What (To Do With) The Duck?

This is less an actual post than a request for input. I have had, for a while now, a duck in my freezer. I bought it at my son's request, but never prepared it because... I don't know what to do with it! The duck came packaged with a packet of sauce. But naturally (or, unnaturally, as it turns out) the sauce is full of stuff I don't want to eat or feed my family. So, I figured I would just check with all of you to see if you have any recipes you love for preparing duck. I don't have time to go surfing the net for recipes right now, so I'm really hoping your collective wisdom will come through for me! Whaddaya say?

A Few Quick Recipes That Are Healthier Than Fast Food

It has been really interesting to me to read your challenges and concerns about eating healthier in the comments of the giveaway post. Many of them are my challenges as well. Over the last six (almost!) months, I have become much better at avoiding fast/convenience foods and eating healthier instead. But... I totally understand the problem of not having the time, or energy, to cook a healthy meal after a busy day. So, here are a few of the "quick but healthier than fast food" recipes I fall back on when I just don't feel like cooking.

The first one I have posted before. That's my Who Hash recipe. The only caveat with this one is that it does involve rice (brown rice, because it's better for you! * Ha! Naturally, having posted that, I then read this article that presents a different view of that. You be the judge!). Sometimes I am too tired to wait for rice to cook. But rice is also something that can be made ahead of time (heck, you can probably even freeze cooked rice for a quick go-to). This is such a simple, filling food- and the kids love it.

Next is what I call Cheater's Chili. I know chili aficionados will be appalled, so it you consider yourself in that category please look away now. Cheater's Chili caveat: involves canned ingredients. I try to avoid canned ingredients these days, but on days where the choice is between canned or take-out, I try to go for the can.

Cheater's Chili

brown a pound of ground beef (with onion if you have it, but it's fine without too)
if there's a lot of fat, drain it off (I don't bother if the meat was very lean)
dump in a couple cans of pre-seasoned chili beans (I like Bush's)
dump in a large can of diced tomatoes
chop a green bell pepper and toss that in
add chili powder
stir while heating through
eat and put leftovers in the fridge

And this last "recipe" is really just a way to prepare salmon (Pacific wild-caught is best, but honestly, you could do a variation of this with canned salmon for less money).

Yummy Salmon

Cover the bottom of a large pan with diced tomatoes, basil, garlic, chopped onion, and chopped/sliced black olives. You can use canned seasoned tomatoes and it works great. Lay the salmon fillet on top of the mix. Cover and heat until salmon is cooked through. The flavors melt together nicely. You don't need to stir this or anything, but use a medium heat so it cooks quickly but doesn't burn to the bottom.

Okay, one more thought... We stir-fry pretty often. I don't really consider stir-fry to be super quick, but it just occurred to me that if I pre-cooked the meat when it was convenient and kept it in the freezer, I could toss it in to re-heat with the veggies and save some time. Especially if I had cooked rice in the freezer. Has anybody frozen cooked rice? How did it work out? I think I have to go try that now... Anybody else care to share your "quick but healthier than fast food recipes"?

Sauteed Spinach And Garlic

I brought home a bag of spinach from the farmer's market on Saturday. For a long time, I have been looking for a good but easy recipe for sauteed spinach and garlic. It always sounded so easy to make, yet I regularly had less than satisfactory results. Too bitter, too blah, to something... The other night I prepared a variation on Ina Garten's Garlic Sauteed Spinach. You can find the original recipe here.

The original recipe calls for 1 1/2 lbs baby spinach. Well, my farmer's market purchase was a gallon-size zip-loc bag stuffed full of full-sized spinach. I have no idea what it's weight was. Once it cooked down, it served the three of us just about perfectly (as a side dish). I roughly approximated (really roughly) the rest of the ingredients. But the original recipe calls for 2 teaspoons kosher salt and I think this may be too much. I didn't use anywhere near that (because of the smaller amount of spinach I used), but it still was a bit too salty for our tastes. Also, I didn't measure the black pepper at all. I sprinkled it liberally over the spinach in the pot, stirred and repeated. I think it would have benefited from a little more. I love garlic and used the full amount called for. If you are using a strong garlic, that might be overkill. But the stuff I was using was fine.

