Healthy Budget Breakfasts

Just for fun, something different, I bought a boxed cereal last week.

I had a coupon which made the granola around $4 a box or $4 for 12 ounces of toasted oats jazzed up with little chocolate chunks and sweeteners.

The granola is pleasant, but not fabulously delicious or for that matter, highly nutritious (it contains 4 different sweeteners).

I certainly won't buy it again; it's unnecessarily spendy for something I can easily make myself for much less.

One pound or 16 ounces of organic, bulk oats is about .99 cents and when you buy dry goods in bulk there's no box to throw in the trash.


If I then toss those oats in melted butter and honey or soft brown sugar or agave, toasting them in the oven on a baking tray -- allowing the oats to cool before tossing in little chunks of dark chocolate --I've essentially made the same granola for about one-third of the price of the boxed variety.

Oats are terrifically versatile and a cereal grain we're all familiar with. Periodically though, I get bored with oatmeal despite cooking it with seeds, dried fruits, marmalade, and topping it with stewed fruit, coconut or coconut milk -- anything I can find to make it interesting.

When that happens, I turn to other cereals for a much needed change. Polenta is an alternative. Like oatmeal, it's around a dollar or less a pound when purchased in bulk. It's also quite bland and therefore polenta lends itself to being transformed with the addition of other flavors.

Most commonly served as a savory dish nowadays, it was originally served as gruel porridge. Generally I cook one cup of polenta in about 3 - 4 cups water, the more water added, the more porridge- and the less gruel-like the consistency.

To enrich the polenta, you could boil it in a combination of water, milk, half and half, or nut, coconut or hemp milks.

Add spices like fresh grated or powdered ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, cardamom, and dried fruits such as raisins, currents, cranberries, figs, pear, and perhaps the zest from a lemon or lime or orange.

Boil the polenta for about 30 minutes. Eat it straight-away as porridge topped with nuts, yogurt, sour cream or stewed fruit or pour the cooked polenta into a bowl and let it set, as in the picture to the left. Keep the bowl of polenta in the fridge for later use.

For breakfast, serve chunks hot or cold with stewed fruits (as in the top pic), seeds like sunflower and pumpkin, and or slivered almonds browned in a little butter. Drizzle with honey, agave, maple syrup or soft brown sugar.

I had a breakfast like this a couple days running and then on the third day, I cut a chunk of the cold polenta and tossed it into a hot skillet with a piece of sliced turkey bacon, stirring the lot about with a fork to break up the polenta, and creating a space in the center of the skillet, I cracked an egg and let it cook.

For a savory, low fat and phytonutrient-rich breakfast, you could substitute the bacon and egg with tofu or tempeh, and add a green like chard, spinach or kale to your polenta mix.

This week, I'll feature economical and nutritious cereal and grain breakfasts-with-a-difference. Check back tomorrow for ideas on preparing millet and quinoa.

Savory Egg Roulade

The day before Christmas I posted a recipe for chocolate roulade.

A sweet dessert, roulade can also be savory, as long as you leave out the sweet ingredients.

Because I'm featuring light, post-holiday meals this week, with eggs at the center of those meals, I thought I'd share a savory version of roulade.

Light and fluffy like the souffle omelet I featured on Monday, an egg roulade is simply the yolks (pic left) and whites beaten separately (to aerate them), and then folded together.

Once folded, the egg mixture is baked on a oiled and floured oblong tray, just as we did with the chocolate roulade (pic below).

As the baked roulade cools, prepare a filling of your choice. We filled the chocolate roulade with whipped cream. Tasty fillings for a savory roulade might be one of the following:

• Cream cheese beaten with pieces of baked or tinned or smoked salmon.
• Mashed or chopped avocado moistened with olive oil and lemon juice and mixed with watercress.
  
• Tuna, egg or potato salad bound with mayonnaise.
• Ricotta cheese mixed with wilted spinach and pieces of crispy bacon.

