is why most people don’t like it. Scallops and salmon are other good alternatives.

Grilled Shrimp “Guacamole” Salad

Serves 2

200g raw shrimp
Olive oil
Salad leaves
1 avocado, diced
Handful of cherry tomatoes, cut in half
cilantro, chopped to garnish

Dressing

Juice of 1 lime
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
½ clove garlic, crushed
1 jalapeno pepper, diced (optional, if you like a bit of heat)
Salt and pepper

Method

Toss the shrimp in a little bit of olive oil and salt and pepper. Either put the shrimp on skewers and place on a hot barbecue grill, or put a cast iron griddle on the barbecue and cook the shrimp in the hot pan. Either way, cook the shrimp for only a minute or so on each side – just until the shrimp is pink. Set aside while you make the salad.

Artfully arrange the salad leaves, avocado, and tomatoes on a plate, or chuck it all together in a bowl – it’ll taste the same either way, really. Whisk the dressing ingredients together and season to taste. Drizzle the dressing over the salad and put the shrimp on top. Garnish with the fresh coriander. Grab a margarita and enjoy! (Or an umbrella, in my case.)

One of the greatest gifts my kids have received through going to daycare part time is the ability to eat soup. For real. (For real they have a hearty bowl of soup as lunch once each week and for real it’s one of the things I’m most grateful they learned how to do elsewhere. Have you seen a toddler eat soup?) I’m a serious devotee of soup. I love the way it can pack an extra two or three servings of veggies into one bowl. I’m crazy about the way it makes entertaining so much easier when you make it your first course. And I love, love, love all the yummy possibilities. But in the summer….? I’ve always thought of July and August as soup-free months. Until this week, that is.

Since playing around with Cuisinart’s Blend and Cook Soup and Beverage Maker it’s a whole new ball game. The unit is a blender (the glass jar holds more liquid than my old blender) but the genius part is that it also cooks. You just put all of your cut up ingredients in there, set the time and temperature and away you go. No transferring hot liquid from the stove top to your blender. It takes up about the same amount of counter space as a traditional blender and of course you can use it just as a blender to make drinks and smoothies as well. But you can also use it to make soups and sauces with way less clean up at the end. I think my favourite feature is the Stir button. When you’re sautéing some onion and garlic, you can give it all a little stir every few minutes, just like you would if you were using a skillet.

I’ve been playing around with chilled soups and the Blend and Cook made it amazingly easy. When you’re creating a chilled soup you want to watch that you strike the right balance between sweet and savoury – which means you want to start with a base of sautéed onion, shallots, garlic or ginger – otherwise you’re making a drink, not a soup. We’ve got some dinner parties coming up so now I’ve got a freezer full of chilled soups all ready to go. I’m thinking of serving both of these soups in little shot glasses – don’t you think that would be pretty?

**What’s your favourite summer soup? Send us your recipes for summer soups and this fantastic appliance could be yours! Leave your recipes in the Comments section and one lucky reader will receive a Blend and Cook Soup and Beverage Maker from Cuisinart. I can’t wait to hear what you’re making!**

Chilled Avocado Soup

(serves 4, more if you’re serving in shot glasses)

1 shallot, diced
1 Tbsp olive oil
2 cups ripe avocado, peeled, pitted and cubed
1 cup of cucumber, peeled and chopped
1 cup of Greek yogurt
1 cup of vegetable or chicken stock
1 cup of water
salt and pepper to taste
2 Tbsp cilantro, chopped finely
2 Tbsp cucumber, peeled and chopped finely.

Method

Set your Blend and Cook to 5 minutes on Medium heat. Pour in your olive oil and add the shallots. Hit the Stir button once or twice to move things around. Once your 5 minutes are up and the heat is off, add the rest of your ingredients. Blend on setting 2 or 3 until everything looks creamy and delicious. Maybe a minute? Taste to check the seasoning. Put the whole glass jar in the fridge to chill for half an hour and then serve. I poured mine into small glasses and garnished with a pinch of cucumber and cilantro.