Sauteed Spinach And Garlic

1 full gallon bag of spinach
2 tablespoons olive oil
6 cloves garlic, chopped
1/4 teaspoon Real or sea salt (adjust to taste)
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper (my best guess)
dollop of butter
lemon juice
sprinkle of sea salt

1. Rinse spinach well and dry.
2. In pot or large pan, heat olive oil and saute garlic over medium heat 1 minute.
3. Add all spinach, salt, and pepper. Toss to combine.
4. Cover and cook 2 minutes.
5. Uncover and turn heat to high. Cook 1 minute, stirring, until all spinach is wilted.
6. Remove from heat. Transfer spinach to serving bowl.
7. Top with butter, lemon, sprinkle of salt and serve.

Roasted Red Potatoes And Asparagus

I wish I had thought to take a picture of this dish when I made it the other night. But it was getting late by the time I got to fixing dinner, and everybody was hungry. This dish is a taste that is a little bit more sophisticated than The Boy cares for, but The Girl did not complain and I thought it was nice. I liked it even better as leftovers, which is saying a lot because I am not generally a leftovers fan. This one goes in the "keep" file.

I brought red potatoes and asparagus home from the farm stand and then asked Google for a recipe. The base recipe is here, but I did as many of the comments suggested and modified it a bit. Here is what I actually did (please bear in mind, there are only three of us; I served three as a side for dinner and got one lunch serving out of the leftovers):

Roasted Red Potatoes And Asparagus

4 large red potatoes and 1 medium sized one, cut into chunks
1 bunch of asparagus, trimmed and cut into 1 inch pieces
3 tsp chopped garlic (more would be better)
2 T. olive oil (I think I used it more liberally than this, really)
1 tsp dried rosemary (might bump it to 1.5 tsp)
1 tsp dried thyme (might bump this to 1.5 tsp also)
2 tsp sea salt
black pepper to taste

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C).
2. In baking dish, combine garlic, rosemary, thyme, half salt, and half olive oil.
3. Toss potatoes in mixture and cover.
4. Bake potatoes 20 minutes. Mix in asparagus and remaining olive oil and salt.
5. Cover and bake 15 minutes or until potatoes tender.
6. Remove foil. Bake until potatoes start to brown.
7. Season with pepper to taste.

* I actually added the pepper with the other spices, but not a lot. I also threw the potatoes into the oven before the oven had fully heated. I needed to run to the store (kids were home to keep an eye on things) and just added in the asparagus, etc when I got home. It turned out fine.

Recipes: A "New" Twist On Breakfast

Yesterday, NPR ran an article called "Market-Fresh Breakfasts" which you can find here. If you are looking for a few new ideas to shake up your breakfast repertoire, you might just find them here. Personally, I have learned that I am far more satisfied with a breakfast of bacon and eggs than I ever was of cereal (including oatmeal) or pancakes. So I'm not sure I could switch to a breakfast that didn't include a good bit of protein. But, I see no reason not to include a generous helping of veggies as well. I think the Eggs Baked With Spinach And Feta In Tomato Shell and Israeli Tomato And Cucumber Salad will both be on my menu soon, with probably some variation of Summer Squash and Red Pepper Tarta With Basil Crust following at some point. The tarta probably involves the most work, but I love that the article's author mentions that this dish is a good one to cut up and freeze in individual servings for easy eating later.

I was surprised by some of the comments this article received at NPR. I would have guessed that anyone who didn't find these recipes appealing would just move on and not take the  time to comment. But apparently, some people really have a problem with the idea that vegetables could be breakfast food, or...something. What do you think Would you eat these foods?