Lunch on June 20, 2011 - It's Bavarian pasta, it doesn't need any sauce

Lunch today was thrown together (yet again) out of things I had in the fridge.  You would think keeping a lunch blog would make me more diligent about meal planning but alas, it has not.

Today I am serving leftover pasta, cottage cheese with strawberries, and avocado.  The pasta is left over (we made veggie-meat sauce over the weekend and had more pasta than sauce). 

I didn't have anything to go on top of the pasta which reminded me of a line from Woody Allen's "Everyone Says I Love You" delivered by the German maid/cook: "It's Bavarian pasta, it doesn't need any sauce.  Italian pasta needs sauce.  The Italians were weak!"  I still prefer pasta with sauce but in the effort of getting out the door quickly today, I settled for Bavarian style - I drizzled some olive oil on top and threw in some sugar plum tomatoes.

Lunch on May 17, 2011 - She never met a starch she didn't like

Today's lunch is full of carbohydrates because as my dad likes to say, Juju never met a starch she didn't like.

Lunch is penne pasta with chicken in balsamic vinegar (inspired by a lunch my friend Amy made for me a few weeks ago - more on that below), corn on the cob (it is everywhere now and so delicious!) and dried seaweed (in a sushi themed fabric snack bag).

The pasta salad is completely inspired by (and merely a halfway decent copy of) a lunch my friend Amy made.  I need to ask her for the real recipe; I just went off what I remembered she told me was in hers.  She started with "balsamic chicken" from Trader Joe's which is, I assume, chicken marinated in balsamic vinegar and other spices.  It was delicious.  She added it to some rotini with chopped onion, red and yellow peppers, tomatoes, and more balsamic vinegar.  She added a sprig of rosemary for color (you know how I love presentation!) and served it with some crusty bread.  Yum!  (I, like Julian, never met a carbohydrate I didn't like).

I didn't have all those yummy ingredients but I still wanted to copy Amy for lunch so I improvised with what I had at home.  I took plain (already cooked) chicken breasts, (if you are a vegetarian I am sure you could substitute this for Gardein or some other veggie protein that takes the place of chicken), chopped them up and marinated the pieces in some balsamic vinegar overnight.  Be careful when marinating in vinegar - a little goes a long way.  Then, I cooked the only pasta I had, penne.  Penne is not a great pasta for this dish; it's hard to pick up and doesn't absorb much of the sauce/marinade but it's what I had.  I took the pasta off the heat and let it cool.  Next I chopped several cherry tomatoes in half and I minced a medium sized shallot (again, this is what I had in my fridge, feel free to experiment with what you have in yours).  I then tossed the chicken, pasta, tomatoes, and shallots in some more balsamic vinegar (just a little), a small amount of olive oil and salt and pepper.  And, voila: a pretty pasta salad with lots of leftovers for everyone else in the house!  My chicken wasn't quite as tasty as Amy's, nor did the entire dish compare to what she served (the penne really killed it) but it was still a very yummy result with very little effort and no need to run to the store for any special ingredients.

For those curious, the seaweed snack is from Trader Joe's.  A kid on the playground turned us on to the idea of snacking on seaweed about 18 months ago and Juju is still hooked.  In fact, at one point last year Trader Joe's ran out of their convenient seaweed snack packs (too many kids in LA got wind of this snack idea) and there was nearly a seaweed riot as lunatic moms (like me) went to all kinds of organic and Korean marts to find a suitable substitute.  Fortunately Trader Joe's came to their senses and got control of their inventory of seaweed in the fall.  When it first reappeared on shelves, in a move my husband still can't believe, I went out and bought a case of the stuff for fear I'd never see it again.  Many months later, Juju is finally on the last bag from the case!  For the record, I'm totally grossed out by dried seaweed (I tolerate it in sushi but that's about it) but I'm told it's got some great health benefits so I hold my nose and continue to serve it.

Lunch on April 15 - pasta, avocado, fruit

Today is an example of a lunch packed the morning of.  No frills, no fun accessories, just something thrown together from what is in the fridge.  Today I am serving leftover pasta with cheese sauce.  Despite my efforts to serve fresh, wholesome foods most of the time, this dish came from a box.  It's apparently "organic" but it's basically Trader Joe's fancy version of mac and cheese.  Juju usually eats mac and cheese when she has a babysitter and this is leftover from earlier in the week when we went out.  The shells and cheese are paired with half an avocado and a fruit medley of strawberries, grapes, and cantaloupe.  I also threw some granola in one of my new SnackTaxi sacks that arrived the other day.