Strawberry and Watermelon Gazpacho

Serves 4 (more if you’re serving in shot glasses)

1 Tbsp olive oil
1 shallot, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
1 tsp ginger, minced
3 cups watermelon, roughly chopped
3 cups strawberries, hulled and roughly chopped
salt and pepper to taste

Method

Set the Blend and Cook to 5 minutes on Medium heat. Add your olive oil, shallot, garlic and ginger. Press the Stir button a couple of times. Add the rest of the ingredients. Blend on setting 2 or 3 for just a minute of two until you get a uniform texture. Taste to check the seasoning. Pour the liquid through a sieve into a large bowl and then chill for half an hour before serving. I used parsley to garnish my soup but a pinch of feta cheese would be great, too.

I’ve been on a really big avocado kick recently. To me, avocados are just perfect for summer. Throwing them in a salad, mashing them up into a dip or just eating them plain, avocados are a healthy and filling ingredient that doesn’t require cooking – perfect for beating the summer heat! So while everyone is busy grilling (check out my roundup on favourite grilling recipes) I’ll be munching on avocados in every way possible.

Before you get to trying out some great SPC avocado recipes, check out What’s So Great About Avocado.

This ALT (avocado, lettuce, tomato) sandwich is absolutely perfect.

I love the way this Green Goddess Dressing uses avocado to add to the creaminess.

Throwing in an avocado with salad can really make a difference, it pairs so nicely with the salmon in this Salmon Dinner Salad.

Cobb Salad is a classic summer dish which is perfect for using up extra avocados!

No, we’re not going to the dark side and suggesting any hallucinogenic fungi! You can actually chemically alter your brain with real food, no criminal record to follow. Turns out there really is a reason that some favourites are considered “comfort foods” and that when you’re down in the dumps your body seems to be taken over by alien forces compelling you to go.get.chocolate.now.

Dr. Stephen Sinatra is a cardiologist known for his “holistic treatment methods focusing on reducing inflammation and maximizing the heart’s ability to produce and use energy.” He is the founder of the New England Heart Centre and Researcher Physician for Healthy Directions (www.healthydirections.com)

Here’s what he had to say about the mood/food connection. “While one or two squares of dark chocolate are good for the heart, a whole bar to boost mood levels isn’t the best advice! The good news is there are a number of other healthy foods that can balance your serotonin - the chemical substance in your brain that promotes feelings of calm, well-being, mental alertness, control, and an increased ability to deal with stress. Plus, they’re good for your heart and your overall health.”

According to Dr. Sinatra, the best foods for naturally boosting your mood (and that of any little “grumps” you may be feeding) are:

1. Nuts and seeds.

2. Ocean-going, cold-water fish such as salmon and mercury-free tuna.

3. Organic DHA-fortified eggs.

4. Ground flaxseed.

5. Soybeans and tofu.

6. Fruits and vegetables, including asparagus, lentils, chickpeas, beans, squash, and sweet potatoes.

7. Whole grains, particularly brown rice, wild rice, barley, and spelt.

8. Organic turkey and free-range poultry

9. Avocados

What do these foods have in common? They are low in saturated fat, high in omega 3’s, low in simple sugars and nutrient dense. All of these factors combine to increase serotonin in the brain and that means… happy fun times! (My apologies to the science nerds who are apoplectic right now at my oversimplification). The great news is, the list is plentiful so if your child’s palate is less than expansive, I bet you can find at least a couple mood boosting foods from the list they just might try and love.

And stop the presses… according to Dr. Oz, insufficient vitamin D levels can also lower mood. To that end “one fantastic food that has recently come to a supermarket near you is vitamin D-packed mushrooms. These are mushrooms that have been exposed to UV light, which naturally boosts the vitamin D level; one cup of these mushrooms packs 100% of the RDA.” Magic mushrooms!

