Super Healthy Chicken And Broccoli Casserole

An All-American Favorite Gets A Mediterranean Makeover

Here’s a traditional American comfort food, adjusted to fit the Mediterranean diet. This dish is 100% healthy Mediterranean eating, with a familiar All-American flavor.

I tweaked a recipe I found in the March 2011 issue of Cosmopolitan. With a 20 minute baking time, the broccoli retains a nice, ever-so-slight crunch. You can bake it longer if you like a mushier casserole. The original recipe called for more lemon juice, but I found it over-lemony and reduced it to what you see here.

Mediterranean All-American Chicken and Broccoli Casserole

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. You’ll need your largest casserole dish, but you won’t need the cover. Gather:

1-1/2 T. butter
1-1/2 T. olive oil

The Mediterranean Diet: Salmon and Pesto and Flax, Oh My!

This is what the Mediterranean Diet looks like.

I’m almost 2 weeks into the Mediterranean diet, and loving it. The Mediterranean Diet involves lots of fresh fruit and vegetables, chicken and fish, a daily quota of olive oil that must be met, a weekly quota of Omega-3 fatty acids in the form of salmon and flax, and a daily quota of whole grains. Dairy comes from low fat yogurt and milk. Garlic, onion and herbs are to be used liberally.

This diet has been found to prevent type-2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke, many cancers, and even Alzheimer’s disease. I’m participating in a voluntary study at the University of Michigan that follows people on the diet for 6 months. So I am committed to the objectives of the study as well as my own health. Lots of motivation to stick with it, as well as personal coaching from a University nutritionist.

At first, it seemed like too much food! I have to eat 2 cups of dark green vegetables, one cup of red vegetable, one cup of yellow vegetable and one cup of “other” vegetable each day. That’s a salad about the size of a sofa cushion. Plus 3 cups of fresh fruit. Jeebus!

Scrumptious Apple Currant Topping

This stuffs good on almost everything.

Wondering what to do with those slightly bruised and past-their-prime apples? Make this topping with ingredients on hand. This delicious cooked topping partners perfectly with oatmeal, pancakes, muffins, or yogurt. Or try this spectacular dessert: a layer of homemade soft oatmeal cookies, vanilla ice cream, and hot apple topping. Decadent!

Apple Currant Topping

5 small to medium Macintosh apples

1/3 c. sugar

1/2 c. currants (or raisins)

1/2 c. finely chopped walnuts (or pecans)

1/8 c. water

Dog Eye Infection Eye Drops Recipe

All better now. Thanks, Mom!

When Miss Gracie recently developed those distinctive greenish eye boogers, I wondered if there was a home remedy I could try before hauling her in to the vet. Especially since I never seem to get her out of there for less than $75. Fees, tests and meds add up fast!

I asked Uncle Google, and he served up several variations of this recipe, plus a lot of heated discussion about whether or not it is humane to try home treating your pet. And a lot of scolding about how if you can’t afford a vet, you shouldn’t have a dog, blah, blah.

I think that, just as with human illness, if the situation doesn’t seem dire, it’s ok to try the equivalent of “chicken soup” before running to the professionals. It’s all about judgment.

Homemade Cold Frappucino Mix

Can't beat those prices!

If you’re like me, you love Starbucks’ cold mocha frappucinos, the kind you find in the soda pop case at the convenience store. They are a summertime staple for me.

But they are pricey at $1.90 to $2.29 for a 9 oz bottle. Even if you catch a 4-pack on sale at the grocery store, or opt for the grocery store brand, they are about $1.30 each. A pallet of 12 at Costco puts the price at 93 cents each, 80-something if Costco is running a $2 to $3-off coupon, which they do a couple times a year.

I’ve found Aldi’s “Beaumont” brand are quite good, especially the French Vanilla flavor, and at an everyday price of 99c each it’s the best single bottle deal you will find anywhere. If you’re on the road and craving a frappucino, don’t stop at the gas station, stop at an Aldi store! They come chilled and are in the cheese section.

However, even at the lowest prices, it still adds up if you have a habit like I do, and when you see the big pile of glass bottles in the recycle bin, it starts to look pretty wasteful and consumerish as well. Oh, and all that sugar! So I figured there had to be a way to make them myself.

Great Recipe from the Great Depression

Watch this delightful video of 91 year old Clara chatting about growing up during the Great Depression of the 1930s, while frying up some hot dogs and potatoes, a dish she calls her Poor Man’s Meal.

My mom used to make this dish, too. We called it simply Hot Dogs ‘n’ Potatoes. She cut the potatoes a bit bigger, and left out the onions (probably as a concession to me), and used her electric frying pan. Served with ketchup, salt and pepper.

Making Stock from Vegetable Scraps

Homemade vegetable stock is a great way to use every last bit of the veggies you buy, and it can be frozen for later use to add wonderful flavor to any recipe.

When cooking, save things like the butt ends of carrots and celery (cut out the tough stem part of the carrot, and the hard base of the celery), celery leaves, clean potato peels, and the rubbery outer layers of an onion (do not use the skin; it will make your stock bitter). Keep a covered container in the fridge for collecting these scraps. At the end of the week, use your treasures to make stock.