You get the idea -- any combination of savory mixtures that you can spread over the roulade before rolling it. Keep in mind that your filling shouldn't be too hot or too liquid-y otherwise it'll cause the egg roulade to disintegrate.

Savory Egg Roulade
1) Separate 6 large eggs -- yolks in one bowl and whites in another.
2) Beat yolks until they're light and fluffy (pic above) with salt and pepper. If you have herbs growing on your winter windowsill you might like to add sage or thyme or oregano.
3) With clean and dry beaters, beat the whites until they're stiff.
4) Turn the whites into the beaten yolks and fold the two together either with a whisk or a spatula.
5) Refer to the chocolate roulade steps 12-22 for baking and rolling tips and tricks.
6) Before you roll your roulade, spread it (pic to left) with one of the savory fillings above or a mix you've created.
7) Lift the savory roulade onto a platter and decorate with sprigs of a fresh herb of your choosing.

To Serve: Because roulades look so spectacular, present it on the platter and cut it into 1 inch pieces at the dining table. Spoon slices onto plates and serve with any number of sides.

On Monday I suggested several winter vegetable sides and then last night, I made for the second night in a row a delicious combination of colorful winter vegetables (pic below).

Substantial and tasty, you might like to try a hearty side like this with your light, savory egg roulade.

Wilted Purple Cabbage with Pumpkin
1) Toss a chunk of peeled and chopped ginger and the same of garlic into a lightly oiled skillet; saute on low.
2) Chop up a chunk of purple cabbage, pumpkin or acorn squash; add to skillet and stir about on low heat.
Note: I added some turkey bacon, but that's optional.
3) Pour in half a cup of stock and put the lid on the skillet, cooking the veggies till the pumpkin is soft.
4) At the last minute, I tossed in two chopped spring onions; you could also add chopped kale or spinach for color and additional nutrients.

Caramelized Onion Quiche

The focus this week is preparing simple and light meals to help re-balance digestive systems over-loaded by holiday food.

Yesterday I implied that eggs, preferably free-range, are virtually meals-in-a-shell especially with the addition of a side of leafy and or winter greens.

I know some people are concerned about the cholesterol in egg yolks, yet as with any food, I'm suggesting consumption in moderation.

So although this week's posts are all about eggs as the cornerstone of a light meal, I'm not suggesting you prepare the dishes I post and eat them everyday for the next week.

I have high cholesterol: high LDL (which is the "bad" cholesterol), however my HDL is on the increase and this is a good thing, since it's the "good" cholesterol.

As my HDL levels have risen, due to my consuming good fats and oils, the ratio between my LDL and HDL levels have become more ideal and apparently this is what you want to see, an ideal ratio between the two.

I've had health-care practitioners go into panic over my cholesterol levels in the past. Yet at 5 feet 6 inches and about 125 pounds (give or take a few pounds, depending on the time of the year), and with a blood pressure on the low side and no health issues, I don't feel too concerned -- particularly given that my physically healthy 93 year-old father has always had high cholesterol.

In other words, I think I'm probably a good example of a genetic predisposition to high cholesterol correlating with good health.

That said I do monitor my intake of animal fat, including eggs which I'll eat several times a week, one or two at a time. Therefore, my average weekly consumption of eggs is about 4, including the yolks; it's not an egg to me if it's just the whites.

One of my favorite light-meal egg dishes is quiche. I have a friend who also loves quiche too, but she rarely has success with her pastry. If you find pastry-making too fiddly but love quiche, I posted a recipe for Crustless Quiche back in April so you might like to try that over today's recipe.

And of course, quiche lends itself to any number of fillings despite that the traditional French version, Quiche Lorraine, is an egg and cream-based custard with smoked bacon.

My recipe today includes caramelized onions for no reason other than I love the combination of the brown, caramel-like sweet onions with egg-custard.

Feel free to add other ingredients in addition to the caramelized onions, i.e. sliced tomato and a grated, dry Italian cheese or spinach, broccoli or chard.