There is something this sandwich is missing: avocado. I would never dare eat a quesadilla or anything else remotely like Mexican cuisine without avocado or guacamole. The issue is we have an avocado allergy in our household, so it was left off this sandwich. However, if you make this, promise you’ll nestle slices of avocado in between the slices of bread. Do it for me and all the lonely tortilla chips I eat in my house without a healthy scoop of guacamole. Pinky swear. Can you tell I miss it?

I’ll pick Mexican cuisine over almost any other. (To my Italian grandmother, you didn’t hear that.) In fact, I’ve been known to smuggle a burrito back from my favorite NYC Mexican joint in my carry on. (For some reason, I haven’t found the best burrito joint here in Toronto. If you know of one, please write, immediately.) Cooking dishes like quesadillas or burritos are one of my favorite dinner options. I can usually pull them off with minimal work, especially if I use the Chili Chicken Taco recipe we featured by Martha Stewart but has been championed by all the busy parents of SPC. After one evening of chill tacos, I whipped this sandwich together when Scarlett groaned at my suggestion of a quesadilla for lunch. “Not another,” she whined. “Can’t I just have a sandwich?” Well, a sandwich she got.

So if you want dinner and then lunch and lunch and maybe even dinner again, double the chili chicken recipe and enjoy this sammie–it makes plain chicken salad look like bologna. I’ve even tried using rotisserie chicken picked up at my local grocery store. I just add a few extra bells and whistle so it can pack the same flavorful punch.

Here’s a blast from the recent past… sandwich sushi! Laura and I are both living the high life of parents who don’t yet have to pack lunches five days a week. But it’s coming at us soon. We’d love to know what you all pack in your kids’ lunches. In fact, we’re begging you! I know this will definitely be on my roster as my kids ask for it all the time. I guess before she starts big school in September I’m going to have to break it to her it’s not pronounced “shushi”, right? – C.M.

I’m afraid of lunch. Not my own, but my kids’. And not the lunch they’re having now which is always great, thanks to the great cook at their daycare, but of all the lunches I’m going to have to be packing come September. That’s right, Esme is about to start big school and I’m freaking out. Honestly, it’s all I’ve thought about for the last month. Where we live, in Toronto, this is the week to register for Kindergarten so we’re down to the wire. We’ve been going to parent information nights at various schools and having about a million discussions, trying to figure out which school is best and how she’s going to get there and how will we handle after-care and what if French Immersion is not all it’s cracked up to be and… okay, maybe it’s not lunch that I’m afraid of.

I love change when it comes to my life, hate it when it comes to the kids. Even though any shifts we’ve made have always worked out they still weigh on me. And what can I do? Change is coming whether I like it or not. I can learn to make a great packed lunch, that’s what. I forget where I saw these sandwich sushi rolls first but we featured them as party snacks in our Birthday Magazine several months ago. But with all the cute bento-style lunch boxes out there, they’re also perfect for school. For the sake of this post I made three different kinds but if I were really packing a lunch I’d probably only do one. These are great for kids to who like to graze as each roll is small (although is actually half a sandwich!).

Let us know what you like to pack for lunch. We love hearing from you and will be building our own lunch-making rosters!

photos by Maya Visnyei

If theres’s a trick to these little sammies it’s that you want all your ingredients to be quite small. So, chop up your pickles and celery quite finely. If you’re doing ham and cheese, grate the cheese. Otherwise, anything goes!

Sandwich Sushi

4 wholewheat bread
tuna salad (drained, mixed with a bit of mayo and diced pickle)
egg salad (hard boiled, mashed with a bit of mayo and a tiny bit of dijon and diced celery)
ham
cheese

Method

Stack your bread neatly and use a serrated knife to cut off the crusts. Take one piece of bread at a time and use a rolling pin to flatten it. You want it to be quite thin and flexible, particularly at the ends.

Spoon a line of your filling along the edge of the flattened piece of bread. You’re creating about an inch and a half thick line of filling. With the filling end toward you start rolling, making it as tight and snug as you can. Place the sandwich down so that the seam is underneath as you roll up the rest of your sushi.

Once all the sandwiches have been rolled, use your serrated knife to cut each sandwich in half. Stack them on their ends, close together to keep them from unraveling.