We’re halfway through January. How’s the New Year’s resolution to “eat healthier” working for you?

We’re here to help with another way to make easy, healthy recipes for dinner. This tip turns plain grilled, poached or roasted proteins into glamour dishes. (See Part 1 and Part 2.)

The photo shows pan-sauteed catfish, but you can use this concept for any fish or seafood, meat, chicken or other protein. The key is to select interesting greens for your salad topper, and to be sure everything is small or delicate—a light layer instead of an avalanche.

Garnish your protein with your salad. Photo
courtesy Whole Foods Market. Get the recipe.

 
Bon appétit et salud!

Chicken Lo Mein from Schwan’s is a delicious
dish. Photo courtesy Schwan’s.

The line, available exclusively through Schwan’s Home Delivery, allows you to enjoy traditionally-inspired Asian cuisine for less than you might spend on a meal out. The new meals include:

• Cantonese Steamed Cod with Ginger and Soy
• Chicken Lo Mein (in photo at left)
• Drunken Noodles
• Salmon Teriyaki
• Thai Chicken Coconut Soup

• Learn more about Schwan’s by visiting Schwans.com.
• To Enter This Gourmet Giveaway: Go to the box at the bottom of our International Foods Page and click to enter your email address for the prize drawing. This contest closes on Monday, January 24th at noon, Eastern Time. Good luck!

You may be familiar with Blue Diamond nuts, produced by a California co-op of 3,200 growers. Their almonds have been sold since 1910—one hundred years of health almonds.

In addition to almond butter and Almond Breeze almond milk, the company makes nut thins that are well worth a try (unless you avoid potentially addictive healthy snacks).

The snack cracker line comprises seven flavors of all-natural, crunchy, baked nut crackers that are wheat-free and gluten-free (and certified kosher by OU). We haven’t tried all six because we’re addicted to the Barbeque, but they include Almond, Almond Cheddar Cheese, Country Ranch, Hazelnut, Pecan and Sea Salt.

Loaded with healthy nuts (see the health benefits of nuts), the crackers have 2g of protein per serving, no cholesterol or sugar and are low in sodium.

We’re as happy as squirrels.

Nut thins are a great crunch—and they’re
gluten-free and kosher. Photo by
Katharine Pollak | THE NIBBLE

Two of our index cards combine in this
salmon-avocado salad. Photo courtesy Whole
Foods Market. Get the recipe.

You can search, and you can buy healthy recipe cookbooks.

But you can also invent your own recipes; and use the occasion as a teaching game for the family. (Plan now to start playing next weekend.)

Here’s the game:

1. Announce the rules: First, each family member develops a list of healthy foods. (If your children are old enough, they also need to know why it’s a healthy ingredient—as do adult participants.) The person with the most gets a prize, to be determined by you. The family will gather on [date] and [time] for the next leg.

2. Next, everyone brings his or her list to the dinner table (or other place and time you designate) and take turns reading them out. You place each new food item on a separate index card. (For example, only make one card for brown rice, even if everyone has it on his/her list.)

4. Now that you have ingredients, it’s onto the next leg: creating recipes from them. Spread the cards out on the table so everyone can see them. Go around the table, asking each person in turn to suggest a combination of ingredients and a recipe (for example, grilled fish, grape and red onion tacos). Write the suggested recipe on a pad, along with the name of the person who suggested it.

5. Finally, you get to make the recipes. Print out a calendar and place the recipes on specific days of the month (it’s easier to plan the meals).

6. After each healthy recipe is made, vote on whether it goes, stays or needs to be revised. Take the time to reinforce why the recipe is healthy, and which ingredients are the healthiest. Mark on the calendar which recipes are “winners.”

7. At the end of 30 days, tally the winning recipes and declare a winner. Now, you can start the process over again.

When you make brown rice, make double the amount you need. That way, you’ll have leftover brown rice, a very versatile food. It can be used for everything from stuffing burritos and omelets to bulking up soups, salads and wraps to creating a flavorful main or new side dish.

If you don’t have any leftover brown rice on hand, you can quickly microwave a package of frozen cooked brown rice, or cook brown rice from scratch in 12 to 15 minutes in a pressure cooker.

This recipe, from Whole Foods Market, creates an elegant Chinese-inspired rice side, enhanced with fresh pineapple and edamame and flavored with grated ginger and cilantro. (Get the recipe.) Serve it as a vegetarian main course or as a side with steamed fish or roasted chicken.

Photo courtesy Whole Foods Market.