Caramelized Onion Quiche
1) To make a simple short crust pastry, add one stick of butter to the bowl of a food processor. Add to that, one and half cups of plain flour. Run the processor until the flour and butter blends to a crumb-like state. Add about a tablespoon of cold water and run the processor again. The pastry will form into a ball or it will remain crumbly. Now turn the mixture out onto your kitchen bench and knead it with your hands so that the pastry becomes smooth and pliable. Allow the pastry to sit.
2) Peel and slice in half one large brown onion, then slice halves again. Toss the onion into a skillet with a chunk of butter; saute till the onion begins to wilt. Add a tablespoon of brown sugar, and turn the heat to low. Gently cook until the onion becomes soft and brown or caramel-like in color. Set aside to cool.
3) Into the clean bowl of the food processor crack four eggs, add one and a half cups of half and half or heavy whipping cream. I use half and half mostly; it's less rich than whipping cream and more substantial than regular milk. Add salt and pepper.
3) Run the food processor, mixing the eggs and milk well.
4) Roll pastry out to fit a standard size quiche pan, either a ceramic pan as in the picture above, or a aluminum pan with a removable base. Press the pastry to fit the pan, pinching the edges of the pastry to create a pretty fluted effect.
5) Spoon onions onto pastry base, spread them about the pastry.
6) Now pour egg and milk over the onions, perhaps sprinkle with a chopped herb like sage or thyme. Don't overfill the quiche pan with the custard mix otherwise it will spill out during baking.
Note: At this point, if you want to add grated cheese, sprinkle it over the top, or lay sliced tomatoes over the top and then the grated cheese -- you get the idea.
7) Pop quiche onto a baking tray (I do this because sometimes some of the custard spills out during the cooking and rather than have it burn onto the bottom of the oven, it cakes to the baking tray instead); slip into a 350-degree oven for about 45 mins or until the top is golden and the custard set.

To Serve: Allow quiche to cool slightly before cutting into portions (see pic above); serve with a salad or sides along lines of those I suggested yesterday.

Souffle Omelet

How are you feeling after all the holiday eating and drinking?

Four days into the New Year, I've noticed that I don't have a big appetite and that light meals and soups are my preference.

I'm going to do my best to honor that preference, not by going on a diet or doing a cleanse but by simply paring back and making simpler meals.

Eggs make terrific, light meals. And I have access to free- range eggs at the moment so I've been creating delicious, uncomplicated, egg-based meals these past few days.

Light and nourishing, full of omega 3's, eggs with the addition of a side of braised winter greens (pic below) and a small bowl of rice, potatoes or pasta is sufficient for a simple lunch or dinner.

Last summer I posted a recipe for Skillet Egg Souffle with Chives. Today's souffle omelet is much the same, though I've given it a different name and left out the chives, since they're not in season, and added a little grated Parmesan instead.

Souffle Omelet
1) Allowing 2 eggs per person, crack and separate eggs --yolks into one bowl and whites into another.
2) Beat yolks until creamy. If you do have any windowsill herbs like tarragon, sage or thyme, you might like to add some chopped fresh herbs to the yolks.
3) Using clean and dry beaters, beat whites till they're stiff. Pour whites onto yolks and either using a spatula or whisk fold the whites into the yolks.
4) Heat a skillet lined with light olive oil till it's hot; pour the egg mix into the skillet -- you only want to brown the bottom slightly so a few minutes on the hot plate is plenty.
5) Sprinkle salt and ground pepper and grated Parmesan over the top of the omelet.
6) Put the skillet into a 350-degree oven for about 5-7 mins or until the omelet has risen like a souffle and browned slightly (pic to left).


To Serve: Because it looks quite impressive, present the souffle omelet at the table in the skillet.

Halve or quarter the omelet and serve with sides such as wilted winter greens (pic left) or baby winter spinach leaves tossed into olive oil and lemon juice (pic above), and a side of hash browns.

If this meal sounds bland to you, consider serving a spoon of salsa, tomato chutney, relish, sauerkraut, or a dill pickle with your souffle omelet.