Speaking of granola, I wanted to post a fantastic kosher for Passover recipe for granola since Pesach starts on Monday night.  Even if you aren't Jewish you will find this recipe delish.  It is courtesy of my friend Marla (it's actually her mother's recipe) and is a great breakfast alternative to the all too common matzah and butter:

Matzah granola

Ingredients:
2 cups matzo farfel (or just crush up regular matzah to fill 2 cups)

1 cup almonds (I use slivered, unpeeled)

1/2 cup shredded coconut (I usually omit this)

1/2 cup honey

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 cup diced, dried apricots

1/2 cup pitted dates, chopped

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
Line a baking sheet with foil and spray it lightly with cooking spray.

In a large bowl, combine farfel, almonds, coconut.
Add honey and oil to the bowl and mix well.

Spread the mixture onto the baking sheet and even it out.

Bake the granola for 20 minutes, stopping at 10 minutes to stir it up.
After 20 minutes, transfer the granola onto a platter, or just remove the foil from the baking sheet and allow it to cool to room temperature.

Pour the granola into bowl, add raisins, apricots, dates, mix well.

Enjoy!

Lunch on April 5, 2011 - Pasta Salad Plus

The idea of making lunches twice a week for my daughter is still fairly new and exciting considering we really like to cook (and eat) in this house and I usually pay a fair amount of attention to presentation.  Having this blog though has really thrown things into overdrive.  I will confess I actually thought about printing out the photo of the lunch above and taping it inside Juju's lunchbox so her teachers would know how to arrange the food in front of her and which container to open first.  Yes, I am aware that that is going overboard but if thoughts like that disturb you, you should probably stop reading this blog now; I imagine stressing over decisions like whether or not to print out lunch diagrams will be commonplace as I plan and execute more lunches and you need to be okay with that.

Today's lunch is actually tomorrow's lunch.  Although I like to pack food as fresh as possible, I simply have more time today than I will tomorrow morning so I've already made the lunch.  Also, the main dish is a pasta salad which I find tastes better the next day anyway.  Joining the pasta salad is a container of strawberries and grapes and a container of mini carrots to dip in hummus (while I loathe Costco, it's only redeeming values to me are cheap, quality kids pajamas and the fact that you can find individual servings of Sabra hummus there).

I have been thinking about making pasta salad since last week.  I know most kids gobble up any sort of noodle but I wanted to move beyond the prosaic mac and cheese.  Plus this lunch is served cold with no option to heat it up so I wanted a pasta dish that was best served at room temperature.  I made up the following recipe; the portions are totally up to you and I apologize that I am not actually a proper recipe writer. 

Pasta Salad Plus - this recipe will give you enough for 3-4 lunches
Cook 1/2 box of mini bow tie pasta. 
While it's cooking, place 1/3 package of frozen corn in a big bowl (don't worry about the moisture as it defrosts).  You can also use fresh or canned corn.
Heat 2-3 tablespoons of oil in a pan and add 1/2 clove of chopped garlic.  Stir and cook the garlic long enough to flavor the oil but don't let it get brown (you don't want to burn it).  When the oil starts to bubble, turn it off and let the garlic hang out in the oil off of the heat.  You may leave out the garlic if you don't like it but I find it really adds a great flavor to the dish.
Cut in half sugar plum tomatoes, as many as you like.
Chop up some fresh basil (optional, I just do this for color) or better yet, to save time, buy the frozen kind made by a company called Dorot sold at Trader Joe's and elsewhere.  Get your chopped garlic from Dorot too - this company has changed my life!
Chop up fresh mozzarella cheese (I used one big hunk, about the size of a fist)
Chop in half black and green olives (optional, I did this because my kid is obsessed with olives)
Drain pasta when cooked al dente and add it to the bowl with the corn.  Add the tomatoes, basil, cheese, olives, and salt and pepper to taste.  Add the oil and mix thoroughly.  If the pasta salad is too dry add more oil to taste.
Put some in containers for your child and eat the rest yourself!
It's best if you can make this dish a day or two before, the flavors taste even better when they've marinated overnight.

Fingers crossed the pasta salad is a hit; I don't actually have any kid feedback yet but I quite enjoyed the sample I had.  And I had enough to send my husband a container for lunch as well which is always a plus.  Today's lunch was served in Kids Konserve stainless steel containers.  I promise a post on all the containers I use very soon.